2008 Bahrain Grand Prix

The 2008 Gulf Air Bahrain Grand Prix was a Formula One motor race and was the third round of the 2008 Formula One season. It took place on the weekend of the 4–6 April at the Bahrain International Circuit in Sakhir, Bahrain.

Going into the race, McLaren's Lewis Hamilton led the Championship by 3 points from current World Champion Kimi Räikkönen of Ferrari and Nick Heidfeld of BMW. McLaren also led the Constructors' Championship by 5 points from BMW and 13 points from World Champions Ferrari.

Report

Practice

Practice was marked by a big accident by Lewis Hamilton in Friday's second session. The McLaren driver went too wide over the exit kerb at Turn 7 and spun into the left side wall, destroying one side of the car.

Qualifying

Session 1

Sato ran wide at the final turn and spun his car close to the pit entrance, damaging the rear of his car. The session was red-flagged to drag his damaged car in at the 16th minute. Of the results, Davidson and Sato in their Super Aguri cars collected their two back-end slots on the grid, both Force Indias, Coulthard's Red Bull and Vettel's Toro Rosso are among the ones that didn't make it into Q2.

Session 2

Massa in managed to push almost 0.8 seconds in a light Ferrari with fresh tires, making a time of 1:31.188. Both the Red Bull and Toro Rosso failed to progress pass this session. Alonso produced a late fast lap to place himself into the top-10, and so is Button in his sister Honda. Webber, Barrichello, Glock, Piquet Jr., Bourdais and Nakajima were the ones that were knocked out after this session, and took up the grid 11 to 16 respectively.

Session 3

Kubica showed the raw pace his BMW is capable of, and snatched the pole position with a stunning time of 1:33.096. Massa was not able to break the time and ranked second, with Hamilton separating the Ferrari duo in his McLaren, in third. Räikkönen shared the second row with Hamilton in fourth. Kovalainen, Heidfeld, Trulli, Rosberg, Button and Alonso completed the top-10 line up.

Race

At the start both Massa and Kubica started well yet Massa managed to pass Kubica's BMW. Lewis Hamilton got away very slowly, dropping right into the midfield. Kovalainen jumped this chance and advanced into fourth as the pack traveled into the first corner. Further back at the grid, Vettel's car was damaged at turn four, with its engine blown at turn five. Hamilton completed the first lap in ninth, behind Alonso in his Renault. Button was hit from behind and punctured his rear tire. He pitted before rejoining the race

On lap two Hamilton crashed into the back of Alonso's Renault, destroying his own front wing and a chance of winning points. Piquet also spun in his Renault, after complaining for gearbox trouble during the formation lap. Coulthard had also pitted, having a puncture as well.

Lap three saw Trulli, Rosberg and Webber battling for the 6th, 7th and 8th places respectively, though none were able to pass the other during the first stage of the race. At the front, Räikkönen passed Kubica for the second place and putting two Ferrari cars ahead of the rest. At the end of the lap saw Heidfeld in fourth place, having overtaken Kovalainen at turn 10 despite making a mistake.

On lap 18, Kubica entered the pits for refueling. Rosberg soon followed suit in his Williams. At the back of the pack Button tried to pass Coulthard from the inside of turn 6 and it went wrong. Button was not able to respond with Coulthard blocking the inside for passing and crashed into the Red Bull, damaging his front wing and his suspension. Eventually Button retired on lap 20.

Later on, Piquet's Renault developed enough gearbox trouble and retired on lap 41. In the front, Webber passed Rosberg for 7th, and started chasing Trulli's Toyota hard. Despite the Australian spending the entire latter third of the race chasing Trulli, a pass was never materialized. Eventually Webber settled for 7th.

At the end, Massa won his first race of the season, leading his team-mate Räikkönen by 3.3 seconds and producing a Ferrari one-two finish. Kubica claimed the final podium of third and Heidfeld finished fourth in the sister BMW. Kovalainen was the only McLaren driver to finish in points, in fifth. Trulli, Webber and Rosberg completed the final points-paying finishes. Timo Glock was finally able to finish the race, despite being classified 9th and out of points.

Post-Race

In his Middle East debut, R&B singer Akon performed for ticketholders on the starting grid after the race.

Classification

Qualifying

Pos	No	Name	Constructor	Part 1	Part 2	Part 3	Grid
1	4	Robert Kubica	BMW Sauber	1:32.893	1:31.745	1:33.096	1
2	2	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	1:31.937	1:31.188	1:33.123	2
3	22	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	1:32.750	1:31.922	1:33.292	3
4	1	Kimi Räikkönen	Ferrari	1:32.652	1:31.933	1:33.418	4
5	23	Heikki Kovalainen	McLaren-Mercedes	1:33.057	1:31.718	1:33.488	5
6	3	Nick Heidfeld	BMW Sauber	1:33.137	1:31.909	1:33.737	6
7	11	Jarno Trulli	Toyota	1:32.493	1:32.159	1:33.994	7
8	7	Nico Rosberg	Williams-Toyota	1:32.903	1:32.185	1:34.015	8
9	16	Jenson Button	Honda	1:32.793	1:32.362	1:35.057	9
10	5	Fernando Alonso	Renault	1:32.947	1:32.345	1:35.115	10
11	10	Mark Webber	Red Bull-Renault	1:33.194	1:32.371		11
12	17	Rubens Barrichello	Honda	1:32.944	1:32.508		12
13	12	Timo Glock	Toyota	1:32.800	1:32.528		13
14	6	Nelson Piquet Jr.	Renault	1:32.975	1:32.790		14
15	14	Sébastien Bourdais	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	1:33.415	1:32.915		15
16	8	Kazuki Nakajima	Williams-Toyota	1:33.386	1:32.943		16
17	9	David Coulthard	Red Bull-Renault	1:33.433			17
18	21	Giancarlo Fisichella	Force India-Ferrari	1:33.501			18
19	15	Sebastian Vettel	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	1:34.127			19
20	20	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Ferrari	1:33.562			20
21	19	Anthony Davidson	Super Aguri-Honda	1:34.140			21
22	18	Takuma Sato	Super Aguri-Honda	1:35.725			22

Race

Pos	No	Driver	Constructor	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Points
1	2	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	57	1:31:06.970	2	10
2	1	Kimi Räikkönen	Ferrari	57	+ 3.339	4	8
3	4	Robert Kubica	BMW Sauber	57	+ 4.998	1	6
4	3	Nick Heidfeld	BMW Sauber	57	+ 8.409	6	5
5	23	Heikki Kovalainen	McLaren-Mercedes	57	+ 26.789	5	4
6	11	Jarno Trulli	Toyota	57	+ 41.314	7	3
7	10	Mark Webber	Red Bull-Renault	57	+ 45.473	11	2
8	7	Nico Rosberg	Williams-Toyota	57	+ 55.889	8	1
9	12	Timo Glock	Toyota	57	+ 1:09.500	13
10	5	Fernando Alonso	Renault	57	+ 1:17.181	10
11	17	Rubens Barrichello	Honda	57	+ 1:17.862	12
12	21	Giancarlo Fisichella	Force India-Ferrari	56	+ 1 lap	18
13	22	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	56	+ 1 lap	3
14	8	Kazuki Nakajima	Williams-Toyota	56	+ 1 lap	16
15	14	Sébastien Bourdais	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	56	+ 1 lap	15
16	19	Anthony Davidson	Super Aguri-Honda	56	+ 1 lap	21
17	18	Takuma Sato	Super Aguri-Honda	56	+ 1 lap	22
18	9	David Coulthard	Red Bull-Renault	56	+ 1 lap	17
19	20	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Ferrari	56	+ 2 laps	20
Ret	6	Nelson Piquet Jr.	Renault	40	Gearbox	14
Ret	16	Jenson Button	Honda	19	Collision	9
Ret	15	Sebastian Vettel	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	0	Engine	19

Notes

• First Pole position: Robert Kubica, BMW Sauber and Poland.
• Lap leaders: Felipe Massa 51 (1–39, 46–57), Robert Kubica 2 (40–41) and Nick Heidfeld 4 (42–45).
• This race marked the end for McLaren’s run of consecutive podiums, a total of 19 starting at the 2007 Australian Grand Prix and ending at the 2008 Malaysian Grand Prix.
• This race marked the first time that Felipe Massa has won a race that he didn't start from pole. This was also Massa's second Bahrain victory making it back to back in 07 and 08.
• There was more controversy between former McLaren teammates Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso, when the former, trying to make up after a bad start, lost his front wing after hitting the back of the latter (now driving for Renault) while trying to pass him. Early suggestions that Alonso may have brake-tested Hamilton were refuted by Autosport.com which said it had seen Renault telemetry data which "shows that Alonso was flat on the throttle from the exit, did not touch the brake and gained speed in a totally predictable manner. Formula1.com has confirmed that the collision was caused by a broken front wing on Hamilton's car.
• For the first time in its history, BMW Sauber reached the first position of the Constructor Championship.

References

External links

• Official Bahrain Grand Prix results from FIA website from Formula 1 website
• Detailed Bahrain Grand Prix results