The Turkish Grand Prix 2007 was held after a break of three weeks. With both the championships delicately poised for the championship rivals, it was indeed an impatient period of F1 inactivity for the fans. The 5.3km long Istanbul Park is considered by many to be a masterpiece in modern F1 era and the awesome Turn 8 presents a delightful spectacle for the sport lovers. Its a true test for the drivers and their machinery alike.
The qualifying was all set to fall in the hands of a flying Finn, namely, Kimi Raikkonen. However, a sight mistake in the final corner of his last run meant that he missed the pole position by quite a bit. His team mate, Felipe Massa made no such error and produced a superb lap to clinch another pole. Championship leader, Lewis Hamilton stacked right alongside Massa in 2nd place while Fernando Alonso settled for a 4th place.
In the race, both Kimi and Massa took advantage of their clean starts and Kimi shot past Hamilton to make it a Ferrari 1-2 by the first corner. Hamilton managed to hold on to the 3rd position while his team mate, Alonso lost out two more places to the BMWs of Nick Heidfeld and Robert Kubica. Overtaking is one of the most difficult tasks in F1 now-a-days and both Alonso and Kimi would vouch for that. This meant that both were stuck behind slower cars for much of the race.
Alonso finally managed to overtake the BMWs during his pit-stop while being on a similar strategy to Massa resulted in Kimi not being able to overtake his own team mate for a win. Late in the race, a rare tire failure for Hamilton dropped him down the order. He was lucky to have got home with 4 valuable points. Alonso took the 3rd place advantaged by Lewis’s misfortune. The Ferrari drivers delivered their 2nd 1-2 result of the season after France.
The season now looks all set to be heading towards an exciting finale. The last 5 races will decide who takes the championship crown. In the constructors table, McLaren lead Ferrari by 11 points only while in the driver’s table, its close between the team mates. Hamilton leads Alonso by 5 points while only 1 point separates Massa from Kimi. The McLaren and Ferrari drivers are 10 points apart. Here’s the complete result from the race -
1 - Felipe Massa - Ferrari - 58 - 1:26:42.161
2 - Kimi Räikkönen - Ferrari - 58 - +2.2 secs
3 - Fernando Alonso - McLaren-Mercedes - 58 - +26.1 secs
4 - Nick Heidfeld - BMW - 58 - +39.6 secs
5 - Lewis Hamilton - McLaren-Mercedes - 58 - +45.0 secs
6 - Heikki Kovalainen - Renault - 58 - +46.1 secs
7 - Nico Rosberg - Williams-Toyota - 58 - +55.7 secs
8 - Robert Kubica - BMW - 58 - +56.7 secs
9 - Giancarlo Fisichella - Renault - 58 - +59.4 secs
10 - David Coulthard - Red Bull-Renault - 58 - +71.0 secs
11 - Alexander Wurz - Williams-Toyota - 58 - +79.6 secs
12 - Ralf Schumacher - Toyota - 57 - +1 Lap
13 - Jenson Button - Honda - 57 - +1 Lap
14 - Anthony Davidson - Super Aguri-Honda - 57 - +1 Lap
15 - Vitantonio Liuzzi - STR-Ferrari - 57 - +1 Lap
16 - Jarno Trulli - Toyota - 57 - +1 Lap
17 - Rubens Barrichello - Honda - 57 - +1 Lap
18 - Takuma Sato - Super Aguri-Honda - 57 - +1 Lap
19 - Sebastian Vettel - STR-Ferrari - 57 - +1 Lap
20 - Sakon Yamamoto - Spyker-Ferrari - 56 - +2 Laps
Ret - Adrian Sutil - Spyker-Ferrari - 53 - Fuel pressure
Ret - Mark Webber - Red Bull-Renault - 9 - Hydraulics
