Coulthard and Liuzzi quickly fell victim to the charging duo, who then lined up Klien as the next target. Jarno Trulli was the leading Toyota in twelfth, but had survived a tangle with team-mate Ralf Schumacher in the turn one confusion, the German having dropped back to 16th as a result.ĭe la Rosa and Trulli were soon on the move and, taking their cues from the morning's GP2 encounter, proved that it was possible for F1 cars to overtake around the undulating circuit. The delay mattered little, however, for Raikkonen made it only as far as turn eight on lap two, crashing out after running wide at Istanbul Park's signature corner.Īt the same time as Raikkonen was departing stage right, Button seized fourth from Webber, while Rosberg came under pressure from Robert Kubica, who had the unlikely train of Christian Klien, Tonio Liuzzi, Pedro de la Rosa and David Coulthard in his wake. Like Fisichella and Heidfeld, the McLaren man made it back to the pits for a replacement, but the stop took longer than expected as his crew struggled to untangle the flailed rubber from the suspension. Raikkonen was pitched into a spin of his own and, despite resuming, quickly realised that his left rear Michelin had been shredded by the American's endplate. The Finn had steered around the spinning Fisichella, only to be collected by Scott Speed, who was also trying to take avoiding action. Tiago Monteiro failed to make it to the end of the lap, while Kimi Raikkonen became the third pit visitor, despite seemingly missing the worst of the mayhem. Not so lucky were Fisichella, who lost his nose as he spun to avoid Alonso, and Nick Heidfeld, who also required cosmetic surgery after being collected in the melee. While Massa, Schumacher and Alonso made a break, the order behind them appeared very scrambled at the end of the opening lap, with Mark Webber up to fourth from night, and Williams colleague Nico Rosberg helping the Aussie sandwich Jenson Button having made the leap to sixth from 14th.
Schumacher fought back, forcing his rival to take avoiding action which prompted team-mate Giancarlo Fisichella to spin and the rest of the field to scatter. The two title contenders almost came to blows at the start, with Schumacher making a sluggish getaway and Alonso appearing to have got the jump on the Ferrari into turn one. Massa led from start to finish in another action-packed race but, while the real drama took place in his wake, the 25-year old's success was not assured until the last lap, as Alonso defended for all he was worth to keep Schumacher at bay.
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