FELIPE Massa realised one dream yesterday, but it will mean nothing unless he achieves another and becomes world champion at the end of the season.
For the first time in his six-season, 95-race career, Massa leads the Formula 1 world championship following his victory in the French Grand Prix at Magny-Cours.
A broken exhaust pipe on the Ferrari of team-mate Kimi Raikkonen aided his caus
e, and for the first time since Ayrton Senna in May 1993, a Brazilian sits on top of the drivers' standings.
Massa now has a two-point cushion over BMW Sauber's Robert Kubica, and five to Raikkonen who held on for second place at the Circuit de Nevers, whilst McLaren's Lewis Hamilton is 10 adrift after he finished a troublesome race in 10th.
"It's a great pleasure to lead, and hopefully we can stay in that position to the end," said Massa.
"For the moment we've won nothing, just some races, and the championship is open with many races to go.
"We need to think about the championship until the last race, and then we will know if we did the right job, had the right luck and did everything we could to win. Because my dream is not just to lead the championship, it is to win the championship.
"
Starting from what was Ferrari's 200th pole of their illustrious history, Raikkonen made the ideal start and did not put a wheel out of place until the exhaust issue began to materialise around lap 30. On lap 39, Massa passed the reigning world champion who admitted he was lucky to finish and avoid a third successive race without scoring a point.
"It's disappointing in the end," assessed Raikkonen.
"I had a good car all weekend, was comfortably on pole, but then I had a problem with the car. In a way I was still lucky to finish the race because in the last couple of laps the car almost stopped, but I came home second which is better than nothing.
"
It is now Hamilton who has failed to score in his last two races, primarily as he again incurred the wrath of the stewards. Starting from 13th due to a 10-place grid penalty stemming from Canada when he drove into the back of Raikkonen in the pit lane, Hamilton was given a drive-through penalty after he was deemed to have illegally passed Sebastian Vettel in his Toro Rosso on lap one. Running in ninth, he was then relegated to 13th, and then 19th and last shortly after he pitted officially for the first time.
"It was an extremely close call," reflected Hamilton. "I felt I'd got past fairly and was ahead going into the corner, but I was on the outside and couldn't turn-in in case we both crashed. Then I lost the back end of the car and drove over the kerb."
The British Grand Prix at Silverstone is next on the calendar, marking the halfway point of the season, and Hamilton said he would be a contender there, despite recent criticisms in the British media.
"I absolutely 100 percent aim on bouncing back there, regardless of what's written in the papers tomorrow," he said. "I'm going to go back to the workshop tomorrow and we're going to focus on the next race and we're going to hit them hard."
"I am going to keep battling, and there is a long way to go. I don't care how far I am behind, Kimi (Raikkonen) was 17 points behind with two races to go (last season) and he still won it. If I'm 20 points behind I don't care, I will still come back."
Hamilton is now fourth in the standings behind his three main rivals, and McLaren 33 points behind Ferrari in the constructors' title race, and 16 behind BMW Sauber.
Canadian race winner Kubica could only manage fifth behind Toyota's Jarno Trulli and Heikki Kovalainen in the second McLaren. For Italian Trulli, it was his first time on the podium since May 2005 in Spain.
The remaining points were claimed by Red Bull's Mark Webber in sixth, Renault's Nelson Piquet – in the top eight for the first time in his rookie season – and team-mate Fernando Alonso.
The full article contains 718 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
