Kimi Raikkonen defeated the home McLaren Mercedes team in front of a partisan crowd at Silverstone on Sunday to maintain the gap in the World Championship between Ferrari and McLaren, but for him to close on drivers Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton, who finished second and third. All three drivers led at varying stages of the race, but it was Raikkonen who emerged first after the second round of tyre stops. Unfortunately, teammate Felipe Massa stalled at the first start and had to join from the pit lane, but stormed through the field to finish fifth.

It was sunny and warm as the field drew up on the grid, but suddenly a yellow flag fluttered above Massa's fourth placed Ferrari, sending the field off on a second parade lap while Massa's car was pushed into the pit lane to join that of Sato starting in the pit lane. At the start, now for 59 laps, poleman Hamilton took off into the lead from Raikkonen in second and then Alonso third. Robert Kubica inherited Massa's fourth place, with Heikki Kovalainen and Giancarlo Fisichella in the Renaults and Nick Heidfeld next ahead of Ralf Schumacher who lost two places.

Raikkonen shadowed Hamilton every inch of the way in the first stint, even coming close to overtaking him on lap 14. Alonso wasn't far behind, usually less than two seconds further back, but these three were in a class of their own. Kubica steadily fell back, so that he was seven seconds behind after 15 laps. He, in turn, was around five seconds ahead of the Renaults, who had changed places on lap 12, before Heidfeld and Schumacher. Massa was already up to ninth.

The first round of stops began on lap 15, with Kovalainen pitting first, then an over-eager Hamilton and Kubica on lap 16, Raikkonen on lap 18 and then Heidfeld on lap 19, followed a lap later by Alonso and Massa. Alonso's short stop saw him emerge in the lead from Raikkonen, with Hamilton now back in third place after he anticipated the raising of the lollilop. The English driver now suffered from poor balance on his second set of tyres, and in the next stint, to just after half distance, his gap to Raikkonen opened up from 2.6s to 15s.

Raikkonen, meanwhile, also lost a little time to Alonso, the gap opening up from 2.4s to 5.5s, but Alonso knew that it was not enough to take the lead at the next round of pit stops. After taking on slightly less fuel than his rivals, he pitted again on lap 37, the first of the leaders to come in. Hamilton came in a lap later, but it wasn't until lap 43 that Raikkonen pitted, and the extra laps saw him emerge in the lead on lap 14, with a margin of 3.2s to Alonso in second place. Hamilton was now over 20s behind in third.

This was the order the leaders held to the flag, although Raikkonen's 6.6s lead shrunk to 2.459s in the last couple of laps. Hamilton was 34s further back, but the big battle was between Kubica in fourth place and Massa in fifth. The Brazilian had carved his way through the field, and during pit stops had been as high as second. However, at his final stop on lap 45, he emerged behind the Polish BMW Sauber driver, and try as he might during the remaining 14 laps, he was unable to overtake and finished a close fifth.

In the Constructors' series, both teams scored 14 pts, so the margin of 25 points between them remains the same. But in the Drivers' series, Raikkonen has moved one point ahead of teammate Massa into third place in the championship, now six points behind Alonso, while Hamilton's lead over his teammate is now 12 points.

This was the fifth win of the season for Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro, the third for Kimi Raikkonen. This was Kimi's twelfth win from 114 Grand Prix starts, handing Ferrari its 197th victory in 750 races and its fifteenth in the British Grand Prix.
 

Jean Todt: "Kimi was simply majestic, from the first to the last lap, to produce our fifth win of the season, his second in a row and his third with Ferrari. Felipe drove an extraordinary race but was penalized with a technical problem at the start, which meant he had to start the race from the pit lane. Considering this handicap, finishing fifth is really impressive. On the one hand we are happy with the win, obtained on what is the home track for our main rivals, but on the other hand we have had yet another confirmation that in this season, our Achilles heel is reliability. Once again today we lost precious points, which has prevented us from making up ground in the Constructors' classification even if we have the best package on track. We have to work on pushing hard with our performance development so as to regain the maximum level of reliability. In order to succeed, we need the support of all our technical partners, starting with Shell, who are doing an excellent job. We will leave nothing to chance in our bid to continue this winning streak."

Kimi Raikkonen: "It was a great race for me. After my mistake in qualifying yesterday I was very disappointed, but today I was able to make up for it. If I had managed to start from pole though, things would have been much easier. The car worked very well both on the soft and harder tyres. We were strong all weekend and I hope this trend continues over the coming races, but I know how difficult that will be. In the first stint, I tried to look after my tyres and save fuel. At one point I got very close to Lewis but I didn't want to take any risks hoping he would pit before me. In the second part, I knew Alonso was on a different strategy and would stop before me. I had to stay in touch and then push at the decisive moment. I am very happy. We have made up ground in the Drivers' championship and there is plenty of the season still to go. We must continue to push on the development of the car and we are working in the right direction."

Felipe Massa: "All things considered, I am happy with what I achieved today. It's clear I could have had a very different race without the problem at the start, but racing is like that. Sometimes everything goes your way and other times, unexpected things shatter all your plans and you have to try and make the best of the situation. At the start, the engine died, but I have not realized yet what had happened. It's a shame because I had a great car today and this will be a race I will remember. Of course I am disappointed at having lost points in the classification but that's life and we have to accept what happened. In the final stint of the race I quickly caught up with Kubica and I was sure I could pass him. But when I was in his slipstream I was losing so much downforce and I could not get close enough. I hope things come good in the European Grand Prix: we will have to get both our cars ahead of the McLarens."

Luca Baldisserri: "A great race, great drivers, a great car! Even if unfortunately we suffered a problem with Felipe's car, the cause of which we have yet to find, that stopped us from repeating our Magny-Cours result. The strategy chosen for Kimi worked perfectly, putting him where he had to be to win the race. We must continue to work with the same intensity both to increase our performance level as well as improving our reliability. Already, as from the day after tomorrow, we will be back on track in a test session at the Spa Francorchamps circuit. We will have new parts to try because if we want to reach our goals we must leave nothing to chance."

Race Details: Kimi Raikkonen: 1st 1:21.43.074 59 laps chassis 262; Felipe Massa: 5th +54.063 59 laps chassis 260; Weather: air temperature 20 °C, track temperature 31/32 °C, partly cloudy.