Pos  Driver       Team                     Time      Laps
 1.  Hamilton     McLaren-Mercedes    (B)  1:15.483  75
 2.  Raikkonen    Ferrari             (B)  1:15.803  63
 3.  Rosberg      Williams-Toyota     (B)  1:16.099  87
 4.  Sutil        Force India-Ferrari (B)  1:16.516  97
 5.  Bourdais     Toro Rosso-Ferrari  (B)  1:16.533  113
 6.  Kobayashi    Toyota              (B)  1:16.570  65
 7.  Heidfeld     BMW Sauber          (B)  1:16.593  59
 8.  Piquet       Renault             (B)  1:16.856  111
 9.  Coulthard    Red Bull-Renault    (B)  1:17.361  67
10.  Wurz         Honda               (B)  1:17.825  89

Just 48 hours after Lewis Hamilton got his world championship ambitions back on track with a stunning victory in the British Grand Prix, the British driver evaluated the new engine cover.

The use of the engine cover follows the trend begun by Red Bull Racing and since copied by Renault and Force India.

Although rain showers have marred the opening day of the test at Hockenheim, McLaren should be able to get enough dry running to evaluate whether or not to run the cover at the German Grand Prix.

McLaren F1 CEO Martin Whitmarsh believed the team's work on the car over recent weeks was now paying dividends in their fight against Ferrari.

"I think the reality is the team have done a fantastic job to continue to develop the car over the past two races and it's starting to pay off," Whitmarsh told autosport.com.

"The championship fight is rather like last year. In reality it will swing backwards and forwards according to how good a job we are doing. We will continue to improve but Ferrari are a strong team and they're going to be continuing to improve. We've just got to do it at a faster rate."

Well, let's see if Ferrari are concentrating 110% on developing the car, as McLaren certainly had upped their game in their preparations for Silverstone. I can't help but feel for Kimi especially, who's only really had yesterday off but even that with all the media rubbish in the air. Now he's back at work, but I'm sure he's focused on his job and only that. He wants to win, and doesn't care what people think about him. Winning is all that matters. Keep flying Kimi! Meanwhile...

The team chose to leave Kimi Raikkonen on the same set of intermediate tyres at his first pit stop and then left him out on the old tyres so long that he fell out of contention for victory at Silverstone yesterday.

Raikkonen and Felipe Massa also had several spins each in the race, although Raikkonen did recover to finish fourth, but di Montezemolo says they all need to learn from their mistakes.

"I hope we'll manage to win our eighth title in ten years," he was quoted as saying by Gazzetta dello Sport. "We will (manage it) if we don't carry on doing stupid things.

"Obviously I wasn't pleased with what I saw yesterday, but I hope it's a useful lesson. Knowing my men, I'm certain it is."

He also says Ferrari have missed out on too many good results so far this season and can't afford to throw away any more in the remaining races.

"We're at the half way point of the season and in the lead of the championship," he added. "But we've lost too many opportunities, so in the second half of the season we must not lose any more."

Hamilton's dominant win

Lewis Hamilton won his seventh race in Silverstone, the first for him starting from the second row of the grid.

Hamilton won by a margin of 1:08.577 over Nick Heidfeld, and this is the largest margin since Damon Hill led a depleted field by two laps in the 1995 Australian Grand Prix. In that race several front-runners retired due to collisions or mechanical failures, and Hill won ahead of Olivier Panis.

To find another race where the two leading drivers were on the same lap and the gap was bigger, we have to move back another year, at the 1994 Pacific Grand Prix, where Michael Schumacher won by 1:15.300 over Gerhard Berger.

Honda and Barrichello back on the podium

Honda scored with Rubens Barrichello their ninth podium in history, the fourth since their return to racing in 2006. The last time Honda were on the podium was in the 2006 Brazilian Grand Prix with Jenson Button, and last time Barrichello climbed on the podium before this year's British Grand Prix was in the 2005 US Grand Prix when he took second behind then-teammate Schumacher in a Ferrari.

Barrichello scored his 62nd podium and thus ties with David Coulthard at the fourth all-time spot behind Schumacher (154), Alain Prost (106) and Ayrton Senna (80).

Joint leads

Following the British GP, there is a three-way tie at the top of the points standing. This also happened last year after Bahrain, when Fernando Alonso, Kimi Raikkonen and Lewis Hamilton had 22 points each.

It's only the third time this happens in 59 seasons: the third time occurred in the first year, 1950, when after Indianapolis Nino Farina, Juan Manuel Fangio and Johnnie Parsons all had 9 points after three races.

(The significant difference of this championship tie is that both Lewis and Felipe have won 3 races opposed to Kimi's only two victories at Malaysia and Spain.)

Qualifying notes

• First pole for Heikki Kovalainen, the 91st driver in history to start from pole position. It's also the third straight year that a McLaren car started on pole at Silverstone.

• Mark Webber equalled his best career qualifying result, a second place he gained four times: Malaysia 2004, Spain 2005 and Monaco 2006 being the other occurrences.

(Kimi managed to out qualify teammate Massa for the third consecutive time from Canada. However on all three occassions Kimi has failed to win in the races.)

Race notes

• Nick Heidfeld equals for the sixth time his best career result, a second place.

• Sixth straight fastest lap for Kimi Raikkonen, his third consecutive fastest lap in Silverstone since 2005. And with a fourth-place finish, the Finn is the seventh driver to score more than 500 points in career. He overtook Alonso in this ranking, now the couple is only one point apart, with Raikkonen at 504 and Fernando at 503.

• Raikkonen was not on the podium at Silverstone for the first time after five years. (2004 - 2nd, 2005 - 3rd, 2006 - 3rd, 2007 - 1st)

• The last time both Ferraris finished the race a lap down (or more) was in the 1996 Brazilian Grand Prix.

• For the first time in his career, Felipe Massa ended the race lapped twice by the leader. It's also the first time he was classified last.

Kimi, as mentioned, set the fastest lap at Silverstone with a time of 1.32.150. The sequence of fastest laps by Kimi Raikkonen keeps growing and now the Finn, reaching six fastest laps in a row this season, is ahead of the all-time 3rd place of Michael Schumacher:

Most consecutive fastest laps

Alberto Ascari - 7 (Belgium '52 - Argentina '53)
Kimi Raikkonen - 6 (Spain - Britain '08)
Michael Schumacher - 5 (Bahrain - Europe '04)

All time most fastest laps

Schumacher - 76
Prost - 41
Raikkonen - 31
Mansell - 30

If you're interested in looking at the full statistics of Kimi's career, you can read them all in the KRS Archive here. As the top 3 in the championship are level in points, no one has a clear advantage but it's time now to start attacking. Ferrari will soon have to decide who to push for the charge for the championship. So...now we head to Germany for round 10 of the season. Kimi has never won at Hockenheim, though he came pretty close to winning at the Nurburgring in 2005, one lap away to be precise. But we all know how that dramatically ended! He has taken two pole positions and fastest laps in Hockenheim however. Being a fast, with high speed straights, circuit, Kimi should be able to benefit from his Ferrari properly this time. Let's hope that together, he and the team can overcome their bad races and get back to winning. Below is a post-race interview with Kimi I've just uploaded, seeing as we didn't get any from him straight away yesterday:


      

Kimi was quite annoyed at that guy being right in his face while he's doing his business. Embarrassing for both sides, but Kimi probably didn't expect the photographer to fall over like that. However it went both ways, Cahier was in his face, stepping on his stuff, and Kimi didn't like it. Also, Mark Arnall (Kimi's trainer next to him) seems to have got annoyed too, saying "oi, mind the stuff", the exact moment Kimi looked up. The photographer was leaning on Kimi's race stuff.

Taken from an interview in Saturday's Silverstone Red Bulletin issue, Kimi says: "I don't mind what people think too much. If they ask nice questions then yes, but for sure if they ask stupid questions I won't answer and they will think I'm a dickhead. But it goes both ways. If everyone's nice to eachother it's much easier." Kimi's manager Steve Robertson and Ferrari press man Colajanni were interviewed on the small incident. They defended Kimi saying they completely understand his reaction although they will try to prevent such incidents occuring in the future. It seems the photographer was working for the Cahier Archive image website, and this is the proof with the famous Cahier signature > This was the picture that flashed in Kimi's eyes as he bent down to get something and the photographer carelessly stood on it, causing Kimi to push him away.
 
The famous photographer who was pushed by Kimi can keep this bruising but golden memory with him and on his website, the moment is captured vividly highlighting the blue/green eye of the Iceman who went hot. Yummy.

It's negative coverage of the world champion, unnecessarily provoked by a photographer who doesn't know where the limit is. Kimi's not a jerk. He's the most composed and laid back guy I've ever seen and I don't even know him. If Kimi is a jerk for pushing this guy, he would have done far worse to Lewis Hamilton for crashing into him in the pit lane of the 2008 Canadian GP. But he didn't.

Speaking to the Finnish press today, Kimi's spoke person Riku Kuvja said:

"They will surely shake hands in Hockenheim. The error was mutual."

Räikkönen is not expected to follow this case or be pursued any legal action from Mr Cahier:

"He is a long-line photographer, and knows the spirit of the game. It is not anticipated that the photographer will take any action," Riku Kuvaja said.

Press Release from Cahier Archive

Following the incident involving Kimi Raikkonen and Paul-Henri Cahier on the starting grid of the British Grand Prix in Silverstone, that saw the finnish driver assault the photographer, we decided that it was necessary to clarify a few points.

There never was any contact between the two men, nor did Paul-Henri ever touch Kimi's equipment. Furthermore, the distance at which Paul-Henri Cahier was taking a picture, although close, was completely standard. The photographers who take pictures at Grand Prix races are all professionnals who have been accredited by the FIA, and as the dozen other photographers who were standing next to Paul-Henri Cahier prove, there was nothing unusual or unethical about this situation.

Finally, Paul-Henri Cahier has been an F1 photographer for almost fourty years and has been close to the greatest champions, but none of them has ever behaved in such a rude manner. It is understandable that drivers might get irritable because of the pressure they undergo, but Kimi Raikkonen never even attempted to express his discontent in a non violent way. Paul-Henri Cahier luckily did not suffer any injury, and so does not intend to take any action, but he regrets the arrogance with which Kimi Raikkonen treated someone who was merely doing his job.

Oh whatever. Kimi's trainer told Cahier to MIND THE STUFF and was right in Kimi's way of his preparations. The video clearly shows, as does the last picture above, Kimi leaning over to get something, and Cahier was being careless knocking something over and flashed a light right in Kimi's face as the PHOTOGRAPH TAKEN PROVES! This is hardly arrogant behaviour, just a really upset driver. Kimi is known to dislike photo sessions in Formula One, though he takes his time signing autographs for fans, but he has never been as annoyed as this, not once. He went defensive and probably the adrenalin drivers have before the race starts played a part and clearly Raikkonen doesn't like people coming too close, let alone a photographer. I hope this teaches some lessons for photographers to do their job PROPERLY. Anyway, I hope both parties can put this behind as soon as possible and apologise to each other - Cahier should apologise for not considering Kimi's space when preparing for a tough race in the wet, and Kimi should perhaps say sorry for making the man fall over like that (which I'm absolutely positive he didn't intend).
Ferrari have downplayed the incident as 'an unfortunate circumstance':

The team explained the world champion's actions on Sunday as 'understandable', after the Finn shoved Cahier because he felt the photographer was being 'too intrusive'.

"The photographer's behaviour was too intrusive as he put his feet on Kimi's stuff despite Kimi's physio warning," Ferrari spokesman Luca Colajanni told autosport.com. "There is video evidence and witnesses which can confirm it.

"Kimi's reaction was understandable, considering how important the minutes before the start of a race are for a driver. He did not push Cahier too hard: the photographer fell down because he was in an unbalanced position.

"We believe it was an unfortunate circumstance."

British photographer Darren Heath witnessed the incident and explained on his website's blog that Cahier had crossed into Raikkonen's personal space.

"He'd got too close and Kimi had taken action, firmly shoving the press man away," said Heath. "A tense few seconds ensued as the snapper thought to retaliate, the wound-up Finn turning away and defusing the situation."