European GP - Nürburgring - 21 May 2000

Hakkinen made a perfect start, taking the space in between Coulthard, who was in pole position, and M. Schumacher, who started from second position, and going in front. M. Schumacher wrested second position from Coulthard, who controlled the damage by keeping Barrichello behind. Villeneuve and Fisichella took the fifth and sixth positions. Trulli went out at the start after being hit from behind by another car and retired. On lap three the other Jordan driver, Frentzen, suffered from a blown engine and retired in front of his home crowd. M. Schumacher had started putting pressure on Hakkinen immediately from lap one and kept on putting in the fastest laps, keeping the gap in between himself and the leader down to 0.5 seconds. Diniz was having problems with staying on the track and kept on taking trips on the grass. At the back of the points positions Fisichella was hot on the trail of Villeneuve, making clear his intention of fighting for fifth position. De La Rosa kept behind them at a safe distance, waiting to take advantage of any manoeuvre Fisichella might make on Villeneuve to try and advance his own position. On lap nine Fisichella overtook Villeneuve on the inside as the BAR could not find traction on the Coca-Cola bend and started getting away, leaving De La Rosa to attack the Canadian for the points position. On lap 11 M. Schumacher dived on the inside of Hakkinen as they came into the chicane, forcing the Finn to give way and stole the lead from him. At the same time the flag came out to signal that it was starting to rain and the track was becoming slippery. One lap later Barrichello attacked Coulthard on the inside and took third position, showing that the Ferrari cars perform better than the McLaren on the wet. Other cars started suffering from the slippery conditions, Verstappen lost control of his car and went on the grass, and so did Herbert and Gené, who lost his front wing. By lap 13 M. Schumacher was already five seconds ahead of Hakkinen, who was being caught up by Barrichello. On lap 15 Coulthard went to the pits for wet tyres (7.4 seconds), like most other drivers were doing. R. Schumacher showed that he knew how to drive on the wet like his brother. On lap 16 M. Schumacher went in to change his tyre too (12.1. seconds) at the same time as Hakkinen, who had problems with a tyre and lost time (over 15 seconds). M. Schumacher came out just in front of Coulthard, who had already been out one lap and therefore had better rain tyres. M. Schumacher came out just behind Button, allowing Coulthard to attack, but the German kept him at bay and managed to put Button in between himself and the Scot. One lap later Barrichello changed his tyres too (7.2 seconds), at the same time as R. Schumacher (9.0 seconds). After the tyre changes on lap 17 M. Schumacher was in the lead, six seconds ahead of Coulthard. Barrichello had a problem that put him back in eighth position behind Verstappen, who had every intention not to let the Brazilian through. Hakkinen, in third position, caught up with Coulthard in second position, attacked and overtook him easily, indicating that Coulthard might have some problems. After 21 laps Fisichella was in fourth position, De La Rosa in fifth and Irvine in sixth. Barrichello had managed to overtake Verstappen on a bend and was in seventh position. The conditions on the track stayed wet with heavy rain, so that even the rainmaster M. Schumacher lost the car for a second on the entrance to the chicane, went sideways but recovered and carried on, Hakkinen being some 12 seconds behind. Zonta went into a spin, went out by the side but, after a long trek on the grass, rejoined the race. Salo lost control of his car after slipping on the wet, went out by the side nose first, got his car stuck in the gravel and retired from the race. Barrichello, in the meantime, had worked his way to fifth position and was attacking Fisichella for fourth. On lap 29 Irvine attacked Verstappen, who defended his line. Irvine and Verstappen touched, Irvine span and collided with R. Schumacher, who was following. Both Irvine and R. Schumacher lost their tail wings and had to retire and so did Verstappen who lost a side of is car. The marshals decided that a safety car was not needed, to the advantage of M. Schumacher who would have lost ground to Hakkinen had he been stuck behind a pace car. On lap 32 Barrichello overtook Fisichella on the chicane for fourth position and set off in chase of Coulthard who was way off the pace of the leaders. On the following lap Barrichello had his second pit stop (7.0 seconds) and rejoined behind De La Rosa in sixth position. Alesi too had his pit stop (11.2 seconds). On lap 36 M. Schumacher had his second pit stop (11.8 seconds) and put in enough fuel to finish the race (that Barrichello had not done). He rejoined in second position some 20 seconds behind Hakkinen. On lap 40 Fisichella had his pit stop from fourth (9.0 seconds) and rejoined in fifth position behind De La Rosa. Button came out of the pit exit just as M. Schumacher was approaching. Button noticed the Ferrari approaching and made way for it, avoiding a collision. On the following lap Wurz, who had been holding up Hakkinen, went for his pit stop (.5 seconds) leaving free track for the race leader. Hakkinen, who had to build half a second for a safe second pit stop, became stuck behind Fisichella and Villeneuve's own private fight for position and lost time. With 22 laps to go Hakkinen could not stay out any more and had to go back to pits for fuel (8.9 seconds), despite not having a sufficient gap to keep the lead. The Finn came out of the pit exit just in time to see the tail of new race leader M. Schumacher's Ferrari disappear in the distance ahead of him. Immediately afterwards Coulthard too had his pit stop (8.2 seconds), rejoining behind Barrichello having lost two places. De La Rosa, who had not yet stopped, was in third position having kept Barrichello at bay all along. On lap 49 De La Rosa came in for his second pit stop (10.3 seconds) leaving Barrichello in third position. De La Rosa did not change his tyres, only had fuel put in to try and speed up the stop. The decision not no put new tyres on De La Rosa's car had been taken by the mechanics and the driver had not been informed, so that he lost time in the surprise of not having his tyres changed. On the same lap Gené went out by the side and retired from the European GP. On lap 51 Barrichello had to have a third pit stop (7.3 seconds), having been short-filled in the second stop. Barrichello's third stop allowed Coulthard to take third position. On lap 54 Zonta, who had span out several times, went out and got trapped in the gravel, retiring. The safety car did not come out, but the yellow flags were displayed. With 10 laps to go Barrichello, in fourth position, was lapped by team mate M. Schumacher, who then proceeded to catch up with Coulthard in third position. On lap 63 M. Schumacher attacked Coulthard, who had to yield to the race leader and let him through. The German then proceeded to lap some backmarkers. Barrichello caught up with Coulthard and had a look, but could not find an opening to challenge for third position. Herbert and Wurz had a shunt as the Briton attacked the Austrian and both span out. Wurz retired, but Herbert allowed his car to spin back to face the right direction, kept the engine running and rejoined the race. The positions stayed unchanged until the end, when M. Schumacher passed the finishing line first, ahead of Hakkinen, Coulthard, Barrichello, Fisichella and De La Rosa. M. Schumacher achieved his fourth victory in four races, increasing his leadership to 22 points. Ferrari too increased their lead on McLaren to 20 points, despite missing out on a potential third place for Barrichello due to the underfuelling in the second pit stop. The race had started dry and soon turned to wet. As the rain started pouring down, Ferrari on the whole showed that their cars are better suited than McLaren for that type of conditions. Ferrari also had, possibly for the first time this year, more linear speed than McLaren. Coulthard's performance was perhaps hindered by the three ribs that he had cracked in the plane crash before the Spanish GP. Jordan's hopes of moving up in the constructors championship were wrecked very early on, with Trulli retiring at the start and Frentzen's engine going up in smoke on lap three. Benetton brought home two points, well deserved by Fisichella, that moved the team ahead of Jordan in the Constructors Championship table. De La Rosa won Arrows their first Championship point this season. Williams could have hoped for a better result, but R. Schumacher's race was brought to an early end not through a fault of his own. M. Schumacher is looking strong this season and it is possible that this year he will finally bring home that drivers championship he had promised Ferrari when he joined the team four years ago. Next appointment is in Montecarlo in two weeks time.