May 8, 2005

West McLaren Mercedes driver Kimi Räikkönen won the Spanish Grand Prix at Barcelona. The Finn started from pole position and led all 66 laps to win the third Grand Prix of his career and his first this season for the West McLaren Mercedes team. Juan Pablo Montoya had a problem with his refuelling rig at his first stop and had to make an extra stop to fill up with fuel and finished the race in seventh place. After five of the 19 rounds of the World Championship West McLaren Mercedes hold third place in the Constructors' Championship on 37 points behind Renault (58 points) and Toyota (40 points). Kimi is 3rd in the Drivers' Championship on 17 points which is led by Fernando Alonso(Renault) with 44 points ahead of Jarno Trulli (Toyota) with 26 points.

The start: Kimi started from pole position from the fifth time in his Formula One career and for the second consecutive race. At the start he took an immediate lead ahead of Alonso. Juan Pablo started seventh on the grid but dropped a place to Michael Schumacher on the opening lap. Both the Minardi-Fords stalled at the start which caused the safety car to be deployed at the end of the opening lap. At the start of the third lap the safety car was withdrawn and the race resumed.

The race: Having built up a lead of 26.5sec, Kimi made his first refuelling stop at the end of lap 25 in 8.2sec and resumed in the lead. Up to that point no other driver in the field bettered the Finn's lap times.

On lap 49 Kimi made his second refuelling stop in 6.8sec. When he resumed he was leading ahead of Alonso who had followed him into the pits for his own stop. Following this Kimi maintained a lead always in excess of 20sec and won after 66 laps with an advantage over Alonso of 27.6sec.

Juan Pablo spun and recovered on lap seven without losing his position. The Colombian made his first refuelling stop on lap 29 (4.2sec). During this stop there was a problem with the refuelling rig ­ which is the same for all the teams and he had to come in again to refuel on the next lap (10.0sec). He came in for fuel for the last scheduled time on lap 56 (4.7sec). Juan Pablo resumed and finished the last ten laps in seventh position.

Kimi Räikkönen: "We have been close to victory a few times and today it finally happened. The car has been working perfectly throughout the weekend and we knew we had a good chance to win. A lot of effort has gone into this from the team and all our Partners and I would like to thank everybody. If we can continue to show performance like the one today we still have a good chance of fighting for the World Championships. We have a competitive package and until Imola we were extremely reliable so anything can happen. I made a clean start from pole and was pushing really hard until the first pitstop when I saw how big the gap actually was. There was a small scare as I pulled away from my first stop because the engine did not pick up but it soon rectified itself and then I just took it easy during my second stop. All in all a great weekend!"

Juan Pablo Montoya : "The car was working well throughout but we had not achieved the optimum set-up so I was struggling a bit with understeer to start with. I spun 360 degrees in turn eight on lap seven and lost some time. Obviously the problem in my first stop cost me some time but all in all I'm OK with the result today considering everything that has happened. My shoulder was good but it was tough particularly at turns three and nine and the last two corners where you pull a lot of Gs. At least I'm not going to be starting the first qualifying session in Monaco first, which is a definite advantage."

Ron Dennis: McLaren Team Principal: "A tremendous race for the team and a truly dominant performance by Kimi. His only problem was to find the discipline to actually slow down, once he had established a significant lead. Juan Pablo's race could have been so much better but an electrical problem which activated the safety system on the fuel rig almost certainly cost him a podium finish. Throughout the race, the performance of the Michelin tyres on both cars was great and certainly contributed a significant amount to the outcome."

Norbert Haug, Vice President Mercedes-Benz Motorsport: "I would like to thank the entire team for a perfect job. Everybody has worked extremely hard to make this victory happen. I am really pleased for Kimi. He performed impressively by leading the race throughout from start to finish. Juan Pablo had the chance for a better result. However due to a problem with the fuel rig at his first pitstop he had to come in one more time. But again; great result, a baseline on which we can build."