2005 San Marino Grand Prix

The 2005 San Marino Grand Prix (formally the Formula 1 Gran Premio Foster's di San Marino 2005) was a Formula One motor race held on 24 April 2005 at the Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari in Imola, Italy. The 62-lap race was the fourth round of the 2005 Formula One season, and the 25th running of the San Marino Grand Prix.

The race was won by Renault driver Fernando Alonso, who extended his lead in the Drivers' Championship after his third win and fourth podium from four races and thus ended the Schumacher-clan winning streak from 1999 to 2004. Defending World Champion Michael Schumacher finished the race in second position for the Ferrari team, only two-tenths of a second behind Alonso having challenged him for the win late into the race having started thirteenth on the grid due a mistake in qualifying. BAR driver Jenson Button crossed the line in third place, but his team were subsequently disqualified for underweight cars; third place was then awarded to McLaren driver Alexander Wurz, who made his first Grand Prix start since being dropped by Benetton at the end of the 2000 season.

Pole position was taken by McLaren driver Kimi Räikkönen, using the aggregate system which was in the rules at the start of the 2005 season. He led the race from the start until his retirement on lap 9 due to a driveshaft failure. Alonso took the lead and kept it except during the pit stop phases when it was held by Button, and later Schumacher when he overtook Button.

Friday drivers The bottom 6 teams in the 2004 Constructors' Championship were entitled to run a third car in free practice on Friday. These drivers drove on Friday but did not compete in qualifying or the race. Constructor No Driver McLaren-Mercedes 35 Pedro de la Rosa Sauber-Petronas - Red Bull-Cosworth 37 Christian Klien Toyota 38 Ricardo Zonta Jordan-Toyota 39 Robert Doornbos Minardi-Cosworth -

Report

Background Vitantonio Liuzzi replaced Christian Klien in the second Red Bull car, for this and the next three races; after unanimous agreement between the teams, Klien was allowed to drive car #37 for Red Bull in the Friday practice sessions. Alexander Wurz drove the second McLaren-Mercedes car, in place of the injured Juan Pablo Montoya, marking Wurz's first full Grand Prix entry since the 2000 Malaysian Grand Prix. During the first qualifying session on Saturday, Red Bull announced that they would use Ferrari engines for two years, beginning from the 2006 season.

Race Räikkönen led from pole, pulling out a gap of several seconds, before his McLaren retired on lap nine with driveshaft problems. Alonso took over the lead, and was unchallenged until lap 50, when Michael Schumacher emerged from the pits just behind him. Schumacher had started 13th, and had been unable to pass Jarno Trulli for 20 laps, until the Italian pitted allowing Schumacher to increase his pace. After pitting himself, he emerged in third place ahead of Trulli and started to catch race leader Alonso. He caught up with second place driver Jenson Button and overtook him, overturning a 20-second gap in 13 laps. After the second round of pit-stops he emerged from the pits seconds behind Alonso. The next 12 laps saw the two battle for the lead but Schumacher was unable to overtake Alonso who took the race victory. Third was Button, followed by Wurz's McLaren, Takuma Sato, Jacques Villeneuve, Trulli and Ralf Schumacher. Ralf was later given a 25-second penalty as he was released into the path of Nick Heidfeld; this temporarily dropped him to 11th place.

Post-race During checks after the race it was found that Button's car had been under the 600 kg minimum weight requirement when drained of fuel. The race stewards cleared Button, as they believed data provided by BAR-Honda was sufficient to prove that they had been operating inside the rules, but the FIA appealed sending them to court. They were found guilty, but the FIA's preferred penalty of having the team disqualified from the championship for the year was not carried through, and they were given a two-race ban, starting from the next round in Spain. In addition, Button's teammate Sato, who had finished 5th on the track, was disqualified from the race despite his car not being found to be underweight. Wurz was thus promoted to third, followed by Villeneuve, Trulli, Heidfeld, Mark Webber and Liuzzi.

Classification

Qualifying Qualifying times from both Saturday and Sunday morning. Pos No Driver Constructor Q1 Q2 Total Gap Grid 1 9 Kimi Räikkönen McLaren-Mercedes 1:19.886 1:22.994 2:42.880 1 2 5 Fernando Alonso Renault 1:19.889 1:23.552 2:43.441 +0.561 2 3 3 Jenson Button BAR-Honda 1:20.464 1:23.641 2:44.105 +1.225 3 4 7 Mark Webber Williams-BMW 1:20.442 1:24.069 2:44.511 +1.631 4 5 16 Jarno Trulli Toyota 1:20.492 1:24.026 2:44.518 +1.638 5 6 4 Takuma Sato BAR-Honda 1:20.851 1:23.807 2:44.658 +1.778 6 7 10 Alexander Wurz McLaren-Mercedes 1:20.632 1:24.057 2:44.689 +1.809 7 8 12 Felipe Massa Sauber-Petronas 1:20.593 1:24.337 2:44.930 +2.050 18 9 8 Nick Heidfeld Williams-BMW 1:20.807 1:24.389 2:45.196 +2.316 8 10 2 Rubens Barrichello Ferrari 1:20.892 1:24.351 2:45.240 +2.363 9 11 17 Ralf Schumacher Toyota 1:20.994 1:24.422 2:45.416 +2.536 10 12 11 Jacques Villeneuve Sauber-Petronas 1:20.999 1:25.260 2:46.259 +3.379 11 13 6 Giancarlo Fisichella Renault 1:21.708 1:25.002 2:46.710 +3.830 12 14 1 Michael Schumacher Ferrari 1:20.260 1:26.984 2:47.244 +4.364 13 15 14 David Coulthard Red Bull-Cosworth 1:21.632 1:26.438 2:48.070 +5.190 14 16 15 Vitantonio Liuzzi Red Bull-Cosworth 1:21.804 1:26.351 2:48.155 +5.275 15 17 19 Narain Karthikeyan Jordan-Toyota 1:23.123 1:28.976 2:52.099 +9.219 16 18 18 Tiago Monteiro Jordan-Toyota 1:25.100 1:29.152 2:54.252 +11.372 17 19 20 Patrick Friesacher Minardi-Cosworth 1:26.484 1:30.564 2:57.048 +14.168 19 20 21 Christijan Albers Minardi-Cosworth 1:25.921 No time 20 Notes – Christijan Albers was left without a time in Q2 after spinning off the track. – Felipe Massa, Patrick Friesacher and Christijan Albers received a 10-place grid penalty for engine changes.

Race Pos No Driver Constructor Tyre Laps Time/Retired Grid Points 1 5 Fernando Alonso Renault 62 1:27:41.921 2 10 2 1 Michael Schumacher Ferrari 62 +0.215 13 8 3 10 Alexander Wurz McLaren-Mercedes 62 +27.554 7 6 4 11 Jacques Villeneuve Sauber-Petronas 62 +1:04.442 11 5 5 16 Jarno Trulli Toyota 62 +1:10.258 5 4 6 8 Nick Heidfeld Williams-BMW 62 +1:11.282 8 3 7 7 Mark Webber Williams-BMW 62 +1:23.297 4 2 8 15 Vitantonio Liuzzi Red Bull-Cosworth 62 +1:23.764 15 1 9 17 Ralf Schumacher Toyota 62 +1:35.841 10   10 12 Felipe Massa Sauber-Petronas 61 +1 Lap 18 11 14 David Coulthard Red Bull-Cosworth 61 +1 Lap 14 12 19 Narain Karthikeyan Jordan-Toyota 61 +1 Lap 16 13 18 Tiago Monteiro Jordan-Toyota 60 +2 Laps 17 21 Christijan Albers Minardi-Cosworth 20 Hydraulics 20 2 Rubens Barrichello Ferrari 18 Electrical 9 9 Kimi Räikkönen McLaren-Mercedes 9 Driveshaft 1 20 Patrick Friesacher Minardi-Cosworth 8 Clutch 19 6 Giancarlo Fisichella Renault 5 Accident 12 3 Jenson Button BAR-Honda 62 Fuel/Underweight (+10.481) 3 4 Takuma Sato BAR-Honda 62 Fuel (+34.783) 6 Notes – Post-race, Ralf Schumacher was penalised 25 seconds for being released unsafely into the path of Nick Heidfeld from his second pitstop; Toyota withdrew their initial appeal before the hearing. – Also post-race, Jenson Button's car was found to be 4.99 kg (11 lb) underweight; stewards initially accepted BAR's explanation as a fuel system anomaly on April 25. However, on May 5, an FIA court of appeal disqualified both BAR cars and banned them from the next two races for "highly regrettable negligence and lack of transparency", noting that BAR's fuel system effectively "used fuel as ballast", illegal under current Formula One regulations.

Championship standings after the race

Drivers' Championship standings Pos Driver Points 1 Fernando Alonso 36 2 Jarno Trulli 20 3 Giancarlo Fisichella 10 10 4 Michael Schumacher 10 5 5 Nick Heidfeld 9Source:

Constructors' Championship standings Pos Constructor Points 1 Renault 46 2 Toyota 29 3 McLaren-Mercedes 25 2 4 Ferrari 18 1 5 Williams-BMW 18Source:

Note: Only the top five positions are included for both sets of standings.

See also 2005 Imola GP2 Series round

Notes

References