Maiden win for Kovalainen in Hungary

Heikki Kovalainen : the 100th winner in F1 history

McLaren's Heikki Kovalainen celebrated a shock maiden win at the Hungarian Grand Prix on Sunday after Ferrari's Felipe Massa suffered engine failure while leading with three laps remaining.



Finn Kovalainen capitalised on Brazilian Massa's misfortune to finish ahead of podium debutant Toyota's Timo Glock of Germany with Massa's team mate Kimi Raikkonen third.

McLaren's Lewis Hamilton stayed top of the championship standings despite a puncture just after the midway stage that saw him finish the race in fifth place behind Renault driver and former team mate Fernando Alonso of Spain.

Briton Hamilton now holds a five-point lead over Finland's Raikkonen in the championship with Massa dropping into third place, a further three points back.

"Of course, I feel a bit sorry for Felipe because what happened to him has happened to me a few times this year," said Kovalainen. "But I'm very happy today, of course, after working through all the hard times along with my team.

"Massa and Lewis were very fast today but halfway through things were working better for me. I just tried to put pressure on Massa at the end and try to make something happen which it did with what looked like a mechanical failure."

Stunning start

Massa had looked set to regain the world championship lead after making a stunning start to Sunday's race.

From third on the grid, the Brazilian used the race's opening turn to surge ahead of his two McLaren rivals before building a comfortable lead.

With overtaking all but impossible on the rest of the twisting Hungaroring track, Massa saw his advantage boosted when Hamilton left the track on the 41st lap before limping into the pit lane with a punctured front left tyre.

Massa then suffered a much more costly problem when his engine died in front of the main grandstand with three laps to go, allowing Kovalainen to wrap up his unexpected victory.

"It's one of the most frustrating races of my career," said Massa. "If you have a problem like that when you're in a bad position at least there is the excuse that it wouldn't have mattered anyway.

"But to have a problem so close to the end and after such a perfect race up until that point it's a really bad feeling."

Mixed feelings

Hamilton's feelings were more mixed, having at least recovered from his puncture to rescue four championship points.

"It was not as bad as it could have been, and not as good either," Hamilton reflected.

"But above all it's been a great day for Heikki. I know what it feels like to get your first grand prix win. It's a very special day for him."

Renault's Brazilian Nelson Piquet defended sixth place with Italian Jarno Trulli climbing from ninth to seventh to complete a great weekend for Toyota.

There was disappointment, though, for BMW Sauber whose leading driver Robert Kubica of Poland just scraped into the points after dropping from fourth on the grid to finish eighth.

There was drama in the pit lane as well with no less than four separate flash fires erupting as teams refuelled.

Flames had to be put out in two separate incidents involving Toro Rosso driver Sebastien Bourdais while Honda's Rubens Barrichello and Williams' Kazuki Nakajima were also affected.

The pit crews were unable to say if the problems with their fuel rigs, all supplied by the governing FIA, were related.

2008 F1 Hungarian GP result :

Pos	No	Driver	Team	Time/Retired	Pts
1	23	Heikki Kovalainen	McLaren-Mercedes	1:37:27.067	10
2	12	Timo Glock	Toyota	+11.0 secs	8
3	1	Kimi Räikkönen	Ferrari	+16.8 secs	6
4	5	Fernando Alonso	Renault	+21.6 secs	5
5	22	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	+23.0 secs	4
6	6	Nelsinho Piquet	Renault	+32.2 secs	3
7	11	Jarno Trulli	Toyota	+36.4 secs	2
8	4	Robert Kubica	BMW Sauber	+48.3 secs	1
9	10	Mark Webber	Red Bull-Renault	+58.8 secs
10	3	Nick Heidfeld	BMW Sauber	+67.7 secs
11	9	David Coulthard	Red Bull-Renault	+70.4 secs
12	16	Jenson Button	Honda	+1 Lap
13	8	Kazuki Nakajima	Williams-Toyota	+1 Lap
14	7	Nico Rosberg	Williams-Toyota	+1 Lap
15	21	Giancarlo Fisichella	Force India-Ferrari	+1 Lap
16	17	Rubens Barrichello	Honda	+2 Laps
17	2	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	DNF
18	14	Sebastien Bourdais	STR-Ferrari	+3 Laps
Ret	20	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Ferrari	+8 Laps
Ret	15	Sebastian Vettel	STR-Ferrari	+48 Laps

Driver Championship Standings :

Pos	Driver	National	Team	Points
1	Lewis Hamilton	British	McLaren-Mercedes	62
2	Kimi Räikkönen	Finnish	Ferrari	57
3	Felipe Massa	Brazilian	Ferrari	54
4	Robert Kubica	Polish	BMW Sauber	49
5	Nick Heidfeld	German	BMW Sauber	41
6	Heikki Kovalainen	Finnish	McLaren-Mercedes	38
7	Jarno Trulli	Italian	Toyota	24
8	Mark Webber	Australian	Red Bull-Renault	18
9	Fernando Alonso	Spanish	Renault	18
16	Timo Glock	German	Toyota	13
11	Nelsinho Piquet	Brazilian	Renault	13
10	Rubens Barrichello	Brazilian	Honda	11
12	Nico Rosberg	German	Williams-Toyota	8
13	Kazuki Nakajima	Japanese	Williams-Toyota	8
14	David Coulthard	British	Red Bull-Renault	6
15	Sebastian Vettel	German	STR-Ferrari	6
17	Jenson Button	British	Honda	3
18	Sebastien Bourdais	French	STR-Ferrari	2
19	Giancarlo Fisichella	Italian	Force India-Ferrari	0
20	Takuma Sato	Japanese	Super Aguri-Honda	0

Constructor Championship Standings :

Pos	Team	Points
1	Ferrari	111
2	McLaren-Mercedes	100
3	BMW Sauber	90
4	Toyota	35
5	Renault	31
6	Red Bull-Renault	24
7	Williams-Toyota	16
8	Honda	14
9	STR-Ferrari	8
10	Force India-Ferrari	0
11	Super Aguri-Honda	0

[Source : SuperWheels]