McLaren drivers Heikki Kovalainen and Lewis Hamilton will each drop five places on the grid for Sunday’s Malaysian Grand Prix after stewards decided they had blocked rival drivers in the closing stages in qualifying. They will now start the race eighth and ninth respectively.

Kovalainen and Hamilton were called before the stewards after suggestions that BMW Sauber’s Nick Heidfeld and Renault’s Fernando Alonso were impeded during their final Q3 runs, when the McLaren drivers were conserving fuel on slowing-down laps, both having completed their final runs.

"The first corners of my last lap went smoothly, but then there were several cars driving very slowly on their in-laps,� said Heidfeld, who qualified seventh, but will now start fifth. “Apparently they had no information that the qualifying was still going on. Before Turn Four I lost a lot of time because both McLarens were cruising on the racing line.

“I think this has cost me about two tenths of a second, which would have meant being third instead of seventh. I just couldn't drive on the line I wanted and, even more importantly, could not brake were I wanted.�

McLaren are not expected to appeal the decision, which means row two on the grid will now be formed by the Toyota of Jarno Trulli and BMW Sauber’s Robert Kubica. Red Bull’s Mark Webber moves up to P6 to join Heidfeld on the third row, while Alonso moves up from P9 to P7.

issoisso wrote:
If the second is true, he should kill himself, because he had 7 laps more fuel than Raikkonen in that car. He would've won easily.

SportingNonsense wrote:

I dont think Massa coud have won, he had dropped too far back.

SportingNonsense wrote:
What happened to the 90% rain chance and better overtaking circuit?

issoisso wrote:


clearly you are yet to see nakajima in full flight

I'm being 100% honest here when I say that F1 will now go through the same that GP2 was going through: meaning no matter how big the leader's advantage is, it's never certain he'll win just because Nakajima is out there on the track

Addy291 wrote:
Nakajima was doing great in the first half of the race, but faded a hell of a lot

CrueTrue wrote:
I got up 7:30 in the morning so I could finally watch some sports (in the middle of nowhere). And what did I get to see? An absolutely boring race.

Fernando Alonso has said he can leave Renault at the end of this season.

The double champion, who returned to the team after a stormy year with McLaren, has had a disappointing start to the season in an uncompetitive car.

"I'm at Renault because I wanted to get back to winning, like in 2005 and 2006, if not this year then next year," Alonso told Spanish newspaper As.

"But I have an option to leave so I can be in the best possible car, and it is clear Ferrari is one of the best."

When Alonso signed for Renault last winter, there was widespread speculation that he would only stay for one year before joining world champions Ferrari for 2009.

And his comments seem to confirm suspicions that the Spaniard does indeed have a break clause in his contract that would allow him to leave after just one year.

Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo is known to regard Alonso highly.

But the Italian team already have world champion Kimi Raikkonen and team-mate Felipe Massa under contract for 2009.

Signing Alonso would involve finding a way to curtail Massa's contract, which runs until the end of 2010.

But Alonso cooled speculation linking him to Ferrari, saying it was inevitable following a poor start to the season by Massa, who has retired from both races following driver errors.

"It's early to talk about moves and rumours, but Massa has had two bad races with mistakes and that has kicked off speculation," Alonso said.

"It's logical, but it's too early."

Aquarius wrote:
I was wondering how much time it would take before popping up. Two races, better/worst than expected...

Actually I read something more convincing than curtailing Massa's contract. If Raikkonen would become World Champion a second time this year, he could decide to stop his F1 career. He's already said he's not after records.
That could give Alonso + Massa at Ferrari in 2009 or 2010.

issoisso wrote:


Mark my words: 2 more years and Raikkonen will stop. If he wins it this season, it's very possible he'll retire straight away and go back to his alcohol.

Which is good, since the videos of him drunk on youtube are always pretty funny