Felipe Massa wins 2008 European Grand Prix

August 24, 2008



Ferrari driver Felipe Massa won the FIA Formula One 2008 Telefónica Grand Prix of Europe at the street circuit of Valencia, Spain on Sunday after his engine failed on a dying laps of the previous race. It became 10th win in Formula One for the Brazilian driver.

His victory was approved by stewards when after the race they had investigated his second pit stop on lap 37 and ruled a fine to Massa without any further sanctions for a potential collision with Adrian Sutil (Force India’) while exitting from the pitlane.



Lewis Hamilton performed well driving for McLaren Mercedes as he fell behind Massa by just about 5 seconds on the finish line.

The three podium places to be exactly like they were on a starting grid, as Pole Robert Kubica came third for BMW Sauber with a substantial 30 seconds gap to Hamilton.

Hamilton's teammate Heikki Kovalainen drove fourth after Kimi Räikkönen's Ferrari engine failed on a 45th lap. A lap earlier Kimi had an incident on a second pit-stop, when he knocked-off the mechanic fueling his car after he twitched earlier trying to beat Kovalainen, who was also on his pit-stop.

Jarno Trulli came 5th for Toyota overtaking Toro Rosso of Sebastian Vettel who will be driving for Red Bull next season.

The second Toyota of Timo Glock and Nico Rosberg's Williams-Toyota closed the top eight.

The only Spaniard in the race, Fernando Alonso (Renault) was forced to retire after Kaz Nakajima (Williams) hit him from behind and damaged the back of Renault.