By Parminio
March 23 2003

Everyone was wondering what would happen with the Renault's up front, and we found out. They were much more competitive that we thought. But Kimi ran a flawless race to take his first Grand Prix Victory in Malaysia. Not only did he win it,he slam dunked it with a margin of victory of 39 seconds. Rubens Barichello drove a good race to come home second, followed by a surprising result for Fernando Alonso in 3rd.

Malaysia has never started a race without some sort of incident, and this time was no exception. Going into turn 1 things got close, which led Schumi to tag the back end of Jarno Trulli and send him spinning off the track. This lead to a chain reaction that damaged several cars.

After that accident, it was off to the races with Alonso pulling out a 5 second lead. It didn’t last for long though. DC retired just 2 laps later with an apparent electrical failure…running a strong 2nd, that really hurt. The fact that Schumi had to pull in to make repairs, and then was given a drive through penalty was a gift that could have seen DC double his lead in the championship…but it just wasn’t DC’s day either.

In wasn’t a lot of peoples day. Juan Pablo Montoya lost the whole rear wing of his car…making him pit for the eternal pitstop that saw him go 3 laps down. Olivier Panis had a strong run going for Toyota, only to have his car quit just after his pit stop. JV never got off the grid.

There were some good days though. Ralph Schumacher quietly sneaked from 17th on the grid to finish 4th. Ralph Firman had a good race as well, battling with Jarno Trulli lap after lap. But it was just Kimi’s day. He was fast, flawless and first. Nothing could catch him. With just 6 laps to go, McLaren hung out the “EASY” sign, begging Kimi to ease up and not blow up. It was a thing of beauty to see Ron Dennis not being able to look. For the last 2 laps, he was on the verge of a breakdown. The last time a McLaren walked away with a victory like this was at Spain with Mika Hakkinen. Mika’s engine let go just a half a mile from the finish line on the last lap.

Kimi’s didn’t…and with that win, he takes the lead in the Drivers title race. McLaren are out to a decent lead in the Constructors as well. No matter what happens from here, the MP4-17D has more than accomplished what anyone thought it could. The anticipation of the arrival of the MP4-18 continues…and grows.