By DPA
Shanghai : Lewis Hamilton missed a glorious opportunity to secure the Formula One driver’s championship Sunday when the McLaren driver failed to finish the Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai. Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen kept his title hopes alive with victory in a time of one hour 37 minutes and 58.395 seconds.
Defending world champion Fernando Alonso held off Ferrari’s Felipe Massa to take second spot and cut Hamilton’s lead to just four points with just the Oct 21 Brazilian GP in Sao Paolo to come.
Torro Rosso’s Sebastian Vettel took a surprise fourth-place finish, followed by Jenson Button in a Honda. Vitantonio Liuzzi in the second Torro Rosso came in sixth, with BMW-Sauber’s Nick Heidfeld seventh and David Coulthard of Red Bull eighth.
Hamilton still leads the drivers’ standings with 107 points, followed by team-mate Alonso (103) and Raikkonen (100).
The 22-year-old Briton went into the penultimate race of the season starting from pole and knowing that victory would give him an unassailable 12-point lead over Alonso.
The Spaniard, meanwhile, started from fourth and managed to pass Massa at the start before the Brazilian regained third spot on turn six.
Hamilton slowly pulled away from second-placed Raikkonen in the early stages before pitting for the first time on lap 15. With the track still wet and further rain threatening, he decided to stick with his intermediate tyres.
Alonso pitted four laps later, followed by Raikkonen, who returned just behind Hamilton in second place. Alexander Wurz in a Williams was the first to switch to dry weather tyres and immediately set the fastest lap.
Massa was the first of the leaders to follow the Austrian’s lead but almost immediately it began raining again. Raikkonen was clearly faster than Hamilton at this stage and after several attempts managed to overtake with 28 laps remaining.
“I just kept pushing to try and get the win today,” said Raikkonen. “In the end I could pass him and pull away quite easily.”
Hamilton then inexplicably stayed out despite his tyres losing grip with every lap and his rear-right tyre, in particular, showing signs of wear.
He paid the price with 25 laps remaining when he failed to make the turn in the pit lane, ending up stuck in the gravel pit and only getting out of his car when the marshals were unable to push him out.
Raikkonen ran wide on lap 39 but otherwise drove within himself on a drying track to claim a vital win and set up the thrilling prospect of a three-way duel for the driver’s title at Interlagos in two weeks’ time.
“I think it will be very difficult to win the championship. It won’t be easy to take four points off Lewis,” admitted Alonso.
“Hopefully, I can do a good race. For the championship I need something dramatic to win.”
Raikkonen, meanwhile, was just happy to be still in with a chance of claiming his first drivers’ title.
“We are back in the championship and it will be an interesting last race,” said the Finn.
Ferrari has already clinched its 15th constructors’ title as main challenger McLaren was docked its constructors’ points in the wake of the spying scandal.