Michael Schumacher believes he can still make a race of it and catch F1 champion Fernando Alonso. Schumacher won the French Grand Prix for a record eighth time Sunday in a boost for resurgent Ferrari, finishing 10 seconds ahead of the world champion Alonso.

Felipe Massa, Schumacher’s Ferrari teammate, was third.

The victory helps Schumacher close the gap on Alonso in the standings with seven races left. Alonso has 96 points and Schumacher has 79.

“The championship is far from over, and these two points we have made up on our main rivals are very important,” Schumacher said. “I hope we can make up more ground.”

Alonso, who took the F1 crown from Schumacher, said his second-place finish was enough.

“Given where I started on the grid, I think second is everything I could have hoped for because we knew that Michael was a bit quicker this weekend,” Alonso said. “We won four consecutive races and hopefully this will happen again from the next race on.”

Toyota’s Ralf Schumacher was fourth — 27.2 seconds behind his brother — and McLaren-Mercedes’ Kimi Raikkonen came fifth in the 70-lap race.

Renault’s Giancarlo Fisichella was sixth, followed by Pedro de la Rosa of Spain, McLaren-Mercedes’s replacement for Juan Pablo Montoya, who has left for
NASCAR.

Schumacher got away cleanly at the start and Massa did his best to stay ahead of Alonso.

Although Alonso made three attempts to pass, Massa held second.

“We had a great start, being first and second,” Schumacher said. “It was an excellent situation to start the race.”

The first indication of race strategy in the 70-lap race came at the end of the 16th when Massa pitted first, followed a lap later by Alonso, then by Schumacher on the 18th.

By 23 laps Schumacher was still ahead but with a bit of breathing room. He was 6.1 seconds ahead of Massa and 11 ahead of Alonso.

The second stint stretched things out even more.

After 50 laps, Schumacher was up by 20 over Massa and 30 ahead of Alonso. However, Alonso went in after 42, meaning he would be able to get to the end of the race without another stop.

“We figured the Ferraris were on a three stop,” Alonso said. “We took a gamble and we believed in our consistency.”

The Ferraris needed one more stop for fuel and tires. Alonso’s Renault didn’t and he was able to get by Massa, but trailed Schumacher by 15 seconds.

The next race is the German Grand Prix on July 30.

This entry was posted on Monday, July 17th, 2006 at 4:34 pm and is filed under Formula One [t], Grand Prix [t]. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.