On track, the news was much the same as it had been in Australia, with
McLaren and
Ferrari fighting it out at the front - this time with the Woking machines coming out on top - and
Lewis Hamilton continuing to impress in his rookie campaign.
BMW again proved to be best of the rest, splitting
Kimi Raikkonen and
Felipe Massa after the Brazilian's slip-up, while
Williams again served notice of its return to form, with
Nico Rosberg on course for points until mechanical problems intervened.
Toyota and
Renault again filled out the point-scorers, this time with
Heikki Kovalainen opening his
F1 account.
The early part of the weekend was again marked by Spyker protesting one of its rivals, this time
Scuderia Toro Rosso, in the ongoing 'customer car' row. As in Melbourne, however, the stewards of the meeting decided that they could not rule on the matter, stating that Spyker's decision to take its protest to a higher authority in Lausanne had set a new precedent.
David Coulthard called on the 'powers that be' to take action on the basic design of F1 cars after his accident in Australia took his
Red Bull RB3 uncomfortably close to Alex Wurz's head. DC highlighted just how exposed a driver's head can be in certain crashes and, while shying away from calling for closed cockpit cars, suggested something needed to be done to increase protection.
Nick Heidfeld was linked to a possible move to Toyota for 2008, opening the annual 'silly season' even earlier than usual, but all parties insisted that the rumours were just that.
Two new sponsorship deals were revealed in Malaysia, with Williams confirming its deal with AirAsia and Spyker with MaxCredible, but the Silverstone-based team then took finance hunting to a new level, but posting four areas of availability on internet auction site
eBay. The offer to get your name on the Dutch-owned cars ends this weekend, so look lively....
