Alonso and Hamilton coasted home a distant third and fourth, Hamilton thanking the powers that be for altering the Pouhon gravel trap into a run off area when he got out of shape with just three laps remaining.
Nonetheless, fourth sees Hamilton lose another point in his advantage over Alonso, the duo now just two points adrift from one another.
With the top four all reaching the finish line, Heidfeld had to be content with another fifth place finish after a sterling recovery from his disappointing start, the German’s longer fuel strategy eventually seeing him overhaul long-time fifth place holder Rosberg midway through the race.
It meant Rosberg would score his third sixth place finish in a row to take him above
Williams team-mate Wurz in the standings to ninth. At the same time though, he will no doubt be frustrated to see a maiden top five result go wanting, as it did in Monza, thanks to a
BMW once again.
Webber kept Rosberg honest in the closing stages to take a relatively anonymous seventh place. Still, given the trouble and turmoil of his season so far, the Australian will likely be more than happy to record a lonely but nonetheless profitable two points for himself and
Red Bull.
The final points place meanwhile went to Kovalainen, the Finn not quite able to make his one-stop strategy work as well as he had perhaps hoped, but nonetheless doing enough to hold off Kubica for the second time in the race during the closing stages. Indeed the duo were separated by no more than a second in the final ten laps and although the Pole tried everything he could to drive his way around him right up to the final corner, Kovalainen was able to hold on to maintain his run of points finishes.
There were no points Schumacher and Trulli in 10th and 11th as
Toyota no doubt become increasingly frustrated at not being able to capitalise on the qualifying performance that had placed them eighth and tenth on the grid, although just behind Liuzzi was a happy 12th in what is his best result of the season.
