by Russell Atkins
A McLaren victory in Melbourne last weekend and a Woking one-two in the Malaysian Grand Prix twelve months ago the omens would appear to be distinctly promising for the Silver Arrows as
Formula 1 returns to the Sepang International Circuit for round two of the 2008 world championship campaign.
Though the formbook is not yet entirely clear with the chaotic Australian Grand Prix masking the competitiveness of certain teams and over-emphasising that of others it would seem fairly safe to say that McLaren and
Ferrari are once more slightly ahead of the field, though which of them is the absolute front-runner is rather harder to discern just yet.
Whilst
Kimi Raikkonen's Ferrari when the Finn was in clear air as opposed to off the track or stuck behind slower cars looked devastatingly quick around the Albert Park circuit on occasion, it was the McLaren boys who set the race's two fastest laps, team new boy
Heikki Kovalainen narrowly pipping
Lewis Hamilton to the honour on his racing debut for the squad, with the reigning world champion unable to get any closer than within half a second of the duo's best efforts.
Though Kovalainen would ultimately slip back to fifth after losing out under the final safety car period and his misdemeanour with the pit-lane speed limiter, the significance of
McLaren's performance and result Down Under especially with Ferrari scoring just a lone point in the season-opener has not been lost on anyone inside the team.
The Silver Arrows have triumphed twice in Sepang since the inaugural race there held back in 1999, with a further four podium finishes and the current lap record to their name. Kovalainen in particular has special memories of Sepang after notching up his first point there twelve months ago in what he called his first proper race in
F1'.
