Sutil and Vettel were out on the spot – the incident maintaining the latter's unenviable 100 per cent non-finishing record in 2008 so far, and meaning three of those retirements have been first lap collisions. The safety car was therefore deployed, with Raikkonen leading from Massa, Alonso, Hamilton, Kubica, Kovalainen and
Nick Heidfeld, up two spots from his lowly ninth grid position.
Nico Rosberg was another to have made a good getaway, progressing into eleventh from 15th, whilst team-mate
Kazuki Nakajima had gone in the opposite direction down in 14th.
The safety car returned to the pit-lane at the end of lap three, and just one lap later Raikkonen had already opened up a 1.3 second margin over the sister scarlet machine, with the two McLarens also looking racy back in fourth and sixth.
The next man to hit trouble, though, was
Nelsinho Piquet, who ran off-track from tenth place, and shortly afterwards would make his retirement terminal, by clattering into the side of an unsighted Sébastien Bourdais whilst endeavouring to make his way back up the order again from 18th place. Piquet was out on the spot, with Bourdais touring back to his pit box where a broken left front suspension would see him take a similarly early bath.
Anthony Davidson was another man to drop out early on, as
Super Aguri's miserable season showed no signs of brightening up anytime soon. The Hemel Hempstead ace's radiator had been punctured by a stone brought back onto the track by Piquet, meaning there was no way back in what could be his last outing in the top flight for now.
