Pointless Kimi slips down to second.

Reigning world champion Kimi Raikkonen has lost his lead in the 2008 drivers' championship after a disastrous outing around the streets of Monte Carlo.

Kimi had a catalogue of problems losing second place to Lewis Hamilton at the start and then getting a drive-through penalty after the stewards deemed there had been a rule infringement on the grid prior to the off.

The Finn eventually finished ninth in his F2008, one place outside the points, after running into the back of Force India's Adrian Sutil with just a few laps to go, dropping him from fifth to outside the points.

"A very poor race for me, right from the off," said the 'ice-man'. "There was a problem with a wheel before the start and we broke the rules, which meant I was given a drive-through penalty.

"During the race, my main problem was trying to get the tyres to work as well as possible. Then we decided to change the strategy as we expected it to rain again, but it didn't happen.

"Twice I had to change the nose after breaking the front wing. So, as you can see, a long run of things going wrong which explains the 0 points.

"I am sorry for Sutil, who I hit with just a few laps to go. I lost control of the car under braking coming out of the tunnel and I could do nothing to avoid him. It's a shame how things went today, as we had the potential to do well.

"It's true that I've lost the championship lead, but I always said the championship would be a very long one. Now we must prepare as well as possible for Canada where we will try to make up for this disappointment."

Ferrari technical director Luca Baldisserri meanwhile was also less than happy with the result, especially as they qualified one-two.

Felipe Massa's third place finish in the sister car was however, some small consolation and he too wants to see the whole team bounce back in Montreal in two weeks time.

"We are very disappointed with this result which is definitely below our level of expectation," added Baldisserri. "We made mistakes which we have to look at to ensure we don't do the same again and we also made a few strategy choices, which all things considered turned out to be wrong even if it easy to be wise after the event. We must draw the right conclusions from this weekend, without colouring our judgement with emotion.

"We showed we were competitive on a track that traditionally has not suited us, but we did not work at our usual high standard. In less than a fortnight we will face a similar challenge in Montreal, where in 2007, we had problems. We really want to make up for today's disappointment."