Finally the front of the grid was as follows - 1)Michael Schumacher 2)Ralf Schumacher 3)Mika Hakkinen 4)Juan Pablo Montoya 5)David Coulthard 6)Rubens Barichello
The warmup lap of the race itself signalled bad luck for Rubens Barichello as his car went out into the gravel track and he had to sprint from there to the pit lane with just 4 minutes remaining for the race to start. He then got into the spare car and joined the grid. The race was about to start.
The lights went out and the race started. The start was terribly bad for Mika Hakkinen as his car got stalled at the third position and all the other cars were speeding up. Hakkinen waved his hands with all vigour to signal all other drivers to pass him without hitting. The start however saw excellent throttle from Juan Pablo Montoya, David Coulthard and Jarno Trulli who overtook Ralf Schumacher within meters from the start line. Montoya once again showed the prowess of his BMW engine following Michael Schumacher closely through the first lap and overtook him with fantastic aggression at the first corner. The positions after this magnificient overtaking move by Montoya were - Montoya, M. Schumacher, Coulthard, Trulli, Ralf Schumacher and Barichello.
Shortly after Montoya went into the lead, on the third corner, Rubens Barichello mistimed his braking and rammed into the back of Ralf Schumacher's car, taking his Ferrari out of the race. This was the second time that Barichello had hit R. Schumacher, the earlier one being the first corner in Malaysian Grand Prix. Ralf somehow managed to get back into the pits but lost two laps to the other drivers. Meanwhile Juan Pablo Montoya was in full flow and set a number of fastest laps with Schumacher in second position and Coulthard in third. Such was the output of his car's engine that he took almost half a second per lap off M. Schumacher's time. Seeing his incapability in overtaking Montoya, M. Schumacher headed into the pits for fuel reload and better grip tyres. This put Coulthard into second position.
