1998 French Grand Prix

The 1998 French Grand Prix was a Formula One motor race held at Magny-Cours on 28 June 1998. It was the eighth race of the 1998 FIA Formula One World Championship.

The 71-lap race was won by German driver Michael Schumacher, driving a Ferrari. It was Schumacher's third victory of the season. Northern Irish teammate Eddie Irvine finished second, with Finn Mika Häkkinen third in a McLaren-Mercedes, having started from pole position. The result marked Ferrari's first one-two finish since the 1990 Spanish Grand Prix.

Report

Background

The race was originally dropped due to a dispute over television broadcasting rights in France. Though TF1 had the rights, rival channel France 3 obtained a judgement from a French court to allow all channels to operate on the grounds of the circuit.^[5][6]

Jos Verstappen replaced Jan Magnussen at the Stewart team for the remainder of the season.

Qualifying

Mika Häkkinen of McLaren-Mercedes took pole position, beating Michael Schumacher by 0.2 seconds. David Coulthard qualified third, and Eddie Irvine took fourth place. Throughout the qualifying session, Schumacher and Häkkinen exchanged first place, until Häkkinen finally took the pole.

Race

At the beginning of the race, Verstappen stalled his Stewart, the race was stopped on lap 1, and a restart was required. At the second start, Häkkinen was overtaken by Michael Schumacher and Irvine. Schumacher then began to pull away, sometimes at one second a lap, with Irvine holding both the McLarens behind him. On lap 20, Häkkinen tried an ambitious move on Irvine. His attempt failed, and he spun into the gravel trap. However, he managed to keep his car going, pitted for fresh tyres, and rejoined in fourth place. Then he regained third place when Coulthard had problems during his pit stop: Coulthard went into the pits, but due to a fuel filling problem, had to do another lap, and then go into the pits again. After the second set of pit stops, Häkkinen was back behind Irvine, and Schumacher was some way in front. On the final lap, on the final corner, Häkkinen made an attempt to overtake Irvine, after Irvine was very slow through the chicane before the final corner. Irvine just held off Häkkinen to take second, but only by a tenth of a second. However, both drivers were 19 seconds behind Schumacher. After Coulthard's misfortune in the pitlane, he finished sixth, scoring one world championship point. It was Ferrari's first 1–2 in 8 years, the previous being at the 1990 Spanish Grand Prix, with Alain Prost and Nigel Mansell.

Classification

Qualifying

Race

Championship standings after the race

Drivers' Championship standings

Constructors' Championship standings

• Note: Only the top five positions are included for both sets of standings.

References

1. ^ Calculated based on the qualifying classification shown during TV broadcast
2. ^ "Grand Prix de France". Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile. Archived 2010-09-15 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 2023-07-21.
3. ^ Calculated based on the race classification shown during TV broadcast
4. ^ Calculated by adding lap length to the race distance
5. ^ "Motor Racing: Doubts over Belgian Grand Prix". The Independent. 13 December 1997. Archived 2022-05-01 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 8 December 2012.
6. ^ "France dropped from F1 season". BBC News. 13 December 1997. Retrieved 8 December 2012.
7. ^ "France 1998 - Qualifications". StatsF1. Retrieved 28 March 2016.
8. ^ "1998 French Grand Prix". formula1.com. Archived 5 December 2014 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 24 December 2015.
9. ^ "France 1998 - Championship • STATS F1". www.statsf1.com. Retrieved 17 March 2019.