To mark F1’s 75th anniversary celebrations, F1.com is counting down the sport’s 25 greatest races with a new feature every week. While you may not agree with the order, we hope you enjoy the stories of these epic races that have helped make this sport what it is today. You can read the introduction to the series and see the list of races here.
At No. 17, Mika Hakkinen gives Mike Seymour his perspective of the dramatic, rain-hit 2000 Belgian Grand Prix, a weekend on which the Finn dominated Qualifying, spun out of the race lead in slippery conditions, and then hunted down Michael Schumacher before pulling off an overtake people still talk about to this day…
After becoming a two-time World Champion, I was full of confidence heading into the 2000 season. Again, Adrian Newey had designed our car, and again, it was very fast – even if it was very difficult to drive. I remember it being on a knife-edge.
Our start to the year was okay. We had some technical issues, which disturbed things, but going to the Belgian Grand Prix, I felt we would do well. I knew that our car would be quick at Spa-Francorchamps – and it was. Really, really, really quick!
When it came to Saturday’s Qualifying session, I was able to maximise the performance of the car in every sector of the lap and take pole position by more than seven-tenths of a second.
Then the rain arrived on Sunday. When you’re driving an F1 car in the wet, it’s quite a scary experience, especially if your car is on a knife-edge. Everything went fine at the start; I got the lead, I was comfortable, but then I touched the kerb a little bit too much at Stavelot, lost control and spun…
Luckily, the engine was still running when I ended up on the grass. Of course, I saw Michael – ‘Neeeeeooooom!’ – going flat-out past me. I said, ‘Oh my God’. But I was still confident. ‘I have a good car,’ I thought to myself.
When those kind of things happen, you don’t have time to think about it too much. ‘What did I do wrong?’ You just have to focus, go back to the track, confirm that there is no damage anywhere on the car and put your foot down.
After that, I started hunting down Michael. I think he had a little bit more downforce than me, because he was very good in the middle sector of the track, which has quite a few corners. He was able to pull away a little bit there, but every time we went in a straight line, I was catching him in a big way.
I put in some incredible lap times and I knew I was going to catch Michael sooner or later, although I wasn’t sure if I would be able to overtake him. I knew Michael, I knew how he raced, and he was a really tough guy to overtake. He didn’t open the door for you.
If you tried to make an overtake on Michael the normal way, when you leave your braking to the last minute and put your nose in, it was probably going to end up in a crash. He was very aggressive in that kind of situation. The positive was that he was consistent!
When I finally caught Michael, I looked at where he was quick, where he was slow, what kind of tactic I had to adopt to be able to overtake him. I soon knew there was only one place where I had a chance to overtake him – the Kemmel Straight. But, to do that, I needed to go through Eau Rouge nearly flat-out.
With the race configuration, with tyres that were old, with a car that was already knackered… to go through Eau Rouge flat-out, I knew that it was a risk. But I had to take this risk to be able to overtake him.
Michael also knew that was the only place where I could overtake – and he kept closing the door. Even when I was next to him, he put me on the grass. I was like, ‘Michael, come on… I’m so much faster, don’t defend, it’s ridiculous. It’s not going to end up a nice way if you continue defending’. But he continued defending.
Then there was a little bit of luck. I don’t normally think about luck. You have to work on yourself, you have to work with the team, maximise everything that you can. In this case, it was luck that there was a backmarker – Ricardo Zonta – on that straight. I thought, ‘This is it. I have to use this opportunity now’.
Strangely, Ricardo was driving in the middle of the track. Not driving on the right, not on the left, but the middle. It was very unusual. When we approached him, Michael went left, which made sense, because the other side of the track was still a bit damp. I knew that Michael was going to aim for the dry line to help under braking for Les Combes.
As soon as it became clear that Michael was going to overtake on the left, I just went flat-out on the right. But I knew that I had to come back to Michael’s line as soon as possible and be on the dry part of the track to hit the brakes. That’s why the movement happened very quickly.
It was a great, great feeling when it all happened.
I really needed to focus hard afterwards. As soon as I got past the second sector and third sector with Michael still behind me, I said, ‘Ookay, that’s it, now I’m going to put my foot down’. I didn’t make any mistakes, Michael dropped back, and I was like, ‘Wow, this is cool’.
When the race was over, I went to see Michael about his defending. I’d known him for many years and we’d been racing each other for many years. We had some little incidents in the past, and these incidents didn’t happen because, ‘Oops, sorry, I made a little mistake’.
I explained to Michael, ‘Look, this is not the way racing should happen. We are both competitors, we are both World Champions, let’s build our respect on the racetrack that we fight nice and clearly’. Michael just said, ‘No, this is racing, Mika’.
Anyway, it’s a long time ago. It’s history. I’m not looking at this situation negatively. I had a chat with Michael, I understood his way of working, and that’s it. We all do things differently…
In general, I think it was an incredible time for the sport. F1 today is mega, no question about it. But that period was special because Michael was at Ferrari, while there was McLaren as an English team with a German engine, helping this Finnish guy to beat a German driver…
In Germany, people were like, ‘Who are we going to support here? Are we going to support Mika or Michael? Michael is at Ferrari, Mika is using a Mercedes engine and doing commercials around Germany’. So, it was a very powerful fan base, and a friendly fan base in my opinion. It was a beautiful thing.
The fans are the most important in this business and, when I raced against Michael, it created a nice environment. We didn’t argue in the media; we fought on the track – even if Michael was a bit aggressive sometimes!
