2000 San Marino Grand Prix
| Race details | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Race 3 of 17 in the 2000 Formula One season | |||
 |
|||
| Date | April 9, 2000 | ||
| Official name | XX Gran Premio Warsteiner di San Marino | ||
| Location | Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari, Imola, Emilia-Romagna, Italy | ||
| Course | Permanent racing facility | ||
| Course length | 4.933 km (3.065 mi) | ||
| Distance | 62 laps, 305.609 km (189.897 mi) | ||
| Weather | Overcast, Mild, Dry, 16 °C | ||
| Attendance | 80,000 | ||
| Pole position | |||
| Driver | McLaren-Mercedes | ||
| Time | 1:24.714 | ||
| Fastest lap | |||
| Driver |
 Mika Häkkinen
|
McLaren-Mercedes | |
| Time | 1:26.523 on lap 60 | ||
| Podium | |||
| First | Ferrari | ||
| Second | McLaren-Mercedes | ||
| Third | McLaren-Mercedes | ||
The 2000 San Marino Grand Prix (formally the XX Gran Premio Warsteiner di San Marino) was a Formula One motor race held at Imola on 9 April 2000. The 62-lap race was the third round of the 2000 Formula One season and was won by Michael Schumacher driving a Ferrari.
Qualifying saw Mika Häkkinen on pole position with Michael Schumacher second, David Coulthard third, Rubens Barrichello fourth, Ralf Schumacher fifth and Heinz-Harald Frentzen sixth. During qualifying Schumacher took pole position for a brief moment, beating Häkkinen's time by 0.025 seconds. Häkkinen's final timed lap of the session however, was quick enough reclaim pole position. In the first 2 sectors of the circuit, Häkkinen was slower than Schumacher by 0.085 and 0.089 seconds respectively. A small mistake at turn 12 forced the Finn to run wide off the track for a moment, and as he exited the final corner onto the pit straight, the car oversteered. Despite these two errors, Häkkinen reclaimed pole position by 0.091 seconds.
As raceday dawned, it seemed that the McLarens were faster than the Ferraris. At the start, Schumacher did not make a good getaway and, in order to defend his position, moved to the left to block Coulthard. As the two tussled while reaching Tamburello, Coulthard had to lift off, allowing Barrichello to get level with him. In the next corner, Rubens was ahead. At the same time, Jacques Villeneuve had a superb start and got past four cars in front of him. Following Jacques were Jarno Trulli and Eddie Irvine in sixth and seventh respectively. All this had allowed Häkkinen to get a 1.2 second lead over Schumacher and a further 1.9 seconds over Barrichello and Coulthard.
It soon became clear that the race was developing into a battle between Häkkinen and Schumacher. Barrichello and Coulthard were dropping away at a second a lap and they were quite a bit ahead of third group consisting of Villeneuve, Trulli, Irvine, Ralf and Mika Salo. At the front, Häkkinen soon began to edge away from Schumacher, slowly but surely. On lap 20, the gap was out to 3 seconds before it stabilized until the pitstops. Meanwhile, Irvine accidentally pushed the speed limiter button, allowing Ralf and Salo to get ahead. On lap 26, over 25 seconds behind the leaders, Coulthard dived into the pits. On the next lap, Häkkinen stopped to refuel with a 3.2 second lead. He was stationary for 7.6 seconds unlike Schumacher who was there for 10 seconds. This nearly doubled Häkkinen's lead, up to 5.7 seconds. Barrichello was the last driver in the top 4 to stop and he came out in front of Coulthard again.
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