Schumacher wins a record sixth title

Ferrari's Michael Schumacher of Germany waves after clinching his sixth drivers' championship at the Formula One Japanese Grand Prix in Suzuka, Japan, yesterday. PHOTO: REUTERS

Michael Schumacher won a record sixth world Formula One title Sunday, coming in eighth at the Japanese Grand Prix, holding off Kimi Raikkonen, who finished second.

Schumacher's Ferrari teammate, Rubens Barrichello, captured the race and prevented Raikkonen from winning. The McLaren driver needed to win and Schumacher remain scoreless,

But Schumacher scored a point in eighth place -- good enough no matter what Raikkonen did. With Raikkonen in second for eight points, the final standings are Schumacher 93 and Raikkonen 91.

It was Schumacher's fourth consecutive title for Ferrari, to go with the ones he won with Benetton in 1994 and 1995.

Raikkonen 11 seconds behind Barrichello at the end of 53 laps.

McLaren's David Coulthard was third. BAR's Jenson Button came in fourth, followed by Renault's Jarno Trulli.

Sixth new BAR driver Takuma Sato, with Toyota's Cristiano Da Matta seventh.

Schumacher across the line in eighth, 59.4 seconds behind, but good enough for the world title.

Raikkonen in the fourth row at eighth place, Schumacher in the seventh at 14th.

At the start, Schumacher moved wide right to avoid any difficulties heading into the first turn. He was 12th at the end of the first lap. Raikkonen was sixth, just behind teammate Coulthard.

Things changed dramatically between the sixth and eighth laps.

First Schumacher hit Sato attempting to overtake him. Schumacher damaged his front wing and had to come in and change it with an 18-second pit stop at the end of the sixth lap. That dropped him to 20th, about a minute behind Juan Pablo Montoya in a Williams, leading comfortably at that point.

However, Montoya went out two laps later, and with other dropouts Schumacher began slowly moving up.

But so did Raikkonen. When Renault's Fernando Alonso went out on lap 19, Raikkonen inherited third behind Barrichello and Coulthard.

Schumacher threading his way up. At 24 laps he was 10th, 43 seconds behind. His brother Ralf was in ninth. An interesting moment came a lap later when both pitted, a few car lengths apart as they came in, stopped for tires and fuel and left in the same order.

Ahead, Barrichello, Coulthard and Raikkonen were the top three.

The pressure was on Barrichello to stay ahead of Raikkonen, about 10 seconds behind at the end of 30 laps with 23 to go.

Michael Schumacher was in 11th, about five seconds behind a vital eighth place scoring position.

In the 33rd lap Schumacher took over eighth place. If he stayed there, no matter what happened to Barrichello and Raikkonen, the title was his. However, Schumacher still had to stop once more for tires and fuel.

Although he moved up to sixth at the end of 37 laps while others pitted, he came in.

On the next lap his brother came in but returned to the track behind Michael. The Schumachers were eighth and ninth.

On the 41st lap both attempted to pass Da Matta. Michael had to brake hard. Ralf hit the back of Michael and spun off. Ralf damaged his front wing. Michael went briefly on the grass, still in eighth place. He stayed in eighth, and the Ferrari team came out of the pits to cheer twice.

First, when Barrichello came across the line for his seventh victory. Then about a minute later, Schumacher crossed and the team cheered the world champion.