A thrilling start saw Giancarlo Fisichella blast his Renault past the Finn's McLaren into the lead at the start, while Fernando Alonso scrambled around the back of the McLaren in his own attempt to pass.

Further around the first lap Fisichella ran wide allowing Raikkonen a successful attempt down the inside, and from then on the McLaren was never headed.

Juan Pablo Montoya, from fourth on the grid, took a back seat for the opening lap scrap at the front, but soon settled into his rhythm and set some blistering lap times as he appeared to be on his way to securing second place and the first one-two of the season for the supremely quick McLarens.

However, Montoya endured a scare just three laps from the finish when lapping Monteiro's Jordan, only to find the Portuguese nudge him into a spin as he slotted in front.

A lap later and the Colombian ran wide again, this time allowing Alonso to salvage a seemingly lost second place.

Renault had been outclassed by McLaren this weekend, Fisichella finishing fourth after being hampered in his first pit stop by a malfunctioning fuel-filler.

Fifth place went to a hard-charging Jenson Button in the BAR, and one has to wonder what might have been had he qualified up at the front where the cars pace should have put him.

Behind Button, Jarno Trulli in the Toyota drove a solid but uneventful race to fifth. His team-mate Ralf Schumacher was the unfortunate victim of other peoples mistakes at the start and never recovered from finding himself last at the first corner. He finished a distant 12th.

The two Red Bull Racing cars of David Coulthard and Christian Klien performed superbly, and kept away from all the first lap trouble, to take seventh and eighth places and more valuable points for the impressive young team.

Williams-BMW's race was one of intrigue and lost promise. Having started from sixth and seventh on the grid the two cars looked to have decent pace early in the race, Mark Webber in particular showing good speed to recover from a poor start.

However, both cars suffered from inexplicable right-rear tyre failures - twice. The cars were, understandably, retired pending investigation into the cause of the problem.

Ferrari followd up a poor qualifying with a similarly lacklustre race.

Michael Schumacher endured a collision with Mark Webber and pitted for repairs that took several laps, before emerging again to improve his qualifying position for the next race.

Rubens Barrichello, in the second Ferrari, was off the pace all afternoon and could only manage tenth behind the second BAR-Honda of Takuma Sato.

11th place went to Jacques Villeneuve, the sole Sauber runner after Felipe Massa got into trouble on the first lap.

Massa, the new Ferrari signing, found himself short of grip and out of shape among the pack, and collided with Nick Heidfeld's Williams.He pitted for a new wing, but his race was over.

Both Jordan's finished, in 14th (Karthikeyan) and 15th (Monteiro), while Robert Doornbos brought the only remaining Minardi home in 13th, team mate Cristijan Albers having retired.

The Championship battle continues at Monza in two weeks, with the gap between Alonso and Raikkonen down to 24 points.

Meanwhile, the Istanbul Park circuit has proved to be an instant classic, with some wonderful corners, and has proved itself worthy of a place on the calendar for the years to come.