onto oil at Brabham corner. He overtook Montoya on the inside at the exit of Jones turn to take the lead at the start of lap 17. Michael Schumacher began to pull away from the rest of the field as Montoya struggled to generate heat in his tyres. On lap 18, de la Rosa fell to eighth after Yoong, Webber and Villeneuve overtook him. On the following lap Frentzen was disqualified for his earlier transgression of ignoring the red light at the exit of the pit lane. By the 22nd lap Michael Schumacher increased his lead over Montoya to 11.3 seconds with consecutive lap times in the 1 minute, 29 second range. Räikkönen was eight-tenths of a second behind Montoya. On the same lap, Coulthard went off the track at Prost corner. His reduced speed promoted Irvine to fourth soon after. On lap 23 Bernoldi was disqualified from the race because the stewards deemed him to have switched to the spare car after the race began. Webber and Villeneuve passed Coulthard for fifth and sixth on laps 25 and 26. Villeneuve in sixth had a rear wing failure that sent him into the tyre wall at high speed on the entry to Waite corner and retirement from his 100th race entry on lap 28. He was unhurt. On lap 29, Yoong overtook Coulthard for sixth position. Seven laps later, Coulthard became the race's final retirement when he pulled off to the side of track at Whiteford corner because his McLaren was stuck in sixth gear. Webber was the first of the top six drivers to make a pit stop on lap 37. He had a problematic 34.9-second pit stop; the Minardi's fuel cover did not open automatically and a mechanic used a screwdriver to unsecure it. Webber rejoined the track in sixth position. Montoya and Michael Schumacher made their pit stops on laps 37 and 38. In the meantime, Räikkönen recorded the race's fastest lap of 1 minute, 25.841 seconds on lap 37, as he sought to pass Montoya for second position after his pit stop. He made his stop on lap 38. As Räikkönen drove onto the track, he drew alongside Montoya and carried excess speed into Brabham corner. He understeered wide onto the grass as he regained control of the rear of his car and fell to third, behind Montoya. With the first four positions settled, attention switched