Lewis Hamilton, the eventual Drivers' Champion, led the Championship going into the race, and started from pole position alongside Räikkönen.

The 2008 Japanese Grand Prix was the 16th round in the 2008 Formula One World Championship and took place on 12 October 2008, at the 2.835 mi (4.562 km) Fuji Speedway, in Oyama, Japan.

[7] The teams, also known as "constructors", were Ferrari, McLaren-Mercedes, Renault, Honda, Force India, BMW Sauber, Toyota, Red Bull Racing, Williams and Toro Rosso.

[11]Fernando Alonso's victory at the Singapore Grand Prix was his first Formula One win since rejoining the Renault team, after driving for McLaren in 2007.

[12] After qualifying in 15th and making an early pit stop, Alonso had managed to jump to the front of the race when his teammate Nelson Piquet Jr. crashed.

Left with no opportunity to pit, the frontrunners had to delay their stops until the damage was cleared, allowing the heavily fuelled Alonso to move to the front once they did so.

[13] Though Alonso questioned whether his Renault team could match the pace of Ferrari and McLaren at Fuji, he said "We must remain focussed and try to repeat our level of performance from Singapore to fight at the front.

[15] Bell said that the objective for the last races was to win more Grands Prix and, importantly, secure fourth position in the Constructors' Championship from Toyota.

[15] The Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA), the sport's governing body, launched the Formula One component of their Make Cars Green campaign at the Japanese Grand Prix.

McLaren driver Heikki Kovalainen was just off Massa's pace; Räikkönen, Alonso and Piquet rounded out the top six, still within a second of Hamilton's time.

[20] In the second practice session, Timo Glock, of Toyota, was fastest with a time of 1:18.383, ahead of Alonso, Hamilton, Massa, Räikkönen and Red Bull driver Mark Webber.

Kubica was quickest with his final lap of the session at 1:25.087; Glock, Piquet, Nick Heidfeld of BMW, Kazuki Nakajima of Williams, Red Bull driver David Coulthard, and Massa rounded out the top seven positions.

[23] Both Adrian Sutil and Giancarlo Fisichella of Force India spent most of the session in their garage, suffering numerous mechanical problems.

[25] Provisionally sitting in third as the session drew to a close, Massa was pushed back to fifth as Kovalainen and Alonso put in last-minute laps to fill the second row of the grid.

[26] Kubica took sixth place, ahead of both Toyota cars of Jarno Trulli and Glock and the Toro Rossos of Sebastian Vettel and Sébastien Bourdais.

[27] The Honda cars of Rubens Barrichello and Jenson Button filled the ninth row in front of the constructor's home crowd.

[26] The Force Indias qualified last; Sutil comfortably outqualified his teammate Fisichella by 0.8 seconds, to sit in 19th place.

[29][34] Kubica took the lead ahead of Alonso and Kovalainen after the corner, avoiding collisions as other cars locked their tyres on the cold track.

On lap two, Massa braked late into the chicane at turn 10, briefly letting Hamilton past, before running over the kerbs on the exit from the corner and hitting the McLaren driver's car.

[38] Hamilton was spun round by the contact and made a pit stop at the end of the lap for new tyres and more fuel, which dropped him to 18th place.

[31][37] Trulli, Bourdais, Vettel and Piquet made pit stops over the next five laps, their teams giving them sufficient fuel to finish the race.

[37] As Bourdais exited the pit-lane in seventh place on lap 51, Massa, who was eighth, but yet to make his final pit stop, attempted to pass him and the two cars collided at the first corner.

[29] Crossing the track boundary into the end of the pit-lane, Massa managed to pass Webber, and out-braked him into turn one, to take eighth place.

[7] Webber took ninth on the line, ahead of Heidfeld, who struggled with a heavy car and failed to improve on a poor qualifying performance.

[47] He added that to finish on the podium after BMW Sauber's failure to improve the car from the beginning of the season was a "great result for the team in, I think, a very difficult moment".

[47] He added that Kovalainen's impact with him at the first corner had caused handling difficulties in his car, which left him unable to improve on his third-placed finish.

[49]Massa denied responsibility, and agreed with the stewards' decision: "I think there's little to say: I had already entered the turn and he hit me from behind, spinning me round.

[51] French sporting newspaper L'Équipe criticized the stewards for their intervention, saying that both drivers held their lines and the collision was just a racing incident.

"[53] Blundell's suggestion eventually became fact – the 2010 season introduced a system whereby a former Formula One driver acted as a steward during each Grand Prix.

[55] The BBC's Andrew Benson said that "Hamilton is still in a strong position but the Englishman will have to cut out the mistakes that have characterised his season if he is not to lose the championship for the second year in a row.