The top four of Massa, Räikkönen, Kubica and Mark Webber held station until the first round of pit stops.

Räikkönen took the lead after these stops and after Massa retired following a spin into the gravel, the Finn cruised to a victory of nearly twenty seconds.

Championship leader Hamilton could only finish in fifth position, after a tardy first stop on lap 19, with his McLaren team encountering a problem on his front right tyre and lost ground while trying to pass Webber.

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

[7] Also during the session, the Red Bull Racing machine of David Coulthard suffered a track rod failure on the curb of turn 12, and forced the team to show the FIA clarification that their car design was safe for the Grand Prix, under Article 2.3 of the 2008 Formula One Technical Regulations.

In qualifying, Massa earned his tenth career pole position, after recording a lap of 1:35.748 during the third and final session.

He was joined on the front row by teammate Räikkönen, although the Finn's fastest time was more than half a second slower than that of Massa.

[13] Third and fourth had originally gone to the McLarens of Kovalainen and Hamilton, however post-qualifying, both drivers were demoted five places on the grid for dangerous driving; having completed their flying laps, the McLaren pair and other drivers slowed to conserve fuel on their in-laps, and impeded Nick Heidfeld of BMW Sauber and Fernando Alonso of Renault whilst they were both on flying laps.

[14] This led to a new rule being introduced for Bahrain giving drivers a set time to complete in-laps in.

On lap four, Alonso and Heidfeld overtook the Red Bull of David Coulthard for ninth and eighth respectively.

Adrian Sutil was forced to retire two laps later when he ran off the track and onto the grass, with hydraulic problems.

By lap nine Hamilton was within two seconds of Webber and the Ferraris of Massa and Räikkönen had opened up a lead on the rest of the field.

Hamilton was within half a second of him by lap 29 but this forced him to brake harder and lose time to the rest of the field.