Schumacher aiming for Malaysian hat-trick

Williams and McLaren will be on the attack in Malaysia this weekend to prevent Ferrari's Michael Schumacher from taking a hat-trick of wins.

Spa, nestling in Belgium's misty Ardennes forests, will always be the German's favourite track but nowhere has the four times world champion been quite so dominant as at ultra-modern Sepang.

Since the first grand prix there in 1999, Schumacher is the only driver to have taken pole position and has won two out of the three races.

The only reason he did not win all three was because in 1999 he moved over while in the lead to allow then title-chasing team mate Eddie Irvine through.

Last year Schumacher arrived in Sepang with five straight wins behind him whereas now he returns for the second race of the season seeking his third victory in a row with last year's F2001 car.

The decision to leave the new but untested and potentially unreliable F2002 in Italy was considered controversial before the season-opening race in Melbourne, where Schumacher won comfortably enough.

The German sees no reason why he cannot do it again, saying he is in "total agreement" with the team's decision to stick with the 'old' car for another race.

"In Australia we saw that our car is not inferior to our rivals' 2002 cars, both in general and specifically, in terms of speed," said Schumacher.

"It is an advantage knowing our car so well, because we did a perfect job working on set-up over the weekend. I don't see why things should be different in Malaysia."

TYRE WARS

Tyres were crucial in a surprisingly cold Melbourne, with Ferrari's Bridgestone brand getting the upper hand over the Michelins used by Williams and McLaren.

Sepang will be hot and sweaty, conditions that can be expected to favour Ferrari's main two rivals who expect new tyre developments for the occasion, but Schumacher still expects to have the upper hand.

"I think we still have the better tyre," he said.

"I'm very optimistic about the Malaysian race. I am sure that we will be in contention for the win."

No drivers from teams other than Ferrari and McLaren have so far stood on a Malaysian podium but Colombian Juan Pablo Montoya and Michael's brother Ralf at Williams expect to change that soon enough.

"The Malaysian Grand Prix is going to be interesting for us and I believe the BMW Williams package is going to perform pretty well there and we are looking quite strong," commented Montoya.

"The car should be fairly good and in hotter conditions the tyre should work a lot better than last week in Melbourne," added the runner-up from the last race.

Ralf had a massive shunt in Australia, hitting his brother's Brazilian team mate Rubens Barrichello and then flying high before plunging into the tyre wall, and will be in the same rebuilt car.

"I have already moved on from the accident at Melbourne, and worrying about whose fault it was," he said.

"What is much more important is that our car was very competitive in Melbourne even with the pretty low temperatures there."

McLaren's David Coulthard, runner-up last season, will be one of many drivers eager to put some laps under his belt and score his first points of 2002 after failing to finish in Melbourne.

With nearly half the field involved in the first corner pile-up in Australia, eight of the 22 drivers have yet to complete a race lap this season.

Among the tail-enders, Japanese debutant Takuma Sato has yet to formally qualify for a race while Malaysian Alex Yoong will have the locals dreaming when he makes his home debut for Kuala Lumpur sponsored Minardi.