The cars line up on the grid but there are two aborted starts before the race finally gets underway. The first sees Jarno Trulli stall. He is sent to the back of the grid. The starting process is repeated and this time it is Michael Schumacher who stalls. He is forced to start at the back, leaving Mika Hakkinen in the perfect position to control the race.

At the third start the field gets away although Johnny Herbert stalls after the lights have gone out although everyone manages to avoid the Sauber. Hakkinen takes the lead with Eddie Irvine beating David Coulthard away to grab second place. Coulthard also falls behind Heinz-Harald Frentzen's Williams. The top six is completed by Jacques Villeneuve and Damon Hill, who makes a better start than Jordan team-mate Ralf Schumacher.

Michael Schumacher drives a storming first lap to cross the finish line in 12th place at the end of the first lap. In the early laps all eyes are on the Ferrari driver as he carves his way up to seventh place by lap five, but then he gets stuck behind the battle between Villeneuve and Hill for nine laps. In that time Schumacher drops half a minute behind Hakkinen and all realistic chances of winning the race disappears. Schumacher continues to push very hard while Irvine tries to do his best to stay with Hakkinen. He begins to struggle with tyres and begins to drop away. Further back Frentzen spends the first part of the race under considerable pressure from Coulthard. There is a small gap back to Villeneuve, Hill and the two Schumacher Brothers.

On lap 15 Irvine comes into the pits and in the next few laps all the frontrunners come into the pits. In the course of the stop sequence Michael Schumacher is able to put in some fast laps and emerges in third place - ahead of Coulthard, Frentzen, Hill and Villeneuve.

While the stops are taking place Ralf Schumacher retires with a blown engine. Further back Giancarlo Fisichella gets ahead of his Benetton team-mate Alexander Wurz to run eighth.

The order stabilises with Hakkinen safely ahead of Irvine and when Eddie stops on lap 28 it is clear that he is on a three-stop strategy. Michael Schumacher is pushing hard and misses the chicane at one point and flat-spots his tyres under braking on several occasions. On lap 29 Esteban Tuero and Tora Takagi collide at the chicane and there is wreckage on the track.

Two laps later at the start of lap 32 Michael Schumacher passes the pits and his right rear tyre explodes - either because of the wreckage on the track or because the tyres are shot. He pulls off. Mika Hakkinen is World Champion. He immediately stops in the pits for his second stop and emerges ahead of Irvine - who has a third stop to come.

The order at the front does not change with the pit stops but the battle between Frentzen, Hill and Villeneuve remains intense in the closing laps. Further back Jean Alesi chases after Fisichella in their battle for seventh place.

Irvine stops again on lap 39 and is able to stay ahead of Coulthard but he is in no position to challenge Hakkinen, although Mika slows in the closing laps. He duly wins the race with Irvine second and Coulthard third.

The battle for fourth place is intense and on the last lap Hill is able to dive past Frentzen to take fourth and guarantee Jordan fourth place in the Constructors' Championship. Also on the last lap Alesi passes Fisichella for seventh place.