Before the race is started Olivier Panis runs into trouble with his Prost and has to start from the pitlane in the T-car. At the start Michael Schumacher is slow away while Jacques Villeneuve and Alessandro Zanardi both stall and are left behind. At the first corner Mika Hakkinen takes the lead from David Coulthard and Eddie Irvine but the Ulsterman has Michael Schumacher right behind him.

As the leaders are racing down Hangar Straight the Race Director orders a red flag but the Ferrari drivers do not know this. As they go down to Stowe, Irvine moves over for Schumacher and the German moves alongside him. For some reason Schumacher's Ferrari locks up and he slides off. He hits the barriers square on at very high speed. The race is stopped immediately while Schumacher is extracted from the car. He is taken to the medical centre and then flown by helicopter to hospital.

The race is restarted more than half an hour later with Zanardi, Villeneuve and Panis all back in the field. This time Hakkinen takes the lead but Coulthard is slower away and it is Irvine who takes second. Heinz-Harald Frentzen takes fourth with a fast-starting Ralf Schumacher in fifth and Damon Hill sixth. At the back of the grid, however, Pedro de la Rosa stalls on the grid and the Safety Car is sent out for one lap. The race restarts at the end of lap 2 and in the the laps that follow Hakkinen is able to build up a lead of five seconds by lap eight.

The order down the field remains fairly stable although Tora Takagi had a brush with Luca Badoer's Minardi, which is forced to retire. At the front the pit stops begin on lap 23 when Hill pits. He is followed in on lap 24 by Coulthard, Frentzen, Ralf Schumacher and Pedro Diniz. On lap 25 Hakkinen pits and Irvine takes the lead for a lap. Hakkinen rejoins but he has a problem with the left rear suspension and has to return to the pits on lap 26. On the same lap Irvine comes in and slightly overshoots his pit. It delays Eddie for a few seconds and Coulthard gets into the lead, although Irvine is right on his tail. Ralf Schumacher is able to get ahead of Frentzen during the stops and is third, while Heinz-Harald in fourth and Hill fifth, while Rubens Barrichello is sixth. Jacques Villeneuve does not stop and runs seventh until he pits on lap 29.

On lap 29 Hakkinen's McLaren loses its left rear tyre which bounces back onto the track and several drivers have near-misses. At the same time Villeneuve's BAR suffers a mechanical failure and stops on the main straight. Hakkinen drives into the pits on three wheels. The Safety Car is sent out for a couple of laps - which puts the leaders back together but at the end of lap 32 the race is on again. At the restart Herbert passes Alesi before the start-finish line. Herbert is later given a stop-go penalty which drops him out of contention.

Barrichello challenges Hill and takes fifth place on lap 34. The second pit stops begin on lap 40 and for a brief Frentzen takes the lead. A lap later Hill leads but then pits and when the order unwinds it is Coulthard two and a half seconds ahead of Irvine with a battle going on for third between Ralf Schumacher and Frentzen. Hill rejoins in fifth and Barrichello is sixth, although the Brazilian has to pit on lap 47 because of a puncture. Two laps later Herbert has to stop for his stop-go penalty and the Jordan drops out of contention. Both drivers charge hard in the closing laps Barrichello passing Panis, Zanardi, Alexander Wurz and Trulli to finish eighth.

In the closing laps there is a lively battle between Diniz and Fisichella for sixth place, but the Brazilian holds on to score his second point of the year.