Massa the master at Magny-Cours

In taking the chequered flag in the French Grand Prix at Magny-Cours, and on a momentous day for Massa, he also became the first Brazilian to top the drivers' standings since his hero in Ayrton Senna led the way 15 years ago.

Massa now leads an enthralling four-way title race by two points from BMW Sauber's Robert Kubica, and five from Ferrari team-mate Kimi Raikkonen who came home second at the Circuit de Nevers.

As for Lewis Hamilton, a drive-through penalty early on - after starting from 13th on the grid - wrecked his bid for points, with the 23-year-old finishing 10th, and he now trails Massa by 10 points.

Hamilton must certainly feel as if the race stewards are against him at the moment as they compromised his early charge through the field with another penalty.

Starting from the lowest grid placing of his career after incurring a 10-place penalty for running into the back of Raikkonen in the pit lane in Canada a fortnight ago, Hamilton had made up three places by the end of the first lap.

However, the stewards deemed his pass on the Toro Rosso of Sebastian Vettel to be outside the rules, and they hammered the exuberant Briton again, and with it any hope of a top-eight finish, despite a sterling effort over the second half of the 70-lap race.

Raikkonen and Massa were proving they were in a class of their own, with the Finn seemingly having the upper hand after the first round of pit stops after which he began to pull away from his team-mate.

But then Massa slowly started to reel in the Finn as each lap passed, and it soon became clear why as he had sustained damage to his rear tailpipe, that finally worked loose 10 laps from home, resulting in him finishing 18 seconds adrift.

But it was just beyond the halfway point Massa made his move on Raikkonen, and from that moment the race was effectively run as far as the two leaders were concerned.