After a perfect first lap, now Frentzen got a little problems around the 4th corner. First he missed it on the first try, next turn he overshot by 4 spaces, only two tires left for the rest of the lap. But Villeneuve and Salo also failed this corner, so Damon Hill took his chance to close up which lead to a triple-lead for ferrari on the next turn and they could hold it until the beginning of lap 3. Seven moves behind the leader Verstappen and Zanardi fought hard for the 10th and last place. Tyrell continued the bad performance today, best car of this team placed on 6th at this time. After a terrible first lap, Ralph Schumacher had smoothly moved forward to 5th place during 2nd lap. Eight of the nine cars left over drove in the pit-stands, Jos Verstappen 8 moves after the leader Frentzen.

As lucky as Frentzen was in the first two laps, it looked like nobody could steal him the victory, even a triple-victory for Ferrari was possible at this moment, now it became a hard time for the german driver. During the third lap he failed almost everytime to reach a corner from the "Piratella"-corner to the 7th curve and lost 5 of his 7 tire-points on the way. Salo did not much better, therefore Villeneuve and Hill used the chance and closed up to the leader.
On move 36 the Ferraris and the Jaguar reached the "Rivazza"-curve side by side, Frentzen on the outside lane, Hill in the middle and Villeneuve directly behind Hill with almost all tires left. To save the last chance of the first victory in a wet race for Ferrari, only able to drive in third gear anymore, Hill stayed in the middle and Frentzen threw to the inside lane, both spending their last tire-points, to force Villeneuve also to shift down in the third gear. But the canadian kid was very frightened about this manouvre, didn't find the right gear, stayed in 4th and with full speed he crashed into the back of Hills car. On the other end of the field, Zanardi heard about this unluck of Villeneuve, fell in deep depression and resigned. The two Ferraris drove safely home their victory after this excitement.
With a perfect third lap, Ralph Schumacher used the last reserves of his car to come close behind Mika Salo and forced him to risk to much in the "Variante Passa". At the scene of the big fight short ago he teared his tires to pieces and ended his move facing against the driving direction. Starting in first gear again, Salo could only watch Schumacher passing by, going on third place and prevented a triple-victory for Ferrari this way. The best that Tyrell could give today was a fifth and sixth place but this was enough to rescue the lead for Heidfeld in the driver-championship. No points in Imola for the unlucky team of Jaguar.