Magny-Cours, France (My Sportsbook) - Michael Schumacher captured Sunday's French Grand Prix at the Circuit de Nevers, his eighth win at Magny-Cours. The No.5 Ferrari crossed the finish line 10.131 seconds ahead of Fernando Alonso.

The victory was Schumacher's fourth of the season and record 88th of his Formula One career. No other driver has ever won eighth times at any track in the series.

Pole winner Schumacher brought the 22-car field to the green flag for 70 laps of racing. He quickly moved out to a solid lead as Alonso couldn't get past Felipe Massa. Alonso tried at the Adelaide hairpin but again couldn't get past the No.2 man at Ferrari.

Schumacher's lead was 1.7 seconds after the first lap as Massa continued to hold up Alonso. All three drivers were pulling away from fourth place Jarno Trulli.

The seven-time champion slowly expanded his lead over teammate Massa and Alonso and the gap was 3.2 seconds on lap six.

Was he actually faster than the other two or was Massa's job to keep Alonso from Schumacher's rear bumper?

Schumacher set fastest lap on lap eight and again on lap 11 as he continued to push his Ferrari to the limit.

Massa came in on lap 16 allowing Alonso the chance to gain on Schumacher. But Alonso came in one lap later and appeared to take enough fuel to reach the finish in two stops.

Schumacher came in on lap 18, but didn't take as much fuel as Alonso, seemingly on a three-stop strategy.

When the first round of pit stops were completed, Schumacher returned to the top spot. Massa and Alonso were 6.1 and 11.1 seconds behind, respectively.

Kimi Raikkonen got around a surprisingly fast Jarno Trulli for fourth.

Could he get into the fray with the two Ferraris and Alonso?

The top-three continued to lap at similar pace, so the margins stayed relatively similar, but Raikkonen was the fastest car on the track on lap 30.

A second round stop for Schumacher and he came out just behind Alonso, who had yet to stop for a second time.

If Alonso was on a two-stop strategy then he had the lead and both drivers still had one more stop to make.

Alonso came in for the final time with 28 laps remaining. A 9.6-second stop had him good to go to the checkered flag. He returned in third place, 24.3 seconds behind Schumacher.

For Alonso to win, he would have to cut that margin to about 19 seconds before Schumacher made his stop around lap 54.

But it was Schumacher who was the faster of the two championship contenders. He set fastest lap again on lap 46 (1:17.111) and the gap widened to 26.9 seconds.

Schumacher's pace was too much for Alonso, who now had his sights set on just beating Massa and keeping the point loss to a minimum.

Massa pitted and rejoined in third place seven seconds behind Alonso.

Schumacher had the lead up to more than 30 seconds when he came in for the final time. No errors by the pit crew and Schumacher re-entered with his huge lead (18.5 seconds) still intact.

Only a mechanical failure or a driver mistake could keep Schumacher from a record eighth French Grand Prix win.

None was forthcoming.

Over the final laps the only question remaining was whether Massa could make a run at Alonso and steal two championship points from the defending World Champion.

With 10 laps to go, Massa closed to within six seconds of the Renault. But that was as close as he could come and the Brazilian had to settle for third place.

Ralf Schumacher, Raikkonen, Giancarlo Fisichella, Pedro de la Rosa and Nick Heidfeld completed the points-scoring positions.

Alonso remains the points leader, but the margin was cut to 17 points by Michael Schumacher's win (96-79).

The next race is the series is set for Sunday, July 30th in Hockenheim, Germany.