SPA-FRANCORCHAMPS: Kimi Raikkonen held off Force India driver Giancarlo Fisichella to win Formula One's Belgian Grand Prix on Sunday, the Ferrari driver's fourth triumph at the high-speed track in the past five years.

The 2007 world champion, who started sixth, overtook pole sitter Fisichella immediately after the safety car came in following accidents on the opening lap - including one involving overall F1 leader Jenson Button - and held on for a 0.9-second victory.

Championship contender Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull, who had retired with engine failures in the last two races, finished third to gain on Button.

Button failed to finish in the points for the first time, and Rubens Barrichello moved within 16 points of his Brawn GP teammate after finishing seventh despite an oil leak that had the car belching blue smoke with two laps to go. Barrichello's car caught fire as he drove into the pit lane.

Button leads the drivers' standings with 72 points, followed by Barrichello with 56 and Vettel with 53. Mark Webber of Red Bull, who finished ninth after a drive-through penalty, trails by 20.5 points.

"This championship is a little crazy, to be honest," Vettel said after the Austrian team had also cut Brawn GP's constructors' series lead to 23.5 points. "It's up and down. (But) we're still in reach." Raikkonen picked up his first win since last year's Spanish GP in a season made unpredictable by rule changes. The Finn is the sixth straight different winner of an F1 race.

"It's a proper circuit, an old-style circuit," said Raikkonen, who clinched Ferrari's fifth win in seven races at the Spa-Francorchamps circuit. "It's just been good to me." A day after earning the Indian team its first pole, Fisichella managed to secure the former Spyker team's first-ever points after 30 races. But the result was slightly bittersweet for the 36-year-old Italian.

"I'm a little bit sad for that because I was keeping (Kimi's) pace and exactly same strategy race," said Fisichella after an F1 race was won by less than 1-second for the 66th time. "It's great for second. But actually we could have won the race." Although rain didn't complicate the start, several accidents on the opening lap did - including Button's.

Fisichella held pole into the high speed Eau Rouge corner as Raikkonen passed the slow starting Barrichello to the outside to sit behind Robert Kubica, who had cut inside, for third.

Several cars touched in the opening corner, with Barrichello and Jarno Trulli both having to pit for repairs, but Trulli eventually retired after starting second.

Romain Grosjean of Renault then ran into Button, who went spinning into the wall at Les Combes. McLaren driver Lewis Hamilton and Jaime Alguersuari of Toro Rosso also exited at the same turn after the young Spanish driver hit the defending F1 champion and sent them both into the wall.

"I didn't know what happened, but I got hit from behind," Button said. "It didn't matter anyway because we weren't competitive here." Raikkonen used his KERS overtaking boost to pass Fisichella for the lead immediately after the safety car pitted as the two entered Kemmel Straight, and he held after the first round of pit stops when both pitted at same time.

"After that it was just a matter of making no mistakes," Raikkonen said.

Raikkonen and Fisichella both pitted with 13 laps to go, with the Ferrari nursing a 1-second advantage, but Raikkonen managed to pull out quicker and held to join Ayrton Senna, Michael Schumacher and Jim Clark as the only drivers to triumph at Spa on at least four occasions.

Ferrari goes to the upcoming Italian GP - another high speed, low downforce circuit - with hopes of a win, while Fisichella continued to beat back questions as to whether he would replace Luca Badoer, who qualified last again for Ferrari, at Monza.

"Even if I receive a call from them, it's not easy," Fisichella said.

Barrichello said a stalled clutch was to blame for his poor start.

"I was very lucky today, to finish in the points with the engine smoking as it was is a positive," the 37-year-old Brazilian said.

Fernando Alonso, who was running third on a one-pit strategy, pitted after 24 laps in good shape but a problem removing his front left wheel - which had touched against Adrian Sutil in the opening corner - eventually forced him to retire.

"Today I missed an opportunity to be on the podium," the Renault driver said.

Kubica and Nick Heidfeld saw BMW Sauber completed the top-five.

Heikki Kovalainen of McLaren was sixth and Nico Rosberg of Williams rounded out the points in eighth.

AP-TK-30-08-09 1605GMT<.