By ROB HARRISAP Sports Writer
SILVERSTONE, England − Ferrari's plans were foiled by a drive-through sanction for the second straight Formula One race, with Fernando Alonso at the center of the dispute again as the team left Sunday's British Grand Prix pointless.
"We seem to be really cursed at the moment, when everything that could go wrong does,'' Ferrari team principal Stefano Domenicali said.
At Silverstone, Alonso was punished for going off the track as a shortcut to overtake Robert Kubica, although the penalty was only imposed several laps after the Renault driver was slowing.
Before Alonso could hand the place back, Kubica was forced to retire with driveshaft failure.
"We feel that it is very harsh,'' Domenicali said. "You can have a situation where immediately there is a possibility to give position back to a driver if you feel there is really an advantage to be gained but on our side we felt that was not the case, otherwise we would have done it.''
Fueling Ferrari's anger is that this incident came two weeks after the team protested the decision to hand Lewis Hamilton his drive-through sanction for overtaking the safety car only when he had already surged far enough ahead not to lose second place.
Alonso, who was behind Hamilton at the time of the illegal maneuver at the European Grand Prix, lost time and slipped down the field. He only managed to move up to eighth after time penalties were handed to several drivers for infringements.
"It is a period where everything is going in the wrong direction,'' Domenicali said. "In this moment we need to stay cool and we need to react to the facts. I'm sure that after these bad moments, the luck will come back and maybe we will move towards the others. We just need to believe in ourselves.''
In another Ferrari calamity on Sunday, Alonso bumped wheels with Felipe Massa, forcing his teammate into the pits for a new set of tires. Having started from seventh, Massa trudged home in 15th.
For the first time this season, Ferrari finished outside the points.
Alonso is now fifth in the overall standings with 98 points, 47 behind championship leader Hamilton on 145, while Massa is eighth with 67. Ferrari is third in the constructors' championship, 113 points behind leader McLaren with 278 and 84 adrift of Red Bull on 249.
There was one piece of positive news for Ferrari on Sunday. As a result of the Valencia incident last month, world governing body FIA announced before the race that the safety car no longer has to be deployed straight away.
FIA said it wants to ensure ``that no drivers will be unnecessarily disadvantaged. In all cases we will attempt to pick up the leader.''
HOME CHEER: While Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button failed to deliver the one-two home fans craved, McLaren bosses were more than happy to remain the championship front-runners on a weekend of car troubles.
Sluggish practice sessions on Friday had forced McLaren to abandon much-heralded rear exhaust diffusers, with engineers working late into the night to reconfigure the British duo's cars ahead of qualifying.
The grid positions Button in 14th and Hamilton in fourth led to a realignment of McLaren expectations on Saturday night. But they profited in Sunday's race from slip-ups by rivals, with Hamilton finishing second for the second straight race to retain the championship lead and Button making up 10 places to finish fourth.
``Although we didn't win ... today is a good day,'' team principal Martin Whitmarsh said. ``In the past four grand prix we've scored 149 points out of a possible 172.''
Hamilton moved up to second after pole-sitter Sebastian Vettel made a poor start, allowing second-place Red Bull teammate Mark Webber to overtake him.
``Considering how far behind we were in practice, we really didn't expect to be this far up,'' Hamilton said. ``We've got two weeks to work on our upgrades before the next grand prix. I won the last race at Hockenheim, in 2008, and if we can get the new floor there, we should be looking pretty strong.''
The German Grand Prix is on July 25.
While world champion Button was pleased to make up 10 places at Silverstone, Hamilton doubled his championship lead to 12 points.
``The only pain is that Lewis has pulled away a bit, but we'll try and get that back at the next race,'' Button said.
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