As one former champion departs McLaren under a cloud, another old champ returns.

Fernando Alonso has left McLaren after a bitter season of rivalry with Lewis Hamilton. He is thought to be heading for a one-year contract with Renault while waiting for a berth with Ferrari.

Meanwhile, veteran genius Michael Schumacher is leaving retirement to test Ferrari’s title-winning car in Barcelona next week.

Seven-times World Champion, Schumacher will concentrate on optimizing the car in the context of the banning of several “cars’ driver aids” next season.

There has been talk of a possible offer from McLaren to the old warhorse to fill the gap created by Alonso’s departure.

In what was yet another dismal race for Lewis Hamilton, the young rookie driver could only trail in 7th in the Brazil Grand Prix after a bad start and repeated gear box failures.

Kimi Raikkonen winner of the 2007 Drivers’ Championship

Given the wall of ill-fate he encountered, his heroic attempts to claw his way back up the field, once the McLaren team had fixed his gear box remotely, at least got him into the points.

Kimi Raikkonen won the race in his Ferrari and took the Drivers’ World Championship, clocking up six wins in the season to Hamilton and Alonso’s four each.

Raikkonen ended a bad-tempered season on 110 points, while Hamilton and Alonso shared second place one point adrift.

Ron Dennis will probably be grateful that a truly awful season, in which his team was fined an eye-watering $100m, can now be put to rest.

However, he did attempt to appeal against a stewards’ decision not to penalize other teams for using fuel at lower temperatures than are required by the rules.

The result stands.

After being cleared by a FIA inquiry in mid-week into what appeared to be dangerous driving in the Japanese Grand Prix, Lewis Hamilton made a pig’s ear of the Chinese GP when only 25 laps from the World Championship title.

Later, he was man enough to admit he’d misjudged the state of his tyres when forced to retire by erratic road-holding.

The race was won by Kimi Raikkonen, with Fernando Alonso second. The result sets up a three-way fight for the championship in the final Grand Prix of the season in Brazil.

Hamilton will kick himself all the way to the bank if he loses the title now.

In a rain drenched race which forced the safety car to slow down the drivers for an extended period, Lewis Hamilton showed his mettle by taking the chequered flag and maximum points.

Luck was on the British rookie’s side in the Japanese Grand Prix as arch-rival, Fernando Alonso, failed to finish when his car seemed to break up in mid track.

However, more controversy has followed the result. The world championship leader has been accused by Red Bull driver Mark Webber of causing him to hit Toro Rosso’s Sebastian Vettel by speeding up and slowing down behind the safety car.

Footage taken from the grandstand is believed to show Hamilton dramatically decelerating and causing the shunt behind him. In theory this could lose him points in the FIA inquiry currently taking place.

However, it’s unlikely the sport will shoot the golden goose and lose the feelgood finale now building up for the last two races of the season.