Fun F1

Thank God for YouTube! If you missed it, there’s an amateur video floating around showing that Lewis Hamilton contributed to the accident between Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber during the Japanese Grand Prix last weekend. Let’s hope someone else captured Alonso spinning off from start to finish because the TV directors did a good job of missing that action too..

Apparently a few copies of this video have been taken off YouTube pretty quickly so let’s hope this embedded one below works for you all..

You’d have to say Lewis was trying the oldest trick in the book – braking suddenly so that the car behind you (Webber) passes you under the safety car. Then Webber would get a drive through penalty or similar, which would have been very convenient given that he was faster than Lewis before the safety car came out…

In any case, it’d be surprising if Lewis didn’t get punished in some way for his actions (actually, it wouldn’t be surprising – this is F1 after all! 8)). Article 40.10 of the F1 Sporting Regulations states:

Once behind the safety car, the race leader must keep within 5 car lengths of it.

Eyeballing it I’d say he left at least 10 car lengths (when the safety car was out of shot right at the end)..?

The Japanese Grand Prix returned to the Fuji circuit for the first time in a long time and you can see why there hasn’t been a grand prix there for that long - the weather and conditions are terrible for Formula One racing. Old footage of previous races show a common problem – a tendency for low fog and terrible visibility (even without rain).

What this meant was we had an extremely boring grand prix with lap-after-lap behind the pace car. But once the race finally started it quickly became one of the most exciting GPs this season.

Lewis Hamilton – Brilliant. His previous racing in the wet in F1 left question marks, but at Fuji he showed what a talent he is in both qualifying and the race. He’s almost guaranteed the title now.

Fernando Alonso – It’s been surprising to see Alonso crack so much under pressure this year given that he handled the pressure from Michael Schumacher in the previous two seasons so well. You have to say Alonso’s biggest rival is himself – the most damage to his championship has come because he’s lost his cool so many times this year. It will be interesting to see if he drives a lot better in the final round if Lewis manages to clinch the title in the next race (ie. once the pressure is off).

Heikki Kovalainen – What a super drive! The way he handled the pressure from Kimi Raikkonen at the end of the race shows just how far Heikki has come. He really could be as good as people said he was before the season started.

Mark Webber – Seemed quicker than Lewis Hamilton before he got hit by Sebastian Vettel behind the pace car.. Could he have won?

Sebastian Vettel – Despite making a terrible mistake by crashing into Mark Webber behind the pace car, Sebastian Vettel was definitely the driver of the weekend. He qualified his “Minardi” in the top 10 and would almost have certainly got a podium if he kept going. It was quite sad seeing him crying in the pits after crashing. Let’s hope it doesn’t hurt him too much psychologically because this guy is definitely on the cards for “driver of the future”.

Ferrari – Even if they weren’t told about the requirement to start the race on the extreme wet tyres, where was their common sense? This really screwed the race and the championship for their drivers.

Kimi Raikkonen – An inspired fightback, but it probably won’t count for much in terms of the championship.

Robert Kubica & Felipe Massa – Very exciting to watch and I’m happy Felipe managed to bring it home ahead in the end because Robert certainly seemed to pull more “questionable” moves out of the two (not to mention almost taking Lewis Hamilton out of the race earlier)…

Ferrari managed to pull off a spectacular comeback by staging a 1-2 victory at Spa Francorchamps on the weekend. However this victory was very much overshadowed by the whole McLaren/Ferrari ’spy’ saga. It’s a real shame when the off-track politics get in the way of a good race. Not the most exciting race, but a great result for Ferrari.

Kimi Raikkonen – Kimi is starting to own Spa Francorchamps isn’t he? King Kimi of Belgium..

Felipe Massa – You have to feel for Felipe. If it wasn’t for reliability he’d be right in the championship hunt with Kimi. The way he was pushing the car at the end of the race was impressive, but we all knew he wouldn’t be allowed to take Kimi on so late in the race.

Fernando Alonso – Many times this season Fernando has gone off-track at the start of the race to avoid an accident. In Belgium, he finally did exactly what he had to do to attempt to get an upper hand – he simple held his racing line. Other than that he had absolutely no answer to the Ferrari’s, but he would have been happy being faster than Lewis Hamilton.

Lewis Hamilton – Very ironic that he had a whinge about Fernando’s driving at the start of the race. Seems he can dish it out (ask Felipe and Kimi in Italy!) but can’t take it.

Heikki Kovalainen – Did a fantastic job to keep Robert Kubica behind him in what was obviously an inferior car.

BMW – Not an impressive race for them. They still managed “best of the rest” after Ferrari and McLaren, but nothing to write home about.

Nico Rosberg – Impresses more and more..

Mark Webber – Thankfully Red Bull seem to slowly be fixing the problems and Webber is certainly delivering. He had a fantastic qualifying session and followed it up with a strong race. Top job

Adrian Sutil – I don’t get it.. There’s so much hype about how good he was driving but at the end of the day he only beat 3 cars that finished the race – and one was his teammate. Sure, he looked racey against some big names, but the fact is he still finished 14th out of 17 cars running at the end.

On a final note, it was really sad to hear of the passing of Colin McRae, his son and their friends during the race. Even though he didn’t have as much success later in his career, the guy was a complete legend. Farewell

Ok, so last time we vented about Fernando Alonso being unimpressive during the Turkish Grand Prix. This time Fernando made us eat our words (finally!). This is probably the most comfortable Fernando has looked during a race weekend all year and when he hooks it up, he really hooks it up. One can’t help but feel he had even more pace in the car, but just controlled the race.

Lewis Hamilton also drove a good race but what’s with these kamikaze passes? First with Massa and then with Raikkonen. One day someone (Fernando?) will hold their line when he tries to pass…

Now to the points:

Fernando Alonso – Finally did what we know he’s capable of. Seems to have gained some support from Ferrari fans (as Hamilton is the evil passer of Ferrari’s )

Lewis Hamilton – Good job, crazy passes. Fortune favours the brave I guess (just look at Michael Schumacher’s career!)

Kimi Raikkonen – Did a great job to get out ahead of Lewis in his pit stop. Did a half-arsed block when Lewis passed him. Would have done himself a much bigger favour if he’d closed the door properly.

Felipe Massa – LOVED how he drove in the first few laps. He had the fire in the belly and I haven’t seen an F1 car slide around like that in a long time. Shame he had this mysterious problem with the rear end of the car though.

Nick Heidfeld – Mr Consistency

Robert Kubica – Getting outdriven a bit by Nick, but still another Mr Consistency in the making.

Nico Rosberg & Heikki Kovalainen – Both these guys have done such a brilliant job this year. Heikki started slow but now they’re both making lunch out of their teammates.

Honda – They scored a point!!!

Mark Webber – Finished a race!!!

Me – I’ll shut up now!!!

Ok, so this update is a little late, but better being a little late than being Mark Webber right (who never gets there at all due to his car breaking down )..?

Felipe Massa – Great drive! What more to say? He handled the pressure from Kimi very well and both drivers were very quick.

Kimi Raikkonen – Possibly faster than Felipe in the race but couldn’t do anything about it. Once again this proves this championship will be won in qualifying.

Fernando Alonso – One of his most unimpressive races this year – and he knows it. I mean, he looked so happy on the podium you’d think he was the winner of the race!

Lewis Hamilton – I’m not sure whether he was unlucky or lucky. Unlucky to have his tyre go in the first place, but very lucky to recover from it. He really seemed to have the edge over Fernando today but once again he ballsed up the start (although this time so did Fernando, but even worse).

Nick Heidfeld – Mr Consistency and the thorn in Alonso’s side once again..

Heikki Kovalainen – Say goodbye Giancarlo Fisichella…

Nico Rosberg – Goodbye Alex Wurz too? Williams certainly seems to be finding some speed, slowly as it may be..

Ferrari – Great job to keep the championship alive. Their performance yo-yo’s a bit but they’re still in the hunt…