Prac Three: Sutil does it again for Force India

Saturday 12th September 2009

There seems to be no stopping Adrian Sutil this weekend in Italy as the Force India driver finished his second successive session quickest of all.

Force India came to the fore at the previous race in Belgium where Giancarlo Fisichella finished on the podium. But with Fisi having left the team it's been up to Sutil to continue the attack, which the German has done with gusto.

Sutil set the fastest time in Saturday's final practice where not only was he quicker than Jenson Button and Nick Heidfeld on the softer option tyres through the final five minutes but he also had the measure of Lewis Hamilton's McLaren when Hamilton was on softs and Sutil was on the harder tyres.

As for Fisichella, he crashed his Ferrari F60 at the turn in to Parabolica and finished at the very bottom of the timesheets.

Report: Sunny skies and hot temperatures greeted the drivers at the start of the final practice session for the Italian GP. Tonio Liuzzi and Sebastien Buemi got proceedings underway as the field ventured out for their standard installation laps before returning to the pits.

Giancarlo Fisichella and Jaime Alguersuari headed out for the first timed laps of the morning, joined by Buemi, who is using a new engine, and Liuzzi. Fisichella crossed the line with a 1:28.402, taking 1.3s off his time on his second lap. Buemi, Luizzi and Alguersuari lined up behind the Ferrari driver. Liuzzi improved to first place with a 1:26.268 while Kimi Raikkonen took second place. Nico Rosberg went sixth. Liuzzi continued lapping and dropped the benchmark to a 1:25.332. Buemi went second and Adrian Sutil fourth. Raikkonen returned to the P1 slot with a 1:25.309.

Lewis Hamilton was the next to lead the way as the McLaren driver clocked a 1:25.180 on his very first flying lap. Impressive pace from the MP4-24. His team-mate Heikki Kovalainen went sixth ahead of Alguersuari and Nico Rosberg. Hamilton improved his time with Kovalainen jumping up to second behind him. The duo, though, were soon split by the arrival of Timo Glock into second place. Sutil moved into fourth.

The yellow flags came out when 27 minutes into the session, Fisichella crashed his Ferrari F60. The Italian, who is making his debut for the Italian marque, wasn't able to stop the car heading into the Parabolica, which sent him on a trip over the gravel and into the barriers. Fisichella claimed unaided from the car and trudged back to the Ferrari garages.

With the flags lifted Fernando Alonso was quick to pounce as he took third place while his team-mate Romain Grosjean went sixth ahead of Jenson Button and Kazuki Nakajima.

Mark Webber finally ventured out with 26 minutes remaining in teh session. Red Bull are limiting their drivers' running due to the fact that both are running out of fresh engines. The Aussie, though, was slowest of all with his team-mate Sebastian Vettel P19.

Strapping on the softer tyres, Hamilton improved his benchmark time to a 1:23.929, however, he was soon cut down by Sutil, who despite using the harder option tyres took second place, just 0.179s behind the World Champion. Sutil continued lapping and took the P1 slot off Hamilton with a 1:23.735. And all this on the harder tyres!

Button climbed to fifth place and then third as he too lapped the Monza track with the harder tyres - and no KERS. Liuzzi took seventh, then sixth and Raikkonen eighth. Vettel improved to 18th place and Webber 16th, leaving Trulli and the crashed Fisichella at the bottom of the timesheets.

Grosjean put his Renault into a impressive slide but managed to get back on track. A few minutes later he was off again and onto the gravel, leaping over the grass before heading back to the Renault pits.

With five minutes remaining, the drivers ventured out for their final runs. Kovalainenn moved up to fourth, Barrichello fifth, Liuzzi sixth, Trulli eighth, Sutil improved his benchmark time, Barrichello second, Alonso third, Kovalainen second, Button took first with a 1:23.404, Sutil quickest with a 1:23.336, Hamilton third and Heidfeld third.

Times
01 A. Sutil Force India F1 1:23.336 21 laps
02 J. Button Brawn GP 1:23.404 21 laps
03 N. Heidfeld BMW 1:23.490 18 laps
04 R. Barrichello Brawn GP 1:23.575 20 laps
05 L. Hamilton McLaren 1:23.633 18 laps
06 H. Kovalainen McLaren 1:23.803 20 laps
07 V. Liuzzi Force India F1 1:23.849 21 laps
08 F. Alonso Renault 1:23.915 17 laps
09 T. Glock Toyota 1:23.959 21 laps
10 R. Kubica BMW 1:23.996 18 laps
11 R. Grosjean Renault 1:24.197 15 laps
12 K. Räikkönen Ferrari 1:24.302 20 laps
13 J. Trulli Toyota 1:24.326 17 laps
14 K. Nakajima Williams 1:24.392 20 laps
15 S. Buemi Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:24.572 23 laps
16 N. Rosberg Williams 1:24.621 21 laps
17 M. Webber Red Bull 1:25.154 13 laps
18 S. Vettel Red Bull 1:25.244 16 laps
19 J. Alguersuari Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:25.791 10 laps
20 G. Fisichella Ferrari 1:25.951 10 laps

Source : Planet F1

Belgian Race Report: What A Race, What A Result

Sunday 30th August 2009

Kimi Raikkonen claimed the victory in the Belgian GP, just managing to hold off Force India's Giancarlo Fisichella - and what a race it was.

After Valencia's tedium and snores, Spa-Francorchamps delivered the exact opposite with no fewer than four drivers, including Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton, crashing out at Les Combes on the opening lap.

This brought out the Safety Car with Fisichella, who had started from pole position, leading the way ahead of Raikkonen. But three laps later, with the debris clear and the Safety Car coming in, Raikkonen launched his attack, easily taking the lead from the Force India driver.

Game over - or so many thought...

Race Report
With no rain predicted for the race, in bright sunny conditions, Giancarlo Fisichella led the drivers round on a very slow parade lap. The ambient temperature was at 16C with the track at 30C.

As the lights went out the man in P4 on the grid was immediately in trouble, the anti-stall mechanism on the Brawn kicking in and Rubens failing to get underway for the third time this year and everyone streaming past him on the grid.

Into La Source and Kimi Raikkonen was forced out wide by the gaggle of cars at the apex, while further back Jenson Button also took that route. Polesitter Giancarlo Fisichella had got away cleanly into the lead, but behind him P2 man Trulli was overtaken on the inside by Nick Heidfeld and on the outside by Raikkonen.

Heidfeld, once past Trulli, effectively into P2 or P3 by now, was slow away from La Source and Trulli ran his front wing into him, loosening it but thankfully it remained in place. Heidfeld's lack of pace on the exit was seized upon by Robert Kubica who swept through on the inside and into P2.

Down the hill they charged: Fisichella, Kubica, Raikkonen (joining from the run-off) followed by Heidfeld, Trulli, Glock and the two Red Bulls.

Further back Adrian Sutil had taken a tightish line into La Source only to find Nico Rosberg inside him and Fernando Alonso inside Rosberg. Contact with Rosberg spun Sutil around and as the Williams driver escaped, Fernando Alonso ran over Sutil's front wing.

It seemed as though Alonso had got away with it, but events later in the race would prove otherwise.

Down the hill to Eau Rouge they charged, the rest of the pack trampling over Sutil's front wing. Kimi Raikkonen, using the Ferrari's KERS button, was straight onto the tail of Kubica and easily outdragged him up the hill to Les Combes, although the Ferrari driver was tentative on the brakes into the corner and took a narrower angle than the normal racing line. Slow on the exit, he was almost punted up the rear by Kubica.

Behind them, Nick Heidfeld missed his braking and went over the grass on the inside, losing a place to Glock and Trulli straight away and subsequently Mark Webber.

Behind them, Jenson Button had got a reasonable start and was P11 (from P14) through Eau Rouge. Going up the hill to Les Combes he got on the inside of Kovalainen and was able to outbrake the McLaren on the outside to take P10 - at which point Romain Grosjean's Renault - trying to follow him through- hooked a wheel inside of his and spun the BrawnGP car into the barriers, wrecking his own car against the Armco in the process.

Lewis Hamilton had got a poor start with the anti-stall almost kicking in and was coping with Barrichello coming up on the outside at Les Combes when he was clattered into by the Red Bull of Jaime Alguesuari. Four drivers out in one corner. The stewards decided they would investigate both incidents after the race.

Something they didn't investigate, but surely must, was Rubens Barrichello's overtaking of a pack of cars using the outside escape route at Les Combes. Barrichello recovered maginificently from last place on the grid and dodged round a few cars at La Sourceand in the run down to Eau Rouge. Up the hill into Les Combes he was alongside Hamilton on the outside, realised he wasn't going to make the turn and took the escape road, dodging all the frantic action involving the four wrecked cars.

With four cars out and debris at La Source it was an easy decision to call out the Safety Car. So as Giancarlo Fisichella led everyone over the line the race order was: Fisichella, Raikkonen, Kubica, Glock, Webber, Heidfeld, Rosberg, Vettel, Alonso, Kovalainen.

Vettel was soon on the radio complaining that Rosberg had overtaken him under Safety Car conditions while Trulli, Barrichello and Sutil headed for the pits. Trulli and Sutil needed new front wings and Barrichello took the opportunity of taking on more fuel under Safety Car conditions - the Brawn having gone the lightest in qualifying.

The race was restarted on Lap 5 but already the major dramas were over. Fisichella didn't manage to shake off Kimi Raikkonen in the corners before the start and as the Ferrari followed the Force India car through Eau Rouge, KERS power was easily able to take him past before Les Combes.

From that point on it was assumed that Raikkonen would open a gap to Fisichella in his cruise to his fourth Belgian GP victory - especially when he set the Fastest Lap on Lap 8 with a 1:47.749. It didn't happen.

On Lap 12 the first pit-stops started to unfold and it was assumed that the Red Bulls - who had gone slightly longer on fuel - would start to take advantage. Glock and Kubica came in first and Toyota had to switch to the reserve fuel ring for Glock sending him back down the race order from P4 before the stop.

On Lap 13 Nick Heidfeld showed his intention of getting a place back off Mark Webber by setting the Fastest lap at 1:47.738.

A lap later and both Raikkonen and Fisichella pitted together, their cars separated by an entire pitlane but the positions staying the same. Behind them, Mark Webber and Nick Heidfeld pitted at the same time. Heidfeld got away first and looked to have made up a position, but just as the BMW approached the Red Bull garage the Red Bull lollypop was raised.

It was yet another dangerous Red Bull release and though they had got away with one the race before, this time round Heidfeld had to take avoiding action and brake to avoid running into the back of Webber in the pitlane. Whether that was on the team's mind or not is unknown but Heidfeld was able to overtake Webber going into Les Combes that lap, while Rubens Barrichello pulled a fantastic overtaking move into the high-speed Blanchimont of all places.

The incident must have severely unsettled Webber because the following lap he started to block and move around in the braking zone trying to keep the Force India of Adrian Sutil behind going into Les Combes.

Red Bull team-mate Sebastian Vettel had a much better time of it, jumping Heidfeld for a place and also his team-mate in the process. It was then announced that Webber would have to serve a drive-through penalty for the team's (not his) pitlane mess-up. He emerged from the pitlane on Lap 18 back in P.13.

The positions on Lap 19 were: 1.Raikkonen, 0.9 in front of... 2.Fisichella, 3.Alonso (not stopped), 4.Kubica, 5.Kovalainen (not stopped), 6.Buemi (not stopped), 7.Vettel, 8.Heidfeld, 9.Barrichello, 10.Sutil

Lap 20 and 21 saw a remarkable feat. Luca Badoer set the timing screens to purple setting the fastest first sector on successive laps.

The Ferrari team were keen for Kimi Raikkonen to put a gap between himself and Giancarlo Fisichella, fearful that the Force India could run a lap or two longer in the middle stint. They asked him to push and try and edge him by a tenth of a second a lap (interestingly it was not Kimi's engineer Chris Dyer who passed on the message). This was duly broadcast on television and then relayed back to Fisichella behind.

By Lap 24 the gap was still only 0.7 though, the Force India easily having the legs of the Ferrari. If Force India could run longer, then they were sitting pretty.

Fernando Alonso was still in P3 and yet to have his first pit-stop. On Lap 25 he came in for what would be his solo stop of the race. However his front left tyre wheel would not accept the wheel spinner and after several seconds of wrestling, the mechanic had to give up and use a replacement.

This was the same wheel that had impacted Adrian Sutil's Force India on the first corner, a result of Alonso taking a risky narrow inside line. The delay had dropped him from P3 to a disastrous P14 and a lap later the team brought him back in to retire as the telemetry showed that the wheel might come loose. They were not going to run the risk of what had happened in Hungary.

Towards the end of the second stint Sebastian Vettel started to close on Robert Kubica's P3 and back in P5, Nick Heidfeld began to close on the pair of them. The two BMWs pitted on Lap 30 and Lap 32 while Vettel was able to stay out till Lap 35 and leapfrog past Kubica.

The biggest battle was always going to be Ferrari versus Force India in the final pit-stops. On Lap 31 the Ferrari mechanics came out into the pitlane and must have been very relieved to find the Force India crew out at the same time. Neither made a mistake and though they resumed in P2 and P3, when Vettel stopped four laps later they would resume P1 and P2.

So on Lap 36 the order with gaps in front of the next car was:
1.Raikkonen 0.8
2.Fisichella 5.9
3.Vettel 2.5
4.Kubica 2.7
5.Heidfeld 12.6
6.Kovalainen
7.Barrichello
8.Rosberg
9.Webber
10.Glock

Vettel put in a series of Fastest Laps in a vain attempt to catch Fisichella and Raikkonen but was never close enough. In the closing laps of the race the excitement was provided by Rubens Barrichello's car which started to blow smoke intermittently on lap 42 of 44 and then constantly from Lap 43 onwards. It gave hope to the following Rosberg in P8 and Webber in P9, but Rubens managed to nurse his car to the line and 7th place.

It was the Ferrari team's first win of 2009, but the biggest celebrants were Force India. Having not scored a point all year, they easily had the fastest car in the race and had scored eight in one go. What's more, they stand even more of a chance for a race win at Monza in two weeks' time.

Sebastian Vettel will be relieved to have finished on the podium again, but the Red Bull team will have been hoping for much more from the race. BMW picked up 4th and 5th through Kubica and Heidfeld and Heikki Kovalainen came home unchallenged in 6th.

Yet again it proved Spa's remarkable ability to provide a memorable race. Even without rain.

FH

Results
01 K. Räikkönen Ferrari 1:23:50.995
02 G. Fisichella Force India F1 + 0.938
03 S. Vettel Red Bull + 3.875
04 R. Kubica BMW + 9.966
05 N. Heidfeld BMW + 11.276
06 H. Kovalainen McLaren + 32.763
07 R. Barrichello Brawn GP + 35.461
08 N. Rosberg Williams + 36.208
09 M. Webber Red Bull + 36.959
10 T. Glock Toyota + 41.490
11 A. Sutil Force India F1 + 42.636
12 S. Buemi Scuderia Toro Rosso + 46.106
13 K. Nakajima Williams + 54.241
14 L. Badoer Ferrari + 1:42.177
Did not finish
15 F. Alonso Renault + 18 lap(s)
16 J. Trulli Toyota + 23 lap(s)
17 J. Button Brawn GP + 44 lap(s)
18 R. Grosjean Renault + 44 lap(s)
19 L. Hamilton McLaren + 44 lap(s)
20 J. Alguersuari Scuderia Toro Rosso + 44 lap(s)

Source : Planet F1

Fisichella takes shock pole at Spa

Giancarlo Fisichella took an historic and surprising first pole position for Force India in qualifying for the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa.

The 36-year-old Italian veteran took his fourth career pole in an extraordinary session, though the car had looked quick through the weekend.

Fisichella - linked to replace Luca Badoer at Ferrari for Monza – kept up the tradition of old-timers following Rubens Barrichello's European GP triumph to set a time of 1m46.308s that could not be matched by Jarno Trulli's Toyota or Nick Heidfeld's third-placed BMW.

Barrichello was the top 'front-runner' in fourth position. The Brazilian is well-placed to make up ground on the championship leader and team-mate Jenson Button, who failed to make it out of Q2.

Robert Kubica was fifth fastest in the second BMW, having briefly occupied a front row slot until the final shakedown in the last minute of the session.

The Pole will start just in front of Kimi Raikkonen, who was sixth ahead of Timo Glock, Sebastian Vettel, Mark Webber and Nico Rosberg, who did well to wrestle the Williams into the top ten.

Several of the big names were knocked out in a curious Q2 session.

Trulli set the early pace in Q2 with an incredible 1m44.865s in the Toyota. He then lowered that to an even more amazing 1m44.766s.

That was good enough for much of the session, until Fisichella thumped in a 1m44.667s in the final moments. But even that was not the fastest time as Trulli managed a 1m44.503s to take the top place back again.

Then Kubica and Vettel pushed the Force India back to fourth.

All this action at the front contributed to those famous names being knocked out of Q3 – Lewis Hamilton ending up 12th, Fernando Alonso 13th and Button 14th. The Brawn driver in particular was perplexed to have been unable to match Barrichello, who of course did make it through in sixth.

Fisichella had already impressed in Q1, setting the fastest time, 0.38s faster than Trulli's Toyota.

Barrichello meanwhile was third in the opening segment of qualifying, despite running off the track at Fagnes early on, ahead of the second Force of India Sutil and the Red Bulls of Webber and Vettel.

Alonso only made it into Q2 by the skin of his teeth, having ruined his best lap after running wide on the exit of Fagnes.

Button and Hamilton also only just made it through too, in 14th and 15th positions.

Luca Badoer, who needed to find 0.5s on his final run – having set a personal best of 1m46.957s – crashed at Les Combes after going wide on the entry on his final attempt. It rendered him last on the grid.

Sebastien Buemi, Jaime Alguersuari, Kazuki Nakajima and Romain Grosjean all also failed to make it beyond the opening 20 minutes.

Pos  Driver       Team                       Q1        Q2        Q3      
1.  Fisichella   Force India-Mercedes  (B)  1:45.102  1:44.667  1:46.308
2.  Trulli       Toyota                (B)  1:45.140  1:44.503  1:46.395
3.  Heidfeld     BMW-Sauber            (B)  1:45.566  1:44.709  1:46.500
4.  Barrichello  Brawn-Mercedes        (B)  1:45.237  1:44.834  1:46.513
5.  Kubica       BMW-Sauber            (B)  1:45.655  1:44.557  1:46.586
6.  Raikkonen    Ferrari               (B)  1:45.579  1:44.953  1:46.633
7.  Glock        Toyota                (B)  1:45.450  1:44.877  1:46.677
8.  Vettel       Red Bull-Renault      (B)  1:45.372  1:44.592  1:46.761
9.  Webber       Red Bull-Renault      (B)  1:45.350  1:44.924  1:46.788
10.  Rosberg      Williams-Toyota       (B)  1:45.486  1:45.047  1:47.362
11.  Sutil        Force India-Mercedes  (B)  1:45.486  1:45.119
12.  Hamilton     McLaren-Mercedes      (B)  1:45.239  1:45.122
13.  Alonso       Renault               (B)  1:45.767  1:45.136
14.  Button       Brawn-Mercedes        (B)  1:45.707  1:45.251
15.  Kovalainen   McLaren-Mercedes      (B)  1:45.761  1:45.259
16.  Buemi        Toro Rosso-Ferrari    (B)  1:45.705
17.  Alguersuari  Toro Rosso-Ferrari    (B)  1:45.951
18.  Nakajima     Williams-Toyota       (B)  1:46.032
19.  Grosjean     Renault               (B)  1:46.307
20.  Badoer       Ferrari               (B)  1:46.359

Source : Autosport

Qualy: Hamilton leads all-McLaren front row

Saturday 22nd August 2009

Lewis Hamilton continued McLaren's resurgence, claiming pole position for the European GP after outpacing his team-mate by 0.034s.

The Brit, coming to Valencia off the back of his Hungarian GP win, crossed the line with a 1:39.498 and appeared to have the pace to better that before opting instead to pit having already secured the coveted grid slot.

Heikki Kovalainen, who is use the old McLaren chassis that is reported two-tenths slower than the shorter wheel-based chassing being used by Hamilton, finished in second place, 0.034s behind his team-mate.

Rubens Barrichello claimed third place for Brawn GP, also less than a tenth off Hamilton's time while Sebastian Vettel qualified fourth and, importantly, ahead of Championship leader Jenson Button.

Kimi Raikkonen was next in line, P6 for Ferrari, with Nico Rosberg and Fernando Alonso completing the top eight.

Meanwhile, Luca Badoer's first qualifying session in a decade didn't go according to plan as the Ferrari test driver finished P20, almost three seconds off the pace.

Full report to follow...

Times
01 L. Hamilton McLaren 1:39.498
02 H. Kovalainen McLaren 1:39.532
03 R. Barrichello Brawn GP 1:39.563
04 S. Vettel Red Bull 1:39.789
05 J. Button Brawn GP 1:39.821
06 K. Räikkönen Ferrari 1:40.144
07 N. Rosberg Williams 1:40.185
08 F. Alonso Renault 1:40.236
09 M. Webber Red Bull 1:40.239
10 R. Kubica BMW 1:40.512
11 N. Heidfeld BMW 1:38.826
12 A. Sutil Force India F1 1:38.846
13 T. Glock Toyota 1:38.991
14 R. Grosjean Renault 1:39.040
15 S. Buemi Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:39.514
16 G. Fisichella Force India F1 1:39.531
17 K. Nakajima Williams 1:39.795
18 J. Trulli Toyota 1:39.807
19 J. Alguersuari Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:39.925
20 L. Badoer Ferrari 1:41.413

Source : Planet F1

Prac Two: Alonso delights Spanish fans

Fernando Alonso delighted his Spanish fans by finishing Friday's practice in the P1 slot despite a bit of a coming together with Nick Heidfeld.

Alonso proved to be there and there about throughout the session, often going quickest before dropping a few places only to then rise to the top. But, with 15 minutes left on the clock, the Spaniard locked his brakes, sending him into the side of Heidfeld's BMW. The damage put Heidfeld out of the session although a new front wing saw Alonso put in a blistering 1:39.404.

The Renault driver's time was a staggering 0.774s up on Jenson Button's best while his Brawn GP team-mate Rubens Barrichello was third quickest.

Meanwhile, Romain Grosjean finished in 13th place, Luca Badoer 18th and Jaime Alguersuari 19th. As for Lewis Hamilton, he was P20 after a minor coming together with the barriers ended his session.

Report: Sweltering conditions and a track temperature of 44'C greeted the drivers as Sebastien Buemi, Nico Rosberg and Jaime Alguersuari led out the field for their installation laps. While most pitted after one lap, Buemi stayed out to set the afternoon's first time, a 1:43.726 and was quickly joined by others. Mark Webber went second, Alguersuari third and Luca Badoer fourth. The timesheets changed, though, as Lewis Hamilton went quickest with a 1:43.214. Fernando Alonso took fourth place with Heikki Kovalainen seventh and Kazuki Nakajima eighth.

Hamilton put his McLaren into a spin and stopped facing the wrong way, not the greatest feeling as one of the Toro Rosso's came speeding past him. The Brit, however, quickly through another spin to face the right way and continued lapping. Meanwhile, Alonso overhauled his time by half a second to go fastest. Kovalainen went second with Adrian Sutil putting in another great lap to take third place. His team-mate Giancarlo Fisichella went fifth only to be dropped by Jenson Button.

Buemi moved up to second place, Rubens Barrichello took ninth and Romain Grosjean tenth as the French racer continued to impress in his debut outing. Nico Rosberg slotted in to second place, 0.449s off Alonso's best, with Barrichello behind him in third. Grosjean also found some pace, taking eighth place, less than a second off Alonso's time. Nakajima moved up to the order, going third behind his team-mate, who had closed the gap to less than a tenth to Alonso. Webber climbed to third.

At the back of the pack, Badoer continued to battle for pace, 3.8s slower than the lead driver. Not a great start to the Ferrari man's first weekend as a Scuderia driver. His team-mate Kimi Raikkonen improved to fifth place while moments later Badoer left the bottom of the timesheets to take P19. Barrichello moved into the top three before he was overhauled by Sutil.

Meanwhile, Hamilton was left sitting in his garage after it emerged that he had damaged his car during his earlier spin. The McLaren driver actually broke a piece, a 'hanger' off the front of his car.

Rosberg took the P1 slot off Alonso while his team-mate Nakajima went second quickest. Jenson Button moved up to eighth place moments before Heidfeld took 13th. The BMW driver's rise up the order meant that once again Badoer was slowest of all. Vettel climbed to second place, 0.039s off the pace.

Button was the next to lead the way as the Championship leader clocked a 1:41.534 to edge Rosberg by 0.054s. Barrichello went third while Alonso improved his time but stayed sixth. Heidfeld shot up the order, moving into second place, 0.046s off the pace. But he was soon dropped as Rosberg went quickest. Buemi moved up to fifth place while Kubica took 11th. Alonso resumed his place at the top of the timesheets with a 1:41.324.

Button and Barrichello moved up into the 1-2 with Jarno Trulli taking third. However, the Brawn duo soon swapped over as Barrichello outpaced his team-mate. Raikkonen went from 12th to fifth while Kovalainen moved up from 18th to 11th. Alonso returned to the front as the Spaniard continued to impress at home. Heidfeld took the long way around, running wide and using the run-off to get back to the track.

Glock climbed to fifth place ahead of Kubica before moving up one position more as he overhauled his team-mate Trulli. Badoer improved to 18th place, leaving Alguersuari and Hamilton in his wake.

Problems for Alonso and Heidfeld as the two parties came together at the final corner with Heidfeld's BMW actually being launched into the air before landing heavily. Damage as well to Alonso's Renault, which appeared to lock up as his braked, causing him to hit Heidfeld.

Nakajima went quickest with Trulli taking third place and Raikkonen seventh. Barrichello was the next to lead the way, Rosberg going second, Button third and then second, Kovalainen went sixth.

Alonso, back on track with a new front wing, put in three fastest sector times on his way to a 1:39.404 which put him quickest. Button went second, 0.774s behind.

Times
01 F. Alonso Renault 1:39.404 33 laps
02 J. Button Brawn GP 1:40.178 33 laps
03 R. Barrichello Brawn GP 1:40.209 34 laps
04 N. Rosberg Williams 1:40.385 39 laps
05 K. Nakajima Williams 1:40.503 35 laps
06 A. Sutil Force India F1 1:40.596 23 laps
07 R. Kubica BMW 1:40.643 34 laps
08 G. Fisichella Force India F1 1:40.681 31 laps
09 S. Vettel Red Bull 1:40.723 33 laps
10 H. Kovalainen McLaren 1:40.738 31 laps
11 K. Räikkönen Ferrari 1:40.739 39 laps
12 J. Trulli Toyota 1:40.770 32 laps
13 R. Grosjean Renault 1:40.787 35 laps
14 M. Webber Red Bull 1:40.956 37 laps
15 T. Glock Toyota 1:40.985 30 laps
16 S. Buemi Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:41.156 34 laps
17 N. Heidfeld BMW 1:41.350 29 laps
18 L. Badoer Ferrari 1:42.017 37 laps
19 J. Alguersuari Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:42.089 34 laps
20 L. Hamilton McLaren 1:43.214 3 laps

Source : Planet F1

Hungarian GP Report: Hamilton Returns To The Top

Sunday 26th July 2009

Lewis Hamilton claimed his first grand prix victory of the season in Hungary as McLaren put their early season woes behind them to return to winning ways.

Starting from fourth on the grid, the defending World Champion put his KERS to good use, easily sliding his way past his rivals and up into second place by the end of the first lap.

From there it was just a case of chasing down Fernando Alonso, which he easily did, taking the lead as the Spaniard pitted.

Alonso's pit stop, though, proved to be the Renault driver's downfall as his front right wasn't secured properly and came off on his out-lap.

With the wheel hurtling across the track, F1 proved for the second time this weekend that its safety standards still need to be improved. The damage from driving back to the pits on three wheels resulted in Alonso retiring on the next lap.

Meanwhile, with Hamilton pulling away from the chasing pack, it was left to Kimi Raikkonen and Mark Webber to settle the podium with the Ferrari driver taking second place off the Australia.

However, in yet another strange occurrence of the weekend, Raikkonen could lose his eight points as he will be investigated by the race stewards after the race for his incident with Sebastian Vettel at the very start of the race. So what were the stewards doing for 69 3/4 laps?

Nico Rosberg put in yet another solid performance for Williams, coming home in fourth place ahead of Heikki Kovalainen and Timo Glock. Jenson Button could only manage seventh place with Jarno Trulli completing the points.

Full report to follow...

Results
01 L. Hamilton McLaren 1:38:23.876
02 K. Räikkönen Ferrari + 11.529
03 M. Webber Red Bull + 16.886
04 N. Rosberg Williams + 26.967
05 H. Kovalainen McLaren + 34.392
06 T. Glock Toyota + 35.237
07 J. Button Brawn GP + 55.088
08 J. Trulli Toyota + 1:08.172
09 K. Nakajima Williams + 1:08.774
10 R. Barrichello Brawn GP + 1:09.256
11 N. Heidfeld BMW + 1:10.600
12 N.Piquet Renault + 1:11.500
13 R. Kubica BMW + 1:14.000
14 G. Fisichella Force India F1 + 1 laps
15 J. Alguersuari Scuderia Toro Rosso + 1 laps
16 S. Buemi Scuderia Toro Rosso + 1 laps
Did not finish
17 S. Vettel Red Bull + 41 laps
18 F. Alonso Renault + 55 laps
19 A. Sutil Force India F1 + 69 laps

Source : Planet F1

LEWIS WINS IN HUNGARY

Finally, a race worth watching. And what a race. The supposedly boring Hungarian GP turned otherwise. Alonso who was on pole and looked to have at least been on the podium ended up DNF because of a loose wheel which came off flying in a dramatic way.

Sebastien Vettel also retired due to a problem with his car and Mark Webber really didn't have the pace although he did end up 3rd. Rosberg quietly finished in 4th and Kovalainnen got some more points for McLaren in 5th. He really is no match for Lewis even with the same car.

The 2 Toyotas were surprising finishing 6th and 8th after a poor practice and qualifying. The Brawns seems to have lost some steam with Button 7th and Barrichello 10th. Looks like Rubens won't be racing next year.

The race was watchable, I'd definitely watch it again. The start was nail biting, there were some overtaking moments and McLaren are back.

Qualy: Webber claims debut pole

Saturday 11th July 2009

What a difference a touch of rain makes to an F1 track, as Germany witnessed the best qualifying session of the season with Mark Webber claiming his first ever pole position.

The rain started to fall lightly at the end of Q1, however, it was in Q2 that the action really started with drivers sliding off the track on their outlaps before returning in full force to the pits for intermediates.

And although the rain stayed away for the final session it was no less exciting as the top five positions all changed after the chequered flag fell with Webber coming out tops with a 1:32.230. It was the Aussie's first ever pole position and a much-deserved one.

Brawn GP was the team that yet again took the fight to Red Bull Racing with Rubens Barrichello and Jenson Button finishing second and third, ahead of Sebastian Vettel. This means the top four drivers in the Championship race will also be the top four on the Nurburgring grid.

Lewis Hamilton, who set the pace in the final two practice sessions, had to settle for fifth place ahead of his team-mate Heikki Kovalainen and Force India's Adrian Sutil.

Qualifying 1
Under leaden skies with the temperature down at 14C ambient and the track at 22C, all the teams scurried into the pitlane for the start of the session fearful that the skies might open and rain would become a factor.

As it was, the rain held off in the opening minutes and while the cars - which had all been fuelled up for three or more hot laps - circulated, Sebastian Vettel established the P1 time at 1:33.413 on the medium (prime) tyre.

Button edged this down to 1:32.649, Alonso reduced it to 1:31.834 before Lewis Hamilton seized the advantage with a 1:31.686 on the first of a series of three runs which took the time down to 1:31.473 (all on the super-soft option tyre).

Realising that everyone was going to be using the green-walled super-soft tyres, Vettel joined the gang and re-set P1 at 1:31.430, while Mark Webber went even better with a 1:31.257.

A rejuvenated Fernando Alonso was flying in the early stages and making the most of an updated aero package on his Renault. It looked like he would snatch P1 until he came up against the Toyota of Timo Glock trying to give himself a bit of space in the final corner. Alonso still got P2 but even if Glock wasn't in trouble with the stewards, he was in trouble on the track.

Going into the final three minutes the danger positions were: 13.Nakajima, 14.Sutil, 15.Piquet, 16.Kubica, 17.Button, 18.Fisichella, 19.Glock, 20.Bourdais.

There had been rain drops spotting the camera lenses after five minutes, but with two minutes to go it began to rain steadily, giving those in the drop zone no chance of improving their lap time. And though Kubica and Glock set off with the hope of getting into Q2, their mid-lap times were so far down that they didn't bother completing the lap.

So, out went:
16.Kubica
17.Buemi
18.Fisichella
19.Glock
Bourdais

Glock was the major casualty, but strange to say after their practice form it was more of a surprise to see Fisichella in the bottom five than it was Robert Kubica.

Qualifying 2
If the rush to get out of the pitlane in Q1 was evident, then the scramble to get out of the pits for Q2 was like the M25 on a Friday night. And the race to get track position was intense on the opening tour as the rain started to fall again and conditions worsened.

Lewis Hamilton was on the outside of a three-car battle going into one turn, while ahead of them Kazuki Nakajima showed how bad the conditions were getting by spinning his Williams-Toyota under braking.

Everyone was having fun controlling their cars, none more so than Felipe Massa who lost control of his Ferrari exiting the Michelin kurve and found himself tiptoeing round a cinder track behind the gravel trap at the run-off for the BIT kurve.

At the end of a madcap lap everyone barring Mark Webber came in to the pits for Intermediate tyres, leaving the Red Bull driver to struggle on for a fruitless lap on slick tyres.

Out they all came again on inters, led off by Fernando Alonso who set P1 at 1:43.931. This was then superseded by Lewis Hamilton at 1:42.325 with Adrian Sutil taking P2 and then Kazuki Nakajima taking P2 off him.

Everyone was having moments all over the circuit. Heikki Kovalainen passed the tentative Toyota of Trulli only to put a wheel on the white line at the exit of Turn 4 in the Mercedes Arena and spun his car with a gentle bash on the Armco that thankfully only ruined his lap time.

Nick Heidfeld was sensational in the wet at Silverstone and Spa in 2008 and he grabbed P1 with a 1:42.310, Raikkonen took it off him with a 1:41.730 and then Mark Webber put in an astonishing lap, sending the timing screen purple for three sectors with a 1:38.038.

While all this was happening, and Nakajima and Vettel were having a paint-swapping moment in the pitlane, Rubens Barrichello chose to put on dry tyres. The rain had stopped briefly and Rubens saw a gap. His lap time was sensational. He carved almost four seconds off P1 from a 1:38 to a 1:34.469.

Now the rush was to get out there again with dry tyres on.

Going into the final three minutes the danger positions were: 8.Hamilton, 9. Nakajima, 10.Sutil, 11.Trulli, 12.Piquet, 13.Rosberg, 14.Button, 15.Kovalainen

And just as soon as the cars had their slicks back on then it started to rain again. With just seconds of the session remaining, Button and Hamilton had been relegated to 14th and 15th positions. Sutil grabbed P2, then Nelson Piquet took P2 off him.

Fernando Alonso lost it under braking for the Veedol chicane but kept his car out of the gravel despite dipping his front wing in. At the same time Kimi Raikkonen started to rallycross his Ferrari F60.

Across the line they came and Heikki Kovalainen managed to get his injured car into P6, Button's last gasp attempt brought him P5 and Hamilton came home in P6. It had been the most breathtaking Q2 of the season, if not the most eventful since we moved away from single lap qualifying.

Out went:
11.Heidfeld
12.Alonso
13.Nakajima
14.Trulli
15.Rosberg

For the first time Nelson Piquet Junior had outqualified his team-mate and by a margin of almost seven seconds. Nelsinho just loves the German Grand Prix (he finished in P3 last year). Alonso looked like he had the potential to run in the top five but threw it all away due to his own misjudgement.

Trulli's exit sealed a miserable qualifying for Toyota and the recent upswing of Williams was stopped dead inits tracks.

Qualifying 3
Unlike the previous two sessions when the green light came on, this time nobody came out at all. There was 8.30 left on the clock when Jenson Button's Brawn GP car broke the silence, but seeing few others come out on track, he came straight in again.

Rubens Barrichello set the provisional pole time with a 1:32.797 and Mark Webber slotted in behind before Sebatian Vettel took P2 off him. The track was drying fast and it looked like everyone was going to save their best till last.

After the early laps, the order was: Barrichello, Vettel, Webber, Kovalainen, Raikkonen, Massa, Sutil, Hamilton, Piquet, Button (who hadn't set a time).

Out they came for either one or two final hot laps. Kovalainen consolidated his P4. Lewis Hamilton jumped to P1 with a 1:32.616, Jenson Button couldn't better it and went P2. Rubens Barrichello passed him for P2, then Mark Webber set pole at 1:32.230.

Vettel, Barrichello and Button were all on hot laps behind him. Hamilton was back in his garage. Though Button set the fastest first sector of anyone, he had a moment in his middle sector and lost 0.5 of a second.

Meanwhile Vettel crossed the line to take P2, but despite Jenson's mistake he took it off the German, and then Barrichello crossed the line to put himelf on the front row in P2 relegating Button to P3 and Vettel to P4.

Hamilton ended up 5th and Adrian Sutil a brilliant 7th for Force India - five Mercedes engines in the top 10. It was Mark Webber's first ever pole position and the Aussie is good in both wet and dry conditions boding well for the race tomorrow.

FH

Times
01 M. Webber Red Bull 1:32.230
02 R. Barrichello Brawn GP 1:32.357
03 J. Button Brawn GP 1:32.473
04 S. Vettel Red Bull 1:32.480
05 L. Hamilton McLaren 1:32.616
06 H. Kovalainen McLaren 1:33.859
07 A. Sutil Force India F1 1:34.316
08 F. Massa Ferrari 1:34.574
09 K. Räikkönen Ferrari 1:34.710
10 N. Piquet jr. Renault 1:34.803
11 N. Heidfeld BMW 1:42.310
12 F. Alonso Renault 1:42.318
13 K. Nakajima Williams 1:42.500
14 J. Trulli Toyota 1:42.771
15 N. Rosberg Williams 1:42.859
16 R. Kubica BMW 1:32.190
17 S. Buemi Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:32.251
18 G. Fisichella Force India F1 1:32.402
19 T. Glock Toyota 1:32.423
20 S. Bourdais Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:33.559

Source : Planet F1

F1 News - Prac Two: Hamilton steals Vettel's thunder

Friday 10th July 2009

Lewis Hamilton stole Sebastian Vettel's thunder in Friday's second practice in Germany, beating the local favourite to the P1 slot.

Hamilton, who has had a miserable season with McLaren to date, showed some signs of promise as he crossed the line with a 1:32.149, edging Vettel by 0.182s.

Third place went to Brawn GP's Jenson Button, who wasn't far off the pace, just 0.2s behind his fellow Brit.

Report: With the track temperature up to 20'C and thick cloud cover overhead, Sebastian Vettel got proceedings underway in the weekend's second practice session. The German, who stopped out on track due to a loose electrical connector in Practice One, led out a string of cars as the drivers set about covering their installation laps. Vettel, though, almost came together with Seb Bourdais as he dived down the inside, looking to start the first timed lap of the afternoon.

Vettel clocked a 1:37.646 but was quickly overhauled by fellow German Timo Glock. Glock too lost out as his team-mate Jarno Trulli went quickest with a 1:37.180. Nick Heidfeld, Felipe Massa, Robert Kubica and Seb Buemi queued up behind them on the timesheets. Vettel returned to the P1 slot, posting a 1:35.577 as the first few drops of rain began to fall. Glock improved to second place ahead of Trulli, Kubica and Buemi.

Giancarlo Fisichella was the first to fall foul of the wet weather as the Roman put his car onto the wet white paint, which put him into a slide that ended with his Force India making contact with a barrier at the Michelin Kurve. Game over for Fisichella.

After a brief rain break the drivers returned to the track with Nico Rosberg taking eighth place on his first timed lap of the afternoon. The German moved up to second place on his next lap before being dropped as Heikki Kovalainen went quickest, the first driver to use the super softs. He did a 1:34.906 only to take more than a second off his time on his second timed lap.

With all the drivers out on track, excluding Kovalainen, Hamilton and Kimi Raikkonen, the timesheets continued to change with Kazuki Nakajima taking second place ahead of Rosberg before Rosberg moved ahead and Massa slotted in between the Williams pairing. Fernando Alonso went fifth ahead of his team-mate Nelson Piquet but that too changed when Trulli put his Toyota into third place.

Nick Heidfeld was the next to take the P1 slot only to lose out to Mark Webber seconds later. Jenson Button went fourth and Alonso fifth. Vettel had problems going into Turn 1, forcing him onto the run-off area as he overshot the braking point. The German later moved up to fourth place, moments after Button took third.

Raikkonen improved from the bottom of the timesheets to fifth place while Hamilton moved up to ninth. The McLaren driver continued his climb up the order taking sixth place behind Glock. Glock's team-mate Trulli also upped his pace, going second quickest with Nakajima third.

The order of play changed as Button took control, going quickest with a 1:32.369, putting him 0.2s ahead of Webber while Adrian Sutil put in another stellar performance to take third place. Trulli improved to second place, 0.142s behind Button. Barrichello slotted into fifth place, finishing finding a similar sort of pace to his pace-setting team-mate's.

Hamilton was the next to put in a charge as he moved up to second place, just 0.044s behind Button before the two Brits were dropped by Vettel's climb up the order. He went quickest with a 1:32.342.

The final few minutes saw a mad rush from the 19 drivers remaining in the session with Hamilton taking the P1 slot and although Vettel closed the gap, he wasn't able to overhaul the McLaren man.

Times
01 L. Hamilton McLaren 1:32.149 23 laps
02 S. Vettel Red Bull 1:32.331 31 laps
03 J. Button Brawn GP 1:32.369 32 laps
04 M. Webber Red Bull 1:32.480 28 laps
05 J. Trulli Toyota 1:32.511 32 laps
06 A. Sutil Force India F1 1:32.585 32 laps
07 R. Barrichello Brawn GP 1:32.664 26 laps
08 F. Alonso Renault 1:32.774 24 laps
09 K. Nakajima Williams 1:32.872 32 laps
10 N. Piquet jr. Renault 1:32.992 29 laps
11 N. Heidfeld BMW 1:33.012 36 laps
12 F. Massa Ferrari 1:33.052 34 laps
13 N. Rosberg Williams 1:33.128 34 laps
14 R. Kubica BMW 1:33.161 28 laps
15 T. Glock Toyota 1:33.172 34 laps
16 K. Räikkönen Ferrari 1:33.182 29 laps
17 H. Kovalainen McLaren 1:33.724 27 laps
18 S. Buemi Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:33.903 30 laps
19 S. Bourdais Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:34.025 30 laps
20 G. Fisichella Force India F1 1:38.877 3 laps

Source : Planet F1

Lewis refuses to blame Sutil for dismal qualy

Saturday 20th June 2009

Lewis Hamilton is refusing to proclaim that he would have been on pole if it hadn't been for Adrian Sutil crash forcing him out of Q1 at Silverstone.

The McLaren driver, who was languishing down in 19th, was on a flying lap when Sutil crashed his Force India into the barriers at the Abbey chicane during Q1.

Because of the severity of the accident the session was red flag and the 24s remaining on the clock did not leave Hamilton - or anyone else - with enough time to put in an out lap and a flying lap.

Thus he dropped out of qualifying and will start P19 on the grid for his home race.

"I did the best I could today," said Hamilton. "I was pushing as hard as I could but our car is too slow. I gave it my all and there wasn't really much more I could have got from the car."

He also refused to blame Sutil's accident for his disappointing qualifying.

"I was pushing on that final lap - but it was nothing special. However, we live to fight another day and anything can happen in the race tomorrow.

"We'll keep pushing on and hopefully put on a good show for all the fans. The great thing is that I've had incredible support these past few days from the fans - they're the ones who are really helping me to get through it, so a big thank-you to all of them."

Meanwhile, team boss Martin Whitmarsh was left to lament Hamilton's lack of luck: "Lewis was a little unlucky to have his final quick-lap cut short by Sutil's accident.

"Today's result is not a surprise, but it demonstrates that we still have work to do to address MP4-24's weaknesses in high-speed corners.

"Nonetheless, we're already fully focused on the race tomorrow and mindful that we could still produce a strong result in front of the many thousands of passionate fans who will be cheering us on."

Source : Planet F1

Hamilton does his bit for road safety

With regards to the news item posted by Simon about the idiot in the Fairlady who lost control of his car and killed another motorist who was about to get married and for all you heroes out there who think you can handle your car while racing on public roads, think again. Your life and other's lives are not worth the heroics.

17/06/2009 Lewis Hamilton paid a visit to Portcullis House in Westminster yesterday, where he spoke to a number of MPs in support of the FIA Foundation initiative 'Make Roads Safe - a Decade of Action for Road Safety'. Those present included David Ward (Director General, FIA Foundation), Peter Bottomley MP (Vice Chair, Parliamentary Advisory Committee for Transport Safety (PACTS), Lord Andrew Adonis (Secretary of State for Transport), Carey Oppenheim (Co-Director, Institute for Public Policy Research) and Louise Ellman MP (Chair, Transport Select Committee). "When the FIA Foundation invited me to speak here today, and when they briefed me by telling me exactly how many people die on the world's roads every year - a total of 1.3 million - I was shocked," said the 2008 World Champion. "So the message I want to send out to drivers is: take a step back and think before you act. You could easily make a mistake and lose a friend's life or your own life. It's about being sensible and making the right decisions on the road. If you want to have fun, go to a go-kart circuit. "When you're on a circuit, the target is to be as fast as you can," he continued, "but away from a circuit, on the roads, it's all about safety. On the roads it's not just you out there - you have oncoming traffic, you have people crossing the roads, and you may have passengers. "Speed limits are there for a reason, and I think everyone should stick to them - I do. Okay, everyone has made mistakes - I admit I have in the past. But you learn lessons from your mistakes. And then, when you become more aware of the implications of your actions, you take more care. "So I want to use my profile as Formula 1 World Champion to do what I can to help raise awareness about global road deaths - and what can be done to prevent them. "In the UK we've made great progress on road safety, but much more can be done. We need a global decade of action for road safety, to cut the number of deaths by half. It's an ambitious vision, but not an impossible one. And it could help to save millions of lives."

Article from Pitpass (http://www.pitpass.com): Published: 17/06/2009 Copyright © Pitpass 2002 - 2009. All rights reserved.

British Grand Prix Preview

Wednesday 17th June 2009

If Simon Gillett, the developer of the Donington Circuit is to be believed, then this is the last British GP at Silverstone for at least the next 17 years. That's the length of the contract he's been given to run the F1 grand prix.

He may not have time on his side or the necessary investment, but what he can rely on is a big audience.

In Turkey at the last round they couldn't attract punters in with a £40 weekend pass and £200 grandstand seats. This weekend Silverstone will be full to bursting with punters paying £180 for a weekend pass alone. Which makes the prospect of taking this grand prix off the calendar a total nonsense. Just as it has been in Canada,

Montreal and Silverstone may not have circuit buildings that look like a Disney-inspired industrial estate, but they do have something far more relevant. Fans.

This weekend they'll be packing out the Northamptonshire circuit in the hope of a Jenson Button victory. However armed with typical British pragmatism they won't mind if he comes in the top three and maintains his championship challenge. Most of them will have despaired of Jenson ever getting into a top class car and this weekend will be more like a celebration of the season so far than a need to see him on the top step of the podium.

The former WWII bomber training base is similar to Turkey in that it has a lot of high speed corners, such as Copse, Becketts and Stowe, but it also has the fiddly Brooklands and Luffield complex making it far more of a compromise on set-up.

As we've seen from wins in Monaco and then Turkey, Brawn can do fiddly and high speed tracks, but can they do high-speed with fiddly? Certainly both BrawnGP drivers have an intimate knowledge of the track, Rubens having competed there since his F3 days and Button competing there since before he could produce any kind of ginger facial offence.

Rubens will be keen to get his starting mechanism sorted out having messed up royally in Istanbul. Hopefully by now he'll have gained a sense of proportion and remembered that he had a dog of a start in Australia, yet blinders in Barcelona and Monaco to balance that out

The Red Bulls will be up there vying for the front row and a Mark Webber win would probably go down almost as well as a Button victory. Webbo's been getting the better of his team mate of late and could even overhaul Vettel in the championship race this weekend.

Toyota should also be a force to contend with, along with the resurgent (though not as surgent as most people expected) Ferrari and BMW teams. It's unlikely to be such a fantastic weekend for the McLaren team and they've been doing their best to dampen down expectations.

Dampening down the circuit might be the best method of securing a Lewis Hamilton podium, but the long-range weather forecast is predicting a dry weekend, with all the rain being stored up for the following weekend's Glastonbury Festival.

Renault are in exactly the same position as McLaren and Fernando Alonso's continued presence in the team is a bit like Button in reverse. All that potential wasted in a below-average car.

F1 fans tend to get engrossed in the sport they love, and all the F1 vs FOTA machinations have tended to obscure the basic fault of motorsport compared to football, or rugby or tennis. My wife asked me why Jenson Button was so good all of a sudden seeing as he'd been in F1 since 2000; "Aah," I replied, "he's only just got a car that's good enough."

"So," she said with the kind of withering clarity I've had to endure for quite some time, "it's not the driver it's the car. How is that a sport?"

I could have given her a very long and complicated answer, but the easiest way out was, "yeah." Had we adopted Max Mosley's Idea-of-the-Year circa 2001 where drivers swap teams each race, then actually we could have more of a sport.

Under that regime the very best drivers would be fighting at the front all season long and we wouldn't have waited nine years to see Jenson Button arrive at his home grand prix leading the World Championship. Given that F1 is reluctant to give up its traditions lightly he better enjoy it while it lasts.

Source : Planet F1

IT'S THE CAR, STUPID!

I'm going to attempt to explain one of the most intriguing and least understood aspects of F1 racing, which some people may understand, some will not and some others don't care. I'm not very technically adept nor have I been watching F1 for 20 years. I am very interested in the goings on in F1 and try my best to read up on any material that I can get my hands on, plus I try to have discussions with like minded people as much as possible.

There have been many arguments lately about drivers and their ability to drive a modern F1 car to the limit and perform seemingly incredible and heroic feats on the track. So much so that fans of certain drivers or teams have become fanatics who cannot see any wrong in their heroes no matter what. They also always see wrong in other drivers and teams and always find excuses to run them down.

I have been following F1 since the Senna days but only started being a fanatic the season before Lewis Hamilton joined i.e. 2006. That's because I was part of a group of people offering F1 simulators for corporate rental. We developed the simulators ourselves and used the official F1 game at the time - F1 Challenge 99-02 with the requisite mods to simulate the current seasons.

A simulator or simulation is different from a game, so F1 Challenge is not the same at F1 2006 on the PS2. With a simulator you have total control over the car i.e. you can change almost all the settings like the real car and the tracks dimensions are actual i.e. they were mapped based on the real tracks. Plus the physics employed were real too, you can't just turn the wheel in a corner and let the car drive itself. You have to continuously adjust to get the perfect line, if not you'll lose vital tenths.

Playing around with this simulator gave me an insight into the intricacies, detail and difficulty of F1 I never realized before. It is so difficult to even improve on 1/1000th of a second if the car setup is not right, your reflexes are not right and the other conditions are not right. But when all the conditions are right, it seems like you are just gliding on water, everything is just smooth. You can telegraph your thoughts to the car and it will almost drive itself and produce a stunning lap time.

It is this "talent" for the driver to be able to dial in into the car that impresses us and makes us look at them as gods. But there are days when even they can't "dial-in" and sometimes the car just doesn't want to cooperate. When the car is designed in such a way that it is difficult to set-up or doesn't flow with the driver's style, it will produce an excuse for fans to ridicule those drivers or teams that they don't support.

I have noticed that these seasonal issues crop up when something changes - either driver or rules change. For example, why is it suddenly that Jenson Button is winning every race in sight when the last 2 years he was sucking exhaust fumes at the back? And why is it that Lewis Hamilton can't even make it into Q2 of qualifying when the last 2 years he was defying the laws of physics to push the car around the track to win? Luck? A bit but I don't think so.

It's the car, stupid! Yes the car. Think Schumacher was a racing god? Sorry to deflate your pride there but it was the car. On our simulator when we want to set the best times on most tracks, we always use the Ferrari F2004. That was the fastest car of that year and maybe the best of the batch in which Schumacher won his 5 world titles.

How can Button win 6 out of 7 races this year so easily and serenely? It's like he's cruising around to victory everytime. The Brawn car had the benefit of 15 months of development as Honda decided to scrap development on the 2008 car and concentrate on this year. They had lots of time to look at the new regulations and think of solutions. It's not just the double diffuser, if it was just that, how come Red Bull were so competitive from day one without a double diffuser?

Plus Brawn had all the resources of Honda to develop the car - a lot of cash, 2 wind tunnels, CFDs, the lot. The car now is powerful (courtesy of the Mercedes engine), aerodynamically almost perfect, technically sound, smooth to drive, easy on the tires and well balanced. With a car like that, any driver on the current grid can become world champion. At least 50% of the equation in winning a race is the car. With the right car even Nelson Piquet Jr could become champion.

So ultimately, all F1 drivers are good, if not they wouldn't be there driving F1 cars. Their main limitation is the car that is available to them. All other issues could be ironed out with the team and resources available.

THE STATE OF MCLAREN

Currently the state of McLaren is not good and it does not look good either for the rest of the season. The car is not performing at low, medium or high downforce tracks, in short it is not performing at all.

The last few races we could see that Lewis is doing everything he can to wring out every inch of performance from the car and Heikki too but somehow when it matters most i.e. during qualifying and the race, it lets them down. The back is so twitchy that on-board footage of Lewis or Heikki driving it looks like a wrestling match between the driver and machine.

I said it weeks ago that McLaren should forget about this season and concentrate on next year. They need to put resources where it matters as this season is too late for them. Brawn GP and Jenson Button has run away with the championship. It's a battle between Brawn and Red Bull. Now even Lewis has admitted it to the world.

And talking about his despair, it is revealed clearly this year that not only does the driver matter but the car is ultra important. Yes Lewis arrived in 2007 at the wheel of a good car and he was lucky but he is also a good driver as he beat a 2 time world champion in the same equipment. The same cannot be said of Nelson Piquet as we can see at Renault this year. That also shows how important the car is as Alonso being the good driver he is, is still unable to match the Brawns or Red Bulls.

This is a good lesson for Lewis and McLaren. I suggest they put their heads down and work on next years' car. Heikki might not survive to next year, so Lewis' teamate might be Rosberg which I prefer. That would be interesting.

As for todays' race, it would be a straigh fight between the Brawns and Red Bulls. I'm rooting for Vettel, hopefully he can pul the cat out from the bag. The Red Bull car is a solid piece of engineering - fast, well balanced and reliable, just the tools one needs to win races. The Brawns are also fast, well balanced and reliable so this should be a good show.

Alvin

TURKISH GP 2009 RESULTS

To be honest, I was expecting a more interesting race than what transpired. Three reasons why I didn't enjoy the race at all.

Number one - which is obvious to people who know me - because McLaren and specifically Lewis Hamilton had no chance at all of scoring any points. And I was right about that, plus the fact that the TV director hardly focused on Lewis or Heikki at all.

Number two is because my other choice of winner - Sebastien Vettel, made a mistake early on in Lap 1 whereby he let Jensen Button overtake him after making a mistake and almost running himself off the track. All that after he stole pole from Button yesterday. The race could have been his but he lost it at the start.

Number three - Jensen Button winning again. As he himself said it, he has become a "right boring bastard". The races nowadays are just that - boring. It reminds me of the Schumacher and Ross Brawn era when Schumacher won 17 out of 18 races. What's the point of watching.

Othe than that, it was good to see at least 1 Brawn car slip to the back and not scoring points when Barichello had his anti-stall kick in at the start and demoting him to 13th then later he just retired. Reason unknown at this time.

All said and done, Red Bull were a serious threat to Brawn GP if only they had not made the little mistakes they did. Imagine if they had Ross on their pitwall.

Alvin.

TURKISH GP QUALIFYING

Well what can I say. It was both an exciting qualifying session and a disappointment as Lewis Hamilton did not even make it into Q2.

Lewis and Heikki both looked good during Friday practice 1 and 2. In fact, the almost dominated and stayed at the top of the timesheets on Friday and Saturday. Then when qualifying started, Lewis' car looked ragged, going all over the place. It's like the car with fuel just doesn't want to behave with the setup previously. Lewis was eliminated from Q2 and Heikki didn't fare too well either being left out of Q1 and holding on to P14.

The only excitement was during the dying seconds when Vettel took pole from Button. That was priceless. I was sure Button would take pole and sure enough he did after the chequered flag but then Vettel came barreling down the track and somehow grabbed pole with a tenth over Button. Great stuff.

It would seem the race will be between the Brawns and Red Bulls with the Toyota of Trulli and the Ferraris thrown in for good measure. I'm putting my money on Vettel though as I think the Red Bull has the pace to win and Vettel is so refreshing after seeing Button winning so many races. Go Vettel!

Prac Two: Heikki sets the pace for McLaren

Friday 5th June 2009

Heikki Kovalainen showed massive signs of improvement in Turkey on Friday as the McLaren driver topped the timesheets, albeit by only 0.006s over Fernando Alonso.

Kovalainen hit the front of the timesheets prior to the halfway stage of the session and quickly set about extending his lead over the chasing pack. And although Alonso put in a late charge, the Spaniard found himself 0.006s off the pace.

Robert Kubica went someway towards putting his Monaco disaster behind him as the Polish driver finished in the third place.

However, it must be noted that all the drivers up and including Nick Heidfeld in 16th place were separated by just 0.7s.

Report: Friday's second practice got underway with the track temperature already sitting at a very warm 43'C and cloud cover building over the circuit. Seb Buemi, Kazuki Nakajima and Nico Rosberg were the first drivers out on track with Buemi and Rosberg both staying out for a second lap. Buemi crossed the line with a 1:38.417 which was easily beaten moments later by Rosberg, who took 7.8s off the Toro Rosso driver's time.

Nelson Piquet soon overhauled them both while Nakajima went third quickest ahead of Jarno Trulli, Timo Glock and Giancarlo Fisichella. Heikki Kovalainen was next into the P1 slot before Piquet returned to take it off him by 0.039s.

Rosberg became the first driver to take to the run-off area as he went wide at Turn 1. Kovalainen edged Piquet to hit the front of the pack but was soon beaten by his team-mate Lewis Hamilton while Robert Kubica went third ahead of Jenson Button. Fernando Alonso and Piquet slotted in second and third quickest while Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen and Felipe Massa were eighth and 12th.

Jarno Trulli improved to second place, 0.033s off Hamilton's pace with Mark Webber taking P4. Kovalainen joins the list of those struggling to stay on track but goes on to take third place on his very next lap. Kovalainen was the next to go P1 with Nakajima slotting in behind him.

Sebastian Vettel's running was brought to an early end when the Red Bull racer's RB5 came to a halt on the side of the track at Turn 2. The German was third quickest when he stopped.

Hamilton put his car into an impressive slide as the McLaren driver lost control coming out of Turn 1. Three laps later, using the softer rubber, the Brit put his MP4-24 into a massive spin. He was, however, able to continue.

Kubica improved to second place as he Polish driver made good use of his new updates, which include a double-decker diffuser. Bourdais runs wide at Turn 1. The drivers appearing to be having a great deal of problems with that corner, with many taking to the run-off area.

Alonso moved up to second place behind Kovalainen, 0.201s off the McLaren driver's pace. Rosberg, Trulli and Glock tussled amongst themselves for the final top eight positions while Massa made his way into the top ten in 10th place.

Nakajima spun at Turn 1 but stayed out on track while Massa had to take to the run-off at Turn 12 after failing to slow his Ferrari down in time for the left-hander. He too was able to continue.

The session ended with Kovalainen in the P1 slot, just 0.006s ahead of Alonso. Kubica was third.

Times
01 H. Kovalainen McLaren 1:28.841 37 laps
02 F. Alonso Renault 1:28.847 35 laps
03 R. Kubica BMW 1:29.056 35 laps
04 K. Nakajima Williams 1:29.091 37 laps
05 S. Vettel Red Bull 1:29.202 4 laps
06 J. Trulli Toyota 1:29.207 41 laps
07 N. Rosberg Williams 1:29.257 40 laps
08 R. Barrichello Brawn GP 1:29.305 35 laps
09 M. Webber Red Bull 1:29.383 39 laps
10 N. Piquet jr. Renault 1:29.401 38 laps
11 F. Massa Ferrari 1:29.416 38 laps
12 J. Button Brawn GP 1:29.430 33 laps
13 L. Hamilton McLaren 1:29.435 31 laps
14 T. Glock Toyota 1:29.518 40 laps
15 K. Räikkönen Ferrari 1:29.520 33 laps
16 N. Heidfeld BMW 1:29.550 40 laps
17 A. Sutil Force India F1 1:30.081 33 laps
18 G. Fisichella Force India F1 1:30.091 38 laps
19 S. Bourdais Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:30.295 39 laps
20 S. Buemi Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:30.629 37 laps

Source : Planet F1