F1-Blog

It was a sad day for the F1 paddock on Sunday. So many goodbyes, to long and well established names.

Michael Schumacher drove a fine last race, coming through from the back of the pack to finish fourth, and Jenson Button did well, finishing third after starting fourteenth.

However there are more goodbyes than that of the great Michael. Yes Michael is leaving, and we will all be sad to see what is possibly the greatest driver of recent history (some would argue ever) leave the sport, but we have even bigger and more historic names leaving as well. Possibly the biggest of which is the mighty Cosworth.

Cosworth have not managed to find a team that will run their engine next year. This is a bad state of affairs, as Cosworth used to be the greatest. It shows how ingrained Cosworth were that all of the major drivers that can be thought off have won with a Cosworth in the back of their car. I'm sure that Cosworth will manage to struggle through and we will see them again in the back of an F1 car, it is after all where they deserve to be.

We are also loosing the Tobacco companies, the familiar liveries of Marlboro, Mild Seven and Lucky Strike will be leaving the sport. These are some of the strongest supporters of the sport throughout it's history, and it will be a sad to think that there will be no possibility of ever seeing the glorious liveries of the JPS Lotus and the likes again

The final goodbye we have is to Michelin. The French tyre giant will bow out at the end of the season due to the FIA instigating a one tyre manufacturer policy. Whether this is a good decision or not is still to be seen. A lot of the advancements that have come to F1 in the recent past is due to the tyre war. And it will be a shame not to see a challenger from Europe for tyre superiority. Perhaps we will see them return at some point, or even better them and Dunlop return, as it has been too long since Dunlop was involved in the sport.

The race turned out to be a good end to a good racing season. The first issues for Ferrari and Michael happened during qualifying. Due to the fact that all of the engine suppliers had to use the engine that would be used for the next 3 years, there where some niggles with a few of the teams.

Ferrari had an issue with Massa's car early on in the session, which was fixed. However Michael's car developed an issue during session three of qualifying, and the team could not fix it before the end of the session, this relegated him to the tenth spot on the grid as he did not set a time in session three.

Button in the Honda also had issues, his were with the traction control systems, on his run in session one the TC system was not coming on at all, forcing him to control wheel spin manually and not allowing him to power out of the corners. In session two they thought the issue had been resolved, however the TC had dropped into failsafe mode, this too did not allow him to power out of the corners, and relegated him to starting fourteenth.

The weather on Sunday came to the Bridgestone cars, with the track temperature increasing it meant that they where even quicker, whilst it seemed that Michelin and their teams had been conservative on there choices.

The start of the race was not without incident, and it seemed that Michael was on a mission in his last race, and started his run through the field, he made easy work of the two BMW Sauber cars and had started his run. The front however stayed the same, with Massa followed by Raikkonen, Trulli and Alonso.

However it was not all happy in the Williams camp as Nico Rosberg tail ended his team mate Mark Webber into the first corner. Mark managed to limp around to the pit's where he retired with damaged rear suspension caused by the impact.

Nico however caused the story of the race. Whilst returning to the pit's his front suspension gave out while he was traveling at 130Mph and Nico spun off into the barriers coming onto the main straight.

The safety car was called out while the debris from the crash was cleared up. Racing resumed with Massa pulling away from Kimi. Michael however was getting into his stride, overtaking both his brother Ralf in the Toyota, and his old team mate Rubens Barrichello in the Honda.

Next car to overtake was Giancarlo Fisichella's Renault. Michael got close to him in the final corner, and managed to draft him into the Senna S's, taking the Renault on the outside into the left hander. All however did not go well, as Michael was turning into the right hander of the S's his car violently lost control, with Michael just managing to hold onto the lurid slide. It was however obvious to see that one of his rear tyres was deflating rapidly. It seems he had picked up a shard of debris from the Rosberg incident causing a deflation. Michael limped round the rest of lap eight to the pits, and change tyres. This however put him at the back of the field, and close to being lapped by his team mate.

Whilst this was happening, both of the Toyota cars slowed, pitted and retired from the race. It seems there was a design or manufacturing flaw with the rear suspension. A pity really as Trulli was doing well in third spot at the time.

Cars started to pit, and after the stops Alonso and Button seemed to be the winners. Alonso managed to overtake Kimi, and Button managed to get in behind Kimi in fourth.

Michael however was determined to show that just because he was retiring, he was not past it. By half distance he had clawed his way back up to eighth place. He came up behind the BMW Sauber of Robert Kubica, and made the pass into the Senna S's look easy. Michael then set off up the road to pass Barrichello for sixth place.

The second round of pitstops allowed Michael to catch and pass Barrichello. Michael was now chasing down Fisichella for fifth place. It seemed that Fisichella was paying more attention to the fast approaching Michael, and not on the fast approaching corner. Because of this he left his braking into the Senna's far too late, and ran wide.

With three laps of his final GP left, he managed to catch and pass his successor at Ferrari, Kimi Raikkonen into the Senna's, giving him fourth place. Even though Michael tried to catch Button, he could just not seem to take enough time of the Englishman, which meant he ended his career in fourth spot, although certainly deserved the driver of the day award.

Another notable performance was had from both Takuma Sato, and his Honda powered Super Aguri. He managed the teams best finish yet, coming home in tenth place ahead of a Red Bull, a Toro Rosso and a Spyker-Midlands. 

Alonso took his second World Championship in a row, and managed to seal the Constructors title for Renault with his finish. How he will get on in the new atmosphere at McLaren is to be seen, but with a competitive car he may go on to set some records of his own, as after all even this second title would have been the youngest title winner, if he had not already have won it the year before.

So we say goodbye to the old F1, and say hello to a new interesting F1, without the shadow of Michael over everyone. With some luck the new talent in the paddock can now shine brightly. The likes of Kimi and Alonso are already well proven. But we have the new wave of young and definitely talented drivers coming through, Kubica has already shown his abilities, and Alonso is the youngest ever World Champion. But we have the likes of Lewis Hamilton, Heikki Kovalainen and Nelson Piquet Jr coming into the sport. I think F1 is in very good hands for the future.

Results

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Yup it’s that time of the year again, another last GP.

This is however going to be a cracker, the title fight comes down to this last GP. Can Michael take his 8th and last career championship, or can Alonso take his second in a row for the Renault team.

Fillipe Massa has stated openly that he will do all in his power to help Michael win the title. Can the same be said for Fisichella? will he help out Alonso in the same way? Fisichella has already signed his deal with Renault, so should he need to help his current team leader.

The Brazilian GP will certainly turn out to be a showdown, lets hope it turns out to be a clean race.

Williams have signed a title sponsorship deal with the American telecom's giant AT&T. The company is moving over from McLaren where another telecom's Giant Vodafone are taking on the title sponsorship.

Details of the deal are not out at the moment, but there is no doubt that this is great news for the Williams team.

Or at least there sponsorship does.

The Renault F1 team will be partnering with ING for the next 3 years, taking over from Japanese Tobacco company Mild Seven.

"This is an important agreement for the growth and development of the Renault F1 Team, providing long-term stability that reinforces our long-term commitment to the sport," team president Alain Dassas said in a statement.

There has been no details on what colours and financial arrangements are involved. However ING's corporate colour is orange.

The 20th and for the forseable future, last Japanese grand prix at the Suzuka circuit threw out a doozy.

The Michelin tyres really did not perform well in qualifying on Saturday, with the Bridgestone tyres showing a 1 second advantage in the final grid layout.

However Sunday brought lower track temperatures, and a more rubbered in track. This brought the Michelin tyres up to the race pace of the Bridgestone runners.

Alonso made a good move from the start to elevate himself from fifth to fourth after the second corner. Alonso however struggled then to pass the obviously slower Toyota of Ralph Schumacher, with Massa and Michael Schumacher after he took the lead on lap 3.

The Toyotas where the first cars to stop, with Massa coming in shortly after due to a puncture, this put Massa out of position after the stop, coming out behind the BMW of Heidfeld. This tied Massa up, and allowed Alonso to stop and come out ahead after his stop.

Alonso, the Renault and the Michelin tyres started to come good, and he started to make inroads into the lead that Michael had gained.

Albers Spyker car, of which he has been complaining of vibrations, rear end explodes. It seems that a drive shaft has broken and the force has destroyed the back end of his car. Fortunately there is not too much debris on the track, and the safety car is not brought out.

Alonso managed to get within 4 seconds of Michael, but it seemed the Ferrari and Bridgestone had started to equalise the gap. Alonso it seemed could not catch the Ferrari.

However it turned out that he did not need to catch Michael, only keep his car on the road. This is because the unthinkable happened, Michael's Ferrari engine had it's first failure in a race since 2001.  The engine failure happens not long after Michael's second stop, it seems that the new Ferrari engine may not be as bullet proof as before. This is however the engines second outing, and Ross Brawn openly states that they run them a little closer to the limit's towards the end of the season.

 Alonso went on to win the race, followed by Massa and Fisichella with Button coming in fourth and Raikkonen driving a good solid race to come in sixth.

The Toyota cars faded badly after the stops and only managed sixth (Trulli) and seventh (Ralph), it seemed that after the tyre changes the cars where just not as balanced as before.

The outcome of the race leaves Alonso only requiring one point in the final race in two weeks time to take the championship, and Renault are nine point ahead in the constructors championship.

Some may say it was about time that Alonso had some luck go his way, and with this race it seems he got it all in one lump.

So it is a sad farewell to one of the last remaining drivers circuits on the grid. Let's just hope that the final race in Brazil is a great final race for Schumi.

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It seems that the Bridgestone tyres where certainly the rubber to have in Japan today.

The qualifying session ended with the first four spots on the grid for tomorrows race are held by the Japanese tyre giant.

This is certainly bad news for the Renault's and Alonso in particular. However the Ferrari's where pushed hard during the third session by one of the other home teams Toyota. This caused both of the Ferrari cars going out to set the fastest times at the end of the session, this however worked against Michael as Fillipe managed to pip the German to the pole position.

The Renault team are the fastest of the Michelin tyre runners starting from fifth and sixth on the grid behind the two Toyota's and the two Ferrari cars.

The shock of the session was the lack in pace from the McLaren cars, both of the cars did not make it through to 3rd qualifying.

Alonso will struggle to win the race tomorrow, however he needs to finish as high on the grid as possible. This will then take the showdown for both championships to the final race in Brazil.

Grid Positions

1. Massa - Ferrari 1:29:5
2. M Schumacher - Ferrari
3. R Schumacher - Toyota
4. Trulli - Toyota
5. Alonso - Renault
6. Fisichella - Renault
7. Button - Honda
8. R Barrichello - Honda
9. Heidfeld - BMW
10. Rosberg - Williams
11. Raikkonen - McLaren
12. Kubica - BMW
13. De la Rossa - McLaren
14. Webber - Williams
15. Liuzzi - Toro Rosso
16. Albers - Spyker
17. Coulthard - Red Bull
18. Doornbos - Red Bull
19. Speed - Toro Rosso
20. Sato - Super Aguri
21. Montiero - Spyker
22. Yamamato - Super Aguri

Jean Todt has hinted that the Red Bull engine deal may be terminated a year early. Red bull have signed a deal with Renault for engine supply next year, but it was looking like the new Adrian Newey designed RB03 was going to have to use the Ferrari sourced engine, with Toro Rosso getting the Renault supply.

Things now have changed, and it looks like Cosworth may have benefited from it, as the Toro Rosso team would require an engine. If Ferrari let the Red Bull team off their supply early, it would benefit them, as they would probably struggle to supply three teams next season (Spiker have signed a one year deal).

The other possibility is that the Toro Rosso team will take up the Ferrari supply for the last year of the deal. However Red Bull could conceivably buy the ailing Cosworth Race Engine company and use them instead.

Whichever way it turns out it looks like the new RB03 Adrian Newey car will be powered by one of the most reliable and best race engines in F1 today, the Renault.

Michael Schumacher has leveled the points between himself and Fernando Alonso, causing the title fight to go to the wire.

The weekend started badly for the Scuddera Ferrari team, with Filipe Massa having to take a 10 place drop due to an engine change on Friday. Then during the Saturday sessions the rain came, and the Bridgestone tyres seemed to not work at all.

It all looked bad for Michael. He pulled out an amazing lap during Quali 3 to get the 5th place on the grid. He was however behind both the Renaults and Honda cars.

Sunday morning brought more hardship for the team, as it rained again. Would the Bridgestone tyres work in race conditions? everyone though no.

The Ferrari's seemed to struggle off the grid, with Michael going back a place after lap 1. The pace man looked to be Kimi Raikkonen, who nearly took second position from the start, but had to yield in corner 2 to Jenson Button, who had got ahead of his team mate.

The first corner melee ended with Alonso showing a massive pace advantage over Fisichella then Jenson, followed by Rubens Barrichello and Kimi Raikkonen.

Raikkonen looked to be on a mission, and overtook Button before the end of the first lap, and made ground on the Renault cars.

By lap 5 Alonso had showed that his pace over the weekend was real, and had put nearly 7 seconds on his team mate, who was closely followed by Kimi.

In the background however Michael was making up for his bad start, and on lap 8 he passed his old team mate Rubens Barrichello for 5th place, and started to make inroads into the Jenson Buttons lead over him.

Lap 13 saw Kimi make a pass on Fisichella to take second place, also Michael had made up the gap to Button and overtook what seemed to be a struggling Honda. It was later heard on the radio that Button's rear tyres had gone off, and he was struggling. He pitted shortly after on lap 15, the first of the front runners to get a new set of boots.

Lap 16 saw Kimi stop for fuel, he however did not take on new tyres. Instead he was doing what most of the drivers did, wear the tread on these tyres down, so they became practically slicks.

Lap 19 and Raikkonen's car stops. It sounds like the car is stuck in the pit lane limiter mode.

Lap 21 brings Schumacher, Webber and a lap later Alonso in for a pit stop. Schumacher just takes on fuel. However the Renault team decide to change the front tyres on Alonso's car to new intermediates.

Kubbica in the BMW tries his luck on lap 24. During his pit stop the team switch him over to slick tyres. The gamble however does not pay off. Kubbica cannot seem to get enough heat into the slicks, and slithers back round to the pits to switch back to used intermediate tyres.

The gap up to Alonso has been coming down, lap on lap Fisichella and Schumacher have been eating into the world champions lead, and it's now down to 6 seconds (from 20). It looks like Alonso in the Renault is struggling with those new front's that he put on at his pit stop. The car will not turn in cleanly to any of the corners, and once in looks very unsettled. However the cars that are now practically running slicks are working a lot better. The track has dried out enough to use slicks, the trouble with switching to slicks is that they are difficult to get up to temperature. This is why the intermediates are working so well, they have worn down to slicks, and are already at temperature.

Alonso get's caught up by the two chasing drivers, and on lap 29 has to allow his team mate to pass him as he just does not have the pace to keep the other Renault behind him. The Renault team decide it would be better for Fisichella to finish first, than it would be for Michael. Coulthard and Massa also stop for there one and only fuel stop. Massa obviously deciding to go heavy after starting from the back, and DC seeming to think with the wet weather that the one stop strategy would not be as big a penalty as it would be in the dry.

Laps 32 through 40 see the whole field stop to switch over from wet to dry tyres, the track is now in the 1:41 times, and that is judges the switchover point. Rosberg is the first to switch in the Williams on lap 32, and after a couple of slithery corners get's up to pace and set's his fastest lap of the race. The other teams obviously seeing this bring their drivers in for the change. 

Alonso's pit change did not however go well. The rear right wheel bolt got cross threaded on the change. The total pit time took around 19 seconds, loosing him 12 seconds in the mistake.

Schumacher is on of the last to pit for dry tyres on lap 40, and although did have a good lead over the Renault's is now being caught by Alonso. This fact brings the German into the pits to switch over to the Bridgestone dry weather tyres. Lap 41 sees Kubbica come in for the change to dry tyres, he was unfortunate that his experiment earlier did not work.

Alonso came out 22 seconds behind Michael after the stop's. His team mate Fisichela was 7 seconds behind the Ferrari. Alonso however after the tyre change has been flying, setting fastest lap and sectors every time he passed the line.

This allows him to catch and pass his team mate on lap 48, and start to take time from the Ferrari ahead of him.

Lap 49 sees Jenson have an off track excursion, loosing the sixth place position he held to McLaren driver Pedro de la Rossa. However it seemed the reason for his off is that the rain has started to fall again at the back of the track.

Button is now the fastest man on the track, other drivers are sliding all over the race track (including Alonso). Button manages to catch and overtake Pedro de la Rossa to regain his sixth place. Button also manages to catch and overtake both team mate Barrichello and also Heidfeld after he spun. Elevating himself to fourth. De la Rossa manages to tail Button passed the other two drivers who get tied up with the tail ender Tacuma Sato, who is later disqualified for the problems he caused.

 All in all it ended up being a good day for the Ferrari team. Even though it was certainly a good drive by Michael, the race was not won by him. Instead it would be fair to say the race was lost by the Renault team, with two pit mistakes by the team. They should have left Alonso on the worn tyres, like everyone else, and then under pressure to make up time in the change to dry tyres, they made a mistake witch made the race win impossible. The points are now even at the top of the drivers standings.

We move onto Japan next, home track of Honda. With the final race in Brazil. The title fight for both Drivers and Constructors championship will go to the wire, and may end up being the closest title fight in F1 for years.

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