F1-Blog

Well done to all those that watched the race live. I will do a full race report later (after a nap), but for now I would like to say well done to all of the drivers, and a special thank’s to Charlie Whiting for letting the drivers race.

The championship too a big turn in the favour of Lewis Hamilton, Lewis won the race with a sublime drive, and Fernando Alonso had an accident and did not finish.

That leaves Lewis 12 points ahead of his team mate. Fernando can still win the championship, however the result makes it more difficult for Fernando to take a third title.

Mathematicaly Fernando can still win, however he needs to win the next race, and hope that Lewis does not score points.

More later after I have had a chance to have another watch of the whole race.

Well me most of the time, however it produced a spanking Quali for Japan, however the weather helped out.

Before the start of the session it looked like it was not going to happen, the clouds where so low the safety helicopter could not fly. However Charlie Whiting obviously decided that the drivers could be ambulanced over road to hospitals if there was an need to.

Session one saw a fair few of the drivers struggling, however as the session progressed the times came tumbling down, obviously the track condition was improving, and the drivers getting used to the track.

There was an issue though, Lewis Hamilton was only in 18th in his McLaren, and it looked like he was struggling. Not the case it turns out, he popped a fast lap in towards the end of the session (in fact with no time in the session left), and made it into Q2.

Toyota driver Ralf Schumacher had a coming together with Sakon Yamamoto and even though he made it into Q2, could not take part. Others out in Q1 were Rubens, Alex Wurz, Anthony Davidson, Taku, Adrian Sutil and Sakon.

Making it into Q2 was Jenson Button though, with a great drive in the Honda, showing a driver can make the difference, just so long as the conditions allow him.

The Q2 session saw a lot of the drivers switch to the intermediate tyres, and start to put faster times in. Lewis Hamilton finished fastest in Q2. With surprise as Jenson also made it into Q3, first time this year.

Drivers to struggle in the conditions, and hence not make it into the Q1 session where, David Coulthard, Giancarlo Fisichella, Heikki Kovalainen, Jarno Trulli and Tonio Liuzzi (and Ralf obviously as he did not take part). Surprise people into the Q3 session are Jenson Button, and Sebastian Vettel in the Toro Rosso.

Q1 was were all the excitment was however, the ‘big four’ duked it out all session, with it looking like Fernando would again get the better of his younger team mate, but in the dying seconds, and with a new set of lightly scrubbed intermediates on, Lewis Hamilton put an immense lap in to take the top spot. The onboard footage of the lap is a marvel, it’s immediately obvious that the boy has incredible car control skills.

So a well done to the McLaren team for keeping their heads, when it could have all gone wrong. I also want to say well done to Jenson, as his driving was sublime.

We look forward to the race now, let’s hope the weather stays as it was for Qualifying.

Results

1. HAMILTON McLaren
2. ALONSO McLaren
3. RAIKKONEN Ferrari
4. MASSA Ferrari
5. HEIDFELD BMW
6. BUTTON Honda
7. WEBBER Red Bull
8. VETTEL Toro Rosso
9. KUBICA BMW
10. FISICHELLA Renault
11. KOVALAINEN Renault
12. COULTHARD Red Bull
13. TRULLI Toyota
14. LIUZZI Toro Rosso
15. SCHUMACHER Toyota
16. ROSBERG Williams*
17. BARRICHELLO Honda
18. WURZ Williams
19. DAVIDSON Super Aguri
20. SUTIL Spyker
21. SATO Super Aguri
22. YAMAMOTO Spyker

With the Japanese grand prix coming up this weekend, I thought it would be a good idea to talk about the Fuji track owners, Toyota.

It’s well known that Jarno has another year on his contract with the Japanese team. It’s also well known that Ralf doesn’t (and probably wont get an extension now so late in the season).

Ralf’s performance over the year has been quite poor in most ways, he has been out qualified and raced by his team mate on a regular basis, and is not well liked inside the team.

So who will they pick up to drive for them next year alongside Jarno? Rumors this week are for two people, who have both denied the rumors.

First up is Felipe Massa, who it is said has talked with the team. Why you ask? Well it’s a big rumor in the pit lane that World champion Fernando Alonso has for all intent and purpose signed a 2008 drive worth 40 million dollars, how accurate this is is anyone’s guess, it’s a little baffling, as both Kimi and Fernando in the same car would be nasty, both will want the number 1 spot, and Ferrari are not big on having two number 1 drivers. He will be at least as frustrated there as he is at McLaren with Lewis Hamilton.

However if the rumor is true, then Massa will not want to (nor should he) go back to a tester role, as he is contracted for 2008 with the Ferrari team. Two possibilities show themselves. He could go to another team (but is the struggling Toyota the right place?), or Ferrari could buy another team on the grid, and allow him to head it up. There has been talk of the Toro Rosso team being bought by Ferrari. The big teams are looking for second teams due to the reduced test schedule next year. Obviously two teams on the same chassis and engine will double their allowed testing time. McLaren will have it (assuming Pro-Drive do make it to the grid), and Renault have Red Bull for engine life testing.

So who else in the seat? It’s highly talked about that Williams driver Nico Rosberg may move across to the team. He would be a good choice for Toyota, they have the solid mature figurehead of Jarno, and Nico is fast, reliable and a genuinely good racer, he also knows the engine already.

Nico denies the rumors though, but hey this is F1, and Williams are reliant on the engine/tech help from Toyota after all.

This would leave Williams in a bit of a hole though, Alex Wurz, although a decent driver, is not a team leader. So who would Williams pull into head the driving lineup? they certainly don’t want Ralf back, and cannot really risk using an ‘up and comer’ from GP2.

There is one other driver move that we need to talk about, if Fernando is jumping ship, then who will step into the reigns at McLaren? they certainly wont run Ralf, and already have a rookie in the second seat. Most drivers are also already singed up, or in the middle of contract runs. The only person I could possibly see moving there is Jenson, but he has stated more than once that he is sticking with the Honda boys.

Hmm, interesting times ahead, I wonder if any of this will be cleaned up at Fuji?

Well, ok it was a good race, for a number of reasons, however it was for the most part quite dull.

Kimi took an easy win, with his team mate Filipe coming in second.

The Ferrari’s were completely dominant throughout the race, with the McLaren’s just not capable of keeping pace.

The revised circuit showed that they have not damaged it, and only the pit lane entrance is disliked by the drivers.

Among the notable happenings in the race were Kubica having a great drive for 9th spot after having an engine change relegate him to starting 14th.

There was a little rucas at turn one between the two McLaren drivers, it looked quite a hard move from Alonso at first, but after seeing replays it was a fair move. What was most impressive was that both of the drivers kept there foot in until the last moment going up the hill at Eu Rouge, where Hamilton on the outside backed off and let his team mate through.

Webber got a run on the Renault of Kovalainen, and managed to overtake him into Les Combes.

The cars all pitted for their first stops at around the same point, with Lewis running the furthest, the middle stint of the race was pretty feature free, and status quo was maintained.

After the switch to soft tyres on the last stint, Lewis tried to make up time on his team mate, but just could not manage it, with the car eventualy loosing grip at Pouhon corner and the young Brit loosing 3 seconds in the chase.

Nick Heidfeld drove another good race to get the fifth spot, keeping his head down, and out of trouble all race. Another good race from Rosberg in the Williams, coming home in sixth, with Webber keeping the Red Bull running to get seventh spot. Kovalainen only stopped once in the race, and because of this managed to get the last points spot.

A worthy mention must go out to the Spyker team, especially Adrian Sutil, who managed to run up in 12th spot for a good amount of time, on race pace in the much improved B Spec car.

Results

1.  RAIKKONEN    Ferrari       1h20m39.066s
2.  MASSA        Ferrari +4.7s
3.  ALONSO       McLaren +14.3s
4.  HAMILTON     McLaren +23.6s
5.  HEIDFELD BMW +51.9s
6. ROSBERG  Williams +1m16.9s
7.  WEBBER Red Bull +1m20.6s
8.  KOVALAINEN   Renault +1m25.1s
9.  KUBICA       BMW +1m25.7s
10. SCHUMACHER   Toyota +1m28.6s
11. TRULLI Toyota +1m43.7s
12. LIUZZI       Toro Rosso +1 lap
13. BARRICHELLO  Honda +1 lap
14. SUTIL Spyker +1 lap
15. SATO         Super Aguri +1 lap
16. DAVIDSON     Super Aguri   +1 lap
17. YAMAMOTO     Spyker +1 lap
R.  BUTTON       Honda +8 laps
R.  WURZ         Williams +10 laps
R.  COULTHARD    Red Bull +15 laps
R.  VETTEL       Toro Rosso +36 laps
R.  FISICHELLA   Renault +43 laps

Fastest lap: MASSA  1m48.036s (lap 34)

News breaking is that Colin McRae may have crashed in his Squirrel helicopter with possibly three other passengers on board the helicopter.

Strathclyde Police have said that no-one on board the helicopter have survived, and it seems the hospital service believe there where four people on board. Rumors are that one of the passengers may have been his 5 year old son.

It will be a tragic day for motorsport as a whole if this is confirmed, and McRae has died.

McRae is one of the most naturally talented drivers, with an ability for car control that is far and above most drivers.

McRae’s manager has told The Sunday Telegraph that he had spoken to Colin’s brother Alister, who had confirmed that he was piloting the helicopter.

I whole heartedly hope that the whole McRae family are ok. But if this a tragic day for motorsport, My heart goes out to the whole McRae family.

Pop over the the Official site, as well as the Telegraphs site.

UPDATE: It has now been confirmed that McRae has died in the accident, along with his son. A bad day for motorsport, we all morn his families loss, he will be deeply missed.

The Qualifying session for Spa was overshadowed by the whole spying affair, but lets not let that distract us from the session.

The four front running cars of the McLaren’s and Ferrari’s have been close all weekend so far. The qualification session showed no change in that.

Q1 saw the new Mike Gascoyne Spyker show better than it has all year, nearly making it into the top 16. Sebastian Vettel again seemed to struggle in the Toro Rosso, he just doesn’t seem to be able to get to grips with it in the same way as he had with the BMW. There was also some tinkering with Massa’s Ferrari at the back end, perhaps another issue with the dampers like he had in the race last week?

Q2 once again saw the German younger Schumacher brother struggle, it seems the bit of resurgence he seemed to have was short lived, and Toyota must just be hoping for his contract to end so they can get some young blood into the team. Other notable losses are Jenson who’s Honda is still not very quick, but starting to look a little better as the season goes on. David Coulthard also missed out on a run in Q3, however his team mate Mark Webber did make it through into final qualifying. The Renault of Giancarlo Fisichella also did not quite make the grade, so again Heikki showed a better pace than his older and more experienced team mate.

Q3 was sort of the session we expected, Massa overtook the slower Hamilton on the out lap, this it seems is because the McLaren car is going longer than the Ferrari’s in the first stint of the race, it may seem so from his final time.

The Qualifying session was dominated by the Scarlet cars though, locking out their first one-two for a while, and only their second this season. They are then followed by the two McLaren cars.

Robert Kubica qualified in 5th, but has to take a 10 place drop as he changed his engine before the qualifying began. This brings Fisi into the top 10, right behind his team mate.

Results

1. RAIKKONEN Ferrari
2. MASSA Ferrari
3. ALONSO McLaren
4. HAMILTON McLaren
5. ROSBERG Williams
6. HEIDFELD BMW
7. WEBBER Red Bull
8. TRULLI Toyota
9. KOVALAINEN Renault
10. FISICHELLA Renault
11. SCHUMACHER Toyota
12. COULTHARD Red Bull
13. BUTTON Honda
14. LIUZZI Toro Rosso
15. KUBICA BMW (after 10 place engine penalty)
16. WURZ Williams
17. VETTEL Toro Rosso
18. BARRICHELLO Honda
19. SATO Super Aguri
20. SUTIL Spyker
21. DAVIDSON Super Aguri
22. YAMAMOTO Spyker

I’ve had a fair few mails and comments about my comments over the McLaren / Ferrari debacle.

Where I sit is this. McLaren have done wrong, I am not denying that, I am British so feel hard done by because of it. However I feel the FIA have let Ferrari get there own way, Why?

I say this because it was a Ferrari engineer who stole the documents in the first place, if that had not occurred then this whole issue would not have arisen. McLaren have done wrong to some extent, however most of the information that the team are blamed for using is pit lane common knowledge to some extent anyhow. So too have Ferrari done wrong, so why have they not been penalised as well for letting the information leave the Italian teams base.

I think this will go a little further, but for now we have a great drivers championship going on, so let’s focus on that.

So we now know that McLaren are being penalised for the whole Stepney and Coughlan shenanigans.

So what does this mean to the team? well they will fight on, both in the championship, and also in the courts.

The drivers will still be able to win the drivers championship, however the team have been denied the chance for the team win they deserve.

They have without a shadow of doubt got the best all round car this season. If Ferrari are happy to win the championship in this way, it just shows that they are not in the sport for the sport, and rather to win at any cost.

I for one hope that the McLaren team fight it through the courts and win, as they will certainly win both championships this year, even if they don’t lift both trophies.

On the good side of things, Mario Theissen has said that he does not want to come second in this way. The sign of a true sporting team.

The FIA need to grow some genitals, and tell Ferrari that they are not the Italian teams personal lapdogs. I think it’s about time some changes inside the sports governing body happen, with the head of it resigning and allowing someone that will not bow down to any of the teams to take over.

This is a very negative day for the sport, it will not be the end of McLaren, but it may be the beginning of the end for the current FIA administration.

McLaren will certainly take this to appeal, and I would not be surprised if the matter does not end up in civil action from the McLaren team for damages incurred.

From us at f1-blog, chin up McLaren, and don’t let the buggers grind you down.

This just in from McLaren……..

“The most important thing is that we will be going motor racing this weekend, the rest of the season and every season. This means that our drivers can continue to compete for the World Championship. However having been at the hearing today I do not accept that we deserved to be penalised in this way.”

“Today’s evidence given to the FIA by our drivers, engineers and staff clearly demonstrated that we did not use any leaked information to gain a competitive advantage.”

“Much has been made in the press and at the hearing today of emails and text messages to and from our drivers. The World Motorsport Council received statements from Fernando Alonso, Lewis Hamilton and Pedro de la Rosa stating categorically that no Ferrari information had been used by McLaren and that they had not passed any confidential data to the team.”

“The entire engineering team in excess of 140 people provided statements to the FIA affirming that they had never received or used the Ferrari information.”

“We have never denied that the information from Ferrari was in the personal possession of one of our employees at his home. The issue is: was this information used by McLaren? This is not the case and has not been proven today.”

“We are also continually asked if McLaren didn’t use the information, what was the reason for Stepney and Coughlan collecting all this data about Ferrari? We can only speculate as neither Coughlan nor Stepney gave evidence at today’s hearing, but we do know that they were both seeking employment with other teams, as already confirmed by both Honda and Toyota.”

“There will be no issue for the 2008 season as we have not at any stage used any intellectual property of any other team.”

“We have got the best drivers and the best car and we intend to win the World Championship.”

The Italian GP was quite a standard affair this year, one of the few races this season that did not live up to it’s possibilities.

Fernando Alonso lead from the first corner all the way to the end of the race, making it look easy. Lewis Hamilton followed him home, for a 1-2 for McLaren.

The best race on the track was with Honda and Williams battling it out between Button and Rosberg in the first part of the GP.

Lewis showed his steel by overtaking Kimi Raikkonen after he was relegated to third when he exited from his second pit stop. The move took part at the first chicane, and was one of his best moves of the season. He braked massively late, and took Kimi on the inside into the chicane.

This was because the Finn only pitted the once during the race, and during the second stint of his race, Lewis Hamilton just could not match the pace of his team leader.

Other notable happenings on track where David Coulthard’s failed front wing, allowing him to fly off the road and into the barriers at 170mph while in the middle of the first Lesmo, this brought out the safety car for a few laps.

Jenson managed to hold onto 8th spot for his second point of the season, for all intense and purpose a win for the Honda team.

So we look forward to Spa-Francorchamps for the Belgian GP. The Spa circuit usually creates a great race.

Results

1 F. Alonso Vodafone McLaren Mercedes
2 L. Hamilton Vodafone McLaren Mercedes
3 K. Raikkonen Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro
4 N. Heidfeld BMW Sauber F1 Team
5 R. Kubica BMW Sauber F1 Team
6 N. Rosberg AT&T Williams
7 H. Kovalainen ING Renault F1 Team
8 J. Button Honda Racing F1 Team