Abu Dabi GP: Desert Stars

(F1 Drivers at Abu Dabi; Source: Grandprix.com)

Whale I pre-empted my recent Saturday “Qualie” teaser in honour of the tenth Anniversary of Canadian Open Wheel Star Greg Moore’s passing…

Along with the fact that I don’t recall it being an overly exciting Qualifying session, as Lewis Hamilton simply “Blitzed” the field, as it was reported that his margin of 0.667 seconds over second place Sebastian Vettel was the largest since 2005.

And “JAGUAR’s” (Hamilton) teammate “KOVY” (Kovalainen) continued his Rodney Dangerfield impersonation, as his Gearbox packed-up on the Fin in the middle of Q2, when it looked likely that Heikki would help insure a McLaren front row lockout… While ironically, as “Fredrico Suave” (Alonso) was making his final Qualifying run for Renault, the Spaniard failed to survive Q1 for the very first time in his career.

And while the Red Bull & BRAWN GP Boyz duked it out for the sharp end of the grid, they were left scrapping over P2 and beyond as Hamilton’s KERS equipped MP4-24 was unassailable, with the top two teams in this year’s Constructor’s Championship inverted; as Vettel led Mark Webber, with Rubino (Barrichello) besting ‘JENSE (Button) once again, while the Kimster (Raikkonen) was unable to advance into the final Q3 Qualie session, finishing 11th and “Fishy-Fellah” (Fisichella) was down in the doldrums once again. (P20)

Thus with Hamilton taking his fourth Pole in the last seven races and Kovalainen 13th, while Raikkonen was P11 and Fisichella starting dead last… (Some 1.5 seconds adrift of Hamilton) The odds of McLaren holding onto their narrow one point lead for third in the Constructor’s title seemed in their favour, as reportedly the difference between third and fourth is a cool $5 million…

Race
Although the Announcers, Driver’s and Media had all spent the entire weekend totally enamored by the brand new circuit (for obvious reasons) largely due to the man made Island’s sheer opulence… I found the race like qualifying to be most Anti-Climatic… Also being not overly impressed by the race itself, as Hamilton seemingly would walk away from the field with his KERS boost upon the F1 Circuses longest straightaway, three quarters of a mile in length and doubling as a future drag strip.

Yet Vettel did his best to remain within sight of the somewhat vanishing McLaren, whose lead was cut in half when “Louise” made an unforced error and thus Sebastian was able to take over the lead after running an extra two laps before pitting… But it was all for naught, as shortly thereafter Hamilton would be forced to retire with an unknown rear braking problem; as I found it most interesting that Peter Windsor reported that Lewis was running two different manufacturer’s compounds on his car; Carbon Industries at the front and Brembo on the rear…

Thus with Vettel’s stiffest competition tucked away into the air conditioned Pit garage, it was a cakewalk for the young German, building up an 18 second lead over eventual runner-up Webber, albeit new World Champion elect Button spiced up the show in the waning laps with a fairly epic duel with the Aussie over second place as the pair ran wheel to wheel, front wing endplates nearly touching, before ‘JENSE settled for the podiums final step…

Race Drive of Abu Dabi
Although Nick Heidfeld gave departing BMW Sauber its final F1 points and “BOOMER” (Sebastian Buemi) came home eighth, once again my hat’s tipped to the man of the fleeting moment; “K-Squared,” as Kamui Kobayashi once again drove an excellent race, finishing sixth, one place ahead of his senior teammate and scoring his first (and most likely last) Grand Prix points, as sadly Kobayashi now looks set to go back to being a Sushi waiter in Japan…

Kobayashi: It’s Toyota or Sushi

Top 3 - Qualifying
Pole: Lewis Hamilton
Second: Sebastian Vettel
Third: Mark Webber

Race Results
Winner: S. Vettel; 2nd: M. Webber; 3rd: J. Button; 4th: R. Barrichello;
5th: N. Heidfeld; 6th: K. Kobayashi; 7th: J. Trulli; 8th: S. Buemi.

San Paolo ‘N Sprinkles

What an extraordinary Qualifying session I’ve just sat thru… As it has to be the longest “Qualie” in recent history? Taking a mere 2+ hours to complete, due to a massive rain delay, when asked of his opinion, Mark Webber quipped; tell him to put his glasses on! Referring to the FIA’s Charlie Whiting as there were rivers of water cascading across the tarmac after Vitantonnio Luzzi had stuffed it into the barriers in Q2, bringing out a Red Flag, before we went into the prolonged stoppage with 12:45 remaining to be run.

Yet while the past two days activities have commenced in the wet stuff, nee rain, (understatement of the day, eh?) reportedly it should be a fairly dry race tomorrow. (Hopefully) As all BLOODY ‘JENSE (Button) needs to do is finish on the podium, no worse then third to clinch his first F1 Drivers World Championship regardless of what Barrichello or Vettel do… So, a BRAWN GP 1-2 with Rubino winning his home race would do nicely, as it’s probably his very last shot, eh?

Besides we really want ‘JENSE & BRAWN GP to clinch the titles in San Paolo just to spite Uncle Bernaughty who’s publicly crooned for the title fight to go all the way to Abu Dubai instead… (So he can jack-up TV Commercial rates?)

Then again, Button and Vettel will have their work cut out for them tomorrow, as Jenson will roll off from P14 and Sebastian from a very uncharacteristic P16! While starting ahead of both McLaren’s…

As the Boy from Brazil; Rubino set Interlagos alight with his first pole in 5yrs, ironically 88 races ago at Interlagos whilst driving as Herr Schumacher’s wingman… So can the ageless Brazilian finally take the chequer’s in his Home race?

Tune-in tomorrow!

Utterly chaotic Qualifying session in Japan

Whale I’ve just finished watching the most chaotic F1 Qualifying session that I can recall in a very long time from suzuka, Japan… And although the rain has stopped for the time being, with reports of another Typhoon heading towards the Philippines, the accidents certainly did not!

The morning’s final practice session saw Mark Webber write-off his RB5 chassis upon ripping off the steering rack in a brutal crash and therefore didn’t take part in today’s Qualifying.

Then, a most bizarre three red flags were issued during a Qualifying session fraught with five crashes involving four drivers, with Scuderia Toro Rosso’s Sebastien Buemi crashing twice and causing a Yellow flag which would ultimately effect the final grid positions of four drivers, who were deemed to have not lifted off of the throttle in this area, as both BRAWN GP Drivers ‘JENSE & Rubino, along with Fernando Alonso and Adrian Sutil would all receive five grid spot penalties for this infraction. (Which makes it pretty funny to see how animated Fredrico was after the Q2 “Quallie” session…) While Buemi was docked five grid spots for driving back to the pits in his damaged car from his second incident and impeding the progress of his competitors.

But oh no, we weren’t done yet with the grid penalties, as adding insult to injury was McLaren’s Heikki Kovalin, one of the red flag crashers… And Force India’s Vitantonnio Luzzi both being forced to take five grid spot penalties upon replacing their gearboxes.

Meanwhile, Toyota’s Timo Glock who was flown by helicopter to Hospital with back pains and a cut leg, who hopefully will race tomorrow, joined Webber on the final row of the grid as his TF109 chassis also needed to be replaced, with SPEED now reporting that Glock will NOT participate tomorrow and there will only be a single Toyota participating.

Hopefully the race will be a little less chaotic with no more accidents, eh?

Revised Starting Grid

Spanish Flies

Amazingly Heikki Kovalainen escaped Un-Injured from his massive crash during the Spanish Grand Prix…
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As fortunately FIA mandated safety design standards have vastly improved driver’s chances of survivability in today’s F1 racing cars. Imagine if this had been the 1980’s when driver’s lower extremities were placed far forwards of the front axle centerline…

Yet for those of us who watched a fairly processional Spanish GP, we were momentarily stunned by Heikki Kovalainen’s massive shunt against the tire barrier thru a 140mph corner…

According to Ron Dennis and Martin Whitemarsh, the team suspects that a “rogue” piece of stone somehow lodged itself between the front tire rim and suspension, as a sudden, unexplained loss of air pressure sent the hurtling McLaren straight thru the sand trap, impailing the stricken MP4-23 underneath the tire barrier… As it took ten minutes to dislodge Heikki from the cockpit of his heavily wrecked McLaren, which miraculously he would escape without injury!

Once again I found Friday’s second practice session TV coverage more informative then Saturday’s qualifying program, albeit Fredrico Suave did NOT disappoint his fellow countrymen, with a light tanks go for broke qualifying run in the dramatic Q3 Final “Qualie” session…

Paddock notes
Peter Windsor noted how glad he was to have his job and how good it was to see Bernie Ecclestone strolling the paddock, making sure that the F1 team’s palatial “Motor Coaches” were all parked perfectly a half inch away from each other…

Super Aguri was extended a further Grand Prix as it appears that its buy-out from the Magma Group has fallen apart. Honda F1’s boss Nick Fry said that Honda had paid a further 2.0 million Euros for the tiny “B-Team” to race this weekend, but don’t expect any further funding at Turkey…

Various discussions were made about the new aero treatments several teams were running, most notably Honda’s “Rabbit-ears,” NOT to be confused with last years version of “Elephant-ears” which Steve Matchett claimed the team had to discontinue because they were so UGLY!

Professor Matchett also discussed Renault’s new Dorsal Fin treatment on the spine of the rear engine cover a la Red Bull Racing; For more info see Speed TV’s chalkboard section…

While poised to become the most experienced man in Formula 1, Honda’s Rubens Barrichello completed two race distances back-to-back during the most recent test at Barcelona, a feat of 150 laps…

The House of Winsor noted how card playing has become all the rage in the F1 Paddock, as “Fishy-fella,” Tonio Luzzi, both BMW-Sauber boyzs and Ferdi the Putz, a.k.a. Alonso have all taken to playing poker until 11:30PM every Saturday night, while Giancarlo Fisichella is the man to beat…

Adrian Newey’s Red Bull version of the Scuderia Toro Rosso STR-03 is still on track to debut at Turkey despite Bourdais’s big crash…

And speaking of the Hamburgular, a.k.a. Sebastain Bourdeax (Bourdais) he’s managed to steal a better qualifying position ahead of more experienced teammate Sebastian Vettel once again, along with beating senior F1 driver DC!

And it was funny to see the Force India F1 team atop the time sheets for a long portion of Friday’s second practice session, with “Fisi” leading Adrian Sutil, who were then split by The Iceman… Before “Kazoo” Nakajima jumped to the top with Nico Rosberg hot on his heels, before the Spanish crowd went ecstatic with homeboy Fredrico Suave and Nelson Nelson of the Renault squad taking their turn at the top of the page…

But as Sir Jackie (Stewart) so bluntly pointed out on Peter Winsor’s grid walk, NOBODY would beat Kimi Raikkonen from pole… As he became the eighth driver in a row to win from the coveted grid position at Barcelona…

And while Alonso delighted the 132,000+ Spanish spectators, his engine finally “DONE BLOWN UP!” while running in the points… As it had been previously pointed out that engines were reported to cost a cool $250,000 Euros a copy. What’s that David? About $400k large greenbacks Bob Varsha quipped…


Qualifying results
Pole: Kimi Raikkonen; 2. Fernando Alonso; 3. Felipe Massa; 4. Robert Kubica; 5. Lewis Hamilton; 6. Heikki Kovalainen; 7. Mark Webber; 8. Jarno Trulli: 9. Nick Heidfeld; 10. Nelson Piquet Jr

Race results
Winner: K. Raikkonen; 2. F. Massa; 3. L. Hamilton; 4. R. Kubica;
5. M. Webber; 6. Jenson Button: 7. Kazuki Nakajima; 8. J. Trulli

2008 F1 Point Standings
Round 4 of 18)

Driver’s
K. Raikkonen 29
L. Hamilton 20
R. Kubica 19
F. Massa 18
N. Heidfeld 16
H. Kovalainen 14

Constructors
Ferrari 47
BMW Sauber 35
McLaren 34
Williams 12
Red Bull 8

Bahrain Sand Dunes

I’d have to say that with the continuing Maxxum-gate and the St. Pete Indy Car race, my thoughts have been wandering like the shifting sands of the Bahrain Kingdom, which still amazes me that the entire Island nation is smaller than the square footage of the neighboring Saudi Arabia airport…

Thus I found Friday’s practice session to be fairly non-descript, besides the re-hashing of Max Mosley’s Pictionary games. Although I found it a bit funny to hear how Professor Matchett’s ex co-worker (John Wheatley) and crew chief of some guy named Schumacher’s at Benetton had been called before the FIA to explain the rash of Red Bull’s suspension failures and whether or not the chassis were indeed safe?

I also enjoyed hearing Peter Windsor’s recanting of the Williams team fooling the FIA scrutineers over the mirror’s rearward visibility, saying that they’d had an Engineer hooked up to a radio to say yes… As the steward scurried about the rear of the car as Adrian Newey had positioned the mirrors in an outward’s location in favour of aerodynamics vs. driver’s visibility. As this had all come up over DC’s less than complimentary comments over the radio we’d been allowed to hear.

And the comment towards The Krakow Kid (Robert Kubica) deciding to loose six kilos of weight off his rakish thin frame in order to help the BMW Sauber team play with ballast is simply astounding! (6 kilos = 13.23lbs) As I always find this utterly amazing when drivers go to such measures in the vain of ultimate car performance…

Then with 8 minutes to go Lewis Hamilton slid over a kerb and slammed sideways into the tire wall, ripping the front wheel and suspension mounts clean off his chassis, to which the McLaren mechanics would stay at the track until 4:30AM building up a new vehicle, as the FIA has STUPIDLY Banned the use of spare chassis this season. Although the teams are allowed to bring spare monocoque’s (tubs) they’re not allowed to be built-up units and thus the McLaren boys worked late into the night building up a new chassis for Hamilton as he’d tweaked the sensitive bonded suspension pick-up points into disrepair, as well as both Louise’s and Heikki’s cars having issues with their transmissions… Ah, the life of an F1 mechanic, eh?

Yet the only surprise of Q1 Qualifying was the Hamburgular outpacing his teammate, the German hot schue Sebastian Vettel, as Sea Bass’s 9th time held up for P16 as the runners completed their flying laps, thus Bourdais made his way forward into Q2, out qualifying Vettel for the first time this season.

And the usual suspects made their way forwards from Q2 into the final Q3 Qualie session, although it was “Jense’s” first time this far up the grid in quite some time.

And I don’t know about you, but I really enjoy the camaraderie that the Three Amigos in the SPEED TV Formula 1 broadcast booth have developed, as Bob Varsha and David Hobbs have been friend and broadcasting colleagues for several years, thus I broke into laughter when Hobbo claimed that ‘Ol Phil Massa was lurking like a Spectre over Louise’s shoulder towards the final Qualie session… Which caused Varsha to chide the elder Hobb’s: NO more coffee for you. (Sunshine)

As although Massa had been blindingly quick the whole qualifying session, he was pipped by Kubica at the very end of the session by less than three one-hundred’s of a second, which gave both the Krakow Kid and BMW Sauber their very first Pole position, which of course caused Varsha to make the requisite Pole on Pole jokes…

Although it was later revealed that it was the very first time in Sauber’s 15yrs as a Constructor and the first time that a new team and driver had garnered the honours since Rubens Barrichello scored the REAL EJ’s (Eddie Jordan) first Pole in 1994.

Thus the grid formed up with Kubica on Pole, Massa in P2, with Hamilton third with the Iceman Kimi alongside in fourth. Row three saw Heikki ahead of Quick Nick in the second BMW Sauber. Row four was an all Toyota engine affair with Toyota’s Trulli “Scrumptious joined by Williams Nico Rosberg, with Jense’s Honda lining up in P9 with the affable Spaniard Alonso slotted in tenth.

Yet Kubica’s moment in the spotlights was soon finished, as Phil Massa sprang like a champagne cork and took the lead, immediately screaming off into the distance on the first of his many hot laps. But the commotion of lap one fell to Hamilton’s unusual lack of pace as the lights went green, dropping from P3 all the way back to tenth, even worse, being stuck behind his favourite dancing partner… Some dude named Fredrico Suave… Who I believe gave the young Louise a patented Ferdi (Hi) Jink as we witnessed Hamilton clouting into the rear of Alonso’s slower Renault which demolished Lewis’s front nose and effectively ruined his race…

After these shenanigans settled down and Professor Matchett pointed out the large chunk of rear wing missing from Ferdi’s rear wing… The race settled down into somewhat procession-like running, although there was an entertaining dust-up between Button and DC. And the comments about DC’s mirrors of course came into the fray as well as Jense not having too far to drive as he’s taken up residence in the Bahrain Kingdom something to do with not having to pay taxes… Although it seems a bit galling to think that this little Island can successfully host a GP with a maximum attendance of 34,000 spectators, while Tony’s ‘lil Sandbox isn’t good enough for Emperor Bernardo…

And speaking of Coulthard, he earned the word of the week, when describing kerb hopping as; Kerb Strike.

Thus as the Ferrari boyzs traded fastest laps and drove off into the sunset, the BMW Sauber teammates were left to scrum over the final podium position, which Kubica held onto, while Massa redeemed himself with the Italian press by convincingly winning over Raikkonen.

Kimi’s second place finish propelled him into the championship points lead while Hamilton’s 13th place finish. (His career worst) dropped him to third in the standings, while Kubica’s podium coupled with Heidfeld’s fourth place sees BMW Sauber take the Constructor’s points lead by one point over the Scuderia, who lead McLaren by a further one point, as we’ll now have a three week break for everyone to get rested up before the European season kicks-off in Barcelona…


Driver’s Point Standings
K. Raikkonen 19
N. Heidfeld 16
L. Hamilton 14
R. Kubica 14
H. Kovalainen 14


Constructors Points Standings
BMW Sauber 30
Ferrari 29
McLaren 28