Japanese GP Report
October 13th 2010 22:43
Following the party atmosphere of Singapore, F1 returned to an old-fashioned, driver’s circuit in Japan, where high-downforce, courage and finesse were needed to tame the snaking Suzuka circuit. Torrential rain pounded the track on Saturday, postponing qualifying – but the skies cleared on Sunday and the title contenders resumed their battle for the ultimate prize.
Red Bull
Sebastian Vettel (1st)
Red Bull re-established themselves atop the pecking order in Japan, a track the high-downforce RB6 simply exists to race on. Last year’s Japanese Grand Prix winner, Vettel was mighty once again – topping all the timesheets and taking pole quite convincingly. He was never troubled in the race, but nor did he pull a massive gap to his teammate. His victory now puts him equal second in the title race, and has given a major injection of enthusiasm to match his unwavering self-belief.
Mark Webber (2nd)
Webbs bogged down off the start line and lost a place to Kubica – but when the Renault’s wheel fell off, it was a business-as-usual run to finish second and maintain his lead in the championship. The Aussie kept Vetts in his sights until the line, taking the fastest lap on the last lap of the race, and crossing the line less than a second behind his teammate. He’s still out in front, but acknowledged he needs to win again if he’s to be crowned champion come the year’s end.
Ferrari
Fernando Alonso (3rd)
Nando didn’t have the car underneath him to make it three from three, but at least he was able to keep the feisty McLarens behind him to claim a handy podium and keep himself well and truly within the title race.
Felipe Massa (DNF)
A first lap duck for Massa after a horrid qualifying session had Felipe believing he was cursed. The majority of cursing probably came from the lips of the Ferrari crew after witnessing their Brazilian driver cannoning himself off the grass and into a hapless Tonio Liuzzi at the first corner. Not a good weekend for a man under pressure.
McLaren
Jenson Button (4th)
J-Butt ran a unique strategy, running longer on the primes than others, which lost him much time to Alonso’s Ferrari and his teammate. He had strong pace at the end with fresher rubber and low fuel – but had Hamilton not have developed gear issues, Button would have been fifth and last of the title contenders.
Lewis Hamilton (5th)
Burnout Boy’s luck continues its downward spiral, this time his gearbox decided it hated him and caused all manner of issues over the weekend. It required changing in practice following a crash at the Degners, but despite the five-place penalty, Lewis was on a mission in the race, and was soon in fourth and looking strong. Then his gearbox threw out fourth – probably the most important gear in there – and it was a nursing effort home to fifth.
Mercedes
Michael Schumacher (7th)
The wiley old dog was for once looking fast compared to his teammate at Suzuka – a track he has always loved. The million-times world champion just scraped into Q3, but in the race was more convincing and battled his way into the points, and was even held up by Nico at one point. Whether or not he celebrated by getting drunk and tipping over fridges as he did in 2003 cannot be confirmed.
Nico Rosberg (DNF)
Nico’s race was going its usual pre-determined path of boring-but-scoring, until he began suffering bad wear on his tyres and he fell into the clutches of his (for once) faster teammate. He held the old fox off though, but then his wheel fell off, which generally makes it difficult to drive.
Sauber
Kamui Kobayashi (7th)
Kamui Koba-bashi was at his fearless best at his home track, despite a disappointing qualifying that left him starting from P14. The local hero ran a long first stint, which meant when he did rejoin, he was down in 13th, but on fresh, sticky rubber. He took full advantage of this, braking into the hairpin later than anyone with self-preservation instincts would dare – and carving up both Toro Rossos, Rubens Barrichello and his team-mate in quick succession. A brilliant late-race showing.
Nick Heidfeld (8th).
The decision to sign Heidfeld paid off in Suzuka, with the German reminding the F1 world why he should never have been left on the sidelines in the first place. He outqualified teammate Kobayashi in the morning – only barely missing out on a Q3 appearance. Then Quick Nick made a clean getaway and raced his way into the points, where he remained all afternoon. He was unable to defend against his teammate who was on fresher tyres in the end, but 8th place in just his second race back is a phenomenal performance.
Williams
Rubens Barrichello (9th)
Woobens put in a solid performance in Japan – though he was mildly disappointed his Williams didn’t carry the pace it showed in qualifying over to the race. He complained about vibrations in the car, possibly caused by Nico accidentally dropping his Sony PSP inside his teammate’s cockpit before the race.
Nico Hulkenberg (DNF)
Rookie met rookie early on in Suzuka. Hulkenberg made a sluggish start, but only made it about five metres from his pit box when a lunatic Petrov swerved in front of the Williams and bundled them both out of the race. Bummer dude.
Toro Rosso
Sebastien Buemi (10th)
Seabass was the odd one out in qualifying, being the dreaded seventh man out in Q1. But the Swiss driver recovered in the race and thanks to a good strategy and strong pace managed to salvage a points finish ahead of his teammate who started higher on the grid.
Jaime Alguersuari (11th)
Lil’ Algy could have come home with the point his teammate collected, but a late race brain fade cost him his nose and position. He had been running within the points when Kamui on a mission passed the Spaniard at the hairpin – instead of conceding the position as he should, Algy fought unnecessarily, playing bumper cars with the Sauber. The resultant damage cost him his front wing and a point. Live and learn.
Lotus
Heikki Kovalainen (12th)
‘Heikki, dude, how was the race?’ “It was a wicked race,” ‘gnarly!’ That’s how Heikki described his Suzuka outing, clearly pretty happy and for good reason. He and Jarno were easily the fastest of the new teams, and they managed to not humiliate themselves on a circuit that rewards good drivers and machinery.
Jarno Trulli (13th)
The winemaker/driver was caught behind Sakon Yamamoto for a few laps after the first lap chaos, but once he got past and became comfy on his sets of primes, the Italian looked strong and gave his teammate a run for the flag.
Virgin
Timo Glock (14th)
Glock Dog wasn’t incredibly happy seeing the Lotuses extend their margin in the division B of the championship. The German became frustratingly stuck behind Yamamoto for a good portion of the race, but he at least brought the car home reliably.
Lucas Di Grassi (DNS)
Crashed at 130R on a warm up lap. How embarrassing.
HRT
Bruno Senna (15th)
Senna was happy with his race, mainly because he and his teammate both saw the chequered flag.
Sakon Yamamoto (16th)
Despite Christian Klien’s brilliant showing at Singapore, Sakon was back for his home grand prix. Though, to his credit he did do a good job battling off Glock and Trulli – and he even set a fastest lap time just one tenth off Trulli’s Lotus and quicker than teammate Senna and Virgin’s Glock. Was still generally useless though,
Force India
Adrian Sutil (DNF)
You don’t see many engine failures these days in F1, but Sutil reminded us of the joys of a good old-fashioned smokey exit. The Force India was never convincing in the race anyhow before its powerplant exploded in a cloud of smoke and oil towards the latter stage of the race.
Tonio Liuzzi (DNF)
Yet another DNF for the Italian Stereotype. To be fair, it wasn’t his fault that he was collected by Massa’s disaster bound Ferrari, but Liuzzi needs a good result if he’s to have any hope of racing in 2011 - badly.
Renault
Robert Kubica (DNF)
The flying owl was fast off the block and mugged Webber for second going into the first corner. Unfortunately his race ended shortly after when the Renault’s left rear wheel simply vanished from the car whilst behind the safety car. An unlucky end after a promising start.
Vitaly Petrov (DNF)
Petrov, like his Renault teammate was like a bolt off the line, but his good work was undone when he scooted sideways into Nico Hulkenberg’s tortoise-like Williams and triggered his own demise.
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