There's no doubt that 2012 has seen some fantastic racing in F1. The last race from Bahrain was spectacular, and every race seems to set the bar higher every time. If the season carries on at this pace, then we're definitely in for one that will be remembered for a very long time.
Qualifying in Spain on Saturday was again a mystery. The practice sessions this year don't seem to have given any indication as to which man will take the top spot of the grid. One thing is for sure though, the qualifying sessions this year are no longer the foregone conclusion of Vettel and Red Bull. This definitely makes things more interesting, but I must admit I'd be happier seeing the Red Bulls a little closer to that number one spot. In Spain, we got quite a shock result for quali - Pastor Maldonado on pole position, Williams' first pole since Hulkenberg in 2010. Admittedly, Maldonado's pole was granted to him after Hamilton was excluded from qualifying (due to a team member not putting enough fuel in the car to get it back under its own steam after the quali lap), but even for a Williams to occupy the second position spot is a feat to be proud of. The line up of the grid was completely unpredictable, and I think you'd struggle to find anyone who honestly would have told you the result. Maldonado took pole, with Alonso second and the Lotuses of Grosjean and Raikkonen third and fourth. Sauber also fared well in quali, with Perez taking fifth. Close behind were nico Rosberg and Sebastian Vettel, after Seb chose to not set a time and save his tyres. Schumacher, Kobayashi and Button made up the top ten, with Webber eventually lining up 11th.
So as you can see, a pretty mixed up grid, making for what was an absolutely spectacular race. Alonso had a great start, as everyone thought he would. However, it transpired that Alonso couldn't turn this into a win - instead, Williams took the highest step on the podium with Alonso finishing right behind. The last few laps of the race were thrilling with the Maldonado/Alonso shoot-out, and credit has to go to Maldonado for not getting too intimidated and hanging on to that first position - honestly, if there's one man you don't want to be chased by it's Alonso, as he's definitely one of the best drivers on that grid. Add to that the fact that Alonso was at his home grand prix, and I don't think you'd find many men who could stand the pressure that Maldonado faced. Raikkonen eventually took third place in another great finish for Lotus, and I think it's fair to say that had the race gone on for much longer Raikkonen would have been right up in the fight between Maldonado and Alonso. With that finish, we had a Williams, Ferrari and Lotus on the podium for the first time in many years, and five different winners for as many teams in as many races. Williams can be proud of that victory, and I'm sure Frank Williams had the best birthday present he could have hoped for. Credit also has to go to Hamilton - from the back of the grid he finished 8th. I was also pleased to see that after his penalty Hamilton acted with good grace, and simply said he wanted to enjoy the racing. Of late, Hamilton's been slightly down and almost mopey in press conferences, but I'm hoping that we're now getting back to seeing the old Lewis, and we can start to focus back on his amazing driving abilities.
With the race over, we obviously expected to see no more drama until Monaco in two weeks' time. However, a large fire broke out at the Williams garage while the team were celebrating and listening to a speech from Frank Williams. The fire looked absolutely horrific, and several people had to be taken to hospital. Luckily, it appears that everyone was ok, although it's a sad way for the Williams team to end such a brilliant weekend. The team lost a lot of equipment during the fire, but other teams have offered to help by donating their extra equipment. It just goes to show how much of a family the F1 circus is, even if it's a competitive environment. Honestly, we could all learn a lot from these guys!
Now that this weekend is over, F1 heads to Monaco for one of its most celebrated races. The best part for me is that once F1 lands in Monaco, I'll be done with my exams, and free to blog and watch the racing uninterrupted. So, well done to Williams, and bring on the next race!
Showing posts with label Raikkonen. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Raikkonen. Show all posts
Wednesday, 16 May 2012
Tuesday, 24 April 2012
Bahrain Blogging
Last weekend I watched the Bahrain grand prix. As you're probably aware, before the race there was a ton of media hype about whether F1 should attend the race given the current situation over there. Arguments against ranged from the political, moral and ethical standpoint to the safety elements of holding the race. Personally, I didn't see exactly why the race should be cancelled providing that the area was deemed safe by the relevant authorities. As much as I agree that the human rights situation is diabolical, I hold the view that Formula 1 is a sport - no more, no less. It has no involvement with the politics of a country, and just because the race is held there doesn't mean that it endorses the political regime of the area. Besides, F1 has held races in several countries with somewhat dubious moral standpoints (China the week before, for example), and yet these races had not been questioned. As such, the only difference with Bahrain was related to safety.
While there were several off-track incidents involving a couple of teams, overall the weekend appeared to go smoothly. There was no interruption to the sessions, and so we could finally get down to watching the racing. Saturday's qualifying session came up with a surprise pole sitter (at least in terms of this year's performance standard). No McLaren or Mercedes this time. Instead, the Renault powered Red Bull of Sebastian Vettel was back where it belonged on the first slot of the grid - much to my delight!
With the grid decided and (as far as I'm concerned) back to where it should be, the race on Sunday was promising. The previous race in China was fantastic, with lots of tight racing. Bahrain to me has never been a particularly thrilling race, however once again the value of DRS was proven and we finally saw an exciting race this year. Vettel got a fantastic start and ultimately went on to win the race. The biggest surprise was who was occupying the second and third place slots. While you'd have expected the McLarens or even the Mercedes' to be near the top, Bahrain was obviously favouring the Renault powered cars as Kimi Raikkonen and Romain Grosjean joined Vettel on the podium! If you never watch the press conferences, I suggest you try and catch this one - just to see Grosjean's expression of happiness!
So, the race was absolutely thrilling and great fun to watch. Hopefully, this is what this race will be remembered for, rather than for the political circumstances surrounding it. There was a lot of questions whether attending Bahrain would damage F1's reputation, but to be honest so far I haven't witnessed a lot of backlash - I think those of us who watched the race were just concerned with the racing, as any motorsport fan should be.
Now that Bahrain is behind us, we've got a bit of a break before the European rounds begin in Spain on the 13th of May. For me, this time will be filled with revision and exams, and I have no excuse to be distracted by F1 any more! The return to Europe also marks the countdown to Spa - the race that I will be attending this year. My race tickets were delivered today, and so the excitement begins...
While there were several off-track incidents involving a couple of teams, overall the weekend appeared to go smoothly. There was no interruption to the sessions, and so we could finally get down to watching the racing. Saturday's qualifying session came up with a surprise pole sitter (at least in terms of this year's performance standard). No McLaren or Mercedes this time. Instead, the Renault powered Red Bull of Sebastian Vettel was back where it belonged on the first slot of the grid - much to my delight!
With the grid decided and (as far as I'm concerned) back to where it should be, the race on Sunday was promising. The previous race in China was fantastic, with lots of tight racing. Bahrain to me has never been a particularly thrilling race, however once again the value of DRS was proven and we finally saw an exciting race this year. Vettel got a fantastic start and ultimately went on to win the race. The biggest surprise was who was occupying the second and third place slots. While you'd have expected the McLarens or even the Mercedes' to be near the top, Bahrain was obviously favouring the Renault powered cars as Kimi Raikkonen and Romain Grosjean joined Vettel on the podium! If you never watch the press conferences, I suggest you try and catch this one - just to see Grosjean's expression of happiness!
So, the race was absolutely thrilling and great fun to watch. Hopefully, this is what this race will be remembered for, rather than for the political circumstances surrounding it. There was a lot of questions whether attending Bahrain would damage F1's reputation, but to be honest so far I haven't witnessed a lot of backlash - I think those of us who watched the race were just concerned with the racing, as any motorsport fan should be.
Now that Bahrain is behind us, we've got a bit of a break before the European rounds begin in Spain on the 13th of May. For me, this time will be filled with revision and exams, and I have no excuse to be distracted by F1 any more! The return to Europe also marks the countdown to Spa - the race that I will be attending this year. My race tickets were delivered today, and so the excitement begins...
Saturday, 14 April 2012
Qualifying Surprises of a Different Sort
Once again it's a grand prix weekend, with this week's action coming from China. Qualifying took place at 7 this morning, and it definitely held a few surprises which should make for an intriguing race tomorrow. This season, McLaren have been confident in all the race weekends so far - despite Lewis Hamilton's sometimes grumpy demeanour. While 2011 was Red Bull's qualifying season, this year it looks as though McLaren have the advantage, securing a front-row lock out in Australia and a third place slot for Lewis in Malaysia. However, this weekend the team have had a few hurdles, with Lewis having to take a 5-place grid drop due to a gearbox change, meaning that his second position on the grid actually translates into seventh. Jenson Button also had a somewhat disappointing session, only qualifying sixth (translating into fifth after Lewis's penalty).
With the McLarens further down, you'd expect the other two big teams to be ahead. Well, this also prompted suprise this morning. Despite Alonso's promising win in Malaysia, Ferrari this week could only manage 9th and 12th, with Alonso out-qualifying Massa once again. Whether the team can turn this around in the race is a question to be answered tomorrow. So what of the Red Bulls? Well, this was perhaps the biggest surprise of all, with Webber no higher than 7th and Vettel not making Q3 for the first time since 2009, instead only managing 11th place.
Now, you should all be aware that I'm a Red Bull girl anyway, and Vettel is without doubt my favourite driver, so I'm leading on to a slight rant here. After Q2 with Vettel out of Q3, Twitter was awash with what I can only describe as childish tweets. Some people were simply laughing at the driver's misfortune, others were making sarcastic comments, and still more were questioning Vettel's ability in F1. While I understand that we all have our own favourites and not all drivers are to all tastes, the frankly low comments I saw on Twitter were embarrassing. I know for example that I'm not the biggest fan of Lewis Hamilton (largely for the fact that his personality has shifted since he first started driving and since he won the 2008 championship - that and the earrings), however I don't ever mock him if he gets a bad result. I certainly don't question his ability in an F1 car either. I recall a comment by Martin Brundle that there are seven billion people in the world, and only 24 F1 drivers in the sport right now. Surely then we should all have respect for every one of those drivers on that grid, as they've proven their talent throughout their careers? Thus, one bad result doesn't mean that the competitor isn't a good driver, and we have to examine other aspects to the session which could contribute to a poor result (for example, Vettel running an old spec exhaust while Webber ran the newer spec).
I think the Vettel-hate on Twitter is largely to do with the success of the driver, and from reading comments (and through personal experience in my academic career) I've noticed that people generally don't like successful people and rejoice when they fall. It seems silly to question Vettel's ability as a result of one bad qualifying session. The guy's won two world championships and was absolutely dominant throughout last year. Before you utter the age old cry 'but it was the car!', I'd ask you to consider that Webber could not match Vettel's performance in the identical Red Bull, so I think that this is a point which is null and void. This year, Red Bull clearly haven't got the dominance with the car, hence the poorer results for both drivers. A similar thing happened after Brawn became Mercedes - the car which dominated 2009 just dropped away in 2010. These things happen, even if the ability of the driver stays the same.
Another case in point is the performance of Alonso. Ferrari have obviously been having issues in the past couple of years, and yet I don't see anyone questioning whether Alonso is a good driver or not. So why the target on Vettel? Like I said before, all 24 of these drivers have exceptional talent to make it this far, and to post childish comments on a social networking site is just petty to me and I'm urging fans to grow up just a little, and at least form some coherent arguments! With any luck, as the season progresses we'll be able to see an improvement for the Red Bull guys, and hopefully the petty comments will stop so we can all go back to watching races and appreciating them no matter who is driving.
So, with the top three teams suffering in China's qualifying session, who took the top slots? Well, after Hamilton's penalty we've got an all Silver Arrows front row, with the Mercedes of Nico Rosberg occupying the first slot (a career first for Rosberg) and Schumacher following close behind. This is a phenomenal achievement, and Mercedes are proving that their car has the pace in qualifying. It could be argued that the aerodynamic system on the rear wing of the car is helping a lot during qualifying (as use of DRS is pretty much unlimited during quali and practice sessions), however we've yet to see this sort of advantage during the race itself. Again, tomorrow will tell us exactly what Mercedes can do.
The third and fourth slots on the grid are also occupied by some surprising drivers. Third place went to Kamui Kobayashi, which is promising for Sauber considering their excellent achievements in Malaysia. Fourth place went to Lotus Renault's Kimi Raikkonen
With the McLarens further down, you'd expect the other two big teams to be ahead. Well, this also prompted suprise this morning. Despite Alonso's promising win in Malaysia, Ferrari this week could only manage 9th and 12th, with Alonso out-qualifying Massa once again. Whether the team can turn this around in the race is a question to be answered tomorrow. So what of the Red Bulls? Well, this was perhaps the biggest surprise of all, with Webber no higher than 7th and Vettel not making Q3 for the first time since 2009, instead only managing 11th place.
Now, you should all be aware that I'm a Red Bull girl anyway, and Vettel is without doubt my favourite driver, so I'm leading on to a slight rant here. After Q2 with Vettel out of Q3, Twitter was awash with what I can only describe as childish tweets. Some people were simply laughing at the driver's misfortune, others were making sarcastic comments, and still more were questioning Vettel's ability in F1. While I understand that we all have our own favourites and not all drivers are to all tastes, the frankly low comments I saw on Twitter were embarrassing. I know for example that I'm not the biggest fan of Lewis Hamilton (largely for the fact that his personality has shifted since he first started driving and since he won the 2008 championship - that and the earrings), however I don't ever mock him if he gets a bad result. I certainly don't question his ability in an F1 car either. I recall a comment by Martin Brundle that there are seven billion people in the world, and only 24 F1 drivers in the sport right now. Surely then we should all have respect for every one of those drivers on that grid, as they've proven their talent throughout their careers? Thus, one bad result doesn't mean that the competitor isn't a good driver, and we have to examine other aspects to the session which could contribute to a poor result (for example, Vettel running an old spec exhaust while Webber ran the newer spec).
I think the Vettel-hate on Twitter is largely to do with the success of the driver, and from reading comments (and through personal experience in my academic career) I've noticed that people generally don't like successful people and rejoice when they fall. It seems silly to question Vettel's ability as a result of one bad qualifying session. The guy's won two world championships and was absolutely dominant throughout last year. Before you utter the age old cry 'but it was the car!', I'd ask you to consider that Webber could not match Vettel's performance in the identical Red Bull, so I think that this is a point which is null and void. This year, Red Bull clearly haven't got the dominance with the car, hence the poorer results for both drivers. A similar thing happened after Brawn became Mercedes - the car which dominated 2009 just dropped away in 2010. These things happen, even if the ability of the driver stays the same.
Another case in point is the performance of Alonso. Ferrari have obviously been having issues in the past couple of years, and yet I don't see anyone questioning whether Alonso is a good driver or not. So why the target on Vettel? Like I said before, all 24 of these drivers have exceptional talent to make it this far, and to post childish comments on a social networking site is just petty to me and I'm urging fans to grow up just a little, and at least form some coherent arguments! With any luck, as the season progresses we'll be able to see an improvement for the Red Bull guys, and hopefully the petty comments will stop so we can all go back to watching races and appreciating them no matter who is driving.
So, with the top three teams suffering in China's qualifying session, who took the top slots? Well, after Hamilton's penalty we've got an all Silver Arrows front row, with the Mercedes of Nico Rosberg occupying the first slot (a career first for Rosberg) and Schumacher following close behind. This is a phenomenal achievement, and Mercedes are proving that their car has the pace in qualifying. It could be argued that the aerodynamic system on the rear wing of the car is helping a lot during qualifying (as use of DRS is pretty much unlimited during quali and practice sessions), however we've yet to see this sort of advantage during the race itself. Again, tomorrow will tell us exactly what Mercedes can do.
The third and fourth slots on the grid are also occupied by some surprising drivers. Third place went to Kamui Kobayashi, which is promising for Sauber considering their excellent achievements in Malaysia. Fourth place went to Lotus Renault's Kimi Raikkonen
Sunday, 25 March 2012
Rain, Heat, and The Ice Man Melteth
For the second weekend in a row I'm having a break from university work having dedicated a few days to F1. This week's action came from Malaysia, a race known for its extremes of weather. After the spectacular race in Melbourne, Malaysia held high hopes for us race fans, to see whether the racing in 2012 would be staying exciting or whether Australia was a fluke. As it turns out, if these two races are anything to go by then we're in for one hell of a season.
In qualifying it was the McLarens who were the big winners once again, with Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button locking out the front row. The surprises started with the occupation of the third grid slot. Red Bull? No. Lotus? No. A silver Mercedes. However, this wasn't the Mercedes of Nico Rosberg, but rather Michael Schumacher; a man who many in the media have criticised since his comeback. I was delighted that Schumi managed to get this grid slot; I've always been an advocate of Schumacher's return, as is highlighted in a previous blog post of mine (as discussed on 5 Live F1 too I believe). It's nice to see that Schumacher still has the ability to drive these cars. So with the Red Bulls losing out again and the Mercedes powered cars at the front after qualifying, today's race was set to be an interesting one.
As Malaysia is another early race, I set my alarm for 7:30 (the start time of Sky's F1 coverage) after moving the clock forwards an hour due to British Summer Time. I'd thus prepared to get up that extra hour earlier - I often sacrifice my sleep for motorsport. Sadly, my phone decided that it would add an extra hour advance to my phone's clock, so I ended up getting up even earlier than planned... Something I feel I will probably pay for when at uni tomorrow. No matter, eventually the race coverage began and I can safely say that this one was a treat, and worth the sleep deprivation.
The Malaysia weather wasn't disappointing, with a shower 5 minutes before the start of the race. This brought back memories of 2009's race - yep, the one where Kimi Raikkonen abandoned his car during the red flag to wander off and have an ice cream. While rainy races are always exciting, there's a fine line between the weather making things interesting and making things dangerous. At the start of the race things weren't so bad, and so the race started as normal. However, the safety car soon came out and 9 laps in the race was stopped. For those of you who aren't so clued up on the rules of F1, when red flags are given the cars line up on the grid in race order. At this point of the race, we had a couple of surprises in the top 10: the Sauber of Sergio Perez and - please believe me when I say this - the Hispania of Narain Karthekeyan. After half an hour of halted running, the race finally resumed under the safety car, and it was from there on that things got really interesting.
Fairly soon after resuming, the track had dried sufficiently to move back on to intermediate tyres. The pit stops led to a lot of confusion on the timing screens, but when things eventually settled down we had our leaders: Fernando Alonso, Sergio Perez and Lewis Hamilton. Honestly, I knew we would have a surprising race, but this was completely unexpected! Perez's pace in the Sauber had to be a highlight of the race for me - at one point it looked as though he was going to take the race lead. No doubt Perez would have won the race had he not gone wide in the closing stages of the race.
Sadly, the races of the Mercedes cars didn't turn out as promised, with Schumacher claiming the last point and Rosberg finishing behind in 13th. To my disappointment, the Red Bulls also had a bit of a poor race, with Webber finishing fourth (ok, not so bad but considering last year's performance it could have been better) and Vettel finishing 12th after sustaining a puncture when lapping the HRT of Karthekeyan (yes, he sadly lost his 10th place). To be honest, Vettel was lucky to finish the race at all: radio messages from his engineer in the last couple of laps told him first to retire, then stay out, then retire again due to a serious problem. I can only hope that Red Bull work out where their problems are for the next race in China. Jenson Button also finished outside of the points, after again colliding with another car and having to have a front wing change. After this change, he couldn't get the intermediate tyres to work, and suffered through the remainder of the race.
There's no way I can do justice to the entire race here, you'll just have to go and watch it. It was one of the best I've seen in a while. After the chequered flag fell, we had the most surprising podium for a long time: Alonso, Perez and Hamilton (ok, the last one isn't so surprising). So, despite the speculation of the pace of the Ferrari, Alonso didn't get a bad result at all. In fact, he was probably as surprised as we were. However, I don't think anyone can argue that the driver of the day is Perez, and there are a lot of us who eagerly await to see what he can do in the future.
blogs. Until next time...
In qualifying it was the McLarens who were the big winners once again, with Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button locking out the front row. The surprises started with the occupation of the third grid slot. Red Bull? No. Lotus? No. A silver Mercedes. However, this wasn't the Mercedes of Nico Rosberg, but rather Michael Schumacher; a man who many in the media have criticised since his comeback. I was delighted that Schumi managed to get this grid slot; I've always been an advocate of Schumacher's return, as is highlighted in a previous blog post of mine (as discussed on 5 Live F1 too I believe). It's nice to see that Schumacher still has the ability to drive these cars. So with the Red Bulls losing out again and the Mercedes powered cars at the front after qualifying, today's race was set to be an interesting one.
As Malaysia is another early race, I set my alarm for 7:30 (the start time of Sky's F1 coverage) after moving the clock forwards an hour due to British Summer Time. I'd thus prepared to get up that extra hour earlier - I often sacrifice my sleep for motorsport. Sadly, my phone decided that it would add an extra hour advance to my phone's clock, so I ended up getting up even earlier than planned... Something I feel I will probably pay for when at uni tomorrow. No matter, eventually the race coverage began and I can safely say that this one was a treat, and worth the sleep deprivation.
The Malaysia weather wasn't disappointing, with a shower 5 minutes before the start of the race. This brought back memories of 2009's race - yep, the one where Kimi Raikkonen abandoned his car during the red flag to wander off and have an ice cream. While rainy races are always exciting, there's a fine line between the weather making things interesting and making things dangerous. At the start of the race things weren't so bad, and so the race started as normal. However, the safety car soon came out and 9 laps in the race was stopped. For those of you who aren't so clued up on the rules of F1, when red flags are given the cars line up on the grid in race order. At this point of the race, we had a couple of surprises in the top 10: the Sauber of Sergio Perez and - please believe me when I say this - the Hispania of Narain Karthekeyan. After half an hour of halted running, the race finally resumed under the safety car, and it was from there on that things got really interesting.
Fairly soon after resuming, the track had dried sufficiently to move back on to intermediate tyres. The pit stops led to a lot of confusion on the timing screens, but when things eventually settled down we had our leaders: Fernando Alonso, Sergio Perez and Lewis Hamilton. Honestly, I knew we would have a surprising race, but this was completely unexpected! Perez's pace in the Sauber had to be a highlight of the race for me - at one point it looked as though he was going to take the race lead. No doubt Perez would have won the race had he not gone wide in the closing stages of the race.
Sadly, the races of the Mercedes cars didn't turn out as promised, with Schumacher claiming the last point and Rosberg finishing behind in 13th. To my disappointment, the Red Bulls also had a bit of a poor race, with Webber finishing fourth (ok, not so bad but considering last year's performance it could have been better) and Vettel finishing 12th after sustaining a puncture when lapping the HRT of Karthekeyan (yes, he sadly lost his 10th place). To be honest, Vettel was lucky to finish the race at all: radio messages from his engineer in the last couple of laps told him first to retire, then stay out, then retire again due to a serious problem. I can only hope that Red Bull work out where their problems are for the next race in China. Jenson Button also finished outside of the points, after again colliding with another car and having to have a front wing change. After this change, he couldn't get the intermediate tyres to work, and suffered through the remainder of the race.
There's no way I can do justice to the entire race here, you'll just have to go and watch it. It was one of the best I've seen in a while. After the chequered flag fell, we had the most surprising podium for a long time: Alonso, Perez and Hamilton (ok, the last one isn't so surprising). So, despite the speculation of the pace of the Ferrari, Alonso didn't get a bad result at all. In fact, he was probably as surprised as we were. However, I don't think anyone can argue that the driver of the day is Perez, and there are a lot of us who eagerly await to see what he can do in the future.
blogs. Until next time...
Wednesday, 14 March 2012
My F1 (Blog) Comeback
Well, it's been a while. The 2011 F1 season has been and gone, and this weekend the 2012 season is back up and running. What with all the F1 comebacks in recent years, I thought it was only fitting that I get back into blogging. I've not posted on here since October. Shocking, I know, but as well as my life as a motorsport geek I also have a life as a psychology geek, and it's the psychology geek which has had the upper hand in the past few months while I work towards my degree. Luckily, we're heading towards the end of the spring term, and so I have a bit of extra time in which to get back into my motorsport geek role. So there we are, I'm back, and I'm planning to stick around for quite some time.
Since my last post in October, the F1 season finished on (for me and other Red Bull Racing fans at least) a massive high. Sebastian Vettel won his second world championship title, and Red Bull also secured their second constructor's title. I have to admit, watching the season review a few weeks back I felt kind of overwhelmed at 2011's racing. It was a very special year for me, as it was the season which marked my first live F1 experience. I often look back at the photos of the Nurburgring as a reminder of what a special weekend it was. I don't think you'll find many people out there who would be disappointed with 2011's F1, and regardless of what you think of DRS we definitely saw some exceptional racing. Speaking of whihc, my favourite moment of last year (bar the entire Nurburgring trip - that is definitely at number one) had to be Webber's overtake on Alonso at Eau Rouge. Hopefully the coming season will bring more of this.
So, to 2012. F1 seems to be loving the comebacks just lately, and news that has not gone unnoticed is that of Kimi Raikkonen's return with Lotus (formerly Lotus Renault - the Lotus naming saga has hopefully come to a close now, with Team Lotus now becoming Caterham. Keep up...). In pre-season testing (which I managed to follow while typing up an essay about Freud, I got a good mark for that essay too, so I'm planning on watching more F1 and typing essays simultaneously... I digress), Lotus looked to me like they had gotten something right, as Grosjean (another comeback, but less prominent) was one of the only men to top the timesheets twice in a testing spate. Whether this testing form converts into race pace is another matter.
The 2012 cars have been branded by many people as ugly, as new regulations have prompted most teams to have a 'stepped nose'. I'll admit that the noses aren't exactly the most aesthetically pleasing, but I kind of have a bit of a soft spot for the ugly cars. The biggest surprise was McLaren's lack of a stepped nose. They've either hit on something genious, or they've missed out on a trick. With any luck we'll have the answers to this question this weekend. Red Bull also appear to have a trick up their sleeves, as their stepped nose features a gaping hole; something which Adrian Newey (Red Bull's technical genious and referred to by internet nerds as 'The Chuck Norris of Formula 1' [yes, really]) has insisted on being nothing more than driver cooling. Again, we'll wait and see this weekend if the Red Bull team have pulled something out of the bag.
The last of the big names, Ferrari, have also been watched intently. 2011 was a poor season for the red cars, and there have been some big claims from team members that in 2012 they will be back fighting. However, this hasn't really appeared to be the case in testing. The car has been, frankly, unpredictable. As such, it's not really all that clear how long it will be before Ferrari are back where they would like to be.
Testing is always a notoriously unreliable indicator of race pace and such, so the real test for the cars will come this weekend in Australia. I for one am hoping for Red Bull glory once again, but for the most part I'll be happy that the season is back up and running. The off-season break seems too long to me, although I'm still ambivalent towards Bernie Ecclestone's idea of having F1 most of the year. I always think that once you have a break from something, the return is all the more appreciated. Although we'll have to see whether I'm still saying this once this season draws to a close!
Hopefully we'll have another awesome season, and see whether Sebastian can chase down a hat trick of championships. This year will also bring another epic F1 trip for me and my Dad: Spa here we come!
Hello 2012.
Since my last post in October, the F1 season finished on (for me and other Red Bull Racing fans at least) a massive high. Sebastian Vettel won his second world championship title, and Red Bull also secured their second constructor's title. I have to admit, watching the season review a few weeks back I felt kind of overwhelmed at 2011's racing. It was a very special year for me, as it was the season which marked my first live F1 experience. I often look back at the photos of the Nurburgring as a reminder of what a special weekend it was. I don't think you'll find many people out there who would be disappointed with 2011's F1, and regardless of what you think of DRS we definitely saw some exceptional racing. Speaking of whihc, my favourite moment of last year (bar the entire Nurburgring trip - that is definitely at number one) had to be Webber's overtake on Alonso at Eau Rouge. Hopefully the coming season will bring more of this.
So, to 2012. F1 seems to be loving the comebacks just lately, and news that has not gone unnoticed is that of Kimi Raikkonen's return with Lotus (formerly Lotus Renault - the Lotus naming saga has hopefully come to a close now, with Team Lotus now becoming Caterham. Keep up...). In pre-season testing (which I managed to follow while typing up an essay about Freud, I got a good mark for that essay too, so I'm planning on watching more F1 and typing essays simultaneously... I digress), Lotus looked to me like they had gotten something right, as Grosjean (another comeback, but less prominent) was one of the only men to top the timesheets twice in a testing spate. Whether this testing form converts into race pace is another matter.
The 2012 cars have been branded by many people as ugly, as new regulations have prompted most teams to have a 'stepped nose'. I'll admit that the noses aren't exactly the most aesthetically pleasing, but I kind of have a bit of a soft spot for the ugly cars. The biggest surprise was McLaren's lack of a stepped nose. They've either hit on something genious, or they've missed out on a trick. With any luck we'll have the answers to this question this weekend. Red Bull also appear to have a trick up their sleeves, as their stepped nose features a gaping hole; something which Adrian Newey (Red Bull's technical genious and referred to by internet nerds as 'The Chuck Norris of Formula 1' [yes, really]) has insisted on being nothing more than driver cooling. Again, we'll wait and see this weekend if the Red Bull team have pulled something out of the bag.
The last of the big names, Ferrari, have also been watched intently. 2011 was a poor season for the red cars, and there have been some big claims from team members that in 2012 they will be back fighting. However, this hasn't really appeared to be the case in testing. The car has been, frankly, unpredictable. As such, it's not really all that clear how long it will be before Ferrari are back where they would like to be.
Testing is always a notoriously unreliable indicator of race pace and such, so the real test for the cars will come this weekend in Australia. I for one am hoping for Red Bull glory once again, but for the most part I'll be happy that the season is back up and running. The off-season break seems too long to me, although I'm still ambivalent towards Bernie Ecclestone's idea of having F1 most of the year. I always think that once you have a break from something, the return is all the more appreciated. Although we'll have to see whether I'm still saying this once this season draws to a close!
Hopefully we'll have another awesome season, and see whether Sebastian can chase down a hat trick of championships. This year will also bring another epic F1 trip for me and my Dad: Spa here we come!
Hello 2012.
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