China Grand Prix review

Sunday’s Chinese Grand Prix was a joyous culmination of this season’s three reforms flowing in tandem to produce an exhilarating race something which Formula One has sometimes lacked in recent years. The DRS (Drag Reduction System) and KERS (Kinetic Energy Recovery System) complemented each other beautifully so that cars could have that extra boost to pass the road hog in their way once they got behind them. While Pirelli’s new tyres really left the paddock’s strategy men with lots to ponder as they dramatically started to degrade once they’d reached their sell by date.

The big winners on the day were undoubtedly Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg who gambled by making an extra pit stop so that their tyres would still be fresh at the end of the race while other racers were left struggling for grip. This allowed Hamilton to catch this season’s runaway championship leader Sebastian Vettel at a vast rate of knots and gave the McLaren man his first victory of the season.

Throughout the field there was no-stop action something the sport hasn’t seen since Brazil 2008 when the aforementioned Hamilton secured his World Championship on the last corner and very rarely sees without nature’s raining intervention.

One man who deserves special praise for his performance on the Shanghai International circuit was Red Bull’s Mark Webber who has quickly become the sport’s forgotten man this year in the shadow of his team-mate Vettel. The Aussie had a disastrous qualifying performance suffering from technical difficulties, then going out on the harder less preferable tyres and failing to make it through Q1 finishing 18th on the grid. Red Bull’s Team Principal Christian Horner insisted the car was good enough to get through to the next session and wasn’t the most sympathetic to Webber’s plight.

On race day though the six-time race winner lived up to his Twitter name and shown true Aussie grit as he stormed through the field to secure a podium finish on the dying laps. It’s also a great compliment to the quality of Red Bull’s RB7 car that Webber could start so far down and bag a third place. But take nothing away from Webber who put in a stonking drive to position himself back into the title battle. It’s now vital he builds on such a great performance and pins back World Champion Vettel in this year’s championship fight.

Webber’s performance was comparable with the countless times the great Michael Schumacher has bludgeoned his way through the field from the back, when he rode his prancing Ferrari. It was also on par with the magnificent drive Jenson Button put in to secure his maiden F1 victory at the 2006 Hungarian Grand Prix as he started 14th to then win. What makes Webber’s drive on Sunday probably more impressive than Button’s that day was that all this happened in dry conditions showing that Webber, his tyres and his strategy just all clicked.

It has been noticeable so far this season that the new rules have prompted more overtaking than we’ve had in previous years but there’s still been the same old problem. Of a car scampering off into the distance and nobody else being capable of catching them although what was really impressive about Sunday and the new tyres in-particular is that now the teams are literally driving into the unknown. As Pirelli are new this season to F1 the teams don’t know how well the tyres will hold together on certain tracks. This was the case in China when Vettel looked to have sealed another victory only for his tyres to lose significant performance, like the majority of the field’s two-stoppers, leaving him a sitting duck for Hamilton. This unpredictable nature combined with the new technology to assist with overtaking could really help create the best season ever and make F1 the exciting sport all the fans want it to be.

Posted on www.virgin.com

Will Felipe Massa's luck change?

Felipe Massa was lucky to escape with his life during qualifying for the 2009 Hungarian Grand Prix after a stray suspension spring struck the Ferrari driver on the head at a speed of around 160mph. The object brutally shattered the Brazilian’s helmet striking him just above the left eye leaving him in a life-threatening condition.

Thankfully the 11-time racer winner slowly recovered making his F1 return at the start of the 2010 season back in the red of Ferrari. Many pundits questioned whether Massa would return a different man and whether fear may have clouded his desire to win. There could be some truth to that as the Brazilian has gone from title contender to second fiddle at Ferrari since he returned to the sport.

Although it's all too easy to point to his horrific accident and suggest this is the reason for Massa's decline overall the Brazilian has had some rotten misfortune for some time and could certainly challenge Red Bul's Mark Webber for the crown of the sport's unluckiest driver. Look at the Brazilian Grand Prix in 2008, this is when his spirit probably started to waver, he crossed the line in the season decider effectively as the World Champion resulting in premature celebrations in the Ferrari garages.

Only for Lewis Hamilton to overtake a slowing Timo Glock on the final corner to secure a fifth place finish which gave the Englishman his first championship as the floods opened in Interlagos and the rain came down on Massa's title dreams. This was an exhilarating finish for fans watching all around the world but to say this was cruel on Massa does't cover it. There's a horrible realisation moment where the cameras homed in on the Brazilian's father, Luiz Antonio, as his celebrations are cut short noticing that Hamilton got the result he needed securing the championship by a solitary point ahead of Massa.

This has to be the moment where Massa lost something as it must have been such a bitter pill to swallow before that he'd always ran his team-mates, Kimi Raikkonen and previously Michael Schumacher, close giving as good as he got but now it has very much been established that Fernando Alonso is Ferrari's title-fighter. Placing Massa in the position of rear gunner and with the horrible understanding that his best chance to win a title has passed him by.

F1 has always been a sport of being in the right place at the right time, ask Jenson Button in 2009, a driver has to take their opportunity as there's no guarantee it'll come around again. Even leading up to his accident in 2009 it was clear to see Massa was a changed man. He competed in 10 races only mounting the podium once and failing to win a Grand Prix.

Since his return he's not won a race either although he did come close to victory at the German Grand Prix in 2010 when he was cruelly denied an emotional win, his first since his accident and since his championship heartache in Brazil, but this was sacrificed for the sake of team-mate Fernando Alonso's title challenge. Massa, who was cruising at the front, got a radio message from engineer Rob Smedley saying: "Fernando is faster than you. Can you confirm you understood that message?" Soon after Alonso passed and the Spaniard took the victory with Smedley messaging a very quiet Massa to say: "Ok mate good lad, stick with him now, sorry." This left a very sour taste given all that Massa had been through and it resulted in Ferrari getting a fine for breaking the rules.

That was a significant moment though as it put into place for all the world to see who Ferrari's number one and number two drivers were. Two races into the new season Massa still looks destined to become one of Formula One's nearly men as there has been no sharp turn in form although he could have gained a rare podium at this weekend's Malaysian Grand Prix if it hadn't have been for a dodgy first pit-stop instead he finished fifth. It's a pity for the Brazilian as he has pace in abundance, race winning pedigree and potential but one thing that he's severely lacking is luck. To be a success at anything your ability needs to complemented by a fair bit of luck and lucky is one thing Massa's career certainly hasn't been.

Originally posted on www.virgin.com

Has Schmacher still got it?

Every child has an idol or role model that they aspire to be in their younger years and you won’t be surprised to discover I was no different. During my 1990s childhood I had three people who I idolised and wanted to follow in the footsteps of. My idols were footballer Gennaro Gattuso, Joy Division/New Order bassist Peter Hook and the one which I longed to be more than any other was F1 driver Michael Schumacher. All three were determined, highly successful characters, prone to the occasional controversy who knew how to reach the top. Now in 2011 they’re not what they once were, their popularity has dwindled, they’re being out-performed by hotshot youngsters and for the most part they’re taking up a role as living memory to their great pasts. Although just because most have given up on them doesn’t mean I have. A prime example of this came as I watched Michael Schumacher’s performance at last weekend’s F1 curtain raiser in Australia. Over the winter I’d anxiously hoped the seven-time world champion’s Mercedes would be topping the pre-season time sheets and at times it did which filled me with great hope that Schumacher would start this season a changed breast from the one which bumbled throughout his comeback year. That said, he left Melbourne without a point so my prayers were hardly answered but what disturbed me the most was that the fact that nobody really seemed to bat an eyelid when he finished empty handed. For example in qualifying when he only qualified 11th failing to make it through to Q3’s top ten shoot-out commentators Martin Brundle and David Coulthard were hardly sympathetic to their former sparring partner’s plight. Worse came on Sunday on the opening lap of the race while millions of people across the world were fixated on the front of the grid waiting to see if Lewis Hamilton would make a move on pole sitter Sebastian Vettel my eyes were elsewhere. Some six rows back in fact to see how Schumi would start, with me hoping he’d at least finish in the points. He started well and got into the thick of the action into turn one but unfortunately he did get penned-in by Fernando Alonso’s Ferrari which halted his progress. Schumacher continued harrying into turn three only for the Torro Rosso of Jaime Alguersuari to collide with him resulting in a puncture. This had seemingly gone unnoticed by the cameramen and commentators but I knew what had happened as I sat backwards into my chair I knew Schumacher’s race was basically over. He tiptoed back to the pits, got new tyres and as he returned to the track he was running comfortably last by over a minute. For a moment I thought back to the glory years of Schumacher in his pomp when he was once a lap down in Austria and stormed through the field to finish third in his Ferrari. I hoped and wished I’d see a sensational performance like that again but it never came instead he trundled round the Albert Park circuit, not overtaking anyone, before he decided enough was enough and he parked his Mercedes in the garage. After that, all I wanted was for his team-mate, Nico Rosberg, not to finish as I didn’t want him to start the season already beating the master. Thankfully I got my wish two laps later when Schumacher’s old Ferrari comrade Rubens Barrichello over-ambitiously went to overtake him smashing into his car. As this happened the footage cut to Schumacher standing in the garage watching the action unfold on the monitors and he gave a little despairing shrug to the camera. This spoke volumes to me because underneath his concerned glances the old devious Schumacher still exists and his face echoed relief that Rosberg, who nearly doubled Schumacher’s points tally of 72 last season, wasn’t beating him again just yet. If we’re honest as much as I adore Michael Schumacher there will be many detractors who will have had a good laugh at Schumacher’s struggles since returning to F1 last season seeing just how far the mighty has fallen. As it is hard, for some, to ignore some of his previous antics, such as purposely taking Damon Hill out of the race at Adelaide, trying something similar on Jacques Villeneuve in Suzuka and parking his Ferrari in Monaco to block Fernando Alonso. Over the winter Sir Sterling Moss questioned his record as a seven-time world champion implying that he was basically in the right place at the right time. This is quite a harsh statement as you don’t win seven world titles purely on luck, or basically reverse the fortunes of the Ferrari team just on good timing not to mention the fact he won two of his titles with Benetton who were hardly one of F1’s established greats. Obviously having a good car helps but there still needed to be a world class driver behind the wheel and that’s what Schumacher was but sadly probably isn’t now. In the build-up to the Australian Grand Prix Nigel Mansell said that he felt that Schumacher had one more world drivers crown in him before he called it a day for good. This is something I just can’t see not with the dominance that Baby Schumi (Sebastian Vettel) seems to have in his Red Bull not to mention the other young pretenders in Mclaren and Ferrari. Personally I think this will be Schumacher’s swansong year and I have realistic expectations for him. I just want to see him grace the podium from time-to-time (which he didn’t do at all last season) and have consistent points finishes. If he could win a race that would be a perfect send-off to what has been the career of F1’s greatest ever driver (even including his comeback). Whatever happens this year I’ll be supporting at every turn, crash and occasional triumph. As featured on http://www.virgin.com/