In what was a chaotic and interesting F1 race, Fernando Alonso came away with an impressive victory in the European Grand Prix at The Nurburgring. After a very strange and scary first lap were torrential rain fell on the circuit, the field was set after a red flag when order had to be restored. The big loser at the beginning was Kimi Raikkonen who missed the pit in during the downpour and had to stay out another lap before changing to rain tires. All the other front runners came in to change tires but the intermediate tires did nothing to improve traction and the full wets probably would not have helped either. One by one cars were going off in the first corner, including Lewis Hamilton who started in tenth because of his accident in Q3 a day earlier.
After a red flag halted the race for several minutes a suprise was at the front of the field prior to the restart. Markus Winkelhock of the Spyker team had come into the pits to change to intermediate tires on the formation lap and assumed the lead when every other driver pitted. However, it was a short lived lead as the restart left him in a precarious position with the Ferrarri of Massa and McClaren of Alonso hot on his tail. Massa did a good job keeping Alonso at bay in the wet and Lewis Hamilton had to battle from a lap down but could not get into the points as he finished ninth.
As in most cases, rain in a Formula 1 race is a great equalizer as many of the slower cars fair far better as was evident with Mark Webber finishing on the podium in fourth for the Red Bull team. Poor Kimi had more bad luck as he was running a strong third when what was called an hydraulic failure put him out. Was he out of fuel? But when rain came again with eight laps to go and all came in to switch to rain tires again, Massa was no match for Alonso as the Spaniard passed him with ease and went on to a much deserved victory. With Hamilton out of the points Alonso is now within two points of the lead and a forced to be reckonded with. I feel that with his retirement Raikkonen is now out of the picture as once again the fastest man in F1 will not win the championship. Some drivers just don't have enough good luck to finish on top! Let's hope for another interesting F1 race in Hungary in two weeks.
After a red flag halted the race for several minutes a suprise was at the front of the field prior to the restart. Markus Winkelhock of the Spyker team had come into the pits to change to intermediate tires on the formation lap and assumed the lead when every other driver pitted. However, it was a short lived lead as the restart left him in a precarious position with the Ferrarri of Massa and McClaren of Alonso hot on his tail. Massa did a good job keeping Alonso at bay in the wet and Lewis Hamilton had to battle from a lap down but could not get into the points as he finished ninth.
As in most cases, rain in a Formula 1 race is a great equalizer as many of the slower cars fair far better as was evident with Mark Webber finishing on the podium in fourth for the Red Bull team. Poor Kimi had more bad luck as he was running a strong third when what was called an hydraulic failure put him out. Was he out of fuel? But when rain came again with eight laps to go and all came in to switch to rain tires again, Massa was no match for Alonso as the Spaniard passed him with ease and went on to a much deserved victory. With Hamilton out of the points Alonso is now within two points of the lead and a forced to be reckonded with. I feel that with his retirement Raikkonen is now out of the picture as once again the fastest man in F1 will not win the championship. Some drivers just don't have enough good luck to finish on top! Let's hope for another interesting F1 race in Hungary in two weeks.
1 comment:
AWESOME RACE!!!!
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