Kimi Raikkonen, Felipe Massa, Ferrari, Circuit de Catalunya, 2008

Raikkonen leads crushing Ferrari one-two

2008 Spanish Grand Prix review

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Kimi Raikkonen and Felipe Massa’s winning margin of 0.9s over Lewis Hamilton suggests the Spanish Grand Prix was a close run thing. In fact it was anything but, and a Ferrari one-two looked like an inevitability from the first corner.

Hamilton came out on top of a three-way fight for third that was contested entirely on a strategic level, with no-one looking in any danger of making a move on the track.

But a stark reminder of the real dangers of Formula One came as Heikki Kovalainen crashed heavily at turn nine and there was relief all round when it emerged the McLaren driver had not suffered serious injury.

Red-wash

Events swung in Ferrari’s favour before the race had even begun. Fernando Alonso got on the accelerator too hard warming his tyres up on the formation lap and spun across the grass on the inside of the last corner, narrowly missing the barrier.

With dirty tyres it was scarcely a surprise to see him beaten off the line by Felipe Massa’s Ferrari, the Brazilian taking up station behind his team mate.

Behind Alonso, Robert Kubica struggled to get the BMW away quickly again having voiced concerns earlier about the clutch on his F1.08. Lewis Hamilton threaded his McLaren through a narrow gap between Kubica and Heikki Kovalainen to move up to fourth.

Toro Rossos out early

Adrian Sutil made an optimistic attempt to pass David Coulthard at turn four on the first lap and spun his Force India. He was collected by – who else – Sebastian Vettel, the German retiring on the first lap just as he has in Bahrain.

That brought the safety car out for two laps, and once it went back in Nelson Piquet Jnr spun off to resume in 18th. He moved to pass Sebastien Bourdais on the sixth lap and the pair collided. Piquet had moved alongside Bourdais as the Frenchman was turning into La Caixa, and it seemed as though the sidepod-mounted mirrors on the Toro Rosso had prevented him from seeing Piquet coming.

Also out at the same time was Anthony Davidson’s Super Aguri. His radiator ingested gravel from Piquet’s earlier spin and failed soon afterwards.

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Alonso drops back – and out

Alonso’s second place on the grid had sent the crowd into rapture but left everyone else wondering if the R28 was quicker or just light on fuel.

The answer came on lap 16 when the home driver pitted, three laps before Massa. Raikkonen was in on lap 21 followed by Hamilton and Kubica on the 22nd tour – both getting out ahead of the Renault. All the same the R28 was clearly quicker than it had been in the first three races of the year.

It wouldn’t last much longer, however. A rare engine failure sidelined Alonso, who acknowledged the applause of the fans that had packed into the Catalunya circuit in their thousands once again.

Kovalainen crashes hard

Alonso’s retirement came after the second, much longer safety car interruption of the day.

Heikki Kovalainen was leading the race when his car speared straight on at turn nine, hitting a tyre barrier wrapped in a conveyor belt almost head-on at around 140mph at a force of up to 29G.

It was a shocking scene as the McLaren had clearly ‘submarined’ underneath the tyres – exactly what the conveyor belt is supposed to prevent. The marshals had to pull the car out to reach Kovalainen. He was quickly taken to the medical centre where his injuries were revealed to be limited to concussion, and he was taken to hospital for checks.

Mclaren suggested the accident was caused by damage to the wheel rim caused by something getting into it – most likely a stone, as had caused Davidson’s problem.

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Races ruined by safety car appearance

Meanwhile the field queued behind the safety car for several laps and, coming in the middle of a sequence of pit stops, this played havoc with some unfortunate drivers races. The worst affected was new race leader Nick Heidfeld, who’d carried a heavier fuel load, and was forced to pit during the safety car despite the pit lane being closed and incur a penalty.

The poorly thought out change to the rules that was introduced last year ruined another driver’s race, and a change is not expected until the Monaco Grand Prix next month.

It also went wrong for Rubens Barrichello, who in his record-equalling 256th Grand Prix start succeeded in knocking the nose off the front of his Honda and having to retire. On lap 42 Nico Rosberg joined him on the sidelines with a broken engine.

Points on offer for lower teams

The unusual string of retirements left the way clear for several drivers to pick up rare points. For a while it looked as though Takuma Sato might claim a dream points finish for the beleaguered Super Aguri team, the Japanese driver running as high as ninth before his second pit stop.

It was Jenson Button and Honda who exploited the unreliability to best effect, claiming sixth place and the teams’ first points of the season.

But there was still more incident further down the field as Timo Glock braked too late at Renault and tagged David Coulthard’s Red Bull. Coulthard suffered a burst rear tyre and Glock also headed for the pits with a broken front nose. The stewards investigated the incident but took no action.

Coulthard provided one of the races few passing moves as he recovered to pass Takuma Sato. Nick Heidfeld did the same with Giancarlo Fisichella, sweeping around the Force India driver at turn one.

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Raikkonen romps home

Raikkonen never once looked like losing the lead and confirmed afterwards that the Ferraris had time in hand: “We could have run a bit faster but [there’s] no point to push when you don’t need to.”

Raikkonen controlled the pace in the later stages even as his team mate began to be caught by Hamilton. It looked like an exercise in winning at the slowest possible speed. But is Raikkonen beginning to think Massa might be his closest competitor in the championship battle, and it’s no bad thing if Hamilton takes the odd point off him?

The British driver was third ahead of Kubica who had another strong race. Mark Webber took fifth place and Button was a happy sixth. Kazuki Nakajima was seventh ahead of Jarno Trulli, who reckoned he’d have finished sixth had he not gone into the pits by mistake on one lap.

Heidfeld ended up ninth ahead of Fisichella, who gave Force India their first top ten finish. Glock, Coulthard and Sato were the remaining finishers.

The next track on the calendar is Istanbul in two weeks’ time. It’s another Ferrari stronghold, and a repeat performance for the red team there would make it highly unlikely that anyone is going to beat them to this year’s championship.

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Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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53 comments on “Raikkonen leads crushing Ferrari one-two”

  1. Your comment concerning Massa "taking up station" behind Kimi is why Ferrari will win it all this year. They know how to manage drivers expectations. There is little doubt in my mind Felipe could have pressed Kimi given the clearance, but he knew his role was to play wing man to the leader.

    If Felipe had taken pole I’m sure the expectations and results would have been reversed. Congrats to all Ferrari fans, McLaren have have a long row to hoe!

  2. If that’s true George, then why did they let him win the last race?

  3. Ferrari have basically realized that (at least in circuits that favor their car, i.e. Bahrain and Barcelona) they can basically choose which driver will win the race. There’s no question Kimi Raikkonen is going to be the #1 there this year, and that’s why he won today – but I’d guess that Ferrari gave Massa a win in Bahrain to get the media off of him and the team. I just hope this doesn’t result in, as one F1 fanatic commentor put it, the "no, sir, after you" races from 2002…

  4. Congrats to Ferrari.
    What is happening this year with McLaren? 
    Finally, and althouth he couldnt’ finish the race, Alonso is achiving something even for all his fans unexpected, he is not only one of the best drivers, he is contribuiting to improve the car as no many drivers could. And this is for me the biggest sorprise of this race. 

  5. Cristina, Mclaren are going through a bad patch at the moment just like Ferrari in the first half of the season. They can’t be discounted just yet.
    And I’m sure all drivers contribute to improving their cars, so Alonso is not the exception here. He’s doing a great job but so are the others, their jobs depend on it, remember.

  6. Generally Ferrari asks drivers to hold station after 2nd pit stop(except Austria 2002 and Indy 2004 was it?), which is quite a well known fact. How do i know it? Well their drivers have recounted in countless post race interviews. So, Massa led the 1-2 in Bahrain and now Kimi did in Spain.

    There are 2 theories Cristina(on a cheeky note):
    i) No experienced driver to set-up the car proper, &
    ii) No new data from Ferrari has come in.

  7. My surprise of the race was simply how small the difference in fuel loads was between Alonso’s renault and the leaders.

    I was honestly expecting 5 or 6 from the first stoppers and 8-9 from the 2nd batch.

    Although I fundamentally disagree with those who try to "fuel adjust" qualifying performances to give an idea of who did well during qualifying (my objections are based on lack of precision) I expect alonso will have come much higher up such adjusted tables than he would usually.

  8. anyone stating that Ferrari favour one guy over the other on a track is talking rubbish.  Ferrari favour the guy leading the pack midway.  Its why Kimi and "flip flops" attack each other at the start, but not after 30 laps.

  9. I think its too early in the season to discount McLaren. We can only begin to tell after a few more races and I am quite happy to see BMW being  more competitive than last year.

  10. As a long time devotee of F1, I suffered the ignonimity of falling asleep halfway through todays race. At what point will the powers that be realize that cars following each other around the track is a PARADE, not a race. I would defy anyone to tell me the last that there was a pass for the lead in an F1 race, and passes during pits don’t count. I just finished watching the NASCAR race, and while I don’t suggest that F1 should become a copycat of the meaningless passfest that NASCAR is, a little imitation would not hurt. Commentators here in the US contend that passing in F1 is difficult because the cars are so closely matched.  This is BS. There are 11 different teams and 5 different engines in F1.  NASCAR is basically a spec car series, with 4 different engines and no one can argue that the COMPETITION is not closer in NASCAR.  F1 is doing its best to become irrelevant.

  11. Sush: I don’t think we can say Ferrari gives equal footing to all drivers. Think about Austria in ’02, when Rubens Barichello basically pulled over and let Michael Schumacher through to win the race, or Brazil this year, when their strategy allowed Kimi Raikkonen to overtake Felipe.

  12. David post 10 above: "… I suffered the ignonimity of falling asleep"  "F1….is a PARADE, not a race."   What took so long to figure that out?  But you diagnosis is correct…."F1 is doing its best to become irrelevant." 

    And for Nico post 11 above…….Ferrari at Brazil last year……..
    was more likely SPORTSMANSHIP on the part of Massa, winning that race would have denied his teammate the Drivers Championship.  Not only did Massa give the race to Kimi he then HAD to finish in 2nd place to prevent an Alonso point!
    Like it or not, Massa is a CHAMPION.

  13. theRoswellite
    28th April 2008, 2:17

    Thoughts on race:  
        -Heikki is safe.
        -Hopefully Alonso & Renault "are back"….sorta.
        -Kimi has another gear.
        -Red seems to be the color of our immediate future.
        -I will miss Super Best Friends.

     

  14. I don’t know if it was some sort of team orders or just good sportsmanship form Felipe last season at Brazil, but if he diden’t let Kimi through it would have been a big disappointment for the drivers, team and millions of Tifosi. It was the right thing to do in my humble opinion- Massa may not have won the race, but he helped bring a huge accomplishment to the team.

    David, great to see another American tuning in for F1! I’ve just started watching the sport and was drawn to it in part because it was not the NASCAR-type passfest you have mentioned, and there is a degree of teamwork involved in designing and producing a quality car Still, when a race is essentially determined in qualifying at a track such as this one, it turns potential new fans awayand dosen’t do the sport any good. Hopefully some of the new regulations changes I’ve heard so much about will do something to help this cause enxt season.

  15. "Like it or not, Massa is a CHAMPION." Tell me that when he WINS a championship, not before. Massa allowing Raikkonen the win in Brazil was business, nothing to do with sportsmanship. I believe Ferrari extended Felipe’s contract the week before the GP race. And you’d better believe that Massa’s cooperation in that final race was part of the price. It was his home race, there is no place in the world he would have preferred to win. All credit to him for deferring, but it was all business.

  16. To GeorgeK

    What would you rather have Ferrari drivers do? Fight each other and possibly get each other out of the race and the championship, is it? Like (erm…) Lewis and Alonso did…

    What Massa did was common sense. Teams interests before his.

  17. George and Sri – I think you may both be wrong. Last year Ferrari did let their drivers race each other, until it was mathematically impossible for one of them (in this case Massa) to become champion.

    Which as far as I’m concerned is entirely the correct approach.

    Now if only they’d do it with two drivers of equal calibre, say, Raikkonen and Alonso…

  18. Barcelona is well know for be an excellent test on the cars  performance. It seems then that Ferrari is a a head ahead but not more. I don´t think we should write off MCL, they are not that far and HAM was strugling to make the right configuration the whole weekend so maybe the car has a better potential. BMW is very close to MCL, I don’t understand the interest of Ron D in denying it. ALO, was light but "only" two laps more than Massa, to me that means that Renault has improved and has probably become the best of the middle teams and with the help of ALO may get near the podium on an odd race.

  19. Massa was off pace all weekend, his lap times and sectors throughout the race were way off Kimis, there simply was no comparision between the two!

  20. Has he denied it? From what I’ve read Dennis hasn’t denied BMW are close to them, but he’s suggested they can’t match McLaren and Ferrari’s pace of development throughout the season. Which I do think may be wrong…

  21. Starting, Hamilton made a trick, very danger and dishonest.
    No one’s is going do that. Shame.

    w. pronoza

  22. Not sure what you mean Pronoza – I didn’t see Hamilton do anything wrong at the start?

  23. What would be interesting from Renault would be to see how much time they will spend developing this car compared to next year’s car. The same can be said about Ferrari, I’m sure they expected to be about 0.5-1s quicker but they aren’t only a few tenths and that is against two other teams and with the rest of the pack headed by an inspired Renault hot on their feet.

    What Renault effectively did this weekend was throw a spanner in the works at BMW, McLaren and Ferrari over the potential of them coming back to the top this year.

  24. What Pronoza meant was the chop in front of his teammate at the first corner, which could have possibly ended in tears for both of them. This view was subscribed by commentators on Star Sports as well.

  25. Massa isn’t a Champion, he’s only at Ferrari thanks to Todt and his son.

  26. Just had a look at the video and I didn’t see anything you could describe as a chop. He swung pretty sharply between Kubica and Kovalainen off the line but all three of them had room. And he moved towards the racing line at the first corner but again left the other two enough room (for an example of how not to do it, look here).

    It wasn’t a “trick”, it was a bit dangerous (Formula 1 is not a tea party) but it wasn’t “dishonest”. This is just Hamilton-bashing.

  27. Not my imagination at work mate. One of them commentators is a Macca driver(Chris Goodwin). I know what you are saying, however, that is what the commentators thought and the other chappie/lass might be referring to that, is what i suggested.

  28. But Sri, Chris Goodwin wasn’t on board last weekend.  He was replaced by Julian Bailey.  But he’s even MORE credible than Chris.  He was an F1 driver back in the 1980s for Tyrrell.

  29. Keith, This kind of nonsense about Hamilton doesn’t need to be answered or discussed. This guy has done one of the best moves in that boring and soporific race and we must to read this kind of misjudgment…RENAULT: Nothing yet has convinced me about the Renault´s step forward. That would be the great achievement in Formula 1 history. I think that they stressed the engine to feed the Alonso´s theater´s play in front of the Spanish crowd. Anyway, we will see the reality in Turkey with fewer “aficionados” around…

  30. What happend to Barrchello’s nose?  I saw that it was knocked off, but never saw how it was knocked off.

  31. hey all those massa fans think it will be hard on him to set such superhuman quick and consistent inlaps before a pitstop which raikkonen usually does nonchalantly which can be matched perhaps only by schumi.

  32. sChUmAcHeRtHeGrEaTeStEvEr
    28th April 2008, 16:08

    theres no doubt that renault have made a step forward ok alonso was light in qualifying but in the 1st 3 races if hed run that light he wouldnt have got near the front row, also he was up there in q2 when all the drivers would be running about the same fuel.

    i dont know how anyone can criticise hamilton for the start he was being squeezed to the outside by kubica and probably didnt even no where kovaleinen was.

    this was kimis race before the start anyway he always runs a bit heavier than massa thats why massa tends to outqualify him. As some 1 mentioned the spanish grand prix usually shows the natural order and the fastest car of that season comes out on top.

    be intresting to see how renault do in turkey, wouldnt be suprised if they adopted a similar strategy, i think its better for them to start high and fall back a couple of places than start in the middle of the pack and struggle for points.

    ferrari will dominate in turkey so hamilton will have to win in monaco if hes going to have a chance this year, hel need abit of luck aswell kimi is diriving really well and the ferrari hasnt had many mechanical problems so far.

  33. Sri and Keith:

    I TOTALLY agree with managing the driver’s expectations Sri. I believe they are equals until qualifying and through the first lap. I don’t think you’ll ever see two Ferrari driver’s attempting to KO each other to grab first place on the opening lap ala Alonso/Hamilton last year.

    What I can’t grasp is how far off the pace Kimi was in Bahrain and Massa apparently slower in Barcelona and on a lighter fuel load. Bad set ups or something more along playing favs with the two drivers? I can’t imagine that, so I’ll go with poor setup/tire selections.

  34. Did anyone else had the impression that Kimi was happier to get the pole in BCN that last year in Brazil after winning the WCP? He was really a lot heavier that Massa so maybe it was a surprise even to him

  35. To David.

     ‘A little imitation’ of NASCAR? Who would want F1 if they had to stop the race everytime it rained? Those are F1’s best races, besides, anyone can drive in a circle. Even Scott Speed won a race at the weekend.
    Oh, last time I can think of a move for the lead. Fernando
    Alonso on Felipe Massa, Nurburgring 2007. What a short memory some ‘fans’ have.

  36. ‘The Limit’ – it’s not a question of ‘having short memories’ – it would be nice if F1 cars could race as closely in the dry as Alonso and Massa did that day, but the simple fact is they can’t and that has to change. There were two proper passes yesterday, and both were drivers in much faster cars going past drivers they would ordinarily be lapping.

  37. Montmelo is said to be one of the most difficult circuits on which to overtake, thus perhaps the procession that we saw in yesterday’s race. But why are some circuits so unfair on overtaking than others. Shouldn’t FIA  widen them to allow this and make F1 more interesting?

  38. I agree Keith, but it bothers me that everybody is blaming the design of the cars. Everybody claimed that banning traction control would help, it hasn’t. The racing is still the same, nothing has changed.
    Nobody has mentioned the circuits. Nobody talks about the way modern F1 tracks are designed. In the majority of cases, overtaking is only possible in one or two corners, mostly turn one. Barcelona is a classic example, so is Hungary.
    The new circuits (i.e Bahrain, Turkey) for me anyhow, do not inspire great excitement. The old Hockenheim, Spa, Monza, now those are the circuits that ‘should’ be the template for all the others. There has been too much ‘dumbing’ down of the tradition circuits, too many chicanes removed (i.e The Bustop at Spa) that were a challenge to the drivers.
    Ofcourse, this is not the only reason, but it has played a huge part in the sport losing some of its gloss and excitement in recent years.
    As for David, I may have gotten a little irritated at his remarks comparing F1 to NASCAR, which to quote Juan Pablo Montoya is like ‘comparing a sports car to a truck’.
    Both series are very successfull and have millions of loyal fans, but they are chalk and cheese, they are totally different.
    You cannot solve F1’s problems by using NASCAR solutions, unless you want to see four Ferrari’s on the track at the same time. 

  39. I don’t think many people thought the traction control ban was going to solve the problem.

    I think most people were glad to get rid of it because it put more of the control of the car in the hands of the drivers, rather than the electronics.

    You’re exactly right though, that "You cannot solve F1’s problems by using NASCAR solutions." I don’t want everyone in identical cars, I don’t want four hour races with eight pit stops where only the last ten minutes matter, I don’t want ‘caution periods’ happening at the merest provocation just for a flimsy excuse to bunch the field up.

    The tracks are by and large fine. The problem is the cars. Within a couple of laps at Catalunya all the drivers were over a second apart. At 200mph that’s 88 metres. There is no way we are going to see overtaking at most circuits until the cars can follow each other closely, and at the moment that is entirely down to the aerodynamics.

    Let me just add one last thing. The problem here isn’t  imply "not enough overtaking" – that’s part of it, but not all of it. The problem is quality of racing.

    When the cars have to run so far apart there is not even the possibility or potential for one driver to pass another – often even if the leading driver makes a mistake. If the cars could run as close as, say, GP2 cars can, the racing would appear much better even if their ability to overtake was only modestly improves.

    F1 does not need 200 passes per race. But it needs more than 2, as we had yesterday.

  40. I fully understand that to do a straight F1 to NASCAR comparison is fair to neither series.  NASCAR has plenty of weaknesses. Most races are too long – one canwatch the start of a race, then mow the grass, take the dog for a walk, wash the car and return to the race having missed very little.  But their cars do compete.  They run side by side. In F1, a car is following close if it is 2 seconds behind the car in front of it.  To me, that just is not good racing. 

    I very much enjoy the level of technology that exist throughout F1. One would think, however, that it could be used to make the series the most competitve in the world, not one of the least.

  41. Scootin159

    Rubinho and Fisico were in the pits and were trying to get out, at once. Well, the pitlane is only so wide, you know. :D

  42. Thanks for correcting me Journeyer. I actually missed the Race-day part, where they introduce the commentators and other guests. So it was a guesstimate on my part(well it is Mr. Goodwin on regularly).

  43. Excellent, onwards and upwards for Ferrari, good thing is that no one quite knows if they could have gone much faster….pressure

  44. Banning TC have actualy made overtaking more difficult no the other way round!!! After Australia we were really excited but as a matter of fact, drivers realised how risky is to overtake with no TC (see RAI for instance). If you think about it, leaving aside the first turns we haven’t seen much action this year and most of the time there were faster cars overtaking the slower ones.
    I hope that slics and the new aerodinamic rules coming in 2009 will bring some more action.

  45. Toncho, when you say "see Raikkonen for instance" I don’t know what you’re referring to.

  46. Even though Barcelona might be a good test to show the pecking order of the teams, one must also remember that Barcelona is the track that is most driven on throughout the year, which means the teams are much closer to one another compared to some of the other tracks. All the teams have extensive data available to them about the track.

    Which is also partly why I cant really conceive that Hamilton struggled with his setup. If I recall correctly Hamilton also tested last week, when at least it wasn’t raining. Kimi and Button only tested for one day in the rain last week and they did fine in the GP. If Hamilton really struggled to find the right setup at Barcelona where Maclaren has tested the most out of everyone, then it really is a big problem for Maclaren.

    Which is why I believe the problem seem to be more connected with Maclaren’s development rate and race strategies.  Ron Dennis has promised a big update for Barcelona, and as far as I could see there where really noting new on the car, (except if the changes where more mechanical). It could be that Maclaren have reached a plateau with their current design philosophy, or they just didn’t have anything concrete fast enough. Whatever the problem is the other teams are developing at a very fast rate especially Ferrari, BMW and even Renault.

    It is interesting to note that this is the first time during the year that Kimi has out qualified Massa. According to Kimi he has made some breakthrough in setups for his one lap pace, if it will transcend into all of the races and not just this race remains to be seen. (And Massa also made a mistake in his last sector in qualifying, so it is difficult to say where he would have ended up bar his mistake.) It was also interesting to see that Massa and Kimi where using different rear wings, Kimi used less downforce then Massa and that might be part of the key to his improvement in qualifying. That being said if Kimi has really found the key to unlock his qualifying pace (which for now seems to be his only weakness), then the others are really going to have a very long year.  

    Overall it still seems that Ferrari might still have some problems with their qualifying pace, the other teams should perhaps try to exploit this more by trying some lighter fuel strategies. Ferrari has not only shown good pace so far but also very good race strategies, but the other teams can still do something about if they can become a little more inventive with their own strategies. However, if it wasn’t for the safety cars Kimi would have probably been leading Massa by +/- 15 – 20 seconds and  Hamilton by +/- 30 – 40 seconds. 

  47. Melanie, didn’t they mean mechanical set up rather than the racing set up in the case of Hamilton during testing and practice? After all he complained of understeer as well. He definitely looked more settled some time into the race and was gaining some ground on Massa although Kubica’s BMW wasn’t far behind either. And Ron said they will figure out more accurately the cars’ performance after Barcelona, not at Barcelona.

    As to where Massa would have ended up bar the mistake in the last sector during qualifying, I think it would definitely have been P1. This has nothing to do with Kimmi’s consistent underperformance here of course. We have to remember that he was two laps heavier than Massa.

  48. Toncho, less aero means in simple terms less down-force. It is very difficult to trail up a car in front and get a tow. Hamilton suffered through the Bahrain grand prix at hands of Fisico (personally i enjoyed it a lot, cos i’m a fan of Fisico too). With lesser aero and limited overall development in other areas(apart from KERS and slicks), expect more of the same. It did not take long at all for me to add 1+1 to get a 2. Hope FIA also does the same.

  49. Kanyima, that is why I mentioned the mechanical updates and now you have confirmed it.
    I just got the idea that Maclaren had something bigger planned for Barcelona, that being said with the current rules it is of course difficult to have any real big updates and it always more difficult to judge mechanical updates. I think Lewis’s second stint was partly better because he wasn’t behind Alonso anymore his thrid stint was also good, so it difficult to say if he did get his setup right or not. They might have anticipated different race conditions the previous day, which have an effect on race day but is something you cant really do to much about. Overall a difficult grand prix to again come to, too many conclusions. Except for the fact that this could have been Ferrari’s third consecutive 1-2 finish, so obviously they are doing something right, and it good that Heikki will be able to take part in the Turkish GP.

  50. Ross Brawn reckons the changes for 2009 will increase the amount of overtaking: story.

  51. Keith: RAI made a couple of mistakes in AUS while trying to overtake.
    Sri: Thanks for that, but I hope you are wrong.
    Today RAI said that this was the best weekend of his carreer.

  52. Toncho, yes he did make those mistakes, but that’s not proof he or anyone else have given up trying to overtake.

  53. Mouse_Nightshirt
    11th May 2009, 15:24

    Quite amusing to see the posts saying “Kimi clear number one”.

    One year on, didn’t quite work out like that.

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