Hamilton is fifth different championship leader (Canadian GP stats and facts)

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Hamilton led McLaren's first back-to-back one-two in ten years

An exciting race in Canada also gave us a bumper crop of F1 stats and facts.

Three champions stood on the podium for the first time since 1991, McLaren scored back-to-back one-twos for the first time since 2000 – and Rubens Barrichello logged his 15,000th racing lap.

Read on for more stats and facts from the Canadian Grand Prix.

Lewis Hamilton is starting to look like a specialist at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve. In three races there he’s had three pole positions and two wins – and he was comfortably leading the 2008 race before that notorious collision with Kimi Raikkonen.

Hamilton now has 18 pole positions to his name, giving him as many as Fernando Alonso as well as Mario Andretti and Rene Arnoux.

His 13th career victory puts him level with Alberto Ascari and David Coulthard.

Hamilton’s win propels him into the championship lead for the first time this year, and the first time since he won it in 2008. He’s the fifth different driver to lead the championship this year, something which has never happened before.

The other leaders this year have been Alonso, Felipe Massa, Mark Webber and Jenson Button. (Vettel was tied on points with championship leader Webber after Monaco, but Webber was ahead having won more races.)

The was McLaren’s third one-two finish of the season and their first back-to-back one-two finish since 2000. They had one-two finishes in the French and Austrian Grands Prix that year, Coulthard leading Mika Hakkinen home in the first and the positions reversed in the second.

Three world champions finished on the podum – something which hasn’t happened for 19 years. You have to go back to the 1991 United States Grand Prix at Phoenix to find the last example, when Ayrton Senna led home Alain Prost and Nelson Piquet.

Robert Kubica set the fastest lap and, surprisingly, it was the first of his career. He is the 120th driver to set the fastest lap in a race.

Massa failed to score for the first time this year, leaving Mark Webber as the only driver to have picked up points in every round. He has finished the last ten consecutive races in the points.

As Rubens Barrichello has a new measure of his longevity in the sport – he racked up his 15,000th F1 lap during the race. He has now raced for 15,010 laps.

Meanwhile Michael Schumacher started his 256th Grand prix, putting him level with Riccardo Patrese as the driver to have started the second-highest number of races. He’s completed 14,352 laps or 56.06 per race, compared to Barrichello’s 51.4.

If anyone’s got an afternoon to spare, it would be interesting to know how many laps those two have failed to complete in their F1 careers…

Laps led

Sebastien Buemi led a lap of an F1 race for the first time in his career. He is the 160th different driver to do so.

DriverLaps led
Mark Webber207
Sebastian Vettel117
Jenson Button74
Lewis Hamilton56
Fernando Alonso20
Nico Rosberg16
Sebastien Buemi1

Podiums

DriverPodiums
Mark Webber4
Lewis Hamilton4
Jenson Button4
Sebastian Vettel3
Fernando Alonso3
Felipe Massa2
Nico Rosberg2
Robert Kubica2

Average finishing position

PosDriverAverage finishing position
1Sebastian Vettel3.33
2Jenson Button3.71
3Mark Webber4.63
4Lewis Hamilton4.75
5Fernando Alonso5.13
6Robert Kubica5.75
7Nico Rosberg5.88
8Felipe Massa6.63
9Michael Schumacher8.14
10Adrian Sutil8.86
11Vitantonio Liuzzi10.33
12Kamui Kobayashi11.00
13Rubens Barrichello11.29
14Jaime Alguersuari11.38
15Pedro de la Rosa11.50
16Sebastien Buemi12.20
17Vitaly Petrov12.60
18Nico Hulkenberg14.17
19Heikki Kovalainen14.50
20Bruno Senna16.00
21Karun Chandhok16.33
22Jarno Trulli16.50
23Lucas di Grassi17.75
24Timo Glock18.00

Laps completed

Another double-DNF for Sauber – with Kamui Kobayashi retiring at the end of lap one – means their drivers languish at the bottom of the ‘laps completed’ table.

PosDriverLaps completed
1Mark Webber491
1Robert Kubica491
3Felipe Massa490
3Nico Rosberg490
5Jaime Alguersuari489
5Lewis Hamilton489
5Fernando Alonso489
8Michael Schumacher443
9Adrian Sutil441
10Rubens Barrichello439
10Sebastian Vettel439
12Jenson Button415
13Vitantonio Liuzzi387
14Karun Chandhok374
15Vitaly Petrov373
16Heikki Kovalainen363
17Nico Hulkenberg349
18Sebastien Buemi347
19Jarno Trulli330
20Lucas di Grassi296
21Timo Glock248
22Bruno Senna244
23Pedro de la Rosa220
24Kamui Kobayashi169

Spotted any other interesting stats and facts from the Canadian Grand Prix? Share them in the comments.

2010 Canadian Grand Prix

    Browse all 2010 Canadian Grand Prix articles

    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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    117 comments on “Hamilton is fifth different championship leader (Canadian GP stats and facts)”

    1. Keith, that great table where you can see how the championship leaders stack up, can you add that to future articles ? It is a great way to see who is consistent in stacking up points, and who is “jumping around”

      I am talking of the one showing points as a function of time(races)

      1. do you mean the line graph how the championship lead has progressed over the season?
        pleeease include this keith.

    2. I think Vettel is going to lead the championship at a later stage as well. That would make it six different drivers leading a championship during a single season. I would think that is one for the record books.

      1. Vettel’s minds gone. I don’t think he’ll win another race this season never mind lead the championship.

        1. i have a bad feeling you’re right tommyB. i hope you’re wrong though, i want the championship as close as possible. i guess we’ll know come silverstone where the car should be good and he drove well last year. we’ll just have to wait and see but webber certainly does seem to be getting the better of him performance wise and mentally.

        2. there’s a lot of truth to this. Vettel’s not performing like he was at the beginning of the year. I was disappointed that he even asked if he needed to overtake Button – why didn’t he simply try!

          1. As a Seb fan of course I hope I am wrong too. After the first 3 races you though this is Vettel’s title easily, now you can’t see him closing the gap on the leaders.

            Silverstone could be the turning point, he needs a win to get his title challenge, confidence and mind back on track.

            1. Hamilton had the same problem in 2008 after Canada and France. He won in Silverstone and got the confidence to get back on top of the championship (then went on to win in style again in Germany)

              Seb NEEDS to win in Silverstone if he wants to win the title.

            2. I think he’d be wanting to win at Valencia first, unless i’m missing something!

            3. Re Silverstone, since this is the track at which everyone thinks RBR will again blow away the field, if they fail there, they can pack it up. I think we will in for be a bit surprise. RBR has not had truly dominant race pace since Spain, when Hamnilton split them; they got off easy in Monaco when Aloso stuffed it in practice.

              The party is over. They had 8 or 9 races of a general performance edge and a substantial margin for most of that time, and they come away trailing in the points. VMM and SFM have been working like fiends to catch them up and the idea of betting that the RBR organization will somehow out-develop those teams, and that their drivers will outdrive Button, Hamilton and Alonso to the finsih is fantasy.

            4. Interestingly though he’s still lowest in average finishing position, ahead of all the drivers that are currently ahead of him in points… and second in laps led. Red Bull have led nearly twice as many laps as all others combined, 324 (RBR) vs. 334 (others).

              Knowing Vettel’s luck with reliability he’ll probably have a great race in Valencia and finish 3rd or 4th, then when they hit Silverstone where the car’s dominant again he’ll take pole and his car will blow up during the race. Knock on wood.

    3. Vettel to lead the WDC? LOL, I’m not sure, does he has to overtake Button to lead the championship?

      1. There is a chance he might not lead the WDC, but I am pretty sure he will finish the season in front of Button.

        1. I think he’s joking about Vettel’s radio message at the GP yesterday

          1. That radio message made me feel a bit sick… A Formula 1 racing driver behind asking if he had to overtake the driver in front to beat him.

            Almost makes me wish the pit lane was banned altogether.

            1. Haha I think the message has been taken a little out of context, he probably just meant do I have to overtake or are they pitting, he had a poorly car so he wouldn’t have wanted to push it too much in fear of another DNF.

            2. Have Red Bull said yet what the issue was that he was having? They said over the radio that they’d fixed the issue at one point, then when he asked about FLap in the late stages they emphatically stated that he was driving a wounded car and was absolutely NOT to attempt an FLap. Then didn’t he stop the car past the finish line? Must’ve been something fairly serious if that was the case.

            3. I agree with Katy.

              The radio message revealed he wasn’t aware what was going on in the race. Not that he didn’t have the heart to attack those in front. To be fair it was a very busy race with a lot going on and he had to manage tyres that were going off, change dif and fuel settings and short shift to nurse the car home. It wasn’t clear how long each tyre would last and it wasn’t clear how many stops everyone would do. At one point it seemed everyone was destined for 3, and then it became clear they weren’t.

              It sounded like he expected to to be near the front when it was all sorted out. It’s natural for him to expect that because that’s where he has been all season and because he started 2nd. He was wrong though if he thought that.

            4. @US_Peter apparently it was a gearbox issue, I assume it completely failed at the end as it looked like he was just coasting over the line.

            5. @ajokay: Vettel’s already stated that their plan fell to pieces when the McLaren’s didn’t come back out into traffic (although I can imagine someone like Schuey working it out for himself.) Vettel just lacking experience, this could be the factor that denies him the championship this year. The team are also a little out of their depth. The quickest right now but not the most durable.

    4. Ferrari have now gone 25 races without recording a pole position. In that time six other teams- Brawn GP, Mclaren, Red Bull, Renault, Toyota and Force India have had at least one pole position.

      1. Wow, that’s crazy.

    5. Keith, How can Vettel still be top of the Average Finishing Positions?

      Hes only Won 1 Race, And has been 2nd Once and 3rd Once.

      Button has Won 2 Races, been 2nd twice, Thats Surely Better.

      Lewis has won 2, 2nd onces, 3rd once aswell.

      This is confusing me, care to shed a light on this?

      1. retirements for button and hamilton and less conistency in the top 5 i’d say.

      2. DNF’s don’t affect the score I guess. If Seb finishes he’s always around the top 4 but Button has had a few poor races like Bahrain/Spain where he’s been lower down the field.

        1. Exactly

        2. And you forgot Malaysia, too… And he was running even on low 11th position at Monaco Grand Prix… I think Jenson Button s results/performances are very inconsistent… It showed also in last year, when he was driving almost everytime behind Rubens from British Grand Prix…

          1. Ive got to disagree. Jenson has scored in every race he finished last year (except Spa, where he was taken out by Grosjean). So he was in top 8 for 16 races out of 17. That’s quite consistent. And this year, he’s been consistently scored but for the Monaco Grand Prix (again, through no fault of his own). You could say Jenson’s jumping around a bit from the podiums to lower positions and back, but its impossible to say his results have ever been inconsistent.

    6. that laps led list annoys me every time. red bull is just dominating to no avail. gees guys.
      if only they could lead the last lap more often…

      1. If Red Bull doesn’t win the constructor’s championship at the end of the year, it will certainly come down to their reliability in the early season. Turkey of course didn’t help either.

    7. Webber is the only driver this year to get onto the podium while leading the championship – he was 3rd in Istanbul.

      1. Well, Alonso was leading the championship when he finished 1rst in Australia. Something that happens every year. If webber had won in Australia you will be right in saying he is the only one…

        1. He means the race after taking the WDC lead.

        2. well unfortunately, Alonso didn’t win the race, Button did, so you’re wrong i’m afraid

          1. You mean Bahrain not Australia.

    8. Web and Ham look like the real title contenders right now even though both made early mistakes. Alo is in there but has made too many mistakes. He could still win but he seems in a more fragile position. Vettel – I don’t even know what’s going on with him. Mark’s just been quicker when needed a lot of the time recently. JB’s a little off Hamilton’s pace but he’s right there also. I can’t discount Massa and I won’t give up but let’s just say this isn’t the ideal way to carry out a title campaign :P

      1. But it wasn’t for a large part of ’08 either if I recall correctly, and he did get very close.
        Unlikely that Alonso will have a Raikonen like slump, but who knows …

        But Massa needs to be more careful, he could have prevented at least one or two of those Luizzi hits and should have recalled China with respect to MSC.

        He gained a lot of respect in ’08 and ’09, but he does sometimes just have really bad races when things are going against him.

        1. I think the start line shunt with Liuzzi was mostly liuzzi’s fault. Massa was the in the middle of Button and Liuzzi. He was ahead of Liuzzi by some way into that corner and I’m not sure where he could have gone to avoid the accident.

        2. he gained nothing after the first couple of races in 2008… and after Silverstone that year, when he spun out like 6 times…

          i never rated him that high anyway tho

    9. How about this stat…

      How many times has Lewis Hamilton been given an unsafe release into the path of other drivers in the pit lane and not received a penalty?

      Anyone know?

      1. That’s not a stat nor a fact, just a question…

      2. Vettel was released alongside Alonso at the Hockenheim two years ago and didn’t get a penalty.

        The stewards have shown several time sbefore they’re happy with drivers travelling two alongside each other down the pit lane. It wasn’t an ‘unsafe release’.

      3. Looking at the replay, It was again for the second race in a row the right rear tire that delayed HAM’s pit stop. Surely they have to look into changing out that gun man or changing out the wheel hub.

        It could have cost him the win, had it not been for the pace of the Mclaren.

        1. Agreed, McLaren have been seriously unimpressive with their pit stops. It’s kind of bewildering in a season where time and again even a half second difference means coming out before or after a rival. This has been evident since the start of the season, yet still you know Ham and Button are going to get passed when they pit. Really don’t get it.

        2. Yeah it’s interesting isn’t it. I suppose it would be a bit of a kick in the teeth to replace that mechanic but maybe they should.

          I’ve been wondering if the rules state that the mechanics have to change the wheels manually. Does anyone know if it would be legal in the rules for them to use a device other than a wheel gun to help them change tyres?

        3. do differrent mechanics/ crews do HAM and BUT’s pit stops?

    10. I enjoy random stats and figures, and I’ve been looking at drivers’ results so far this season and come up with the following fun but mostly meaningless stats:

      Only seven drivers have achieved a classified finish in every race so far: Hamilton, Rosberg, Webber, Massa, Alonso, Kubica and Alguersuari. As Keith said, Webber is the only one of those to finish in the points every time, while Alguersuari has been the most consistent in terms of his finishing position (always between 9th and 13th). The drivers with the broadest spread of results are Hamilton (high of 1st, low of 14th) and Massa (high of 2nd, low of 15th).

      Were it not for his two DNFs, Vettel might have the most impressive overall results record, as his lowest classified result has been 6th (hence he tops the average finishing positions list). The only other drivers whose lowest result is within the points are Button (low of 8th, one DNF) and Webber (low of 9th, no DNFs).

      There are four drivers who have still only managed to finish two races apiece. Of these, the ‘new team’ drivers have each achieved identical positions on their two finishes – Senna has been classified 16th twice, while Glock has been classified 18th twice.
      The other two drivers who have only finished twice each are the Sauber drivers – a bit of an ominous stat given that Sauber is not a new team.

      Regarding the other new team drivers: everyone seems impressed with Kovalainen’s efforts (and, indeed, if any of the new teams are set to score points this year, it looks likely that Heikki will be the man to do it) but he has only managed four classified finishes out of eight races – the same as his teammate Trulli and Virgin’s Lucas Di Grassi. The most reliable finisher of the new teams is actually Karun Chandhok in the HRT, with six classified finishes to his name.

      1. I love statistics, it has a way of consoling people.
        Statistically, I’ve won more races than you, even if I don’t have any of those sparkling stuff to show for it.

      2. That’s an interesting point about classified finishes. Certainly makes Alguersuari look fantastic in that company. And the fact that he’s the most consistent in finishing place is great, given the fact that he’s not in nearly as competitive a car as the other six. Given his age I think we’ll see great things from Jaime in the future.

    11. And here are average positions of all 24 drivers during the whole length of all eight this season races… It shows consistency through the whole race, not just a finish position… For example Robert Kubica is more consistent then both Ferrari drivers… Felipe Massa is often not too quick and Fernando Alonso makes mistakes, which are all counted here in these average positions… That s why he is so down the order…

      AVARAGE DRIVER POSITIONS IN 8 RACES SO FAR:
      /Info from lap by lap chart, which can be found on
      f1stats.com/

      1. VET – 2,824
      2. WEB – 3,900
      3. HAM – 4,137
      4. BUT – 5,623
      5. KUB – 6,143
      6. ALO – 6,480
      7. ROS – 6,488
      8. SCH – 7,456
      9. MAS – 7,637
      10. SUT – 9,304
      11. LIU – 11,407
      12. PET – 11,441
      13. BAR – 11,865
      14. ALG – 11,881
      15. DLR – 13,130
      16. KOB – 13,331
      17. BUE – 13,646
      18. HUL – 14,045
      19. KOV – 15,586
      20. TRU – 17,391
      21. GLO – 17,959
      22. SEN – 17,982
      23. DIG – 18,937
      24. CHA – 19,115

      And I hope you understand my English, because I am not from an English speaking country…:) Have a nice day guys…:)

      1. Sorry mate, I didn’t understand a single word you’ve said :(

        1. I think its the position of the Driver on each lap of every race added up together – for example HAM in Canada – take the last two laps he was 1st and 1st so it would be a value of 2. But added up for each lap in every race. I think?!

          1. Thanks DannyT. But you didn’t get the joke :)

            1. So, you understood and was just joking? As I wrote, my native language isn t English…

          2. Yes, you are right… Sometimes the result didn t reflect a great performance during race (for example Lewis Hamilton in Spain, who was classified 14th, but was driving for a looong time on excellent second place)

            So it is based on driver s performances and their consistency…

            And I posted a wrong website – this one is correct – http://www.statsf1.com/

      2. Interesting that Sutil and Luizzi were right on their team average this race!

        Also, I guess from this one might conclude that on average, the pairs of Webber/Hamilton, Alonso/Rosberg, SCM/Massa, Liuzzi/Petrov, Barrichello/Alguesuari, DeLaRosa/Kobayashi, Glock/Senna and Di Grassi/Chandok have been battling for the same positions quite a bit.
        Or they really alternated in performance.

        Interesting that Sauber end up fighting each other (or reliability, I suppose).

    12. That’s odd, that it’s been 19 years since the last time 3 World Drivers’ Champions were on the podium together.

      To think that there was never an occasion where, Schumacher, Häkkinen and Hill, or Schumacher, Häkkinen and Villeneuve, or some other combination, were on the top steps together.

      1. Never an occasion when they were all champions at least…

      2. Carlos Santos
        14th June 2010, 15:17

        Hill just step twice into the podium after being World champion (Hungary 97 and Spa 98), and Villeneuve had a not very successful season with Williams in 98 before moving to BAR

        1. Good point Carlos.

      3. In 2007 there was a podium with Alonso, Kimi and Hamilton, but at that point, Hamilton and Kimi weren’t champions, so..i it doesn’t count

      4. Sunday was only the 11th time we’ve had 3 WDCs on podium.

        Canada 2010: Lewis Hamilton, Jenson Button, Fernando Alonso
        USA 1991: Ayrton Senna, Alain Prost, Nélson Piquet
        Brazil 1973: Emerson Fittipaldi, Jackie Stewart, Denny Hulme
        South Africa 1970: Jack Brabham, Denny Hulme, Jackie Stewart
        USA 1968: Jackie Stewart, Graham Hill, John Surtees
        Mexico 1967: Jim Clark, Jack Brabham, Denny Hulme
        Italy 1967: John Surtees, Jack Brabham, Jim Clark
        Holland 1966: Jack Brabham, Graham Hill, Jack Clark
        Great Britain 1965: Jim Clark, Graham Hill, John Surtees
        South Africa 1965: Jim Clark, John Surtees, Graham Hill
        Great Britain 1953: Alberto Ascari, Juan Manuel Fangio, Nino Farina

        Credit GPUpdate.net:
        http://f1.gpupdate.net/en/formula-1-news/237060/all-champion-podium-first-since-91/

        1. Who’s Jack Clark?

          1. Britain ’53 is an awesome result. They were the ONLY three WDCs at the time

        2. Great info Burt.

          I never thought all champion podiums are that rare.

          Just 3 in last 37 years!!!

          But we should get a few more this year. Michael will surely step on the podium some time.

          1. Wow only 11 times and only 2 in the last 37 years!

        3. Stewart wasn’t champion in 1968. F1.gpupdate made a mistake. :-0

          1. You are spot-on. Jackie won his first WDC the following year in 1969. “Jack Clark’ should be ‘Jim Clark”, of course. Lots of ‘J’s.

        4. And there was an extraortinary situation (like almost in every F1 records):
          In the 1983 Brazil gp the podium finishers were: 1. Piquet 2. Rosberg 3. Lauda – all champions.

          But Rosberg was disqualified few hours after the race (because the pit crew pushed him to start after his pitstop), and everyone stayed on his original position, so officially no one finished 2nd, but THERE WERE three champions on the podium.
          :)

    13. Was the grid for the Canadian Grand Prix the first time this season, and therefore since the 1990’s, the first to contain 24 cars? Unless that already happened in Turkey, all the races this year have had someone either not take the start, or have to start from the pitlane.

      I noticed that all the cars started the race from the grid yesterday.

      1. I think it’s the first time. I think di Grassi started from the pitlane in Turkey if I remember correctly

      2. I think it was…

      3. great stat, and all cars made it around the first lap! (KOB only just!)

        1. …and no safety car. How often does that happen in Canada?

      4. First since Pacific Grand Prix 1995 what I can recall. Japanese GP had 23 starters with Suzuki out. Australian GP had 22 after Häkkinen injured and Badoer failed to start warm-up lap.

    14. Hamilton has more points than mercedes.

      The works team must really hate that

      1. And look at this, too:

        Webber 103
        Vettel 90
        Renault 79

        1. F1 World Cup

          Average countries points:

          England 108
          Australia 103
          Poland 73
          Germany 37
          Spain 32
          Brazil 19
          Italy 6
          Russia 6
          Switzerland 5
          Japan 1
          Finland 0
          India 0

          (Pathetic stat to save Englands blushes)

          1. Australia 103 – 37 Germany?

            Not going by last night’s performance.

    15. I’m not where this notion that RBR will obviously be out developed by McLaren and Ferrari.
      Last season RBR developed the RB5 through the whole season, ending with a car that was clearly the fastest and most successful.
      Yes you can argue that McLaren and Ferrari were looking to 2010 but only towards the end of the year.
      But RBR’s development capacity can’t be denied.

      1. Agree’d – Although Hamilton was the most successful driver in the second half of last season.
        On that knowledge I’m guessing Mclaren will know what areas to develop in the second half of the season considering how cr*p their car was at the start of last season. Although it will be harder now they have a competitive car to find gains.
        Red Bull seem to be losing the plot a little bit IMO – Bad decisions yesterday with Webber, a ‘Problem’ with Vettels car.
        Does anyone know what the problem was with Vettels car yesterday?
        Was it low fuel? If it was that would have been interesting considering Hamiltons run out of fuel moment in QF

        1. The problem was with an oil leak in the gearbox.

      2. You’re right that RBR can develop as fast as anyone, but I think part of why they finished so far ahead of McLaren last year was that they started ahead of them as well. McLaren started this year a lot closer, and with the advantage of having the F-duct sorted out, RBR have now spent a lot of time working on developing, that they certainly would rather have spent working on other developments…

    16. I thought I`d take up Keith`s challange of how many races MSC and BAR hadn`t completed. After twenty minutes my brain was aching, but I`ve found the perfect link for you number chunches out there.

      http://www.chicanef1.com/query.pl?action=Submit&exact=on&driver=Rubens%20Barrichello&classi=ret&nc=0

      1. Lol, It doesn`t matter how many times you read it, there`s always a spelling mistake…. Oh a fact,,HAM has won 66.33333333r of the Canidian GP`s He Has entered.

        1. 63.3333r%..See what I mean

          1. What? 2/3 is 66.6666666….%

          2. Jarred Walmsley
            14th June 2010, 22:13

            The r means recurring, meaning basically the .33333 continues on for ever

            1. I figured that out, but I’m pretty sure it should be 66.6666r%

            2. Your Maths is right, Enigma.

    17. Gearbox problem. Same as the one that forced Webber to take the grid penalty. Also affected Webber in the race.

      1. Shoudn`t that be Vettel was affected?

    18. Is good that there’s plenty of drivers fighting for the championship, those tables make for very interesting racing – Red Bull haven’t really got the points on the board that maybe they should have.

    19. I agree redbull should be doing much better.

    20. This was the first Canadian Grand Prix since 2004 which didn’t feature the safety car. 2005-2008 all did

      1. I was wondering about that.

    21. Sebastien Buemi must be the first Swiss driver to lead a lap for a long long time right?

      Since Clay Regazzoni I’m guessing?

      1. Yes, Regazzoni, ’79, Silverstone.

        1. You mean Deletraz never lead a lap? That’s astonishing!

        2. Good knowledge!

    22. I wonder if Hamilton’s on for claiming the most pole positions of all time. I wouldn’t be surprised if he had that record in 10 years. I reckon he’ll be up to 20-23 by the end of this season.

      1. It depends on how competitive his car is, but he’s certainly in with a very good chance. The real test is can he do it in less races than either Senna or Schumacher…

      2. Schumi has 68 poles. If Lewis has 23 at the end of this season, then at his current rate it would take him another 8 seasons to beat the record.

        1. RedBullRacer
          14th June 2010, 23:41

          Assuming McLaren never make the mistake of building a car quite as terrible as their 2009 effort, Hamilton’s rate of pole positions should be higher in the coming seasons!

          1. McLaren seem to have a down period at least once per decade so I wouldn’t get too optimistic!

            Hamilton is great at getting pole positions… The fact that he has more than Raikkonen and as many as Alonso is astonishing. However we must be patient, Hamilton may have had a lot of poles in 07-09 due to the fuel strategy. We finally have low fuel qualifying so we will see whether he can excel or not.

            Massa was also as great at qualifying as Hamilton. It is a shame he has struggled this year.

        2. That’s do-able, especially considering we have ‘real’ qualifying back now.

      3. is it now safe to say that HAM is generally quicker over one lap than BUT?

        1. According to my data, comparing their laps in qualifying from the last session in which they both participated this year, yes.

          By five thousandths of a second, which is the smallest gap on the entire grid!

          1. That sounds a bit odd because Lewis has generally been a few tenths quicker.

            I’m guessing Australia and Malaysia skew the figures somewhat because Lewis didn’t get into Q3 on both occasions?

    23. I agree, You would think they have the funding to do well.

    24. I know this is nit-picking Keith and I am not hamilton-bashing, but was he really comfortably leading when he crashed into the back of Kimi in the pit lane in 08? as I recall he was third in the queue behind Kubica and (obviously) kimi.

      1. Yeah, but he was comfortably leading before the safety car.

      2. Before the safety car came out he had a decent lead.

    25. Yes kimi got ahead of him in pits

    26. Whats wıth McLaren and lettıng other drıiers have a run at Lewis in the pits, almost like they want to create good tv exposure of Hamilton doing all the overtaking on track. Well, it works and at least its more plausıble than the “racism theory”:p

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