F1rejects.com is an excellent site which features comprehensive reviews of each race since 2000 (although the last few races of 2008 are missing). The site gives a ‘Reject Of The Race’ award to the driver/team/individual(s)/inanimate object that most deserves a place in a ‘Hall of Shame’. This year’s winners:
Bahrain – over-hyping of the 2010 season
Australia – Mark Webber
Malaysia – BMW Sauber
China – Vitantonio Liuzzi
Spain – Bruno Senna
Monaco – Article 40.13
Turkey – Sebastian Vettel, Christian Horner, Helmut Marko
Canada – Michael Schumacher
Europe – Race Control
Britain – BMW Sauber pit crew
Germany – Force India
Hungary – Michael Schumacher
Belgium – Sebastian Vettel
Italy – Nico Hulkenberg (+ stewards)
Singapore – Kamui Kobayashi
Japan – Lucas di Grassi
Korea – Adrian Sutil
Brazil – Vitantonio Liuzzi
Abu Dhabi – Podium rose water
Also, at the start of the season, the site predicted who/what the ‘Rejects of the Season’ would be. Some of them were quite accurate:
Bahrain’s ‘endurance’ layout – did not prove popular, and the race will go back to the old layout in 2011.
Crowds (or lack thereof) in Istanbul – lack of crowds at Istanbul has been a talking point, but the race is currently on the provisional 2011 calendar despite some initial doubts.
The new teams’ hopes of matching the established outfits – despite points now being awarded down to 10th, all the new teams failed to score.
Williams’ aspirations of being a front-running team again – Williams were a distinctly midfield team all season (bar Hulkenberg’s pole).
Renault – you know you’re in trouble when you’re sponsored by Lada – Considering the situation they were in at the end of 2009, 2010 was not actually a bad season at all for Renault.
Virgin’s all-CFD design – this novel approach managed to underestimate the size of the fuel tank. The car was also particularly unreliable in the early part of the season.
The “BMW Sauber Ferrari” name – this name is due to be changed for 2011.
Of the drivers, Vitantonio Liuzzi and Pedro de la Rosa – de la Rosa was dropped mid-season, and Liuzzi’s future was in doubt on more than one occasion.
Zoran Stefanovic – you know you haven’t heard the last of him yet – did apply unsuccessfully to enter in 2011.
USF1′s attempts to be back on the grid in 2011 – I think we all know what happened here…
