F1

Fights for the victory

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  • #128636
    Enigma
    Participant

    As interesting as a wet race can be, or maybe a race full of crashes, retirements and unpredictabilities, I think that by far the best thing in F1 is a fight for the win, between two drivers or more (That’s probably the reason why Canadian and Turkish GPs were rated so highly).

    So I’m wondering, how many fights for victories have we had this year?. If we exclude the first corner overtakings (Sepang, Interlagos…), technical problems (Sakhir, Korea), team orders (Hockenheim) and the races with no fights for victories, from this season we only have 4 races.

    2 of those were fights via different strategies or via pit stops – Webber won in Hungaroring because of different strategy (which he made work perfectly) and Vettel’s penalty, and Alonso won in Monza with a better in-lap pit stop and out-lap.

    So we only had two really good fights for the win this year – Istanbul and Montreal.

    In Istanbul it was because the McLarens were faster than the Red Bulls after the pit stop, and I’m thinking maybe it was a bad thing that Webber and Vettel crashed. Given the McLaren’s straight line speed at the time it could be a three or even a four-way battle for the win, which would be just amazing.

    In Montreal there was big tyre degradation and noone knew how many pit stops would be needed. There were five drivers with a shot at the victory in the race, and it was late in the race that we realised the Red Bulls were out of it. Hamilton and Alonso had the amazing pit battle, and then they were battling for some time, and Hamilton got in front. And even later in the race there was a chance of Button catching Hamilton and taking the win due to better tyre managing, but it turned out Hamilton did just as good a job.

    But still, it was an incredible race with a great fight for the win, which is rare these days.

    So, what other races from previous seasons do you remember had similar fights for victories? The two that quickly come to mind are races in Spa in 2000 and 2008, but what about the others?

    EDIT: Shanghai could count as well, as Rosberg lost the lead to Button following his mistake. But it was nowhere as dramatic as Montreal and Istanbul.

    #156645
    jackie
    Participant

    2005 and 2006 San Marino GP in Imola. Schumacher vs. Alonso, great battles.

    My favorite battle for win it was 1969 British GP at Silverstone. Magnificent duel between Jackie Stewart (Matra) and Jochen Rindt (Lotus). Reason – about 30 times lead changed between Jackie and Jochen. That was racing. ;)

    Sorry for my bad english.

    #156646
    Icthyes
    Participant

    2007 Chinese Grand Prix, although that died as soon as Hamilton was out.

    2008 German Grand Prix with Hamilton coming back from fourth.

    2000 German Grand Prix is worth a mention. Whilst Rubens and Mika weren’t actually battling on-track, they had a yo-yo battle with Barrichello on dries streaking away in the dry forest only for Hakkinen to make up time in the wet stadium section.

    #156647
    Dan Thorn
    Participant

    Silverstone 1987, Austria 1982 and my personal favourite other than San Marino 2005, Phoenix 1990.

    #156648
    Icthyes
    Participant

    I can’t believe you mentioned 1982 and San Marino in the same sentence and didn’t put them together ;)

    #156649
    Dan Thorn
    Participant

    Pah, that wasn’t a battle for the lead, Gilles wasn’t fighting it!

    #156650
    Icthyes
    Participant

    He was when Pironi got ahead of him.

    #156651
    jackie
    Participant

    “Silverstone 1987, Austria 1982 and my personal favourite other than San Marino 2005, Phoenix 1990.”

    Great races Dan Thorn. ;)

    Another great race for win was in Hockenheim 1970 for German GP. Sixteen lead changed between Jochen Rindt (Lotus 72) and Jacky Ickx (Ferrari 312B) in 50 laps.

    #156652
    ed24f1
    Participant

    I agree, a race-long battle for the lead is fascinating, just like Monza the last two years.

    Magny-Cours 2004 was another fascinating lead battle that comes to mind, with Schumacher doing the unique 4-stop strategy.

    #156653

    Oh yeah Rindt & Ickx battle Germany 1970 looked amazing, along with some of the classic slipstreaming battles from Monza.(Of course ive only ever seen them in short clips, so if anyone knows where to get hold of full races.

    My favourite however has to be Hamilton/Raikkonen Spa 2008.I was there and it was soo intense one minute the McLaren fans were upon there feet next second the Ferrari fans. I was soo gutted when Raikkonen crashed, watched the end of the race then drove straight back to England, couldn’t face the Mclaren fans in the English camp-site (though Hamilton was disqualified later) :)

    #156654
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    It’s a close call between Germany 2010 and Austria 2002!

    No seriously though, from my F1 time, which admittedly isn’t so long, I’ve enjoyed Belgium ’08, Turkey 2010, Singapore 2010 and San Marino 2005.

    #156655
    Bleu
    Participant

    Starting from 1990, I found these races where margin between 1st and 2nd was under a second. I also removed all team 1-2s because in some of those the closeness of the race was really staged. Especially in Ferrari/Schumacher era.

    Hungary 1990

    Monaco 1992

    Australia 1992

    Portugal 1993

    Europe 1996

    Argentina 1997

    Canada 1999 (SC finish)

    Austria 1999

    Malaysia 2000

    Brazil 2002

    Brazil 2003 (red flagged)

    Monaco 2003

    Canada 2003

    Monaco 2004

    San Marino 2005

    Hungary 2007

    Belgium 2009

    Singapore 2010

    #156656
    Ned Flanders
    Participant

    Hungary 2007 seems so out of place on that list! That race was controlled by Hamilton, Raikkonen never really had a hope of getting by as I recall. Although, the race was of secondary importance that weekend…

    #156657
    GeeMac
    Participant

    Japan 94 anyone? Based on Enigma’s initial post it may not qualify (because it was a two parter), but there is no denying that it was an epic and tense Hill/MSC battle.

    #156658
    Icthyes
    Participant

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