Here we go. Formula One 2010 is no doubt a classic season with some brilliant racing and 5 drivers in 3 vastly different but brilliant Grand Prix cars going for the championship with 2 races to go in the season in the next 11 days:
The Red Bull Renault RB6, piloted by Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber, are fast everywhere with great overall downforce but fragile and lacking in momentum due to a race of bad luck in Korea.
The Ferrari F10, with Fillepe Massa backing the man with Momentum and driving better than he ever has in Fernando Alonso, with a car that is fast in medium and high speed corners but not as fast as the Red Bull overall but can keep up on the whole over a race distance.
The Mclaren Mercedes MP4/25, the fastest in a straight line thanks to the soon to be outlawed 'F-Duct', driven by British interests and previous 2 world champions Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton who can stay with Ferrari and Red Bull but struggling for all around luck and grip in high speed corners.
The championship picture looks as follows:
1: Fernando Alonso: 231 points
2: Mark Webber: 220
3: Lewis Hamilton: 210
4: Sebastian Vettel: 206
5: Jenson Button: 189
As you can see plainly Car No.1 Jenson Button is 42 points off with 50 left on the table thanks to the new points system. He needs at least a win and a 2nd place with the rest of the title contenders not finishing either race for him to retain his crown. He is not going to give it up because it is feasible but it is almost impossible due to the mechanical reliability of his car, which Hamilton drives and the raw pace of Alonso and The Bulls reliability pending. He is looking at the possibility of being placed into a supporting role for the 2008 champion because of his poor race in Korea. He is almost completely out of it and needs to produce the 2 races of his life to stay in the title hunt.
Sebastian Vettel is piloting the Red Bull and is seen by many as a man who will one day win the F1 World Championship. He has the driving momentum as his drive in Korea was flawless in difficult conditions but then the fragility of his car (the latest problem being a Renault engine failure) has cost him 3 maybe even 4 wins this season and now he is 25 points behind championship leader Alonso and 14 points behind his team-mate. He may be forced into a supporting role due to the problem that both of them are challenging for the title and could therefore take points off each other. He has curbed his crashing problems which he suffered during the European season (Spa and Turkey specifically) and is driving his best but I can not see him coming back from as far back as he is in the championship war.
The No.2 car, Lewis Hamilton's Mclaren has been involved in more actual on incidents than any of the championship contenders due to crashes with Webber, Massa and the Barcelona tire wall but he has put on some of his best drives (such as in Spa, Melbourne and Montreal) and has put himself into title contention thanks to a mixture of on the whole controlled driving and some brilliant overtaking moves (just ask Nico Rosberg for example). He is the best of the top 5 drivers (see further down for whom I think is the best Driver in F1) and has momentum thanks to a strong finish in Korea and engines with a decent amount of life left in them. He could use consistency and good driving to come good at the end of the season and potentially steal from under Red Bull's and Ferrari's collective noses.
Mark Webber has overall been the Bull on Parade this season. With more finishes than anyone else, by far his best driving ever and the fastest car on the grid his accident in Korea could be a real stop to the momentum which could have taken him to the crown with consistency. He could be down on confidence and from history when he is low on confidence luck can go against him. I can see him not winning this World Championship despite this being his best chance unless he gets a pair of good results in Brazil and Abu Dhabi and the next man I am going to talk about has some problems in the next 2 Grand Prix.
Fernando Alonso is the man with the most momentum and a championship lead to savour. He has been driving brilliantly since the championship has left Europe. Taking on these 4 drivers would be no easy task for any of the greats and Alonso has a chance for putting his name alongside names like Fangio, Brabham, Stewart, Lauda, Piquet, Prost, Senna and Schumacher as people who have won 3 or more World titles with 2 decent finishes in the final 2 races. However Alonso has another potential problem: His engines are old and 2 of them have blown up all together back in Malayasia and Practise 1 in China. He could suffer engine troubles which could make everything change in terms of the points standings. He has to manage those engines carefully and hope that he can nurse them to the end of the season. The next 2 races are places he has not tended to do well in (minus his 2nd place in Interlagos in 2008) but that car is balanced and he has an already agreed trump card to take points off his rivals in the form of Fillepe Massa.
It is not just these 5 drivers who have a lot to fight for this season:
- Kubica is fighting to get a victory in car I am convinced is fast enough to capitalise should luck go his way. He is the stand-out driver of the year and has become, in my view, the best Driver in Formula One and could be a spoiler in someone's title challenge.
- There is a big fight for 9th place in the championship between Michael Schumacher, Rubens Barrichello and Adrian Sutil and all it takes is a retirement from the 7 times champion to open the fight for the place back up.
- Lotus, Virgin and Hispania are still fighting to be in the top 10 of the constructors and the pay check that goes with it. But with a Hispania which has no updates since Bahrain and Virgin who are unreliable it looks Lotus (and particularly Hekki Kovalinen) who look most likely to steal in and gain a point when things go wrong for others.
- Nick Hiedfeld, Vitaly Petrov, Tonio Liuzzi and Nico Hulkenberg are looking to upstage their team mates to secure a drive for next season as their places are all in doubt due to the potentially unknown status of Sutil next season. A very strong performance by any one of these drivers can show bosses from various teams that they are able to cut in F1 with bosses looking to developing drivers with money such as GP2 champion Pastor Maldonado and GP2 and future Sauber runner up Sergio Perez.
With Brazil coming up shortly I am going to come up with one of my un-famously incorrect predictions for qualifying and the race. As per usual Qualifying will be on the left and the race results will be on the right, if a driver has retired then I will place (ret.) next to their name and if a driver finishes where they qualify there will only be one name.
- Webber/Hamilton
- Vettel/Alonso
- Alonso/Webber
- Button
- Hamilton/Massa
- Massa/Kubica
- Rosberg/Schumacher
- Kubica/Rosberg
- Schumacher
- Kobayashi/Barrichello
- Hulkenberg/Kobayashi
- Sutil/Algersuari
- Barrichello/Heidfeld
- Algersuari/Liuzzi
- Petrov/Kovalinen
- Heidfeld / Sutil(ret.)
- Buemi/Glock (ret.)
- Liuzzi/Senna (ret.)
- Kovalinen/ Di Grassi (ret.)
- Glock/Trulli (ret.)
- Senna/Buemi (ret.)
- Trulli/Vettel (ret.)
- Di Grassi/Petrov (ret.)
- Yamamoto (ret.)
Interlagos looks set to have yet more wet conditions and as such should provide plenty of entertainment on a track which has many overtaking opportunities and potential for accidents and Safety Cars which can change the game throughout the field as one of the greatest World Championship battles in history draws to an end.
Sorry I will let you get on with your day in a moment but I will leave you with one extra thought:
The Renault is currently just about on a par with the top 3 teams on pace and Robert Kubica has for the most part always gone well at Interlagos.
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Cheers Ladies and Gentlemen
Nick
Musing-edit
Klien is driving this weekend. He should really have been racing the whole season with Chandok while Senna should really have driven for Lotus.
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