Planet-F1

British GP: Winners and Losers

Sunday 6th July 2008

Silverstone was a triumph for Lewis Hamilton; a disaster for David Coulthard and Felipe Massa, and a defining moment for both Rubens Barrichello and Heikki Kovalainen.

Star of the Race
Lewis Hamilton, McLaren, 1st
It's not really true to say that Lewis Hamilton destroyed the opposition at Silverstone today, because a lot of the opposition pressed the self-destruct button. But when you get rival team managers of the stature of Ross Brawn commending Lewis's drive as outstanding, you have to appreciate that it was something special. Brawn couldn't believe how quick Lewis was on Inters in the appallingly wet conditions (not as bad as Fuji last year, but getting there). Given his performances in Fuji, Monaco and Silverstone, this nowmeans that Lewis has inherited Schumi's title of Der Regenmeister.

Though Kimi Raikkonen tried to minimise the damage by admitting that the team made one mistake that cost them - not changing his tyres at the first pit-stop - even when he had the right rubber on he was significantly slower than Hamilton. Otherwise, why was he lapped?

Lewis made one brief trip across the grass and that was it for errors on an afternoon when Robert Kubica found the gravel, Felipe Massa led a charmed life and hit nothing, and Kimi Raikkonen slewed backwards out of control and also managed to avoid anything solid.

It was the perfect response to his critics. In the garage after the race it looked like Anthony Hamilton was so overjoyed he was never going to let Norbert Haug go. Lewis should always remember Eric Cantona's famous phrase when dealing with the tabloid press. "When the seagulls follow the trawler it is because they think that sardines will be thrown into the sea." Winning helps disperse the seagulls.

Overtaking Move of the Race
Nick Heidfeld, BMW on Trulli and Alonso
Or
Nick Heidfeld. BMW, on Kovalainen and Raikkonen
Oh what a glorious thing that humble ECU is. Its presence in managing engines has eliminated traction control. Traction control's absence has given us F1 drivers in corners fighting for grip. In turn this has led to overtaking moves the like of which we have not seen for years.

In the last few races we've had Barrichello overtaking at an impossible corner in Monaco, Massa overtaking two at a time on the grass in Canada and now Heidfeld at Silverstone putting two glorious double overtaking moves on seriously good drivers (two World Champions included).

His careful manouevering around the outside and then the inside of Trulli and Alonso through Luffield and Woodcote was a joy to see once - for him to repeat it later at the same spot - with Kovalainen and Raikkonen - was almost like witnessing lightning striking twice.

On the weekend that Donington were theoretically given the British GP from 2010, Heidfeld's careful passes were reminiscent of Ayrton Senna's opening lap at the circuit's only GP of 1993. On that day Senna fell back to sixth and then drove through to first place on the opening lap, finding grip no-one else could find.

Now that Nick has cracked how to heat his tyres up for qualifying we are going to see an invigorated Heidfeld challenge. And the person most likely to lose out from that is Robert Kubica.

Winners
Rubens Barrichello, Honda, 3rd
Rubens got the kind of cheer on the podium you might have expected for a home driver. He drove an exemplary race - not entirely on the road - but his/the team's decision to come in for wet tyres when he did seemed like a good one. At that point the lap times on inters had fallen to 1:50s and it seemed like a no brainer.

This race was proof, if proof were needed, that Rubens should be driving for Honda in 2009. He's not been that far short of Jenson Button's pace this year and Jenson is reputedly the fourth highest paid driver in F1.

David Coulthard probably watched it from the Red Bull motorhome and thought - 'that could have been me'.

Kimi Raikkonen, Ferrari, 4th
Kimi Raikkonen has had a fortunate couple of races and collected 13 points, when he could easily have ended up with nothing. In France he nursed an ailing car to the finish and wasn't asked to pit to remove a flailing piece of machinery. In Britain, he lost his car going backwards out of control towards the pitlane barriers but stopped short.

It was a rare sight to see the Ferrari consistently lapping five or sex seconds slower than the Mclaren, and on one lap he was a whole eight seconds slower than Robert Kubica. This wasn't a case of getting caught out in unforeseen rain, this was a miscalculation of grip and tyre wear by Ferrari.

Lest it be forgot when Raikkonen lost it backwards through Woodcote he had the right tyres on.

Up until the first pit-stops he looked in ominous form but his fall from grace was spectacular.

Fernando Alonso, Renault, 6th
Alonso might have been thinking back to the Chinese GP of 2006 today. In that race he opted to go for new tyres when he could have kept his original set on and Michael Schumacher reeled him in like a very small fish. Today he left his tyres on and suffered as a result.

Nelson Piquet has now passed him in successive races, only this time he saved his team leader's embarrassment by skating off into the gravel from a healthy fifth place.

What's even more interesting, though, is that Fernando has had time to film the latest Lynx Dry anti-perspirant advert. (Probably on You Tube if you don't have UK TV). It's the one where Fernando's eyes operate independently to squint at his under-arm wet patches. Doesn't he earn enough from his day job...?

Jarno Trulli, Toyota, 7th
Jarno's late pit-stop put him back down the order, but his fresher tyres helped him nail the other Toyota-powered car on the final lap, which must have been a joy for the team and a rarity in Jarno's F1 career.

Kazuki Nakajima, Williams-Toyota, 8th
Despite an early off-track excursion Kazuki san scored yet more points. He also managed to keep his car pointing in the right direction a lot better than most of the rest of the field.

British GP Crowd
The FIA have made a big fuss of consulting the fans about what they want from F1 racing, and the fans are often cited when the FIA want to frame technical regulations. But the fans who packed out the British GP for qualifying on Saturday probably didn't give a toss that the grandstands aren't as permanent as those in Malaysia.

At Sepang the race is never sold out and the crowd for qualifying is a joke, yet Sepang is given as an example of what F1 should be like. Does that mean F1 should only run in countries where the government are prepared to chuck a load of money to Bernie for the race, create a white horse of a circuit and have a race that lacks atmosphere? The fact that Silverstone was a sell-out on Saturday is proof enough that a British GP is what the fans want, and they were rewarded with a