2011 Brazilian Grand Prix – Race Reports (Webber’s Last Stand)

Despite that we finally had a fifth Grand Prix winner, this year’s race in Interlagos, Sao Paolo was rather boring and uninteresting.

Race Direction: Good

The race director caught all the yellow flags and over half the pit-stops. However, I can’t give out the Excellent grade since the back group was really not focused on at all during the race.

The Top-10:

Mark Webber took the victory after his team-mate began suffering from gearbox trouble. Sebastian Vettel was once again without equal and would have probably taken the victory had he not had any technical issues. Jenson Button regained his original starting position in the last few laps of the race and finished third and on the podium only for the second time in Brazil.

Ferrari had a good day with Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa finishing back-to-back, 4th and 5th respectively. Also an excellent day for Team Force India whose drivers both finished on points. Adrian Sutil drove a solid race to finish 6th and his team-mate, Paul Di Resta, rose from outside of the top-10 to finish a strong 8th.

Nico Rosberg was the only Mercedes GP driver to finish on points today with a fairly solid 7th place. Kamui Kobayashi made an impressive rise from 16th in the start the finish. Vitaly Petrov also did good, starting from 15th and taking the final point as the 10th finisher.

Golden Pineapple Award

Jaime Alguersuari took his second and final Pineapple Award of the Year. However the pineapple king, with four 11th place finishes is hands down Adrian Sutil, who may or may not be driving for Williams next year. Team Force India has the highest amount of pineapples with a total of six.

Driver:	Awards:
Adrian Sutil	4
Sergio Perez	3
Nico Rosberg	2
Paul di Resta	2
Pastor Maldonado	2
Vitaly Petrov	2
Jaime Alguersuari	2
Felipe Massa	1
Kamui Kobayashi	1

Team:	Awards:
Force India	6
Sauber	4
Mercedes	2
Williams	2
Renault	2
Toro Rosso	2
Ferrari	1

Drop-out count: 4

Technical difficulties ended the races of both Lewis Hamilton and Vitantonio Liuzzi. It was not shown why Pastor Maldonado also had to drop out of the race, though judging from the position of his car, I suspect he must have suffered a spin or a light crash at the very least. Timo Glock can blame his pit-crew for letting him out too soon with one of his wheels still unattached.

Back of the Lot News

Toro Rosso failed to reach points in the final race of the season with Sebastian Buemi finishing behind his team-mate at 12th place. Sergio Perez also drove a puzzlingly weak race and Rubens Barrichello’s race was ruined by a horrible start.

Michael Schumacher and Bruno Senna collided with each other which caused Schumi to lose his right rear wheel and limp to a pathetic 15th place in the finish. Senna also received a drive-through penalty, finish 17th and behind Heikki Kovalainen who was yet again the best of the new team drivers.

2011 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix – Race Report

This year’s Abu Dhabi race was extremely uneventful. Last year it was the one of the pivotal races where Sebastian Vettel took his championship. Although there were some nice scuffles in the front group, what’s very telling of the race’s excitement level is that, after Vettel’s tyre-puncture and retirement, most of the standings in the top-10 were raised only by one spot.

Race Direction: Poor

This time I have to be a little harsh, even though the race director managed to give a balanced coverage of the race and even catch half the pit-stops on camera, there were way too many missed yellow-flags and he didn’t even show D’Ambrosio’s retirement. Even Buemi’s is questionable since he was only seen after he had already left his car and taken his helmet off.

The Top-10

After Sebastian Vettel dropped out, Lewis Hamilton drove to an easy victory. Fernando Alonso did the most impressive work of the day by rising from fifth on the grid to second in the finish. Jenson Button had to fight Mark Webber furiously at times for the final podium but came out on top at the end.

Mark Webber also had a scuffle with Felipe Massa, but a slip by Massa late into the race put too much of a gap for the Ferrari to catch up. Webber was fourth and Massa was fifth.

A solid race from Mercedes GP and Force India. Nico Rosberg and Michael Schumacher finished sixth and seventh respectively; Adrian Sutil and Paul Di Resta took spots eight and nine. After a long string of disappointing races, Kamui Kobayashi finally drove a solid performance and finished tenth and last in points.

Golden Pineapple Award

Sergio Perez took his third Pineapple Award for the season, which means that he still has a chance to dethrone Adrian Sutil as this year’s pineapple leader in the last race of the season in Brazil. Perez had an up-hill battle all the way since he had to replace his wing during the first few laps of the race. Sauber has solidified its second place in the Pineapple standings with a total of four pineapple victories.

Drop-out count: 4

Sebastian Vettel‘s tyre punctured during the first few turns of starting lap. Though he made it to the pits, his suspension was so damaged that there was no way for him to move on.

I can’t really say what happened to Sebastian Buemi, Daniel Ricciardo or Jerome D’Ambrosio since the director didn’t even bother showing most of these retirements. However, since there were no yellow flags for D’Ambrosio and Buemi was seen in the pits shortly after he retired, my suspicion is that the retirements were technical in nature and these two managed to park into the pits. Ricciardo’s car was left on the side of the track during the latter part of the race so I suspect his retirement was a technical problem too.

Back of the Lot News

Despite starting at historically awful grid positions, the Williams team was at least able to improve their over-all result with Rubens Barrichello finishing twelfth and Pastor Maldonado, despite messed up pit-exits and a drive-through penalty, was able to finish fourteenth.

Today it was the Renault Team that really weren’t up to their usual performance with Vitaly Petrov slipping off the track at one point and Bruno Senna also receiving a drive-through penalty for ignoring blue flags. Toro Rosso’s day was pretty pathetic considering Buemi’s retirement and Jaime Alguersuari’s extremely unimpressive fifteenth place.

Heikki Kovalainen was racing well and drove at a steady pace at positions 12-14th until his final pit stop which landed him back at 17th, the spot he started from. He was followed by Trulli, Glock and Liuzzi.

2011 Indian Grand Prix – Race Report

The first ever Indian Grand Prix was a decent race for sure. There were a few interesting collisions and the new track is definitely ripe for interesting races. The fact that the top-tier cars are so dominant this year just didn’t give the middle group a chance to shine (the same is true for the entire season) and so next year I’m sure the race will be much more interesting.

Race Direction: Excellent

I’m rather stunned but the race director met my criteria more than admirably. There were no missed yellow flags, over half the pit-stops were caught on camera and thanks to some furious racing both in the middle and back of the lot, there was a well-balanced amount of attention given to all racing participants. My hat is off to this director and I hope other race directors will take notes from his example.

The Top-10

Sebastian Vettel is like an unstoppable juggernaut at this point. Jenson Button drove a solid race to finish second and Fernando Alonso defended his position well to finish third.

Mark Webber had another abysmal start to a race and finished a humble fourth. I think the Aussie has to get it through his head at some point that races are lost and won on the starting grid. Michael Schumacher rose the ranks from outside of the top-10 to finish a strong fifth. With his team-mate Nico Rosberg finishing on sixth, Mercedes GP can pat themselves on the back for a solid race performance.

There was plenty of grief for McLaren thanks to Lewis Hamilton and Felipe Massa running into each other during the race. Hamilton, who started from the top-5 was able to manage a seventh place after having his front wing replaced. Otherwise, he would have easily taken a much higher position.

For the first time in the longest while we’ve had seven different teams in the Top-10. Joining the Four Leafed Clover (McLaren, Ferrari, Red Bull, Mercedes) are Toro Rosso, Force India and Sauber. Jaime Alguersuari drove an excellent race to finish eighth and the TR car has been up to pace all weekend which is fantastic, considering how poorly the team’s season has gone. Adrian Sutil made up for his team-mate’s poor performance by finishing a fairly solid ninth. Sergio Perez made an impressive rise from grid-20 to take the final point in the Top-10.

Golden Pineapple Award

Vitaly Petrov made an admirable rise after his penalty, but sadly couldn’t reach points. This is only his second Pineapple Award this season, so it doesn’t affect the standings.

Drop-out count: 5

Most of the retirements happened during the first half of the race. Although there was a sizable crash in the back-to-middle lot only two retirements resulted from this. Kamui Kobayashi, who drove another bad qualifying, was sadly the one to be taken out immediately by the crash. Timo Glock also retired after a few laps, presumably from the damage his car suffered from the accident.

Technical difficulties befell on Pastor Maldonado and Sebastian Buemi. Maldonado’s gear-box gave out in the middle of the race and Buemi’s engine blew out, rather sadly since he was also driving an otherwise excellent race for Toro Rosso.

Though Hamilton and Felipe Massa collided, Massa didn’t suffer much damage but received a drive-through penalty for blocking Hamilton which is what caused the accident. Massa suffered a similar suspension failure, as he did in the qualifying, by driving over the edge of the track.

Back of the Lot News

Most of the excitement in the race was provided by drivers in the middle group who were fighting furiously to reach points. The Toro Rossos taking on Bruno Senna was by far the most exciting battle. Senna, whose KERS wasn’t working properly, was even finding it difficult to keep a distance to Heikki Kovalainen‘s Lotus.

Heikki drove a fantastic race. At one point he was tenth in the standings and he not only left all his competition behind, but also Rubens Barrichello (though granted, Barrichello lost his front wing in the crash during the start). His team-mate, Trulli, did not have a happy day. After bumping into the back of Maldonado’s car, Trulli spun out and had to come into the pits, finishing 19th and dead last.

Narain Karthikeyan (replacing Vitantonio Liuzzi for this race) was able to race for the first time in his native country and was at least able to beat his team-mate Daniel Ricciardo, though he lost out to another F1 new-comer, Virgin’s Jerome D’Ambrosio.

2011 Korean Grand Prix – Race Report

Though the Korean Grand Prix wasn’t the best race of the year, it was still okay and much better than last year’s race. Some might feel it was the opposite and I myself had a lot riding on the race since the Drivers’ Championship was wide open back then (as was whether the circuit would be finished in time for the race).

Anyway, race direction grade and results as follows…

Race Direction: Okay

I’m letting the race director off on an Okay grade, though officially according to the standards I laid down he should have gotten a poor rating. There were only three yellow-flags in the race but only one (and admittedly the most important one) got caught on replay. I was teetering on wether or not penalize the director for Pit-stops. However, I do have to – while over half of the first pit-stops got caught on camera I was going to be generous and started counting the second pit-stops even before the half-way point of the race. Even after three retirements, however, the second half of the pit-stop count was short by two so I can’t give it a pass. However, why the rating got bumped up from Poor to Okay is because the director did focus on events all through the different tiers of racers, even the back lot. And for this I can’t give a poor rating (besides which all retirements got caught on camera).

The Top-10:

Sebastian Vettel was unstoppable once he overtook Hamilton on the start. However, Lewis Hamilton fought back and defended his position admirably until the end. A good day for Mark Webber, whose third position has now won Red Bull the Constructors’ Championship as well. Webber also gave Hamilton a run for his money on the final laps though couldn’t manage to overtake him.

Jenson Button drove an okay race. The most excitement he experienced was racing with Nico Rosberg in and after the pit-lane since the two would not let off. In the end though, Button finished a respectable fourth while Rosberg finished a rather humble eighth.

The Ferraris switched places from the start with Fernando Alonso finishing fifth and Felipe Massa finishing sixth. The most excitement experienced from them today was a bizarre and cryptic radio message from Alonso caught by the broadcaster: “I give up.” What this message was referring, I’ve no idea, but it certainly sounds very out of character for Alonso.

Toro Rosso had probably their best race of the season. Jaime Alguersuari drove  fantastic race, was at one point third in the running and finished a solid seventh by the end. His team-mate Sebastian Buemi didn’t shine quite as brightly but took ninth place for the team.

Force India slumped today though Paul Di Resta landed only one position down from the start, to tenth.

Golden Pineapple Award

Adrian Sutil is strengthening his hold on the Pineapple throne with his fourth Pineapple victory. A disappointing result for him considering he started from tenth place. Hopefully things will look up in India.

Drop-out count: 3

The most excitement experienced today on track was due Vitaly Petrov ramming his car to the back of Michael Schumacher. Petrov damaged the suspension on his left front wheel as well as totalled both his own front and Schumi’s rear wing. Schumi couldn’t go on and the debris left on-track caused a Safety Car session. Petrov made it back to the pits, but even with a replacement wing on hand the Renault mechanics couldn’t fix his suspension and the race was over for the Viborg Rocket.

Pastor Maldonado suffered a drive-through penalty for cutting straight to the pits rather than using the entry lane and his pathetic race day was ruined by technical difficulties that forced him to retire.

Back of the Lot-News

It seems whenever Toro Rosso is thriving Force India and Sauber suffer as a result. Today Sauber were particularly bad with neither driver making it to points. Kamui Kobayashi drove an uncharacteristically bad race and even Sergio Perez couldn’t keep up with the middle group. Both finished behind Team Lotus’ Heikki Kovalainen, which is great news for him and Tony Fernandes, but very embarrassing for the Sauber team.

The Williams team was already doing poorly due to Maldonado’s drive-through and retirement. Rubens Barrichello’s rise from 18th to 12th was a slim consolation, though he did manage to beat Bruno Senna on pure one-on-one basis.

For the new teams it was the same old, same old, though I’ll applaud Daniel Ricciardo for leaving both D’Ambrosio and Liuzzi behind him. The fact that he wasn’t a match for Timo Glock is in part due to the fact that he is driving an inferior car and that Glock is in fact a really good driver (just stuck in a really sucky team).

2011 Japanese Grand Prix – Race Report

Sebastian Vettel secured the drivers’ championship in the unspectacular Japanese Grand Prix. This years race was a massive let down in comparison to last year, second only in its lack of excitement to the Valencian Grand Prix.

Race Direction: Good

To be fair, not a whole lot happened on track but the race director did manage to stay focused on what was relevant and interesting. No missed yellow flags, most of the pit-stops were covered. I can’t give an Excellent grade since there was practically nothing shown from the Back of the Lot, but other than that a Grade A showing from the race director.

The Top-10

Jenson Button tried challenging Vettel at the start but fell behind and only rose gradually after Vettel had to make an extra pit-stop. Jense drove a solid race though and I’m happy for him. Fernando Alonso also showed massive improvement from the start of the race and finished second. Sebastian Vettel only had to score in order to secure his championship, but a third place meant that at least he’d be celebrating his championship from a podium.

Mark Webber had a weak qualifying but finished a strong fourth at the end. Lewis Hamilton and Felipe Massa butted heads on-track once again. This time a piece from one of their cars landed smack middle of the track and caused the safety car to come on. Unfortunately, this didn’t add much excitement. Hamilton finished a respectable fifth and Massa dropped to seventh by the end.

Michael Schumacher had  a good day and even lead the race for a brief moment before his first pit-stop. He finished sixth. His team-mate Nico Rosberg made the most impressive rise of the day, from 23rd in the start to 10th  in the finish, taking the final point for Mercedes GP. It’s sort of expected, given he’s driving the fourth best car in the series – but also a great accomplishment as he no doubt had to pass several to contenders.

The second most impressive rise was achieved by Sergio Perez who started from 17th and finished eighth. Vitaly Petrov drove an unspectacular but safe race to finish ninth.

Golden Pineapple Award

Adrian Sutil takes the lead of the pineapple chart with a total of three positions. Force India had a really lackluster race day in Japan.

Drop-out count: 1

Almost a record low for this season. Sebastian Buemi‘s wheel came off mysteriously when he entered a curve. It’s not at all clear what really happened but Buemi’s retirement was the final nail on the coffin for Toro Rosso’s massively unspectacular day.

Back of the Lot News

A rather shocking lack of improvement by most drivers this race and I’m not entirely sure why that was. Kamui Kobayashi and Bruno Senna were the biggest failures on-track, both falling out of the top-10 early on. It’s quite remarkable, given Senna’s otherwise solid (half-)season and especially for Kobayashi who really wowed the crowd in his homeland last year.

Force India, Toro Rosso and Williams all failed massively today. Jaime Alguersuari rose a measly one position due to his team-mate’s retirement, Di Resta and Maldonado made absolutely no improvement on their positions and Barrichello fell four positions down. Come on, guys! You really need to start getting your shit together. Williams have had a crap season anyway, but now it seems like Toro Rosso and Force India just weren’t trying at all.

Once again, nothing new for the new teams. Lotus occupied the top-spots and we already know which of the two drivers was the better of them (hint: Heikki Kovalainen). The only thing worth mentioning about the rear-end teams is that HRT’s Vitantonio Liuzzi was permitted to race despite not putting up a time within the 107% rule. This time around I can’t imagine why the FIA let this one fly because clearly Liuzzi should have been disqualified from the race. The FIA has only really enforced the 107% rule in the season opening race and since then every instance of the 107% limit not being reached the cars have been permitted to race regardless. What the fuck…

2011 Singapore GP – Race Report

The Singapore race had a fairly interesting start, climaxing on a safety car after Schumacher’s crash, but a very boring latter half. The winner is easy to guess…

Race direction: Poor

The race director for Singapore squeaks by with the poor rating. He managed to cover barely half the pit-stops and at least took the time to show all the retirements. However with a grand total of nine missed yellow-flags of which only one was caught on replay, I have to question if the race director was even awake for much of the race. Both the front and the back runners received a fair amount of coverage, but on a small circuit like Singapore, that’s hardly a massive task.

The Top-10:

Once again, Sebastian Vettel was the leader from start to finish; the most peril he endured was when the Lotus team let Heikki Kovalainen out of the pits too early nearly resulting in collision (for which the team received a fine after the race). Jenson Button drove an impressive race and was even gaining up on Vettel in the final laps, but simply couldn’t pass the lapped drivers fast enough to challenge Vettel. After another abysmally bad start Mark Webber did finish a respectable third.

The Ferraris did not have a fun time. With Alonso having to tangle with Webber and Massa getting rear-ended by Hamilton who also managed to puncture one of his rear tyres which forced the Brazilian to make an extra pit-stop. Alonso finished fourth and Massa ninth.

Lewis Hamilton didn’t let his drive-through penalty for rear-ending Massa bother him and instead fought his way back up to fifth. After the race Massa went to tap Lewis on the shoulder when he was giving press-statements. Hopefully though, these two won’t have any bad blood left between them by the time of the Japanese Grand Prix.

Team Force India is certainly happy for the turn out. With both their cars making it to Q3, Di Resta’s sixth and Sutil’s eighth place were an extremely positive result for the team. Nico Rosberg also fought from a less than stellar start to finish seventh, tangling with Sauber’s Sergio Perez who was the tenth and the final scorer for this race.

Golden Pineapple Award

Pastor Maldonado takes his second pineapple for this season, which ties him with the four other two-time pineapple winners. Maldonado was at least able to better his position slightly from the start of the race but he didn’t seem to be even close to driving for points. Better luck next time though.

Drop-out count: 4

Jarno Trulli and Timo Glock both fell foul to technical difficulties.

After tangling with Nico Rosberg, Sergio Perez found himself defending his spot against Michael Schumacher. At one corner Perez took the inner lane which pocketed Schumi. Rather than breaking Schumi plowed over Sergio’s car and flew off track. Though Schumi wasn’t injured and Perez was still able to finish the race in spite of the accident, it was easily the most impressive looking crash in the race. Schumi’s car was also in the way enough that a Safety Car had to be brought on track.

Jaime Alguersuari also lost control of his car and hit the wall in the tunnel portion.

Back of the Lot News:

I’m not sure what happened to Rubens Barrichello. He started from 12th and was at one point driving for points, but then finished a modest 13th by the end. The Renault Team had a lousy weekend due to their failed upgrade package. Bruno Senna finished where he had started and Vitaly Petrov lost out to Heikki Kovalainen who was the highest of the new team drivers (16th).

Kamui Kobayashi also had a miserable weekend. After crashing his car in Q2 he had to start from grid-17 and a drive through penalty later in the race ensured that he had no chance of scoring this time around.

For Virgin and HRT it was the same-old, same-old.

Monza Grand Prix 2011 – Race Report

The first half of the Monza Grand Prix was quite exciting with several crashes and a safety car session at the very start. However, past the half-point there wasn’t much excitement with the race lead getting away very soon and with distances between cars becoming quite huge. Still, the race was much more exciting than most of the races in the early part of the season.

Race Direction: Good

I have to say that I couldn’t find much to be critical of about the way the race direction was handled. The large amount of retirements of course meant that the director was able to pick off most of the pit-stops though for the first stops it was less regular. Apart from two very brief yellow-flags all other off-road activity got caught on camera and the director even focused on the middle-group struggles which was commendable.

The Top-10:

At the start it looked like Sebastian Vettel would have to fight for the race victory, but he regained his number one spot after the safety car, afterwards no-one even came near him. Jenson Button didn’t have the most stellar start but after taking down Schumacher and Alonso, the man definitely deserved to be on the second highest podium today. Fernando Alonso had a fantastic start but then lost to Vettel after the safety can and to Button once Jense got close enough. Still, a solid drive from the Spaniard.

Lewis Hamilton struggled to get past Michael Schumacher and at one point lost control of his car which allowed his team-mate to overtake him. In the end though, Hamilton did beat Schumi, finishing fourth ahead of him. Schumi’s drive start was impressive and his fifth place a notable improvement from his starting position.

Felipe Massa got rear-ended by Webber in the first chicane of the track and due to a spin fell behind. He was not able to improve his standings from the start finishing sixth. With Sutil’s retirement, Paul Di Resta was the only Force India car to finish (8th).

A good day for Toro Rosso who got both cars to points. Jaime Alguersuari made the most impressive rise from 18th in the start to finishing seventh by the end. His team-mat, Sebastian Buemi, had to yield to Bruno Senna‘s Renault but still finished on points. Senna was ninth and Buemi tenth.

Golden Pineapple Award

Pastor Maldonado and the Williams Team can finally add their name to the pineapple chart. Maldonado’s poor drive definitely wasn’t his fault since he got caught in the last chicane when he had to stop his car in order to avoid hitting the three cars that got taken out by Liuzzi. Not a good day for Williams at any rate.

Drop-out count: 8

A season-high matching amount of drop-outs (there were also eight retirements in Malaysia). A car froze already on the starting line. I believe this was Jerome D’Ambrosio as he did not appear on the track throughout the whole race. Technical difficulties also ended the race for Adrian Sutil, Sergio Perez and Kamui Kobayashi. HRT’s Daniel Ricciardo was also left without an official race result since he was pulled into the pits to repair his car, although he was put back onto the track.

At the very start of the race Vitantonia Liuzzi’s HRT car went off track and slid into the cars of Vitaly Petrov and Nico Rosberg who were just entering the opening chicane. This brought in the safety car. The stewards ruled that Liuzzi was entirely to blame for the accident and will be receiving a penalty-drop in the next race of the season.

Mark Webber also experienced his first retirement of the season when he hit Massa’s car in the chicane. This caused his front wing to fall out of place. A little later Webber ran off the track when the wing went under his car and hit the wall.

Back of the Lot News

There’s really nothing much to talk about. Rubens Barrichello must have been caught in the chicane crash as well since he was only able to rise one position from the start, to finish 12th, and driving much of the race behind the Lotus cars.

With both HRT cars effectively out of the race and only Timo Glock left to defend Virgin’s honour, Team Lotus was once again, easily, the best of the new teams. Heikki Kovalainen got a great start and was even driving at position 11 though he eventually finished in the familiar spot 13 ahead of his team-mate, Jarno Trulli.

Belgian Grand Prix 2011 – Race Report

After an exciting start and opening half the race simmered down to a more even pace although there was still some excitement with the top drivers passing each other.

Race direction: Okay

Once again the race directing could and should have been much better. However, it was still a slight improvement from the last two races. I’m not penalizing the race director for ignoring most of the pit-stops since there seemed to be such an over-abundance of them. Trying to show every single one of them would have probably drawn the attention away from the excitement on-track. There were plenty of ignored yellow-flags but at least the most prudent ones got caught on replay. And at least the director had the decency to inform us of Ricciardo and Perez’s retirements which also helped.

The Top-10:

Sebastian Vettel drove to an almost unchallenged victory with the Ferrari’s and McLaren’s struggling to keep up with him. Mark Webber recovered from a blundered start to finish second. Jenson Button hit his stride on the latter half of the race and took on several drivers to finally finish third.

Fernando Alonso was able to recover from a surprisingly weak qualifying although he failed to defend his position from both the Red Bulls and Button. Ferrari also fumbled on Felipe Massa’s pitstops which landed him eighth. Another mediocre weekend for Ferrari.

Michael Schumacher also recovered from his crash in the first qualifying, which started him from all the way back to finally finishing fifth behind Alonso, overtaking his team-mate in the process. Nico Rosberg can at least be proud of his overtake of Vettel at the start of the race and Rosberg held the position for a long time, eventually finishing sixth. Over-all, a good day for Mercedes GP.

Adrian Sutil and Vitaly Petrov both improved their positions, finishing seventh and ninth respectively, and ensuring that Force India and Renault would not leave the track empty-handed. Finally Pastor Maldonado of Williams took his first Championship point. His achievement is notable in light of the penalty he received for intentional bumping into Lewis Hamilton at the end of Q2 yesterday (as revenge for Hamilton over-taking and making contact with him in the final corner).

Golden Pineapple Award

Paul Di Resta drove a pathetically bad qualifying yesterday in uneven conditions and wasn’t able to improve his standings significantly. Let’s see if the Scottish rookie can improve himself for the Italian Grand Prix.

Drop-out count: 5

There were plenty of collisions that ruined certain drivers’ results, but somewhat surprisingly on two drivers had to retire because of it. Jaime Alguersuari and Bruno Senna bumped heads together leading to the former’s retirement. Sebastian Buemi’s rear-wing also broke which is probably the reason for his retirement. The retirements were most unfortunate in light of Toro Rosso’s impressive speed in the qualifying, especially Alguersuari’s.

On lap-13, Kamui Kobayashi bumped the back of Lewis Hamilton’s car, sending him spinning to the edge of the track. Kobayashi unfortunately ruined his own impressive drive as a result.

Finally, Hispania’s Daniel Ricciardo and Sauber’s Sergio Perez were forced to retire, most likely due to technical difficulties. Perez drove a good qualifying so it’s unfortunate he couldn’t finish the race.

Back of the Lot News:

Lots of drivers lost good standings in the qualifying to crashes in the first turn of the Spa Circuit. Particularly Bruno Senna, who replaced Nick Heidfeld at Renault, drove an impressive qualifying but due to ramming into Alguersuari’s Toro Rosso fell to the back of the lot and only managed a weak 13th place. Kamui Kobayashi made an impressive rise from the back of the lot and even drove in the top-5 at one point, until he rammed Hamilton off-road and had to make an extra pit-stop. Rubens Barrichello was also driving for points but something happened that dropped him to 16th behind the Lotus cars.

Heikki Kovalainen had his best qualifying of the season by making it to Q2 yesterday, but like many others lost positions at the start. However, Kovalainen eventually passed the Hispanias and the Virgins but couldn’t beat his team-mate who also finished his highest position this year at 14th, with Kovalainen right behind him.

Virgin and HRT had a lousy time in Spa. Both team’s failed to pass the 107% rule, although had good enough times in practice to allow them to compete. Liuzzi was last with D’Ambrosio and Glock ahead of him. Glock finished behind D’Ambrosio due to a drive-through penalty at the start.

The Hungarian Grand Prix 2011 – Race Report

The Hungarian Grand Prix had some genuine excitement to offer thanks to unstable weather created by the occasional showers. As an added note, the Race Rankings page will now be updated after every race for the rest of the season.

Race Direction: Poor

I really didn’t want to give the race director a poor-rating since on the over-all he didn’t do too bad of a job. He missed out on over half the pit-stops in the first rush but did more than admirably on the second one and considering that some drivers pitted as many as four or six times, that’s saying something. However, the director missed out entirely on the action in the back except when drivers were making bad overtake attempts against Kovalainen. The middle-scuffles received at least some attention though mainly when a Ferrari or Mercedes were involved.

The most important criteria for the poor rating was a total of six missed yellow flags of which only one was picked up in a replay. Were it not for this I would have been convinced to give the director an Okay-rating instead. It’s still a big step up from Germany.

The Top-10:

Jenson Button showed solid skill once again in a race affected by rain. Sebastial Vettel didn’t have the easiest time either and almost hit Nick Heidfeld’s towed car on the pit-exit but still managed an impressive rise to second. Fernando Alonso‘s race had ups and downs, but a solid drive as well as a drive-through penalty for Hamilton raised him to the third podium.

Lewis Hamilton could have had a shot at the victory but spins, slip ups, being overtaken by his team-mate and a drive-through penalty finally landed him in fourth. Mark Webber had a poor start and struggled to rise the ranks all through the race, finally getting stuck at fifth. Felipe Massa suffered a spin into a wall but was able to continue without much affect on his final position which was sixth.

Paul di Resta drove his best result of the season by finishing seventh and bringing valuable points to Force India. Sebastian Buemi made a fantastic rise after a penalty forced him to start all the way from grid-23, Buemi rose the ranks to finish eighth. With his team-mate Jaime Alguersuari grabbing the final point as tenth (impressively considering he almost destroyed his front wing), this race seemed to be a return to form for Scuderia Toro Rosso.

After Schumacher’s retirement due to technical difficulties Nico Rosberg was the only Mercedes GP driver to take points by finishing a modest ninth.

Golden Pineapple Award

Kamui Kobayashi made an impressive rise and was close to taking fifth or sixth position in the race, but towards the end of the race his tyres wore out and he had to give way to Di Resta, Buemi, Rosberg and Alguersuari. Today Kamui-san’s risky strategy didn’t pay off, hopefully things will go differently in Belgium at the end of August.

Drop-out Count: 4

Technical retirements ended the races for Michael Schumacher, Jarno Trulli and Heikki Kovalainen. This is quite sad on all accounts, for Schumi since he actually lead the race at point and was driving an otherwise excellent race. For Trulli the result was extremely dissappointing since the man had seemed to have regained his stride and motivation for this weekend. Heikki was also defending his position beautifully against Maldonado, Perez and Sutil who all fell behind him at the start.

The most dramatic retirement happened with Nick Heidfeld‘s Renault. I’m still not sure what happened but it seems his gas-tank exploded when he was leaving the pits. His car eventually caught fire when he was exiting the pit-lane but he was thankfully able to pull over to the grass before jumping out.

Back of the Lot News

To repeat once more, Team Toro Rosso achieved the most impressive rise from the back of the lot to points. Vitaly Petrov was unable to improve his standing. Adrian Sutil and Sergio Perez both fell considerably behind at the start and Perez even got a drive-through penalty for over-taking Kovalainen in Heidfeld’s yellow-flag zone.

Williams only made very moderate and hardly noticeable improvement with Barrichello rising from 15th to 13th and Maldonado only one position to finish 16th (and receiving a drive-through penalty for speeding on the pit lane).

Timo Glock was the best of the new team drivers, albeit 4 laps down and only after both Lotuses dropped out from the race. Daniel Ricciardo was finally able to hold his own, not just against his team-mate – but against Jerome D’Ambrosio as well.

German Grand Prix 2011 – Race Report

I apologise that this race report is a touch late, but I had to watch the race in recorded form due to being unable to watch it on Sunday.

While the 2011 German Grand Prix was pretty okay on the excitement level (after a slow start) my frustration with the Race Director grew so much that I’ve decided to add a new feature to my race-reports. Explanations can be found on the Race Reports Explanation page, for this new ranking. In addition the 2011 Race Rankings will be updated shortly.

Director ranking: Piss Poor

Not only did the race director miss four yellow flags of which only one was picked up on replay, the director seemed very focused on only the leader pack for most of the race with only occasional glimpses of the middle-group. This and a lack of interest by the director in pit-stops would have been enough for a Poor-rating, but the fact that the director didn’t even give Barrichello’s and Liuzzi’s retirements the time of day was just too much to ignore.

The Top-10:

Lewis Hamilton rocketed past Webber on the start and superior tyre-strategy brought the victory to McLaren. Fernando Alonso tried his best and a rise from fourth to second was the result of a solid drive, even if there were some slip-ups. Mark Webber finally did all he could after his poor start and it was good enough to secure him the third podium.

Sebastian Vettel suffered from bad settings in his car (Red Bull was expecting rain which failed to arrive) and was stuck battling Rosberg and Massa for much of the race. Still, fourth place earned him some valuable points. Massa had a poor start to the race but, all things considered, finished an admirable fifth. Adrian Sutil was the last man on the same lap as the Top-5 and earned Force India some valuable points.

Nico Rosberg did not have an easy time and Michael Schumacher suffered a spin early on in the race, but the Mercedes GP cars finally finished an okay seventh and eighth respectively. Kamui Kobayashi made another impressive rise to points in his Sauber car just ahead of Vitaly Petrov who could have done much better. However, the Vyborg Rocket’s tenth place was at least a slight consolation for Renault after his team-mate’s ruined race.

Golden Pineapple Award

Sergio Perez hasn’t quite gotten to his peak performance, but going from 15th to 11th was an okay result. He just may be on points at Hungaroring.

Drop-out Count: 4

Nick Heidfeld had a hell of a day. After losing a fairly good qualifying position to a spin at the very beginning he got bumped off the track by an unattentive Sebastian Buemi. The rest of the retirements were due to technical failures. From Williams, HRT and McLaren the drivers who suffered were Rubens Barrichello, Vitantonio Liuzzi and Jenson Button. Button had been driving a very disappointing race so I can’t imagine a hydraulics problem boosted his confidence much.

Back of the Lot News:

Once again, Kamui Kobayashi made an impressive rise to points, while Di Resta and Maldonado choked in the heat of things (although I think Di Resta suffered a spin at some point). Toro Rosso hasn’t really done very well as of late with Alguersuari finishing 12th and Buemi, who due to irregularities had to start from the very back, ruined Heidfeld’s race (as well as his own) and suffered a drive-through penalty.

For the new teams it was again the same old, same old. Karun Chandhok who returned to drive for Lotus, subbing for Jarno Trulli, finished dead last, though in his defense, Chandhok suffered a violent slide which dropped him behind the Virgins and the Hispania cars.