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Monday, April 24, 2006

renault lost imola


[imola]

ferrari will not get carried away. the race was in fact lost by renault, and it wasn't by much. f1central sums it up nicely. if it wasn't for the four blessings ferrari had at imoloa, they would not have been on the top step of the podium.
  1. have the race been at a track like the nurburgring, quickest man fernando alonso would almost certainly have found a way past slower race leader michael schumacher
  2. just how much was the runaway title leader ever going to risk in order to take a stab up michael's inside
  3. a few more degrees of italian sunshine might have further 'grained' the bridgestone tyres out of speed
  4. renault's questionable decision to pit alonso early for his last pitstop almost certainly sealed the spaniard's second-place fate.

blessing it was for ferrari. four things to make it all go wrong, but none of it happened. with that, ferrari took a very crucial win for the team, and to become the first team to beat renault this season.

how michael came out in front of the renault was just unbelievable. considering michael was driving around 1.27 to 1.28 a lap, and alonso capable of lapping 1.25 to 1.26, it was actually all advantage to renault. yet after the debatable pitstop by renault, michael was still able to speed through in front of alonso.

with that said, i don't think it was a bad call by renault to bring alonso in. because no matter when the team choose to bring him in, being in superb shape as compared to michael, alonso should have no problem ending up ahead. i am sure most people expected that to happen. i believe even alonso thought that would happen.

i would say ferrari made a great move by pitting right after renault, probably sensing that traffic would come into play. all credit to the strategists. michael did his part as well, driving a relatively faster in-lap to make it a perfect pistop. from that point on michael just needed to drive his pace and alonso couldn't threaten a bit.

besides, it's about time another team won. i am most happy with that. i don't care who's on top, just as long as it's not renault. i want a more competitive season, not a renault runaway like last year. honestly, i get a little sick watching renault do so well. mclaren, honda, and toyota, work harder and challenge a bit more!

next race will be a totally different story. nurburgring will provide more overtaking chances. at a circuit where ferrari normally can't perform, they are about to face a tougher time. they need to sort out their tyre issues, else they probably would only be fighting for points. renault is still very dominant, and being slightly unfortunate at imola, they would be looking to win the next one. personally, i believe it wouldn't be a problem for the blue team.

winner of the race:
ide is the biggest winner of the race. he won the dumbest driver of 2006, the slowest driver on the grid, the most forgettable performance, and of course he won the ticket out of f1 indefinitely. congratulations ide!

no really, ferrari is the biggest winner.

loser of the race:
poor rubens. his chance to finally shine turned out to be one of the worst performance. after qualifying a respectable third, he had a horrible start which ended him in fifth. and after the first pitstop, we lost contact with him till the very end, where we found out he only managed to finish 10th. how he managed to finish behind button, after button's disastrous pitstops, i don't quite understand.



previous posts:
melbourne: renault completes hat-trick
melbourne: jenson grabs pole down under
sepang: sepang revealed more problems
sepang: engine changes dominate qualifying
bahrain: thrilling bahrain
bahrain: an exciting start to 2006


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Sunday, April 23, 2006

michael leaping again


[pictorial]

18 months later, michael finally has a chance to jump for joy:

michael leaping again [f1racing.net]

a record breaking 66 poles and the win at imola, it was mission accomplished for michael schumacher. no wonder he's so delighted.



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Tuesday, April 18, 2006

three weeks break


[opinion]

the f1 three-week break is such a torture. there has been no action and just all bullshits from the f1 world as the teams took their "easter holiday".

i decided to take a little break for myself too. actually, i have been swarmed with work and just didn't have the motivation to write. i was basically just reading the f1 news, and didn't have much to say about them news. thus a quiet time for the blog.

the holiday, however, didn't stop f1 from testing, doing promtion, and gossiping. many teams are introducing new parts to the car, ranging from new aerodynamic packages, suspension configuration differences, better component materials, more powerful engines, and as always, improved tyre compounds. all very exciting, that is if you're into the technical aspects of f1.

if technology isn't your cup of tea, then you may be interested in some gossiping or speculations. many gossips for the past weeks, some interesting while some just plain ridiculous. of course the big story is the ferrari driver line-up, in which it is speculated to be announced this weekend at imola. is it going to be schumacher, kimi, massa, or rossi? qwerty has some speculations, you might want to check it out.

as the days draw closer to the weekend, i have a sense that michael schumacher might still stay in ferrari for another year. besides, i think 2007 will be even better for ferrari. so why not? besides, he said so himself. if not, renault is the next best thing. but michael in blue, that'll take some time to get used to.

trouble for some of the rookies. first off, scott speed is being such a big punk. he probably thinks as an american, he can do whatever he pleases. i think he needs to learn the rule of f1, else he's going to get kicked out pretty soon - the balls he got to "fuck off" david coulthard. george has an opinion on this.

next up, the whats-his-name of super aguri's second seat is facing the boot pretty soon. oh well, it's just unfortunately how well sato can drive that old car, it totally made his teammate look like shit. all the spinning on the track and sliding in the pit didn't help at all, those moves looked plain ridiculous.

finally, who can forget the termination of mike gascoyne. i must admit, i was pretty surprised, especially after a podium finish in melbourne. i don't think he did a bad job, and i don't think that was the reason he got sacked. i guess when opinions crashed the wrong way, someone's got to go. in this case, mike is gone and possibly on the way to midland. bummer.

what else? i guess just the same old for the rest. all those "we'll win", "we have better car now", "we can challenge", "issue solve" and what not.

as a wild guess, i think renault will take imola this weekend. after qualifying, i'll review my guess again - to an analytical prediction.

cheers!



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Sunday, April 02, 2006

renault completes hat-trick


[melbourne]

alonso and renault takes another victory from what must be the most frantic and eventful grandprix since suzuka last year. renault has won three out of three, and alonso taking 28 points out of the maximum of 30.

a repeat of 2005?

only thirteen cars finished the race, with many of the cars finding the wall due to what i belive to be tyre warming problem. jenson, heidfeld, and michael all seemed to have problem in that aspect, probably judging the weather wrong and thus making wrong tyre choices. furthermore, the race was stopped four times for safety car, and that certainly didn't help warm the tyres.

alonso, however, seemed to have no problem at all with warming the tyres. once he got through the slow-moving button, he sailed away instantaneously. kimi was closed behind, but he had vibration problem due to a flatspot he got after overtaking jenson. ralf did well to get to the final step of the podium, after a drive-through penalty for speeding in the pitlane, had no apparent problem with the bridgestone.

total disaster for ferrari with a weekend gone horribly wrong. massa was the first casualty which brought out the first safety car, which certainly didn't help their hard compound tyres to get warmed up. what more, michael was four second a lap slower and was overtaken by liuzzi in a toro rosso! when the car finally got the speed, the ferrari crashed into the barrier. more embarassingly, a frustrated michael was seen wandering off into the wrong garage after retirement...

further embarassment for fisichella when his engineer lambasted him over the radio about how damn slow he was. the problem is, everyone watching the broadcast heard the message. i wonder how that will hurt his feeling, and more importantly, his career. while alonso was displaying messages of how it was "comfortable" and "chilled out", fisichella got a mean word or two from flavio and symonds.

finally, pole sitter jenson couldn't finish his race and his engine blew at the last corner of the last lap of the race. his engine blew smoke, oil, and fire as he desperately tried to cross the line. i don't believe all those bullshit from nick fry that they've decided not to cross the line, so as to not get a ten slot penalty for changing the engine in imola. the car simply just couldn't cross the line. that was pretty humiliating as well.

the irony is, barichello picked up honda's points even though he was driving like shit. and scott speed got the last point for str, beating coulthard in redbull's team a (colthard got some embarassing message through the radio as well). crazy results.

overall, a very eventful race. lots of great overtaking, good tussles among teammates, nice crashes, and some nice strategies. a little too many safety car for my liking. but imagine without the safety car interruptions, we might just see alonso lapping kimi. 2006 looking to be a complete renault domination again.

winner of the race:
bmw has been improving so fast they have overtaken williams. at melbourne, their efforts paid off having both cars in the points. heidfeld drove a consistent race to finish fourth, while jv got into sixth after starting from the back of the grid. i'm sure bmw will be celebrating after this.

loser of the race:
michael schumacher could have got into the top five; instead he pushed the car, which is actually below par, a little too hard. the pit never suspected him to crash, and you could see their disappointment. although montoya made the exact same mistake, going wide in the last corner and catching that bump on the curb, there's just no excuse for that.



previous posts:
melbourne: jenson grabs pole down under
sepang: sepang revealed more problems
sepang: engine changes dominate qualifying
bahrain: thrilling bahrain
bahrain: an exciting start to 2006


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jenson grabs pole down under


[melbourne]

is it just me, or is f1 qualifying just plain boring?

i was watching the melbourne qualifying with a bunch of my cousins and uncles/aunties. normally everyone would discuss and comment on the cars, the drivers, and so on; instead, several times everyone was just quiet because there was just nothing to discuss. many were confused with the rules, while some simply dozed off.

the session only started to get exciting at the last five minutes of qualifying. massa's crash and montoya's spin were quite nice to watch, but there was more noise to be heard on jenson's surprising pole. that was the real excitement; maybe everyone was just quite happy to not see renaults in front.

the renaults are just behind button. given their superior start, i believe fisichella and alonso will be ahead of button by the end of the first lap. it will be interesting to see the fight between the two renault drivers, but i suspect we won't be seeing that as alonso will just make fisichella a fool and simply overtake him.

what will the mclaren do behind the renault? can we finally see some wheel to wheel action?

the toyotas are surprisingly up on pace, after their dismal showing in the first two races. they are the best performing bridgestone, with ralf schumacher qualifying in the third row, out-qualifying the ferrari. ferrari embarassingly didn't make the cut to the top ten. worse still, michael has no idea why.

as for how the others fared, here is the grid. michael moved into top ten because villeneuve was penalized for an engine change. nice qualifying effort by liuzzi, but bad job from nico. and what to say about poor old rubens? nothing really, just horrible.

for my prediction for tomorrow's race, the three drivers on the podium will be jenson, alonso, and kimi in no particular order. it may be possible for michael to finish top five, if the car can be fast enough.

finally, if the weather decides to play a part, we may see a very interesting race and surprising finishes.



previous posts:
sepang: sepang revealed more problems
sepang: engine changes dominate qualifying
bahrain: thrilling bahrain
bahrain: an exciting start to 2006


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