Lewis, where did it all go wrong?
This weekend’s French Grand Prix was not a good one for Lewis Hamilton. Following on from his disastrous mistake in Canada (running into the back of Kimi’s Ferrari, which was stopped at a red light on the pit lane exit), this weekend Lewis was deemed to have “gained an advantage” when he straight-lined a chicane as he tried to overtake Vettel. Hamilton is now fourth in the Championship, ten points behind leader Felipe Massa.
These things happen; Formula One is a fast, high-pressure sport where split-second decisions are required constantly and where even blinking at the wrong time could cause you to have a big accident. You can put them down as just racing incidents - just wasn’t having a good day. But after the promise of last season, which ended so crushingly with poor tactics in the second-last race and an attack of the nerves in the final race, it seems that Lewis is (already) in danger of doing a Coulthard (or a Button, in fact). Promising so much and not quite managing to deliver.
At the moment, Lewis’ problem seems to be that he thinks everyone is out to get him, saying in an interview this week “You can keep on giving me penalties, whatever you want. I’ll keep battling, and trying to come back with a result.” Lewis, they keep giving you penalties because you keep breaking the rules. You ran into the back of stationary car - in the pit lane, no less - two weeks ago, and didn’t have the grace to apologise properly for it (”I saw the red light but it was too late to stop. I don’t think it’s a racing incident. It’s just unfortunate when this stuff happens… I apologise to Kimi if I ruined his race”). Now, you straight-line a chicane because “I couldn’t turn in on the guy, or we would have crashed”, which seems to indicate that you hadn’t overtaken him until you went straight on.
I want to see Lewis win the Championship (it’s about time another Brit did) but I’ve got a horrible feeling that his chance this year is not as good as it was last year.
All the excitement is off the track
There’s lots of flak surrounding Max Moseley (FIA President) at the moment, over allegations that have been made about events in his private life. He’s called a special meeting of the FIA, after four of the major teams in F1 called on him to explain himself, and apparently he’s been asked to stay away from this weekend’s Grand Prix in Bahrain.
I’ve no idea if the allegations (supposedly about “a Nazi-style orgy in a torture dungeon”) are true, and even if they are it is his private life so shouldn’t have any bearing on his job, but for me the best part about the whole thing is the only comment I’ve read from Max himself is to deny any Nazi connotations. Which seems to imply the rest of it is true.
Ewwwwww.
Update: there’s even a video. Although - as is the way of these things - it could be anyone. And thankfully it doesn’t go into detail.
Blimey
What a scorching start to the season, in more ways than one. Fifty degree track temperatures undoubtedly played their part in some of the drama at the opening race of the F1 season in Albert Park, Melbourne (it can’t have been a nice environment for the drivers, bundled up in layers of flame-proof clothing and sitting just in front of one of the world’s most expensive hot-air producers) but I think it’s safe to say that the banning of electronic driver aids (like engine braking and traction control) had the biggest effect.
Anyone who was expecting the same old, same old (like me) would have been pleasantly surprised; the excessive temperature and the lack of traction control making the start especially exciting, as no-one, except perhaps for Lewis, was in the position you’d expect them to be in. Having put his McLaren convincingly on pole on Saturday, Lewis Hamilton proceeded to lead the race from start to finish, but behind him it was a very different story.
I would imagine that Max Moseley won’t be too happy with the race, as there wasn’t all that much overtaking, but with drivers still trying to come to terms with their cars there was certainly plenty of action; five drivers out by the end of the first lap were followed by most of the rest of the field across the 58 laps, to the point where only six cars managed to finish the race out of the original 22. Both Ferraris failed to finish, but because of the way the points system works Raikkonen collects a single point. Massa, in the other Ferrari, collected David Coulthard in spectacular fashion and then a few laps later was out himself. Timo Glock had the biggest crash of the afternoon - actually becoming airbourne at one point - but thankfully walked away relatively unscathed.
Sebastian Bourdais, making his debut for Torro Rosso, was on for fourth before his Ferrari engine gave way, but still manages to score points, whilst Alonso - back in the Renault after his unhappy season at McLaren - was able to capitalise on the misfortune of others to finish fourth.
The first race of the season is always a little different from the rest, as it’s the first time the cars have been run together on a level playing field, but hopefully Australia will show the way for the rest of the races; Lewis taking the wins and the rest of the field squabbling over the remaining points. Roll on Malaysia in a week’s time.
FIA at it again
This story adds more fuel to the fire of the inconsistent nature of rulings by the FIA, the ruling body of Formula One motorsport.
In case you’re not aware, earlier in the year the FIA fined McLaren-Mercedes - who were then leading the Constructors Championship - $100 million and excluded them from the Constructors competition for being in possession of technical information from Ferrari, their major championship rival. It was not proved that McLaren had used any of the information in their possession to later their car or gain a performance advantage and Ferrari were shown to have been just as deeply involved as McLaren but only McLaren were punished.
It was later shown that Ferrari had run an illegal car in the first race of the season, but no punishment was made. If - as happened with Honda a couple of season ago - they had been docked their points, Kimi Raikkonen would not have been world champion this year.
McLaren are also going to be under intense scrutiny for 2008, with FAI President Max Moseley saying that “Finding something will not be easy. On the other hand, there are sources we are going to deploy who will give us as good a chance as its possible to have to find it.” Which says to me that McLaren might as well pack up and go home, as they haven’t got a hope of not getting penalised for something this season.
But now Renault are the subject of the FIA’s inconsistency. It seems that they obtained McLaren techincal data back when an ex-McLaren employee joined the team. It has been suggested that they did use the information gained to alter their car, but - apart from being found guilty of the charges brought against them - they have not been punished. They did the same thing McLaren were accused of, there was apparently more evidence against them, and they get away without punishment.
I’ve become very cynical about Formula One, the FIA and Max Moseley over the course of the 2007 season and it seems to me that everything done in the sport is done to serve the interests of Ferrari. I’m sure Max Moseley would argue that this is not the case, but lets see him prove it by having a bit of consistency with the application of the rules. Otherwise, the 2008 season is not going to be worth watching.
"And your boyfriend’s name is Evel, and he lives up in the sky”
Growing up in the 70’s, I was spoilt for choice when it came to heroes. But the one that stood head and shoulders above all the rest for me was the man in the star-spangled jumpsuit who liked to jump his motorbike over things.
I think the appeal of Evel Knievel was he would attempt these amazing-sounding and terrifying-looking stunts, apparently just for the hell of it. It was always a lottery as to whether he’d make it or not but that didn’t matter; you knew he wasn’t going to die performing a stunt and you knew that he’d be back bigger and better next time.
As you grow older, your heroes get tarnished as you learn that they weren’t such nice people in everyday life, or that the reason they crashed all the time was because they didn’t prepare properly and these charges have been levelled at Evel. But for me, that never changed anything. What mattered for me - and still does today as I’ve been re-watching some of the old footage - is that this man could reach out of the TV, grab your hand and take you on a rollercoaster ride that you were never going to forget.
He was the great showman of my childhood and I don’t think anyone who saw him at his heyday will ever forget him.
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