Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys and Girls and everyone in
between, the 2013 Formula 1 season has begun! When the rubbers meets the
tarmac, all the boasting and hot laps from testing will either hold up or get
cast into the wind and we’ll know who’s worth watching this year.
After 3 years on
top, Red Bull and their wonder boy Sebastian Vettel look like the package to
beat, especially with McLaren and Ferrari looking to try and to find some
revolution that would put them on top while Red Bull did the sensible thing and
evolved an already brilliant car instead. However, their rivals are close and
there may well be a few unexpected lurkers creeping up on them.
Once again, the Formula 1 season starts down under in
Melbourne, Australia, a circuit that throws up a few twists with its very
nature as a street track, not to mention the weather playing a roll from time
to time and this year it certainly didn’t disappoint.
Circuit: Melbourne Grand Prix Circuit
2012 Winner: Jenson Button
2012 Pole: Lewis Hamilton
To start with, I thought this grand prix would disappoint as the moment the Red Bull took to the circuit, Vettel put himself at the front for both first and second practice on the Friday. Almost imperious as his pace seemed to be, he wasn’t quite out of reach as at least the top six were within a second of him, always including his team mate Mark Webber, the Lotus of Kimi Raikkonen and the Mercedes of Nico Rosberg.
Roll on Saturday and the story changed mid-way through
third practice when the heavens opened. Here, Romain Grosjean in the Lotus was
fastest, followed by the Ferraris, Paul Di Resta in the pretty solid Force
India and the ever present Raikkonen.
The rain intensified and forced the first round of
qualifying to be delayed so the marshals could clear some of the standing water
from the track. When things got underway, Nico Rosberg in Mercedes was fastest
while his new team mate was over 2 seconds slower, also spinning during one of
his first runs on the slippery track but was able to continue. Hamilton wasn’t
the only one to be caught out by the conditions with both Caterhams crashing
and both Felipe Massa and Esterban Gutierrez meeting the same piece of wall.
Unsurprisingly, the Marussias and Caterhams were knocked out, but they were
joined by Esterban Gutierrez after his late crash and Pastor Maldonado, who
felt his car was almost as bad as the 2011 Williams.
The rain picked up again and with diminishing light,
qualifying was postponed to the Sunday morning. The track was still wet but
with no more rain it dried up as second qualifying wore on, Nico Rosberg again
fastest in the tricky conditions. Despite looking good in the wet, Jean-Eric
Vergne was knocked out along with Valtteri Bottas and Sergio Perez when they
gambled on dry tyres on a still damp track. They were joined by Daniel
Riccardo, Adrian Sutil and Nico Hulkenberg, the latter two losing out in the
last few minutes.
The track was dry for third qualifying and the terrifying
pace of Vettel in his Red Bull returned, putting him on pole nearly half a
second ahead of his team mate Mark Webber. Hamilton, who had been there or
there abouts throughout most of practice and qualifying despite his offs, put
himself in third ahead of the Ferraris of Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso as
well as his team mate Rosberg. The Lotus’ of Raikkonen and Grosjean took up
seventh and eighth followed by Paul Di Resta and the off the pace McLaren of
Jenson Button.
With the grid set and the mechanics hurrying to prepare
for the race, concern started to take hold that Red Bull was once again going
to romp off to victory, not to mention the wearing of the super soft tyres
which during practice qualifying runs degraded quite a bit before the lap was
even completed. The current need to nurse the tyres is becoming a pet peeve of
mine as it means drivers can’t be aggressive. The durable Bridgestone tyres
used in 2010 didn’t ruin the racing but now the Pirellis are specifically
designed to degrade quickly.
Nico Hulkenberg had very different concerns however, as
his Sauber developed a fault in the fuel system that prevented him from
starting the race and leaving the eleventh place grid slot vacant.
Before the race, I also discovered the Sky Sports F1
‘companion app’ (timing, driver tracker map, on board cameras etc) lagged about
ten to fifteen seconds behind the live pictures I was watching, so I had to
enjoy timing that was quite a long way out of date half the time.
Anyway, race start. I think everyone’s hearts sunk when
Vettel got away cleanly and both Webber and Hamilton got away slowly, Webber
especially as he dropped down to seventh while Hamilton dropped to fourth
behind the fast starting Ferraris before later being passed by Raikkonen as
well. Besides Daniel Riccardo going wide on the first turn, there were no
incidents which you’d normally expect for the first race of the year.
Before depression set on the paddock for Vettel vanishing
into the distance, once again with his eyes set on joining Jim Clark and
Michael Schumacher as legendary driver/team combination, something unusual
happened: the Ferraris caught up within four laps.
Both Massa and Alonso were faster than the Red Bull, as
was the Lotus of Raikonnen who hunted down the lead trio, but neither Ferrari
could quite find a way past the Red Bull. Soon however, the lead four pitted
for new tyres as the super softs, unsurprisingly, weren’t holding up, though
both Mercedes were able to continue on a reasonable pace for 12 laps on the
tyres.
The four continued in order, Vettel threatening to break
away as he bore down on the yet to stop Sutil in the Force India who inherited
the lead when the Mercedes cars pitted after starting on the more durable medium
tyres. However, Vettel couldn’t get past and before long Sutil was actually
getting away from the four battling cars behind him.
With the continued stalemate, Alonso pitted for a second
time, followed the next lap by Vettel and the lap after by Massa, causing the
three to reverse their positions as Alonso took advantage of the fresher tyres.
Raikkonen continued, taking the lead when Sutil pitted. The German re-joined
ahead of Vettel, but while taking care of his tyres got jumped by the reigning
champion.
Raikkonen continued fairly quietly, almost stealthing his
way into the lead as he made full use of a two stop strategy, as suppose to the
three stop strategy much of the rest of the field used. Hamilton attempted to
use a similar strategy, but while the Mercedes’ tyre use has improved it wasn’t
good enough to enable him to compete on such a strategy and he was forced to
three stop.
Nico Rosberg didn’t have a chance to try the strategy as
his electronics failed, putting him out of the race. Before this, Pastor
Maldonado spun and beached himself in the first corner gravel trap after clipping
the grass on the outside of the track.
Alonso chased down Raikkonen as hard as he could,
escaping Vettel in third as Massa dropped back in forth. Hamilton in fifth
wasn’t able to contend with the cars ahead as he continued in a distant fifth,
Webber recovering from his poor start to get himself into sixth.
Both McLarens continued to struggle, Button never really
featuring very high and spending much of his time battling Grosjean, Di Resta
and the Toro Rossos until one of them, Riccardo, was forced to retire with a
damaged exhaust. Perez too struggled and I’m sure Martin Whitmarsh didn’t
appreciate the Sky commentary team calling him up during the race for a word.
Speaking of which, I could rarely rely on the timing from the companion app as
it frequently didn’t match up with what was actually happening for laps on end.
Despite Alonso’s best efforts, he couldn’t catch
Raikkonen who pumped in the fastest lap near the end of the race to show just
how good his Lotus was as he took the first win of the season with Alonso in
second and Vettel in Third.
Sutil, despite leading the race twice and being a thorn
in the sides of Vettel and the Ferraris, suffered hugely when he made his
required change onto the super soft tyres towards the end of the race, his
tyres fading rapidly despite the lower fuel load and well used track which cost
him two positions to Hamilton and Webber before the end of the race. After that
performance, I have to take back my remarks about him in my preview. I’d
actually forgotten how good he could be.
Further back, Williams’ day ended with Bottas battling
the sole Sauber of Gutierrez, both remaining well off the radar throughout.
Jules Bianchi showed well to finish ahead of both his team mate and both
Caterhams.
Looking forwards, I have a feeling Raikkonen is going to
be the one to beat this year, even if Vettel does put himself on pole at every
race. The Lotus is both quick and gentle on its tyres and the Ice Man has defiantly
not lost any of his ability. However, Melbourne is a street track and doesn’t
quite show the true performance of the cars. The Sepang International Circuit
in Malaysia is next, one of Herman Tilka’s better creations (Bernie Ecclestone,
who effectively owns F1, goes to him all the time when developing new
circuits), and should give us a better indication of who’s where, but then
there’s a greater chance of more severe weather too.
Image Source: Codemasters FB page, Auto Sport
Race Results:
| Driver | Constructor | Race Time | Grid | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st | Kimi Raikkonen | Lotus | 1:30:03.225 | 7 |
| 2nd | Fernando Alonso | Ferrari | +00:12.451 | 5 |
| 3rd | Sebastian Vettel | Red Bull | +00:22.346 | 1 |
| 4th | Felipe Massa | Ferrari | +00:33.577 | 4 |
| 5th | Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes | +00:45.561 | 3 |
| 6th | Mark Webber | Red Bull | +00:46.800 | 2 |
| 7th | Adrian Sutil | Force India | +01:05.068 | 12 |
| 8th | Paul Di Resta | Force India | +01:08.449 | 9 |
| 9th | Jenson Button | McLaren | +01:21.630 | 10 |
| 10th | Romain Grosjean | Lotus | +01:22.759 | 8 |
| 11th | Sergio Perez | McLaren | +01:23.367 | 15 |
| 12th | Jean-Eric Vernge | Toro Rosso | +01:23.857 | 13 |
| 13th | Esterban Gutierrez | Sauber | +1 lap | 18 |
| 14th | Valtteri Bottas | Williams | +1 lap | 16 |
| 15th | Jules Bianchi | Marussia | +1 lap | 19 |
| 16th | Charles Pic | Caterham | +2 laps | 22 |
| 17th | Max Chilton | Marrusia | +2 laps | 20 |
| 18th | Giedo van der Garde | Caterham | +2 laps | 21 |
| 19th | Daniel Riccardo | Toro Rosso | DNF (Exhaust) | 14 |
| 20th | Nico Rosberg | Mercedes | DNF (Electronics) | 6 |
| 21st | Pastor Maldonado | Williams | DNF (Spin) | 17 |
| 22nd | Nico Hulkenberg | Sauber | DNS | 11 |
Driver’s Championship:
| Driver | Score | |
|---|---|---|
| 1st | Kimi Raikkonen | 25 |
| 2nd | Fernando Alonso | 18 |
| 3rd | Sebastian Vettel | 15 |
| 4th | Felipe Massa | 12 |
| 5th | Lewis Hamilton | 10 |
| 6th | Mark Webber | 8 |
| 7th | Adrian Sutil | 6 |
| 8th | Paul Di Resta | 4 |
| 9th | Jenson Button | 2 |
| 10th | Romain Grosjean | 1 |
Constructor’s Championship:
| Constructor | Score | |
|---|---|---|
| 1st | Ferrari | 30 |
| 2nd | Lotus | 26 |
| 3rd | Red Bull | 23 |
| 4th | Mercedes | 10 |
| 4th | Force India | 10 |
| 5th | McLaren | 2 |
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