Hamilton rocks Melbourne
When you have achieved the near impossible feat of winning back-to-back Formula One world championships, you can allow yourself a moment of self-congratulation. If the honour was achieved after twice battling head-to-head with an android called Michael Schumacher, you can safely go a step further. You can stand on a rooftop and yell "none like me!" without fear of contradiction.
Fernando Alonso, then, began 2007 in ebullient mood. He was contemplating a season when he could enjoy being world champion. There was no other person on the scene ever having held the title, so this was a chance to consolidate. 2007 offered the best opportunity for a third world title as the opposition was sufficiently muted to be disposed of with relative ease. Winter testing told Alonso that the only blot on the 2007 landscape was the superior speed of Ferrari; but back of the envelope calculations showed the Spaniard that this was not such a great disadvantage. Kimi Raikkonen would be starting out in a new team with the added pressure of having to chase his first title, in the shadow of Ferrari's greatest warrior, surrounded by people crafted over the years to do Michael Schumacher's bidding - no mean task. This would be enough for McLaren to use in making up the speed deficit in the early races of 2007 while they built up their engine and aerodynamic package. In addition there were the psychological tricks that Alonso would be entitled to employ on any wanna-be world champion (world championship has its privileges after all!). No better set of circumstances could have presented itself to the world champion.
The figures and sketches on the back of Alonso's envelope did not include the letters "LH". Perhaps they ought to have. Alonso will have woken up this morning in need of a snifter. A new young talent announced his arrival on the Formula One scene yesterday in stunning style. That talent is none other than the world champion's Mclaren team-mate, Lewis Hamilton. And what a sensation he is! As Chipo said, "this was not in the script". In Saturday qualifying, Hamilton matched Alonso's times almost to the second but got pipped when it mattered and had to settle for fourth place on the grid. Very impressive start, I thought. A foretaste of things to come. This was inadequate preparation for what was to come on Sunday's action.
As the starting lights went out, the BMW of Robert Kubica in third place cut dangerously across the bows of Hamilton's McLaren and almost forced him on to the grass. A lesser man in similar circumstances would have reacted differently - probably hit the throttle hard. Not Hamilton. The grand prix novice responded by swerving his Malaren around the outside as they approached the corner, leaving his braking so late that he not only re-passed Kubica but took second place from his team-mate. Alonso could only gasp in astonishment as the young pretender scampered away into the distance and then led him, matching the world champion's pace throughout, for two thirds of the race. Hamilton would have finished second behind Raikkonen had Alonso's team not cleverly switched strategy after the first round of pit-stops which gave Alonso two laps longer than Hamilton before coming in for pit-stop number two. In other words, the world champion had to fall back on strategic games to get the better of his rookie team-mate; not simple wheel to wheel superior ability. From Alonso's perspective this is frightening. From Hamilton's, in Orwellian newspeak, this is doubleplusgood!
When you are receiving plaudits from the greatest names in the history of Formula One on the day of your first Grand Prix, you know you have arrived. Sir Stirling Moss and Niki Lauda are not men who waste time dishing out superlatives when they don't have to but both were effusive in their praise of Hamilton yesterday. "He's a racer, not a driver," said Sir Stirling Moss. "And he's the best thing I've seen in Formula One since I came into it in the early 50s." "I've never seen anybody perform in his first race like he did," said Niki Lauda.
Alonso's headache was compounded by the commanding superiority of the Ferrari in the hands of Kimi Raikkonen. Only the third man ever to win a race on his Ferrari debut, Raikkonen did so in the style made famous by his German android predecessor: lead from the front and lap nearly the entire field. He conducts himself with such outrageous nonchalance that it is clear nothing rattles Raikkonen. One gets the impression that the rakish Finn is doing his best to establish a reputation as a hard-partying chap with a devil-may-care attitude but one who is devastatingly fast. He doesn't care who he annoys in the process. Having refused to sign autographs in Australia, Raikkonen received his winner's trophy at the Albert Park amid a cacophony of boos. It is very difficult to understand this approach - one needs one's fans desperately - but time will tell.
Remember David Coulthard saying at the end of last year that Lewis Hamilton was too young and too inexperienced to be placed straight into a Formula One car at the top end? Well, Mr Experience himself pulled the silliest move of anyone yesterday. Attempting to overtake Alexander Wurz on the inside, Coulthard - to the horror of the Austrian - found himself climbing over Wurz's bonnet and catapulting his now wrecked Red Bull into the gravel. Wurz graciously accepted Coulthard's apology but I don't think this was his idea of the perfect start to a career as a driver (he spent years as a McLaren test driver).
Lewis Hamilton's electrifying debut means that all bets are off. Everyone's calculations have been upset. Alonso now has to factor in his team-mate. Raikkonen now has to plan for two McLaren irritants. Jenson Button has to get used to having been usurped as English wonder-boy. And Formula One has to get used to having a black man receiving trophies.
You couldn't have made any of this up…
Gitau
19 March 2007
Fernando Alonso, then, began 2007 in ebullient mood. He was contemplating a season when he could enjoy being world champion. There was no other person on the scene ever having held the title, so this was a chance to consolidate. 2007 offered the best opportunity for a third world title as the opposition was sufficiently muted to be disposed of with relative ease. Winter testing told Alonso that the only blot on the 2007 landscape was the superior speed of Ferrari; but back of the envelope calculations showed the Spaniard that this was not such a great disadvantage. Kimi Raikkonen would be starting out in a new team with the added pressure of having to chase his first title, in the shadow of Ferrari's greatest warrior, surrounded by people crafted over the years to do Michael Schumacher's bidding - no mean task. This would be enough for McLaren to use in making up the speed deficit in the early races of 2007 while they built up their engine and aerodynamic package. In addition there were the psychological tricks that Alonso would be entitled to employ on any wanna-be world champion (world championship has its privileges after all!). No better set of circumstances could have presented itself to the world champion.
The figures and sketches on the back of Alonso's envelope did not include the letters "LH". Perhaps they ought to have. Alonso will have woken up this morning in need of a snifter. A new young talent announced his arrival on the Formula One scene yesterday in stunning style. That talent is none other than the world champion's Mclaren team-mate, Lewis Hamilton. And what a sensation he is! As Chipo said, "this was not in the script". In Saturday qualifying, Hamilton matched Alonso's times almost to the second but got pipped when it mattered and had to settle for fourth place on the grid. Very impressive start, I thought. A foretaste of things to come. This was inadequate preparation for what was to come on Sunday's action.
As the starting lights went out, the BMW of Robert Kubica in third place cut dangerously across the bows of Hamilton's McLaren and almost forced him on to the grass. A lesser man in similar circumstances would have reacted differently - probably hit the throttle hard. Not Hamilton. The grand prix novice responded by swerving his Malaren around the outside as they approached the corner, leaving his braking so late that he not only re-passed Kubica but took second place from his team-mate. Alonso could only gasp in astonishment as the young pretender scampered away into the distance and then led him, matching the world champion's pace throughout, for two thirds of the race. Hamilton would have finished second behind Raikkonen had Alonso's team not cleverly switched strategy after the first round of pit-stops which gave Alonso two laps longer than Hamilton before coming in for pit-stop number two. In other words, the world champion had to fall back on strategic games to get the better of his rookie team-mate; not simple wheel to wheel superior ability. From Alonso's perspective this is frightening. From Hamilton's, in Orwellian newspeak, this is doubleplusgood!
When you are receiving plaudits from the greatest names in the history of Formula One on the day of your first Grand Prix, you know you have arrived. Sir Stirling Moss and Niki Lauda are not men who waste time dishing out superlatives when they don't have to but both were effusive in their praise of Hamilton yesterday. "He's a racer, not a driver," said Sir Stirling Moss. "And he's the best thing I've seen in Formula One since I came into it in the early 50s." "I've never seen anybody perform in his first race like he did," said Niki Lauda.
Alonso's headache was compounded by the commanding superiority of the Ferrari in the hands of Kimi Raikkonen. Only the third man ever to win a race on his Ferrari debut, Raikkonen did so in the style made famous by his German android predecessor: lead from the front and lap nearly the entire field. He conducts himself with such outrageous nonchalance that it is clear nothing rattles Raikkonen. One gets the impression that the rakish Finn is doing his best to establish a reputation as a hard-partying chap with a devil-may-care attitude but one who is devastatingly fast. He doesn't care who he annoys in the process. Having refused to sign autographs in Australia, Raikkonen received his winner's trophy at the Albert Park amid a cacophony of boos. It is very difficult to understand this approach - one needs one's fans desperately - but time will tell.
Remember David Coulthard saying at the end of last year that Lewis Hamilton was too young and too inexperienced to be placed straight into a Formula One car at the top end? Well, Mr Experience himself pulled the silliest move of anyone yesterday. Attempting to overtake Alexander Wurz on the inside, Coulthard - to the horror of the Austrian - found himself climbing over Wurz's bonnet and catapulting his now wrecked Red Bull into the gravel. Wurz graciously accepted Coulthard's apology but I don't think this was his idea of the perfect start to a career as a driver (he spent years as a McLaren test driver).
Lewis Hamilton's electrifying debut means that all bets are off. Everyone's calculations have been upset. Alonso now has to factor in his team-mate. Raikkonen now has to plan for two McLaren irritants. Jenson Button has to get used to having been usurped as English wonder-boy. And Formula One has to get used to having a black man receiving trophies.
You couldn't have made any of this up…
Gitau
19 March 2007
posted by Gitau at 2:50 pm
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