The champion is humbled at home
If you went to Montjuic on a day other than the weekend when this sleepy little Catalan village annually hosts the Spanish Grand Prix, you would struggle to believe that it is possible to have nearly half a million people converge there. The railway station at Montjuic is a two platform, minor affair (one platform leading in and the other out). You would never dream that any more than, say, a couple of dozen people could use it. But thousands converged on the tiny station this weekend. As many Spaniards as the population of a small country found their way to Montjuic this past weekend. Whether it meant taking the train to Montjuic, driving, walking, cycling, rowing anything - they simply had to be there to see the Spanish world champion strut his stuff at the Circuit de Catalunya on the hill above the village.
Saturday came and, just when it seemed certain that Fernando Alonso would not disappoint his myriad fans by starting anywhere other than on pole position, Brazilian speedster, Felipe Massa, squeezed a teeny weenie extra bit out of his Ferrari and pipped the world champion's time. Everyone knows that Barcelona is one of those circuits where Saturday usually matters more than Sunday. It is so difficult to overtake there that races are more like processions following the pole-setting leader than anything else. Alonso knew this and it bothered him not a little. He was world champion and he was racing at home before a whooping crowd. It was his duty to win at home. Nothing less was sufficient. Thus energised, he went to sleep on Saturday determined to do something about Massa.
When the lights went off on Sunday and the Spanish Grand Prix was "go", Alonso went for Massa. He lunged on the inside but Massa closed the door.. He then switched tack and tried to overtake the Ferrari on the outside. Massa wasn't having any of it and Alonso found himself in the gravel. He was fortunate not to end his race there - that's what usually happens in these situations - but managed to recover back on to the tarmac but now in fourth place behind Lewis Hamilton and Kimi Raikkonen. If he ever had a chance of winning the Grand Prix it ended there. As Chipo wryly put it "does Alonso think the others are simply going to move aside and let him win?" I detect panic in the world champion. That challenge on Massa was not a wise thing to attempt. The thing to have done was stay behind Massa and harass him into making a mistake; or, if this was not possible, get him through a clever pit-stop strategy. Uncharacteristically, Alonso placed the blame for the incident firmly in Massa's lap. To my mind it was probably six of one and half a dozen of the other. In the event, Massa reaped the rewards of his third consecutive pole position and took a well deserved victory. Not good for the Spaniard. But worse - far worse - was, once again, to finish behind his rookie team-mate, Lewis Hamilton.
Across the Formula One world there is extreme perplexion about what to make of this youngster. We have never seen his like before. Fourth on the grid, he managed to get past Kimi Raikkonen's Ferrari at the first corner (exactly what Alonso tried but failed to do to Massa) and happily inherited second place from Alonso when Alonso went off. He then drove a solid race but his McLaren never really had the legs of Massa's Ferrari. He did, however, manage to keep the deficit respectable and finished just over ten seconds behind the winner. Four races, four visits to the podium and counting. Spectacular. I struggle to remind myself that the most consistent scorer in 2007 thus far, the world championship leader and the youngest driver in the paddock is racing in his debut year as a Formula One driver. It seems foolhardy to think of Hamilton as a rookie any more. He drives with greater skill and authority than drivers who have spent eons at the wheel of a Formula One car. It is disingenuous of Alonso to say that he is more worried about the other chaps - Raikkonen and Massa - than he is about his team-mate. Hamilton puts the wind up the world champion hugely. I can just about hear Hamilton psyching himself up in the shower ala Pacino: "You think you're big time? You're gonna die big time!"
The other chap who might also have the McLaren rookie on his mind is Kimi Raikkonen, the highest paid driver in Formula One. While Hamilton earns significantly less than a million, Raikkonen trousers a cool twenty million from Ferrari and a great deal more from endorsements (not to mention that side business in Helsinki I once mentioned - "Ice Tits", the lap dancing joint). The perennial question arising whenever a driver retires through mechanical fault - is it the car or is it the driver? - ran through my mind yesterday. Raikkonen has made clear that he has no time for the former Ferrari team leader, Michael Schumacher. He wants to do things his own way. One cannot begrudge him wanting to do this but when the advice of a man who has won 91 Grands Prix and seven world championships is available free of charge, it seems prudent to take it. Schumacher, Massa and the team of Ferrari mechanics stayed well into the night in the Ferrari garage tweaking this and adjusting that so as to ensure optimum performance from the Ferrari. Raikkonen was not interested. Result: Massa got pole position, fastest lap and race victory - in other words, everything - while Raikkonen limped away from Barcelona with a broken down Ferrari. Coincidence? You can see that Massa learned from the Schumeister. When his car caught fire during refuelling, he did a Schumi and simply shrugged it off as irrelevant.
What was baffling about yesterday’s race was the attrition rate. Car after car dropped out in increasingly bizarre ways. At the Barcelona circuit, which all the teams know more intimately than any other, this was very strange.
We're getting used to having young Hamilton on the podium now - he doesn't know anywhere else to end a Grand Prix! Next up is the premier motor racing event on the calendar, the Monaco Grand Prix. Lewis Hamilton knows the streets of Monte Carlo extremely well. Every time he has raced there in lower formulas he has won. The calm smile he gives when asked whether he can win there should send shivers down the spines of his opponents. Hamilton goes to Monaco without being under any sort of pressure. A win would be superb but not winning would be no disaster. Hamilton enjoys the luxury of not having the weight of any expectations on his shoulders. The same cannot be said of his team-mate. Roll on Monaco!
Gitau
14 May 2007
Saturday came and, just when it seemed certain that Fernando Alonso would not disappoint his myriad fans by starting anywhere other than on pole position, Brazilian speedster, Felipe Massa, squeezed a teeny weenie extra bit out of his Ferrari and pipped the world champion's time. Everyone knows that Barcelona is one of those circuits where Saturday usually matters more than Sunday. It is so difficult to overtake there that races are more like processions following the pole-setting leader than anything else. Alonso knew this and it bothered him not a little. He was world champion and he was racing at home before a whooping crowd. It was his duty to win at home. Nothing less was sufficient. Thus energised, he went to sleep on Saturday determined to do something about Massa.
When the lights went off on Sunday and the Spanish Grand Prix was "go", Alonso went for Massa. He lunged on the inside but Massa closed the door.. He then switched tack and tried to overtake the Ferrari on the outside. Massa wasn't having any of it and Alonso found himself in the gravel. He was fortunate not to end his race there - that's what usually happens in these situations - but managed to recover back on to the tarmac but now in fourth place behind Lewis Hamilton and Kimi Raikkonen. If he ever had a chance of winning the Grand Prix it ended there. As Chipo wryly put it "does Alonso think the others are simply going to move aside and let him win?" I detect panic in the world champion. That challenge on Massa was not a wise thing to attempt. The thing to have done was stay behind Massa and harass him into making a mistake; or, if this was not possible, get him through a clever pit-stop strategy. Uncharacteristically, Alonso placed the blame for the incident firmly in Massa's lap. To my mind it was probably six of one and half a dozen of the other. In the event, Massa reaped the rewards of his third consecutive pole position and took a well deserved victory. Not good for the Spaniard. But worse - far worse - was, once again, to finish behind his rookie team-mate, Lewis Hamilton.
Across the Formula One world there is extreme perplexion about what to make of this youngster. We have never seen his like before. Fourth on the grid, he managed to get past Kimi Raikkonen's Ferrari at the first corner (exactly what Alonso tried but failed to do to Massa) and happily inherited second place from Alonso when Alonso went off. He then drove a solid race but his McLaren never really had the legs of Massa's Ferrari. He did, however, manage to keep the deficit respectable and finished just over ten seconds behind the winner. Four races, four visits to the podium and counting. Spectacular. I struggle to remind myself that the most consistent scorer in 2007 thus far, the world championship leader and the youngest driver in the paddock is racing in his debut year as a Formula One driver. It seems foolhardy to think of Hamilton as a rookie any more. He drives with greater skill and authority than drivers who have spent eons at the wheel of a Formula One car. It is disingenuous of Alonso to say that he is more worried about the other chaps - Raikkonen and Massa - than he is about his team-mate. Hamilton puts the wind up the world champion hugely. I can just about hear Hamilton psyching himself up in the shower ala Pacino: "You think you're big time? You're gonna die big time!"
The other chap who might also have the McLaren rookie on his mind is Kimi Raikkonen, the highest paid driver in Formula One. While Hamilton earns significantly less than a million, Raikkonen trousers a cool twenty million from Ferrari and a great deal more from endorsements (not to mention that side business in Helsinki I once mentioned - "Ice Tits", the lap dancing joint). The perennial question arising whenever a driver retires through mechanical fault - is it the car or is it the driver? - ran through my mind yesterday. Raikkonen has made clear that he has no time for the former Ferrari team leader, Michael Schumacher. He wants to do things his own way. One cannot begrudge him wanting to do this but when the advice of a man who has won 91 Grands Prix and seven world championships is available free of charge, it seems prudent to take it. Schumacher, Massa and the team of Ferrari mechanics stayed well into the night in the Ferrari garage tweaking this and adjusting that so as to ensure optimum performance from the Ferrari. Raikkonen was not interested. Result: Massa got pole position, fastest lap and race victory - in other words, everything - while Raikkonen limped away from Barcelona with a broken down Ferrari. Coincidence? You can see that Massa learned from the Schumeister. When his car caught fire during refuelling, he did a Schumi and simply shrugged it off as irrelevant.
What was baffling about yesterday’s race was the attrition rate. Car after car dropped out in increasingly bizarre ways. At the Barcelona circuit, which all the teams know more intimately than any other, this was very strange.
We're getting used to having young Hamilton on the podium now - he doesn't know anywhere else to end a Grand Prix! Next up is the premier motor racing event on the calendar, the Monaco Grand Prix. Lewis Hamilton knows the streets of Monte Carlo extremely well. Every time he has raced there in lower formulas he has won. The calm smile he gives when asked whether he can win there should send shivers down the spines of his opponents. Hamilton goes to Monaco without being under any sort of pressure. A win would be superb but not winning would be no disaster. Hamilton enjoys the luxury of not having the weight of any expectations on his shoulders. The same cannot be said of his team-mate. Roll on Monaco!
Gitau
14 May 2007
posted by Gitau at 2:30 pm
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