Barcelona, not Hamilton's ideal place
Most people who have taken the trouble to go there will readily admit to having fallen in love with Barcelona. It is one of those beautiful cities by the sea where you can have a delightful lunch while staring away into ripples of nothingness in the sea and feeling mightily contended with life. Perhaps I am being a little hasty here. “Most people” does not, without a doubt, include a young English chap who goes by the name of Lewis Hamilton. If you asked him to decide which of this year’s nineteen Grands Prix he would like to see axed from the Formula One calendar forever and a day, I am sure he would have little hesitation in hissing out “the Spanish one” through gritted teeth.
Hamilton began the race in third place behind the Red Bulls of Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel – both of whom had demonstrated on Saturday that the Red Bull car is easily the fastest of the lot – and was unable to do very much to improve his position. A cleverly selected pit-stop for tyres and a bit of muscling of Sebastian Vettel had promoted him to second place and he looked certain to secure eighteen points when, one lap from the end of the Spanish Grand Prix, his front left tyre suddenly deflated and he found himself careering off the circuit into a tyre wall, his McLaren wrecked. Events like this usually produce gasps, sharp intakes of breath and anguished groans or sobs. Not in Spain. Hamilton’s duels with Fernando Alonso – a man who is revered more highly in Spain than the King – in 2007 have meant that he is hated there. By being a brilliant rookie who dared to make Alonso look, well, mortal, he earned the enduring hatred of the entire Spanish kingdom.
As Hamilton stepped out of his stricken car, the pain of missing out on eighteen points was as nothing compared to the ecstatic cheers that rang out around the Circuit de Catalunya. To a man the locals leapt up, waved their flags and hooted with joy. Hamilton’s mind would probably have gone back to the racial insults he received a couple of years ago from blacked-up Spaniards in golliwog wigs and rued the day he first set foot on Spanish soil. If Spain goes the way of Greece and has to be rescued by its European Union partners, I bet you £100 that Mr Hamilton will probably extract a nicely chilled bottle of Veuve Clicquot from his fridge and quietly drink a toast.
If the Englishman had good reason to put the memory of yesterday behind him, his Australian opponent in the Red Bull will probably count his win yesterday as the best drive of his career. From pole-position to the chequered flag, Mark Webber was so imperiously in control of events that nearly a whole minute separated him from Fernando Alonso who inherited second place after Hamilton’s retirement. The only thing Webber would have had to worry about was lack of reliability – the thing that has proved to be the Achille’s heel of the Red Bull team. Sure enough, poor reliability dogged Sebastian Vettel for the last third of the race and it was only the fact that he was so far ahead a resurgent Michael Schumacher in fourth place that he was still able – just – to finish on the third step of the podium.
Truth be told, in the absence of rain to spice things up, the race was a dull affair. Barcelona may be a vibrant city bursting with life and beautiful people but the Circuit de Catalunya just doesn’t cut it. The good news is that we only have a week to go before the most glamorous and prestigious race in the entire world: the Monaco Grand Prix.
Ferrrari and McLaren need to get their thinking caps on fast because Red Bull are increasingly looking to be as much of a problem for everyone as Brawn GP were in 2009. How quickly things change in Formula One…
Gitau
10 May 2010
Hamilton began the race in third place behind the Red Bulls of Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel – both of whom had demonstrated on Saturday that the Red Bull car is easily the fastest of the lot – and was unable to do very much to improve his position. A cleverly selected pit-stop for tyres and a bit of muscling of Sebastian Vettel had promoted him to second place and he looked certain to secure eighteen points when, one lap from the end of the Spanish Grand Prix, his front left tyre suddenly deflated and he found himself careering off the circuit into a tyre wall, his McLaren wrecked. Events like this usually produce gasps, sharp intakes of breath and anguished groans or sobs. Not in Spain. Hamilton’s duels with Fernando Alonso – a man who is revered more highly in Spain than the King – in 2007 have meant that he is hated there. By being a brilliant rookie who dared to make Alonso look, well, mortal, he earned the enduring hatred of the entire Spanish kingdom.
As Hamilton stepped out of his stricken car, the pain of missing out on eighteen points was as nothing compared to the ecstatic cheers that rang out around the Circuit de Catalunya. To a man the locals leapt up, waved their flags and hooted with joy. Hamilton’s mind would probably have gone back to the racial insults he received a couple of years ago from blacked-up Spaniards in golliwog wigs and rued the day he first set foot on Spanish soil. If Spain goes the way of Greece and has to be rescued by its European Union partners, I bet you £100 that Mr Hamilton will probably extract a nicely chilled bottle of Veuve Clicquot from his fridge and quietly drink a toast.
If the Englishman had good reason to put the memory of yesterday behind him, his Australian opponent in the Red Bull will probably count his win yesterday as the best drive of his career. From pole-position to the chequered flag, Mark Webber was so imperiously in control of events that nearly a whole minute separated him from Fernando Alonso who inherited second place after Hamilton’s retirement. The only thing Webber would have had to worry about was lack of reliability – the thing that has proved to be the Achille’s heel of the Red Bull team. Sure enough, poor reliability dogged Sebastian Vettel for the last third of the race and it was only the fact that he was so far ahead a resurgent Michael Schumacher in fourth place that he was still able – just – to finish on the third step of the podium.
Truth be told, in the absence of rain to spice things up, the race was a dull affair. Barcelona may be a vibrant city bursting with life and beautiful people but the Circuit de Catalunya just doesn’t cut it. The good news is that we only have a week to go before the most glamorous and prestigious race in the entire world: the Monaco Grand Prix.
Ferrrari and McLaren need to get their thinking caps on fast because Red Bull are increasingly looking to be as much of a problem for everyone as Brawn GP were in 2009. How quickly things change in Formula One…
Gitau
10 May 2010
posted by Gitau at 12:25 pm
1 Comments:
Hi Gitau, I really enjoy your reads on F1 but I am now compelled to curiously ask what you have against Lewis. To me i think he is an outstanding driver and given his age, he has done very well for himself. imagine he was in an team that doesn't goof the way Mclarens do most of the time, he would be formidable this season. many are times he starts mush below par and still manages to forge ahead like in the last race but for the tyres made in TAIWAN bought by Myclarens!!
Anyway keep it up and you forgot to send the drivers standing as you had promised although have logged on elsewhere to view.
Stay Lucky!
Gichini's buddy
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