Tuesday 9 April 2013

Welcome to the F1 grid

I'd like to formally, and informally, welcome you all to my new Blog all about F1, and I suppose some introductions are in order. My name is Matt (but I go as The Lemon online, because apples get all the glory) and I'm a software developer, I live in the UK, am (at the time of writing) 20 and a passionate F1 fan. A quick side note, the blog's page itself is very basic and I will be adding some more pazzaz to the blog, fancy headers and things, I just wanted to get a post going so I can properly motivate myself.

Well upon writing my introduction I realise that my life isn't vaguely interesting and you probably don't care so I'll move right along to what lies ahead and what you're all here for, Formula 1!

2013 season so far

So far we've had two races, Australia and Malaysia both have created some heated debates within forums and the media.
Kimi - "Yeah, it's alright I suppose."

Australia

The Australian Grand Prix promised to deliver, and it did. The season opener was always going to be under close watch as last years season was so tight for the first seven races, this year again threw surprises into the spectators. Kimi Raikkonen won, which in itself is a good start to a season, showing the Lotus has promise to be a title contender, and rather shockingly Grosjean didn't crash, even in the wet!


Alonso and Vettle came predictably second and third respectively; then Massa who is looking on fine form and causing a headache internally for Ferrari, and Hamilton beat all the nay-sayers and came fifth (I'll come to him and his move in a later post). The real pleasurable shock came with the Force Indias, Sutil was leading the race for some time, and he earned being there, it wasn't a fluky pit stop or anything like that, but as he was on a different strategy he dropped back and finished just ahead of his Scottish team mate. The surge we saw Force India have with Hulkenberg at the end of last season may have followed through and might not be a one shot thing.

Malaysia 

Vettel won, Webber second, Hamilton third and Rosberg fourth. I didn't even have to look at my notes (Wikipedia) to know that, sod the rest of the race, the last 18 laps are all anyone wants to talk about, but let's start backwards.
A picture speaks a thousand words, and this one says
"Fuck you Seb!"

At the tail end of this podium were a very strong looking Mercedes, Hamilton was up with the big boys and Rosberg was never too far away at any stage in this race, however due to under-fueling the german was right behind Lewis and trying to pass at the latter stages of the race. Fearing that both cars would either A) Take each other out or B) Run out of fuel doing it, Brawn decided to tell them not to fight, and for Nico to hold station behind Lewis. Understandably this upset Nico, but considering  the two DRS zones kept meaning Nico would jump ahead of Lewis, only for him to be passed again on the next straight was causing the cars to be beside one another for a worryingly long time, it was probably best they didn't run out of fuel dueling. Rosberg did continue to shout about how he was faster, but this is just to say to higher ups 'Look I can battle just as well as my teammate!' which is fair enough. Eventually though he calmed down and stayed put, mostly because Brawn is a scary, scary man and I don't think there is any resentment in the team.

Staying put is something that Vettel seems to not understand, nearer the end of the race he was told not to pass. It was a team order directly from his team principle. He then just completely ignored it and later claimed he...Well I'm not sure what he claimed, he said he did hear it but thought it mean't something different, I think. I'm not saying Webber hasn't done anything in the past, but Vettel's win at all cost attitude put the team at risk of loosing some serious points, and potentially has caused a large rift in the team.

The most awkward podium in human history - Fact
Both of these situations meant that we had the most awkward podiums in the history of motor sport, Webber hated Vettel for stealing his win when he thought the race was over, Seb at the time apparently didn't realise he did anything wrong and Hamilton was insistent that Rosberg should have been where he was standing. Three guys all on the podium who didn't want to be there, albeit in that order, which is ironic because there are 20 chaps behind them who would all love to be up there. And the interview with Martin Brundle was actually quite amusing, because to be honest I don't think even he wanted to be up there.

Notice how I haven't mentioned McLaren in either of the two races, this is because their issues deserve a whole post dedicated to them. Aren't they special.

Well that's it for now, hopefully I'll be able to post some more comments before this Sunday's Chinese Grand Prix.

Side Note: The podium to end all podiums did give us this fantastic GIF
I thrust in your general direction!

2 comments:

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  2. A very entertaining read, looking forward to the next exciting installment. Hopefully you'll have something to write about McLaren after Shanghai, maybe the three week gap will have allowed the Woking based team to get their sh*t together!

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