German Grand Prix, Round 10, 20/07/08

[MikeLane]

McLaren take a strategy risk and Hamilton makes it work to take a brilliant win.

German Grand Prix

Hockenheim, Germany
July 20th, 2008 – Round 10.

By

Mike Lane

F1 Correspondent.

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Following the qualifying session, Heikki Kovalainen was fined 5000 Euros for breaching an FIA regulation. McLaren used a non approved system for refuelling his car and so the engine should have been turned off during the process.
The penalty does not involve any grid change but once again McLaren have been penalised. They seem to be awfully unlucky lately.

With Massa on form and joint leader of the driver’s championship with Hamilton and Raikkonen, he may well turn out to be Hamilton’s match here.

It will be a fascinating start and down to the first corner to see if Kovalainen can come into play, but the real test will be when we know what fuel strategies are in play.


The grid order was:-

1. Lewis Hamilton (McLaren)…………….…2. Felipe Massa (Ferrari).
2. Heikki Kovalainen (McLaren).……………4. Jarno Trulli (Toyota).
5. Fernando Alonso (Renault)………………..6. Kimi Raikkonen (Ferrari).
6. Robert Kubica (BMW Sauber)…………….8. Mark Webber (Red Bull)
9. Sebastian Vettel (Toro Rosso)…………….10. David Coultard (Red Bull).
11. Timo Glock (Toyota)……………………..12. Nick Heidfeld (BMW Sauber)
13. Nico Rosberg (Williams)…………………14. Jenson Button (Honda).
15. Sebastien Bourdais (Toro Rosso)…………16. Kazuki Nakajima (Williams).
17. Nelsinho Piquet (Renault). ……………….18 Rubens Barrichello (Honda)
19. Adrian Sutil (Force India) ..…………….…20.Giancarlo Fisichella (ForceIndia).


As the lights went out for the start of the race Hamilton got a good start, as did Massa.

Down to the first corner and Hamilton went defensive to hold the lead and everyone else got through safely.

As they came into the hairpin, which was to feature large in this race, Alonso went wide which slowed Trulli a fraction and allowed Kubica to steal 4th place.
Meanwhile Coultard made a poor start and dropped from 10th to 15th place.

As the race settled down there were some good individual scraps taking place and Raikkonen pushed past Alonso to take 6th place.

By lap six Hamilton, out front, had a lead of 4.127 secs over second place man Massa and 7secs over Kovalainen. He was laying down a challenge to the rest but it was early in the race yet.

Once again we saw Button and Coultard fighting for position, albeit only 13th and 14th, but one wondered if their previous recent encounters were going to be repeated when they crashed.

Coultard was clearly in a faster car, but this battle was for position and Button was making his Honda a ‘wide’ car to pass. By that I mean, positioning it in such a way on the race-track as to make it extremely difficult to pass.

Meanwhile Hamilton was steadily increasing his lead, although it was believed he had slightly less fuel on board than Massa. By lap10 he was 5.9 seconds ahead of Massa and put in the fastest lap of the race, so far, with a time of 1min16.078secs.

By lap 13 Coultard had managed to clear Button in the Honda and was now able to push harder.

Hamilton continued to increase his lead and by lap18 was 11 seconds ahead of the Ferrari of Massa. We had speculated how far he would be able to go into the race before a pit-stop and that question was answered when he came in at the end of the lap. Clearly his lead was insufficient to take a pit-stop and maintain the lead. His tyre choice on this change was for the harder compound and clearly it was intended that the second stint would be a longer one, so that when he had to change to the softer tyres it would only be for a short period.

This season there has been a question mark over Hamilton’s ability to manage tyre wear on the McLaren when fitted with the softer compound. His style of driving seems to result in graining of the tyres much quicker than his team-mate, Kovalainen.

When Hamilton rejoined the track he was just ahead of Trulli in the Toyota, but he was unable to hold that position on fresh tyres and a fuel heavy car, so Trulli retook the position.

One lap later Kubica made his pit-stop from 4th place, followed by Trulli. As Trulli rejoined the track he was overtaken by Hamilton.

The following lap Alonso took his pit-stop and Trulli got past him.
We were now clearly into the first round of pit-stops and Massa came in only two laps after Hamilton. He took on the softer compound and was clearly intending to have a shorter middle stint.

When Raikkonen came in three laps later he also took on the softer compound but this was not looking like Raikkonen’s day. Indeed it had not been the best of weekends for him.

At this stage of the race of course, it is difficult with the different strategies, to assess where cars truly are relative to each other in the overall race but the order on lap 25 was:-

Hamilton
Massa
Glock
Kovalainen
Heidfeld
Kubica
Raikkonen
Trulli
Vettel
Alonso
Webber
Button

Hamilton had an 8.9 secs lead over Massa and clearly the McLaren was consistently faster than the Ferrari.

Interestingly, some drivers had elected to run a one stop strategy and it was not until lap 30 that Glock came in with his Toyota.

Piquet was another driver who was on a one stop strategy and he didn’t come in until lap 35. This policy was to pay off for him later in the race.

The following lap, disaster struck for Glock, when he had a mechanical failure at the right rear of the car as he exited the last bend onto the main straight. The failure sent his car across the track and backwards into the pit wall, sending debris across the track.

The Safety Car was immediately deployed and Timo Glock was taken to the medical centre to be assessed.

For Hamilton this was a potential disaster, as all the lead he had worked so hard to establish, was immediately wiped out.

The cars lined up behind the Safety Car and on lap 40 the pit lane was declared open.

There was a frenzy of activity as cars dived into the pits for this unscheduled stop, but off course it was at an appropriate time for the second round of stops so teams took advantage of it.

To the surprise of everyone, I think, McLaren did not bring Hamilton in for his last pit-stop and he continued behind the safety car as organised chaos reigned in the pits.

The only explanation I could see was the concern over the softer compound tyres and there were too many laps left to risk, but this was a huge gamble because with all his main rivals able to go to the end. It would leave Hamilton potentially having to make up maybe 20 seconds over the next 10 or 11 laps.

Webber exited the pits with smoke billowing from his Red Bull and one lap later he was forced to park it and out of the race.

On lap 42 the race restarted with Hamilton needing to really pull something out of the bag.

Kovalainen, in the sister McLaren, was chasing Kubica, in the BMW Sauber, hard and executed a great overtaking move to take him.

The next lap Raikkonen and Alonso were fighting hard as they came into the hairpin. The Finn won the battle as he scythed past and Alonso had to back off the throttle, which also allowed Rosberg to get past.

By lap 45, just three laps after the restart Hamilton was 7 seconds ahead of Massa and the Ferrari driver seemed unable to match the pace.

Meanwhile Coultard and Barrichello were racing hard, but unfortunately had a coming together which put Barrichello out of the race and resulted in a new nose cone for the Red Bull car.

As predicted, on lap 51 Hamilton had to take his second and final pit-stop, but had only pulled out a 13 second lead to Massa. It was going to be an uphill struggle to get back in the race and as he rejoined the race he found himself behind his team-mate, Kovalainen, and in 5th place.

Hamilton was not going to give up and he quickly passed a compliant Kovalainen for 4th place.

Heidfeld then went into the pits for his last stop leaving Hamilton to chase after Piquet, who was leading, and Massa in 2nd.

Staggeringly, by lap 54 Hamilton was only 2.4 secs behind Massa and clearly faster.

On lap 57 the seemingly inevitable happened when Hamilton outbraked Massa into the hairpin and took 2nd place. The Ferrari driver was not going to give up so easily and pulled alongside at the next turn, but Hamilton was clearly faster and held the place.

Piquet was still in the lead, with his one stop strategy and the Safety Car clearly helping the strategy, but Hamilton was chasing hard.

This was clearly going to upset the order at Renault today and as if on cue, Alonso spun at the hairpin.

On lap 60 the inevitable happened and Hamilton pulled the same overtaking move on Piquet into the hairpin to take the lead of the Grand Prix.

The final little cameos to be played out were when Raikkonen got passed Kubica for sixth place and Vettel surged past Trulli for eighth.

Lewis Hamilton won the race in 1hr31min20.874secs with a faultless performance and made it two in a row.

The final race order was:-

1st Hamilton………….1hr31:20.874
2nd Piquet…………….+5.5s
3rd Massa……………..+9.3s
4th Heidfeld…………..+9.8s
5th Kovalainen……….+12.4s
6th Raikkonen………. +14.4s
7th Kubica…………... +22.6s
8th Vettel………… +33.2s
9th Trulli……………..+37.1s
10th Rosberg…………+37.6s
11th Alonso…………. +38.6s
12th Bourdais……….. +39.1s
13th Coultard…………+54.9s
14th Fisichella……….+59.0s
15th Nakajima……… +60.0s
16th Sutil…………… +69.4s
17th Button…………..+1 laps
18th Barrichello……...+17 laps
19th Webber ………+27 laps
20th Glock………….. +32 laps

After ten rounds the Driver’s championship looks like this:-

Hamilton………58 points
Massa………….54
Raikkonen……..51
Kubica…………48
Heidfeld………..41
Kovalainen…….28
Trulli…………...20
Webber…………18
Alonso………….13
Barrichello……...11
Piquet…………..10
Rosberg………….8
Nakajima………..8
Coultard…………6
Vettel……………6
Glock……………5
Button…………...3
Bourdais………....2
Fisichella………..0
Sato……………..0
Davidson………..0
Sutil……………..0

The Constructor’s championship looks like this:-

Ferrari…………105 points
BMW Sauber…...89
McLaren………..86
Toyota…………..25
Red Bull…………24
Renault………….23
Williams………..16
Honda…………..14
Toro Rosso………8
Force India……..0
Super Aguri…….0

McLaren took an enormous gamble when they decided not to pit Hamilton under the safety car.

As Ron Dennis, boss of McLaren, revealed after the race, they had thought the safety car would have come in earlier, but they got that wrong.

It may be that they also had concerns about the last stint, which under the rules had to be on the softer compound tyres.

Nevertheless this was a fantastic drive by Hamilton to manage the apparent disadvantage and turn it into victory. This young man seems to be maturing as a Formula One driver as we all hoped he would.

Other notable performances were Piquet, who had an outstanding race and strategy to take his first podium and rescue his reputation at Renault, and Vettel in the Toro Rosso who got the last of the points positions with eighth.
He is having an outstanding season, which should stand him in good stead for his future.

Heidfeld had a good result beating his team-mate and recovering his position after a poor qualifying session.
He does seem to be a much stronger racer than qualifier.

This was a great race with a good deal of overtaking, which we don’t always see and I look forward to the next race in Hungary where the McLarens should again be strong.

For Ferrari they will be doing a good deal of soul searching to try and analyse what went wrong here in Germany.

Mike Lane

F1 Correspondent – Home Base - England