Hamilton Retakes The Championship Initiative With Masterful Drive In Japan

[PressRoom-GFN]

By Mike Lane

FUJI SPEEDWAY, Japan (Sept. 30, 2007) – With Fernando Alonso making inroads into Lewis Hamilton’s lead in the championship during the last two races in Italy and Belgium, it was vital for Hamilton to respond in Japan. Kimi Raikkonen also has been making a late charge and could be the dark horse in the fight for this year’s world championship.

After a wet qualifying session on Saturday, the grid for the race had some surprises in it. Hamilton had struggled throughout the sessions until his last lap when he took the pole position by 7/100ths of a second from teammate Alonso. This was his fifth pole of the season and could not have been more important.

The first four grid positions were taken by the four main contenders for the championship, with Hamilton, then Alonso, followed by Raikkonen and Felipe Massa. Further back, Jenson Button was a creditable sixth with his best qualifying effort this year, and Sebastien Vettel in a fantastic eighth to give the Toro Rosso team its first top 10 grid start.

Fuji Speedway, a 2.8-mile road course circuit with the main straight just under 1 mile in length, has been updated for Formula One's return and is generally liked by the drivers, but the area does have unpredictable weather. Sunday’s race was to occur in appalling weather and with rivers of standing water on the circuit, it was decided to start the race behind the safety car.

All of the teams were told to start their cars on full wet tires, so the race began behind the safety car without incident and Hamilton leading the pack. On lap 2, Massa went off the track after a spin and it became clear that for some inexplicable reason Ferrari had apparently ignored the directive and placed intermediate wet tires on both cars. On the next lap, both Ferraris made a pit stop to obtain full wet tires and take on some fuel, which relegated them to the back of the pack.

By lap 6, the rain appeared to be getting worse and lap times were 2 minutes 13 seconds compared with Hamilton’s pole time of 1 minute 25 seconds. Indeed, on this lap, Raikkonen spun, but returned to the track without damage, underlining the treacherous conditions.

Despite the modern Formula One tires displacing 80 liters [23.5 U.S. gallons] of water per second, drivers were reporting conditions were impossible due to spray and the lack of vision. It was apparently impossible to see the rear light of the car in front!

On laps 15 and 16, the two Ferraris made another pit stop for tires and fuel, which increased speculation they were changing strategy to go to the race's finish without another stop. With a clear track in front of him, Raikkonen was 10 seconds faster in the middle sector alone while trying to rejoin the pack.

Cars that had been lapped were give permission to unlap themselves by overtaking the pack. Vitantonio Liuzzi took advantage of this instruction and having overtaken the pack posted a 1 minute 36.4 second lap, which was significantly faster and confirmed what Raikkonen had demonstrated the previous lap. The decision to let the lapped cars through seemed to have been made by the race director to assess the conditions and on lap 19 the safety car pulled off the track, unleashing the field from controlled laps.

Hamilton controlled the restart and maintained his lead, while further back, Button in the Honda, Mark Webber in the Red Bull, and Robert Kubica in the BMW all overtook Nick Heidfeld in the other BMW. On the same lap, Alex Wurz got his braking wrong and collided with Massa, which eliminated the Williams driver.

Wet races often result in odd situations and at this point the order was:
Hamilton
Alonso
Vettel
Webber
Button
Giancarlo Fisichella
Heikki Kovalainen
Kubica
David Coultard
Heidfeld

On lap 23, Button and Heidfeld collided, resulting in Button losing his front wing and his lap times dropping 3 seconds per lap.

In a separate incident, Takuma Sato also lost a front wing and came into the pits for a nose change. While there the mechanics fueled the car, but a fire broke out around the fuel filler. With commendably fast decision making, the pit crew released the car and as a result of the car's movement through the air, the fire was extinguished.

The following lap Button also made a pit stop for a new nose, thus relegating him down in the race order.

Meanwhile, Raikkonen was making steady progress up the order and had risen from 21st to 12th. On lap 26, he overtook Ralf Schumacher for 11th and it began to look as though he might finish in the points.

The next lap Alonso pitted for fuel and tires, and appeared to have received enough fuel to get him to the race's finish. Hamilton was still on the track, producing the fastest laps to gain the greatest advantage. When Alonso exited the pits he found himself behind Kubica, which was not what he had hoped.

On lap 28, Hamilton made his pit stop and clearly received enough fuel to get him to the race's finish. Vettel was now the race leader, followed by Webber, and Hamilton in third. Meanwhile, Alonso spun off the track without damage but dropped to eighth.

On lap 30, both Massa and Nico Rosberg spun without damage, underlining the treacherous conditions and Hamilton’s cool control of his car.

On lap 33, Vettel pitted, having led the race for five laps. At this point, both Alonso and Hamilton appeared to be lapping slower than before and Heidfeld overtook Alonso. On the next lap, Kubica nudged Hamilton in an ambitious overtaking maneuver, which threatened to eliminate the championship leader.

Lap 36 saw Vettel tag Alonso, resulting in the Spaniard spinning and Hamilton being overtaken by Coultard and Fisichella. It was unclear whether Hamilton was in trouble or just staying out of trouble with the knowledge that cars ahead of him had yet to make their final pit stops.

As the laps unfolded, it looked as though Hamilton was playing a waiting game with those ahead of him making their pit stops and Kubica penalized with a drive-through penalty. Meanwhile, as predicted, Raikkonen made his way steadily through the field and was now in fifth.

On lap 42, Hamilton was once again in the lead with Webber seemingly catching him and Vettel in third. Sensationally, Alonso lost control of his car in turn 5 and hit the wall in turn 6, consequently eliminating him from the race. The track was littered with debris and once again the safety car was deployed.

Visibility had not improved and on lap 46 Vettel hit Webber’s Red Bull car in the rear, sending him spinning into the wall to end the day for both of them. Of course, Vettel drives the Toro Rosso car, which is the ‘B’ team for Red Bull, and thereby eliminated his teammate.

On lap 48, the safety car came in and racing resumed with Hamilton in the lead and Kovalainen, Massa, Coultard, and Raikkonen rounding out the top five, respectively.

Raikkonen was racing hard and on lap 57 executed a brave, overtaking maneuver around the outside of turn 5 to pass Coultard for fourth. The question now was how Ferrari would “engineer” Raikkonen past Massa, as he is now the championship contender, not Massa.

The answer came in lap 59 when Massa made a late pit stop for tires, which clearly were not required. Raikkonen was now third, while Massa dropped to ninth. The next lap Rosberg retired with apparent electrical failure to end a fairly disappointing weekend, followed by Heidfeld in the BMW.

Raikkonen continued to try and improve his race position with the young Kovalainen putting up a determined fight to resist him. As Hamilton crossed the finish line to win a memorable race, with Kovalainen second and Raikkonen third, Massa and Kubica were locked in a battle for sixth. It seemed like they took it in turns to run the other off the track, but in a fair battle that resulted in Massa triumphing.

The final positions in the race as Hamilton took the checkered flag were:
Hamilton won in 2:00: 34.579 with an average speed of 151.978 km/h.
2nd Kovalainen +8.377 secs
3rd Raikkonen +9.478secs
4th Coultard +20.297secs
5th Fisichella +38.864 secs
6th Massa +49.042 secs
7th Kubica +49.285 secs
8th Sutil
9th Liuzzi
10th Barrichello
11th Button
12th Yamamoto +1 lap
13th Trulli +1 lap
14th Heidfeld +2 lap
15th Sato +2 lap
16th Sato +1 lap
Schumacher unclassified
Davidson unclassified
Rosberg unclassified
Vettel unclassified
Webber unclassified
Alonso unclassified
Wurz unclassified

The Championship points are:
Drivers
Hamilton 107
Alonso 95
Raikkonen 90
Massa 80
Heidfeld 56
Kubica 35
Kovaleinen 30
Fisichella 21
Wurz 13
Rosberg 12
Coultard 8
Webber 8
Trulli 7
Schumacher 5
Sato 4
Button 2
Vettel 1

Constructors
Ferrari 170
BMW 92
Renault 51
Williams 28
Red Bull 23
Toyota 12
Super Aguri 4
Honda 2
Spyker 1
McLaren 0

Once again the “rookie”, Lewis Hamilton showed what incredible maturity he has and with the championship moving into the final two races in China and Brazil, who would bet against him winning the world championship.

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