Jenson Button VS Lewis Hamilton
Hamilton had a poor weekend, on all accounts. Pulled over by the police for ‘hooning’, qualifies poorly, makes up ground then loses it with a poor strategy call by his team, then proceeds to vent his frustration at team over radio, and through post-race interviews. Not to mention the fact he was taken out my Webber and lost another place…
Compared to Button’s good qualifying, inspired – but risky – decision to swap to wets, and his calm, tyre preserving drive to take advantage of Vettel’s bad luck and take the win.
Really the winner is obvious, a bad weekend for Hamilton. Let’s see how he does in Malaysia, everyone will be analysing him and looking for signs that he is feeling the pressure.
Winner: Button
Michael Schumacher VS Nico Rosberg
Schumacher was much closer this race. He qualified right behind him; only a split second slower.
Unluckily, in the race he got caught up in the Alonso spin and broke his wing and never recovered. Not a clear indicator of pace, but people are quick to jump on him for being repassed by di Grassi and not being able to get past Alguersuari. In my opinion, if Hamilton can catch up to Alonso by two seconds a lap, then not is able to pass; I don’t think any other driver has much of a chance when only slightly faster.
Winner: Rosberg
Sebastian Vettel VS Mark Webber
I’ve been pretty hard on Webber in the awards, and grand prix review, so I will go easy on him this time.
Winner: Vettel
Felipe Massa Vs Fernando Alonso
Felipe was struggling in qualifying, where as Alonso was right on the pace, and trying to challenge the Red Bulls.
But once he got spun around in the first corner, his race was over, and it was a great drive to even manage fourth. Ferrari admitted they didn’t allow the drivers to battle in the last segment of the race, so that put Alonso as the rear gunner for Massa.
I’d say Felipe was lucky to get third, Alonso was clearly faster.
Winner: Alonso
Rubens Barrichello VS Nico Hulkenberg
Hulkenberg hasn’t impressed like I thought he would. I was expecting a more of a Hamilton, maybe not challenging for wins, but kind of making good moves around older more experienced drivers, and generally making a name for himself. Even though his retirement wasn’t his fault, he was slower than Rubens all weekend.
Winner: Barrichello
Robert Kubica VS Vitaly Petrov
Vitaly got owned! He was the driver from the established teams to get knocked out in Q1, and even thought he made a good start, spun it into the gravel and out of the race.
Kubica’s drive was great. Good mix of defensive driving, and keeping your own pace.
Winner: Kubica
Adrian Sutil VS Vitantonio Liuzzi
They are both quite evenly matched, by Liuzzi has been bringing home the points. Sutil needs to up his game, or this could really be his last season in Formula One.
Winner: Liuzzi
Sebastian Buemi VS Jaime Alguersuari
Buemi has a great qualifying session, but his race was ended early through no fault of his own. Alguersuari did keep his head with Schumacher on his tail though. It’s a hard choice.
Seeing as Alguersuari finished eleventh from 17th, I guess the conclusion that Buemi would probably have scored points is reasonable. As position is king in Formula One.
Winner: Buemi
Heikki Kovalainen Vs Jarno Trulli
Heikki out qualified the ‘one lap specialist’ Jarno Trulli but quite a large amount. In fact the beating was so severe that Jarno’s car lost all hydraulics and didn’t start the race.
Part of that last sentence is true, you figure.
Winner: Kovalainen
Karun Chandhok VS Bruno Senna
Chandhok did very in qualifying, for a time it looked like he was going to qualify ahead of his team mate. Yet, Senna pulled it out of the bag at the last moment.
In the race Chandhok drove a slow, but generally tidy race in that horrible HRT car. It was basically a test session, and hopefully they gained a lot of information about the car so that they can start improving on it.
Winner: Chandok
Pedro De La Rosa VS Kamui Kobayashi
Damn Kobayashi is disappointing me. Sure it should be expected, it’s a crap car, and Pedro has tons of experience…
This race goes to Pedro, he out qualified Kamui, and then in the race Kamui’s wing fell off. We don’t know if it was failure, or due to contact, but those Sauber wings are real weak.
Winner: de La Rosa
Timo Glock VS Lucas di Grassi
Glock pulled off a nice switch back on Schumacher, he also lasted longer before his car broke, and he qualified sixth tenths of a second faster than di Grassi.
Winner: Glock
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