I do not want to say this was the best race of the season but it sure was entertaining. We could see some serious racing with overtaking up and down the grid, we had a safety car following a crash (luckily without any serious injury), we could see a serious strategy blunder and impressive recovery from it and 2 Brazilians on podium, one of them being Piquet jr. !

McLaren dominated the weekend from Friday but the close fight between Massa and Hamilton in qualifying promised some possibility of a fight for the race win. At the end we had a fight but more thanks to McLaren getting it wrong than Ferrari getting it right. Lewis Hamilton pulled away right from the start and Massa never looked like a serious opposition. Early on even Kovalainen was a threat but after few laps Massa pulled away from him. Not sure why because Heikki was not that much more heavy than Massa. In the meantime Hamilton managed to build a decent lead in front.

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F1Wolf

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It looked way too easy when Hamilton passed his team mate after his second pit stop. The presenters at the Star TV studio were rather ironic after the race saying that there are “no team orders in F1″ , the whole bar where I was watching the race was full of boos. So were there team orders or is Hamilton that much better than Kovalainen that he simply made that look that easy ? At the end, it did not take him that long to overtake Felipe Massa …

So were there team orders or not ?

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Photo: Daimler Media

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Lewis Hamilton managed to overcome apparent strategy blunder and won the 2008 German GP at Hockenheim. Nelson Piquet climbed up to the podium for the first time in his F1 career scoring also the first podium of the season for Renault. Felipe Massa finished 3rd. First time since 1991 Belgian GP (when Senna won and Piquet sr. finished 3rd) there were 2 Brazilian drivers on podium .

The race was affected by safety car following Timo Glock’s violent crash. Glock looked a bit shaken after the crash but seems to be OK.

2008 German GP result:

1. Lewis Hamilton - McLaren - 1:31:20.847
2. Nelson Piquet - Renault + 5.586
3. Felipe Massa - Ferrari + 9.339
4. Nick Heidfeld - BMW Sauber + 9.825
5. Heikki Kovalainen - McLaren + 12.411
6. Kimi Raikkonen - Ferrari + 14.483
7. Robert Kubica - BMW Sauber + 22.603
8. Sebastian Vettel - Toro Rosso + 33.282

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Lewis Hamilton will start the German GP from pole position after beating Felipe Massa by 0.02s in dry qualifying session. Heikki Kovalainen and Jarno Trulli will occupy row 2. Fernando Alonso recovered from a Q1 elimination scare and will start from P5, just ahead of disappointing Kimi Raikkonen. Robert Kubica who suffered technical problems in free practice and was also on a brink of elimination in Q1 will on P7. Mark Webber, Sebastian Vettel and David Coulthard complete the top 10.

Q1 was very even, only about half second separated 4th from 16th. Nelson Piquet missed out on Q2 fourth time this season and I wonder for much longer will the team remain patient with him … Kazuki Nakajima and Rubens Barrichello were the other 2 higher profile casualties of Q1.

Qualifying Results:

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After some Monaco drizzle we had the first proper wet to extreme wet race this year. It has provided us with all that can be expected - lots of spins, pit stop and strategy dilemas and some surprising faces on the podium.

It is not easy to review this race without missing something. A lot was happening on the track, the commercial breaks on ESPN Star came always in the wrong moment and Steve Slater did again his best to confuse us all with mixing up the driver names and talking bull while important things were happening on the track. How can someone like this guy keep the job with a TV station that broadcasts all over Asia is a mystery to me. But back to racing …

When we look back at the end of the season for the start of the year then Lewis Hamilton’s start to British GP will be high on the list of candidates. Starting from 4th but almost in the lead after few corners. Only very sharp defensive driving from his team mate kept him in second position. I am not sure McLaren pit wall enjoyed those few opening corners watching both their drivers getting way too close for comfort on the wet and slippery track. Both McLarens pulled away with Kimi Raikkonen in 3rd safely behind (safely for McLarens but safely for Kimi too). Hamilton kept pushing and Kovalainen kept defending. But then on lap 4 all of a sudden Kovalainen let Hamilton pass … TV applauded that as a great overtaking maneuvre from Hamilton, to me it looked like team orders in place …

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Lewis Hamilton has won his (eventful) home Grand Prix after taking full advantage of his great start and some very strange tyre decision by Raikkonen’s camp. Nick Heidfeld brought his BMW Sauber home in 2nd place. The Ross Brawn factor came to effect in tricky wet / extreme wet conditions. Right choice of tyres in right time and Rubens Barrichello claimed his first podium since joining Honda … They must have missed Brawn at Ferrari today …

2008 British GP Result:

1. Lewis Hamilton - McLaren - 1:39:09.440
2. Nick Heidfeld - BMW Sauber + 1:08.500
3. Rubens Barrichello - Honda + 1:22.200
4. Kimi Raikkonen - Ferrari + 1 laps
5. Heikki Kovalainen - McLaren + 1 laps
6. Fernando Alonso - Renault + 1 laps
7. Jarno Trulli - Toyota + 1 laps
8. Kazuki Nakajima - Williams + 1 laps

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The events of last weekend in France brought out suggestions someone is out there to get McLaren. On one hand string of penalties to Hamilton and Kovalainen on the other hand not even an investigation into Trulli’s defending 3rd position from Heikki, no action taken against unsafe Ferrari of Kimi Raikkonen.

So are McLaren hard done ? The following photos (inside the post) may provide some answer:

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McLaren Mercedes team are currently at worst the 2nd best team on the grid. The last French GP did nothing to make me feel otherwise. Heikki Kovalainen finished 4th after starting from 10th (following his 5 place grid penalty). Without the drive through penatly Lewis Hamilton would not have finished too far from podium either despite starting from P13…

But yet despite their strength the team lies at 3rd place in constructor standings, 16 points behind 2nd BMW Sauber and 33 points behind Ferrari. Their drivers are currently at 4th and 6th place. Compare it with their standings after 8 races last year. Top 2 drivers at the table, the team leading the constructors table by 25 points ahead of Ferrari…

The car is good, the car is reliable (only 2 retirements, both due to accidents, see the 2008 season stats here), so where is the problem ?

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The race start was little disappointing - all the cars made it and for the first 13 laps the race was rather uneventful. Lewis Hamilton pulled away from Robert Kubica and Kimi Raikkonen. He looked like the man to beat. The only excitement came from Nelson Piquet overtaking every car that got in his way. But then Adrian Sutil spun off and safety car was out on track. Once the pitlane opened pretty much all the cars that were not on one stop strategy dived into pitlane. Raikkonen and Kubica jumped ahead of Hamilton after their pitstops but had to stop at the red light at the pitlane exit. Lewis Hamilton did not look up to check the light, he did not look ahead to check the cars in front him and hit the rear end of Raikkonen’s car. Nico Rosberg joined the party moments later and rammed into Hamilton. Kubica escaped unscathed but Hamilton and Raikkonen were out of the race…

Hamilton’s stupid mistake opened the door for BMW Sauber. It looked first the luck was on Heidfeld’s side. Once the race restarted he pulled away from the field helped by not that quick Barrichello in second place. After his pitstop he still returned ahead of his team mate but the “hint” on team radio about slowing down lighter Kubica made the trick. Kubica passed Heidfeld and never looked back. BMW drivers were definitely helped by misfortune of their main rivals but … they grabbed the opportunity and more importantly made no mistakes in a race that was all about not making any mistakes … Deserved 1-2 finish for BMW and clearly popular win for Kubica just about a year after his scary crash at the same track … Nick Heidfeld now remains the only driver without DNF this season … Did not make him to look too happy on the podium though …

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No rain today but still it was an eventful practice session this morning in Montreal. That was after rather quiet first fifteen minutes. After that all the teams tried to make up for the time they lost while the track was wet on Friday morning. Some were trying too hard, 2 cars hit the wall - Bourdais and Vettel, Nelson Piquet skilfully parked it right next to the wall. Vettel did enough damage to his car to miss the qualifying … Bourdais damaged his gearbox and got himself 5 place grid penalty for Sunday race. For the record Nico Rosberg was the fastest man on track in the morning session.

Morning practice suggested that perhaps we could see some surprise from Toro Rosso in qualifying. Vettel however was not able to take part in qualifying and the best Bourdais could manage was 16th just behind 15th Nelson Piquet. Jenson Button did not make it to Q2 for the first time this season after what looked like some mechanical problems. The other 2 looser spots went as usual to Force India cars.

It was much more exciting in Q2. Both Timo Glock and Kazuki Nakajima were getting very close to Q3 but at the end the only unusual name in top 10 was Rubens Barrichello. Mark Webber was very impressive, finished Q2 in 5th place but unfortunately spun off on the way back to pits and was not able to take part in Q3. Already in Q2 the track was visibly deteriorating and drivers were not able to match their Q1 times. The track conditions only got worse in Q3 and so the final session turned into sort of a gamble. Lewis Hamilton occupied the top spot for most of the time. Kimi Raikkonen was able to go faster in sectors 1 and 2 but not in the sector 3. Only Robert Kubica managed to claim the pole position for a while but Hamilton reclaimed it back on his final run. Renault must be excited with Alonso on P4, Williams should be very happy with P5 for Rosberg. Barrichello only made one run, probably choosing to save up fuel for the race.

The drivers seems to be attracted to the walls and I would be surprised if we have no safety car out tomorrow. If that happens, anything can happen …

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