2007 Chinese Grand Prix
From Frikipedia
You know, winning a world championship is very much like making love to a beautiful woman. You have to keep up a good and consistent rhythm, you can on occasion choose to finish second, and most importantly, you need to make sure you look after your rubber. Sadly for Lewis "Tyler" Hamilton, he failed in the lattermost of those respects in Shanghai, and allowed his two rivals for the crown to put themselves right back into contention, despite having been written off by just about everyone last week. Though not by Friki, oh no. Friki would never allow itself to do something like print a photo of Alonso retiring in Japan with a "Game over" caption. Nope, you must have Friki confused with a different overly shambolic random F1 reviewing website.
The failure to call Hamilton in for a tyre change before it was too late, even despite Hamilton visibly losing stacks of time on the preceding laps, was the latest spectacular cock up in a season-long litany of spectacular cock ups from the McLaren team, and goes to affirm that the team has lost little of its ability to throw a race away, an ability practised a number of times throughout the Mika Hakkinen/Kimi Raikkonen years of the team. Ironically (n.b. not really ironic), Kimi was the man to benefit as he romped home for the win.
All this happening on the backdrop of a weekend of upheaval for poor Friki. It schizophrenically worked its way through a series of commentaries on a wide variety of sports (i.e. two), all while busily moving house to it's new and actually properly named web address. It's always a hassle moving house, and as ever, Friki has forgotton to pass on its new address to a couple of people, hence why this review was (briefly) more devoid of images than a masive text-only file of the entire novel of War and Peace copy-and-pasted a million times over.
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Friki's Almost Popular Race Weekend Common Terries
Race Result
1 Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari 56 Laps in 1:37:58.395
2 Fernando Alonso McLaren-Mercedes +9.800
3 Felipe Massa Ferrari +12.800
4 Sebastian Vettel Toro Rosso-Ferrari +53.500
5 Jenson Button Honda +1:08.600
6 Tonio Liuzzi Toro Rosso-Ferrari +1:13.600
7 Nick Heidfeld BMW Sauber +1:14.200
8 David Coulthard Red Bull-Renault +1:20.700
9 Heikki Kovalainen Renault +1:21.100
10 Mark Webber Red Bull-Renault +1:24.600
11 Giancarlo Fisichella Renault +1:26.600
12 Alex Wurz Williams-Toyota +1 Lap
13 Jarno Trulli Toyota +1 Lap
14 Takuma Sato Super Aguri-Honda +1 Lap
15 Boobens Honda +1 Lap
16 Nico Rosberg Williams-Toyota +2 Laps
17 Admiral Yamamoto Spyker-Ferrari +3 Laps
Ret Robert Kubica BMW Sauber I'm WINNING!..I'm not winning
Ret Lewis Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes I'm CHAMPION!..I'm not champion
Ret Ralf Schumacher Toyota I'm SHIT!..Yeah, I'm shit
Ret Adrian Sutil Spyker-Ferrari I'm still awesome
Ret Anthony Davidson Super Aguri-Honda I'm invisible
Friki Review
The race was intriguing, if never particularly thrilling. The weather was enough to confuse and disorientate the new-ish weather prediction graphics that occasionally flashed very specific, if entirely inaccurate, times for when the rain would start, or the rain would stop, or we'd get some snow, or the apocalypse would happen. It was "damp", if not wet at the start, but Hamilton started off controlling things fairly easily, pulling out a decent lead over the disconsolate Kimi, Massa and Alonso. DC was somehow in 5th, having qualified remarkably well. His teammate Mark Webber had a stunning excuse all lined up, after he decided to make a number of contrary pit stops at around half distance. It is worth reminding, however, that DC was at the disadvantage of having qualified on a full dry setup, and it was remarkable that by the end of the race, the circuit announcer could proudly proclaim that DC was 8th, and hence point to David!
As the track conditions changed from damp to dry, it became rather obvious to everyone apart from the McLaren strategists that Tyler's tyres (there's a tongue twister for you) were entirely knackered. First Kimi mumbled his way past, and then Alonso began to close up at a fair rate of knots. For some reason though, the call wasn't made until it was too late, and Tyler ended up parked in an undignified manner in a gravel trap, much to the anguish of ITV, and indeed Tyler himself who went all narky and initially refused to speak to Louise Goodman, which was rather funny.
Anyway, with Tyler out the way, and Kimi and Alonso holding station at the front, both clear of a rather tepid Felipe Massa, who hasn't really figured in a race for a good few events, the fun switched to a fairly titanic scrap for the lower points places.
Oddly, after the outrage of all the points he denied the team by taking himself and Webber out in Japan, odd-face Sebastian Vettel was the "best of the rest", occupying the BMW place. As for the BMWs, Ickle had an odd off day, and could only manage 7th, but Bignose hit a winner on the strategy, though sadly not on the reliability. He retired from the lead just after Lewis popped his car into the gravel, and rumour has it that he wasn't scheduled to stop again. T'could have been BMW's first win since a certain chunky legend took the flag in the 2004 Brazilian GP. Oops.
Behind Vettel was Jenson Button's Honda, to prove what a slightly odd finishing order we were given. Ironically, the points Button got here finally lifted Honda above The Goo in the Constructors standings, but they also dropped behind STR at the same time, as Vettel was joined in the points by overweight beard model Vitantonio Liuzzi.
Elsewhere, the Renaults and Toyotas were fairly invisible, Spyker slipped back to the role of "slowest team" after a couple of intermittently promising looking weekends in Spa and Fuji.
Nico had a bit of a 'mare, which Friki managed to ignore by concentrating intently on typing vague commentary quips a few seconds after its own elbow managed them.
Still though, the season is nearly at an end. Just one more Grand Prix between us and a lengthy off-season of boredom and intrigue and occasional car launches. And NOT ONLY do we have the nailbiting scrap between Williams and Red Bull for 4th place in the Constructors Championship to look forward to seeing decided, but we also have the little matter of a three-way fight for the WDC.
So, will it be the mumbly Finn, the prissy Brit or the petulant Spaniard?
You'll have to wait and see, won't you. What do you expect? That Friki knows the answer? It can do many things, but look into the future is not one of them. Honestly, some people are never satisfied, are they. What is the world coming to? The moon on a stick, some people want.
Friki's Unanswered Questions
- Since when do you have gravel traps in the pit lane?
- Would Lewis have slowed down more easily on a tarmac run off?
- Has the exciting WDC finale sort of ruined Friki's planned affirmation that the Celtic Cross championship idea would be far better?
Unofficial Friki F1 Race Points in association with Celtic Crosses
1 Sebastian Vettel 5 Celtic Crosses (Best of the rest!)
2 David Coulthard 4 Celtic Crosses (Point to David!)
3 Jenson Button 3 Celtic Crosses (Points to Jenson!)
4 Robert Kubica 2 Celtic Crosses (This'll cheer him up!)
5 Kimi Raikkonen 1 Celtic Cross (Well, he did win.)
6 STR 1/2 a Celtic Cross (For turning up.)
Unofficial Friki F1 Championship Standings in association with Celtic Crosses
=1 David Coulthard 17 Celtic Crosses
=1 Adrian Sutil 17 Celtic Crosses
3 Nico Rosberg 15 1/2 Celtic Crosses
4 Heikki Kovalainen 14 Celtic Crosses
=5 Jenson Button 13 Celtic Crosses
=5 Lewis Hamilton 13 Celtic Crosses
=5 Ickle 13 Celtic Crosses
8 Mark Webber 11 1/2 Celtic Crosses
=9 Fernando Alonso 11 Celtic Crosses
=9 Felipe Massa 11 Celtic Crosses
11 Kimi Raikkonen 11 Celtic Crosses
12 Sebastian Vettel 10 Celtic Crosses
=13 Giancarlo Fisichella 9 Celtic Crosses
=13 Takuma Sato 9 Celtic Crosses
=15 Robert Kubica 8 Celtic Crosses
=15 Jarno Trulli 8 Celtic Crosses
17 Alexander Wurz 7 Celtic Crosses
=18 Scooch 5 Celtic Crosses
=18 Jamie Murray 5 Celtic Crosses
=18 The Stewards 5 Celtic Crosses
21 Ralf Schumacher 4 1/2 Celtic Crosses
=22 McLaren 4 Celtic Crosses
=22 Jelena Jankovic 4 Celtic Crosses
=24 Markus Winkelhock 3 Celtic Crosses
=24 Boobens 3 Celtic Crosses
26 Admiral Yamamoto 2 1/2 Celtic Crosses
=27 Anthony Davidson 2 Celtic Crosses
=27 Safety Car man 2 Celtic Crosses
29 STR 1 1/2 Celtic Crosses
=30 Bridgestone 1 Celtic Cross
=30 Microsoft Outlook 1 Celtic Cross
=30 Adrian Newey 1 Celtic Cross
=30 Scott Speed 1 Celtic Cross
=34 Brighton 1/2 a Celtic Cross
=34 Canada 1/2 a Celtic Cross
=34 Ferrari 1/2 a Celtic Cross
=34 The Goo 1/2 a Celtic Cross
=34 Tom Varndell 1/2 a Celtic Cross
=39 GNER -5 Celtic Crosses
=39 Rugby -5 Celtic Crosses
41 Rain -10 Celtic Crosses
Review
One round to go, and yet more drama at the head of the leaderboard for the inaugrual Unofficial Friki F1 Championship in association with Celtic Crosses. Many pre-season favourites are now out of contention with only five more crosses to play for, but there are still seven drivers with a chance of clinching the crown at Interlagos.
David Coulthard leaps up to share the lead with rookie leader Adrian Sutil, and they both have a useful cross-and-a-half lead on Nico Rosberg. Further back, but still mathematically in with a chance, lurk Heikki Kovalainen, Jenson Button, Lewis Hamilton and Ickle.
Incidentally, Friki had no desire to fix the standings so there were three Brits in the top 7, it has just sort of happened like that. Many apologies. Perhaps there's just an inbuilt Anglophile gene around these parts which means we can't help it. It would certainly explain James Allen.
