Tag Archives: mark webber

McLaren falter and Red Bull charge onwards in Japan

With the five title contenders only 25pts or a race win apart the championship looked incredibly close going into the race. Vettel’s victory and the failure of either McLaren driver to even look like they could get on the podium unless one of the other guys has a problem means that the championship looks less open going to Korea.
If Red Bull don’t have an issue at the next race, and I probably mean a double DNF here then the McLaren guys are out of the title race now, Alonso is still in there but it’s looking more and more like Red Bull have this year in the bag.
Kobayashi had a fantastic race for Sauber and was the only man to really drive past people, if the tactical guys at Sauber had got their act together then he may well have finished further up the field than he did. If more [...]

Alonso shines under the lights of Singapore

Love him or hate him Fernando Alonso is a great F1 driver, he soaked up tremendous amounts of pressure to secure a back-to-back victory for himself and Ferrari. He needed those points to give himself a hope in the title and now he’s only 9 points behind Mark Webber, that would be under two in last years system. Button is now 25pts off the pace but that’s still only a single race victory. With four races to go a DNF would probably be the end of the title chances unless everyone else suffers similarly. With races in Japan, Korea, Brazil and Abu Dhabi on the calendar and with some doubt surrounding the Korean GP there is simply no margin for error.
The race itself took part under floodlight which is the norm for Singapore, which into it’s third year didn’t seem to prove an issue to the drivers as they [...]

Ferrari rule in Monza and the title closes up – again

If you’re driving a Ferrari, Monza is the place you want to win, the Tifosi will celebrate you like a King – it doesn’t matter who you are, they may have cheered so loudly a few years ago when your engine expired when driving for a rival but all that is forgotten if your Ferrari takes the chequered flag first.
So Alonso gets another of the jewels for any Ferrari driver and it was all down to about 5 metres out of the pit lane, the team won the race not just Alonso, Buttons stop was about half a second slower than Alonso’s and that made all the difference. That’s not to say that the Spaniard couldn’t have overtaken Button on the track but I don’t see any reason to believe that he’d have been able to do something he hadn’t managed for the first two thirds of the race. But [...]

McLaren rise back to the top at Spa, but what was Vettel doing?

McLaren came back to winning ways in Spa after Red Bull had dominated the last few races, how much of that is to do with the new load tests and how much is to do with McLaren’s improvement is unclear but it does make the championship more interesting. With Hamilton and Webber scoring heavy points and Button, Vettel and Alonso not scoring it puts the Championship into a new light too, it won’t take much to make it a two horse race.
The race itself showed why the drivers love Spa, and why as spectators it can be interesting due to the rain. When it rains at the track is always causes problems as it only gets part of the circuit. This leads to difficult tyre choices and turns drivers into heroes, or makes them look stupid, of course managing to T-bone another car whilst on a straight is still quite [...]