Italy – Race Analysis

A good race with a magnificent drive from winner Fernando Alonso: That was the story of the 2007 Italian Grand Prix. With four races to go in the Formula One season, it seems like the final battle will be among the two McLaren drivers. The 18-point difference from championship leader Lewis Hamilton to 3rd place Kimi Raikkonen is unlikely to completely go away, especially because we have seen so few retirements this year.

Alonso stole the show in Monza

Pole position, best lap, race win. I could stop here and it would be enough for everyone to understand what a great race Fernando Alonso had. The details show that it was even greater. For every lap of the whole weekend, he was 2 to 3 tenths of a second faster than Hamilton.

He saved the best for the race, though. When it became known that Ferrari had prepared a single-stop strategy for Raikkonen, Alonso would have to drive as fast as ever to stay as leader after his 2nd stop. Kimi pitted on lap 25 and was about 15 seconds behind. Alonso would need a 28-to-30-second gap to guarantee that he would rejoin the race ahead of the Ferrari. He had fuel up to lap 43, which meant 18 laps to open up 15 more seconds – more than 8 tenths a lap. Although Raikkonen had a lot more weight due to the larger fuel load, it would be hard. Not for Alonso. He just drove some of the fastest laps of the race. By the end of the stint he was consistently lapping at around 1min23s. Just so everyone can understand how fast that was: 1) His fastest lap of the race was 1min22.871s, and he was consistently lapping close to that time; 2) Lewis Hamilton’s fastest lap was 1min22.936s, barely beating the 1min23s that Alonso clocked many times, lap after lap.

There were a lot of great performances in Monza – including those from Jenson Button, Heikki Kovalainen, Robert Kubica and Nico Rosberg –, but as emotional as the other choices may be, the lap chart tells me that I must pick Fernando Alonso as the star of the race.

Second was not bad for Lewis

What else could Hamilton have done? Nothing, in my opinion. Racing is like this: one day you beat your teammate, the other day he beats you. Sometimes he beats you badly, like Alonso did to Hamilton in Monza. It was just one of those days, and hopefully for Hamilton there will not be many more of those until the end of the year. Fernando is just 3 points behind Lewis in the championship standings.

Hamilton’s overtaking manoeuvre over Raikkonen was one of the greatest this season. In fact, I think it is tied for number 2 this year – number 1 has to be Nick Heidfeld’s brilliant move around Alonso in Bahrain and the other number 2 is Kubica’s move around Rosberg yesterday. He had to go by Raikkonen, and it was only a matter of time before he did, because his car was faster. By surprisingly pulling aside just as he barely got close to Ferrari, he made his job a lot easier, as Raikkonen did not even have the chance to close the inside line. Even the Formula One Management TV transmission lost the exact moment when Lewis got by Kimi, so surprising that it was.

I am a bit worried about the way Lewis started the race. Maybe I am too old-fashioned, but in my opinion the start is a drag race towards the first corner. In drag races one driver must respect the other driver’s line. I know that in today’s F1 it is very important to get to the clean racing path, but Lewis just threw his car towards Felipe Massa and hoped that the latter would avoid the collision. Hamilton usually makes a lot of moves going into the first corner. If all drivers were to zigzag like that, half of the grid would be out of the race before the first corner. In the old days, the other drivers would have spoken to Lewis and they would respectfully get to an agreement about how to proceed at the starts. Today, it seems like they do not talk to each other anymore.

Ferrari beaten at their home turf

Considering all teams and all countries where F1 goes to, the most painful defeat has to be that of Ferrari in Italy, because the Italian fans are so passionate about the red team. This time it hurt even more. Ferrari was expected to win the race. Their longer wheelbase should have helped them around the Parabolica curve. In reality, McLaren could not only match Ferrari’s straightaway speed, but could also beat them at most corners, including the critical Lesmo and Ascari curves, just before two short straightaways. My only guess is that the Mercedes-Benz engine is stronger than the one from Ferrari, so McLaren could use more wing and have better results at the high speed corners.

The one thing that should never have happened was the suspension breakdown in Massa’s car. That was critical. Now he is 23 points behind Hamilton and I believe Ferrari has only one shot at the drivers’ championship – with Raikkonen. Unless the spy scandal changes everything...

My two words on the spy scandal

As an engineer myself, I have sworn to follow the law and never to deviate from what is known as ‘integrity’. This oath is taken by engineers everywhere. If half of the information released by the press about the spy scandal is true, I am sorry, the two engineers that are involved – Nigel Stepney and Mike Coughlan – should go to jail, McLaren should lose all of its constructor points and be banned from the 2007 season – and possibly from 2008 as well. If the drivers had no involvement with the illegal procedures, they should be allowed to keep their points. Just the fact that they will be forced to change teams in mid-season – if they can – will compensate for the points they got by indirectly benefiting from the illegal information. Again, this is my opinion only if these accusations are true. Ok, maybe I wrote more than two words.

Italy’s quick notes

- Robert Kubica had a really bad first pit stop, as he stopped the car in the wrong position and the mechanics had problems with the jack. Later, his bold move around Nico Rosberg was one of the season’s highlights and compensated for anything that went wrong.

- Sebastian Vettel had very good practice and qualifying sessions, but during the race he made a small mistake and ran into Davidson. Overall he was much better than in Turkey, though, but still not better than the replaced Scott Speed.

- I expected more from Jarno Trulli, but another bad start put him out of contention for the points. He finished only 11th.

- Jenson Button and Nico Rosberg showed what it is like to race wheel to wheel, respecting each other’s racing line. I wish all F1 drivers were as respectful as them.

- Heikki Kovalainen finished 7th, leaving his teammate Giancarlo Fisichella far behind in 12th position. Another great race by Heikki, especially because the Renault engine does not seem to be very strong this year.

Star of the race:

Fernando Alonso

Shame of the race:

Ferrari as a team – especially for having the single race retirement related to mechanical failure.

--Andre N.