The 2014 F1 Season Preview

It is nearly time!

This is probably my favourite blog post of the year to write. It means we are finally talking in terms of days, not weeks and not months, but actual DAYS until the new F1 season begins. A mammoth 19 race schedule starts in Melbourne this weekend and culminates at the Yas Marina circuit (it wouldn’t have been my choice to host the season finale but hey) in November. And finally there will be a point to Sundays again which quite honestly without F1 are just interminably dull and pointless.

No matter what kind of season has preceded the imminent one, whether it has been truly sensational (2012) or bored the proverbial pants off you (2013), the first Grand Prix of every new season engulfs me in a huge wave of excitement. Its like being a little kid on Christmas Eve again – the sense of anticipation, bundles of nervous energy and the hope that your parents have bought you the latest U2 album that you’d been asking for every single day for weeks on end and not, in a moment of explained madness, The Greatest Hits of Elton John. This memory (yes from the late 80s) scars me to this very day.

This particular season really feels like a Voyage into the Unknown. This type of clichéd phraseology is trotted out by lazy journos so often at the start of new sporting seasons that it sounds trite but really and truly the 2014 season promises to be unlike anything that has gone before. Actually I must confess I re-read last year’s Dash of Eau Rouge Season Preview earlier and I *may* have said something like I really couldn’t predict how this (2013) season would play out. Moron Alert.

Red Bull, winning everything in F1 since 2010

The Red Bull/Vettel dominance hasn’t been a great selling point for the sport in recent years. A technologically driven (no pun intended I promise) sport like F1 must keep reinventing itself to stay ahead of the game and lets be honest, with the exception of Christian Horner and Sebastian Vettel, who in their right mind would want another hideously dull season like 2013. And even Sebastian Vettel must occasionally want to actually race another car as opposed to them being grainy flecks in his rear mirror or mere obstacles for lapping.  These changes will hopefully inject some real excitement and edge into races again [dispels from mind the not-at-all ludicrous possibility of Silver Arrows winning every race between now and Monaco].

My Twitter feed has already gone F1 mental. The drivers have now arrived in Australia, the teams are all there, the cars are there (well only in a manner of speaking in some cases), Lewis is chillaxing in Sydney with his bro Tinie Tempah and I would honestly give a squidillion trillion pounds to be there. Melbourne does season openers so so well, all the drivers clearly love it there as well as the TV presenters and crews. Come race day it will be Celeb Central on the grid (oh #MartinsGridWalk I have missed thee) but in all fairness if money, kids, real life etc were no object Melbourne would definitely make it into my Top 5 F1 races to attend.

A Grand Prix in a beautiful city with a relaxed party vibe - whats not to like?

Since the Australian GP moved from the iconic Adelaide track (the destination for the final race of the season from 1985 to 1995) to Melbourne it has had the honour of opening the F1 season (bar a couple of years for reasons or indeed races that entirely escape me). And Albert Park has given us a mixture of magnificent races, shock results and controversy. These ones immediately spring to mind:

Irv the Swerve on his way to being a title contender (yes really!)

1996 – the one where Damon Hill won after Brundle’s horrendous airborne crash on the first lap.

1998 – the one where we all watched in awe as the gleaming MP4/13s obliterated the rest of the field and then some (admittedly it was an utter snoozefest but oddly memorable for its significance).

1999 – the one where Eddie Irvine took his first win for Ferrari (so not in Jean Todt’s script) after a thrillingly topsy turvy race.

2002 – the one where half the cars were eliminated in an apocalyptic accident by the end of the first lap and home favourite Mark Webber came home on his debut in 5^th place IN A MINARDI.

2009 – the one where Brawn GP came from nowhere (literally nowhere – Brawn GP was formed out of the dormant Honda team only 3 weeks before the first race) to wipe the floor with the opposition and their drivers (Jenson and Rubens) sealed a 1-2 victory. Funny what can happen when you bring in a whole load of major rule changes. Oh.

2013 – the one where Kimi took first blood for Lotus and everything seemed possible. Sobs at what could have been...

Brawn GP in 2009 - the surprise package to end all surprise packages

What will be the story of the 2014 race? Mercedes dominance? A joyful Williams first win since 2012? Renault engine carnage? A stunning debut by Kevin Magnussen? Multi-21: The Sequel at Ferrari? Will Martin flirt more with Kylie than Dannii on the grid or bypass both for Tanja Bauer? So many imponderables…

Those gorgeous Minogue girls

Last year everyone banged on endlessly about tyres. This year it is officially the Year of the Engine which has given the sport the biggest shake up since like…well ever.  Christian Horner (the savviest media operator in F1 by a mile) has predicted Mercedes could have the race won in a couple of laps. Certainly (on the face of it) it looks like a straight fight between Mercedes and Williams with the dark prancing horse of Ferrari impossible to discount. The word is a lot of the teams will use the three practice sessions simply as test sessions. McLaren for starters are bringing a brand new aerodynamics package to Australia. That cushy happy existence at McLaren under Martin Whitmarsh is but a thing of the past – if the Dark Lord himself Ron Dennis says he wants a better car, then he will get a better car.

Only three days to go. I can almost smell the burnt rubber. By the time I wake up on Friday morning, Practice 1 (1.30am-3am) will have taken place but the 3 year old’s inbuilt dawn chorus alarm clock means at least I will be up in time to catch Practice 2 (5.30am-7am). But the main event will be the utterly spine-tingling moment when finally after months of waiting its lights out in Melbourne at 06.00 hours on Sunday morning and we will witness the dawning of a new F1 era.

Indian GP - Qualifying

Previously on F1, this man dominated from start to finish and starts on pole tomorrow. You do the maths.

Stone the crows…I’m actually going to blog qualifying. For the first time since Singapore. Back to a golden age when a car other than a Red Bull was on the front row of the grid. Truly a happier time. So will it be 60 minutes of cars setting fast laps, at the end of which Sebastian Vettel will get pole? Let us see.

He actually looks scarier when he smiles.

All hail the Indian GP for putting on qualifying at a great time for the House of Power. The 5 year old refused to go to football due to the arctic weather outside (its safe to say he’s no Roy Keane in the making) and is ridiculously excited that the F1 roadshow has now rocked up in his beloved India. I asked him yesterday why he likes India so much and he said “because it has hot deserts and pyramids”. Go figure.

I’m boycotting the Beeb this weekend due to the fact that their chief F1 writer believes that apparently Michael Schumacher is only the 4^th best driver of all time. Biased much? I await with interest the eulogies on the top three (Fangio, Senna and Clark – all of whom I think were utterly brilliant drivers for the record) and the convenient lack of mention of the fact that they won all or most of their titles in The Best Car of its Day just like the villainous Michael Schumacher.

Downtown Delhi - a riot of noise and colour and insanity.

Watching the opening moments of the Sky coverage which showed the team risking life and limb trying to navigate their way through downtown Delhi in tiny little cars, I realised that driving in Delhi looks a lot like Mario Kart. Crazy does not cover the half of it. Maybe this could account for the 5 year old’s fascination with the place! I read an article on driving in Delhi the other day and came across this brilliant quote:

“Real men don’t feel pain. They don’t cry. They also don’t use an indicator. We in Delhi – we are all khaalis mard. All Man.”

So Bernie, how about a Grand Prix in Cuba?

First up, an interview with Bernie (poor Martin Brundle, two near-death experiences in one day) about the endless, protracted negotiations on the Concorde Agreement. According to Bernie it is all the fault of the lawyers. In the good old days, according to Bernie, you used to just scribble things down on the back of an envelope – damn those pesky lawyers hey for wanting things done properly. More worryingly, Bernie seems to think we might lose 2 or 3 races in Europe in order to ‘move on’. Brundle to his credit looked utterly aghast and pointed out that this would mean we would only have 4 races left in Europe. OH GOOD. Because we all want more races like the coma-inducing Singapore, Korea and Bahrain ones.

Welcome to Narain's home grand prix!

Its Time For Narain to give us a guide to the circuit! Its actually quite a fun looking circuit with a mini Eau Rouge hill up to a very long straight. The main issue last year was lots of dust. Oh and also Narain said he got a bit dazzled by all the orange stripes bordering the track. Bless. Johnny Herbert said Narain’s main problem was his team-mate being faster than him. Fair point when all’s said and done.

Time to get on with the important business of qualifying and with two minutes to go of Q1, the top three were Vettel, Hamilton and Webber. Hovering just above the Dropzone of Doom was Paul Di Resta, Schuey and Kobayashi. Vergne was languishing in 18^th spot while his team-mate, Ricciardo, shot up to 12^th place. Kovalainen spun off and parked his car on some gravel. Its fair to say his career has been downhill (black-run style) since his one, failed shot at stardom at Team McLaren.  Dumped out of Q1 were the usual suspects: HRT x2, Marussia x2, Caterham x2 and Jean-Eric Vergne but, importantly, Narain Karthikeyan was NOT last. Anyhoo, the fastest drivers on the track in Q1 were Maldonaldo, Vettel and Rosberg. Hope springs eternal.

With 3 minutes to go of Q2, Vettel and Webber were the fastest Adrian Newey designed cars drivers on track. Bored already. Massa was stuck in 17^th (wonder if Luca regrets offering that new contract yet?) and the Bad Boys of F1, Grosjean and Maldonaldo, were 15^th and 16^th respectively. Massa found a scrap of pace and shunted Schuey into the dropzone and all eyes were on Kimi who had yet to make it into the top ten but with a final push squeaked into 8^th place. Maldonaldo from 17^th did a blistering lap to zoom up into 7^th place. Schumacher could not improve on his time and will only start tomorrow in 14^th place. Not a good day at the office then for Schuey, Grosjean and Senna who all missed the cut unlike their team-mates. The biggest cloud of misery would be hanging over the Force India garage whose drivers, Di Resta and the Hulk, would only be starting in 12^th and 16^th. Ouch.

If the commentators are going to name-check James Bond, then I feel entitled to follow suit!

And finally time for the chaos, mayhem and pandemonium of the final shoot-out session. Well I talk a good talk but with 3 minutes to go, a grand total of 3 cars had set a time – Webber, Alonso and Hamilton. Is it just me or is this qualifying format not really working? In The Most Desperate Attempt Ever to include a topical James Bond reference, Brundle noted that Vettel was 7/1000ths out or alternatively 007. Not to be outdone, Crofty then said Vettel was ‘the Man with the Golden Finger’. Please make it stop now.

And whatd’ya know….Vettel put his car on provisional pole. Gah. This is how everyone will line up in tomorrow’s race:

1.     Vettel

2.     Webber

3.     Hamilton (snuck into 3^rd spot at the death)

4.     Button

5.     Alonso

6.     Massa

7.     Kimi

8.     Perez

9.     Maldonaldo

10.  Someone is missing! No time was set...<checks results> ah, its Rosberg

Tough times for Alonso. Is the title slipping inexorably away?

So its the third consecutive Red Bull front row lock-out – oh whoopi-do-dah. Barring a miracle, it looks ominously like its Vettel’s championship for the taking. Darn Adrian Newey and his genius car upgrades that arrived in Singapore. Seb has the swagger jagger of a champion elect (while Alonso marched into the pits with a pained grimace) although despite what Martin Brundle says, Seb looks nothing like Brad Pitt! Clearly Martin would be as useless as the husband at a quiz-night picture round.

Anyway on race day anything can happen. We all know from Narain that those orange stripes can play havoc with a driver’s senses so fingers crossed for some cracking action.

Singapore GP - The Race

A small clue as to my thoughts on the race!

In a season full of stupendously exciting races, it was inevitable that there would be one absolute crashing bore snoozefest of a race. And so it came to pass at Singapore. If truth be told, the Monaco Grand Prix was also pretty dull this year but Monaco is steeped in F1 history with lashings of glamour and yachts and so is an Untouchable Track. Also once every 5 years, Monaco throws up an absolute corker of a race (normally in torrential rain) which is the Stand Out Race of the Season. So it is a keeper.

I think Singapore is definitely a race to experience in person. This is a nicely positioned hotel. Hint hint.

Singapore in contrast just makes you lose the will to live. And we have Bernie to thank for 5 more years of this dross. I was utterly baffled by the almost universal joy among F1 types on Twitter at this news. Either I’m hopelessly out of step or it goes to show that you really do ‘have to be there’ to appreciate Singapore. Another fatal flaw with the Singapore GP is that it is a night race. Yes, I know this is its USP and again it must be incredible to go and watch a race at night-time blah blah but all that translates to onto my TV is lots of cars driving on tarmac in between concrete walls in pitch darkness. Not even a freaking tree or hill in the distance to make life more interesting.

Still cover me, I’m going in. 

The lovely Katy Perry. Lets hope she had a good book with her.

Jake’s opening gambit was to excitedly announce “by the time its completely dark, the cars will be on track”. Yes, Jake, I know and it sucks. The only build-up on the BBC highlights show was a recap of qualifying (I was unable to watch the race live due to Important Football and obviously I wasn’t daft enough to sit through a full re-run). I remember seeing lots of mentions of Katy Perry on my twitter feed at the time of the race so lets hope Martin Brundle managed to sneak in a question to Petrolhead Katy as to what she thought of Ferrari’s revised new rear-wing endplate. Actually while I was quickly doing some ‘research’ earlier, I stumbled across this website detailing all the latest technical developments in the cars. My eyes glaze over at anything remotely technical but it is right up the husband’s street.

Time For the Start and Go Go Go...! And it was a good clean start even for the enfants terribles of F1, Maldonaldo and Grosjean. Vettel had a storming start to leap into 2^nd place. Button was in 3^rd and an uber-cautious Maldonaldo was going backwards (but without crashing into anyone!). Grosjean and Webber were having a bit of a tussle and Rosberg had somehow got ahead of Michael Schumacher.

By the end of the first lap, poor old Petrov had lost his front wing so had to immediately hobble into the pits along with Massa who was running last but no one seemed to have a scoobie why. Turned out to be a puncture but don’t worry, Felipe, I’m sure Stefano Domenicali hadn’t even noticed.

And our first incidents were under investigation – Rosberg and Webber. For what? It was just the usual race start jostling! Just be thankful it wasn’t the carnage of Spa. BTW, have you ever noticed that Coulthard says A-lon-zo and not Alonso. It is very annoying. You can see my mind started wandering very early during this race.

Watching paint dry - more interesting than Sunday's race?

I may have dozed off because suddenly it was lap 11 (nothing had changed obviously) and Vettel was in the pits. He rejoined the race in 12^th place and promptly muscled his way past Perez. Button was starting to close on Hamilton. Cue lots of speculation as to when Hamilton was pitting. On lap 12, Alonso pitted, then Schumacher and meanwhile Button was gaining yet more time on Hamilton. Slightly ominously, Hamilton radioed in to say he had a ‘funny feeling’ (as DC quipped “lets hope that tonight’s going to be a good night” – its sure going to be a long one).

Hamilton came into the pits on lap 13 and it was a very fast pitstop. Blimey, at this rate, my McLaren Pitstop Disastometer will be redundant. Still give it time… Crucially he came out in front of Vettel. High fives all around at McLaren! Lap 14 (out of 61 – give me strength) and Kimi pitted and then sensational news (ie. the commentators tried to inject some fake excitement), we heard that Jenson Button was coming in at the end of this lap. Seriously, in the context of this race, pitstops were like manna from heaven in terms of entertainment. And where did Button rejoin the race? In 3^rd place. Where he originally was.  B-o-ring.

Jezza. He didn't think much of Singapore either!

I think Jeremy Clarkson spoke for a nation (bear with me…) when he posted these tweets:

If I want to watch loads of cars driving along, I could stand on a motorway bridge.

Turn the sprinklers on. Shoot someone's helmet with an air rifle. Tell Lewis on the radio his girlfriend slept with Kimi last night.

Zzzzzzz. Where was I? We had a couple of near misses involving the Hulk and Maldonaldo; and then Rosberg and Kobayashi. Nothing as thrilling as an actual crash obviously. Not saying the race was duller than a dull convention at the University of Dull (shameless Blackadder steal which probably shows my age – still what doesn’t these days?) but the commentators were even telling us excitedly that Charles Pic had just been in for a pitstop. We. Don’t. Care. There was a lot of chat about the BBC’s new golden boy, Paul Di Resta, that I mostly managed to block out because you know what dudes, he was only running in 8^th place. Name on the trophy and all that – it sure as hell won’t be Di Resta.

Lewis Hamilton - is the title race slipping away from him?

And then on lap 23, a SHOCKING DEVELOPMENT. No really, it was totally shocking! Lewis Hamilton’s car totally conked out – and the eagle eyed DC immediately noticed he was in neutral and that his gear-box was stuffed. A big blow to his title chances and we saw Lewis dejectedly walking away looking back in disbelief at his car. I’m going to put my neck on the line and call this a Pivotal Moment in the Title Race. We heard a snippet of Radio McLaren saying ‘we did all we could yesterday’ so looks like they had some inkling that the car was not right. Guys, this is not going to persuade Lewis to take a pay cut. If he wants a dodgy unreliable car, he might as well go to Mercedes and get £60 million smackeroos.

Zzzzzzzzz-ing forward to lap 30 and Maldonaldo came in for an unexpectedly early pitstop and he rejoined just behind Grosjean and ahead of Alonso. Looking good for Fernando given there was a fairly reasonable chance that Maldonaldo and Grosjean were bound to crash at some point! We then followed the ‘battle for 4^th’ featuring Nico, Grosjean, Maldonaldo and Alonso for an eternity. Well, when I say battle, I just mean 4 cars following each other around like a queue snaking into Homebase on a Bank Holiday. If a driver as brilliant as Alonso can’t make a move stick at this goddamn track, then what is the point of it.

And HALLELUJAH!!! On lap 33, Narain Karthitheyan crashed his car into the wall at turn 18. Finally we had a bit of frigging excitement with a safety car and lots of frantic pitstops. Narain, like most of us, was probably just bored senseless and decided to call it a day.

Michael and Jean-Eric. Awkward.

On lap 38, while still behind the Safety Car, Vettel very naughtily slowed nearly causing Jenson Button to plough into the back of him. Disaster was averted – just about – by Jenson’s lightning reactions. But one lap later, we had actual carnage. Barely had DC uttered the words ‘Schumacher will now have the opportunity to have a little run at Jean-Eric Vergne’ when Schuey did indeed have a little run at Vergne by crashing into the back of Vergne’s car and…er…bringing both their races to a juddering halt of mangled car. To the immense credit of Vergne, he didn’t hit Schuey handled the incident in a very mature way.

The Safety Car. The star turn at the Singapore Grand Prix!

So out came the safety car again and we were told the race would apparently go to the ‘time limit’ as we’d now had two safety cars and the race would be timed out. Here’s a thought. Maybe the race is actually too long. Anyhoo, the race got underway properly again on lap 43 and Kimi had clearly awoken from his Singapore GP induced coma and started driving like a demon right behind his team-mate. There was a stunning little battle going on between Senna and Massa which resulted in Massa squeezing past Senna at a place where no one should overtake. Very brave driving from Felipe! Then inexplicably, we heard that the incident was being investigated. Oh for heaven’s sake, what is wrong with some people? We finally had a stunning bit of racing and its treated suspiciously.

So 12 laps to go and it was a straight fight between Vettel and Button for the win with a 1.8 second gap between them. Time for our next incident. As Perez tried to nip down on the inside of the Hulk, they tangled and Perez’s Sauber lost its front wing. Have Massa and Perez  already swapped cars on the sly – this is role reversal gone mad. Next to wake up from their Singapore GP coma was Webber who executed a balls of steel move to get past Kobayashi but as the Hulk decided to join in on the fun, he clattered into Kamui (knocking off another Sauber front wing) and picked up a puncture himself into the bargain. Sauber really have the worst luck in the world.

And finally the end of the race and deliverance was nigh as the clock ticked to zero heralding the Final Lap. Too late for poor old Bruno Senna who was forced to retire from the race with loss of power.

Seb and Jenson. Another year, another 1-2. Can we just give them a 1-2 for next year already and scrap the race?!

So without further ado, here are the results from the Singapore Grand Prix 2012:

1.     Vettel – Back in the title race with a vengeance.

2.     Button – Spared McLaren’s blushes with a super-cool drive.

3.     Alonso – Yet again, on the podium.

4.     Di Resta – Be still my beating heart (joke).

5.     Rosberg – An excellent drive given the uselessness of the Mercedes car.

6.     Raikkonen – Qualified 12^th and finished 6^th on a track where you can’t overtake. 

And what does this all mean for the title race – the main contenders:

1.     Alonso – 194

2.     Vettel – 165

3.     Raikkonen – 149 (and to think he hasn’t even won a single race!)

4.     Hamilton – 142 (what a costly mechanical failure he had in this race)

Well go me, I managed to blog about the Singapore GP without slipping into a coma myself or simply cutting and pasting the BBC’s review which was seriously tempting.

Next time around, we are in Suzuka. A fab-u-lous track which has given us many great races and my All Time Best Sporting Moment.