Category: Ferrari

Sebastian Vettel’s second win in a row at the Indian Grand Prix has made him pretty popular with the 1.3 billion locals. His answer to the question about what is unique in India compared to the others countries F1 races in will also help boost his popularity.

Speaking of popularity, we don’t really want to make Martin Brundle’s head too big, but his debut on the podium to conduct the post-race interviews was first-class. From afar the podium interviews have looked like an ill-conceived idea carried out quite poorly at times. Over time they have improved and if we can get decent questions race after race, like we saw from Brundle, then perhaps the fans at the racetrack and at home can both benefit.

The other point of note we learned from the presser is that Mark Webber’s KERS started playing silly buggers around one-third race distance.

[Pic: Ferrari]

It’s quite a simple post-race report for the 2012 Indian Grand Prix tonight, really. Sebastian Vettel made a clean start, having to cover his Red Bull teammate, Mark Webber, into the first corner before driving off into the sunset collecting his fourth race win in succession.

There was a minor issue for Vettel inside the final 10 laps when his floor rubbed along the ground for a few brief moments, but ultimately it came to nothing.

Ferrari, mindful of having to make up places for Alonso from his P5 grid position, geared their man for straight line speed. And it was a very effective ply; the dual world champ able to despatch the two McLarens early on. Although he did have to wait for a failing KERS unit on Mark Webber’s car before being able to claim second place for his own on lap 48 of 60.

Webber was able to hang on and deny a fast charging Lewis Hamilton to earn himself the final step on the podium. Hamilton, then, finished in P4 ahead of McLaren teammate, Jenson Button, and Ferrari’s Felipe Massa.

Young Aussie Daniel Ricciardo came home in P13, two places ahead of his Toro Rosso teammate, Jean-Eric Vergne. The result for Ricciardo was made easier after Vergne and Schumacher came to blows on the opening lap. It was only minor contact, but enough to give Schumi a puncture and Vergne needing to pit for a new front wing.

Schumacher was called into the garage early by his team, but was a classified as a finisher, albeit five laps off the pace. He will be investigated by stewards for ignoring blue flags as well. The general malaise of Schumacher’s late season form has gone beyond amusement or embarrassment now. It’s just sad to watch.

There’s only three races to go now and while the title is not safe for Vettel yet, you’d reckon only something extraordinary will prevent the young German etching his name into the record books as the sport’s youngest ever triple world champion. Indeed, such is Vettel’s current dominance he has led every lap, unbroken, for the last three grands prix.

Good luck Fernando, you’re going to need it!

Here is the full post-race transcript from today’s press conference at today’s Korean Grand Prix. Obviously a lot of the talk was about tyre wear and Sebastian Vettel replacing Fernando Alonso atop the world championship table.

We liked this reply from Alonso when talking about the remainder of the season, “We seem to extract the maximum from the car when we are under pressure and as I said, four beautiful races to come with good possibilities for us to fight for the championship…

“I’m sure there will be some circuits where we are a little bit more competitive, and some circuits where we are maybe not competitive enough, but overall, in the last four races, as we said, now we need to score seven points more than Sebastian, that will be extremely tough but we believe we can do it.”

Let’s hope we have a fight for the championship that goes right down to the last lap of the last race.

[Pic: Red Bull/Getty Images]

Sebastian Vettel won today’s 2012 Korean Grand Prix, making it three wins on the trot for Red Bull and with it he gains the lead in the chase for the world championship. Vettel took the lead in the first corner of the race and was never headed, despite a great scrap with teammate and pole sitter Mark Webber on that opening lap.

Webber held onto that second position without too much bother, despite a relatively strong third place from Fernando Alonso (Ferrari).

Felipe Massa’s resurgence continued and on another day, and in another team perhaps, he would have challenged Alonso for third place. About three quarters of the way through the race Massa was told, in effect, that Fernando was slower than him and, given their respective world championship rankings, was asked to maintain postion.

This was a race where nothing happened and everything happened. In the midfield there was action aplenty. Kamui Kobayishi (Sauber) appeared to skittle Jenson Button (McLaren) and Nico Rosberg (Mercedes AMG) on the first lap. But right throughout the race there mini-battles keeping the focus of the sparse crowd in attendance.

Daniel Ricciardo (Toro Rosso) dropped five places on the grid thanks to the dreaded unscheduled gearbox change. That meant he started from P21 and the young Aussie put in a cracking drive to get as high as eighth place. Late in the race wearing tyres were the story for the whole field. Ricciardo would have been disappointed that he had to let Jean-Eric Vergne by to take his eighth place, having previously enjoyed a buffer in excess of 10 seconds. But after starting so far down the pack he’d be very happy with the two points for P9.

It was a dirty day for McLaren, losing Button on the first lap, while Lewis Hamilton struggled with tyre wear as the race developed. In the end he had to complete three pit stops compared to the bulk of the field’s two and could only manage P10. Compounding McLaren’s woes, it appeared as though Hamilton could overtake Ricciardo in the final stages, but the 2008 world champion collected a loose piece of astro turf after running wide at Turn 13 that greatly affected his aero. He did will to hold onto tenth place. The net result of this bad day sees Ferrari overtake them in the constructors’ championship.

Meanwhile the lack of overtaking in the first four places would indicate a relatively placid race, but things really sparked up in the latter stages as that previously mentioned tyre wear took hold. At times Vettel’s race engineer, Guillaume ‘Rocky’ Rocquelin, had to plead with his young charge to slow down as the anti-clockwise circuit took its toll on the right front.

Similarly, Mark Webber was struggling with and it seemed for a moment that Fernando Alonso had judged the race to perfection as he began to close on Webber. Soon the minor places settled back into their rhythm, so much so that Webber set the fastest lap of the race on the penultimate round, and the only query over the result was if Vettel’s right front tyre would last.

Thankfully for the 25-year-old German it did and he was able to safely register his 25th career win. With Red Bull’s late season form, and only four races to go, you’d have to think it would be a major upset if Vettel does not collect his third world championship in succession.