Spanish Grand Prix Review

April 28, 2008

The Spanish Grand Prix was this past Sunday, and, as expected, Ferrari walked away with it. Kimi had an excellent qualifying session and was on the pole, even though he had more fuel than Felipe Massa, who was third. With passing being very difficult at the Circuit de Catalunya, the race was sealed at the first corner, with Kimi in first, and Felipe taking second away from Fernando Alonso. Even though the race was far from exciting, the weekend had plenty of other points of interest.

The weekend started with not knowing if Super Aguri would make it to the race. The investment deal with Magma had fallen through and Super Aguri was basically out of money. Honda had said that they would no longer support them, but at the last minute gave them a reprieve. Honda said they would support them for this weekend, but this was the last weekend, and Super Aguri needs to find financing if they want to race in Turkey.

The suprise of the weekend was Fernando Alonso’s qualifying session (in fact his whole weekend). The Renault has certainly found speed since the first three races, and Fernando was able to qualify second. Even though his car was light on fuel, it wasn’t recklessly so. In fact, it was an aggressive strategy that might have paid off if his engine hadn’t blown up.

McLaren were back, although a little slower than the Ferrari’s. Thankfully, Heikki Kovalainen survived a huge impact spearing into the tyre barrier at about 150 mph after his front left wheel failed, making him a passenger. It didn’t look good for a while, but it appears that he only had a slight concussion and should be ready for Turkey. Lewis Hamilton managed to finish third after starting in fifth place.

Robert Kubica had another good race finishing fourth, which was much better than his teammate Nick Heidfeld, who finished ninth after being caught out by the safety car, and having to stop and refuel even though the pits were closed. This meant that he received a 10 second stop and go penalty.

Red-Bull had a better weekend with Mark Webber finishing fifth. David Coulthard had another accident (this time with Timo Glock) and finished twelfth.

Honda had a better weekend with Jensen Button finishing sixth, and Barrichello not finishing after an incident with Fisichella.

Williams had a disappointing qualifying session, with Nakajima out qualifying Rosberg for the first time. Rosberg is able to make it to 7th place (from 15th) before an engine failure. Nakajima finished 7th.

Toyota are definitely looking better this year, and Trulli would have had 6th, but a mistake on the radio (he thought he was called into the pits, but it was Glock) meant he pitted three times instead of two. This dropped him to 8th and the final points paying position.

Toro Rosso had a terrible race, with Vetel being punted off on the first lap (for the 3rd time this year, if he didn’t have bad luck, he would have none at all), and Bourdais had suspension failure after a clash with Piquet.

Force India had looked much better in practice this week, but Sutil had an accident with Vetel at the beginning. Fisichella managed to get as high as 8th, before finishing in 10th place.

Now on to Turkey, with Ferrari 12 points ahead in the constructors championship, and Kimi 9 points ahead in the drivers.

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