Hungary 2012 - What We Learnt

 By Jem Ruggera

When Lotus, When?

Oh Lotus. It's like you're playing with us. Tantalising us with these glimpses of pace, tempting us with the possibility that with the right strategy you can convert the inherent speed of the E20 into the race win we've been talking about since the start of the season.

At the Hungarian Grand Prix, Romain Grosjean was in scintillating form on Saturday afternoon. He completed the first lap in the same position that he started, which, for the Frenchman, was a pretty good effort, especially considering he was starting on the dusty side of the track. He had a few leery moments during the race, particularly accelerating out of the chicane, but he generally tracked winner Lewis Hamilton throughout the race.

The truly exciting one to watch was, of course, Kimi Raikkonen. His qualifying position of fifth was still a little disappointing, and one suspects that if he'd just qualified a little higher... No, let's not go there. His pace in the second stint was phenomenal, and it was around this time Kimi played himself into the battle for the lead. Exiting the pits after his second and final stop, the two Lotuses were side-by-side into Turn 1. Raikkonen had the inside line, and hung Grosjean out to dry. No team orders at Lotus then...

Raikkonen quickly hunted Hamilton down, and with fifteen laps to go he was within DRS range. From there however, he never really managed to get himself into a position to make a run, and he duly followed Lewis over the line.

A 2-3 finish for Lotus moves them to within a point of second-placed McLaren, and Kimi is now just six points behind second-placed Mark Webber in the drivers standings. There were rumours of Ferrari being interested in Kimi Raikkonen for 2013, but considering they paid close to $25 million just a few years ago for him not to drive for them, it all seems rather unlikely.

 

When Lotus team principal Eric Boullier was asked if he expected to keep both Kimi Raikkonen and team-mate Romain Grosjean next year, he said: "Definitely. There is no reason for them to leave." He has a point. The E20 is fundamentally a strong car, a car that is thick in the fight for second in the championship. Kimi is driving as well as he ever he has, and Romain Grosjean is truly the comeback king of 2012. Wins, and championships, beckon.

Right?

Modern Classics - Silverstone 2003

Modern Classics

The British Grand Prix - Silverstone 2003

By David Galton-Fenzi

In this column we’ll take a look at the epic races of the modern era. Races that were so unforgettable that they deserve to be retold and re-lived,  and to celebrate this week’s British Grand Prix we’re looking at a Silverstone classic, the day Rubens made them all look very ordinary.

---

The Story So Far

---

I’m sure it doesn’t actually feel that long ago but we’re going back 9 years here. The Wachowskis (Don’t call them brothers any more...) were ruining everything in 2003 by releasing both Matrix sequels, and in sports a young Swiss player by the name of Roger Federer had only just won his first Grand Slam title at Wimbledon. Seems like an age ago now doesn’t it!

Formula 1 was at war! Well, it was in the midst of a full blown tyre war anyway, waged between the French rubber of Michelin who supplied McLaren and Williams and the Japanese Bridgestone who supplied Ferrari. Since coming back into Formula 1 in 2001, Michelin had struggled to seriously challenge the might and experience of Bridgestone with any consistency. In 2003, for the first time, they had seriously raised their game and cars fitted with their rubber were legitimate contenders, and thank god, because I’d rather have injected the ebola virus straight into my eyeballs than sit through another whitewash championship like the previous one.

How bad was it? Well, after Michael Schumacher had finished shitting over the entire 2002 schedule, (He finished on the podium in every race. EVERY FUCKING RACE!) the FIA decided to change the scoring for all future Grands Prix, with the intention to keep the championship closer for longer. So instead of the top six drivers scoring, with 10 points for a win, then 6, 4, 3, 2, 1 for the lesser places, the points now went all the way to the eighth place finisher; 10, 8, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.

The scoring changes and Michelins improved tyres worked a treat, and by Silverstone in 2003 the championship had developed into a four horse race. Obviously Michael Schumacher was involved, gunning for his fourth straight title (and sixth overall - the greedy bastard!) but Kimi Raikkonen in his McLaren and the two Williams’ of Juan Montoya and Ralf Schumacher were pushing him hard, with the standings looking like this;

Pos	Driver	Points
1	Michael Schumacher	64
2	Kimi Räikkönen	56
3	Ralf Schumacher	53
4	Juan Pablo Montoya	47
5	Rubens Barrichello	39