F1 Europe 2011

The Valencia track has never produced exciting racing and this one was no exception. During the early stages of the race, Vettel, Webber, Alonso were close to each other, which offered tantalizing possibilities of good racing to come, but that never materialized. There was some action lower down the field but nothing at the sharp end of the racing order. Thanks to the Pirelli tires, DRS, and Kers, the race was better than previous years but it was not a barn burner by any stretch.

In fact, it was very much a return to regularly scheduled programming as Vettel and Redbull dominated both qualifying and race day. Vettel's win looked quite serene. Second place was like a win for Ferrari who were reasonably competitive but were still not capable of challenging Redbull for a win. Webber had a good race, but lost the chance for a second place finish when he changed to the prime tire too early, and then had to nurse an ailing gearbox to the finish. Mclaren was way off the pace and were quite disappointing with Hamilton and Button finishing fourth and sixth respectively.

The next few races are critical for Ferrari and McLaren if they have any hope of challenging Redbull this season. Both teams must deliver upgrades that will enable their drivers to race for wins, because second or worse is not going to be enough any more. The season is not lost yet but the point where conceding this season and focusing on next year's car is not far away.

I am still hopeful that Webber can challenge Vettel but it depends on Webber getting a better feel for the Pirelli tires. Webber has acknowleged that this is one reason he has been out performed by Vettel this season, even though they are driving identical cars.

The bottom line is someone needs to start chipping away Vettel's points lead. And soon.

F1 2010 Europe

It was a surprisingly exciting race at a circuit that is usually somewhat pedestrian. Vettel was back on form and put in an unbeatable qualifying lap. The difference this time was that he converted that pole position into a race win for the first time this season.

Webber qualified in second place but for some reason went backwards through the field on the first lap. The reason for loosing so many places was never explained but it put Webber out of position and racing Kovalainen's Lotus on lap eight, which led to this horrific crash. There's nothing scarier than seeing a race car flying through the air at over 300 km/h. Thankfully, an F1 car is incredibly strong which allowed Webber to walk away.

It was the first time Webber had to pass a Lotus for position and he completely misjudged how early the Lotus brakes compared to the Redbull. I think everyone learned an important lesson about how to race against the slower cars from the new teams. You can't ask the slower teams not to race for position and the top teams need to be a little more cautious when racing the slower cars.

The driver of the day was Kobayashi. He was in third place after the safety car returned to the pits and was only two seconds off the pace of Vettel, while also looking after his first set of tires for almost the entire race. But the the rules requires a tire change which he did with only four laps remaining. The fresh rubber enabled him to pass both Alonso and Buemi. The latter pass was a classic last corner, do-or-die, manoeuvre. Awesome! Kobayashi demonstrated he drives with his head as well as his right foot.

F1 Europe

Finally watched the European GP. Barrichello deserved that victory. He drove a faultless race and the team made absolutely no mistakes. Did Hamilton lose the lead because of McLaren's pit stop error or was it a lack of race pace? I think it was the latter. Barrichello definitely had the faster car but he chose to use it only when the McLaren's pitted. Both times he managed some stunning laps which allowed him to use the classic "pass 'em in the pits" strategy. Perhaps as result of that, the race was not very exciting. The saving grace was that nobody had the ability to dominate the race, which would be even more boring.

Button isn't driving like a world champion otherwise he would have tried harder to recover from the miserable start. Compared to the beginning of the season, he does not look like the same driver. I still have a suspicion that something has changed at the team, like maybe Barrichello isn't sharing as much information about car setup as before. I just can't accept that he has lost that much pace compared to Barrichello for no reason whatsoever.

There is no doubt that McLaren are back in game, as are Ferrari. It was to be expected of course given the huge budget's these teams have, but it took McLaren much longer than I anticipated. Thankfully, Brawn GP have also improved but is it enough? Their lead in the constructor's standing isn't all that comfortable. Now it is Redbull's turn to struggle. They didn't score any points for only the second time this season. More troubling is that Vettel has only two unused engines for the remainder of the season and there is a stiff ten place grid penalty if they use a ninth engine.