Great job from Kimi and Lotus, after the qualifiying I didn't expected this. Quali was their weak point last year and from testing it was well known that the car has a good pace on long runs (if the gearbox stays in one piece), but I didn't expect Kimi to win the race. Good points and maybe podium at best. Mercedes as expected weaker in the race than in quali, unfortunate for Rosberg because we would have got good points. McLaren is nowhere near the top, seems like the suffer even more than Ferrari last year with their new suspension. Button and Perez aren't like Alonso, who can drive a bad car quick. Especially Button is well known that when he was a setup that he likes, he is almost unbeatable (see Spa 2012), but when its not, he fights in the midfield (Canada 2012). I guess the will struggle at least until the european part of the season starts, maybe even longer. Red Bull is up their with the best teams, but not as dominant in the race as they were in quali.Ferrari is right their at the top, as I expected. Another suprise was Force India. Sutil drove well, until his tyres let him down in the last stint. Di Resta drove a quiet race and got some points, as well as Grosjean. A bit of a disappointment was Sauber, with Hulkenberg not even abel to start and Gutierrez also drove a quiet race well out of the points. Also Williams seems well of the pace, with Maldonado spinning off and Bottas ending last of the midfield teams. Not much to be seen from Toro Rosso, I didn't even notice Riciardo was out and Vergen couldn't keep up with his pace from Q1. At the backmarkers, Marussia and especially Bianchi showed good performace. Pic is more experienced than Chiton and van der Garde, so no surprises their. The worst drivers in the field deserve last place.
But it was an interessting race and a good start for the season. I'm looking forward to Malaysia, because with the higher temperatures and a permanent race track it will be a clearer, who stands where.
Ya know. Back then, there were 3 or 4 different sets of rain tires available though. They had:
Intermediates Soft Rain Tires Hard Rain Tires Monsoon Tires
They've scratched the Monsoons nowadays to save money, which is a wise move imho. I'd love to see super wet qualifyings just as much as the next guy, but it's just such a waste of resources to carry like 300 sets of extra rain tires to every grand prix, just so the 1/100 super wet grand prix can be run.
wow I just wish the fucking timing would allow us UK residents to watch this at a reasonable time :/ but it sounds amazing that Kimi got all the way from 7 to 1. Good luck to him in the season!
On March 17 2013 16:58 grindC wrote: Lotus showed good race-pace, but struggled in qualifying. I wonder how that'll work out over the course of the season...
Kimi went a bit sideways on his quali lap, so we didn't get to see the best of him in that regard. I really think they are up there with the rest and if the current trend with the tyres continues, this will surely be a great season
On March 17 2013 16:58 grindC wrote: Lotus showed good race-pace, but struggled in qualifying. I wonder how that'll work out over the course of the season...
Kimi went a bit sideways on his quali lap, so we didn't get to see the best of him in that regard. I really think they are up there with the rest and if the current trend with the tyres continues, this will surely be a great season
Ah, so that's it. I didn't catch qualy that late at night
On March 17 2013 09:39 Pandemona wrote: Im happy with that! Nice showing by Mercedes
Also have a big feeling that the Red Bulls wont win tomorrow, i see both of them losing out if it rains or if it is decent weather i think their cars will just fail them on reliability!
Lolz, well i kinda called it
But seriously WTF @ Australian weather xD when do you see Australia with cold weather like that which caused a really poor race and crazier than normal tyre degradation because of it! Oh well, Kimi drove a nice race and showed good pace at all times and deservedly won. Ferrari showed they are on it from the start too which is even better news as well. Mercedes looked good in qualifying and in the wet, so it will be good to see what they do next week in the warmth of Malaysia.
On March 17 2013 22:49 Dibella wrote: Alonso shows again that he is BY FAR the best driver in the F1 right now.
By being out-qualified by his team-mate (who is poor) and struggling to get past him?
Well that is qualifying, but on raceday he is always the better one.
Finished above Massa for one reason, he undercut his team mate....and his team mate had no chance after being kept out 2 laps longer after that as well. Massa showed great pace at the start of the race and during qualifying. So i can't say after that race Alonso is miles ahead of him.
On March 17 2013 20:38 sc4k wrote: wow I just wish the fucking timing would allow us UK residents to watch this at a reasonable time :/ but it sounds amazing that Kimi got all the way from 7 to 1. Good luck to him in the season!
was der no re-broadcast of the race? It started at 7 in CET, so 6 in GMT. In Germany, the race was broadcasted again at 13:00. btw before Bernie moved some of the asian races to the limit of starting times, they startet at 4 in the morning.
On March 17 2013 22:49 Dibella wrote: Alonso shows again that he is BY FAR the best driver in the F1 right now.
By being out-qualified by his team-mate (who is poor) and struggling to get past him?
Alonso has a roughly 7 to 1 qualifying ratio against Massa. But I suppose when that "1" happens it means he's a mediocre driver.
No one is saying that Alonso is mediocre, just that his performance this weekend does not prove he is BY FAR the best driver in F1 (whether or not that is true). In fact this weekend he didn't even show that he was BY FAR the best driver on Ferrari.
On March 18 2013 01:05 sc4k wrote: It's being rebroadcast now, but it's always nice to watch events live isn't it :O
They can't have it start any later. The current time is already an issue if there are any delays or the weather isn't great, since it is getting dark around the time the race is finishing. Same with most of the other asian races.
If you want to watch live, you have to just wake up early. It's not like the EU races are scheduled for people outside the EU, while all the Asia races are scheduled for people in Europe.
European races start 12:00-14:00 local time, Asia races start 15:00-17:00. And Singapore is a night race to make it during the middle of the day in Europe. If the Asia races started later, it would be close to getting dark when they were finishing.
I think Force India are probably feeling like their choice to go for Sutil is vindicated. When he was on older tyres than the Ferraris and Vettel, he was still keeping up with them in the middle of the race pace wise. Definitely showed he deserved a second chance, which I wasn't expecting.
Maybe they should have dumped DiResta and gone with Sutil and Bianchi. The Force India is looking good, much like the Lotus, they are benefitting from being much easier on their tyres. Sutil showed amazing pace on his first two sets of mediums, the kind of pace that Ferrari and RB were running at and better than Mercedes. That kind of tyre presevation will serve them well and I think it is a much better car than the McLaren for example at the moment. Bianchi had a great debut, take a bow son, he destroyed the rest of the guys in the shitbag teams. He also set a fastest lap that matched Sebs fastest! The last time I think I have instantly been so impressed by someone in a backmarker was when Alonso drove the Minardi. Mercedes being able to run much further on the softs but burning through mediums was somewhat confusing, can't get my head around that one to be honest. I still think Red Bull have the best car in terms of outright pace, but once tyres starting going off Vettel was sucked back into the Ferrari's and Kimi. I expect they will sort out the tyre wear and come good in the hot races coming up next.
EPT
