Jenson Button is a class act. In the ‘green room’ before the podium ceremony he smiled and warmly congratulated the new World Champion as he walked through the door – then firmly made it clear that he won’t forget Sebastian Vettel’s ruthless chop at the start of the Japanese Grand Prix.

“Didn’t you see me at the start?” asked Jenson. “You were behind me,” replied an audibly defensive Sebastian. “I was on the grass,” said the race winner, and then laconically: “So that’s how we’re racing then.” No sulking, no histrionics and totally magnanimous towards the deserving World Champion. But he made his point.

As we have come to expect, Button drove a beautifully judged race around the glorious Suzuka circuit, conserving his tyres in what was a tough race for the Pirelli rubber and only pushing when he really had to. That included the final laps of this hard-fought Grand Prix as the McLaren man had to put a spurt on to defend his lead from Fernando Alonso. He had enough in hand, but only just. Having crossed the line, Button pulled up at the pitlane exit, his McLaren short of fuel. It’s become a cliché… but as victories go, there were echoes of Alain Prost.

Vettel had every reason to savour his moment as the youngest back-to-back World Champion. But his actions at the start undoubtedly cast a faint shadow over his crowning glory.

Starting on the dirty side of the front row, Button still made the better get away and had the momentum to charge into the lead. But Vettel clearly had no intention of ceding. He’d said before the race he wanted to win this title from the front and wouldn’t be racing simply for that vital single point, and so it proved. Button wasn’t alongside the Red Bull by any means, but still he was left with no option but to trim the grass on the approach to Turn 1, a moment that allowed his team-mate Lewis Hamilton to sweep around him to claim second place.

“He’s got to get a penalty for that,” said Button on the radio at the end of lap one. But no. Vettel hadn’t done anything illegal. The stewards took another look at it and decided upon no further action. We’ve seen the Vettel chop before, during his first championship year (remember Hockenheim and Silverstone 2010?). Within the rules, it’s not deemed as foul play – but that doesn’t mean it’s not wrong. It’s an ugly tactic – and a dangerous one, too.

Vettel had his lead, but with tyre degradation a heavy factor here at Suzuka he couldn’t just put the hammer down to break from the McLarens. Behind Hamilton and Button, Alonso passed his Ferrari team-mate Felipe Massa – who had outqualified the former double World Champion – with a DRS-assisted move into Turn 1 at the start of lap six.

After his recent troubles, Hamilton’s gifted second place might have given him hope for a turn in fortunes. Such thoughts would have been wiped out on lap eight as the team notified him that he had a slow puncture on the right rear. Button passed him at Spoon and Lewis made it back to the pits, at least losing a minimum amount of ground in the process. He only lost a single place, to Alonso.

Hamilton’s first pit visit was only a lap ahead of Vettel’s first scheduled stop for another set of option Pirellis, with Button, Alonso and Mark Webber coming in a lap later. Massa made his stop next and emerged behind his ‘mate’ Hamilton and set upon the chase to claim fourth place from the McLaren.

Vettel’s second stint lasted just 10 laps before he was in again, and likewise Button was in a lap later. But this time Jenson had the pace to gain his revenge for the chop. He returned to the track ahead of his rival, in a lead that would prove to be decisive.

But for his team-mate, it was a case of here we go again as Hamilton clashed once again with Massa. On lap 22 Felipe edged alongside Lewis on the outside line as they approached the chicane – and as they had in Singapore, they came together. Hamilton claimed the small, useless mirrors on F1 cars left him with no awareness that Massa was there, and his ignorance of the Ferrari’s position was obvious. There were echoes of Spa and his frightening crash with Kamui Kobayashi, but this time at slower speed both cars survived, although Massa lost some bodywork in the incident. No major drama then, but for Lewis it had been a clumsy moment once again. The 2008 World Champion would later describe his race as “shocking”, and by his high standards it was an accurate assessment.

Massa’s debris and more elsewhere on the circuit brought out the safety car shortly after. At the restart, Button bunched the pack (perhaps over-doing it as they approached the chicane), then made his charge across the line ahead of Vettel, Alonso, Webber, Massa, Hamilton and Michael Schumacher.

Having lost the lead in the second round of stops, Vettel dropped another place at the third and final pit visits. Alonso’s Ferrari stopped four laps later than the Red Bull and grabbed second, but Sebastian wasn’t about to settle for a safe third – to his credit. He harried Alonso and looked set to use his DRS to take the place back, only for traffic (in the form of Jerome d’Ambrosio) to thwart him. His angry fist-waving as he passed the Virgin Racing car gave further indication to Vettel’s determination to win his title by going for “glory”. The lad can never be accused of lacking ambition!

As the race entered its closing stages, it became obvious that Button was far from home and dry. Alonso was still well within range of the McLaren – but crucially not quite within the one-second DRS range to deploy the wing down the start/finish straight. Button responded to the threat and kept Fernando at arm’s length to claim his third win of the season. Given his affinity with Japan and his love of the country, his victory was a popular one.

Vettel made the podium to claim his historic second title, ahead of team-mate Webber, Hamilton and best-of-the-rest Schumacher, who even lead the Grand Prix with an out of sequence strategy.

Sauber’s Sergio Perez scored an excellent seventh, ahead of Lotus Renault’s Vitaly Petrov and the Mercedes of Nico Rosberg, who scored the final point having started from the back of the grid.

Next stop, Korea. The championship is over, but in reality it has been for most of the season. Still this season offers much to keep us hooked.

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A very good Grand Prix, and for the first dozen laps a great one. True, eventually the inherent superiority of the Red Bull RB7 asserted itself at Spa, so that Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber scored a comfortable enough 1-2, but in the first part of the race the action at the front was frantic – indeed four different drivers led before an accident on lap 13, which eliminated Lewis Hamilton and brought out the safety car. At the finish Hamilton’s McLaren team-mate Jenson Button was third, followed by the Ferrari of Fernando Alonso and the Mercedes of Michael Schumacher and Nico Rosberg.

It’s been said before, but it can never be said enough times: take them to a proper circuit, and you get a proper race.

Qualifying at Spa is invariably unpredictable, sometimes chaotic. The weather sees to that, and it’s been that way since the running of the first Belgian Grand Prix here, back in 1925. Fickle doesn’t make a start on it. Torrential rain can materialise from nowhere, and it is not unusual for one part of the circuit – at 4.35 miles it’s the longest in Formula 1 use – to be bone dry while another is streaming.

Conditions on both Friday and Saturday were mixed, but very rarely was the track entirely dry, and after qualifying all the drivers lamented the lack of dry running, for the the forecast for race day suggested that the sun would shine.

For all the uncertain conditions it was the usual suspects who figured most strongly in qualifying. There were, however, some anomalies. Right at the beginning of Q1, for example, Schumacher’s Mercedes shed its right rear wheel on the climb to Les Combes.

The Spa circuit is situated only 50 kilometres from Kerpen, Michael’s birth place, so he not surprisingly refers to it as ‘my garden’. In the days of his pomp he won here six times, and he had reckoned that the Mercedes, while not competitive with Red Bull, McLaren or Ferrari, might be better suited to Spa than some of the recent F1 venues. In that he was right – team-mate Rosberg qualified fifth – but it was hardly surprising that he was dismayed by the thought of starting dead last. This weekend, after all, marked the 20th anniversary of his Formula 1 debut.

If Schumacher didn’t figure, neither – more suprisingly – did Button. In Q1 Jenson was fastest of all, predictably much at ease in the sort of mixed conditions in which he excels. In Q2, too, he topped the lists for a while, but in the late minutes the track was drying fast, and the name of Button began sliding down the list. It didn’t look like a problem, for he was surely capable of responding, and thus he backed off, cooling the tyres, having been informed by McLaren that there was time for one more quick lap.

There wasn’t, though. By the time Jenson made it back to the start-finish line the allotted time had ticked away to zero, and he found himself out of Q1, back in 13th place. And frustrated, you might say.

And there were others, too, notably Alonso. An abiding problem for Ferrari this season has been getting heat into the Pirelli tyres – in a normal summer, with plenty of races in hot weather, this would have become a virtue, of course.

As it is, we have had a succession of races run in unusually cool conditions, and if that has hampered Ferrari it has very much aided McLaren, where there is no problem getting the tyres up to temperature – indeed on hot days it works against them.

Alonso was well in the mix through most of qualifying, and indeed set fastest time in Q2. In Q3, though, he was delayed by Perez on two of his laps, and on the last one slowed at the chicane to let Webber through, fearing that otherwise he might get a penalty. When Alonso is slower than team-mate Massa it raises eyebrows; when he is a second slower something somewhere doesn’t compute. Eighth was not where Fernando had expected to start.

Vettel-Hamilton-Webber is how the first three lined up, but this wasn’t a typical Vettel pole position. In Q1, he admitted, he didn’t feel comfortable with the car. “Then, in Q2 I discovered Spa again – and in Q3 everything was fine. On the last lap I pushed as hard as I could…”

Most of the time Webber looked the more likely of the Red Bull drivers to take pole, but in the end Mark – celebrating his 35th birthday, and also the signing of a new contract for 2012 – set third best time, beaten to the front row by Hamilton.

Lewis always excels at Spa. “I had pole for about five seconds,” he said, after setting his time at the very end of the session, “but then Sebastian came over the line…”

En route to his fastest lap Hamilton was undoubtedly… muscular as he passed Pastor Maldonado’s tardy Williams at the final chicane, but really he had little option. After the chequered flag had fallen the two cars made contact as they went down the hill to Eau Rouge, and while neither driver appeared entirely blameless the Venezuelan was adjudged more culpable than Hamilton, and ‘fined’ five grid positions. Lewis got away with a reprimand.

Undoubtedly the most startling performance in qualifying came from Bruno Senna, seventh for Lotus Renault GP, three places ahead of team-mate Vitaly Petrov. Ayrton’s nephew has been drafted into the team for the rest of the season, replacing the disappointing Nick Heidfeld, who was frequently outpaced by Petrov. Given the testing ban, Senna has had almost no cockpit time this year, and his showing certainly raised an eyebrow or two.

The circumstances of qualifying created an interesting scenario for race day – when rain threatened, but never materialised. As we have said, it’s a long lap at Spa, and in Q3 the drivers – very much keeping the weather in mind – stayed out on one set of tyres rather than the usual practice of running a quick lap, changing to a new set of tyres, then running a second quick lap. In normal circumstances, therefore, you start the race on a lightly used set – but at Spa the top 10 drivers went to the grid on tyres that had done 20 or 25 miles. Throw in the fact that there had been very little dry running, and it was hardly surprising that the drivers were a little apprehensive.

“We were going very much into the unknown today,” said Webber, “in terms of what the tyres might do – and I’m not just talking about blisters…” Vettel agreed: “When the front tyres blistered, there was a lot of vibration, and it really wasn’t very comfortable going into Eau Rouge or Blanchimont like that. In the end, we’re sitting in the cars…”

As a rule of thumb, then, the intention was to change tyres as soon as practicable, to get rid of the set that had run in Q3. Medium and soft were the compounds brought by Pirelli on this occasion, and of course the top 10 drivers necessarily started on soft. Button, though, hadn’t made it to Q3, and was therefore able to take a different tack, and start on the medium tyres.

Although the start was reasonably straightforward, there was chaos at La Source, as invariably there is on lap one. Senna, sadly, undid all his good work in qualifying by slamming hard in Jaime Alguersuari’s Toro Rosso, which had started an impressive sixth. And behind them cars started bouncing off one another.

“I got a terrible start,” said Webber. “The anti-stall kicked in, and I thought I’d get passed by about 30 cars – but fortunately most of them hit each other at the first corner…”

The sensation at the start was Rosberg, who came out of La Source with only Vettel ahead of him, and on the long climb to Les Combes – the designated ‘DRS Zone’ at this track – Nico was able to take the lead quite easily.

This was to become a phenomenon of the afternoon. Some are in favour of DRS, and some are not, but either way there was no doubt that at Spa the zone was too long, making overtaking too straightforward. Any driver leading another narrowly out of Eau Rouge was like a tethered goat. On lap three Vettel took back the lead from Rosberg in exactly the same way, and we would see it time and again throughout the race.

Sebastian immediately began to pull away, but after five laps was into the pits, keen to get rid of that first set of tyres. Webber, indeed, had stopped a couple of laps earlier than that, as had Button, who had had his required run on the medium Pirellis, and wanted to be on the soft ones as soon as possible.

In the first part of the race, though, the man really going motor racing was Alonso. From his eighth grid position Fernando was up into fifth by the end of the first lap, and on the second he got by Hamilton. By lap six he had also passed Massa and Rosberg, and that – given that Vettel had pitted by now – took the Ferrari into the lead.

Alonso made his first stop on lap eight, and that briefly put Hamilton into the lead – until he came in on lap 10. Briefly Rosberg was now in front once more, but in a staggering demonstration of his confidence in the Red Bull – and in his own abilities – Vettel passed the Mercedes on the outside at flat-out Blanchimont…

That was a move to make you doubt your own eyes – and there had been another a couple of laps earlier. As Alonso accelerated down the hill to Eau Rouge, immediately after his stop, Webber was closing on him – and going into the first, left-hand swerve, he went by! No one could ever remember a pass – a competitive pass – being made here in any F1 race at Spa, and it said much for both drivers that the moment didn’t end in tears.

“Yeah,” Mark agreed, “it takes two guys for that situation to work out OK. Fernando’s a great driver, and he’s also smart enough to know when enough’s enough. Believe me, there are a lot of guys I wouldn’t have tried that with…”

On lap 13 Hamilton, running fifth behind Kobayashi’s Sauber (which had not yet made a stop), overtook – DRS again – on the hill, but as they approached Les Combes Kamui closed again, and was almost alongside (on the outside) as they reached the turn-in point.

Perhaps Lewis had not expected the Sauber still to be close at hand. Whatever, he steered slightly left, giving himself the ideal line into the corner – and the cars touched. At once the McLaren pitched into the guard rail more or less head on, and when it came to rest there was initially no movement from the driver. Eventually Hamilton stirred, and removed the steering wheel, but he seemed shaky as he stepped out, another to rejoice in the strength of the contemporary Grand Prix car.

As soon as the safety car was deployed, Vettel dived straight into the pits, and really this put his victory beyond doubt, for when they were given the signal to go again, three laps later, he was on new tyres, where his rivals were not. Although Alonso led them away again, it wasn’t long before Vettel was able to DRS him on the long hill. And once into the lead anew, Sebastian pulled easily clear.

His team-mate might, who knows, have been able to go with him had he, too, stopped for tyres as the safety car came out. “I radioed in,” said Webber, “saying that I wanted to come in, but I never heard anything back…” As it was, Mark had to run a very long stint on his second set of tyres.

The final round of pitstops, at which most drivers were required to take the slower, medium compound tyres, began on lap 29, with Alonso followed by Vettel on 30 and Webber on 31. On lap 32 Button, who had been making striking progress, was also in – but he of course had started the race on the medium tyres, and was therefore able to stay with the soft ones.

On lap 37 Webber passed Alonso again, this time less dramatically (DRS on the hill) than before, and began slightly to close on Vettel. But the pattern was now set, and the Red Bulls simply swept on to the finish. Alonso, meantime, had no answer for the soft-tyred Button, who moved by – yes, DRS again – on lap 42, thereby claiming the last spot on the podium.

The other talking point in the late laps concerned the Mercedes drivers. Schumacher, having started from the back, indeed drove an extremely good race at this track he loves, and was up to sixth, behind team-mate Rosberg. We began to wonder if ‘team orders’ – now fully legal again, of course – might come into the reckoning…

Finally there came a message on the radio: ‘Nico, we need you to save some fuel…’ Given that three of the 44 laps had been run behind the safety car, that seemed a touch unlikely, but Rosberg duly acquiesced, and the Mercedes hierarchy had the finishing order it perhaps preferred…

Three races – Silverstone, the Nürburgring, the Hungaroring – had gone by since the last Red Bull victory, and some had begun to wonder if perhaps a little of the earlier magic had been lost. On the strength of Spa, they should not put too much store by that theory. “The car,” said Vettel, “was simply fantastic today – maybe the best it’s been all season…”

Button, meantime, was left to ponder how different his race might have been, had it not been for that ‘communication’ mistake in qualifying…

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Spa-Francorchamps. The very words have a sense of excitement, of anticipation, don’t they? Grand Prix cars howling and wailing through the Ardennes, swooping up and down across the valley. Oh yeah, Eau Rouge may be easy flat in a modern car, but Spa is Spa, and it’s good.

And another thing. It is five hours by road from the south of England, the Channel Tunnel making this trip the simplest it’s ever been. Lots of Brits will be there, waving their flags and banners every time ‘our Lewis’ or ‘our Jenson’ go screaming by on another lap of what is still a magnificent racing circuit, even if it’s not the spooky challenge it was in days gone by.

This year the teams go to Belgium after a month’s holiday, an enforced shutdown when – for two weeks – no work may be done on the cars. The drivers will be chomping at the bit, the mechanics will be refreshed and the engineers will have been dreaming up yet more tweaks in the quest to beat those pesky Red Bulls. Just as McLaren, and possibly Ferrari, began to catch up along came a month’s break in the season. It is now or never if anyone is to have the faintest hope of catching Herr Vettel before they go to Brazil in November.

So what makes Spa-Francorchamps one of the great circuits, one of the races you always anticipate with pleasure? Many things, really, but above all it’s the chance to see Formula 1 cars let loose at full chat around a naturally flowing piece of asphalt that dips, dives, climbs and snakes through a valley in the dark green forests of the Ardennes.

Arriving is good. As you wind your way through the woods you can tune in to the circuit radio station, start to get excited. Then you hear the cars, like wild beasts rampaging around beyond the trees that encircle the car parks. These days, sadly, you can’t tell which car is which from the engine noise like you could when Ferraris made their own music and Matras, or Cosworths, sang another kind of song. But despite the homogeny of modern times, this is still a wonderful place to watch an F1 driver at work.

I go in, not to the paddock or pits, but to the top of the hill at Eau Rouge, known as Raidillon, where the cars appear as if about to fly into the sky. Then it’s up into sixth, seventh and flat out down the long straight to Les Combes where Mika Häkkinen so famously outfoxed Michael Schumacher in 2000 when faced with a backmarker at nearly 200mph. From here you may walk as far as you please, pausing to goggle at the sheer grip and grunt of these machines, the commitment of the drivers, and the ridiculous speed with which they change direction. Or walk the other way to Blanchimont where the raw speed beggars belief.

I first saw Jenson Button in a Grand Prix car here in 2000, in a competitive Williams, in tricky weather conditions. He qualified a superb third and finished fifth. It was clear to me and countless others that – given the right opportunities – here was a very talented driver who had earned his rapid rise through Formula 3 to the top level. Took him nine years to get his title… no wonder he looks so much more at ease these days.

So, once you’ve had your fill of the skills on display at a proper circuit, you return – ears ringing – to your hostelry, study the times over a good Belgian beer, eat too many chips with mayonnaise and wonder how we ever ended up in places like Abu Dhabi or Sepang. All Grand Prix racing is good, and fascinating, but European races remain the best.

And Monza is next. Joy. Pure joy. Racing cars, pasta, Parmesan and Chianti. But that’s another story for another day.

Who will win at Spa on Sunday? I have no idea. A month is a long time in modern F1 racing. But, forced to predict, I reckon it’ll be a McLaren.

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Welcome to another ‘week in motor sport’. There was plenty to talk about this week and I sat down with features editor Rob Widdows to mull over the Hungarian Grand Prix and the news of new deal with Formula 1, Sky and the BBC.

I am sorry that we’re back to our usual editing quality, but we’re in the process of finding a budget and hope to return to the professional format as soon as possible!

As always, let us know what you think about everything we discuss.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Or, if you’d like to download it…

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The 2011 Hungarian Grand Prix marked Jenson Button’s 200th Formula 1 race start. He lined up third on the grid and in the race he drove superbly in mixed conditions. At the scene of his first Grand Prix win in 2006 he crossed the line victorious once again, this time ahead of Sebastian Vettel and Fernando Alonso in third.

Vettel and Lewis Hamilton had filled the front row in qualifying, but when it became clear that it was going to be a wet start to the race all bets were off. Yes, the Red Bull driver was quick, but so were the McLarens and the Ferraris.

The race started with everyone on intermediate tyres and despite the track being only slightly wet there appeared to be no grip at all. Even Fernando Alonso came off on a couple of occasions and he’s not known for making mistakes.

Vettel led away with Hamilton in second, however, on lap five – when the front-runners were going 28 seconds slower than they had done in qualifying – the German ran wide letting the McLaren driver through.

The racing line soon dried and it was Webber who was the first into the pits on lap 11 to switch to a set of super soft tyres. Jenson Button did the same on the next lap and after he had slithered round part of the lap many were wondering whether Webber and Button had made the right choice. At the end of the lap Vettel and Hamilton also dived in for fresh rubber, but by now Button had been out on the slicks for a lap and, as he does so well in these conditions, had found his confidence and what grip there was. When Vettel emerged from the pits he had his mirrors full of Button’s McLaren and it didn’t take long for Jenson to get by the struggling Red Bull.

Hamilton was in the lead with Button now running comfortably in second place. However, when it looked as though everything had settled down Nick Heidfeld emerged from the pits after stopping for fresh tyres on lap 25 with his car on fire. The Renault driver quickly pulled over by the pit exit and jumped clear, thankfully before the side of the car bizarrely exploded. Luckily the marshals attending the stricken machine were unhurt, but with the car in such a dangerous position it was surely only a matter of time before the safety car was deployed. Webber, Alonso and Hamilton clearly thought the same thing as they all dived into the pits, avoiding the smoking Renault on the exit. Button pitted shortly afterwards on lap 28, but by now it was clear that there wouldn’t be a safety car. Vettel was still out and losing huge amounts of time as his super soft tyres were finished.

The order remained unchanged after the pitstop phase was over, and while Alonso looked worryingly fast for the leaders, they kept a decent gap until Webber pitted once again on lap 40. This time the Red Bull driver opted for the harder of the two compounds, as did Vettel and Button when they pitted on lap 42. But, and this is where it all started to go wrong for Hamilton, the McLaren driver stayed with the super soft rubber. As the order settled down once again the question of whether Hamilton could make it to the end of the 70-lap race started to become the major factor in who was going to win the Hungarian Grand Prix. The harder of the compounds, that all the other front-runners were on, clearly could last the distance, but what of Hamilton?

On lap 47 everything changed. Rain started to fall once again and Lewis spun after catching a wet kerb on the inside of the chicane. As he spun his car back round to rejoin the race Paul di Resta had to make for the grass in order to avoid him. Shortly afterwards we heard that the incident was being investigated by the stewards, one of which was Allan McNish who had also been the driver steward at Monaco earlier in the year. Button was right on the tail of Hamilton now, and if anyone was disappointed after Webber and Vettel were not allowed to race at Silverstone, they certainly got some payback thanks to the McLaren duo.

The pair swapped the lead numerous times over the next lap as with the fresh rain it would be the driver in the lead who got the choice of when they wanted to pit. Hamilton had regained the lead by the pit entry and so he dived in for intermediates, leaving Button to navigate round another slippery lap.

Half the grid was on intermediates by this stage and it looked like the sensible option. However, the rain soon stopped and Hamilton almost immediately started to lose ground, being passed by Alonso on lap 54. That same lap Hamilton, who probably couldn’t imagine his afternoon getting any worse, was told that he had a drive-through penalty because of pushing di Resta off the track.

He pitted first to change back to slicks and then a lap later he served his drive-through. In the space of a few laps Hamilton had gone from the lead of the Grand Prix to sixth, 55 seconds behind Button. He wasn’t done yet though and then passed Massa, who was struggling with shot tyres, and Webber while the pair were negotiating traffic, six laps from the end.

Amazingly Hamilton was extremely calm after the race. “Congratulations to Jenson,” he said after finishing fourth. “He was pushing me hard all race and the best man won today. I need to find Paul (di Resta) and apologise to him because I just didn’t see him.” He went on to complain about radio issues and the fact that the team couldn’t hear what he was saying, but he did finish with “it wasn’t the best call (referring to the choice to pit for intermediates), but that’s racing. The team did a fantastic job and I feel as though I’ve let them down a bit.” It was a very different Hamilton to the man we had seen earlier in the season, furious in post-race interviews.

Jenson Button meanwhile was understandably ecstatic. “What a perfect start to the summer break,” he said on the radio after crossing the line. “Let’s come back and win them all.” I doubt that will happen, but what Button did do on Sunday was prove – once again – that he really is the master of mixed conditions.

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Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

The night before the British Grand Prix Fernando Alonso murmured that he thought he really might be able to do something about the Red Bulls this time. He wasn’t overt in his remarks, for that is not Alonso’s way, but merely made the point that of late Ferrari’s race pace had been appreciably more competitive than in qualifying. Even when a second or so from Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber on Saturday, he had been able to show them something on Sunday afternoons – and this time he was within a tenth or so…

An hour or so before the start Fernando took to the track in Bernie Ecclestone’s Ferrari 375, similar to the car with which Froilán González scored the team’s first World Championship victory at Silverstone in 1951. It appeared, in similar circumstances, a few years ago, driven by Michael Schumacher, but Alonso got rather more into the spirit of the thing, and steered the car on the throttle in a manner which would have delighted the flamboyant González. There was a pleasing symmetry about the day, therefore, when Fernando was able to celebrate the 60th anniversary of Froilán’s great day by scoring his – and Ferrari’s – first victory of the season.

There was drama aplenty in this British Grand Prix, and that was good, for the weekend – right up to race time, anyway – was sadly dominated by endless discussion of the wretched blown diffuser rules, which seemed to change by the hour. Not unnaturally it was a matter of overwhelming interest to those directly involved, of course (and every one of them seemed to claim their cars had been more adversely affected than any others), but for everyone else it was simply a consummate bore.

There was unhappiness that a rule change should have been introduced in the middle, rather than at the end, of a season, and bewilderment that the rule change was then amended – and amended and amended…

Eventually one o’clock on Sunday arrived, and it was time simply to get on with it, to go racing. In tricky conditions the day before Webber had taken a very brave pole position, shading team-mate Vettel, with the Ferraris of Alonso and Massa on row two. Jenson Button was happy enough with his position on the grid – fifth – but less so with the fact that his time was a second and a half away from pole. He was, however, a picture of contentment compared with McLaren team-mate Lewis Hamilton, who blamed the team for sending him out on the wrong tyres in Q3, and qualified only 10th. He hoped for a wet race, he said.

In part, he got one, at least for a while, for an hour before the start one of the widely forecast showers arrived – but only on part of the circuit. Thus, the start-finish area (now on what used to be the far side of the circuit, of course) was pretty dry, but in other places drivers reported aquaplaning. Although the start was conventional (rather than behind the safety car), the obvious tyre choice was intermediates – which meant, in turn, that the obligation to use both of the slick compounds on offer evaporated.

One of these was the hard compound not seen since Barcelona, where they emphatically did not suit the Ferraris, so it could be that Alonso benefited from a stroke of luck, but on the other hand he claimed that in practice the car now worked very well on the hard Pirellis. “All the recent changes we’ve made to the car have been good,” he said. “We brought quite a big aero update to Silverstone, and everything worked fine. I’m very proud of the team for the recovery they have done…”

Initially, though, it didn’t look as if Alonso – or anyone else – would trouble Vettel this day, the British Grand Prix looking like so many gone before this season. In the – very – mixed conditions Sebastian looked much at ease as he quickly built a lead over Webber, whom he had passed away from the line. Five laps in, he was virtually five seconds to the good.

Alonso ran a couple of seconds behind Webber, but the man really on the move at this stage appeared to be Hamilton, who was quickly up to fifth (from his 10th place on the grid), and picked off Felipe Massa’s Ferrari immediately before the first stops. Although the track had been drying there was some uncertainty as to when the optimum time to go to slicks would be – indeed Webber later said that the leaders probably stayed out too long on the intermediates, nervous of making the switch before the track was truly ready for slicks.

In fact, it was Michael Schumacher who settled the issue – and somewhat inadvertently. On lap nine he rather cack-handedly collided with Kobayashi’s Sauber, which meant an immediate stop. Slicks were put on the Mercedes, and soon Michael was setting new fastest laps, which of course brought the front runners in, Webber, Alonso and Hamilton on lap 12, Vettel and Massa on lap 13.

The stops done, Vettel led from Webber once more, with Hamilton now third, then Alonso, Button and Massa. Next up, after the top six, was the highly impressive Paul di Resta, who had qualified a superb sixth for Force India.

The race was moving on apace, five drivers – Button, Alonso, Vettel, Hamilton, Webber – setting fastest lap on consecutive laps, between 16 and 20. Having been passed earlier by Hamilton, Alonso went by the McLaren again on lap 24, at which point Lewis immediately came in for his second stop.

A couple of laps later Webber was in, but the turning point of the race came on lap 27 when Vettel and Alonso pitted together – and it was Fernando, rather than Sebastian, who came out first, for Red Bull had had a rear jack fail before the left rear wheel had been properly changed.

Initially, it didn’t like look the end of the world for Vettel, who had dropped only three or four seconds – but if he had lost the lead to Alonso in the pits, he had also simultaneously lost second place to Hamilton, who had pitted before them, had tyres that were well up to temperature, and was charging.

Getting by Lewis would not prove to be the work of a moment for Seb – and all the time Fernando was away in the lead, building a gap, looking increasingly unstoppable.

Would Alonso have won, had Vettel not been delayed in the pits? “I honestly don’t know,” he shrugged. “I think we were very quick today, but Sebastian had track position on us at the time, and overtaking – even with DRS – is not so easy here…” From Vettel there was a similar response: “For sure it would have been a very tight race – Ferrari certainly had very good pace today…”

Indeed they did. Once into the lead – with Vettel endlessly frustrated in his efforts to get by Hamilton – Alonso cranked out a whole serious of fastest laps, increasing his lead from two to 10 seconds in a matter of half a dozen laps.

The final round of pit stops began with Vettel, on lap 36, and when they were all done Alonso remained serenely in front, 10 seconds to the good, beyond reach. By lap 50, with two to the flag, he was 20 seconds up, and Vettel now had a new worry – in the shape of his team-mate, whose Pirellis were two laps newer.

Webber had passed Hamilton for third place on lap 46, Lewis immensely frustrated by an instruction from his team that he should save fuel if he wished to make the finish. Once by the McLaren, Mark began making inroads into his team-mate’s four-second advantage, and through the last couple of laps was right on Vettel’s tail.

This was a matter of some concern to the Red Bull, who requested – nay, instructed – that the drivers hold station to the flag, and not put in jeopardy a basinful of World Championship points.

Webber decided that he was a racing driver, quicker at that stage of the race than his team-mate, and frankly admitted that he simply ignored the order, issued four or five times, to keep behind Vettel. In the end Sebastian just kept his second place, but afterwards Mark was completely unrepentant about disobeying his team – indeed he made it clear that he was thoroughly unhappy that such an order should have been made. “Let’s face it, if Fernando had retired on the last lap for some reason, this would have been a matter of fighting for a victory…”

Vettel, it must be said, offered no criticism of Webber’s attempt to get by him – indeed appeared, if anything, sympathetic, as if suggesting that in the same position he would have done the same as Mark. Red Bull has been so much more harmonious this year than last; one hopes this doesn’t precipitate another summer of discontent.

The pair of them went over the line almost as one, and a few seconds later there was more of the same, as Massa – who had closed on the fuel-hampered Hamilton at the rate of three seconds a lap – tried to separate the McLaren-Mercedes from fourth place. Lewis offered what may be termed a muscular defence: at the very last corner the cars touched, and Felipe’s Ferrari ran very wide. He didn’t lift, but Hamilton just beat him to the line.

All at Ferrari were of course ecstatic about Alonso’s victory, 60 years on from that historic day when González beat the Alfas for the first time. “It’s a perfect day,” Fernando beamed. “To win at Silverstone is such a special thing – I think all the Formula 1 drivers feel the same about it. It was a privilege to drive Froilán’s car earlier today, and now Ferrari has won the British Grand Prix again – with just the same passion as then…”

And what of all the debate and dissension regarding the blown diffuser rules? “Well,” said Fernando, “before all this Red Bull, Ferrari and McLaren were the competitive teams – and today Red Bull, Ferrari and McLaren were the front runners in the race, so maybe too much has been made of it. I mean, I didn’t notice a Force India or a Sauber suddenly competing for victory…”

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They dish out the same number of points for every race on the calendar. But for the drivers some races are more important than others. A win at Monaco, Monza – or Silverstone: they’ll always mean more than a victory in Shanghai, Istanbul – or Valencia.

Sebastian Vettel dominated the European Grand Prix on the anodyne Spanish port circuit last weekend, and he had every right to take great satisfaction from the win. It was another consummate performance by this wonderfully gifted young man. But ask him in 10 years time to recall the days that stand out and I doubt this will be one of them. The same sort of unchallenged victory would mean something at Monaco. But here? It’s just another haul of 25 points.

The next GP will be different, and not just for Vettel. Sebastian has won at Silverstone before, of course. In 2009 he scored the third GP victory of his career at the old airfield track, becoming the youngest ever winner of a British Grand Prix. He knows how sweet it feels to win at a place with real history (despite being almost unrecognisable from how it used to be). Lewis Hamilton understands. So does Mark Webber. Jenson Button? Well, he’s desperate to join that elite club. The British GP is worth more than 25 points.

Jingoism on our part? I don’t think so. We like to think that Motor Sport has a broad outlook and doesn’t stoop to national bias. But at the same time we’re proud to be a British magazine and it’s only natural that our home GP should hold a special place in our psyche for us.

It’s that dear familiarity and shared experience of Silverstone, Brands Hatch and even Aintree (at least for the older contributors!) that inspired our A-Z of the British GP, the cover story of the August issue that is on sale now.

It was fun putting it together, and for those of you who never miss a British GP (and I know there are many), we hope the alphabetic guide will ring a few bells. Essentially, it’s a celebration of everything we love (and perhaps less than love…) about being a motor racing fan.

Perhaps you might have your own suggestions of British GP staples. To give you a taster, the entry we came up with for K is Keke’s lap. R is for Red Arrows. U is for Useless PA systems – and so on. Fancy getting into the spirit ahead of this year’s race? We look forward to reading your suggestions.

And for those of you who count another GP as ‘home’, we hope the A-Z will offer a few universal home truths about the experience of fans whatever part of the world you live in. We’d love to hear what you associate with your own GP, whether it be Interlagos, Monza, Melbourne, Montréal…

Elsewhere in the August issue, we continue the British GP theme by asking three past winners of the race – Damon Hill, Johnny Herbert and John Watson – to give their verdicts on the F1 season so far, and what to expect at Silverstone and beyond. Three guesses whom they expect to win on July 10…

As usual, it’s not all modern F1 in Motor Sport. We head back 25 years to recall Henri Toivonen, rallying’s greatest cult hero. He and co-driver Sergio Cresto perished in a terrible accident in Corsica back in 1986 that not only robbed us of a gigantic talent, but also spelt the end of the wonderful – but deadly – Group B monsters. Anthony Peacock returns to Corsica to visit a corner of the beautiful island that will be forever Finnish.

As well as all that Eoin Young completes his story about his first season trekking round the European racing scene 50 years ago; Simon Taylor lunches with former BRM team manager Tim Parnell who gives his unique insight into the racing world of the 1950s through to the ’70s; and Mat Oxley hits the road on Norton’s retro café racer, our first motorcycle test of 2011.

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

The Sebastian Vettel steamroller continued in Valencia as the German scored yet another finely judged victory in the European Grand Prix, having seen off an unexpectedly strong challenge from Fernando Alonso and Ferrari.

Vettel has not finished lower than second in any of the eight races thus far this year, and he now has a massive advantage of 186 points to the 109 of his nearest challengers, Jenson Button and Mark Webber.

Valencia has never produced much in the way of entertainment, and the trend continued with a race that lacked in drama. All 24 cars finished, which meant that Narain Karthikeyan became the first driver to ever finish 24th in a Grand Prix, the Indian having already set a record of 23rd in China. There were no penalties and no spins, and the only unscheduled stop occurred when Michael Schumacher crunched his front wing on Vitaly Petrov, and had to come in for a replacement.

It was not a race totally devoid of excitement, however, as for much of it Vettel enjoyed only a slender advantage and behind him there was a great battle for second.

Having earned pole Vettel stayed safely ahead of Webber at the start, while Alonso jumped Lewis Hamilton and slotted into third. From the front Vettel was able to control the pace, staying just a few seconds clear of Webber while preserving his tyres. The race turned into a three-stopper for almost everyone, with three stints on the soft tyre followed by one on the slower medium compound at the end.

In the second stint Alonso managed to get past Webber in a well-judged move, one of the few in which any driver successfully used the DRS zone. However, at the second stops Webber came in earlier and did just enough on his one lap on fresher tyres to get back ahead.

At the third stops the Aussie again came in before the Ferrari, but his new medium tyres were no match for the old softs that Alonso still had on. A slight glitch on the pit entry cost also Webber a few tenths, but the two laps on the softs were they key that saw Alonso go ahead.

In the final stint on the medium tyre Vettel had no reason to be cautious, and he was able to pick up his pace and pull away from the Ferrari, even setting fastest lap as he opened up a 10-second advantage. Webber had a few worries about high gearbox temperatures and was content to drop away from Alonso and secure third.

McLaren was off the pace of those ahead all day, and Hamilton finished a lonely fourth an incredible 46sec down on the winner. He did at least get ahead of Felipe Massa, who like Alonso had passed him at the start. The Brazilian took fifth place, while Jenson Button was a frustrated sixth and even further off the pace than Hamilton.

Nico Rosberg was seventh for Mercedes, while an unusual two-stop strategy saw Jaime Alguersuari jump from 18th on the grid to eighth at the flag, giving many of his rivals food for thought. The final points went to Adrian Sutil and Nick Heidfeld. After his collision Michael Schumacher trailed home 17th.

Attention now turns to Silverstone, where the complete ban on using engine mapping for off-throttle blowing of diffusers is put in place. Will it trip up Red Bull more than its main rivals? Don’t bet on it…

By Adam Cooper

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

The Canadian Grand Prix was a frantic affair in every respect, and not surprisingly so. It’s difficult to categorise the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve – in essence it’s a normal road circuit, but it was built before huge run-offs were the norm, and the proximity of the guardrails and walls serves to convey the impression of a street track. By current standards, it is therefore extremely unforgiving – make a mistake, and the chances are that you will hit something.

That’s on a typically dry day. Safety cars tend to feature abnormally in the Canadian Grand Prix, and when you threw in the element of rain – such as we had for this year’s race – there was the potential for chaos. Before the start everyone was speculating about the number of safety car periods there might be, and it was sure that Bernd Maylander was in for a busy afternoon, but no one expected the sort of rain that eventually came down after 20 laps or so – the forecast had originally been for ‘showers’…

What we got, though, was effectively a monsoon, and after the pack had trailed around behind the safety car for half a dozen laps Charlie Whiting decided enough was enough and brought the race to a halt. There was a lot of noisy protest from sections of the crowd, but unquestionably it was the right call – within minutes the whole place was awash, and one thought back to Adelaide in 1991 when the race was red-flagged after only 14 laps, and never restarted. By calling a halt to things when he did, Whiting allowed for the possibility of further racing taking place later – more than two hours later, as it turned out.

They are fanatical about Formula 1 in Montréal, and few – if any – spectators drifted away during the enforced stop, even though it felt as though the rain would never stop. When it did, finally, they had every reason to rejoice that they had stayed. After nine more laps behind the safety car – in total, Maylander paced the field for 31 of the 70 laps – they were away again, and Jenson Button, after experiencing every racing incident known to man, wasn’t in the top 15.

As we know, a combination of two further safety car periods, clever tyre choice – and inspired driving – led to a situation where Button scythed up the order and took the lead on the very last lap, when Sebastian Vettel, who had comfortably led throughout, allowed himself to be pressured into a rare mistake. It was a scintillating drive by Jenson, perhaps the best we have ever seen from him: how often he excels in mixed conditions, such as at Melbourne last year, when again he was the winner.

Through the ‘second’ segment of the race someone else excelled, too. Even more than Button, Michael Schumacher long enjoyed a reputation for supremacy in uncertain conditions, but since his comeback at the beginning of last season, there have been very few occasions when Schumacher reminded one of the driver he had been.

In dry qualifying at Montréal, Michael had – as usual – been outqualified by Mercedes team-mate Nico Rosberg, and he followed him, too, in the first segment of the race. When the deluge had abated, however, and the race restarted behind the safety car (with everyone on full wets), Schumacher dived into the pits as soon as Maylander pulled off and took on intermediates. Back in 12th place, in truth there was little to be lost, but his willingness to chance intermediates – and it was his decision to switch to them – was not only brave, but also inspired.

Over the next couple of laps the world and his wife came in for inters, but by then Michael was already enjoying the superiority of them. As others fell foul of the conditions, he began to move up, and his one-fell-swoop pass of the squabbling Massa and Kobayashi duo was pure Schumacher opportunism at its best.

By lap 51, with 19 to the flag, he was up into second place, and it began to look as though he would make the podium for the first time since his return. On lap 58, though, there was yet another three-lap safety car period (after Heidfeld had clattered into a wall) which closed up the pack once more, and on top of that Charlie Whiting decided by lap 63 that conditions – there was a dry ‘line’ all round the track by now – were such that DRS (the ‘moveable’ rear wing) could be enabled for the first time in the race.

Although he fought hard, Schumacher in this situation was unable to resist both Button and Webber, so in the end he finished fourth, and just missed that podium. I don’t suggest that Michael will ever again be the driver he was – in the dry he simply isn’t quick enough any more – but on a day of tricky and uncertain conditions, when experience and guile had a major role to play, he gave us the first real reminder of the greatness that once was. Afterwards he chose to shrug it off, but I’ll warrant that inwardly Schumacher got more satisfaction from this day in Montréal than any other since the comeback.

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

Another week, and another ‘week in motor sport’! This time I sit down with editor Damien Smith – despite the fact that the magazine is on deadline – and chat about possible driver movements in the McLaren camp, the possibility of the BBC dropping Formula 1, the situation at Citroen in the WRC and Dario Franchitti’s run of form in the IndyCar Series.

We are creating an audio file at the moment so if you don’t want to watch it, just download that on Wednesday 22nd…

As always though – let us know what you think about all the news.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

What a weekend of racing we’ve had! The action-packed Canadian Grand Prix, the unbelievably close Le Mans 24 Hours and of course, the MotoGP round at Silverstone.

This week I’m joined by Damien Smith and Rob Widdows who help me analyse as much racing as possible in 18 minutes!

As always, let us know your thoughts.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Or, if you’d like to download it…

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

So he is human, after all. As on so many other occasions this year, Sebastian Vettel dominated the Canadian Grand Prix – but only for 69 and a half of the 70 laps. Under pressure from Jenson Button on the last lap, Vettel got momentarily off the dry line, flicked sideways – and that was all Button needed. “In lots of ways I was lucky today,” Jenson said, “but still it was a very sweet win – maybe my best ever…”

The unforgiving Circuit Gilles Villeneuve invariably throws up an eventful Grand Prix, but this one was something else again. On a day of appalling weather, the race started behind the safety car, and Bernd Maylander would take to the track on four further occasions before the afternoon was done. So overwhelming was the rain that, 45 minutes into the race, after 15 laps behind the safety car, it was decided to bring out the red flag.

Unquestionably it was the right thing to do, and the right time to do it. Soon the rain was ferocious, and it went on and on. By the time it eased, then finally stopped, the track was pretty well waterlogged. When the safety car led them away once more, for the restart, a little over two hours had elapsed since the halt.

As usual Vettel started from pole position, but on this occasion his margin of superiority was rather less than usual – less than a couple of tenths – and Fernando Alonso, on the front row of the grid for the first time this year, quite fancied his chances. “This was always going to be one of Ferrari’s best circuits,” he said, “because it doesn’t have any really fast corners, so our lack of downforce is less of a problem than usual…”

By the same token, Red Bull – whose cars are unapproachable in quick corners – expected Montreal to be one of their weaker tracks. “Of course I’m pleased to be on pole,” said Vettel, “but actually I’m a little surprised…”

Perhaps Seb was being a touch disingenuous. The Red Bull may excel on circuits where aerodynamic grip is all, but it’s not less than outstanding anywhere. Mark Webber qualified fourth – behind the two Ferraris – but when you factored in that he had missed Saturday morning practice because of KERS problems on his car, and then qualified without KERS, his time said everything about Adrian Newey’s latest sublime design.

The team which disappointed most in qualifying was undoubtedly McLaren, with Lewis Hamilton fifth fastest, and Button seventh. Hamilton won here last year, and hopes were high of a repeat, but on Saturday evening he glumly said that the car was ‘simply too slow’. Martin Whitmarsh conceded that probably McLaren had run too much wing, and consequently suffered on straight line speed; on the other hand, he pointed out, if it were – as forecast – to rain on race day, Lewis and Jenson might find themselves in the pound seats.

It didn’t quite start out that way, however. After four laps behind the safety car, the field was flagged away on a wet track – and at the very first corner Hamilton tagged the back of Webber, putting the Red Bull into a spin. “I think,” Mark drily observed, “that Lewis saw the chequered flag at turn three…”

They raced for only three laps before the safety car was out again – this time because the McLarens had contrived to run into each other on the pit straight, Hamilton trying to pass on the left, and getting squeezed into the wall. “I’ve apologised to Lewis,” Jenson said. “I honestly couldn’t see a thing behind me…” Hamilton’s brief, but eventful, Canadian Grand Prix was over.

The safety car was out for five laps on this occasion, and when they restarted, at the end of lap 12, Vettel immediately disappeared into his own race again, pulling out 2.5 seconds on Alonso in the course of a single lap. Webber, meantime, was working his way back through the field following the first lap altercation with Hamilton. It was announced around this time, too, that Button had been given a ‘drive through’ penalty for a safety car infringement.

On lap 17 Ferrari brought Alonso in for a change from wets to intermediates, and the team’s timing could not have been worse. Within a couple of minutes the rain began to come down hard again, and, as Fernando stopped once more, to take on more wets, out came the safety car again, this time simply because the conditions were adjudged too dangerous to allow racing to continue. After 15 laps of tooling round, the decision was taken to halt proceedings until the rain began to ease off.

The wait was longer than anyone might have anticipated – it began at 1.45, and it was not until 3.50 that the race was restarted, again behind the safety car, of course, for it appears that the days of conventional starts on wet days are now consigned to history.

When the race did get away again – on lap 26 – it was brief indeed, for Alonso and Button touched as Jenson tried to pass on the inside of a right-hander, and the Ferrari spun over the kerb, and was instantly beached. Safety car once more – and for Alonso no points from a race of which he had had such high expectations. As Button made his way to the pits to replace a punctured tyre, it was announced that the incident – like countless others on this day – was ‘under investigation by the stewards’.

Conditions remained extremely treacherous, and clearly they brought out the best in Schumacher, who was turning in the best performance of his unhappy ‘second career’. On lap 42 Michael passed Webber, and proceeded to close up on Kobayashi and Massa, who were scrapping over second place.

Unlike most drivers Kamui, at the time the race was red-flagged, had not yet made a tyre stop, which meant that he (and both the Renault drivers) effectively got the stop free, the tyre changing being done during the enforced break. He drove a typically spirited race in Montreal, but when at one point he moved to cover a move by Massa the effect was to slow both of them – and Schumacher, close at hand, took the opportunity to snick by into second place! Michael perhaps on the podium again…in the Mercedes pit they could barely contain their excitement.

By lap 56, with 14 to the flag, Vettel led comfortably from Schumacher, who was fending off Webber, then Button, Kobayashi, Heidfeld and Massa. Out of the second turn Heidfeld ran into the back of Kobayashi’s Sauber, and damaged his front wing – which then broke violently enough to lift the front wheels from the ground: the Renault pitched into a wall, and out came the safety car again…

It was this incident which was to change the outcome of the race – and there was something else, too. The rules prohibit the use of DRS (the opening rear wing) in the wet, but now the track – or at least a ‘line’ round the track – was swiftly drying out, and everyone was on slicks. One wondered if and when Charlie Whiting would use his discretion to enable DRS again. It would not be long.

As before, Vettel charged away again on the restart, and looked firmly set on another 25 points. Within a couple of laps he was three seconds clear, but then, as he admitted later, he took it perhaps a little too conservatively – and perhaps reckoned without the effect of DRS on some of those behind him.

By lap 63 it was operational, and its dramatic effect – whether you like it or not – was clearly seen, for Webber, having been unable to pass Schumacher without it, now went past as if the Mercedes were parked. Immediately, though, Mark went over the final chicane, and although he had already cleared Schumacher he was concerned that he might be penalised – considered to have gained by cutting the chicane – and therefore he handed the place back to Michael. On the following lap he might have hoped to take the position for good, but instead was passed by Button, who was clearly on a charge.

“I love conditions like we had towards the end of the race,” Jenson said, “and the car was working beautifully…” On lap 65 he was 3.1 seconds behind Vettel; on lap 66 the gap was down to 1.6.

At this point we expected Sebastian simply to respond, to draw away again in the manner we have so often seen. He didn’t, though – indeed Button continued, little by little, to close.

On lap 67, with three to go, Webber got past Schumacher again, and this time made it stick, putting and end to Michael’s hopes of at last making a podium. No matter: this was consummately the best performance we have seen from him since his return, and fourth place was a good result.

Lap 68, and Vettel set the fastest lap of the race – which was instantly beaten by Button. Now the gap was an even second, so Jenson was bringing himself into DRS range of the World Championship leader. Next time round he was fractionally closer still, but not able to take a run at Seb: it would all come down to the last lap.

We expected that Button’s move would come – DRS-assisted – on the long straight at the end of the lap, but in the event he had no need of any such thing, for Vettel, responding to the pressure, got slightly off the dry line, and although he held the consequent slide it was too late to prevent the McLaren from going by. Half a lap from the end of the Canadian Grand Prix Jenson was into the lead, and there he stayed.

A tumultuous race, you might say, in every conceivable respect. How often does a driver come through five safety car periods, six pit stops, including a ‘drive through’ penalty, a puncture, contact with (at least) two other cars – and win a Grand Prix? I can remember nothing comparable. Button admitted that luck had been with him – “I couldn’t have done it without DRS and all the safety car periods” – but perhaps the biggest slice of it came from Emerson Fittipaldi, this weekend the driver advising the stewards.

On these occasions Fittipaldi has always shown himself to be fundamentally ‘on the side of the drivers’, and not given to dishing out penalties in an era when every little incident is scrutinised. It would have been criminal to have robbed Jenson of what he referred to as ‘his sweetest victory’. This was a wonderful drive.

Vettel, it must be said, was entirely magnanimous in defeat. After the last safety car period, he said, he probably should have gone harder, built up more of a lead, but who could blame him – in this season of endless victories – for being perhaps a touch complacent? No one’s saying it, of course, but the 2011 World Championship is already effectively won.

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

Nelson Piquet described driving a Grand Prix car in Monte Carlo as like trying to ride your bicycle around your living room. A victory on the streets of the Principality, he declared, was worth two anywhere else.

Keke Rosberg once likened the flat-out dive down the hill from Casino Square to Mirabeau to being on a toboggan without any snow to cushion the bumps. And Keke was not afraid of anything.
Both these men were racing cars with a manual gearbox, slick tyres and an excess of mechanical grip over aerodynamic downforce. Hence they were very busy in the cockpit, constantly changing gear and correcting slides on the changes of camber. They’d wear out the glove on the right hand, and the sole of the boot on the right foot. Blisters were commonplace at the chequered flag.

Men like Graham Hill – they called him Mister Monaco – and Ayrton Senna made it their own, stamping their authority on the twists, turns and bumps of the streets. And that’s what a great driver does – he takes the little place by the scruff of its impossibly glamorous neck. It is not a place for the faint-hearted.

The Monte Carlo circuit is easier now, but still a huge challenge in a Formula 1 car. As we head towards the race this coming Sunday, I feel as excited and expectant as ever, this Grand Prix being one of my all-time favourite occasions. There is simply nothing like it, there being an element of total madness. Were such an idea to be put forward now it would probably be dismissed on grounds of ‘health and safety’ and lack of palatial facilities. But Monaco survives, and let us rejoice that it does.

The race is something of a lottery, of course, but no less thrilling for that. Despite protestations to the contrary, overtaking is possible, this being proved each year by those with absolute skill and bravery. The streets are the ultimate test of a driver and nowhere else can you get so close to the action on the track. No longer are you able to walk through the tunnel, or stand behind the barriers, but a seat at the swimming pool section, or in Casino Square, is as good a view of an F1 driver in action as you will find.

Every time I walk down to the circuit at the start of practice on Thursday I get goosebumps and feel that surge of excitement as the cars scream up the hill from Ste Devote. I quicken my pace, get out my stopwatch, and make a dash for the nearest vantage point. The media centre is not the place to be. No, you want to be out there, drinking it in, as the cars skim the barriers, blast into blind corners and wail away towards the harbour where they will dash past the yachts in a crazy blur of noise, colour and raw speed. One split second of distraction and the car will be off-line and into the scenery. It is a magical experience for both driver and spectator.

Who will be at the front on Sunday? I have no idea, but all things being equal the best drivers will prevail. So expect Vettel, Hamilton, Button, Alonso and Webber to shine. Red Bull’s aerodynamic advantage will be somewhat constrained in Monte Carlo, while the McLaren is nimble and Alonso will squeeze something out of his Ferrari. If it rains, well, then all predictions are set aside. For once this season a good grid position will be important, with drivers unlikely to be able to storm through the field, so Saturday should be as thrilling as ever. Traffic is the bogey in Monaco, new tyres or not, soft option or hard.

If you have never been to the Grand Prix du Monaco, you have not completed your motor racing initiation. You don’t have to stay in a fancy hotel or visit the Casino, you just have to be there. Yes, it looks pretty on the TV, but on the side of the track, or leaning from a window above, this is a gut-bashingly great motor racing spectacle.

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

Some days certain drivers rise above the rest of the field. The Spanish Grand Prix was one of those days for Sebastian Vettel and Lewis Hamilton.

The two drivers were in a league of their own on Sunday and it was only some great driving from the German – who had Hamilton breathing down his neck for the last part of the race – that kept him in front.

Even though the Red Bulls had qualified a second ahead of the next fastest runner, Hamilton, it was Alonso that took the initiative in the run up to the first corner and came out in first place from fourth on the grid. It was a typically smart and brave move from the Spaniard. His home crowd was justifiably delighted – if a little amazed – but it wasn’t to last. The Ferrari driver was leap-frogged by Hamilton and Vettel in the stops and then changed to a second set of hard tyres in his third stop when he was struggling to keep Webber behind him. He wasn’t comfortable with them at all and gently slipped down the field to finish fifth, a lap behind the leaders.

Vettel and Hamilton meanwhile drew out a lead at the front of the field. Hamilton just wouldn’t give up though and threw everything at the championship leader. Vettel was without his KERS, yet again, for some of the Grand Prix and it was only thanks to the Red Bull’s superior downforce in the middle sector that held the McLaren at bay down the pit straight when Hamilton was using his KERS and DRS. It was a masterful display of driving from the pair and, without a doubt, helped the race be the most exciting and enjoyable the circuit has produced for a long time, if ever.

Things didn’t go according to plan for Button even though he did manage to finish on the podium with Vettel and Hamilton. The Brit had a terrible start, with far too much wheelspin, from fifth on the grid and dropped all the way back to 10th on the first lap. McLaren quickly did the sums and put Button onto a three-stop strategy rather than a four which he handled brilliantly. Any thoughts that his tyres wouldn’t last and that Webber would catch and pass him in the final stint were rubbished when he crossed the line eight seconds ahead of the Australian.

“I did everything I could,” said Hamilton after the race, “but the Red Bull was just so quick in the middle sector I couldn’t get close enough.” That it was, but crucially the Red Bull was nowhere near as dominant in the race as it was during qualifying. The Circuit de Catalunya is a high downforce track and the very quick cars invariably do well there. The Red Bull was the quickest car throughout the weekend, but McLaren must be delighted by how much they have closed the gap on race pace, especially since it was at a track that rewards cars with plenty of downforce – something the Red Bull has got plenty of.

The DRS zone didn’t make a huge impact during the race as it didn’t start early enough on the pit sraight, meaning that rarely did the following car manage to close the gap. However, this was a truly great Grand Prix, and it’s safe to say that it was thanks to the Pirelli tyres and not the other ‘gimmicks’ as my colleagues Damien and Nigel call them.

So what did everyone think? The best race from Catalunya ever? It will be hard to beat. Do check back with us tomorrow as I will be quizzing Rob Widdows about all the racing over the weekend for our ‘week in motor sport’ video feature. Do leave me a question to ask him below, and don’t go easy…

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Another ‘week in motor sport’ episode where I talk to the editor Damien Smith about Lewis Hamilton’s stunning victory in the Chinese Grand Prix, Mark Webber’s rise through the field and the new ‘gimmicks’ in F1 like the DRS and KERS.

We also discuss Mike Conway’s first IndyCar win, Sebastien Ogier’s second WRC win on the trot and Silverline Chevrolet’s effort to get Jason Plato’s car ready for race 3 in the BTCC at Donington. Oh, and we also touch on two future Grand Prix champions who have just started karting.

The week in motor sport

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We don’t often see Lewis Hamilton well up with emotion, but it was more than understandable as he prepared to step out on to the podium in Shanghai. His victory in the Chinese Grand Prix will go down as one of his finest after a scintillating race that was packed with incident and excitement.

McLaren’s first win of the season, breaking Red Bull and Sebastian Vettel’s seemingly iron grip on the top spot, came through great strategy, wonderful driving – and heart-in-mouth work from the mechanics. A fuel leak as Hamilton prepared to leave his garage to take the start almost destroyed his day before it had really begun. Team principal Martin Whitmarsh reckoned Lewis only made it to the grid with about 10 seconds to spare as the mechanics raced to quell the leak. The boys at McLaren earned their win bonuses in those vital seconds and have every right to enjoy a few Tsingtaos before the flight home.

Dominant pole position man Vettel was on the back foot after bogging down at the start and although he recovered to lead this Grand Prix, his two-stop strategy fell four laps short of delivering him a hat trick of victories for the season.

Jenson Button, starting second, swept into Turn 1 in the lead from the lights, as Hamilton left Vettel scrabbling to hold on to third place from Nico Rosberg’s Mercedes. The two McLarens and the Red Bull ran in close formation until lap 14 when Button and Vettel both made their first stops. Button had already run a lap longer than he was supposed to and then made a glaring error as he tried to stop in Vettel’s pitbox! “I was looking down as I came into the pits,” explained the sheepish Englishman afterwards.

A bemused Vettel followed Button into his pitbox and emerged from the stops after only a slight delay, and in front of the McLaren. Hamilton pitted a lap later, but his hopes of jumping the pair were thwarted after a poor in-lap during which Felipe Massa’s Ferrari passed him.

At this stage, Mercedes had made the biggest gains after Rosberg and Michael Schumacher’s early stops on laps 12 and 10 respectively. Indeed, Rosberg found himself in the lead from Vettel, Button, Massa, Hamilton, Schumacher and a subdued Fernando Alonso.

Meanwhile, Mark Webber appeared to be making little progress from his lowly 18^th on the grid following his troubled practice and qualifying. He’d started the race on the hard prime tyres and only made up a couple of places before stopping for a set of softs on lap 10. It looked like being a long afternoon for the Australian at this stage, but his patience would be rewarded…

At the front, Button would be the first to stop for his second set of Pirellis, on lap 24 – a clear indication that McLaren had chosen a three-stop strategy. Rosberg stopped a lap later, so Vettel now led from Massa’s two-stopping Ferrari. Nico rejoined still ahead of Button and Hamilton, and at this stage it appeared the race might be slipping away from McLaren.

But not for long. Vettel would make his second and final stop on lap 31, leaving him a daunting 25 laps to nurse his tyres to the flag, and a few laps later Hamilton began to make his move. He closed in on Button and made a decisive move on his team-mate into Turn 1 at the start of lap 36. The battle of the two Englishman had been decided.

Lewis followed leader Rosberg into the pits three laps later, allowing Vettel and Massa back in front – and now the chase was on. By lap 42 Hamilton was monstering Rosberg, who offered little resistance at Turn 6 as the McLaren outbraked the Mercerdes. He despatched Massa at Turn 1 on lap 45 and now there were 10 laps for him to catch and pass the World Championship leader.

On tyres eight laps fresher, it was an uneven contest. Four laps from the finish Hamilton looked unstoppable and so it would prove. He jumped Vettel with another terrific move, this time at Turn 7 – pleasingly taking the lead without the need for his rear wing Drag Reduction System.

The race was won, but the action was far from over. Webber was finally feeling the benefit of those fresh soft ‘option’ tyres that his poor qualifying had saved him for the race. His pace towards the end of the Grand Prix, after an aggressive three-stop strategy, was astounding and he closed in on an incredible podium finish. Rosberg was picked off at Turn 6 two laps from the flag, then Button – who admitted he’d uncharacteristically struggled to look after his rear tyres – was powerless to stop Mark sweeping by on the long back straight. From his lowly grid spot, Webber was just seven seconds behind winner Hamilton. It was a performance that might just rejuvenate the Australian as he fights to get back on terms with his World Champion team-mate.

Rosberg scored a creditable fifth behind Button, the Mercedes ace producing the goods to beat Massa who looked much more like his old self for Ferrari in China. He beat Alonso to sixth, while Fernando worked hard to hold off a determined Schumacher. These old rivals had enjoyed a spirited battle earlier in the race, with Alonso pulling off a perfect ‘undercut’ pass on the drag out of the hairpin. That his DRS appeared to be malfunctioning during this battle gave a clue that his afternoon had not gone entirely according to plan.

Hamilton paid great tribute to the team he has criticised of late, while Vettel took defeat with a smile after a day when radio problems had made communication with his pitwall difficult. Once again the team struggled to make its KERS run reliably and the pressure is back on Red Bull and Adrian Newey to solve the problems before the Turkish Grand Prix.

As modern Formula 1 races go, this was one of the best. Yes, DRS is a gimmick, Pirelli has been asked to provide ‘flawed’ tyres and a question mark remains over the benefits offered by KERS. But right now, the combination is creating races full of variables and plenty of passing moves that could never be described as easy. Artificial racing? Maybe. But you can’t deny it’s exciting.

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“Fantastic job, fantastic job. In the heat we kept our heads cool,” commented Sebastian Vettel on the radio after he won the Malaysian Grand Prix. “Every week it’s a pleasure driving for you and I’m loving it, I’m loving it…”

I’m sure Vettel is loving his time at Red Bull at the moment as even without his KERS – which stopped working early on in the race – he never looked flustered, or troubled. He has now won five of the six last Grands Prix and he is oozing confidence. No doubt there’ll be plenty to get on with back in Milton Keynes after the KERS systems of both Mark Webber and Vettel failed to work, but you get a sense that any teams that want to compete with Red Bull have their work cut out.

3.2 seconds behind Vettel was McLaren’s Jenson Button who, having qualified fourth, drove a strong race. His team-mate had the measure of him for most of the weekend, and indeed, for most of the race. However, at Hamilton’s third stop the team opted for the harder of the two compounds, his front left took time to be changed, and from then on the Brit struggled to keep the same pace as the leaders. Button, who had been running behind Hamilton, jumped him when he finally stopped for the third time, but even if he hadn’t, there’s no doubt he would have got past soon enough. Only 10 laps later and he was over 15 seconds down the road.

Fernando Alonso quickly closed onto the back of Hamilton’s struggling McLaren, but clipped his front wing on the back of the car while trying to pass and had to pit for a new front nose that lap. If Hamilton thought his troubles were over he was sadly mistaken, as both Nick Heidfeld and Mark Webber closed up onto the back of his gearbox and made their way past soon after, Webber doing so after Hamilton ran wide. After another pitstop to change his ruined tyres, Hamilton finally finished seventh.

It was another good weekend for Renault as after both Heidfeld and Vitaly Petrov got off the line brilliantly they maintained a good race pace. Heidfeld finished an encouraging third while Petrov, who had run well for much of the race, finally ran wide and while coming back onto the track managed to traverse a rain gulley that pitched the Renault off the ground. The car came down with an almighty thump and, astonishingly, the steering column came away from the rack leaving him with no steering at all.

Thankfully by this time Petrov was going slow enough to come to a halt a few metres down the road, but no doubt the Russian was cursing his decision to take the rain gulley flat. He may have shown how far he has come on in Australia, where he finished a promising third, but mistakes like that will go down badly with any team that looks set to pick up points.

Mark Webber, Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso finished fourth, fifth and sixth respectively, but it was the Australian that stole the show. On the way to the grid he reported that his KERS didn’t work and it was this problem, combined with a slow getaway, that relegated him to 10th by the end of the first lap.

He recovered well though and got some strong points. However, he has to start beating his team-mate in qualifying and the race to stand a chance of the championship, and at the moment can you see that happening?

It was another good result for Scot Paul di Resta who managed to out-qualify and out-race his team-mate Adrian Sutil. The Force India is clearly off the pace at the moment and there’s no doubt that Sutil and di Resta are getting the most out of the car. The team will be reasonably relieved with their 10th and 11th positions.

So what of next weekend in China? McLaren is undoubtedly closer to Red Bull than it was in testing and the first race. Ferrari seem to have dropped back even further on one-lap pace since Australia, and Mercedes had a woeful weekend in Malaysia with Schumacher finishing ninth and Rosberg a very quiet 12th. It looks like Vettel and Red Bull will be the combination to beat again in seven days time and if the other teams aren’t careful, they could go to Istanbul for the start of the European season with a certain German sitting on 75 points at the lead of the championship.

On Sunday evening Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso were each given 20-second penalities. The McLaren driver was given his for making more than one move while trying to block Alonso, and the Ferrari driver was penalised for causing an avoidable accident. The penalties mean that Hamilton drops to eighth place, but Alonso stays in sixth.

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

We may be one of the oldest motor racing magazines in the world, but we do like trying new things. Our latest idea was to record a very brief round-up of the news each week so that every Monday you can log on to the Motor Sport website and watch a video clip that neatly sums up all that’s happened in the motor racing world over the past seven days.

Well, we’ve given it a go. It may be a little longer than we anticipated and our attempt at a newsroom feel – recording it in front of everyone in the office – may not have been 100 per cent successful, but it’s a work in progress. If any of you heard our first audio podcast you’d be amazed…

So, hopefully the days of reading hundreds of news stories every Monday morning are gone. Maybe…

Let us know what you think as this really is a first attempt. We hope you enjoy it.

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Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

“That was really controlled,” said Sebastian Vettel over the radio at the end of the Australian Grand Prix. “Thank you very much, very cool.”

His race was indeed ‘very cool’ as having blown everyone away in qualifying – his team-mate Mark Webber included – the German took the lead off the line and only gave it up to Lewis Hamilton during his two pitstops. He drove a faultless race and even though the Red Bull wasn’t equipped with KERS, something that Christian Horner only admitted to after the race, it was clearly the fastest car out there. A worrying state of affairs for all the other teams.

Hamilton had a less ‘controlled’ race as although he managed to keep second place after getting too much wheelspin off the line and momentarily letting Webber through, the underfloor of his car came away later on in the race. Despite the lack of downforce he kept his track position and will be hoping that the car passes scrutineering. Something that team principal Martin Whitmarsh was confident of after the race, but not something that is a dead certain.

Big news came in the shape of Russian Vitaly Petrov though as having got a superb start from sixth on the grid he finally finished third. He didn’t put a foot wrong and proved that he’s not just racing because of the financial benefits to his team. A great result and a fitting tribute to the missing Kubica.

Nick Heidfeld’s race in the other Renault was sadly not as successful. After a poor qualifying left him all the way down in 18th on the grid, the replacement for Kubica had his work cut out. However, although he did finally finish 14th, his pace was nowhere near his team-mate’s. The fact that he was drafted in as a ‘safe pair of hands with plenty of experience’ is all very well – and I doubt he will finish where he did in the next race – but when you’re standing in for Kubica results will be expected. Watch this space.

Other big news was Sergio Perez. The Sauber driver had an absolutely fantastic race and – having pitted only once for new tyres – finished seventh behind Button (6th), Webber (5th) and Alonso (4th). Quite how the Sauber could be so gentle on its tyres is amazing and certainly bodes well for the rest of the season, especially when we go to tracks that are harder on the Pirellis. It was a great way to start a Formula 1 career and hopefully the confidence will be flowing after such a strong start.

So what of all the new rules and regulations? As I mentioned, Red Bull didn’t even run their KERS during Saturday and Sunday having evaluated it on Friday and deciding that it was too big a risk to run. The Red Bull of Vettel was comfortably the fastest car out there, which does tend to suggest that the KERS still needs work. I just wish the rules gave teams that used the technology a bigger advantage. 80bhp may seem like a lot of power – it is more power than some small hatchbacks – but surely with a boost of 150bhp the teams would put more effort into the device and the technology would be advanced that much faster? The rules are set though, and it’s 80bhp that the drivers can lay their hands on when they press the button.

The adjustable rear wing didn’t produce as much overtaking as everyone expected. However, it did solve the problem of being stuck in a slower car’s dirty air to some extent. Yes, the pit straight was not a long enough straight on which to operate it and the effect wasn’t as large as it perhaps could have been, but it did help faster cars close the gap and overtake either into turn 1 or later on in the lap.

One of the best examples was when Felipe Massa was following Sebastien Buemi later on in the race and although he was within one second of the Toro Rosso driver – who was sitting in a car with the same engine as his own – for a couple of laps, it took him two attempts to get past, even with the ability to open the flap on the rear wing on the pit straight. Was it too hard? Too easy? Time will tell. A gimmick? That it is, but as someone pointed out, during the turbo era drivers could turn up their boost to overtake someone which would have had a similar effect.

Finally the tyres. Pirelli have made some big improvements since testing and the four or five-stop race was a pessimistic exaggeration. In the end the most number of stops cars really needed were three, while all the front runners opted for two – bar Perez of course who managed to use only two sets all race. “We have to make some compliments to Pirelli,” said Vettel after the race. Of course, having just won the Grand Prix he wasn’t going to be rude about them.

Albert Park is a different circuit to most though so we’ll have to wait and see how things pan out when we get to Malaysia in two weeks and even China in three. In the meantime – congratulations to a dominant Vettel, a McLaren team that has managed to find a second between testing and the first race, and of course to Petrov and Perez who showed that Formula 1 isn’t all about experience. Just ask Barrichello who had the weekend from hell, spending more time off the track than on…

The two Saubers of Kamui Kobayashi and Sergio Perez have since been disqualified for a rear wing infringement. The team has made it clear that they wish to appeal the decision after investigating matters at its factory. Meanwhile, Hamilton’s floor was deemed legal by the scrutineers and his second place remains.

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Testing, testing, one-two-three. We are now in the midst of the fourth and final pre-season Formula 1 test at the Catalunya circuit in southern Spain, where it has been unusually grey and chilly. This is the test that should have been in hot and dusty Bahrain…

Pre-season testing can, as we have so often seen over the years, be not only inconclusive but also misleading. This is because there is always a certain amount of smoke and mirrors, some deliberate sandbagging and insufficient accurate information forthcoming on fuel loads and set-ups.

And this year, we should remember, we are dealing with totally new tyre compounds from Pirelli, which has not yet got a race under its belt in any kind of climate. Rubber is likely to be a major factor in early 2011.

Popular opinion – and many engineers agree – is that we are going to see a lot more tyre degradation in the early races than we have previously been used to. Three pitstops are predicted, some saying more, especially if the weather is hot, the surface abrasive. Added to this unknown we have KERS, moveable rear wings and new cars to consider.

Logic says that Red Bull will the early pacesetters, and so it proved on Tuesday in Spain, with Mark Webber (above) top of the timesheets from Jenson Button – by some margin. This does not mean Red Bull is going to disappear into the distance at Melbourne on March 27, but simply that on March 8 the new Red Bull was more sorted than the new McLaren. And that’s no surprise at this stage. In an era when aerodynamics is key, you can expect an Adrian Newey-designed car to be at or near the top of the times.

What will be in many ways more interesting to see is how the two most radical cars shape up against the rest. These are the Williams (below), with its radical rear end and new transmission, and the Lotus-Renault, with its forward-facing exhaust system. If either of these two risky design ideas prove to be the way to go, then the others will have to follow suit, just as we saw two years ago with the Brawn’s double diffuser, when Button’s pre-season testing pace had alarm bells ringing right down the pitlane.

This year we have seen no such clear advantage, although Red Bull is predictably fast. Not far behind is Ferrari, smarting from its title defeat in Abu Dhabi. All Grand Prix teams of any stature play their cards close to their chests, saving their best until the first afternoon of qualifying. And, just to complicate matters, testing is not what it used to be.

In days gone by there was virtually unlimited mileage, the teams under no pressure to get it all sorted in just four short sessions in February and March. And there’s another difference. Test drivers, or reserve drivers as they are now known, have to get some mileage now or never, whereas before they could do their testing while the teams were away racing. And this means – as we have seen in Spain – lots of new, young drivers being given time in the cars when, in a perfect world, they’d be waiting until the race drivers went away to race.

So, we should not be surprised if Red Bull, Ferrari – and possibly McLaren – are at the front of the grid in Melbourne. Button (above) says we should not expect too much, that the car is not the equal of Red Bull or Ferrari, and they don’t have time to catch up before the end of the month. Bad news for McLaren fans.

Oh yes, and we also know that Mercedes-Benz has a great deal of work to do if Schumacher and Rosberg are to be anywhere near the podium. Unless, of course, Mr Brawn has been keeping something up his sleeve…

So end the ifs, buts and maybes. Soon it will be time to race…

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

Imagine if James Hunt was still around today, I mused to Martin Brundle at Daytona a few weeks ago. “Well, if he was I’d be out of a job!”, the BBC’s new lead commentator fired back.

The truth would probably be somewhat different. Hunt, who died of a heart attack at the age of just 45, would have struggled to hold on to a high-profile media role in the modern world. Richard Keys and Andy Gray would have had nothing on Master James! Had he lived, he’d have said something outrageous long ago and would probably have been handed his cards after a short and very nasty tabloid campaign against him. After this, I like to think he would have settled down into his new role as an outspoken, politically incorrect star columnist here at Motor Sport… and how refreshingly outspoken and irreverent those columns would have been. Such a shame he was taken from us all so early.

Hunt was a brilliant, instinctive broadcaster during his time sharing a mike with the long-suffering Murray Walker from 1980-93, in much the same way that he was a brilliant, instinctive racing driver. He shot from the hip and carried lasting prejudices (yes, poor Riccardo Patrese), and that attitude would not have sat well in this sensitive age. Can you imagine the froth that would have been generated on the web forums if Hunt was broadcasting today? They’d have loved him and lynched him.

For me, Hunt was all the greater because of his imperfections (He once turned me down for an autograph at a Brands Hatch Grand Prix because he was late for the celebrity race. Somehow, I didn’t mind  – because it was him. Even as a kid I was aware of his reputation for timing, so found the polite but firm ‘no’ and the mad rush he was in very amusing).

He took his racing intensely seriously, to the extreme of vomiting before the starts and so on, because he knew only too well how dangerous was his chosen vocation. But at the same time he refused to take life seriously away from the races – which is exactly why he agreed to pose for Patrick Lichfield’s cheeky photoshoot that adorns the cover of the April issue.

Nubile young ladies on the cover of Motor Sport? Sacrilege! Mr Tee (Motor Sport’s former proprietor) must be spinning… But if there is an image that sums up the man our writer Eoin Young struggled so hard to like, it’s this one. All that’s missing is a bottle of something strong and a fag in his mouth. Like James, we don’t like to take life too seriously here at Motor Sport, and we couldn’t resist. Especially as it highlights once again how different our world is today compared to the 1970s. Can you imagine Jenson Button taking part in such a photo shoot? (I can actually – but I don’t think McLaren, Vodafone etc would like it much! Imagine the airbrushing…)

Eoin was James’s original – and very reluctant – biographer. His personal impressions of a man who he came to know well, and eventually like a great deal, are fascinating. For those of us who only knew him as an image in photographs or as a voice on television, they are truly revealing. Incidentally, Eoin lives back in New Zealand these days and we were alarmed to hear this week of the dreadful earthquake that has devastated Christchurch. We were relieved to hear that Eoin was unhurt, although he has suffered damage to his property. From everyone at the magazine, and I’m sure all of you who read it, we send you our best wishes, Eoin.

James Hunt pops up again elsewhere in the April issue, his serious racing side highlighted within Rob Widdows’ entertaining Dispatches column on an eye-opening trip to Monaco with Hesketh Racing, and also within this month’s riveting Lunch with Murray Walker. Now, you won’t be surprised to read that Murray was typically eloquent when Simon Taylor met up with him recently. But even for Murray, this one is special. Despite suffering from a heavy bout of ’flu, he saved his best form for Motor Sport. I’ve never read a more frank and insightful piece on a man who is always a great interview.

We also look ahead to the forthcoming F1 season, with a bumper preview featuring Nigel Roebuck in discussion with Sir Jackie Stewart, a definitive explanation of the new rules – including those gimmicky moveable rear wings – and a study of the overtaking debate by former Renault technical boss Pat Symonds. Since we went to press, the Bahrain GP has been cancelled, of course, so we’re down to ‘only’ 19 races beginning in Australia on March 27. Within our issue, Jackie Stewart has some strong words on the circuits that F1 visits today and the changes that he believes are needed to inject a greater challenge into the sport. We quite agree.

You can also read our verdict on the new McLaren MP4-12C road car, find out more about Mini’s return to world rallying and catch up with comeback kings Martin Brundle and Mark Blundell during their impressive return to the cockpit at the Rolex Daytona 24 Hours.

Before I close, I should mention that our founder editor Bill Boddy celebrated his birthday this week. On February 22 WB turned 98 years old. His stories continue to file into our inbox for each issue and the magazine simply would not be the same without him. Happy birthday, WB, from all the team at Motor Sport.

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

Here we are… the first of our 2011 podcasts.

We made the journey to the McLaren Technology Centre yesterday and managed to distract Martin for well over an hour. We hope you enjoy it! As always, let us know what you think.

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

“Nice wheels” and “Vodafone is painted on nice this year”. That was the level of insight offered by Lewis Hamilton at the ‘reveal’ of his new McLaren-Mercedes MP4-26 in a Berlin shopping centre on Friday.

Extravagant Formula 1 launches are generally a thing of the past, but Vodafone Germany wanted to make a show this year and while most teams have limited themselves to test day roll-outs, McLaren flew the media masses to the German capital to unveil its latest silver machine.

But as launches go, this one suffered a bit of a misfire. As we waited on our ‘media platform’ in the cold, a film began to play silently on the big screen. It took a while for some to even notice this launch had started.

The film showed members of the public carrying bits of bodywork through the streets of Berlin, on the tube and up escalators. Then, in front of us a team of McLaren mechanics wheeled the incomplete racing car into the shopping centre and began to piece together MP4-26 before a murmuring audience. The ‘civilians’ who’d been seen carrying the bodywork pieces on the big screen entered the arena and handed the parts over to the mechanics to fit to the car. Finally, Hamilton and Jenson Button walked in to look over the car – for the first time as a complete entity, according to Lewis – and participate in a Q&A session with the German host. The effect was… underwhelming.

In the press conference (thankfully back in the warm), Martin Whitmarsh and McLaren’s three senior engineers, Paddy Lowe, Jonathan Neale and Tim Goss, offered a little more substance on 2011 and their new challenger.

The overriding conversation point was the introduction of the adaptable rear wing for this year, which will allow drivers to ‘trim out’ levels of rear downforce and decrease drag in FIA-designated parts of the track when they are within a second of a rival – thus increasing the chances of overtaking.

It seems incredible to be writing this, but people are talking about overtaking being too easy in F1 this year, thanks to this new regulation. The effect is said to be about 10 times more than we saw with the (now-banned) F-duct last year. Overtaking, so it is said, will become common and therefore meaningless.

Team principal Whitmarsh had an answer to the doubters (of which I am one – I think it’s a gimmick). “What’s important to remember is that there was a comprehensive survey of fans and one of the overriding issues it raised was that there wasn’t enough overtaking opportunities. Now some of us deeply involved in the sport might not believe or accept that, but you don’t go to the detail of asking everyone what they want and then when primary point comes out, not do anything about it. There was a responsibility placed upon us to do something.

“We’ll all have opinions about it throughout the year. But if you’ve got it, you can tune it. The extent and manner of how you deploy it, and when, that’s an easy thing now for us to tune.”

The drivers are reserving judgement until they have real experience of the new regulations, but Jenson did suggest that the satisfaction of a perfectly-timed overtaking move might change this year. We will see.

Meanwhile, they are unconcerned about the complications of having extra buttons to press this year, thanks to the adaptable rear wing and the re-introduction of KERS. Lewis reckoned it was “quite easy” to manage. Again, only time will tell.

As for the MP4-26 itself, its most noticeable feature is the heavily sculpted sidepods that waste away dramatically at the rear, in the quest for improved airflow to the rear end. As usual, the car that was revealed only gives a clue to the real specification that we will see hit the track next week at Jerez. The car will no doubt change again by the time we reach Bahrain for the first race.

At the launch, the exhausts – which no longer have a double diffuser to blow through this year – exited straight out the back. Tim Goss confirmed that it’ll be a major area of development this year.

The next few weeks will be intense for the F1 teams. With so much change and so much that is new, drawing an accurate picture from testing will be even more difficult than usual. We eagerly await the Bahrain GP for some real answers to the big questions of F1 2011.

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

As Fernando Alonso chased Nico Hulkenberg in the early stages of the Brazilian Grand Prix, it was apparent that on the long climb at the end of the lap the Ferrari was making little impression on the Williams, and you had to be impressed by what Cosworth has achieved this season. Rubens Barrichello suggests that ‘driveability’ isn’t all it might be, but on horsepower – so long as the engine is reasonably fresh, anyway – it apparently lacks for little. Pretty impressive, you’d have to say, for what is supposedly a ‘customer’ engine, supplied to four teams: whatever else Lotus, Virgin and HRT have been short of in their debut season, it hasn’t been grunt.

Alonso found himself in the unusual position of chasing Hulkenberg because the young German – although swiftly dispensed with by the Red Bulls – had succeeded in putting his Williams on pole, and it was pleasing that this should have occurred at Interlagos, where the team’s last victory – by Juan Pablo Montoya – was scored six long years ago.

The manner in which Hulkenberg achieved his pole position reminded me rather of qualifying for the Race of Champions at Brands Hatch in 1975, when Jody Scheckter – in freezing conditions – threw his Tyrrell around with such vigour that he alone got decent temperature into his tyres, and achieved a time no one else could approach. In the case of Hulkenberg, a wet Interlagos was drying out by the end of qualifying, and he – one of the first out on slicks – drove as quick an out-lap as he dared, got his tyres up to temperature, and went for it, setting a time more than a second faster even than the Red Bulls.

As we saw so often in the season past, Adrian Newey’s wonder cars duly waltzed it in the race, but Alonso wasn’t very far behind Webber at the flag, and might have been able to exert a little more pressure had he not lost a significant amount of time behind Hulkenberg in the early laps. The importance of qualifying is perhaps even greater today than at any point in the past.
Most would agree, I think, that on many occasions in this era of Formula 1 the highlight of the weekend – in terms of excitement – is Q3, that final 10-minute period when only the 10 fastest cars are out, and the track is relatively uncluttered. Since refuelling was dropped, thank God, so the need to ‘qualify with fuel for the first stint of the race’ has gone with it, and thus the cars are in pure, ultra-light ‘qualifying spec’.

Think of Singapore. Alonso stole that race from the faster Red Bull of Vettel because he drove a perfect qualifying lap, and Sebastian, heading for pole on his final run, lightly clipped a guardrail. That meant starting second, and although he pressured Fernando for the entire race, second was where he finished, too. Saturday, in other words, decided Sunday, and often it has been that way because overtaking, as we know, is extremely difficult with F1 cars of the contemporary era.

The top six drivers in the 2010 World Championship represented three teams. At Red Bull, Vettel out-qualified Webber 12-7, at McLaren Hamilton beat Button 14-5, and at Ferrari Alonso was ahead of Massa 15-4. Ten times Vettel started from pole, followed by Webber (five), Alonso (two) and Hamilton and Hulkenberg (one apiece).

No wonder the young man looked so gratified in Brazil. It’s a tragedy that financial considerations – Hulkenberg isn’t loaded down with personal sponsorship – have obliged Williams to part with him, but Nico will surely get a drive elsewhere for 2011. Most drivers, after all, go through an entire F1 career without once starting from the front.

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I have been out on the road. Not having as much fun as Jack Kerouac, but nonetheless an interesting week or so. The final leg of my journey took me – via London, Wales and Littlehampton – to Goodwood where, as some of you know, I have spent a large part of my life.

On this occasion I went to see Jenson Button. Now you might imagine that a Formula 1 driver would have his feet up at home this week, that’s if he’s not testing the new Pirellis in Abu Dhabi. Wrong. Former World Champions are always on the go, their highly remunerative contracts requiring them to spend time with sponsors and other important benefactors. This is particularly true at McLaren, a team that takes its ‘sponsorship management’ very seriously.

So this week Jenson dropped in to Goodwood for a private day for title sponsor Vodafone. His task? To give its guests a ride to remember. And boy, did he deliver. It was bucketing down when JB took a silver Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren out onto a very wet Goodwood circuit, the big car searching for grip between the puddles. But a bit of precipitation has never bothered Button. This is a mighty car, the result of the combined technologies of McLaren and Mercedes-Benz, built in Portsmouth and Woking. Big 5.4-litre V8 engine, automatic gearbox and rear-wheel drive. Just right for thrilling those lucky enough to be his passengers on what the team calls its day of ‘hot laps’.

Were there gasps and shrieks from the passenger seat, I wondered? “No, but there were from me,” quipped JB. “It is very wet out there, almost too wet really.” Button is super-fit, relaxed, cheerful and charming, a man upon whom the World Championship has been sitting very comfortably. People take to him, especially the ladies. On this form, it’s not hard to see why. This was a day to show just why he is where he is, and you get the impression that McLaren is very pleased indeed with its new boy.

I watched in awe as the car rumbled round, waiting to interview him for a Goodwood DVD proclaiming the joys of events at Lord March’s Sussex estate. JB drove Prost’s McLaren TAG at the Festival of Speed this year and described it as the best day of his life. The rain fell incessantly as JB growled around in the Merc. Even he was lifting for the ultra-quick Fordwater corner, such was the volume of water. The silver machine is worth damn near £300,000 and there’s no point in frightening people.

The following day the 2008 World Champion flew in to have his turn. Luckily for Lewis Hamilton and his guests, it was sunny and dry. From where I was standing this looked like a happy family, a Vodafone McLaren-Mercedes team very much at ease with itself despite a poor year by its standards. You can be sure that noses are already on the grindstone at Woking…

Life, as Jean-Paul Sartre suggested, is the eternal imponderable. And life on the road allows for plenty of time to ponder. If Bahrain seems just too far way, worry not, they will be out testing new cars in February. Lewis and Jenson can’t wait to get their hands on MP4-26, to renew their friendly but serious rivalry. Meanwhile they will have their holidays, do their bit for the sponsors, and return to a new car, new Pirellis and a new season.

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After Sunday’s excitement the editorial team wasn’t that quick to get down to work on Monday morning. Instead we spent a reasonable amount of time discussing who our top 10 drivers of the season would be (don’t tell the MD).

You’ll have to wait until our full season review comes out at the beginning of December to see what the final result was, but for what it’s worth, here’s mine.

1. Sebastian Vettel: Yes, he made some mistakes, most notably at Spa and Hungary, but he also suffered from mechanical failures which robbed him of certain wins. When neither of those happened, he was unstoppable.

2. Mark Webber: No one thought he could really challenge Vettel on raw pace, but he did. His win at Monaco was sublime and this was his best F1 season to date. Shame nerves got the better of him in Abu Dhabi.

3. Fernando Alonso: The Spaniard regularly put the Ferrari further up the grid than it had any right to be and his second half of the season was a lesson on why not to give up. Hockenheim incident doesn’t take anything away for me.

4. Lewis Hamilton: He put in some flawless drives and some superb qualifying performances. He struggled all year with a McLaren that was never quite fast enough to compete with the Red Bulls at every track. A few too many mistakes, but that’s what happens when you’re pushing a car beyond its limits.

5. Robert Kubica: OK, he didn’t have much competition from his team-mate and he didn’t actually win a Grand Prix. However, he seems to have galvanised Renault and he put in some superb performances in Australia, Monaco and Belgium. Also extremely consistent and mistake free.

6. Jenson Button: His two wins were absolutely brilliant examples of what a wise head can pull out of the bag. He made fewer mistakes than Hamilton, but his qualifying pace needs to be sorted for next year.

7. Nico Rosberg: There was much talk before the season that Rosberg was going to be blown away by Herr Schumacher. The exact opposite happened, and for me Nico was one of the most underrated drivers of the season.

8. Rubens Barrichello: Williams has looked like a proper team on more occasions than not this year and much of that has been thanks to the experience and hard work of Barrichello. Never underestimate the brilliance of the Brazilian.

9. Kamui Kobayashi: He made plenty of mistakes and wasn’t that consistent, but wow, when he was racing he found gaps where no other driver could and provided so much entertainment he has to be in the top 10.

10. Felipe Massa: Before this year Massa has only ever qualified on pole in Brazil when he has been driving a Ferrari. In 2010 he was ninth on the grid and then 15th at the end of the race. However, before he was asked to move over in Hockenheim he was doing a great job after receiving one of the worst head injuries you can imagine.

The great thing about these lists is that they vary from person to person… so what do we all think?

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After only six years in Formula 1 Red Bull Racing has won the Constructors’ World Championship. Thanks to a Red Bull 1-2 finish in Brazil the ex-Stewart and Jaguar team sealed the championship with one race to go, and now Sebastian Vettel, Mark Webber, Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton will all go to Abu Dhabi with a chance of winning the Drivers’ World Championship.

As Hamilton admitted after the race, though, he is going to need a miracle to come out on top, as he is 24 points behind Alonso. It also looks unlikely that Vettel will be able to claim his first World Championship as he is 15 points behind the leader. With the speed advantage of the Red Bulls at the moment, it’s easy to say that the title is Webber’s to lose, but you can bet your last pound that Alonso will be right there. Such is Alonso’s lead (eight points) that even if Webber wins the race in Abu Dhabi and Alonso finishes second, the Spaniard will claim his third World Championship. Whatever happens, expect there to be some fireworks in six days time…

In Brazil the Red Bulls looked ominously quick throughout the three practice sessions, but quite amazingly, it was Nico Hulkenberg who took pole position on Saturday after a great set of laps in Q3 on a drying track. Come the race Hulkenberg dropped back, finally finishing eighth, and the Red Bulls walked into the distance.

The McLarens didn’t have an easy time on Saturday, Button qualifying 11th and Hamilton fourth, but they managed to come home fourth and fifth ahead of the Mercedes pair of Rosberg and Schumacher, with Alonso taking the final spot on the podium.

So how do we see the championship turning out? Will everyone’s engines last for the whole of the last race? As much as I hate making predictions, I think Webber will do just enough to take the title next weekend… What do you think?

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine

I’ve been thinking. Yeah, I know, but bear with me. As the days get shorter, we approach the penultimate race of this extraordinary season of Grand Prix racing. The year 2010 will surely be recorded as one of the great seasons, and certainly it has been the most exciting since this century began.

We can’t wind the clocks back – actually, we’ve just done that in the UK as we move into our ‘winter’ time zone. But, if you skate back over the season so far, even a cursory glance at the races brings to mind one of the most oft-used words in the lexicon of motor racing. If. A short word, but one with so many ramifications.

If Massa had not been forced to allow Alonso to overtake at Hockenheim. If Alonso had not hit the barrier in Monte Carlo. If Button had not left the pits with his radiators blanked. If Hamilton had not crashed at Monza and in Singapore. If Vettel and Webber had not collided in Turkey. If Webber had not thrown it away in Valencia and in Korea. If…

It is a season almost defined by what ifs, and perhaps more so than for many a year. This may be explained by the constant pressure, the constant excitement, or the batch of top drivers in top cars we have right now. Whatever, not once since March has it been clear who would take the 2010 title. Not to me, anyway.

And, even more remarkably, it is barely any clearer as we approach the Brazilian Grand Prix. There isn’t a sport on earth that would not be revelling in such a cliffhanger. And you can bet your salary that Bernie Ecclestone, not to mention the television companies, are doing just that.

OK, it does look a tall order for Button and Hamilton. And to a lesser extent for Vettel, lesser because he has the best Formula 1 car we’ve seen this season. So, it’s down to the wire between Alonso and Webber, right? Wrong. Because we are going to São Paulo, where the weather is fickle and where there is almost invariably some kind of drama.

The great Grand Prix circuits, of which Interlagos is indubitably one, have the elements of drama, tragedy and comedy ingrained into the very asphalt itself. There is the grid, painted onto a steep gradient, and then there is the first corner. There are those long, long corners with their tricky cambers and terrible drainage. There is the crowd, a seething, passionate mass of people who just love this sport to bits. The rickety grandstand opposite the pits trembles with anticipation on the warm-up lap. I am not joking. The drummers and the dancers, draped in national flags, are there at dawn. It is Grand Prix racing at its gladiatorial best.

Yeah, but Alonso will do it for Ferrari, Massa will help him, and Webber will have some kind of stupid failure. Wrong. Anything can happen, as we wait for the lights next Sunday afternoon. What happens at Interlagos, I do believe, will decide the season. A week later, in Abu Dhabi, things will simply be quietly confirmed.

On paper, it has to be Webber. He has the best car and is the man in the lead. On paper, it has to be Alonso. He is the best driver. On paper, it has to be Vettel. He is the man in form, arguably the bravest.

Every Grand Prix at Interlagos is a wonderful event, a thrilling experience, and this year – one way or the other – will be one of the best of them all. If…

Motor Sport Magazine - The original motor racing magazine