The 2007 Japanese Grand Prix

[Julian Mayo]

Congratulations to Lewis Hamilton for winning the Japanese Grand Prix. He kept it together and managed to survive a tangle with Kubica. Hamilton is now 12 points ahead in the championship and just needs to stay ahead of Alonso and Raikkonen next weekend to clinch the Championship.
Kovalainen did well finishing in second and defended well against the charging Raikkonen who managed a podium finish despite having to pit early in the race to switch to the extreme wet tyres.

David Coulthard did well finishing 4th ahead of Giancarlo Fisichella while it was very entertaining watching Massa and Liuzzi fight it out on the last lap fighting for 6th and 7th. Liuzzi made it into 8th place scoring a point for Toro Rosso.

It is yet unclear what was happening with Alonso as his perfomance today wasn't too spectacular (before his crash) given his previous wet weather performances.
Shame what happened to Webber as he was running in second. Vettel was very dissapointed with himself after crashing into Webber.

Your thoughts and your driver of the day ?

Some will say all sorts of nasty things...........Alonso was clearly struggling after the tyre change...................2lb of pressure difference in left n right hand front tyres? nah too crude for McLaren, after all they had tha ability to conspire to steal all the info from a team who lost their ability to test in their wind tunnel......hmmmm
JayVee n others......IMHO.............Alonso is a lot like me,.........crash or crash thru.....when the Hamdickhead gets pole there is nothing left to lose.
The car was a pig after the pit stop.
While all the focus was on the M n F teams, a bloke who vomited in to his Full Face Helmet, fueled to go longer, stayed in touch, stayed on the Island, n in my very humble opinion, seemed to be catching Hambighead easily, and set one of the fastest laps quite a few times
WUZ ROBBED

[rc89pl]

http://youtube.com/watch?v=7z5nfNIfD94

best f1 battle this season. and Kubica in first role again.

[mlittle]

Drive of the day.......Lewis Hamilton; he kept it on the island all race long; barring disaster, the WDC is Hamilton's....other drives of the day:
--Kovalainen, great performance for Renault
--Raikkonen, like Kovi and Hamilton, Kimi kept it on the island for most of the race
--Massa and Kubica right at the end of the race; their fight was a checkers or wreckers fight(didn't their race remind anyone of Villeneuve and Arnoux at Dijon back in 1979?

For the 1st of the two "Charlie-Foxtrot" moments of the race( ).......Vettel crashing into Webber during a safety car period 2/3rds' of the way through the race, ruining the Red Bull stable's day(Coulthard and Liuzzi did finish in the points, though)........of course, the 2nd of the two was Ferrari's very, very dumb decision to start on intermediates instead of full wets(even though race control had told everyone to start on full wets), screwing up their race from the start

At times during the race, I had to keep looking at a calendar to make sure it was still late September and not Halloween....... ............anyway, on to Shanghai!

[Lloyd]

raincoats at 20 paces! I enjoyed that race after it finally started. Louie is being a bit precious complaining about being unable to see. The safety car didnt create any spray so he had a dream drive compared to the rest. My drive of the day would have gone to either Vettel or Webber until something swayed my decision. Both qualified well, drove well for the conditions, except Vettel thought he was in a dodgem car. No for me a driver who can regurgitate while managing to drive in the wet without any windscreen gets my vote. Imagine where it all ended up. I was also impressed by his restraint when Louise asked for comment. I honestly feel that may have been Webbers best chance of winning a Race as Hamilton would have let him thru if it had come to a stoush as hamilton is now fixated on winning the championship. Bad luck again.

[jacfan]

Yes I thought Mark was very restrained too but still would not have wanted to be LG trying to get an interview with an understandably very very very angry MW. Forgot he chucked in the helmet. Hmmm should have given him driver of the day.

[Kapel]

My DOTD would have been Webber by far..n i had the feeling he would have beaten hamiliton to victory even though the Mclaren was faster..as he had nothing to lose n hamilton couldnt afford another tussle n ruin his 1st world championship.

From the available Kimi gets my vote superb drive after being forced to pit b'cos of the goof up on tyre change..surprisingly FIA forgot to inform their team Ferrari!! hmm..
Kimi's move on Coulthard was brilliant..& Massa last lap was super exiciting..

On Alonso,i just wonder if something broke on his car which led to him going out ( does any1 suspect mischief here)...thank god he was unhurt...but i would not want to believe it was a driver errror altogether even though he was not at his best in the wets this time...i think there's something fishy here..

Plus i thought the stewards made a wrong call for Kubica drive thru penalty...hamilton did go wide n let an open area for kubica to attack n suddenly he closes the door...n made a statement he couldnt c in his mirrors..IMHO it was a racing accident..specially in these non visible conditions..not fair to b punished..

History is already made now with the rookie winning the world championship!

[JayVee]

It is good fun reading those theories but I would hope nothing of that actually happened. (you could also think that Vettel who was driving a Ferrari powered car crashed into Webber forcing both out so Raikkonen gets more points!)

Whatever was wrong with Alonso or his car, he did the best he could.

Well done to Hamilton and I hope those who follow him are happy and I hope someone can try and tell him that one good wet race doesn't make him Ayrton Senna

I am just

[F1greyhound]

Ok,

congratulations to LEWIS on actually dominating the season and finally taking the WDC with arrogant ease.....reminds me of AYRTON and MICHAEL......plus LEWIS has really EVERYTHING it takes to be a leading driver in F1, the skills, the politics and he can be dirty enough when necessary. His radical braking antics behind the safety car were adding well to the already pretty dangerous driving for everybody in this GP. SEBASTIAN and MARK were actually VICTIMS!! of smart LEWIS...

FERRARI f@#!%^ up their fair chances of KIMI becoming WDC with their tyre choice, or was it the FIA giving something back to devastated RON?
Anyway, altogether the red cars were not reliable enough this season and the team tactics were worse than in years gone by. Suppose ROSS BRAWN has to be back next year to reassure team success.

Well done HEIKKI, KIMI and everyone showing some sort of performance in these circumstances....thanks for the show FELIPE & ROBERT!!

Looking forward to China, only thing that could make for an exciting season end would be KIMI beating FERNANDO and LEWIS coming out with 0 points. I know this wont happen, though.....

[Julian Mayo]

Ok,

congratulations to LEWIS on actually dominating the season and finally taking the WDC with arrogant ease.....reminds me of AYRTON and MICHAEL......plus LEWIS has really EVERYTHING it takes to be a leading driver in F1, the skills, the politics and he can be dirty enough when necessary. His radical braking antics behind the safety car were adding well to the already pretty dangerous driving for everybody in this GP. SEBASTIAN and MARK were actually VICTIMS!! of smart LEWIS...

FERRARI f@#!%^ up their fair chances of KIMI becoming WDC with their tyre choice, or was it the FIA giving something back to devastated RON?
Anyway, altogether the red cars were not reliable enough this season and the team tactics were worse than in years gone by. Suppose ROSS BRAWN has to be back next year to reassure team success.

Well done HEIKKI, KIMI and everyone showing some sort of performance in these circumstances....thanks for the show FELIPE & ROBERT!!

Looking forward to China, only thing that could make for an exciting season end would be KIMI beating FERNANDO and LEWIS coming out with 0 points. I know this wont happen, though.....

The word is that, having failed, Todt will be gone

[jacfan]

Ok,

congratulations to LEWIS on actually dominating the season and finally taking the WDC with arrogant ease.....reminds me of AYRTON and MICHAEL......plus LEWIS has really EVERYTHING it takes to be a leading driver in F1, the skills, the politics and he can be dirty enough when necessary. His radical braking antics behind the safety car were adding well to the already pretty dangerous driving for everybody in this GP. SEBASTIAN and MARK were actually VICTIMS!! of smart LEWIS...

FERRARI f@#!%^ up their fair chances of KIMI becoming WDC with their tyre choice, or was it the FIA giving something back to devastated RON?
Anyway, altogether the red cars were not reliable enough this season and the team tactics were worse than in years gone by. Suppose ROSS BRAWN has to be back next year to reassure team success.

Well done HEIKKI, KIMI and everyone showing some sort of performance in these circumstances....thanks for the show FELIPE & ROBERT!!

Looking forward to China, only thing that could make for an exciting season end would be KIMI beating FERNANDO and LEWIS coming out with 0 points. I know this wont happen, though.....

The word is that, having failed, Todt will be gone

Where to? McLaren perhaps.

[Julian Mayo]

Ok,

congratulations to LEWIS on actually dominating the season and finally taking the WDC with arrogant ease.....reminds me of AYRTON and MICHAEL......plus LEWIS has really EVERYTHING it takes to be a leading driver in F1, the skills, the politics and he can be dirty enough when necessary. His radical braking antics behind the safety car were adding well to the already pretty dangerous driving for everybody in this GP. SEBASTIAN and MARK were actually VICTIMS!! of smart LEWIS...

FERRARI f@#!%^ up their fair chances of KIMI becoming WDC with their tyre choice, or was it the FIA giving something back to devastated RON?
Anyway, altogether the red cars were not reliable enough this season and the team tactics were worse than in years gone by. Suppose ROSS BRAWN has to be back next year to reassure team success.

Well done HEIKKI, KIMI and everyone showing some sort of performance in these circumstances....thanks for the show FELIPE & ROBERT!!

Looking forward to China, only thing that could make for an exciting season end would be KIMI beating FERNANDO and LEWIS coming out with 0 points. I know this wont happen, though.....

The word is that, having failed, Todt will be gone

Where to? McLaren perhaps.

Moved up and over in Ferrari........Waaaay over.

[Jim Watt]

I hope that particular rumor (that Jean Todt is FINI!) is true!! It hardly matters whether or not Ferarri got the news that full wets were required (in fact, given the conditions it's surprising they didn't require anchors, too!) JEAN TODT approved or made the decision to put his machines out there in inters. This is something you wouldn't even expect from Spyker for crying out loud!

That said, it was interesting that Kimi seemed to be able to keep the car on the circuit even on the inters!!

Since I was the one floating the conspiracy theories re: the WDC, I can't help wondering if Ronny didn't put a gremlin right in the cockpit with Fernando; he kept looking down and swiping at something! My theory is that it was a black cat messing with his brakes and throttle settings!

Anyway, since I had Fernando with no points this race, I might be able to salvage something from pole n' 8. Of course, I also had Kimi nipping the pole by TWO TENTHS over Lewis, so

I agree with Jay Vee mostly: the race, as much as it was possible to see, was a triumph for Lewis. It's going to be fun for me to see "the New Michael" at McLaren; he appears already, in only 15 GPs, to be as hated --and as smooth & lucky!-- as Michael!! It's for sure that he won't be in a red car any time soon, or, probably, ever.

For Japan, Fernando announced that nothing was going to happen in the first turn. want to take any bets about China!!??

I hope Fernando goes back to Renault and the rumor about Button coming to McLaren is true. I'd love to see the lad duke it out with Lewis!

Jim Watt

[Snowy]

and the rumor about Button coming to McLaren is true. I'd love to see the lad duke it out with Lewis!

Jim Watt

James Allen's wishful thinking is woefully infantile and borders on the insane. Jenson will give Honda another season to get their act together and hopefully he will take the first step to getting his act together by shaving off that beard. I believe the number of GP's won by people with beards can be counted the little finger of one hand.

[Julian Mayo]

and the rumor about Button coming to McLaren is true. I'd love to see the lad duke it out with Lewis!

Jim Watt

James Allen's wishful thinking is woefully infantile and borders on the insane. Jenson will give Honda another season to get their act together and hopefully he will take the first step to getting his act together by shaving off that beard. I believe the number of GP's won by people with beards can be counted the little finger of one hand.

They are good fire insulation.

[jacfan]

Oh but what about all the extra weight. Probably lucky for Mark Webber that he doesn't have a beard. Now that would not be nice after last weekend.