The return of the race in the mountains of Austria ended up being considerably flatter than the terrain upon which it is located. The problem today was simply that the race for the most part was won, and positions decided by a row of clever people sitting on the pit-wall. While we did see that in race trim one team did have more pace than anyone else, this was an event dominated by strategic calls and time lost and gained in the pit lane. Many people could see it as a disappointment, in the fact that we saw drivers backing off from the car in front just to wait for pit-stops to roll round. This did mean mean that we were faced with a moderate drought in on-track action and high-intensity wheel to wheel battling. In some respects a cagey race was fairly inevitable as it was the first time in over a decade that the track has been used for F1 and all of the data from 2003 would have been invalid. Information on race fuel consumption and brake wear was discerned ad-hoc as the race developed. In the end did this help Williams hang on to a temporary advantage over the Mercedes team...
The Race
To throw another new variable into the mix this afternoon, the track temperature shot up under the alpine sunshine... which meant we were treated to many shots of Austrian fans in odd traditional shorts. That said there were other traditional garments which were far more appealing... and those certainly didn't include Ricciardo's shorts as he entered the track pre-race. Hopes were high for 71 interesting laps because of the mixed up grid - Hamilton and Vettel considerably further back and the two Williams at the very front.
It appeared that we would be deprived of seeing Hamilton spend laps fighting and duelling with the cars in front of him an some form of epic recovery drive when the lights went out to start the race. Lewis passed four cars before reaching the apex of turn one just behind Alonso in 5th place, Rosberg also made ground off the line taking second from Valtteri Bottas. There was one thing Nico didn't account for, the straight line speed of the Williams allowing Bottas to take second place back. Hamilton almost took 4th from Fernando in turn but realised that such a move would only result in shattered suspension. Alonso only held onto his lofty 4th place for five more corners before Hamilton dove down the inside of turn 8 to form a Mercedes powered quartet which powered off into the distance.
If we looked back to see how the second world champion starting out of out position was doing... well not grand, not grand at all really. Sebastian Vettel was going far slower than he should be, complaining once again of having no drive. It seems as if yet more mechanical difficulties were striking a Red Bull car that didn't contain an Australian... how times have changed. The thought from Red Bull was that deploying the 'overtake' button caused the problem and therefore told Ricciardo not to press his 'overtake' button either. After being lapped by the field on the back straight and pulling over to a marshal's post Vettel's car reactivated. To add insult to injury as the German rejoined in turn three Ricciardo drifted wide in avoidance handing his position to Daniil Kvyat. Here on home turf the Red Bull sponsored cars were not doing so well, and a B-team driver was their highest placed contender... I daresay Dietrich would have something to say about that...
The top four had started to make ground over the Alonso's Ferrari in fifth place, who for the second race in a row was starting to find himself driving a very isolated race. Everyone else was trapped in a train of cars following behind Kevin Magnussen's McLaren - this queue included the pairing of Sergio Perez and Jenson Button who were running an alternate strategy having started outside the top ten. Perez in particular had made good initial gains after the grid penalty from Canada forced him to start 16th and was running in 11th place.
On lap 10, those runners on the softer of the two tyre compounds started to pay their first visit to the pits - the majority of the earliest stops were for those caught up in the Magnussen queue in an effort to get into freer, cooler air. It didn't work out so well for Gutierrez when the Sauber team appeared to forget that a car really needs to have the four wheels attached. Esteban was forced to stop the car when it turned out the right rear wasn't properly affixed to the car. When this sort of thing happens the FIA throw every volume of the rulebook at you - Gutierrez was handed a 10 second drive through penalty, and a 10 place grid penalty for the next race at Silverstone. It took a little longer for the top runners to start their pit-stop cycle, initiated by Nico Rosberg on lap 12. Hamilton immediately responded on the following lap to negate any advantage Nico would have gained. Unfortunately for Lewis his stop was slightly slower and all the time gained on a strong in-lap was wiped out.
We'd have expected Williams to pull their cars in at the earliest opportunity to prevent Mercedes benefiting from more track time on new faster tyres. But they allowed Nico Rosberg three laps worth of undercut, and granted Rosberg a free pass into the lead... well not quite the lead. Sergio Perez assumed that position by virtue of staying out on the harder of the two tyre compounds. Having initially held the lead Felipe Massa had dropped to fifth place, the rear of the quartet of cars waiting behind Perez. We'd also have expected that the cluster of Williams and Mercedes cars would be lining up right behind the Force India looking for a way past - but everyone was all to happy to wait. In fact as they played follow-the-leader, the Mercedes cars would pull out of line to get out of the stream of hot air from the car in front. Both Rosberg and Hamilton were informed over the radio to 'manage' the brakes - although they were a long way short of the problems faced in Canada.
Esteban Gutierrez pitted to take his stop-go penalty and rejoined one lap down in 21st - normally this wouldn't be a momentous development - but it meant Vettel in last place had a friend to race with. The difficulties facing Red Bull at their home venue meant that we still had a Toro Rosso as the highest placed car from the home brand. It could be considered strangely mysterious that Daniil Kvyat's car experienced a catastrophic rear suspension failure under breaking for turn three. The Russian pulled the car off in turn five with a shredded rear corner to be the first retirement of the race, and promoting Ricciardo into the lead Red Bull sponsored position... in 9th.
Perez finally pitted from the lead, restoring the quartet of Mercedes powered cars to the top four positions - the pace immediately picked up, but not by as much as we expected. Rosberg wasn't able to drive away from Bottas in second - exploiting the 8 tenths a lap they appeared to have over Williams on these tyres earlier in the weekend. In fact Valtteri was able to close the gap on the lead Mercedes after Nico ran wide in turn one, Hamilton closing behind Bottas in third place. Massa however appeared to drop further back from the lead trio, too much more of that and Felipe might find himself dealing with his former team-mate Fernando Alonso. One of the grand ironies in sport as Massa, dumped by Ferrari only to find himself in a much faster car running ahead of Alonso.
After many, many laps of running in a very isolated last place, Sebastian Vettel caught up with Gutierrez for the highly important 21st position. Vettel failed to account for the slower pace of the Sauber and instead of passing the Mexican, he crashed into the back of the car in front... Completely summing up Red Bull's day. Sebastian was asked to retire the car and frankly give up, making it two Red Bull sponsored cars out of the race.
More pit stops were in the offing as both Mercedes drivers were instructed to pick up the pace for their in-laps with Hamilton instructed that it was indeed 'Hammer time'. I often wondered when hammer time was exactly, turns out it is lap 40... Just like in the first round of stops Lewis' pit time was around a second slower than Nico's. If Williams wanted to take the race to Mercedes they needed to pit soon, again to counter the 'undercut' affect - but again they waited until both Mercedes cars had completed their stops. This dropped Bottas down a net third place behind the two Mercedes cars once more found themselves in another commanding 1-2 position. Massa lost even more time to the three cars he was leading in the first phase of the race as the Brazilian rejoined behind Sergio Perez's Force India. Fortunately for Massa Perez wasn't on another one-stop campaign and would have to stop again before the end while Massa didn't.
With no interlopers Mercedes were able to pull away from Bottas in third as Massa Struggled to pass Perez for fourth. At the opposite end of the points it was time for our long overdue 'Kimi radio conversation of the week'. Raikkonen was informed that he was racing Button for the lower end points and that he needed to find 0.2s per lap to jump the McLaren. Kimi merely responded with 'Well give me more power then' - which is a fair point, it is difficult to suddenly find more pace when you're driving on a limited engine and fuel map setting. Further back, there were even more difficulties for the host company, as Jean-Eric Vergne was having terminal brake issues. Vergne was coming through turn 7 when a huge cloud of brake dust erupted from the front wheels forcing another retirement. All of the cars out of the race were Red Bull sponsored machines, including both Toro Rossos.
At the front Hamilton started to close in on Rosberg for the lead, but he couldn't quite break into the DRS range. The majority of the positions seemed to be very cemented towards the end of the race, perhaps hoping to conserve brakes and fuel in the remaining laps. Perez after stopping for the softer tyres was one of the few to make up a position late in the going - taking 6th from Magnussen before turn two after the Dane got a poor exit from the first corner. While one Force India was moving up, another was going backwards as the sole remaining Red Bull went round the outside of Hulkenberg in turn five. Ricciardo initiated the pass by a late dive in turn three, holding the line through four and out-braking Hulkenberg in the faster turn five. Overtaking move of the race... shame we had to wait until the final lap for it to take place.
Lewis needed several more laps to be able to do anything with Rosberg taking his third victory of the season and extending his championship lead over Hamilton. Bottas takes his first ever podium and the first for Williams in a long while, with Massa a few seconds further back in 4th. Fernando is once more the highest placed non-Mercedes powered car in the absence of any threat from Red Bull. Perez made up 10 places from 16th to well inside the points for Force India after taking 6th place from Kevin Magnussen - demoting the McLaren driver to 7th. Ricciardo brought the sole remaining Red Bull home in 8th place, ahead of Hulkenberg in 9th. The final point was claimed by Raikkonen in the Ferrari - who must have found enough power to stay ahead of Button.
The Bonus Points Championship Points Winners
This might not be the most be the most enthralling of events, but it was more of a strategic struggle than anything else. But points will be on offer as follows:
- 25pts - Valtteri Bottas - A fist podium always deserves some points
- 18pts - Sergio Perez - Gaining 10 places in a static race also gets some points for the Mexican.
- 15pts - Lewis Hamilton - A very impressive opening lap, passing five cars, four of those in the first corner of the race.
- 12pts - Nico Rosberg - Another win under more pressure from Hamilton in the latter phase of the race
- 10pts - Daniel Ricciardo - Congratulations on being the only Red Bull car running at the end - and for making that pass on Hulkenberg
- 8pts - Felipe Massa - Actually brought Williams home in a strong position without being involved in an accident - well done.
- 6pts - Fernando Alonso - Comfortably beating Raikkonen again, almost embarrassingly so for the Finn
- 4pts - Kevin Magnussen - Another rookie doing better than an experienced champion team-mate.
- 3pts - Daniil Kvyat - The Russian spent the entirety of the race, for the bit he was still running anyway, as the highest placed Red Bull car ahead of the main team
- 2pts - Jules Bianchi - Another lower division win for the Marussia driver after the accident that took both team drivers out in Canada
- 1pt - Sebestian Vettel - Deserves a consolation point for driving into the only car he raced with today....
There is another announcement that needs to be made at this point, a long time ago, before the 2011 Singaporean GP blog HQ gained a mascot - a fish. This fish was a result an epic quest to deposit a small plastic sphere into a glass jar at range. Blog fish was then adopted an unofficial mascot here at Blog HQ... In the week running up to the Austrian GP, blog fish died only a few races short of the third anniversary of the adoption. As a result 10 posthumous points will be awarded, as this was the maximum score possible for a qualifying session - which was the post blog fish was originally announced.
Looking ahead to Britain
Ah jolly good, the teams and drivers are coming here... well admittedly a long way south of here... for the 50th race at Silverstone. A true high speed traditional circuit steeped in history and of great importance to so many of the teams based in Britain. This upcoming race is home to some of the most famous corners the world over for their speed and the bravery needed to extract those final few tenths... if only the new section built in 2012 wasn't so much of detraction from the purity of the previous incarnation.
Will Mercedes dominate again.... very likely.
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