An Armchair Perspective Of The Malaysian GP

Note: As the Malaysian GP has transcended normal F1 races these days, the blog owner has invited an F1 fan to write the review. It was just not a race to be narrowed down to one driver's perspective, it warranted more.

I will admit it. I am a hardcore Kimster, and sometimes the only thing that matters to me is how well he performs in the race. But being a Kimi fan, you have to sometimes bow to that ugly bitch called luck. 2010, 2011 and 2014 seasons have taught me how to keep my head down and keep the fire kindled, despite my favourite struggling or rallying. It has changed my perspective, and now I also crave for those oddball race winners, skies opening up on circuits, team squabbles and a general respite from the monotony of the sport. I have started to love races with good scraps for positions all through the field, even though Kimi languishes at the wrong end of the field. Malaysian GP 2015 was one such race, and Kimi did not waste away at the back too.

A spectacle like this rarely comes to light in the highly regulated and formularized world of F1. The domination of one team and the presence (or preferment?) of an ‘alpha’ car has been the case for far too many years. Even if you go way back in history, to the 1960s, you will come across grainy photographs of that ONE team and that ONE driver who will have triumphed over all his compatriots. If you take the recent seasons into account, you need not even go back so much. Michael Schumacher, Sebastian Vettel and recently Lewis Hamilton have managed to stay seconds and laps ahead of the rest of the field.

Honestly, I did not expect Mercedes to be challenged so early on after the utterly intimidating shit they pulled off last season. And the fact that the team to put up some resistance would be Ferrari was beyond my wildest dreams. 2014 was the worst season the Maranello-based outfit has had post its resurgence during the Schumacher era. It was a year full of disappointing finishes for Kimi Raikkonen, and only two podiums for team leader Alonso. The team experienced its worst political upheaval, resulting in the ousting of long-standing patriarch Luca de Montezemelo (and Stefano Domenicali with him). After testing and the opening race, it was clear that Ferrari had worked their asses off over the winter, to make a better engine and a suitable car for the new incoming driver Sebastian Vettel, who first appeared to critics as making a grievous mistake by leaving Redbull. Nonetheless, Ferrari’s podium courtesy of Vettel at Albert Park was what could best be described as ‘the best of the rest’, with the Mercs in a class of their own. Vettel finished third behind them, with a gigantic 34.5-second gap to race winner Hamilton.

As I write this, I am scouting for torrents of Sky F1’s coverage of the race, to add it to the personal archives. The last time I remember being so elated with a race was in Abu Dhabi 2012, for obvious reasons. (If it is not obvious, Kimi won.) It did not even feature enough scraps to be excited about, but then watching your driver win a race after a comeback is kind of a big deal. Even the two races I have seen live at Buddh International Circuit don’t come close. (They were plain boring actually.) So, without further ado, let us dig in and find out what has made this race transcend the normal levels of F1 epic.

Malaysian GP

Held at the Sepang International Circuit, Malaysian GP has always had some amazing races. I have a special reason to love it all the more: Kimi won his first grand prix here in 2003 with McLaren. It is unpredictable in terms of the weather, with rains butting in unannounced at any moment. While this is much to the chagrin of drivers and teams - who like to keep it sorted with predetermined strategies – it gives fans some action and upheavals to cheer about. It is a taxing race for the drivers, right at the top with Singapore, with the sweltering humidity causing enormous fluid loss.

The track itself features two long straights joined by a hairpin, which constitutes the last corner of the lap. Striking the balance for the Herman Tilke-designed circuit are a combination of low, medium and high speed corners, which need teams to develop a setup with the right amount of downforce to take the corners, and the right amount of drag to negotiate the straights. It is a firm favourite amongst drivers, the unpredictability of the outcome notwithstanding. Pirelli have brought their medium and hard compound tires to the race, along with the intermediates and full wet tires in case of a shower.

Friday & Saturday practice sessions

Practice sessions are mostly skipped by the TV audience, but I make it a point to catch them because that is where I get all my predictions from. They are mostly about teams doing qualifying, start and race simulations, but as the data about fuel load or tire age is withheld, there is no way to find out what exactly goes on. Marussia finally returned to F1 as Manor F1 team, much to the relief of Ron Dennis and co. at McLaren, as they will no longer be the last cars on the grid. FP1 (Free Practice 1) mainly revolved around Lewis Hamilton encountering reliability issues on his Mercedes very early on in the 90-minute session, preventing him from posting any time. Kimi ending up second on the charts just 0.4 seconds off pace-setter Rosberg was a personal highlight for me. Also, Carlos Sainz Jr. posted a sixth best time and appeared to do better than senior team Redbull on similar Renault engines.

The only action that FP2 offered was a spin by the Manor of Merhi on the right-hander turn onto the back straight, which saw him getting beached and a red flag resulted. Raikkonen was flying again, and got the better of teammate Vettel on both tire compounds. The long runs of the Ferrari looked encouraging enough to warrant a podium n D-day. Hamilton topped the session with a 1m39.790s lap, with Kimi half a second adrift. Williams looked a bit off, with Redbull and Toro Rosso routinely having posted better laptimes than them in both sessions.

FP3 sees the main protagonists Mercedes and Ferrari at the top again, but not without complications. Raikkonen suffered an ominous left rear puncture, which saw him posting a flying lap very late into the session. Rosberg topped the session with a slightly improved lap of 1m39.690, with Hamilton two-tenths off behind him. Verstappen, the youngest bloke in F1 ever, displayed a lot of promise in his Toro Rosso, posting a top 10 lap in all three sessions. Alonso, who returned to racing after his short concussion sabbatical, got the better of teammate Button and posted faster times. Another thing I observed was that many drivers were complaining about “snappy” rears, and we all know who cares more about the front than the rears. I was already looking forward to qualifying.

Qualifying

Let me get the most irritating aspect of qualifying out there, as a Kimi fan. The session was scheduled at 1700 hours local time, while the race was to be held earlier the next day at 1500 hours. The interesting agenda behind this was to shuffle the starting grid up courtesy of thunderstorms which show up in later afternoons in Sepang. The shift was probably done by Bernie Ecclestone in his crusade to make the sport more ‘exciting’. While I welcome exciting, I do not like it when it causes harm to a favourite driver.

There are 20 cars running in qualifying, so the elimination zone will hold five cars. Q1 witnesses everyone except the Manor of Stevens post a laptime, and there are no prices for guessing that the Manors are eliminated along with the ailing McLarens of Alonso and Button. Quite in contrast to the case in practice sessions though, Button gets the better of his new teammate and qualifies ahead in 17^th place. The fifth driver to get relegated is Felipe Nasr of Sauber, whose time in the pits does not allow him to better his time.

Q2 is the most crucial part of the whole qualifying session. The thunderstorms are closing in on the circuit, and flashes of lightning can be seen in the distance. Rosberg is told: “The first lap will be it, so make sure it is all out.” Every single driver in the pits wants to get out as soon as possible and put up a flying lap, which can be the decider if rain starts pouring. Vettel’s Ferrari is the first to line up the pitlane start, with Kimi down in sixth. The lights go green and everyone snakes out to complete the outlap and get ready for the sole decider one. Vettel manages to pull out a lap in clean air at the front and gets through to the with a 1m39.632s. Rosberg goes 0.3s faster, to displace him. Hamilton is on a slow lap, and dives around Raikkonen to scrape through to Q1 with an eighth best time. As a result of the traffic, and probably his own mistake, Kimi gets muscled down to 11^th position. Meanwhile, the rain starts falling, and the drivers can no longer improve on their times. So knocked out of Q2 along with Kimi *heartbreak* are Maldonado, Hulkenberg, Perez and Sainz.

Q3 is delayed by the downpour for more than 30 minutes, during which I nurse my broken heart and will myself into watching the rest of the spectacle. The start sees a mix of tire compounds on different cars; some go out on the faster intermediates while others go full wets. The cars running wets abandon them after the outlap itself. After initial runs, the pecking order at the top is decided: Mercedes and the lone Ferrari, followed by the rest. Vettel is bullied down to third place by the mighty Mercs, and it seems it will stay that way. But wait! Vettel pulls out a surprise and displaces Rosberg to third as the chequered flag draws down on the qualifying session. Verstappen exudes brilliance by taking the sixth spot behind Redbull drivers Ricciardo and Kvyat. Massa and Bottas languish in the rear of the list, to give company to Grosjean and Ericsson.

Raceday

Only 19 cars have lined up for the race, with Will Stevens opting out with a fuel systems issue on his Manor. There is no sign of rains, and the track is dry as a bone. This will be crucial in determining the tire strategy, as a hotter track can eat into the tires quickly. Pirelli have predicted most cars to make three stops, with the more tire-benevolent cars probably stretching it to two stops.

Starting order:

1 Hamilton

2 Vettel

3 Rosberg

4 Ricciardo

5 Kvyat

6 Verstappen

7 Massa

8 Bottas

9 Ericsson

10 Grosjean

11 Raikkonen

12 Maldonado

13 Hulkenberg

14 Perez

15 Sainz

16 Nasr

17 Button

18 Alonso

19 Merhi

All the drivers except Button and Alonso are on medium boots. I reconsider watching the race, but my gut says Kimi may somehow recover. The warmup lap gets wrapped up and the cars line up on the grid for race start. Malaysia has a long run to the first corner, and this normally unfolds as an interesting first lap due to the tags and cuts drivers hand out to each other. I chew my lip and hope that Maldonado does not do any harm to Kimi. As Charlie comes on the TV, I sit up. The customary five red lights come on one by one and as they go off simultaneously, the race is GO! Lewis gets a clean start and is already ahead of the rest of the field, as Rosberg tries to overtake Vettel into Turn 1 but remains unsuccessful. Maldonado is already limping to the pits with a puncture on lap 1, and Hamilton leads Vettel by 0.7s and Rosberg by 1.6s. But hey wait! Where is Kimi? He seems to have dropped back and has slowed down considerably. Bummer! It is a puncture for Kimi too, and I start wondering if it was indeed Maldonado who did it. If there is a nomination for the unluckiest driver in F1, Kimi should top it. Our young star Verstappen has been pushed back to ninth place ahead of Grosjean and teammate Sainz, who had a blistering start from 15^th. Grosjean soon overtakes Maxy, and we are poised for a battle between the rookie teammates. 

Lap 3 sees another incident which changes the course of the race quite dramatically. Ericsson spins at Turn 1, and is trapped in the gravel. This forces the safety car to come out while the crane retrieves the stranded car to safety. Safety car period normally sees a mad dash to the pits for drivers, and Hamilton, Rosberg, Massa, Bottas, Ricciardo and Kvyat duly dive into the pitlane. Hamilton and Rosberg are sporting the prime tires now. Vettel, along with Hulk, Grosjean, Sainz and Perez, stays out and this is extremely crucial. The other important thing, which makes me jump for joy, is that the safety car helps bunch the whole grid up, and Kimi draws closer to the pack. The order at the restart:

1 Vettel

2 Hulkenberg

3 Grosjean

4 Sainz

5 Perez

6 Hamilton

7 Ricciardo

8 Massa

9 Rosberg

10 Kvyat

I am concentrating all my energies on Vettel, Hamilton, Rosberg, Verstappen and Kimi. Those were the drivers I had singled out after the qualifying. Kimi is 16^th at the restart, and as soon as the safety car goes off, he takes Merhi for 15^th. Hamilton and Rosberg continue to negotiate their way through the traffic, and this is proving to be giving Vettel an advantage. He continues to build up the gap at the front, and is yet to pit. Hamiton passes Perez right after restart, and soon overtakes both Sainz and Grosjean. He builds up on Hulk and passes him on the start straight, to emerge second behind Vettel, 9.9s off. The traffic gets the better of Rosberg and he is still stuck down in seventh place. Lap 13 sees Hamilton chip off two-tenths from the gap to Vettel. Lap 14 sees Rosberg surge ahead from behind the train of cars, and he is now third, 18.4s from Vettel.

Meanwhile, Kimi pits and comes out 17^th behind Sainz. At the end of lap 17, Vettel makes his first pitstop, puts on medium rubber again, and heads out to emerge behind Rosberg in third place. Hamilton and Rosberg are now 12.7s and 4.6s ahead of him respectively. Behind Vettel are the Williams cars, with Massa and Bottas running close together, 6.6s off the Ferrari. By lap 20, while I was thoroughly engrossed in all the action at the front, Kimi has made it to ninth, with some amazeballs overtaking moves on Nasr and Button. Up until this moment, it seemed to me that Vettel had a chance at taking the second spot on the podium, if he makes one stop less than the Mercs. Kimi, at this juncture, did seem to have a shot to feature within the top five, and I was furiously chewing on my nails as he was making steady progress towards the Williams cars. Lap 21 brought my attention back to the front of the pack again, where Vettel took Rosberg on the inside of the last corner to emerge second! I literally screamed, because to see a dominant car being trashed like this is enormous fun. Vettel now takes off after Hamilton, who has older degrading tires and a 7s lead at the front. My attention is again taking to the midfield, where Verstappen pulls off the Overtaking Move of the Race on Ricciardo on the outside of Turn 1, as opposed to the normal inside line, and takes tenth place. Flitting back to the front again, Vettel rapidly gains on Hamilton at more than 2s per lap, and is all over his gearbox, when Hamilton finally bails out and dives into the pits for fresh rubber.

At this juncture, it is quite clear that the Ferrari cars are kinder on the tires, as compared to the Mercs, and Vettel can actually pull off a two-stopper to challenge for the win. After Massa makes his second pitstop from fourth and is relegated to the back, Kimi overtakes Bottas for fourth behind Rosberg. I cannot describe the feeling of seeing him at the front after all the shit he has been through. Game on! Rosberg too makes his stop, which further pushes Kimi to third position. Vettel and Hamilton are now 23s apart, with both having to make a stop each. Lap 27 sees Rosberg overtake Kimi easily under DRS on fresher tires. By lap 30, Vettel is 20.2s ahead of Hamilton and 33.7s off Rosberg.  In all the confusion, we also see spectacular spin by Kvyat’s car courtesy of a tag by Hulkenberg. Hamilton has realised that the win is out of contention this time and asks his engineer what they can aim for. He is asked to overtake Vettel if he wants to win (Mission Impossible VI). He gets to work nonetheless, and chips off the gap to Vettel lap after lap. With 20 laps remaining, he has managed to cut the gap to 14.7s. Vettel pits on lap 38, and Ferrari puts him on the hard compound that he has to now use mandatorily. He rejoins the track inches ahead of Rosberg, and scoots away easily on his fresher tires. The next lap sees the reigning world champion come in for his final pitstop, and we see the team putting on the prime tires on him instead of the options. Strange. But the confusion is cleared next moment when Hamilton barks into the radio: “This is the wrong tyre, man!" The engineer tells him there were no fresh mediums left. Vettel now leads Rosberg by 3.6s, and he is yet to pit. His delta to Hamilton is 10.9s.

The Mclarens also need a mention here, with both of the cars having retired with power train problems. Kimi meanwhile has recovered to fifth after his final pitstop, and has Bottas ahead of him. Bottas then pits from fourth on lap 41, which promotes Kimi to fourth position. With 12 laps left, Vettel has built up the gap to Hamilton to 13.6s. Vettel also entertains us to some live music on the team radio, when he sings “blue flag, blue flag, blue flag” for the lapped cars of Grosjean and Hulk, who are squabbling for position ahead of him. Hamilton continues to chip off the gap to Vettel, but not nearly much to make a difference. Vettel makes a statement for all the critics who question driver decisions by lapping his ex-teammate’s Redbull. With three laps left, Vettel is still 9.              9s ahead of Hamilton, and we smell a squabble between the Williams cars. Bottas is 0.6s behind Massa, and he tries to overtake him. Massa resists and stays ahead. Bottas completes the move on the penultimate lap, with a beautiful move on the outside of turn 5. Last lap comes on for Vettel; the TV depicts Ferrari mechanics waiting with baited breath for their first win since Spain 2013. Vettel crosses the finish line to an ecstatic team lining the wall and screaming fans on the circuit and behind TVs around the world. I am personally excited for Kimi too, with his stellar drive. Carlos Sainz Jr. also put in a great performance for a rookie, settling for eighth place after losing out seventh to feisty teammate Verstappen in the last laps.

Concluding thoughts:

•   I don’t care if you brand me as partial, but I vote Kimi Raikkonen as Driver of the Day. He was definitely helped by the safety car at the start, but that just cancelled out his puncture disadvantage. He was stellar, period.
• I still think Mercedes has the edge over Ferrari in pace, with the weather and strategy in Malaysia acting in Ferrari’s favour. Merc also could’ve delayed their first pitstop under the safety car, given more time to the cars on the quali tires.
•  Nico Rosberg is Nostradamus. He had ‘hoped’ that Ferrari get closer to Mercs in races in Australia. Vettel had laughed him off, but turns out it came to light sooner rather than later.
• Verstappen displayed amazing overtaking and defending capabilities for a 17-year-old throughout the race.
• Lewis Hamilton should take defeat in his stride, and grin openly. Instead, he chooses to remain sombre and generally pissed when he loses. Not cool, bro!

The New Horse In The Stable Talks About The Australian GP

Sigh, I am finally in Ferrari, Michael would have been so proud. I will be brutally honest; I have been trying to get into the place even while Redbull was giving me wings. There comes a time when you realise you absolutely need ‘red’ on your CV, and I have been in that place since 2009. (No offence, Deitrich.) So Ferrari… So far it has been an absolute kick to be here. I have been an extremely lucky bugger to escape the shambles Redbull is in now, though I will admit McLaren (I actually mean Fernando) are in worse shape. *teehee* I have fit in quite well at Ferrari, and the internet and F1 fan sites are plastered with photographs of Kimi and me bromancing around the garage all through the GP weekend. Yes, I have a great rapport with Kimi, we get along well, thank you very much. Much to the chagrin of other drivers and astonishment of the media, as seen from the post-race press brief, we are actually friends. If you guys don’t remember, I will recount the hilarious conference interaction between me and a certain other driver at the end of this post. It will spoil the suspense of the race if I give it up now.

Artwork by Abhinav Krishna, an amazing F1 artist 

Show him some love : The Circus

Winter was a very long but exciting one, and initially I was really apprehensive going head on into the mess that Ferrari was in. Atleast Redbull had wins in 2014, no matter if they were not mine. The getting-used-to and getting-to-know-every-Italian on the team was really big, with some family dinners thrown in for good measure. After the oust of Luca di Montezemolo from the team, there seems to be a little less intimidation from the top brass and a little freed up atmosphere in the lower echelons of the team. This is evident in the much more informal Twitter handle now, and the inauguration of the Instagram account. Things happen for the best I reckon. Personally, I never liked Luca, though I have spoken to him a few times only. After the tests at Jerez and Barcelona, I was convinced that the car was definitely better than the RB10. And Kimi was positively beaming, which indicated it was infinitely better than the F14-T. (See? I can read him man!) The team had worked hard over the winter, and had added atleast 80bhp to the sluggish engine unit. Which puts us in top contention, but still a long way off from the current ‘prancers’ Mercedes.

Bromancing (We do not engage in the Italian style)

This weekend we arrive in Albert Park, which will customarily kick off the 2015 F1 season. Albert Park, in spite of technically being a street circuit is quite different from other street tracks. It has fast, sweeping corners and as opposed to a traditional street circuit, which has very less heavy braking, Albert Park has plenty. Hence, taking care of the tires in the race is as crucial as being fast, as that matters a lot when strategy is key. We drivers love Albert Park, and the fans here always turn up in hordes. I adore this place, even though I got booed for winning here on previous occasions. Does being in the most popular F1 team change that? Let’s find out!

Australian Grand Prix

Run at Albert Park, a recreational park on the outskirts of Melbourne serving as an F1 track for the weekend, Australian GP is the popular season starter for F1. The track itself snakes around the Albert Park Lake, and makes for a picturesque venue, with the Melbourne skyline adorning the horizon. With 58 laps, the track offers plenty of opportunities for overtaking, but Turn 3 rules supreme amongst all. Getting a good exit after the first couple of turns is extremely important, and hence race start often decides the final standings. (Well, when doesn’t it, in F1?) It is a clockwise circuit, so atleast no oddity there. Pirelli formulated a new tire compounds for the race, and this was presented in the form of medium and soft rubber. As the circuit is merciful on the boots, most drivers are expected to do a one-stop race. We are fighting it out with the Williams in reality, with the Mercs too far off in terms of pace. So, depending on how the race plays out, the strategy will be put into play dynamically. Oh well. I am just messing around with you guys. We decide the main strategy post qualifying. Don’t listen to politically correct answers.

Melbourne F1 Circuit map

Friday and Saturday practice sessions

Practice sessions in the season kick-offs are all about apprehensions and curiosities. The former are about your own car and the latter are about the other cars. I am one of the firsts to line up at the pitlane exit at the start of FP1, like a dutiful son. The first lap I put in for my new team is 3.7 seconds off from the one Nico put in for Mercedes. That was just a warmer though. I leap to second behind Nico on my second attempt, but still the effort is 2 seconds off him. That was it for flying laptimes with minimal fuels. The team let me do long runs after that and I end up fifth on the charts. FP2 is mainly checking up on the pace we could give in for qualifying, and it is stopped briefly when Kevin crashed his ailing MP4-30. The session also sees me competing with Kimi for fastest laps until the two bullying Mercs decide to put their good (Notice that I did not say ‘best’) game on and take away our swings. I am quite satisfied with my car settings, and at the end of the session I stand third after clocking 26 laps. I am still 0.7 seconds off, and the Mercs still only have their good game on. FP3 briefly sees Valtteri grabbing my third position for a while, and I clock in a decent lap in vengeance. This not only sends Valt to his rightful place but also happens to knock Nico off his second place. (He was on the slower, medium tires though) I hold on, and FP3 ends with me sandwiched between the mighty Mercs, with Kimi clocking in a distant sixth.

Qualifying

Q1 is on and the team decides to send Kimi out first. I take the car out on soft tires after some last minute tunings, and I take my time warming up the tires in Q1. Meanwhile, Kimi puts in a lap of 1m30.188s on the faster soft tires and goes first. I light up purple sector after sector and beat Kimi with a solid 1m29.307s. Lewis and Nico manage to take the mickey out of us, and slot in laptimes in 1m28s on the slower, medium tires. Alarmingly, Valtteri puts in a laptime of 1m30.488s to slot in behind me on mediums too! The team thinks that is enough running for Q1, and both the Ferraris find their way back to the garage. Max, who is the youngest chap on the grid, gives a stellar lap on softs in his Toro Rosso to go third, displacing me. He is relegated to fourth by the end of the session by Felipe, who takes the third slot on softs. The shocker of the session is Mclaren, with both Jenson and Kevin (stepping in for Fernando) knocked out of Q1 with Marcus Ericsson for company.

Q2 sees every car on the soft compound tires, and I set my first laptime to grab third place from Kimi behind the Mercs. I clock in a 1m27.594s. The team thinks that is good enough and doesn’t send me out again. I remain third at the end of Q2 and five drivers are eliminated. Q3 starts, and it is a 12 minute tussle to the pole. I go around the circuit like a madman and clock in a 1m27.519s, to slot in second behind Lewis. Nico runs off after a lockup at the second last corner, and Felipe slots in third after me, 0.6s off. Kimi is fourth after him. Meanwhile, on his second run, Lewis improves massively to a 1m26.327s, and Felipe manages to snatch the third slot from me. My tires are relatively worn out, and I cannot put in a better lap again. Bummer. So, Kimi and I line up fifth and fourth respectively on the grid for the race.

Artwork by Abhinav Krishna, an amazing F1 artist 

Show him some love : The Circus

Race

The Sunday starts with just 15 cars lining up the grid; Manor Racing does a no-show, Valtteri drops out with a lower back injury and Kevin & Daniil back out with mechanical failures on their cars. My race is with the lone Williams of Felipe, and probably my own teammate Kimi. The third rung on the podium is up for grabs, and unless the Mercs suffer any problems, the other two rungs are out of contention for the rest of us. We take the cars around for the warmup laps, and I have a slow start which momentarily unnerves me. But thankfully I recover and take my place back from Kimi. After snaking around the track and getting enough heat in the tires, we all line up on the grid. Charlie takes charge and the five red lights come on one by one, to go off simultaneously, and we are GO! I have a slow start again and Felipe has bolted ahead of me and is chasing the Williams. I have a bit of a moment with Kimi at Turn 1, and to avoid getting hit, he makes a manoeuvre which makes him lose a few places and end up eighth.  I see a Lotus in the barriers at Turn 2 in my mirrors, and it turns out to be Pastor. It turns out I trigger those events, by tapping a kerb and nudging Kimi. Kimi ends up slowing, and the three cars behind him try dodging him and one of them, Pastor’s Lotus, spins into the wall. Racing incident, I suppose. The guys ask me to be careful on the second lap, and look out for tire-piercing carbon shards. The new safety car, Mercedes AMG GT S, makes a debut.

It was a racing incident... Kimi agrees!

Safety car goes back in in no time, and we are racing again. The Mercs have already raced off to chase the sunset together, and Lewis is 3 seconds ahead of me. Felipe is 0.7s ahead, and I prepare myself to rein him in. DRS is active and I begin to up my game. But it turns out Felipe has some tricks up his sleeve too, and he matches my pace despite my DRS advantage. By the end of Lap 12, he is 1.2 seconds ahead of me, and I fall back, biding my time. I continue chasing him, and keeping him in the sub-1.5s distance. The guys on the wall have got some good mind games on with the Williams crew, and it’s a matter of best-strategy-wins. Felipe is called in by his team on lap 21, and I take my chance and launch off. Felipe rejoins in sixth behind Daniel, and that is good news because my ex-teammate will hold him up for sure. I lap faster than earlier when I was in Felipe’s bad air, and I can’t say the same for him in Daniel’s exhausts right now. The team calls me in on lap 24, changes me into the medium boots; the move brings me out comfortably ahead of Felipe, despite a 3.6s stop. All hail the reverse-undercut! My team wins in the strategy mind game, and it is up to me to take the car to the finish as I am one-stopping. By lap 28, I am nearly 2 seconds ahead of the Williams, with a clean track ahead of me.

I dare you to pit!

At lap 33, I am well and truly clear of the hounding by Felipe, and more than 4s ahead of him. By lap 40, the gap between us has stabilised and I can afford to look around at other things and chatter away into the radio. Kimi makes a second stop, as he had put on softs after his first, and needed to stop again to use the mediums. He rejoins fifth, poised to challenge Felipe, but his race ends because of tire on left-rear is not attached properly. Shame. He was doing amazing. At the front, Lewis is leading from Nico, and both the Mercs are miles off from me. As I am letting my mind wander, the guys warn me that Felipe is slowly encroaching and has chipped away the gap to 3.2 seconds on lap 45. I get a grip on and sit up straight, metaphorically. The team warns me that I have to look after the depleting fuel too. I put in conservative laps, and Felipe continues to eat into the gap and is a scary 2.5s behind me on lap 51. I decide that there is enough fuel to last me through the 7 laps remaining, and decide to push away. I manage to match Felipe’s laptime on our next lap. It is lap 56, and I recover lost ground and put myself four seconds ahead of the Williams again. Soon, the three remaining laps are done, and I cross the chequered flag behind Lewis and Nico in a distant, 35s off third place. Turns out Lewis and Nico had a close fought race too, and the German was just 1.8s behind the Brit in the final lap.

Arnie stealing everyone's thunder!

I am elated that I have managed to bag a podium on my Ferrari debut. A special mention should also go to rookies Carlos and Felipe Nasr, who have managed to bag good points for their teams in their very first F1 race. Arnold interviews us on the podium, and I don’t hear any boos for me. Now, as I promised, the following is the excerpt from the post-race press conference:

I mention to the interviewer that I feel bad about both the Ferraris not finishing and Kimi having to retire.

Nico(butting in): Are you genuinely disappointedly to see him (Kimi) retire?

Me: Yes… I don’t know how much you like each other (Lewis and Nico) but Kimi and myself we get along, so I think it is a shame.

Nico(defensive now): I thought as a racing driver you might like it that you have a couple of points’ advantage over him now. I don’t want you off the wrong foot there, sorry.

I smile knowingly at Lewis. And he looks on with a hint of awkwardness on his face.

Home boy Felipe Massa on the Brazilian GP

I am definitely having the last laugh as far as my exclusion from Ferrari is concerned. I have been with the team for a long time and made a lot of life-long friends there, but well… Get this: Ferrari kicks me out, brings Kimi back again (who was unceremoniously chucked out in 2009), I go to Williams, the F14T is a dog of a car and Williams is ahead of Ferrari in Constructors’ Championship. So much for having two roosters in the same coop. Williams has produced a brilliant car for the first time in many years, and I consider myself lucky to be here when that has finally happened. For a long time now, I have had to don the role of a submissive second driver, and being at a team other than Ferrari is doing wonders for me. Williams too pulled a “_____ is faster than you” card on me at Sepang, but I refused to let Valtteri pass and the message was conveyed.  All I want is to be a racing driver who will fight to keep his position, and I will not regret doing something like that again. Admittedly though, Valtteri has been getting more out of the car than me, and he has the points to prove it. But I am relishing the year, and living to fight the next race after each one.

Second Finn I have had to deal with. This one's a lot easier! :-)

This weekend we arrived at Interlagos, Sao Paulo; the track where I won the race but lost the championship. Home races invoke positivity in the driver, and when the crowd cheers for you, the drive and determination gets doubled. You can feel the energy pulsating through the whole place, and it eggs you on. It is an enormous sensation. Interlagos is a track which is very dear to me because of that, and winning or being on the podium here is the most special emotion in the world.

In other news, four cars were off the grid for the race. Caterham and Marussia ran into organizational and financial problems, and did not compete. It is a huge concern, and having been in a teamwith both limited and unlimited resources, I have come to appreciate the delicate nature of cost-cutting in F1. Caterham also launched a crowd-funding project to raise funds and compete in the remaining races, which is basically an auctioning of used car parts to collectors and enthusiasts. At the time of writing this entry, Caterham has managed to scrape through, and will be racing in Abu Dhabi. I am also very happy for our test driver Felipe Nasr, who has bagged a seat at Sauber next year.

Brazilian Grand Prix

Autodromo Jose Carlos Pace or Interlagos in Sao Paulo always makes me think of gladiator arenas. The circuit is built into an indented piece of land surrounded by the city, and the depression makes it look like a pit or an arena with the grandstands serving as viewing galleries. It is one of the most loved tracks on the calendar, and my personal favourite. It is an anti-clockwise track, but after racing in Austin, we have already got used to it. Interlagos has hosted many season finales, and the races here have always been exciting, more so with the rains butting in sometimes. Pirelli brought their medium and soft tire compounds for the weekend, and the bumpy, abrasive track meant that there will be a lot of pitstops.

Friday and Saturday Practice Sessions

FP1 saw me coming out as soon as the pitlane light was green, and after an installation lap we got down to the business of fine-tuning. We ran both the compounds in the session, and observed that the there was a lot of wear on the Pirellis. I also had a moment in the closing stages when I went off at Mergulho and after a tussle got it back on track. I managed to post a ninth fastest time on the mediums and then dived for soft boots. The change of rubber shot me up to fifth , where I stayed. Nico topped FP1, 1.047 seconds ahead of me.

FP2 was uneventful, except for a fire on Fernando’s car, which brought out the red flags. My position kept fluctuating between fourth and sixth and Valtteri kept doing a slightly better lap than me on the softs every time. There was another red flag courtesy of Esteban, and I stayed sixth fastest behind Valtteri. Nico muscled himself into first place again, and I trailed him by 0.976 seconds this time. FP3 saw a resurgence from me and I beat Valtteri to bag third fastest time by nearly two-tenths of a second. Nico lead this session as well, but I closed the gap to him to 0.429 seconds.

Qualifying

Q1 gets a quick start as I drive car out to the track for the outlap, and to get to the optimum fuel load takes a few laps. On the third lap after the outlap, I set a time better than Valtteri in 3^rd, which is eventually beaten by Fernando and Nico. By the time Q1 ends, Valtteri and I are an easy 3-4 on the charts behind the customary Merc domination. Romain, JEV, Sergio and Pastor get eliminated in the shootout of the 18 cars.

We move on to the 15 minutes action of Q2. I go out after a few minutes into it, and promptly set the third fastest time behind Nico and Lewis. Valtteri is feisty though, when he swoops in to displace me down to fourth. In the final few minutes of Q2, I give it my all, and climb up to second behind Nico, Lewis apparently sand-bagging. Esteban, Hulk, Adrian and Daniel Kvyat get relegated.

The commencing of Q3 sees the air heavy with anticipation in the garage and the stands, because the Williams is clearly in good contention for a podium, and if something goes wrong with the Mercs, a potential win. Q3 is a quick-as-lightning 12-minute shootout, and as the pitlane lights turn green, there’s a scramble on the track. Valtteri locks up more than once, and the team warns me about it. Nico is keen on keeping his spotless record of being right at the top the whole weekend, and Lewis is constantly on the lookout to topple him. It is a crazy session. Nico loses no time in setting the top time, and Lewis is close behind. Valtteri goes third, and then I relegate him to fourth. I am just 0.052 seconds from Lewis after the first runs, and I hear the crowds erupt on every grandstand I pass. The final run sees the same scrap, and the positions remain the same. I have a chance at beating Lewis to second on my flying lap, but a ruined middle sector throws that away. So, qualifying session sees Nico, Lewis, me, Valtteri, Jenson and Sebastian in that order for the grid positions on Sunday.

Lewis looks not-so-happy

Race

There is something about Brazil which is unlike any other racing track; the urge to ace a home race of course, and also the enormous amount of positive aura around the track. This weekend my son also will be watching, and he is at an age where this will be imprinted in his mind forever. I almost am desperate to give a good show, and the pressure is huge as we all line up on the grid for the warmup lap. The fans are in their thousands, and I can spot Brazil colours all over the circuit. The cheers can be heard loud and clear above the meek sound of the V6 turbos as we go around for the usual warmup lap, and it feels me with verve and dread at the same time. After a particularly long weaving around the hot track, we wait on the grid for the five red lights to go out.

The rubber on the tires is hot and in optimum temperature, and Charlie Whiting does the honours of declaring the start. 18 V6 engines rev up and as the lights come on and go out, we launch ourselves out of the grid boxes. I get a quick and perfect start and emerge out of the Senna S in 3^rd position unscathed, and so do all the others. By the end of two laps into the race, we see no incidents but the guys warn me about an oilspill in Turn 2. 3 laps in and I see the two Mercs already 2 seconds ahead of me, and building up the gap further. The Pirelli soft rubber is already starting to show signs of wear, and the team takes the call of calling me in after lap 5. The stop is perfect and I switch onto medium tires. I head out and a lap later the team pits Valtteri. He is safely behind me after he heads out, and I gain some tenths having achieved the undercut.

Snaking through Senna's S after race start

The relieved feeling of having executed a perfect stop is short-lived as the stewards slap a 5-second stop-go penalty on me for speeding in the pits. Dang! This means that the next time I go into the pits, I have to wait for an extra 5 seconds before my tire-changing business. This means that Valtteri has a huge chance of jumping me. To add fuel to the fire, the team informs me that he has set the fastest lap. On lap 15, I am running 5^th, behind Nico and Lewis, who in turn are chasing down yet-to-pit Hulk and Daniel Kvyat. Nico and Lewis soon edge ahead and overtake Hulk and Daniel, leaving it to me to do the same honours. I chase down Daniel rapidly, and overtake him on the starting grid straight and hear the crowd cheer. It is a good energy and I put my foot down to chase Hulk and reclaim my third position only to realise that it already came relatively easy, as Hulk is in the pits the same time I am chasing Daniel. I take my spot at third position behind the Mercs, and I can see Lewis’s Merc ahead, just 4 seconds away. In a couple of laps, I can see Valtteri in my mirrors, around 3 seconds behind me, with Jenson hot on his heels.

Overtaking Daniel Kvyat

In the following laps, Lewis and Nico run their own private race as they edge away further and further from the rest of the grid. By lap 25, I am 16 seconds behind Lewis, who in turn is challenging Nico for first position at less than a second behind the latter. I come in for the scheduled stop on lap 26, when I also do a 5 second stop-go penalty. The team makes me wait longer than 5 seconds and I come back on track in 13^th position behind Daniel Kvyat. I am eager to see if Valtteri will beat me after he stops, courtesy of the ‘7-seconds penalty’, but he doesn’t. His stop also takes long, as the mechanics adjust his seatbelt and he comes back on track in 15^th position, behind Kevin too. By lap 29, the drivers yet to stop do the deed, and I see Hulk 4 seconds ahead of me in 4^th place behind Kimi, who has decided to do a two-stop race. Nico is still the leader, and at a comfortable margin ahead of Lewis, who has apparently gone for donut. I get down to business, which is chasing down Hulk and as we arrive at lap 37, I am o.924 seconds behind him. He chooses the same lap to pit, and I automatically get promoted to 3^rd, as Kimi has pitted already. The gap to Lewis now is 14.267 seconds, and it looks like I am going to have a quiet race from 3^rd position.  But no, I can see Jenson close enough in my mirrors, and it turns out he is trailing me by 4.6 seconds. That is not a problem, because the two cars drift further apart from me as the race progresses. At lap 50, I am 23 seconds behind Lewis in 3^rd, and Jenson is 8.5 seconds behind me. 

I pit on lap 51 for my final stop and visit the Mclaren pit for a quick hello before going to my own pit. It is a funny mistake, but in my defence they all look so similar in their white overalls. I change over to mediums to run to the end. It is a decent 3.6 seconds stop, and I emerge in 5^th behind Hulk and Fernando, who are yet to make their final stop. Fernando pits on lap 53, and I am promoted to 4^th position. Meanwhile, Lewis is still chasing Nico ahead of Hulk, and I am 0.625 seconds behind the Force India. I pass him easily again at the same spot into Senna S as I took Daniel Kvyat, and the crowds applaud as enthusiastically as before.

Hey Ron! I am better than Fernando!

I run a quiet race after that, as Lewis is 30 seconds ahead of me and Hulk’s Force India fades easily behind me, and on lap 62 Hulk pits to let Jenson take the 4^th position behind me. Jenson’s gap to me is a safe 12 seconds, so unless something horrible happens to my car, I have the podium in the bag. The situation ahead is not so laidback as me though, as Lewis chases Nico like a man possessed. He is within DRS distance of less than 1 second for the remaining 9 laps, but eventually fails to rail Nico in. On the last lap, I take the liberty of looking around at the crowd and the support overwhelms me as it always does. The race ends, Nico wins, Lewis comes a close second. I stand on the podium in my home race again, with my son watching and Brazil cheering, and it is the best feeling in the whole world. 

Proud Felipe

Proud Felipinho

Whatever happened to the trophies..

Note: All photographs belong to their respective owners and FOM. Let me know if you need me to take down any.

The Fastest Cowboy in Austin: Daniel Ricciardo

I try to be modest and nice all the time, but excuse me this time mate. I totally kicked Seb’s ass throughout my stint at Redbull and it feels great!*grins*  Seb is facing the same car troubles as Kimi is, and even though I love it, I know it is tough to drive a car you are not comfortable with. The RBR has been kind to me, and I daresay I am used to jittery cars screaming for more downforce since my days at Redbull’s sister team Toro Rosso. And to be fair to Seb, he has spent five years basking in the glory of the era of Downforce Supreme, and switching to this car from that is tough indeed.

The team has been very good to me, in spite of me donning the role of a second driver. The rumours about Mark being side-lined to favour Seb before I came to this team really seem shaky after this. Mark is my countryman, but Redbull is a very impartial team in my experience. Formula 1 is a rat-race. It is the closest thing that I can relate to about the Darwinian theory of survival of the fittest. Today, it’s Seb who is facing problems, but that can turn around and tomorrow it might be me.

We Hear No Evil

There has been a lot of stuff happening in F1. First, it was Jules’ dreadful accident, which left all of us drivers shaken. It makes you stop and think about life, which can be so fleeting as to change in milliseconds. What are we really doing? That question inevitably arises in mind and forces you to introspect. But the answer is simple enough for us. We are following our passions, and doing something we are best at doing. Racing is all that keeps us sane, because that is what we have conditioned ourselves to do over all these years. Secondly, Caterham and Marussia are not racing this weekend at Austin due to intra-team problems, and it makes the grid look a lot smaller. On the brighter side for drivers, it means lesser blue flags.

Circuit of the Americas

Circuit of the Americas is a well-loved track in the Formula 1 community, and drivers love it because of the enthusiastic fans, the flow of the track, the Esses, and the fact that it has taken the best out of some tracks and rolled it into one package. It has sections from Germany’s Hockenheim, Turkey’s Istanbul Park and England’s Silverstone. But it has one section that is unique; the steep climb into Turn 1, which ushers you blindly further on. In addition to all of this, the track runs anti-clockwise and this requires a newer set of neck exercises to counter the g-forces on the left side.

Track map of CotA

Friday and Saturday Practice Sessions

FP1 on Friday is disappointing for me because I have to end my run early owing to a problem in the Energy Recovery System(ERS) on the car. We have new youngsters Max Verstappen and Felipe Nasr replacing Jean-Eric and Valtteri respectively. I get 45 minutes on track before that happens, but the jittery feeling with the front and lack of traction is unnerving. We have much to do, but have to wait till FP2 to do it. Lewis tops FP1 behind Nico.

The team gets my car ready in two hours for FP2. I post a seventh best time in the first attempt on prime tires. The option/soft tires improve things later and I manage to split the Mercs and post a second. Nico has gearbox issues and Fernando pips him to third place, and goes on to depose me too. Nico manages to come back and floors it to come second again. Thus, I stand fourth in FP2. FP3 is fun at first without the big guns showing as I post second place in some laps, and then first behind Felipe. After that it is just a fall into the back as I get deported to sixth place. As the chequered flag comes out and I still am on a flying lap, I push and I push but run horribly wide at the corner before last. I stay sixth.

The steep climb into Turn 1

Qualifying

The team takes its own sweet time to prepare me to be sent into the battlefield as Q1 begins. 12 minutes out of the 18 minutes have already zoomed by before I am on the outlap for my first qualifying lap. I give it all and post a fifth best time, purpling the final sector to wrap it up. Q1 relegates are JEV, Esteban, Seb(!) and Romain. The Q2 clock starts with its 15-minute countdown, and we waste no time in getting the car on track this time. I post a seventh position on my first try, with Nico and Lewis leading the pack. Towards the end, I scrape a fifth best lap on the charts, and Pastor, Sergio, Hulk and Daniel Kvyat are knocked out. Q3 sees me the first car out of the pitlane, eager to put on a good show. I am back in eighth after the first runs, and determined to do better. I do more runs after a pit visit and catapult from eighth to fourth. Felipe relegates me soon and at the end of Q3, I am in fifth position ahead of Fernando. Nico, Lewis, Vallteri and Massa are at the front in that order.

Had to take a selfie!

Race

The new protocol dictates that we drivers come to the start of the grid and stand in a file for the local national anthem. It seems like a long walk for backmarkers on the grid, and I have reservations about this. After the US national anthem, we return to our cars and start the nervous preparation for the race. I think that Williams has come through really well this season, and their car could be judged as the best of the rest from the grid at Austin. Seb will start from the pitlane it seems, with a penalty for using the sixth engine.

LOL

We go on the warm-up lap to get heat into the tires, and weave around the track before coming back to the grid to wait for the five red lights to go out. I focus on getting a clean start and as the lights go out I floor the throttle. I get a horrible start as Fernando and Kevin relegate me to seventh place. The first two laps are hardly over and a skirmish between Adrian and Sergio on the Esses brings out the Safety Car. It starts the flurry of pitstops from a lot of cars, most noticeably Kevin for me. The SC goes back in within a few laps and we are racing again. With Kevin out of the equation for now, and Fernando right in front of me in 4^th place, I lose no time in overtaking him and do it from the inside on Turn 1. Close shave! Ferrari crossed out! The team instructs me to reign in the Williamses next. After 10 laps, I am still behind the Williams cars in fifth place, and Nico-Lewis are fighting out their own duel at the front. On the brighter side, I have pulled a good 6 seconds ahead of Fernando in 6^th.

On lap 13, I see Valtteri lock up in Turn 15, and in a plan to undercut him I dive for the pits in the same lap. Felipe also does the same from third position. I put on the medium tires(prime) and head out. The next lap sees Valtteri pit too, and on lap 15, he comes out of the pitlane side by side with me. I have the momentum from a longer run and I dive around the outside of Turn 1 to take 4^th place. One Williams down. But not for long! Valtteri is on the faster soft option tires, by virtue of which he is already all over me. He tries to DRS me on the straight before Turn 12, but I hold off. He attacks me again into Turn 15, but I keep him off. The next two laps are all about defending my behind from the apparently agitated Finn and I think I do a good job. After lap 18, I am 1.6 seconds behind Felipe and 1.3 seconds ahead of Valtteri.

This positions continue to be so for the next several laps. Valtteri seems to have started caring about his tires more than me, and steadily drops off behind me. I still keep a respectable distance to my next target Felipe in front, but somehow I don’t seem to be able to catch him. Meanwhile, on lap 25, Lewis overtakes Nico to lead the US grand prix, and judging from the way the stands erupt, you would think Lewis is American. I pit again on lap 31, and put on another set of medium tires again. I rejoin the track ahead of Valtteri, who pitted a lap before me. Felipe is still a little more than a second ahead of me. He pits on lap 32, and rejoins behind me after a botched stop by Willliams(3.7s). Second Williams down. I am now running third, with 22 laps to go. Everything has gone as planned, and a podium seems a possibility. Amidst all the hullabaloo, I also set the fastest lap.

On lap 35, Nico is 3.6 seconds ahead of me and Felipe is 1.8 seconds behind me. I still have a chance to catch Nico, and I also am not too comfortable with my gap to Felipe. Almost like an answer, Nico raises his game on the next lap and clocks fastest lap. It seems I can’t catch him after all. My immediate problem is Felipe all over my gearbox, and I focus on fending him off. I manage to get 2 seconds ahead of him in the next few laps, and the team reminds me that the battle with the Mercs not over yet. They are involved in a war of their own, with Nico rapidly catching Lewis. They might fight and things might get messy, which spells good fortune for me. But that was too good to come true. I spend the remaining laps catching Nico, a gap which was not working in my favour. Meanwhile, Felipe also manages to stage a brief resurgence and comes as close as 1.5 seconds to me. That remains so until the end of 56 laps. I hold on to third and Lewis wins the race.

And with that, my mathematical chances of winning the Drivers’ Championship are over, with Lewis at 316 points, Nico 24 points behind him at 292. I have 214 points, which 102 down on the leader, and with 75 points now available at last two races, I am officially out of the race for WDC. Good luck to Lewis and Nico!

Of pink helmets, clean shaves and a Russian GP

I have always been considered as a second-rung driver, since right back in 2000 when I debuted in Formula 1 with Williams. Seven team changes (by name only) and a world championship later, I am still not deemed as one of the best on track. Formula 1 is about the right driver in the right car, and after a long hiatus that came true for me in 2009 with Brawn. The car clicked and we were one. Driver and car. Race after race. Regrettably, that has not been taking place after I left Brawn- now Mercedes- to join F1 giants McLaren. Joining them was a no-brainer; who in their right minds will refuse a seat at the one of the oldest teams in Formula 1?

Winning the coveted title with Brawn in 2009

At McLaren, I suppose I did pretty well against their 2007 rookie sensation Lewis. Nevertheless, McLaren had not learned their lesson from the fireworks generated by driver rivalry in 2007, resulting in a lost championship. When I came in, they were all about equal driver status again. But yeah, they had always been about equal opportunity, which is an admirable thing about a team. I liked them from the get go, except a few too many endorsements that were obligatory. Case in question: I have always had a little stubble, but when Gilette became a sponsor of McLaren I was given strict instructions to shave clean. Maybe the rigidity made Lewis leave, but I don’t mind it much.

With Kevin during the Wig Wednesday for a cancer charity for children

In 2014, Kevin Magnussen replaced the brief intern Sergio Perez, who was thrown out unceremoniously. Kevin has shown promise, but I have outdriven him on most occasions so far. Papa’s passing made a huge impact on my psyche, but I did not let that deter me from performing my best. I put on the race suit, donned my helmet, pulled down the visor and raced. That is what I know best. And yet, there is uncertainty about my future at the team. Do I have to be the one to step out to make way for whoever is coming? Am I so unreliable that my team cannot have faith in my talents? Rumour is Kevin might go out too, or both he and I might get to continue. I detest it when the driver market is buzzing with transfers and retirements and Sabbaths looming. Sebastian triggered it by saying he will move to Ferrari next year, and Fernando seems so disillusioned with Ferrari that he will definitely leave. And possibly join McLaren. 

Tribute helmet for Papa

This year has been the most difficult of my entire life, with my old man not having my back anymore. But I raced on as usual, and have had the upper hand in points to Kevin. After Japan, I needed to make a strong statement that I am still the driver that won the championship. I know I am not young anymore, but I still have got what it takes. And though I never expected Sochi to be the place where I prove my worth, it turns out it was.

Russian GP

A week was very less time to recover from what happened to Jules Bianchi in the Japanese GP. He is still fighting for his life after that freak accident, and the whole F1 world is united in their support for him. What took place is a sign that motorsports is dangerous no matter what they say. Even a sport as safe as F1 is not really safe. I hope with all my heart that Jules comes back to racing sooner rather than later.

A Formula 1 race has never been held in Russia after the sport was christened so in 1950. The last F1-like event was held in St. Petersburg in 1914. So, Sochi and Russia was a new experience for both the Russians and the drivers. On first glance, the track looks a lot like Abu Dhabi in terms of its environs, with the Black Sea replacing the Marina Bay. Hermann Tilke ‘designed’ the street circuit, and it seems he wasn’t given much leeway in terms of any ‘designing’. The flow of the track is like Valencia, and despite the praise I showered upon it on live TV, I think Sector 1 is its only saving grace. The track is not very exciting, with all the turns feeling exactly the same, and it has way too many 90-degree ones. That may have been because of the constraints of integrating it in the Olympic stadium.

A panoramic shot of the circuit

We all watched the GP 2 race for getting maximum information about the track, as no one had gone racing here before. It seems the first sector, especially Turn 2 and the sweep into Turn 3 was a good place to overtake. The start was going to be extremely crucial because it was a long 800-metre run to the braking point of Turn 1. DRS zones could also have some overtakes. The race was predetermined to be a one-stopper, because Pirelli did not want to take chances with an unknown variable and went conventional on the tire compounds. It turned out the tarmac was very grippy and not so abrasive, which is unusual about a new track. 

Sochi track map

Friday & Saturday practice sessions

Practice was mostly about getting a feel of the track and trying it out for real after all those long hours in the simulator. In FP1, I did the installation lap and then proceeded to understand the track. Six minutes into the session I start trading a few fastest laps with the boys. After the first runs, I top the list with a second clear over all. I get a spin at Turn 8 in the second run, and the asphalt run-off came in handy. The session ended with me third after the two Mercedes cars. The car continues to feel good in FP2 and I post a fastest time of the day. I start exchanging laps with Lewis and Nico, who beat me by a few hundreds of a second every time. But that was inevitable with them being Mercs. FP2 results see me 6^th on the charts with Kevin going second after Lewis. That could only mean one thing. There is pace in the car this weekend. FP3 was a slight anti-climax with me in 9^th position and Kevin in 15^th after he suffered a driveshaft problem. We had gone a bit radical with the car setup and it didn’t work out. So it was a real challenge to pick ourselves together and do better for qualifying, on the old car setup. Well, let’s see if we do redeem our performance, shall we?

Qualifying

The first few runs in Q1 saw me in 13^th position. I decided I had had enough and put up a lap that pushed me up to 5^th. The next run I go 4^th fastest, and Kevin tails me in 5^th. Q1 saw the Felipe eliminated with some problem, along with Pastor. And the Marussia and Caterhams. I do well in Q2 as well, with initial laps placing me at 5^th, but Kevin and Daniel Kvyat beat me down to 6^th place at the end of Q2. Q3 was a scrap between the Mercedes at the front and amongst the rest of us behind them.  The first runs see me go 3^rd fastest, but Lewis promptly relegates me downwards. I get a few more runs, but at the end I am not able to best Valtteri, who looked good enough to play with the Mercs. Kevin finished 6^th, and local hero Daniel Kvyat got rousing applause for a well-qualified 5^th. The pole, you ask? Lewis, of course! I was very elated to find the speed on the car again, and it was a cheery Saturday.

Race

I will not take long to finish this, because despite being a 53-lap race, nothing interesting really happened. The sure-to-feature safety car, as predicted by most pundits failed to turn up too. Fuel-saving was going to be a crucial factor, and a safety car would’ve helped with that. The race was reminiscent of the late races in 2013, when Pirelli went conventional with tire compounds, and it resulted in one-stop races. Nevertheless, flat-spotting the tires was a major concern here, so we needed to try our best not to lock-up or spin. We had gathered from the sessions so far that the race was going to be heavy on fuel, and not-so-heavy on the tires. Qualifying 4^th after the bad showing in Q3 had given me some hope going into the race. I was going in with a determination to do my best.

Marussia with a message for their driver Jules

Before the race starts, we follow some new protocols regarding the national anthem where all drivers have to line up at the front of the grid. We also shook hands with Vladimir Putin and other Russian politicians. The Russian fans had turned up in full capacity, and it was good to see that. The main objective for me in the race was to get ahead of Valtteri Bottas, and snatch the third podium step.

The race starts and I get off pretty clean. It is a long dash to the first braking point, and I see a Mercedes car having a massive lockup into Turn 1. Turns out it was Nico, who got bad flatspots and had to pit immediately. Thanks to Nico hitting the pits, I am up to 3^rd position. The start proves to be a blinding one for Fernando who started from 7^th position, and he is in my mirrors by the end of lap 6. The team reminds me on the radio that he is 0.8 seconds behind me. He is rapidly closing in on me, and Valtteri is 5 seconds ahead. Which means I am falling off on pace. By the end of another lap, I pull away slightly from him, though still within 1 second and DRS range. The Ferrari goes off my trail in the next lap by 2 seconds, when Fernando puts in a slow lap. The drop-off continues with Fernando and me, and at the end of 10 laps, he is 3.6 seconds behind me, and I am trailing Valtteri by 9 seconds. Nico’s relegation to the back may have changed things, or not. The team lets me know that he intends to run the whole race on the tires he just put on. I grin to myself saying it is too early for him to do that because he doesn’t know if the tires will last.

Valtteri and me squabbling over grid position at race start

The next few laps involve me nursing my tires and keeping Fernando at bay. He closes in, and then I start matching his pace. It was the good old back and forth, with no one losing or gaining in the end. The team and I decide to stick with Plan A, which is to do 20-odd laps on the soft tires and then pit. The Ferrari doesn’t prove to be much of a threat, and I keep Fernando at a respectable distance. I pit on Lap 21 and go out in 9^th position after a good one. I get Kimi in front of me, who pits in a while. Meanwhile, Nico has managed to overtake or stop-jump a lot of cars and is in front of me after JEV pits. Mercedes have managed to make it work till now, but will they be able to carry on with such heavily-used tires till the end? I am hoping Nico’s tires go off and I am able to overtake him in my new boots.

Fernando was in my mirrors for half the race 

The next few laps sees me maintain a steady gap to Nico at 3 seconds, and even though his tires are old, the car is working good. After lap 28, I am in 5^th position, having achieved the undercut on Fernando, who is now down in 7^th behind Kevin. Valtteri and Nico are still ahead of me, and it looks like I will finish 4^th, unless Nico’s tires go off in closing stages. But by lap 30, Nico is closing in on Valtteri, and both of them are stuck behind Sebastian, who hasn’t pitted. He pits, and they are unleashed into clear air. Nico takes the opportunity and makes a bold overtake on Valtteri. He seems desperate to do damage control.

With 19 laps to go, the result seems written for me and Kevin, in 4^th and 5^th position. Unless a safety car features. Valtteri is 3 seconds ahead of me, and I start in pursuit of him. To no avail. The Williams car too is racing after the Mercedes of Nico, who is still expected to drop pace due to old tires.

With 10 laps remaining, I am still in 4^th, and fuel consumption is looking good according to the team. The effort to rope in Valtteri proves futile as he notches up fast laps one after the other in the chase for Nico. The race ends in the same positions and that is that. I am obviously happy with a good showing, but a racer always wants to win. I feel that we did the best we could. And I hope I made my mark to be considered for the seat next year. Wrinkles or not, I beat Kevin and 45 points ahead of him in the championship. And congratulations to Lewis and Nico for the now mundane one-two and Mercedes for winning the Constructors' World Championship.

That pink helmet really stands out

- Jenson Button, driving the MP4-29 for McLaren