German Grand Prix Review

A really quite interesting German GP proved that, if you take Michael and his peerless combination with his Ferrari team out of the equation, and if you equalise some of the other variable factors, such as the fact that all the other points scorers were on Michelins, then Formula One in 2004 is in fact potentially as interesting as it was last year. Right now there is little to split between BAR, Renault and even McLaren, with Williams still thereabouts, and even Jaguar and Sauber lobbing in some curveballs.

Consider what a Ferrari-less championship would look like right at the moment. Button on 88 points would be running away from Trulli on 67, followed by Alonso 58, Montoya 47, Coulthard 33, Fisichella and Raikkonen 28 each, then Sato on 26. Renault would be shading BAR in the constructors' championship 125 to 114, followed by Williams on 72, McLaren 61, Sauber 43, Jaguar 20 and Toyota 17. Only Pantano and Bruni would not have scored points, and even Baumgartner and Minardi would have 5 by now!

At the same time, you can't blame Ferrari and Michael in particular for simply being supreme. There's a lot of mud being slung at F1 this year, and, the fear of spiralling costs aside, this is driving the move towards rule changes. But could we not take a more optimistic view? Right now we are witnessing the artistry of a champion team and a champion driver at their best, with an unpredictable tussle behind them every single race. Are we not getting the best of both worlds?

To the point where Max Mosley has even gone back on his announcement to retire as FIA president, deciding instead to see out his term and even talking about standing for re-election! You've gotta love the politics at the FIA and in the Piranha Club in general. Was that the oldest trick in the book? Play the "That's it, I'm quitting!" card, take a free swipe, get everyone to defer to your outgoing wishes, and follow that up by the one-two "I'm not going after all!" sucker punch.

On the track itself, Schumi was in determined form throughout the weekend, aided by his Bridgestones which, in complete contrast to what happened at Hockenheim last year, were the more durable and reliable tyres especially in sector 3 in qualifying, whereas it was the Michelins that had the graining problems. He may have been pushed all the way by Raikkonen, and but for his grid penalty Button may have won, but what ifs and maybes don't cut it, and essentially Michael got a good start and cruised to victory.

The same could not be said for Rubens Barrichello. On a day when a two-stop strategy was nowhere near as effect as it had been at Silverstone, Rubens put himself even further behind the eight-ball by half-heartedly slamming into Coulthard at the hairpin on lap one and losing his front wing. From that point on he was never in contention, bringing his perfect points-scoring record in 2004 to an end. Ferrari's sponsors must have been fuming at their lack of coverage during the race!

The bad news is that Ferrari will surely hit next season with all guns blazing, potentially catching everyone else off guard as they did at the start of this year. All the other teams are having enough trouble mounting a consistent challenge this year, and up to now have still been working on B-spec models, other aerodynamic gains, engine improvements and so on. Their dilemma is that they can't afford to come off the gas for the rest of this season, but they also can't afford to let Ferrari get a head start for '05.

Take BAR, for example. In the last few races they seemed to drop off the ultimate pace, but Jenson Button came back with a vengeance at Hockenheim, so there must have been some significant gains at Brackley. Button is still chasing that first win, and will still have to work hard to fend off the Renault drivers for 3rd in the title race, whilst possibly giving Barrichello a scare for 2nd. The team itself is still within striking distance of Renault in the constructors' title as well. So there can be no let up from BAR for the rest of 2004.

Clearly, Button had the pace to challenge Schumacher, but his pre-race engine change put paid to that. In the event, his strategy was perfect - short-filled enough to ensure a decent midfield grid position, but still heavier than the other three-stoppers to give him enough clear laps to vault up the field. And that is exactly what happened, Jenson rising up from 13th on the grid to 5th after the first stops, 4th after Montoya went off, 3rd after the second stop in front of Coulthard, and eventually 2nd after passing Alonso.

Takuma Sato has slipped a little bit since his sparkling efforts at Indianapolis though, and another eventful weekend saw a crash in Saturday free practice, an opportunistic pass on Webber in the race followed by a brave move inside Trulli, before another spin that crucially let Webber back past and a slowish third stint that saw him lose 7th to Pizzonia. Taku has obviously shown enough this year to be retained for 2005, but the rough edges of the diamond still have some way to being smoothed.

But if Button and BAR were ruing what might have been, then Kimi Raikkonen was letting his anger out in no uncertain terms. He showed that McLaren's performance at Silverstone was no fluke, and that the MP4/19B was, against everyone's expectations including ours, not just a step up but potentially a race winner. The failure of the main plane of his rear wing was unusual, to say the least, but rear wing failures in general result in violent and dangerous accidents. Kimi was lucky to walk away unharmed.

In the other McLaren, David Coulthard continued his consistent year with a very solid drive to 4th, and having had a better roll of the dice in terms of reliability, he moves back ahead of Raikkonen in the championship. The trouble is, where can he go next year? He's not a must-have driver for a team, surely he'd prefer to race instead of testing for McLaren, Jaguar might not be able to afford him, he may not want to go there anyway, and Williams doesn't seem interested. The silly season seems to be passing DC by.

Of course, that means he will most likely get the ill-treatment within the team that Flav dishes out to those in his bad books. It is such an awful shame that what started out as Trulli's best season yet in F1 should peter out as it almost certainly will. A poor tyre choice to run on the softer Michelins, compounded by his underbody collecting Raikkonen's rear wing, followed by a very lacklustre final half of the race that saw him passed even by Klien in the other Jaguar, was, it has to be said, disappointing.

This after his suspension failure and huge crash in Britain, and that catalytic last lap error in France; at this rate, he is still ahead of Alonso in the championship, but he looks like a sitting duck now, whilst letting Button get away with 3rd. If Jarno really has improved as the total-package racing driver, then in the last six races he will need to pick himself up, show that he still means business and is not merely keeping the seat warm, and remain a match for Fernando.

Needless to say, Briatore's lack of diplomacy when it comes to man-management is legendary, but from the outside, it also looks as though Trulli's demand for a pay rise for 2005 was a muddling piece of awful timing. At any rate, Jarno and Renault is the only combination to break the Schumi-Ferrari stranglehold in 2004. For this partnership to dissolve in such a ungentlemanly spat more befitting of teenage girls, both Trulli and Briatore share our 'Reject of the Race' award this time around.

That is, Juan-Pablo Montoya in particular went fast in pre-qualifying, and this time plonked the FW26 on the front row as well, but once again they provided no genuine threat in the race, not even to Button, Alonso and the McLarens, let alone Michael's Ferrari. JPM's torrid start saw him plummet from 2nd to 7th, and an unspectacular race including another costly off-road excursion saw him finish an eventual 5th, the car and its tyres once again having been not quite right.

A racer of the Colombian's ilk would normally drive around whatever imperfections there are in the car beneath him, but the fact that he hasn't seemed to get the race set-up right all season, and the fact that he prefers complaining about it over the radio instead of finding a way to drive around it shows that JPM has really completely lost interest. Which is understandable considering that he has nothing to fight for championship-wise, but it is inexcusable nonetheless.

Antonio Pizzonia returned to F1 racing in the other Williams, and at least did what Marc Gené didn't and scored two points for 7th. But had he really been that much better than the Spaniard? Probably not. If you look at the results from France and take out the 3 drivers that DNF'd at Hockenheim (Barrichello, Trulli, Raikkoinen), Gené would have finished 7thalso. After being 2nd quickest in pre-qualifying, Pizzonia dropped to 11th fastest in qualifying proper, and then had a weak start that dropped him behind Webber's Jaguar, where he was to stay for the rest of the afternoon. Needless to say, there was some delicious irony in that.

REJECT OF THE RACE
Trulli and Briatore
Teenage girl spat ruins an otherwise promising year

Nevertheless, by managing to score points when Gené didn't, Pizzonia has probably guaranteed himself the Williams seat until Ralf Schumacher returns (if at all), and he has put himself in the frame for a full-time drive next year. Although it is well known that Williams were looking to replace Gené with Nick Heidfeld, only for Eddie Jordan to veto the move. Quite clearly, the quietly-spoken German is closer to the top of the list than Antonio will ever be.

Webber surprised himself by claiming 6th place, having genuinely out-raced Pizzonia, Sato and Trulli, despite his own predictions of a damage-control race. Though he might have been a little more race-savvy in defending against Montoya, he made a crucial move past Fisichella such that he was not held up by the two-stopping Sauber, before his opportunistic dive inside Trulli after Sato had also barged his way past. The three points lifted Jaguar back up to 7th in the constructors' title, past Jordan.

Here is a man who knows he is off to greener pastures next year, with an announcement of his move to Williams due in a few days, if that. But he remains unstinting in his efforts for Jaguar, as has been shown in the last three races, and that kind of ethic is what will take him, and quite possibly Williams, to the top. Meanwhile, much credit also to Christian Klien for an impressive weekend, in which he was almost on Webber's pace, and finished 10th with a drive that on some other days would have garnered points.

Cristiano da Matta made very little impression over the weekend before spinning out with his tyre failure, but the Cologne team are at a crossroads right now. They have two drivers who will probably be leaving, neither of whom are really on anyone else's shopping lists, so their performances from here will probably start going south. They can either let the TF104B do what it can and start working towards 2005, or they can keep trying to improve their 2004 position, possibly at the cost of a good start to next year.

Very little to show once again from Heidfeld and Giorgio Pantano in the two troubled Jordans, although EJ certainly made headlines for defending his decision to stop Heidfeld going to Williams before the race. Unlike Paul Stoddart or even Peter Sauber, who understand that their teams are talent nurseries and who would not stop their men pursuing their dreams by going to better outfits, Eddie is clearly still keen to keep his aces in order to turn around his team's fortunes.

Still the doldrums for Minardi too, although apparently there is also some tension with title sponsor Wilux. Wilux are apparently unhappy with Gianmaria Bruni's efforts, and also displeased that the team may have replaced all sponsorship in Britain with their tribute to the late John Walton without consultation. If so, then it would have been a silly move, however touching the gesture was. Sponsorship money is everything to a team like Minardi; a feud with their title backer is the last thing they need.