Turkish Grand Prix Review

With the circus moving from the confines of the Hungaroring back to faster, more sweeping tracks, it was no surprise that Ferrari came back to the fore, even if their advantage over McLaren was not that big. The only real question in Turkey, then, was which Ferrari driver would take the spoils? In one of the sad indictments on F1 2007-style, Kimi Raikkonen made a slight error in the last few corners of his last flying lap in Q3, lost around two tenths of a second, and started 3rd to Massa's pole.

The Finn moved up to 2nd immediately at the start, but that was that. Although he made several attacks, he never really looked like passing Felipe on the track. And, unlike in France, when he snatched the lead on pit strategy, here on both his stops he pitted a lap before his team-mate. It doesn't matter how brilliant your in-laps and out-laps are, one lap on heavy fuel while your rival is on low tanks is probably enough to stuff your chances. In the end, Raikkonen's late fastest lap seemed a bit of an empty gesture.

Having said that, all credit to Massa, whose driving hits a whole new level of consistency and pace when he is out front. All of his four previous wins, starting from Turkey last year, then Brazil, then Bahrain and Spain this year, have been examples of imperious domination from the front. Likewise, he would have added the European GP this year were it not for the late-race sprinkle. It almost seems like being in the lead makes him calmer and steadier, rather than more nervous. This was another fine, deserved victory.

Ferrari's problem is that their drivers have swapped positions in the championship for four straight rounds. Massa is now 15 points behind Hamilton, Raikkonen 16. More 1-2s and the McLarens are catchable - just. Do Ferrari back Kimi, who is probably slightly faster? Or do they back the less-fancied Massa and hope that he keeps taking poles and dominating races from the front? Frankly, the simple answer is, as has been the case all year, Ferrari can't afford to do anything other than let them work it out for themselves.

The Spaniard's decision to attempt his last Q3 run on the harder tyres was strange, and a poor start compounded his dilemma by dropping him behind the BMWs. Races like Magny-Cours this year have already taught him the kind of frustration that he can suffer when trapped behind the German-Swiss cars, and here it put Fernando right behind the eight-ball. After leapfrogging both BMWs at the first stop, he made little headway into Hamilton's advantage, inherited a lucky 3rd, but only took two points off his team-mate.

Lewis was excellent in both practice and qualifying, really putting the pressure on the Ferraris at a circuit where the red cars were expected to dominate. He was equally terrific in the first two-thirds of the race, when he hung onto the tail of the F2007s and ensured that they could not relax. But, once again to show the kind of good fortune that seems to be running his way all season and making life so much easier for him, even when his puncture struck, it came at exactly the time of his second stop.

Not only that, but the flailing tyre only caused minimal front wing damage, and the whole episode only relegated him to 5th at the end. Imagine if the puncture had occurred midway through his stint and seriously compromised his race strategy, for example obliging him to run a much longer stint on his less-preferred compound. Imagine if it had happened earlier in the lap, forcing him to lose more time limping. Imagine if it had cause him more wing and suspension damage. Put it simply, Lewis got off lightly, again.

On a weekend when they announced that they had re-signed both their drivers for 2008, in truth BMW found themselves in a bit of a pickle. It was another solid 4th place for Nick Heidfeld, but the team had managed to put no real pressure on McLaren and Ferrari, and, on ultimate pace and optimal strategy, they were under no real threat from anyone else. It was the same in terms of their constructors championship position. Perhaps that gave them cause to experiment.

The other Finn's qualifying run was excellent yet again; he has now qualified either 6th or 7th in five of the last six races. That means he's either beaten one of the BMWs or been best of the rest. Here in Turkey, in his first stint, despite running the heaviest fuel load of the frontrunners, he kept the gap to the leaders to a minimum such that when they pitted, he took the lead. A Renault hasn't been in that kind of position all year. Not bad for a team that says that they are already looking to 2008.

Having split the BMWs at the first stop, he kept the pressure on and gave valiant chase to Hamilton in the final segment of the race. Now, Kovalainen's definitely someone who hasn't had it easy all season - his nightmarish debut in Melbourne, after which Flavio Briatore blasted him in the press, is testament to that. But he is truly becoming someone to look out for. He has scored 16 points in the last seven races, which would surely have been more had he not been punted on the first lap in France.

More than that, Heikki has now overtaken Giancarlo Fisichella in the points. That should not go unnoticed. Fisi has not scored in the last three GPs, and frankly looked lacklustre. He was completely outshone again by his rookie team-mate, and pitching Jarno Trulli into a spin at the first corner was simply amateurish. Funnily enough, last year he spun himself at the first corner, claimed that that was to avoid hitting team-mate Alonso, and won 'Reject of the Race' for his trouble.

This year, in the same situation, he decided to hit Trulli instead. That's enough for us to give him 'Reject of the Race' this year as well. Although he tried to make up for it by passing a few cars at his first stop, he still finished out of the points. There's no talk of replacing Kovalainen; all the pressure's on Fisi. Briatore has a conundrum. Does he hold out and try to poach Alonso? Does he take a punt on the untried Nelson Piquet Jr? Right now, sticking with Fisichella is the least-favourable option.

REJECT OF THE RACE
Giancarlo Fisichella
Repeats first corner mayhem from 2006

However, the lack of strategic difference, not to mention the lack of difference between the two tyre compounds, also meant that Alexander Wurz couldn't make up much ground from his 14th grid position. Monaco and Canada showed that the Austrian is the king of tyre preservation; in that case, Williams could have taken a punt and put him on a one-stop strategy. Case in point: Ralf Schumacher ran four places behind Wurz in the early stages, but finished just one place behind the Williams on a one-stop plan.

As for Red Bull, it was another nothing weekend. The team have been exasperatingly stop-start in their development all year. They came to Turkey with aero improvements, particularly for their rear cowling, and a new car for David Coulthard, only for the new chassis to catch fire on Friday. Mark Webber also experienced handling and set-up issues on Friday, neither car made it into Q3 despite improved free practice pace, DC had an average race whilst - surprise surprise - Webber was the only retirement.

And so the chorus starts up again about how Webber is the unluckiest driver in F1. Wherever he goes, unreliability seems to hound him. And whilst as unashamed Webber fans we feel his pain, there comes a point when you have to ask whether he contributes to his constant bad luck. Mark does not have a mechanically sympathetic driving style. He thrives mainly on jolting the car into the corner at precisely the right moment, which makes him such a demon qualifier. But does that also make his car more liable to break?

Toyota will surely come away from Turkey disappointed that, despite their recent improved form, yet again they were unable to get the results when it mattered. They were 3rd and 4th quickest in free practice two, but Ralf followed up his excellent Hungary performance with another pathetic and excuse-laden failure to made it through Q1. His race pace was hamstrung by his one-stop fuel loads, although he did manage to climb up to 12th as a result.

In qualifying 9th, Trulli continued his remarkable qualifying run that has seen him miss the top ten only once all season. But after he was hit at the first corner, he never ran higher than 13th at any stage, despite some interesting tussles with the Hondas. It all suggests that he wouldn't have had the sustained race pace anyway. Even worse, Jarno has only finished in the points once, and in the top ten twice, in the last nine events. One can't recall his last really good race. He's hardly Toyota's future either, to be honest.

Now, here's a tangent. But for the McLaren and Ferrari, the order in which we have discussed the seven teams above is not only their same order in the constructors title, amazingly their drivers are also ranked in perfect Noah's Ark formation. Hamilton and Alonso are 1st and 2nd, followed by Massa and Raikkonen, then Heidfeld and Kubica, then Kovalainen and Fisichella, then Wurz and Rosberg, then Webber and Coulthard, then Trulli and Schumacher. F1 may be close this year, but it's also as hierarchical as ever.

The notable absentee there, of course, is Honda, whose ignominy continued after a double engine change having qualified 14th and 15th sent both cars to the back of the grid. Although Rubens Barrichello had the better of the start of the season, and still appears to have a slight edge over Jenson Button over a single lap, it's clear that Button is beginning to come into his own in race trim, having worked out how to make best use of the Bridgestone tyres over a sustained sequence of laps.

Already there had been Jenson's point-scoring effort in France, his sensational opening laps at the Nurburgring, and his run in Hungary whilst Barrichello languished in last, but in Turkey Button was in dynamic form despite being consigned to the back of the field. Out of the 14 passing moves recorded by the lap chart, Button pulled off eight of them. Barrichello has had the better reliability than Button - in fact, Rubens' only retirement all year was a collision at Indy - but he doesn't seem to be doing much with it.

In the face of all that, although Takuma Sato had something of a lacklustre round, Anthony Davidson's last Q2 lap, which nearly got him into the top ten, was absolutely scintillating - and he had the good fortune that the cameras were following him for all of it. But, after both cars were forced wide by Trulli's first corner spin, Davidson didn't have the speed to climb back up the field to any great extent. That has very much been the story of his season: flashes of speed over one lap, unsustained over a race distance.

Over at Toro Rosso, things got interesting. Granted, Sebastian Vettel had still had no testing between Hungary and Turkey, but he'd driven a full race distance in Hungary and could no longer say that the car was completely unfamiliar to him. Still, Vitantonio Liuzzi had the edge throughout free practice, was over 0.6s faster in qualifying, and set a fastest race lap more than 0.4s quicker. Liuzzi raced on the fringes of the top ten early and eventually finished 15th but ahead of Trulli and Barrichello.

It was the first time he had made the flag since Malaysia, but more importantly, Vettel made zero impression and was left down in 19th. You can almost feel Liuzzi's stocks beginning to rise with every passing weekend that he leaves wunderkind Vettel in his dust. On that note, Spyker was still left in everyone's dust, after their B-spec car, which is meant to be some 0.8s per lap faster and designed to lift the team into the midfield, failed the mandatory FIA crash test.

So the team reverted to their existing car, but its comparative pace has slipped even further back. Adrian Sutil continued to impress by qualifying around 2.5s of the best, but once again he did not have a trouble-free race, stalling in the pits and stopping on the last lap with fuel pressure failure. By contrast, Yamamoto can point to a steady race finish, and he did get close to Sutil in free practice. But when it mattered in qualifying, several wild moments left him over 1.6s slower than Sutil, and that rather said it all.