By Adam Macdonald
Another weekend in the F1 world has passed with some unexpected happenings causing confusion. If current form continues then the league will soon be split into 3 or 4 mini-leagues.
On the Up
It was a week of progression up the league table for Wirralsigns and Chris GP Team, moving up 12 and 11 places respectively. RMT gained the most places, with 16. 41% prediction accuracy could have been improved if the Ferrari boys had performed true to form, as the selection had Massa in 5th and Alonso for the win.
One to Forget
TeamJupilerF1 and Don Quixote both went down places, 9 and 8 places. However, it was AsinoRampante who went down 13 places making his the biggest drop in the league. All had placed Alonso and Webber on their podiums. Faulty cars and wearing out tyres put pay to those weekends.
The only way is up
There is a gap opening between KimiKaze XI, on 25 points, and the 54 other members of the league. 25 points from 4 rounds isn’t a great return so good luck for Barcelona mate. Hope the upgrades and Spanish sun can bring you some luck.
Nobody saw it coming
To say nobody saw this coming would be wrong, but Paul Di Resta gave a superb performance to finish as high as he did. Naturally, he had some luck with Sutil, Massa and Alonso all having car problems, but nevertheless a solid performance.
Rosberg on pole also caught a lot of people out. Rosberg’s pace became evident after Q2, at the same time as Alonso struggled for grip, giving many cause for concern.
Food for thought
After questioning many people’s decision to select Romain Grosjean in this section, it was typical that he should pop up on the podium again. The new chassis did the trick for the Swiss-French driver, to the delight of many, so long may the revival continue.
This week I would like to know where the pace of the Sauber has gone, especially Nico Hulkenberg. They had seemed to be making progress but were nowhere to be seen through practice, qualifying and the race. A bad weekend or not developing the car enough, Barcelona will be an important weekend for them.
Remember when…
In this section there will be a question each week to test your memory from GPs gone by. The idea is not to look it up but see if you can remember it first!
Kimi Raikkonen has now been on the Bahrain podium a staggering 6 times. Can anybody name the first year and who else was on the podium with Kimi that time? (Answer will be posted in the next Predictor summary)
Last question’s answer
The question was: When was the last time Fernando achieved back to back victories?
Answer: The Italian and Singaporean Grand Prix, September 2010. 2 victories; both with the margin of victory under 3 seconds!
I nailed DiResta and Raikonnen, but had Alonso and Massa 1st and 3rd… dear oh dear… Jenson and Webber I picked up some points for, but Grosjeans return to form, Vettels surprising pace, and the Ferrari misfortune burnt me the worst this time. Level with the Judge and another guy on 106, but they are ahead, presumably due to better winner or % predictions, anyone kno whow this works?
I’d done even worse, I expected Alonso to qualify well, but for Massa to return to his form of outqualifying him and score pole… Raikonnen seems a good bet for a podium at the moment but putting the Ferraris up there as well was a bad idea!
I was miles out with the Bulls, had Seb down as having a bad one and Mark nibbling on the verges of the podium…
I suspect I should probably actually take notice of the form in free practice rather than just taking random guesses and hoping something unusual comes off…
39 points this week and back in the lower/middle order.
Bloody Hamilton bravado. Cost me 12 points him passing people at the end of the race. I had Webber for 6th (-5), Rosberg 7th and of course Hamilton himself at p9.
Where’s a ‘multi21’ when you need one or a “Negative Lewis – fall back please. I want to bring these cars home” 🙁
Frustrating week. I wonder if Ferrari problems this weekend will change people’s predictions for Barcelona?
I wonder if Ferrari will start being sensible again and playing it safe
Good point, at first i thought ok, they’re so confident they’re willing to take a risk, where last year the state of mind was mainly damage control. But from the “half empty glass” point of view, they might have left some points on the table.
Australia: good race Ferrari won 30 of their 77 points so far here.
Possible points left behind: 3, with a better race strategy Massa could’ve finished 3° and not 4°
Malaysia: Alonso damages his wing, hitting Vettel, and the team decides to stay out and hope to make it to the first pitstop, we all how that turned out. Massa scored 10 points, don’t think he could’ve done better, he had graining problems, but finished the race with the same pace as Red Bull and Mercedes.
Possible points left behind: 15 to 25, Alonso had the car to win or at least go to the podium.
China: Brilliant dominant race by Alonso, showing what he and the F138 are capable of. Again Massa had problems with graining, but Ferrari left him out 1 lap to long in my opinion, that made a big difference.
Possible points left behind: 2, Massa could’ve been 5° and not 6°
Bahrain: I’m not sure what happened to Massa but he made his stop at the same time as the cars with mediums did, so why he started on hards i don’t know. Then Alonso’s DRS, it got stuck so they had to bring him in, losing 20 secs. closed it by hand and send him out again, after the first attempt to use his DRS it got stuck again, why not wait 1 or 2 laps before the 2nd. pitstop to try it again?
Alonso lost an average of 2 tenth’s per lap, without DRS (he wasn’t always 1 sec. behind another car)
That would make it about 11.5 sec. for the whole race, that would put him 16 sec. behind Vettel and not 37 sec. not sure if he would’ve been able to keep Di Resta behind, but with his pace 5° was surely possible.
Possible points left behind: at least 6 (5° and not 8°)
So looking from the not so bright side, Ferrari left between 26 and 36 points on the table.
A little bit more conservative would be nice Stefano, thank you!
A few things:
1. Kimikaze only started predicting from Bahrain, hint the low score of 25.
2. Is the question asking who has been on the podium with Raikkonen the 5 other times he has been, or has some of the wording been accidentally left out?
sorry, meant to say first in there. I’ll amend it
I scored 32 for this round. Which was very lucky since I missed out the predictions cutoff for this round, meaning my selection for China was carried over. For China I had ROS for pole and incidently it happened here in Bahrain. I also had RAI on the podium cause it’s a given these days. Also picked up a few points here and there including an expected penultimate lap fastest lap from multi-21 illiterate VET.
Lol. That happened to me last year. Though I didn’t forget, I just assumed whilst in the church at a wedding I would be able to make my selection.
I think I was waiting as late as possible for FP3 news on a gearbox penalty…
Anyway had enough 3G – in fact watched qualy with earphone in during the ceremony – but predictor site was so busy it wouldn’t save my predictions. I was left with the previous rounds selection too.
I had my 3rd best score of the year 😀
Your Honour married? Hope it was not your own wedding 😛