Brought to you by TJ13 Courtroom Reporter & Crime Analyst: Adam Macdonald (@adamac39)

Once again, Pirelli came under the spotlight after being bullied into a compound change by pressure from teams and drivers.  For all the public exposure they get, there must be a nagging feeling of being unappreciated that recurs back in the Milan factory.  After being all but forced into taking softer rubber thanks to the low-level of wear expected, they must have been nervous on Saturday night having seen how the tyres were graining and blistering on free practice long runs.

In the end, it made for a different type of racing to that which we have seen in a while.  The 2011/12 esque tyre drop offs reminded of how racing used to be just a couple of years previous.  Personally, I prefer seeing the drivers being able to push properly and being more on the limit than what we saw yesterday.  What do you the readers think?

On the Up

Steph14 scored 92 points to climb 21 positions, aided by the bonus points and a correct 1-2 prediction.  Now sitting in 34^th place, a top 20 – first page – finish is not out of the question.  Good luck for Abu Dhabi!

Bonus bonanza

Just a little more luck

A small amount of fortune would have seen a poor weekend transformed into a very successful outing in Brazil for El_Koeno.  There were quite a few almosts and no spot on predictions as the team fell 11 places to 50^th in the TJ13 league.

Lacking the Latin luck

An expert view

Either a highly deluded or extremely lucky result for Augusto Farfus, Brazil’s leading tour car racer and GP Predictor expert.  An interesting top 5 which turned out to be correct… did he have some local inside knowledge?

Local knowledge always helps

Nobody saw it coming

The self-destruct mode that the Williams team went into, only saved by some fortune on Massa’s part, put pay to good weekends for many.  Ricciardo’s Red Bull retirement sent must have sent many heads into hands as hopes for a good score went up in flames – or more poignantly brake disc smoke.

Food for thought

More long straights at the Abu Dhabi Tilke-drome will aid the Mercedes powered cars, although the advantage should be less than at Interlagos.  There will be many with a very old powerunit limping to the end of the season, so choose wisely.

Also, all the talk of race boycotts seems to have died down.  Perhaps Bernie has promised hard and fast action to appease the now rear gunners of Formula One; could this controversy spark up again?

Furthermore, given that teams will have to pay depending on how many points they score throughout the season, will we see some teams retiring cars to save on pointless double expense?  Crazy as it seems, it is not implausible!

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!

Of the 15 most recent seasons (2014 included) how many have seen the title decided at the final race?

(Answer will be posted in the next Predictor summary)

FYI, the 2006 season does count, although only just. It was the 2006 Japanese GP which effectively secured the title for Alonso after Schumacher’s engine failure effectively put pay to his Championship ambitions.

Last question’s answer

The question was: The fact that pole position was a quicker time than in 2013 was highlighted by many in the media, showing how much the cars had developed.  However, in the race it was Sebastian Vettel set this year’s fastest lap with a 1:41.379, but who set the 2013 fastest lap and with what time?

Answer: As Fortis96 correctly wrote, it was a 1:39.856 set by Sebastian Vettel.  The reason for pointing this out was that the media is focussing on qualifying lap time as the benchmark, however, the race pace is the real mark of progression – which is not quite as quick yet.  Saying that, they are doing with only 2/3 of the fuel from before…