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Full Results
It was another classic grand prix from the woods in Spa, Belgium where Formula 1 had yet another winner in 2009 in the form of Kimi Raikkonen who, possibly due to a lack of ice cream on sale around the Spa Francorchamps circuit managed to overtake Fisichella after a safety car restart and race to victory after first lap collisions took out Jenson Button, Lewis Hamilton, Romain Grosjean and Jaime Algeursauri.
As always, the tight hairpin that is the first corner saw the 20 cars scrapping, especially with Barrichello’s slow getaway. Kimi seemed to purposefully use the run off area to ensure he kept his nose clean and came back on in 3rd. It was only a matter of corners before he took second position and was soon after on the back of Fisichella with his finger hovering over the KERS ‘turbo’ button. Further down the field there were plenty of cars fighting for position until chaos broke out and both British drivers were taken out. The carnage brought out the safety car for three laps while the track was cleared. During the safety car laps, Luca Badoer managed to get what was then the fastest lap of the race… he still finished last overall though.
Immediately after the safety car pulled in, Fisichella was a sitting duck waiting for Kimi to use his magic button, which he did along the straight after Eau Rouge and despite having a faster car, Giancarlo could do little to stop the prancing horse from galloping past him. For the remainder of the race these two were nose-to-tail with the Force India blatantly quicker but unable to fight Kimi.
Further down the field, there were more overtaking manoeuvres than we’ve seen all season. Barrichello was particularly racey, making use of the advantage of Mercedes power down the straights, overtaking Badoer, Trulli and Nakajima in a couple of laps. He had a pretty solid race after damaging his front wing on the opening lap to finish 7th and take a couple of points of Jenson in the championship. It wasn’t as easy as it sounds with blue smoke billowing out of his Brawn for the final three laps and Rosberg and Webber chasing him down, desperate for points. Unfortunately for Webber his ended up a pointless 9th for the second race in succession, while Rosberg made Williams’ bleak weekend slightly more bearable by bringing home one point. Largely this was due to a drive-through penalty for Webber after the team released him into Heidfeld during pit stops on lap 15, causing the BMW driver to take avoiding action.
Alonso’s race was panning out well, with a glimmer of a chance of a podium, until lap 25 when he had a 30+seconds pitstop while one of his mechanics struggled with the front left wheel – a feeling of deja vu for the Renault team, struggling with a wheel as they did at Hungary which resulted in a near race suspension after sending the car out anyway. Today though, it turned out that first corner damage ruined the awful ’spinner’ on the front wheel, which resulted in retirement for the quick running Spaniard. He’ll be pleased to know that the naff looking wheel frisbees are banned for 2010 onwards.
So it was indeed a fabulous grand prix, as we all expected with a result we could not have predicted barely a week ago with Force India finally delivering on their promise of being a front running team. We’re now looking forward to seeing what Vijay and his boys can do at Monza. Unfortunately for them it’s now looking likely that their driver of the day, Giancarlo Fisichella could be taking Felipe Massa’s Ferrari seat for the Italian grand prix weekend after another embarrassing weekend for Luca Badoer, finishing last while his team mate won. Oh. Dear.
One final thought though – have Force India missed a real chance for victory today? Their car was outright faster than Kimi’s Ferrari, yet because they pitted Fisichella on the same lap as Kimi both times, they were never going to ‘leapfrog’ the Finn. Surely if they had pitted a lap later of even a lap earlier they could have worked something out to get Fisi ahead of Kimi and give themselves a better chance of victory, sure Kimi would stil have had the KERS boost button, but it may have not been enough with the raw speed of Fisi’s Force India. Regardless, still a fabulous race for the young team and we’d love to have tickets to Vijay Mallya’s party tonight.
There’s a cold sore epidemic it appears. Rubens, Kimi and Mark spotted with strange lip conditions so far…
Well if they can’t get close on track it certainly seems they’re making up for it in the paddock…
It was a great race, though i do hate collisions, someone’s always involved that could’ve made the race even more intereting. In this case Hamilton and Alonso, even though Fernando didn’t retire on the spot with his bump.
Thank god the spinners are gone next year.
I’m a little confused also as to why Force India chose to pit Fisi on the same laps as Kimi. Though perhaps they were just running their race and it was Ferrari copying them, thereby bringing Raikkonen in earlier than planned, knowing that if Fisi got a sniff of a clear track he’ll be off into the distance.
Though the safety car did spoil Giancarlo’s chances. Raikkonen can thank Grosjean for that.
Jenson’s a lucky boy.. it was just yesterday that i said all it would take is one DNF for him to make the championship close right up. Unfortunately all his rivals didn’t finish high enough to make any meaningful impact on his points lead, which is a shame.
Bit annoying that Nick dropped a couple of places after La Source after initially gaining second place, he had better pace than Robert all weekend and could’ve made Sebastian work harder for 3rd.
Should Fisi drive for Ferrari in Monza? Nope. It’ll definately be the end of his F1 career if he does, whereas if he sticks with Force India there’s a good chance they’ll keep him for next year after today’s performance.
Ferrari would be insane to allow Badoer to stay in the car, he’s had one too many chances as it is, no offence to the guy but he’s never set the world on fire in F1, good test driver maybe; good racing driver? Nope.
Got to admit there’s a new rumour that came up tday which had me crossing my fingers in anticipation and miraculously there may be some weight to it. It’s the Kimi to McLaren for 2010 one. I still maintain that Kimi drove all his best races behind the wheel of a silver car, and there was a little (in my mind) telltale sign in the red button forum after the race where Martin Whitmarsh basically sang Kimi’s praises effusively.
Pleeeeease let it be true!!
I think Kimi is rubbish, I’d rather see him disappear into the ether in world rally and leave f1 to the drivers with personality.
Terry T – On what basis is kimi rubbish? The fact he’s a F1 Champion? The fact he is in the top 10 for race wins? Or the fact he’s in the top 5 for fastest laps?? Take ur pick from his brilliant track record!!!
Yeah I’ve got to say that despite being a McLaren fan last year I cheered the loudest for him around Monza last year, it will probably be the same again this time around. Regardless of his off track behaviour, which a large amount of people find very endearing, the guy will be widely remembered as one of the greatest racing drivers of the generation, and don’t forget that Sir Stirling Moss took a similar accolade despite never winning a world championship.
Best of luck to Kimi in whatever he decides to do.
Oh yeah DaveH, the Kimi to McLaren one is something I’d been personally thinking about for a while – with Dennis gone, it could be a real possibility. Certainly more plausible than Nando back in a silver car… Though that would be priceless to see Lewis turning up at Woking to see Fernando there just chatting to his engineers, he wouldn’t be thanking the team then.