Button Wins Superb Chinese GP
- Published on Apr 18th, 2010 by Adam Milleneuve
© McLaren
Well that was a right (prawn) cracker of a grand prix and a well deserved 1-2 finish for McLaren as Jenson Button orders a victory for his Chinese take-away and springs a Shanghai surprise on the championship standings. It was an utterly unpredictable race with rain falling here and there and we saw some pretty amazing moves on track as well as strategic calls.
To recount such a race, we'd have recall each lap, so instead here are the talking points following today's action-packed grand prix.
Fernando Alonso jumped the start and was later penalised - the Spaniard came an impressive 4th, despite making 5 pit stops. Talking of pit stops, there was an incident involving Sebastian Vettel and Lewis Hamilton where Lewis overtook Seb on the way into the pit lane and then, as the cars were released simultaneously, they went side by side down the pit lane. Rather frustratingly, the stewards have decided to look at this event after the race... And they will also look at Alonso and Massa, because the Spaniard overtook Felipe on the way into the pits too.
The Renaults were superb today, both Bobby K and Vitaly Petrov had good races, with them finishing in 5th and 7th respectively. Nico Rosberg also had a superb race, despite his car not being as quick as the McLarens, he put up a great fight and made Michael Schumacher look slow... again.
Speaking of Schumacher - today's race was pretty difficult - people say we should respect our elders, but today it was as though the rest of the field was taking the mick out of the German legend as seemingly everyone, including Russian rookie Petrov overtook the most successful F1 driver ever, in only his 4th grand prix.
During the second safety car, Jenson backed up the field so much that the cars were 3, 4 or even 5 abreast into the final hairpin corner, which caused various incidents with cars running so close leaving Mark Webber off the road. Alonso grabbed the opportunity on the restart and converted it to nearly being a Chinese podium.
In total, the Chinese Grand Prix featured a massive 69 pit stops, plenty of over-taking and a dash of controversy. The final standings... for now (the pit lane incidents between Hamilton and Vettel and between Massa and Alonso are to be investigated)
Comments and Discussion
Buemi might want to get bigger mirrors on his car, that's twice this season he's been shunted out by an out-of-control car behind him!
Grid penalty for both Mclarens. Lewis for not cutting behind Vettel and Button for holding the pack up way too much.
To be fair he couldnt have done much about it.
I couldn't agree more. I'm tired of seeing Hamilton breaking the rules and getting away with it.
I think it was 50/50 between Hamilton and Vettel, but that was plain silly from Button.
I know he wanted to back the group up as much as he could but that was a bit extreme.
Delighted for Nico though. He's been the quiet man for me this year.
He's doing quite well. I'd expect him to win a race at some stage this season.
And well done to Renault today. They seem to have shaken off last years controversies, they are almost like a new team. Kubica and Petrov are solid drivers.
Overall it was a great race today. More of the same please!
Alonso's pass on Massa as they entered the pits was crazy. Fernando clearly had no intention of queuing to get his tyres.
http://www.fia.com/en-GB/mediacentre/f1_media/Pages/on_event.aspx
Both Lewis and Seb given a reprimand by the stewards. As the BBC said, looks like they were more interested in the rest of the pit lane then the release!
Both of McLaren's drivers were more than a little controversial today, which was problematic as today's Special Guest Steward was a McLaren driver for six years. Therefore the fact that Button and Hamilton haven't been penalised for their respective misdemeanours is going to attract a bit of undue attention. I would personally have given Hamilton a penalty for his pit lane antics, and Button one too for backing up the field too much (how much is too much? I'd say when another driver has to run off the road to take avoiding action - that's too much).
But it was nonetheless a good race. Shame that it's very unlikely to rain in Barcelona!
Special Guest stewards (ex-drivers) do not make the decision. They're only there to advise the rest of the Stewards from a driver's point of view.
If Lewis gets a penalty for his pit lane rendez-vous then so should Vettel for pushing him towards the mechanics of Williams (who said he didn't see Lewis and so steered to the right whilst going down a pit lane.. which is a straight line?)
Noone got hurt and those who do get into accidents usually get no punishment so glad the race was safe and there was minimal damage to the cars.
Button slowed down behind the SC before the release and rightly so - he held the track position, he was first, noone could overtake, and they were moving slowly behind the SC... All the other cars shouldn't be expecting to accelerate muchknowing they are stuck behind each other.
Thanks to Lewis we saw some great moments that won't fade away quickly. He showed us that overtaking is possible, even if that means with the help of his F-Duct system
Indeed, one has to note that it was the rain that made today's race exciting and unpredictable. Maybe volcanic ash could have a similar effect....?
Both Vettel and Hamilton getting the same penalty (just a slapped wrist in this case) was correct. They couldn't penalise one and not the other.
While Hamilton's release wasn't exactly his fault and was more of a team error, it was him knowing that Seb was there and not conceding to slot in behind that was the problem, though the pitlane in China is wide enough for two cars, as are most of the newer tracks.
I was more concerned with Vettels push, because that was very dangerous, and he wasn't at all blameless for it. Watch the onboard shots, he looks in his mirror, sees Hamilton and turns the car to the right.
While they look like they're going slowly on tv, they're still going 100kmh (track dependant) in the pitlane which is more than enough to spin a car into a garage if the front wheel gets tangled in air hoses. Very silly.
As for the constant hate directed at Lewis, not only from the fans but from the drivers. It can only be that he's making everyone look stupid and they're annoyed that they might actually have to race and overtake things because he's been showing them up for the past 3 races.
Plus because he's inventive and aggressive, he's doing everyone a favour by showing that you can overtake in more places than just the traditional ones on each track. Sure, he's not the sharpest tool in the box for making good tyre calls, but this guarantee's good racing since he always puts himself out of position.
I didn't see anything bad about Alonso's pass on Massa. The pit entry is still part of the race track and Fernando's been stuck behind Felipe for the previous 2 GP's, he had the opportunity to get ahead so he took it.
Likewise, Button's slowing after the pace car left. There's a rule somewhere that states something along the lines of "The lead car cannot cross the safety car line until the safety car is in the pits". It's something like that, maybe not exactly, but along those lines.
In other words, he had no choice but to back them up so much, though it perhaps would've been a bit more sensible to start doing it halfway down the straight.
I thoroughly enjoyed the race, some great performances by many drivers, though it was a tad tricky to follow in the middle when there was a constant stream of cars pitting and changing positions for a period of about 10 laps. I'm a bit annoyed with the BBC for making the highlights programme a 'McLaren show' and cutting out most of the other teams overtakes.
Another great start for Robert!!!
...and yet another great link to your blog... hmm, Mr/Miss KubicaFan - if you're going to leave a comment please say something interesting or take part in the Badger Banter.
It was a good start for Kubica and great race, he was gutted to miss out on another podium, but at the rate he's going there may be a clean victory for them this year if McLaren, Ferrari, Red Bull and Nico Rosberg have a bad race...
It seems Badger is becoming a new source in Poland: http://www.eurosport.pl/formula-1/grand-prix-malezji/2010/robert-jestes-gwiazda_sto2279551/story.shtml
Haha, that is ace. Maybe we should run a story on Kubica and his hobbies and see if they pick it up and run with it... hmm
Well it's a known fact that he's a big poker fan and that his sporting hero is snooker snooker player Ronnie O'Sullivan...
Well it's a known fact that he's a big poker fan and that his sporting hero is snooker snooker player Ronnie O'Sullivan...