BARRICHELLO'S A WINNER AGAIN
Well it soon became obvious that Massa wouldn't be able to race at the European Grand Prix in Valencia after what has to be the worst F1 crash this side of the Millenium. Which meant that there was a spare Ferrari seat going begging. Ferrari's plan A? Bring back Michael Schumacher of all people. Even I have to admit that was an interesting decision and I've never been a Schumacher worshipper. It all became a bit anti-climatic though, F1's former god turned out to have a dodgy neck so it was back to square one. At short notice, they promoted Italian reserve driver Luca Badoer who was last seen in an F1 car when driving for Minardi in '99. In the meantime Renault also decided to shift their lineup, ditching Piquet and replacing him with French GP2 form guy Romain Grosjean. All Jenson was hoping to change was his form.
Well, qualifying came and neither Brit had serious issues in Q1. The same can't be said of Badoer though who might as well have been driving his old Minardi he was that useless! Grosjean was more impressive in Q1 but couldn't keep his form up and fell short in Q2. Kubica set the first time but Rosberg soon outgunned him and then Lewis took provisional pole, Jenson briefly made it seem as though we'd have an all-British front row but while the reigning world champion went on to claim his first pole of the season, Jenson got swamped in the last few minutes and in the end Kovalainen completed the first all-McLaren front row of the season with Jenson having to settle for P5.
In the race itself, things just got worse for the world championship leader. Before the first lap was over he was down to 9th and having to persue Mark Webber and for a lot of the race he was in and out of the points trying to stay competitive but at one point was still down in 11th! In the end, his mission for the day was simply to finish ahead of the Red Bulls, and helped by some unreliability on their part he was able to put them away after his second stop. He tried chasing down Alonso but failed and in the end had to settle for 7th. No one seems to have much of a clue why Jenson was on such bad form despite everything else seemingly being in his favour.
Lewis on the other hand, showed his potential succsessor how it should be done and surged away from the pack but he didn't have quite enough in his pocket for his lead to survive a pitstop but once things levelled out, an amazing second win looked seemingly inevitable. However someone up there had other ideas and at his second pit-stop the mechanics simply weren't ready for him. Martin Whitmarsh claims that wasn't what messed up his race though. Either way Lewis wound up having to settle for 2nd this time around. Still, at the start of the season a 2nd place seemed a very long way away and so it's safe to say that Hungary was not a flash in the pan.
Did anyone really fancy Rubens Barrichello's chances in this race? I have to admit that I'd rather written his title hopes off by this point. Starting from P3 though it wasn't long before he emerged as Lewis's main challenger for the race. With Jensn already looking out of it, Brawn told him to make the most of his time in the lead but he didn't quite do enough first time around. He was still there at the right time when the McLaren pit guys blundered and after that, I didn't hold out much hope of Lewis catching him. The result was Rubens' first win since China '04 and someone needed to pinch him. I had begrudge him the win though, even if it does make him a threat to Jenson once again.
Jenson however is still leading the championship with 72 points, though his lead has been cut ever so slightly to 18 points(but whatever happens, at this point he is harunteed his best championship position since he finished 6th in '06). Further down, Lewis moves up to 6th place with 27 points(and mathematically could still retain his title which is more than could be side for Damon Hill at this stage of the '97 season).
Things are definately getting interesting.
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