LEWIS ON BRINK OF HISTORY
(Image taken from BBC)
Once again another season was ending and as always it's last moments took it through Japan. And usually, the races in Susuka either decided the championship or, like last year played a big part in doing so. This year looked to be another of those races, except this time roun it was held at the Fuji Motor Speedway and the last time a Grand Prix was held there, James Hunt won it - the year was 1977! So none of the current drivers had ever raced there and what's more, there was rain!
Well Barrichello was the big name to drop out of Q1 though Lewis only made it through to Q2 by the skin of his teeth. DC fell in Q2 despite a late effort and eventully had to settle for P13! That did leave Jenson in Q3 and on his best form all season. It was Alonso who looked a sure bet for pole though with Lewis getting nowhere...untill at the last minute a la Silverstone he came up with a scorcher to take P1, his fifth pole of the season with Jenson pulling off P7, his best starting position of the season!
Jenson and DC got a further boost thanks to Rosberg having to change his engine before qualifying - which forced the Williams driver down from P6 to P16. That shifted DC up to P12 and allowed Jenson's weekend to get even better - the unlucky Honda man starting in P6. Still more rain expected for the race itself and given that Lewis didn't have much wet weather experience, he certainly couldn't take anything for granted on raceday.
Well Jenson wasn't helped by not being able to see a thing but he didn't have to worry for the first 20 laps or so, they were run under a safety car! Once the race started he was able to take advantage of a Massa drive through to make 5th but a clash with Kubica took out his front wing and his race looked a writeoff from there and sure enough he was stuck in 19th for a while. He did manage to make his way up the field, helped partly by retirements and finished 11th.
DC had a solid race, keeping clear of various bits of insanity to get into a points position early on only to have a later bump with Kubica but an extra pit stop did not prove to be a big issue for him and with a smoother race than most(which included a clash between Webber and Vettel)made it as high as 4th before a second safety car period, after which Raikonen sent him down to 5th. Even that was a great result for the Scot but then Alonso crashed out and he went on to finish in 4th - his best result of the season so far!
Lewis, well for someone with little experience of wet weather driving he was absolutely perfecto. Stay ahead of Alonso at the start: check. Keep an eye on the Ferrari's: Didn't need to, they were useless in the rain. Lose the lead only briefly due to an absolutely perfecto pit stop: Check. Have minor issues but still keep the car on the track(unlike your double world championship teammate and rival): check. And so he collected his 4th win of the season at exactly the right time.
So, Lewis now leads the world championship with 107 points with his championship lead having extended to 12 points. He is now garunteed to match both Jenson's '04 peak and Jackie Stewart's 1965 rookie performance of 3rd in the world championship. Further down, DC moves up to 11th with 13 points(but no podiums) while even further down, Jenson's still in 16th with 2 points.
If Lewis finishes ahead of Alonso in China he becomes the first Brit since Damon Hill to win the World championship and the first ever rookie world champion.
Murray Walker said that "anything can happen in Formula 1 and it usually does". I don't think he ever expected this to happen.
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