Chinese Grand Prix 2011: Raceday - Formula One Highlights (Part 7)
The race headed into lap 20. A driver topped the time-sheets as usual. However, this time it was a rather unlikely candidate. It wasn’t a McLaren Mercedes or a Red Bull; neither was it either of the Ferraris or the spirited Nico Rosberg. The fastest time
for Lap-20 came from Nick Heidfeld in his Renault. The German had been experiencing some technical difficulties it appeared, as he was overtaken by 4 cars one by one in a short span of time.
A lap later, the cameras spotted some debris flying off the Ferrari of Fernando Alonso – Was it something to be worried about or could the Spaniard still soldier on? Turning our attention towards the Red Bull camp, Mark Webber was up to 11th position.
The Australian was closing in on Kamui Kobayashi... and fast!
At the front of the pack, race leader, Nico Rosberg’s on-board radio sprang to life. The Mercedes GP team sent across a message that the car’s brakes were overheating which meant that the young German driver had to adjust and perhaps brake sooner than normal.
The on-the-edge braking also endangered his tyres to heat up and lose grip – Risky with the Pirellis as they’re slowly being renowned for their lack of durability over the course of a couple of laps.
Riding with Mark Webber, the veteran had closed up to under half a second over the car in front bearing Kobayashi. However, while the Red Bull driver’s pace was commendable, the cameras also spotted a bit of damage to the nose of the Sauber – This meant
that unless the car came in for repairs and ideally a new nose, Kobayashi was losing a considerable amount of time per lap.
Looking down the classifications, Narain Karthikeyan was yet to pay a visit to the pits in his Hispania Racing car – It appeared to be a bit of a gamble on part of the lower table team as they evidently looked to match up to the Virgin Racing drivers Timo
Glock and Di Ambrosio.
21 laps of the race were completed. All active cars still had to go around at least 35 more times around the Shanghai circuit starting with the race leader Nico Rosberg.
Stay with us on Bettor.com for more highlights of the race that conspired in China.
To be continued in part 8...
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