Force India repeat performance at Spa unlikely
Last year Force India almost won a grand prix.
Hard to credit for a team that usually finishes so far behind the rest that the caretaker leaves them with the keys to lock up the pit lane before they leave, but they did.
Prior to the 2009 Belgian Grand Prix, they never scored a point but collected plenty of retirements, and are always involved in plenty of accidents.
So when Giancarlo Fisichella almost won the race, it was one of the biggest shocks in Formula One. The Ferrari of Kimi Räikkönen was victorious on the day, but it would be the stunning display of Fisichella that would grab the headlines.
It was a strange weekend, as the title contenders of Jenson Button, Rubens Barrichello, and the Red Bulls of Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber weren’t able to fight for the win. Although Vettel finished third, he had no chance. Fisichella was the quickest driver over the weekend and should have won the race, but came across a resurgent Räikkönen and had to settle for second place.
Qualifying on the Saturday ended with Fisichella taking pole position, while the Toyota of Jarno Trulli and the BMW Sauber of Nick Heidfeld occupied second and third respectively. You may be asking yourself what was so unusual about that, but consider this: the top three teams in qualifying only had one race win between them and showed no signs of winning at previous grands prix. Suddenly, they were primed to take the win. Now that is strange.
Unfortunately for Heidfeld, he finished sixth, while Trulli retired from the race. The man who fought for the win was Fisichella, but he came across a resurgent Räikkönen who wasn’t going to give in easily.
Was it genuine speed or a fluke? Well, the Force India package was suited to the aspects of Spa-Francorchamps, as they ran their car with low downforce, enabling them to be quick on the straights. The following race was in Italy at Monza, the quickest track on the calendar, and Adrian Sutil in the other Force India finished fourth after starting in second.
It didn’t seem to be a fluke at the time, but to date these two results have been Force India’s best results, so it wasn’t genuine speed they had after all.
A repeat of the remarkable result this year is out of the question, according to Force India owner Dr Vijay Mallya.
He says it would be difficult for lightning to strike twice. “All the same, we're not pinning all our hopes on Spa and Monza. It is going to be tough to replicate the kind of form we showed in Spa last year. Everybody has improved, the competition is fierce and also very even in the midfield - the gap between teams is so small now,” he said.
Sutil is a little more optimistic: “Of course last year the team had a dream result at Spa, with the pole and then the podium, so we'll go back there with confidence knowing that this has been historically a track we've performed very well on.
“But this is 2010 and we have to look at what we are doing now rather than to the past. I'm pretty confident that we've got a car that will still suit the track very well,” Sutil added.
May the force be with them.
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