Post-race rundown – Japanese Grand Prix (Part 1)
After an exhilarating race at Suzuka, Red Bull finished on top with a 1-2 finish. Sebastian Vettel won the race followed by his teammate Mark Webber. Fernando Alonso finished in 3rd place to secure a podium position for his team.
The race winner thought that it was a flawless race for him and he never really doubted his chances of victory after the first corner. With Mark Webber as a rear gunner, Sebastian Vettel finished the race comfortably but he would have taken on all the cars
by himself either way. This was the result he needed for his championship run and this means that if he gets two more victories over his teammate, he will lead the championship ahead of him before the final race.
The championship leader produced a smart drive that played the percentages in order to help him extend his championship lead at the top of the table. One can say that he was slightly lucky as Robert Kubica’s wheel came off during the safety car period giving
the Australian a sigh of relief, especially because Alonso was driving at a strong pace.
The Spaniard Fernando Alonso finished in 3rd place behind the two Red Bulls and limited the damage to his title chances. Ferrari was the least strong team out of the top 3 all weekend at Suzuka and Fernando now needs to play to his F10’s strength
at the remaining three tracks. With time passing by so quickly, Ferrari will have to think of something effective as the next race is a new track at Korea and that will play down Red Bulls chances.
The current world champion Jenson Button finished in 4th place behind the podium holders. His strategy did not pay off but he was in the third fastest car on track and finished accordingly. It was a good strategy for the team as he simply did
not have the pace to match the top three cars or his teammate Lewis Hamilton. However, it seems that Jenson Button’s championship chances are under threat and the only way he can win is if he wins at the coming three races.
Even after a handful of fastest laps, Lewis Hamilton was just not able to score a good place but this time, one cannot blame him. He was the unluckiest man in Japan as he had two gearbox failures over the weekend. Finishing in 5th place was like
a miracle for him after the 5 place grid penalty he received after a gearbox change after the qualifying session. Lewis gave an amazing performance as he managed to driver without the second and third gears for almost half of the race. The only good news for
him is that he will get a free gearbox change ahead of Korea, but he is now 28 points down and that is a pretty big gap with just three races remaining.
Finally, Michael Schumacher was able to finish ahead of his teammate Nico Rosberg as the German managed to finish in 6th place. Michael won the race 6 times at Suzuka and this was a welcoming return for him. He managed to stay just 0.5 seconds
behind Nico lap-after-lap and held him back impressively. It was like a new side of Michael was witnessed this past weekend. However, the seven time world champion got lucky as Nico lost his wheel giving Schumacher a strong result.
Kamui Kobayashi is now known as the most entertaining driver on the grid as he was able to execute overtaking manoeuvres over the hairpin at Suzuka, which has never been the most ideal place for overtaking in the recent years. Kobayashi gave his life’s best
performance as he was overtaking his rivals with such ease.
The Japanese grand prix seemed like a welcoming race as Nick Heidfeld finished with 4 points after a solid qualifying performance. With Sergio Perez confirmed as the Sauber driver for next year, he needs to impress the rest of the teams in these final races
to stand a chance of keeping his place in F1. Nick had a great start but he must outperform his teammate Kamui Kobayashi at the final three races to really impress.
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