Alvin's Formula One Blog

Spanish Grand Prix Preview

Tuesday 5th May 2009

The Spanish Grand Prix will be the real litmus test for the FIA's brave new rules to promote overtaking in F1. The slick tyres, the cartoon rear wings, the oversize front wings will all get the ultimate test at the Circuit de Catalunya this weekend.

Because the Spanish GP is one of the traditional snore-fests in F1. There used to be three you could bank on: San Marino, which was beautiful and boring; Spain, which was windy and boring; and Hungary which was just wake-me-up-in-65-laps'-time boring.

Imola's gone, but Barcelona and Budapest remain to challenge the technical rule makers. If we have the usual procession in Spain then the FIA's upheaval of the teams' design processes for 2009 will be the most monumental waste of time and money.

The good news is that the teams haven't been allowed to test before the race and so there are still quite a few set-up variables that will need refining on Friday and Saturday. What's more, we will have KERS on some of the cars.

BMW won't be running it, McLaren will probably be running it and Ferrari's KERS tends to decide itself whether it's going to run or not, as Felipe Massa found out in Bahrain.

The likely suspects for the front row of the grid are the same as in Bahrain with Brawn unveiling an update to their car and Red Bull and Toyota both bringing new parts. Brawn also need to unveil a new sponsor in a hurry as it appears Bernie Ecclestone has done a U-turn on giving them the Honda revenue from 2008.

Jenson Button will continue to be the man to beat after a mature drive in Bahrain where he was never put under serious pressure after the first pit-stops. Rubens Barrichello lost out through a different race strategy which probably won't recur in Spain.

It will be interesting to see if Toyota persist with the very light fuel strategy they employed for qualifying in Bahrain. Timo Glock is far more used to nursing along a big tank of gas than running skinny, whereas Trulli prefers being a lightweight. It's not unknown to have bits of car on the track at the tight Turn 1 and so a Safety Car would be a real blow to anyone running light.

With the cars hardly separated by 1.5 seconds now, the volume of fuel onboard has never been more critical in Q3.

Mark Webber may not get as good a chance as this (with arguably the best car on the grid and McLaren and Ferrari nowhere) to be World Champion and needs to start scoring points, preferably more points than the irrepressible Sebastian Vettel. Vettel came second in 'Katie's Dirty Sister' last race and the world awaits with bated breath (well, the PF1 Office) to find out what he will name his car for Barcelona. How about 'Miguel'?

Ferrari still need a good result to get their season started and they have traditionally done very well in Barcelona. Last year Kimi Raikkonen dominated the event. That won't happen in 2009, but he could edge closer to the front. And surely Felipe Massa can't continue to have the bad luck of a faulty engine management system and then a faulty KERS device. All this without Nigel Stepney being anywhere near the cars.

Williams need some fast points to capitalise on their diffuser advantage before everyone gets their own version fully road-tested, while BMW need to climb back from the abyss they have fallen into. Things surely wouldn't have got this bad if they had stayed in partnership with Williams in the first place. Theteam have got a major car update for the Spanish GP and they need it.

McLaren are painting a very gloomy picture of their prospects in Barcelona because of their car's lack of rear end grip, but they seem to be the only ones who are confident about their KERS device. Exactly where Lewis Hamilton pops up in the running order will be down to the whole barrage of updates from the other teams.

The guy who draws the new technical additions for Autosport - Giorgio Piola - a veteran of 600 GPs (he started when Barrichello was a foetus) always holds his head in his hands at the prospect of the first European race in Barcelona. It's like having all 10 cars launch on the same day.

But if come Sunday we have an opening lap like the one witnessed from Mark Webber's on-board camera in Bahrain, at least we'll know all the technical changes have been worth it. If not, then it literally is... back to the drawing board.

Source : Planet F1