Alvin's Formula One Blog

11/05/08 15:54 F elipe Massa has claimed his third straight victory at Istanbul Park, taking the chequered flag four seconds ahead of Lewis Hamilton in a race of tyre and fuel strategy. Kimi Raikkonen finished in third position to retain his lead at the head of the championship standings. Massa drove a great race, keeping his cool when Hamilton breezed by him to take the race lead. The McLaren driver also had a good race, opting for an unconventional three stop strategy to challenge for the race win and ultimately only lose out to the flying Massa by a small margin. Massa’s victory moves him second in the championship from fourth, tied with Hamilton. The start of the race saw Massa convert his pole into the race lead while Raikkonen lost ground to Robert Kubica. Front-row starter Heikki Kovalainen was the man to lose out as Raikkonen’s front wings caught Kovalainen’s rear tyre forcing the Finn to make an unscheduled stop for a new set of tyres. As Massa and Hami...

Sunday 11th May 2008 McLaren boss Ron Dennis has revealed that Lewis Hamilton's three-stop strategy in the Turkey GP was the consequence of concerns about tyre degradation. Hamilton surprised onlookers with his exciting but risky strategy, which required the Englishman to retain a dramatic on-the-edge pace throughout the two-hour race. While the strategy paid dividends in so much as Hamilton finished ahead of Kimi Raikkonen, Dennis afterwards revealed that it was actually enforced on the team. "Our strategy was linked to a tyre problem that we experienced in practice on Friday in terms of the tyre structure. We had to take what was the very safe option of three stops." So rather than Hamilton ending Ferrari's run of 1-2 victories because of the strategy change, Dennis depicted Hamilton's second place as being secured in spite of the ploy. "We had the pace to win," he maintained. "W...

Well, the race is done and over with. The result - Massa, Hamilton and Raikonnen. Damn, another Ferrari domination. It would've been different had Kovalainnen not gotten a puncture as a result of Kimi hitting his rear tyres at turn one. It was quite an exciting race compared to the others so far this season. A lot of overtaking and strategy mixing up. Obviously Kovalainnen's strategy was screwed up at turn one when after the puncture he h dropped down to last place. His fight back up the grid to 11th place was incredible to watch. He should be the man of the race. Kimi didn't start very good, Kovalainnen lost a place but Lewis was great. He took 2nd straight away and stayed under Massa's rear wing for a long time. Lewis' strategy change where he did short pitstops to stay with the Ferraris was good too, I was thinking WTF was McLaren thinking but they pulled it off. All in all, a good race and now the championship race gets more interesting heading to Monaco. Monaco...

It was and eventful practice 1,2 & 3. Watching the race live online (www.mad-max.coolpage.biz/f1player.html) with live timing from www.f1.com and chatting with like minded individuals at www.f1fanatic.co.uk was fantastic. I've been doing it since the Spanish GP. Anybody want to try it out, please do. It gives you a deeper sense of understanding of the goings on at a race weekend. Anyway, the qualifying is done and what a surprise. It's Ferrari-McLaren-McLaren. And the second McLaren is Heikki Kovalainnen! His first front row qualifying - congrats are in order. Lewis is P3, not bad but could've been better with soft tyres (he decided to go out with the hard option on that last attempt). I'm still thinking about Alonso's pace though, even since Spain. Suddenly Renault have some pace to play with the top 3 teams in practice and qualifying. It seems that Alonso is better at it than Nelsinho (obviously) but it's the car. Renault has done something to the car sinc...