With five different teams and seven different drivers winning races already, the 2012 season has seen an unprecedented level of competition at the very front. Compare that to ten years ago in 2002, when just three different teams won a race and only four even made it to the podium, and it’s clear that the new rules have evened things out and allowed a closer level of competition than ever before. And yet the five teams who have most recently won F1 world championships, namely Ferrari, McLaren, Red Bull, Mercedes (previously Brawn) and Lotus (nee Renault), still lead the way.
The most surprising performer of the top teams, in a season full of shocks, has been Lotus. With a new team name and new driver line-up, and having only recently changed owners, they looked awfully like a team in transition. But future aims of a world title challenge are very nearly being achieved this season.
With Kimi Raikkonen on the driving strength, two things were likely – monosyllabic interviews and some feisty performances. Thankfully the latter has happened just as often as the former, despite Nelson Piquet Jr describing Raikkonen as “a little weak”. The championship the rest of us have been watching has seen Raikkonen close to victory (in Bahrain and Hungary especially) and he remains rightly confident of a title shot, although he could do with working on his qualifying performances relative to team mate Romain Grosjean.
The Frenchman has been a revelation, and proof of what can be achieved if a driver is given a second chance at F1 level – something many talented young drivers (Jan Magnussen, Giorgio Pantano, Marco Apicella et al) never had. Grosjean has outperformed Raikkonen at times, and looked particularly good in Valencia before mechanical problems intervened.
Three podiums is a fine return from the first 11 races, especially considering his lack of F1 experience which has contributed to a few offs (but by no means too many, despite Jackie Stewart’s insistence that he could teach Grosjean a thing or two). Lotus remain dark horses for the championship, as their car appears to work on every circuit and they have a new double DRS device in the pipeline which should serve them well in at Spa and Monza. They should certainly at least claim that hitherto elusive race win at some point before the end of the season.
Unlike Lotus, Mercedes have tasted victory this year, but unlike Lotus it’s hard to see them doing so again in the remainder of the season. Nico Rosberg’s long-overdue first triumph in China was a case of all the cards falling into place – a great drive from the German on a track he enjoys, a car with good straight line speed for the Shanghai circuit’s fast sections, and a chassis setup that worked the tyres just hard enough. Mercedes seem to have struggled with the round, black rubber things more than any other team this season, and this goes some way to explaining Rosberg’s erratic performances – he finished as low as 15th at Silverstone.
At least he’s actually finished most of the races – team mate Michael Schumacher has suffered a catalogue of failures, often when running in points positions. The elder German rolled back the years in Monaco with a superb pole, but was pushed back five places on the grid for clumsily running into Bruno Senna in the previous race in Spain. This sums up his season – flashes of speed mixed with some rookie-esque errors.
A slightly fortuitous podium in Valencia represented a long overdue change in luck for Schumacher, who always seemed to get the rub of the green in his ‘first career’. The jury is still out on whether he has done enough to stay on beyond the end of the season, although the decision appears to be in his 43 year old hands. Some signs of progress with the car in the second half of the season would help him make his mind up but, despite a myriad of designers, chassis development seems to have stalled. Mercedes have also suffered five mechanical retirements this season (one more than HRT) which is unforgivable for a top-five team in the modern era.
In contrast the Ferraris have been bullet-proof all year, with not a single mechanical DNF. The main problem to begin with was a lack of pace from the ugly F2012 car, with the team not confident they could even challenge for podiums. They reckoned without the continued genius of Fernando Alonso, who has scored in every race and won as early as Malaysia despite his recalcitrant machinery. The importance of that win in boosting team morale was incalculable, and the car has evolved into being genuinely capable of challenging for wins (at least in Alonso’s hands). His personal highlight was a slightly fortunate win in front of an adoring home crowd in Valencia.
Felipe Massa, by contrast, has had an abysmal year by any measure. Outqualified at every event by Alonso, the Brazilian has scored just 25 points compared to the Spaniard’s 164. Felipe hasn’t stood on the podium since the 2010 Korean GP – in that time, Alonso has been there 17 times. Massa simply hasn’t been good enough to compete, whatever the reason, and even a slight recent improvement has only resulted in a few top six finishes despite the advances made with the Ferrari car.
Everyone wants Massa to do well, but I can’t help feel he needs to leave Ferrari before we see anything like his best again (if ever). The Brazilian’s struggles mean the Constructors championship is out of the question, but Alonso holds a 40 point lead in the drivers’ standings. Don’t bet against him regaining the title after six years of trying, which would be the joint longest gap between title successes since Jack Brabham in the 1960s (and could well open the floodgates, Schumi early 2000s-style).
It’s almost as long since McLaren last tasted championship success – other than Lewis Hamilton’s triumph four years ago, the team hasn’t won a championship since the 1990s (having had the 2007 constructors crown taken off them in the wake of the ‘spygate’ scandal). Hamilton responsible for so much of the team’s recent success, has re-found his form this season after a difficult 2011 just as the team have managed to produce a car which was competitive from the outset (not something they had achieved in the last few years).
The Briton has driven well at most races, despite bad luck in both Spanish races – in Barcelona he started last after running out of fuel in qualifying and in Valencia he was assaulted by Maldonado. Recent car improvements led to a dominant win in Hungary which sets him up nicely for the rest of the year. In contrast, after an excellent 2011 season Jenson Button has reverted to type. He claimed a good win in Australia but has since struggled with a car and tyres not exactly to his liking, and as a result has consistently been a few tenths slower per lap than Hamilton. Unfortunately, this season the field is so close that he’s often been mired in traffic because of this deficit.
Monaco was Button’s nadir – he was genuinely outpaced by Kovalainen’s Caterham all race. There have been some signs of improvement since, notably a fighting drive in Germany, but it’s far too late for his championship chances and maybe even McLaren’s in the constructors’ race. For the team to win either title they require both drivers to be competitive on a given weekend so that they can take points off their rivals (Alonso in particular). The elegant MP4/27 does seem to be back on the pace which may allow both drivers to do just that in the upcoming races.
So, what of the reigning champions? Well, despite leading the constructor’s race Red Bull haven’t had it all their own way this season and are no longer the dominant force despite another great Adrian Newey car. The fact that Sebastian Vettel is only 42 points off the driver’s championship lead is a minor miracle, given that he’s only been on the podium three times in total (and just once since his only win in Bahrain). That stat in itself is even more incredible, but shows just how hard the competition is in F1 this year.
Vettel was desperately unlucky in Valencia, where he would have won easily but for an engine fault, but has otherwise struggled to assert himself in quite the same way as the last two seasons. The qualifying stats versus Mark Webber (5-5 at present) support the general impression that Sebastian isn’t quite reaching the high standards he set in the last campaign.
Webber himself started the year with a string of four fourth places, and has added another since. His form in the races hasn’t been a lot better than last year in general, but with no one driver dominating his consistent results are enough to put him second in the standings. Unlike last year though, the Australian has been able to win races - his drives in Monaco and Silverstone were pretty dominant and he trounced Vettel on both occasions. To win the title, Webber needs to turn those days where he can’t win into podiums (his two victories are the only two rostrum visits he’s had).
Red Bull as a team look well placed to defend their Constructors’ crown, as they are the only top team (bar Lotus) who have both drivers operating at a similar level at most races. But the flipside of that is that the drivers will inevitably take points off each other, which will harm their pursuit of the driver’s championship and further strengthen Alonso’s grip on the drivers’ prize.
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