Sunday 24 July 2011

Imperious Hamilton wins in Germany

Sometimes Lewis Hamilton is just irresistible. Today was one of those days. After his astonishing qualifying lap put him on the front row yesterday he overcame a spirited Fernando Alonso and strangely lacklustre Mark Webber to collect his second win of the season.

Alonso might feel had he had his wits about him coming out of his final pit stop he might have clung on to win, but Hamilton's superior pace on the harder tyres at the end of the race suggested he might have made it past anyway. In any case, Ferrari have long suffered from issues over getting heat quickly into their tyres.

Championship leader Sebastian Vettel added fuel to the speculation that he's a lights-to-flag merchant, he was only able to get past Felipe Massa thanks to a slow Ferrari pit stop right at the death. Such is his Championship lead however, he may have taken the perfectly legitimate decision that points accumulation is better than risking a non-finish. That's exactly why he's not as fun as Hamilton or Alonso though.

Vettel still sits comfortably atop the standings though, fully 77 points clear of Mark Webber (not a threat) and 82 clear of Lewis Hamilton. Fernando Alonso is right to think that, oddly, Mclaren and Ferrari need to work in tandem to have any hope of overhauling the young German - even then still the faintest of hopes at that.

2 comments:

haitchjg said...

Well maybe at Hungary the warmer temperatures will favour Ferrari and McLaren and they indeed can upset the Bulls points progress. I'm in two minds, I like to see the smaller teams thrashing the big boys, trouble is its harder than ever to see RB as "small". Undoubtedly Newey is the power behind the Wunderkind but surely there is another Aero-dynamisist out there who can challenge him?

GreenJJ said...

Red Bull have got a budget as big as Ferrari and Mclaren, possibly bigger. Don't think there's an answer to Newey since Rory Byrne retired, he's a freak and there's no getting round that!