Usually, a typical Grand Prix tends to go like this: The fastest cars qualify in the front, the slowest cars in the back, the race starts, there is no on-track overtaking, the pit stops come around, gives a more heavily-fueled driver a few laps to make up some time on the more lightly-fueled driver ahead of him (if indeed there is a lighter-fueled driver in front), the former possibly ends up in front of the latter after his later pit stop, the faster cars lap the slower cars, and we can pretty much predict the final results of the race if everybody finishes.
Had it not been for some minor events and first-lap incidents, the 2008 Turkish Grand Prix would have been another predictable two-hour procession. However, there were minor ups and downs over the course of the weekend for the title contenders, which led to the GP being the most exciting and eventful race of the 2008 season so far.
Practice
Kimi's weekend started out on the wrong foot, as his gearbox suffered a glitch during Friday practice. He would miss out on valuable track time and, with the importance of setting up the car to be quick on two specifications of tyres, he would not be able to extract the maximum from the car in time for qualifying.
Qualifying
Massa put together a fantastic lap to put the car on pole. His ballsy driving style allows him to perform well at tracks with high-speed corners (Turn 8) and severe braking into slow corners (Turn 12). Rob Smedley commented that a person needs to have a pretty sick sense of humour to drive Turn 8 as quickly as Filipe does. With a history of winning from the front, you would have bet that he was fueled to get on pole, and that's exactly what he did. He was rather hesitant to make any bold predictions after qualifying, however, saying that the two McLarens and the sister Ferrari behind him might give him a tough afternoon on Sunday.
Heikki seemed to be the only happy guy at the post-qualifying press conference. He managed to put the car in second position and would start the race on the front row on Sunday.
Lewis Hamilton put the car third on the grid and didn't seem too happy afterwards. He had driven his final hot-lap on the wrong tyres and also botched his lap. Perhaps he knew that his mistake in qualifying meant he would be running his lighter strategy against heavier cars on Sunday. In that case, he was probably going to lose a position to Kimi by the end of the race.
On another note, McLaren’s PR department is doing things quite well it would seem—Lewis was complaining after qualifying that the team made wrong tyre choice for Q3. A few hours later, he was quoted to say that ultimately, tyre choice was his decision and that he’s the only one who knows what’s going on in the car.
Kimi didn't put in a very good lap either, but managed to get himself to fourth on the grid.
The surprise in the top ten was Mark Webber's Red Bull. Even if he was light on fuel, getting into Q3 meant he had to wring the neck of that Red Bull around the Otodrome. And for a change, Coulthard was also in the top ten. Being 1.1s slower in Q3 than 9th place Heidfeld, you would bet that his car was fueled to the brim. He was hoping go deep into the race before pitting and score some points.
Alonso was his usual self, showing up his rookie teammate Piquet Jr. Although Renault also managed to qualify fairly high up in Barcelona, he was light on fuel, and you can expect the same strategy here.
Race
Massa and Hamilton got of the line well. At the first left-hander, Kimi puts his car inside Heikki's under braking. As Heikki drove his intended line, Kimi was squeezed to the apex, thought better of it, and braked even harder to back off. He would lose so much momentum that he would be passed by Kubica and Alonso on the outside.
Just when you thought everyone had made the first corner, Giancarlo Fisichella in the Force India gets launched 4 feet into the air over the rear wing of rookie Nakajima. He braked way too late into the corner and that brought out the safety car.
Heikki comes into the pits within the first few laps—he had a slow puncture in his left-rear tyre. Evidently, he had come into contact with Kimi’s front wing at the first corner, which now also had a broken endplate. Because the safety car bunched the field up, Heikki was dropped to the back of the field. On lap 5 of 58, he was about 3 second behind Sutil, who was previously in last place. Heikki would make it up to 12th place at the end of the race, finishing +1 lap behind the leaders.
Kimi passes Alonso easily on the back straight after Turn 11. The Alonso I know doesn’t really let people by that easily. Watching the replay, Alonso slowed down noticeably before the braking and slipped in line behind Kimi. Perhaps knew that he was racing Webber, and that any time lost in a fruitless fight against Kimi would only harm his race. As much as I enjoy a proper fight, I admire Alonso for what I consider a very mature decision.
It is this ability to see the overall big picture of a race that has earned him two consecutive world championships. On the other hand, it can be construed that Alonso let Kimi past so as to appease the Ferrari bosses, as he would probably like to drive a Ferrari in the future if his Renault remained a midfield car.
Alonso pits early, as expected. This makes Webber’s qualifying lap all the more impressive, as he goes three laps longer. That Red Bull is starting to show some pace in the hands of both drivers and is certainly more reliable that last year’s RB3.
Another early stopper on was Hamilton. This perfectly explains why he appeared slightly dejected yesterday afternoon. He was fueled to go on pole, but he only ended up qualifying third. He would be stuck behind Massa’s heavier car in the first stint when what he really needed to do was open a gap at the front.
After proclaiming, “I own this track” before the race, Massa had a great start from the clean side of the track. He would run the ideal two-stop strategy and keep Hamilton behind him for more than two of Hamilton’s four stints. After Hamilton completed his second of three stops and while Massa had completed his final stop, Hamilton pulled alongside Massa under braking and passed him going into the slow final corners. Massa temporarily lost his composure, and put in a few laps off his previous pace.
Meanwhile, Hamilton was about 0.5s quicker per lap quicker in the lighter car. It looked like Massa had been broken until his race engineer, Rob Smedley, reassured him that Hamilton had put on a set of hard tyres at the last stop and has yet to use a set of softs (the regulations require every car use both types of tyre in the race). Therefore, Hamilton still has to make another stop. If Filipe could stay within 20 seconds of Hamilton, he would only need to keep an eye in his mirrors in the final laps. Massa did exactly that, and went on to win for his third straight time in Turkey.
Kimi would also dispatch of Kubica over the course of the race, and with Heikki losing out due to the puncture, Kimi would finish in third place.
Heikki ran a fantastic race from the back of the grid. If I’m not mistaken, he overtook more cars in this race that we’ve seen in 2008 so far! It seems like the driver has settled in nicely and his approach with the team is working well so far. He finished 12th on a day when he could potentially have won.
Lewis Hamilton’s race stands out in my mind as an absolutely fantastic performance.
During Friday practice, the Bridgestone had confirmed to McLaren that Lewis front-right tyre was suffering from mild delamination (they had cut up Lewis’ tyres to confirm this). Apparently the McLaren generates a lot of front downforce and, coupled with Lewis’ setup and driving style, puts more forces through the front-right tyre in Turn 8 than any other driver. The Bridgestone tyres just could not withstand a stint on the ideal two-stop strategy. Bridgestone recommended to the team that Lewis’ middle stint should be no longer than 18 laps. With the GP being 58 laps, Lewis strategy would have been 20-18-20, as any more laps in the first and last stint would also overstress the tyres. McLaren decided that this strategy would was not ideal for a few reasons:
1) The optimal tyre was the hard compound, but running it for 20 laps would still put the car, driver and race result at risk. This strategy simply did not allow the tyres to be operated with what was considered a sufficient safety and reliability margin for McLaren.
2) Running the soft compound for 18 to 20 laps would compromise the pace of the McLaren for too many laps against the Ferrari, regardless of the stint in which they were used.
Therefore, the solution would have to decrease the number laps run on each type of tyre, especially the softs. So the McLaren opted for a three-stop strategy. Computer simulations suggested that, for two identical cars with no issues with traffic, an ideal three-stop strategy would have been 5s slower than a two-stop over a race distance. So Lewis really needed to start on pole and pull away with his lighter car in every stint in order to challenge for victory.
The simulations also told them on Saturday night that Lewis’ third-place grid position would likely yield a fifth place finish if Heikki and Kimi, and Kubica ran perfect races. As we know, Heikki suffered a puncture and Kimi had to pass Alonso and Kubica before he could use his Ferrari’s pace. However, it should not discount Lewis’ performance, as a second place finish on a suboptimal strategy definitely took some great driving to achieve.
As for other drivers, Button and Piquet shared a good scrap at the slower corners. Button gave Piquet enough room at Turn 12, only to be pushed right up against the pitlane entry near Turn 13.
Heikki’s charge up the grid found him behind the Toyota of Timo Glock at one point. Again, we saw Glock battle it out with Heikki in the braking zones, making it hard for the Finn to pass. The impressive defensive display by Glock was reminiscent of his GP2 battle with Lewis on this very same track in 2006. In that race, Lewis had spun his car early on and had to try to make his way back up the field. Lewis passed nearly everybody in that race to finish 2nd, but it was Glock who put up the best fight against Lewis.
In the end, the difference in Lewis’ strategy, Kimi’s damage limitation drive, Heikki’s charge from the back and Massa’s third consecutive win at this track made the 2008 Turkish GP one of the most exciting races this season!
Full Result
Pos Driver Team Laps Gap
1 Massa Ferrari 58 1h 26:49.451
2 Hamilton McLaren 58 + 0:03.779
3 Raikkonen Ferrari 58 + 0:04.271
4 Kubica BMW 58 + 0:21.945
5 Heidfeld BMW 58 + 0:38.741
6 Alonso Renault 58 + 0:53.724
7 Webber Red Bull 58 + 1:04.229
8 Rosberg WilliamsF1 58 + 1:11.406
9 Coulthard Red Bull 58 + 1:15.270
10 Trulli Toyota 58 + 1:16.344
11 Button Honda 57 + 1 Lap
12 Kovalainen McLaren 57 + 1 Lap
13 Glock Toyota 57 + 1 Lap
14 Barrichello Honda 57 + 1 Lap
15 Piquet Renault 57 + 1 Lap
16 Sutil Force India 57 + 1 Lap
17 Vettel Toro Rosso 57 + 1 Lap
18 Bourdais Toro Rosso 24 Retired
19 Nakajima WilliamsF1 1 Accident Damage
20 Fisichella Force India 0 Accident
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