2007 Formula One European Grand Prix

[Cyco]

Hamilton, pulls the start of the year, Winklehock leads, and he and 5 others crash on corner 1

How crazy is that?

[Cyco]

Hamilton back on the track

[Dino Scuderia]

The whole grid looked like a bunch of amateurs except for Spyker who chose the correct tire.

[Wouter Melissen]

The whole grid looked like a bunch of amateurs except for Spyker who chose the correct tire.

Sadly, faults are the only way to make F1 interesting. Canada was another fault festival and probably the most entertaining race.

Winkelhock is the signing of the season!

[Jack_Bauer]

Fernando Alonso wins a drama filled European Grand Prix at the Nuerburgring in sensational style. The notorious Nuerburg weather played a massive part to play in a topsy-turvy race as Alonso stole the victory from under the nose of Ferrari's Felipe Massa in the closing laps of the race with a stunning move through the high-speed turns 5 and 6. It is a massive boost for Alonso's title hopes as leader Lewis Hamilton's fairytale beginning to his Grand Prix career came to an end with a pointless ninth place finish after a crazy sort of weekend for the young Brit. Pre-race favourite Kimi Raikkonen's Nuerburgring jinx came to haunt him once again as his winning streak came to a disappointing end as his Ferrari ground to halt with reliability issues.

The race got underway under dark skies as heavy rain was looming on the horizon, but all but debutant Marcus Winkelhock started on dry weather tires. Lewis Hamilton got a brilliant launch from the start and made it from 10th to 4th half way through the second turn. However, this is where things started to go wrong for the championship leader as Nick Heidfeld collided with BMW teammate Kubica on the inside, spinning the Pole to the outside and clipping Hamilton's rear as he went. The resulting rear puncture dropped Hamilton all the way back down the field again. Half way through the opening lap the heavens opened, and a sudden deluge threw the race into disarray. Everyone chose to dive into the pits ASAP, but race leader Kimi Raikkonen misjudged the grip levels and slid straight through the pit entrance and back out onto turn 15 again, spelling disaster for the in-form Finn.

Everybody switched to the Intermediate tires, but the rain fall was so extreme that they were not enough to cope. This proved especially so on the downhill run down in to turn 1, which virtually became a river. Button was first to fall foul of the treacherous conditions. He had made a stunning start to the race, making it to P3 from 17th on the grid and was on a full tank of fuel, but all his good work was undone as he aquaplaned off into the tyre wall at turn 1. Lewis Hamilton was next to follow Button, then Rosberg, then Sutil and Speed before the safety car came out. Liuzzi still managed to bin it in turn one whilst behind the safety car! Remarkably Lewis Hamilton had the presence of mind to keep his engine running and was given a helping hand out of the gravel by the marshalls due to being in a dangerous position. Even under safety car conditions it was too just too dangerous to continue and the race was red-flagged to give time for the rain to abate. The race would restart with Marcus Winkelhock leading in the Spyker on his debut, in his home Grand Prix no less! If this is to be his one and only F1 Grand Prix it was certainly a memorable one!

As soon as the rain stopped the sun came out which began to dry the track very quickly. As they got underway again after a couple of laps behind the safety car a dry line immediately began to appear. Hamilton had taken advantage of the new safety car rules and had got himself back onto the lead lap, but then took an extraordinary gamble by going straight onto dry weather tires. He was soon in the turn 1 gravel trap again as it became apparent that he'd made a poor choice. Until the track began to fully dry he was losing around 12 seconds per lap to the leaders, and any hope of a decent points finished evaporated as quickly as the rain from the asphalt. At the front of the grid Massa had squeezed ahead of Alonso from the start and was fending him off well. Everyone was watching Hamilton's times on the computers and as soon as he started to set fastest laps on the dry tires everyone dove into the pits. Massa looked more comfortable than Alonso on the dry weather rubber and began to pull away slightly at the front. Alonso began to fall back into the clutches of Kimi Raikkonen who had made a remarkable recovery into third place. Behind him the big winners in the chaos at the start of the race were the Red Bulls of Webber and Coulthard and Wurz's Williams, taking advantage of the BMWs' coming together at the start.

Raikkonen closed right onto the gearbox of Alonso's McLaren, and it looked as though it were set up for a Ferrari one-two finish. But Kimi mysteriously started to drop back little by little. Whether this was mechanical related or just through a lack of pace we don't quite know, but not long after his car began to cut out with what looked like electric or hydraulic problems. He managed to get back to the pitlane entrance, but there the Ferrari finally gave up the ghost and his race was over. Not even bringing his 80 year old grandmother to the race from Finland for extra encouragement was enough to break Kimi's hoodoo at this track!

Out front Massa looked to be comfortably maintaining his lead to Alonso and was hot favourite for the race victory. In the midfield there was drama as two of the German racers came together in turn 15 in front of their home fans, Heidfeld punting Schumacher into the gravel trap. He was Heidfeld's second 'victim' of an unusually scrappy race for Quick Nick, and Ralf Schumacher's frustration was evident for all to see. Hamilton was making steady progress through the field, exchanging fastest laps with Massa as he went, but points still seemed a distant hope. It didn't stop him trying though, as he made one particularly fearless move on Fisichella as he took to the grass on the exit of turn 12 at about 150mph to give him the line into the final chicane. Bold stuff indeed, but looked to be all in vain as he was shown the blue flags and forced to yield to the race leaders, losing him masses of time.

But the German weather had one more trick up its sleeve. With about 10 laps to go the dark clouds began to descend again, and more rain was imminent. Kovalainen took a huge gamble and went to intermediates in full dry conditions, but the decision was clearly a couple of laps too soon as he started plummeting down the field. Eventually the rain came, and Alonso began to smell blood. He was already closing on Massa as they headed to the pits with Fisichella's Renault sandwiched between them. The race's most controversial moment came as Alonso's pit crew released him straight into the path of the Renualt, and he almost collided with the Honda mechanics infront of him. There may yet be some fall out from that incident as there will surely be an appeal to the FIA about the legality of the move.

Alonso wasn't giving that a second thought though as he set off in pursuit of his first victory since Monaco. He was on the tail of Massa in no time as he looked much the faster driver in the slippery conditions. He harassed Massa for the best part of a lap but Massa looked to be holding firm. Alonso new he wasn't going to be given any easy chances in the main overtaking spots, so he took an extremely unorthodox route intead! He took to the wet/karting line around the outside of the super-quick turn 5 to get alongside Massa and give him the line into 6, shades of Senna at Donnington in '93. Massa wasn't giving up without a fight and they banged wheels under braking, but Alonso had the line and took the lead of the race. Once Alonso had the lead he started tearing away at the front, piling on over a second a lap for the final few laps and took a quite brilliant victory. Massa looked furious at the finish, but can have no complaints over Alonso's move, it was firm but fair and the young Brazilian had no answer for Alonso. Whether there will be any repercussions after the race for McLaren after their rather dubious final stop for Alonso we will have to wait and see, but it would be cruel to take the victory away from Alonso after such a thrilling performance.

Hamilton meanwhile looked like he may have a sniff of a point after all, his McLaren was flying in the wet and he was gaining on the Renaults ahead at a rate of about 3 seconds per lap. But he fell just short of Kovalainen, a massive blow to his title aspirations. But the drama wasn't quite over as behind them the battle was still raging between Webber and Wurz for the final podium place. Webber seemed to make a mistake in the final chicane and Wurz almost snatched his second podium of the season from the Australian, but Webber just managed to hold on and took P3 by just two tenths of a second. Coulthard took fifth with a brilliant performance, climbing all the way from 20th on the grid, leading home the two BMWs.

So the title race takes another dramatic twist as Fernando Alonso closes to within 2 points of his young teammate. The two Ferraris both lost ground in the title race, certainly a LOT more ground than they would have expected, as Massa again leapfrogged Raikkonen in the standings. In the constructors' standings McLaren not have a substantial 27 point lead over Ferrari, not what Ferrari would have expected from a race when they looked to be have the faster car. Advantage McLaren again...

1. Alonso
2. Massa
3. Webber
4. Wurz
5. Coulthard
6. Heidfeld
7. Kubica
8. Kovalainen
9. Hamilton
10. Fisichella
11. Barrichello
12. Davidson
13. Trulli
ret Raikkonen
ret Sato
ret Schumacher
ret Winkelhock
ret Button
ret Sutil
ret Rosberg
ret Speed
ret Liuzzi

[cmcpokey]

well, alonso won. that doesnt excite me, but the pass for the lead was fantastic, as were the last 6 laps in the rain to make it interesting.

[2ndclasscitizen]

1st corner lap 2, most entertaining bit of F1 in quite some time.

[Cyco]

The McLarens had far higher levels of grip in the slippery conditions over the last few laps. The passes by both cars on the last laps where quite spectacular.

The BMW guys will surely get a good talking to for taking each other out on the 2nd corner.

[dydzi]

that was too thrilling race with too irritating end

[Pando]

One of the most entertaining races in a years. Can't say that I would've liked the end results apart from a few surprises though.

[go.pawel]

A totally unpredictable race, just the way I like Shame that our TV broadcast went out for 15 minutes during it
I'd expect penalty for Heidfeld though, for his totally irresponsible moves with Kubica and Schumacher. And disqualification for Hamilton as he was able to come back to the track only with help from outside, which afaik is forbidden.

[Matra et Alpine]

disqualification for Hamilton as he was able to come back to the track only with help from outside, which afaik is forbidden.

NO.
If the car is in an unsafe position then marshals are permitted to move it to a safe location. If the driver manages to keep the engine running then it's OK to join.

[go.pawel]

NO.
If the car is in an unsafe position then marshals are permitted to move it to a safe location.

That "safe location" being in this case the track itself? Hamilton was there with 5 other drivers, yet only his car got lifted back to the track. I don't remember any other driver being helped this way in this or previous season. It looks to me like a case of severe favouritism.

[Cyco]

Winkelhock was parked in the same gravel trap and rejoined

[go.pawel]

Winkelhock was parked in the same gravel trap and rejoined

Nope, it was Sutil, together with Button, Rosberg, Speed and Liuzzi. All of them retired, despite not having any major damages. Only Hamilton was craned back onto the track.