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Archive: French Grand Prix

Why I am finding F1 less gripping in 2011

11 May 2011 23:31

Categories: *, Formula 1

There have been four grands prix in 2011 so far, and they have been widely hailed as a great success. There is no doubt that the races have been action-packed, with something always going on.

But I wasn’t feeling it quite as much as many others were. I thought the Chinese Grand Prix was okay. But the reaction of others left me perplexed. All kinds of platitudes were bandied about. “The best dry race in decades!” “The best since Japan 2005!” Really? I wasn’t feeling that at all.

But I couldn’t quite put my finger on what was leaving me cold about F1 in 2011. There have been a lot of changes for this season, which has led to a very different style of racing. But what was it about the new F1 that was leaving me less thrilled than others?

It took me some time to work it out. But once I hit on it, the worse it seemed — and it has left me feeling a bit pessimistic about the prospects for truly good racing in 2011.

A pain in DRS?

A lot of attention has been focused on the brand new drag reduction system. Results of the DRS have been patchy.

At some races — particularly Australia — the DRS has been just enough to allow a driver behind to catch up. At the opposite extreme, in Turkey it was obvious that the DRS zone was far too long, and drivers were making easy passes that were not pleasing to watch.

The core problem is that it gives one driver and advantage over another — a significant deviation from the purity of racing. Comparisons to turbo boosts in the 1980s are no good. It may be a button that drivers can press, but there the similarity ends.

Back then, all of the options were open to everyone. You could choose to have a turbo or not, and you could use it whenever you wanted. But to say who can use a device and when they can use it is not on.

To artificially give the trailing driver a speed advantage is taking us into Mario Kart territory. As a friend said to me, “It’s like they have allowed cheating”. It is fundamentally wrong and does not belong in any event that calls itself a sport.

I love the idea of moveable rear wings, but the implementation is all wrong. I don’t even understand why it can only be used in one part of the circuit. As Niki Lauda said, why is it the FIA’s job to say where drivers can pass each other?

Moreover, the hit and miss nature of the DRS zone is leading to different sorts of results in different races. The zones change size, and sometimes the FIA have got it wrong. They have even changed the position of the DRS activation point during a race weekend. What other word is there for this apart from ‘manipulation‘?

This may be a device designed to “fix” the “problems” with overtaking. Instead, we have come one step away from fixing the results.

F1 has sold its rubber soul

But I am more concerned about the situation with the new Pirelli tyres. While the DRS is widely criticised, people have been much kinder about the tyre situation. Indeed, one of the more popular refrains this year has been “thank you Pirelli”. But I am in no mood to thank them.

They are designed to degrade artificially quickly. This is a significant deviation from the concept of F1. Formula 1 is now no longer about the best drivers in the best cars. It’s about the best drivers in the best cars — with the worst tyres.

While technical regulations have always restricted cars (it is the “formula” in Formula 1, after all), the tradition has always been to maximise the performance to create the fastest car possible that adheres to the formula of the day. That is what brings us radical ideas like the double diffuser and the F-duct, that many F1 fans love to talk about.

With the tyres, Pirelli have deliberately made them perform badly. Come on, this is supposed to be elite motorsport.

Moreover, these dodgy tyres have now become the central issue of a grand prix weekend. I have long bemoaned the dominance of tyres in F1. If a car has better aerodynamics, you can see it. If an engine is faster, you can hear it. But the tyres? They are just black boxes that sit in the four corners.

But there is no getting away from it — tyres are hugely important to the performance of a car. What I don’t understand is why you would want to accentuate that.

Critics of F1 often complain that the drivers of the best cars always win. What these people misunderstand is that F1 is all about engineering excellence, just as much as it is about great driving.

But now we have now reached a stage where the deciding factor is neither the driver nor the car. It is now all about strategy — driven by deliberately dodgy tyres — above all else.

They are now so important that the situation is now threatening to make qualifying a complete non-event. After all those years spent tweaking the format of qualifying in the name of “the show”, you have to laugh when further changes totally break a format they finally got right.

The reason? Because you need as many fresh sets of tyres as possible to last the whole race. This means less track action on Saturday, as teams are fearful of using too many sets of tyres. What is this, Formula 1 bean counting, or Formula 1 motor racing?

Divergent strategies reduce real racing

In addition to spearing Saturday action, it is my view that the tyres situation is making Sundays less exciting too.

Take the experience of Mark Webber. He climbed from 18th on the grid to finish 3rd in China. You’d think if anyone would be excited about the wheel-to-wheel action in 2011, it would be him. Not so much.

After the race he told the BBC, “Sometimes the overtaking moves aren’t that genuine because the guys really have nothing to fight back with. It’s more tactical now, and a bit less racing.” During the BBC’s broadcast from Turkey, Martin Brundle revealed that Webber had told him privately that he got no satisfaction out of the progress through the field in China. James Allen further hinted at Webber’s distinct unhappiness at the situation.

Following Turkey, Jenson Button lay the blame for his poor result squarely on his strategy. Asked about what happens when his tyres go off, Button said, “You’re not racing any more. You’re trying your best to get the best out of the car, but you’re not racing anyone around you because you are a sitting duck… They just come past you and you can’t do anything.”

Overtaking has looked like it’s too easy this year, and it is not just because of DRS. The situation with the tyres means that drivers are dealing with such radically different levels of grip that the slower driver does not even bother to defend any more.

Many celebrated Lewis Hamilton’s pass on Sebastian Vettel for the lead of the Chinese Grand Prix. But for me, it killed the race as soon as it happened. I was hoping for Vettel to be able to defend, but he simply couldn’t. As it was, the pass was inevitable for laps in advance.

In the laps between Hamilton’s pitstop and his pass on Vettel, the McLaren driver was an average of 0.9s a lap faster than the Red Bull. (At one point he set a lap time 1.6 seconds up on Vettel.) To put this into perspective, during Q1 in China, a 0.9s gap to the fastest driver would have earned 18th on the grid.

Is it really exciting to watch a car that’s got an advantage of around one second a lap breeze on by? Not for me. This isn’t overtaking — it’s merely passing. It’s hardly Dijon 1979, is it? Today René Arnoux would flip his flap, press his boost button and head off into the distance on his superior tyres — race over.

The performance differences are huge, and it is all down to decisions that are made by computers far in advance. It is out of the driver’s hands. What is this, the Excel Grand Prix of Spreadsheet?

It is right that strategy plays a part in a race. But this year the balance has been tipped way over the edge, to the point where the driver’s influence on the outcome of the race has been severely diminished. You almost may as well hold the grand prix on a computer where all of the strategies have been put in.

To open up strategy options for this season without resorting to crap tyres that create crap pseudo-racing, they could simply have ditched the rule whereby drivers are forced to run on both compounds. This would have opened up the possibilities of running a 0, 1 or 2 stop strategy.

Instead, we are now seeing record-breaking levels of pitstops — upwards of 80 pitstops a race — for no good reason. This has taken away the emphasis from the on-track action, and has made huge amounts of the “racing” totally irrelevant.

It wasn’t broke, so why “fix” it?

The most disturbing thing about all the changes this season is the fact that there was very little wrong with Formula 1 in the first place. I didn’t complain that Formula 1 is dull. And while there was room for improvement, I have long bemoned the gimmicky thinking that has come about through efforts to “improve the show”. Now it is in danger of jumping the shark.

I love Formula 1 motor racing. I have done since the mid-1990s. There were lots of other people who claimed they also loved F1 — but at the same time complained about “processional races”. They said that F1 was too dull. Yet, for some reason, they still watched it anyway, and demanded changes. Huh?

I feel like the sport I love has been hijacked.

I also believe that the criticisms of the new format have been misunderstood by some insiders. It is not “too much overtaking” or “too much of a good thing”.

James Allen said, “it’s a bit like going into a sweet shop and eating half the stock, when you’ve only been used to getting a packet of Polos at best.” That’s not how I feel. It’s actually more like going into a nice restaurant expecting a good meal and being served a Big Mac instead.

Time to end the fixation with “the show”

Don’t get me wrong. I am still deriving satisfaction from Formula 1 this season. But the wheel-to-wheel action has become a lot more insipid this year, and bland passing has become so prevalent that overtaking has become devalued.

Kers is great for Formula 1. But the tyres situation, combined with DRS, is threatening to spoil the party. It wasn’t broke, but they fixed it anyway. But in “fixing” the racing, we have come just one step away from fixed races. The positioning of the DRS zone, determined by an FIA mandarin, could potentially make the difference between who wins and who loses.

Somewhere along the line, F1 has become so fixated on “the show” that it has forgotten about the race. There are now too many gimmicks and complications that deviate from the core concept that has served motorsport well for over a century: put a bunch of cars on a track and discover which is the fastest.

Of course, motorsport must always seek to entertain the audience. It wouldn’t exist otherwise. But you also need to remember why fans of motorsport tune in. Clue: it’s because they want to see a motor race. There are plenty of other places where you can be entertained by contrived or fictitious means.

But sport is supposed to be based on merit. It needs to be real.

When Renault’s James Allison said “We are an entertainment business,” it showed how wrong this whole approach is. We are dangerously striding towards WWE territory. If James Allison wants to work in an entertainment business, he can go to work in Hollywood. I want to watch a race.

The toxic focus on “the show” needs to stop.

This is a show:

This is a race:

Now, let’s go racing.

26 comments

What might have been for Timo Glock

2 April 2011 12:27

Categories: *, Formula 1

I wonder what Timo Glock is thinking just now. Following an impressive early career, and after showing flashes of talent at Toyota for two years, Glock faced a difficult decision prior to the 2010 season.

Renault or Virgin? Once upon a time it was a tough choice

His first option was to take a risk and sign for Renault, whose future was on the line. At the time it was said that Glock was considering driving for Renault, Robert Kubica was seeking assurances about the team’s future. Renault were beginning to phase out their involvement in running an F1 team.

His other option was to sign for a new team, Virgin, but one that was not likely to have the plug pulled on its future so soon. Glock chose this option.

Virgin’s struggles

No doubt, with the information he had at his disposal at the time, Timo Glock had a difficult decision to make. But today, he must feel sick about his choice.

He is making increasingly frustrated noises about Virgin’s lack of progress. He first complained that Virgin had lost ground to the teams it was targeting, such as Toro Rosso. Then he began to question whether Virgin was even capable of qualifying for races following the reinstatement of the 107% rule.

Judging by Virgin’s performance in Australia, these fears were well founded. And what’s more, they risk slipping back even further.

Threatened even by Hispania

For Malaysia, Hispania will be looking to race with their 2011-spec front wing. Their new front wing failed a crash test, apparently by a minuscule margin. So they used a 2010 front wing in Australia. But if they can fit the new wing for Malaysia, the hot word is that Hispania could be faster than Virgin.

That would be seriously embarrassing for Virgin. The team has staked its reputation on Nick Wirth’s idea that a competitive car can be designed without the use of a wind tunnel. They just about got away with it last year. But this year, with Virgin’s lack of progress, a serious question mark is beginning to hang over the CFD-only method.

Over the winter, the Hispania team has become something of a laughing stock. Struggling for cash, the team has done the bare minimum of running. It did no testing. Before attempting to qualify in Australia, they had only completed the merest figleaf of an installation lap.

They then failed to qualify for the race. It was worryingly reminiscent of what Arrows did in 2002 in its final few races before it had to close down, when the drivers deliberately failed to qualify in order to avoid the costs of racing while still meeting their contractual requirements.

However, a recent article by James Allen suggests that the future for Hispania may be more promising than Australia’s performance indicated.

While Virgin struggle, Renault are flying

That article also says that Glock “looked a haunted man” following the Australian Grand Prix. It’s easy to imagine why, when you consider again the choice he faced before 2010.

The team he apparently walked away from, Renault, is on the up and up. While Renault themselves may have more or less pulled out entirely, the team now has solid backing from Genii Capital, a group that appears to mean business in F1. The team also has major, prominent backing from Proton, who are using the team to promote their Group Lotus activities.

The Renault car itself is in great shape too. Its innovative exhaust system is one of the most talked-about car developments of the winter. And Vitaly Petrov’s solid run to third place in Australia sent a strong signal that, while Renault may not exactly be title contenders, they are certainly out to give the front runners a real run for their money.

So, the situation could hardly have gone worse for Timo Glock. He had a difficult decision to make, but as things stand it has turned out to be unambiguously the wrong one. It could cost his career dearly. To be pottering around in a car that may not even be fast enough to qualify does not befit a driver of Timo Glock’s stature.

With Virgin worrying about 107% while Petrov stands on the podium, it is easy to see why Glock would look haunted.

3 comments

Singasnore — What makes a good F1 race?

28 September 2010 23:19

Categories: *, Formula 1, Newspapers, Television

What do viewers at home love about F1? It is great wheel-to-wheel racing? Lots of overtaking? Strategy calls? Or the venues? Looking at the polarised reactions to this past weekend’s Singapore Grand Prix got me wondering.

A few of the journalists were pretty effusive about the race. Will Buxton was particularly euphoric:

Epic race. One of the best of the season. Wow.

I saw that this drew a few hoots of derision, including from me! Because from the comments made by other fans watching at home was that… well… it was a bit dull really.

It wasn’t a stinker by any means. There was some good action and a fair few talking points. But large stretches of the race were rather processional. Hardly epic.

The epic race without the racing

Will Buxton justified his comments:

No sarcasm. Epic race. ALO VET lap trading, WEB early stop and brill drive, HAM / WEB moment, GLO driving arse off. KUB amazing.

There is some truth in what he says. While Webber and Kubica provided some entertainment, this was only because they were out of phase with the surrounding cars strategy-wise, so were not on an equal footing with the drivers they were battling with.

As for the battle at the front, the problem was that Alonso’s victory was never truly in doubt. He commanded the track all weekend, and always even looked like he might have a bit extra left in the tank too.

During the first phase of the race, Vettel drifted back to 3.5s behind Alonso. After the pitstops, the gap eventually grew to over 2s before slowly decreasing again. Vettel did get mighty close to the end of the race, but this was typical Alonso driving conservatively.

Renault engineers always talked about how conservative Alonso was as a driver. They never had to tell him to turn the engine down; he had already done it.

So it was in Singapore. Alonso had done just enough to establish himself as the certain winner of the Singapore Grand Prix and had the whole situation under control.

It may have looked good on the timing screens. I did indeed get excited when purple sectors were being set and Vettel started to decrease the gap. But the “lap battle” was partly down to the street circuit becoming cleaner and faster towards the end of the race.

I’m sure they were playing with each other, but neither looked to be pushing particularly hard. Alonso was always in control, and Vettel never looked interested in truly pressurising.

At the start of the race, Vettel had ceded the first corner, setting the tone for his race. It did not look like he was particularly interested in winning — a suspicion confirmed by Vettel’s comments that passing Alonso would have been too risky. And why bother? Alonso is the ultimate defensive driver, as his amazing battle with Michael Schumacher at the 2005 San Marino Grand Prix demonstrated.

The bottom line is that if you hold a race on a street circuit with one overtaking spot — two at a push — then the racing isn’t epic. There might be stuff surrounding the racing — strategy, crashes, pretty buildings… But not much overtaking.

Interesting, yes. Epic, no. The ingredients simply weren’t there.

Epic racing or epic facilities?

There is a trend for certain venues to be talked up a lot by the F1 circus, no matter how good the racing is. I particularly remember Valencia Street Circuit — which has served up three of the most turgid grands prix seen in the last decade — was universally praised by the teams as being a great venue for grand prix racing.

Scratch the surface of the headlines, though, and you see that they are not so interested in the racing itself. Ron Dennis said that the 2008 European Grand Prix at Valencia was so great that it made him “ashamed to be English”. But it left most others ashamed to be F1 fans, it was so bereft of racing.

Of course, Ron Dennis was thinking about the facilities. Facilities are apparently the only thing that matter in F1 these days. Never mind what the viewers at home make of the track. As long as the venue is equipped with a shiny silver throne for the McLaren chief to do his golden business in, who cares about the people at home?

Similarly, the journalists have clear favourite places to visit and places they can’t stand. China? Don’t talk to them about it. And spare a thought for poor, poor Magny-Cours. It was so awful — not because of the circuit, of course, but because it was in the middle of nowhere, as the journalists never missed the chance to remind us!

Meanwhile, Melbourne is always the “great place for a race” — is that code for a booze-up? And Singapore is now “epic”.

Never mind the fact that the Marina Bay Street Circuit is not great for overtaking. Never mind that the 2008 race needed a manufactured crash to pep it up, and that the 2009 race was voted the fourth worst of the season by F1 Fanatic readers.

TV coverage demonstrates skewed priorities

The scenario was not helped by some rather lacklustre television coverage from FOM this weekend. It looked to me like the director was more used to directing pop music videos than motorsport.

Coverage at night races is always dominated by shots of the lit-up buildings and the scenery surrounding the circuit. It feels more like the Singapore Grand Prix is more like an advert for Singapore than a motor race. Who was going to bed last weekend without seeing that flashing “Your Singapore” banner in their sleep?

When it comes to races like this, Bernie Ecclestone’s priorities are clear. Why else would the bland coverage of last year’s Abu Dhabi Grand Prix have won an FIA award for best coverage of the season? Much of the race action was missed. Anyone not paying full attention would have thought that the race was won by a hotel that looks like a giant flashing lady-toy, so fixated were the cameras on anything but the cars.

Those in the inner circle in F1 should remember that the fans at home are looking for epic racing — not epic Holywood movies, epic nightlife or epic superloos.

8 comments

Jonathan Legard's performance in perspective

24 July 2009 19:38

Categories: History, Opinion

As I expected, my previous post has generated a bit of controversy in the comments. So I have decided to break from the series of posts looking at the BBC’s F1 coverage this season, and the final part will be published tomorrow.

Instead, I am going to do something which will hopefully outline why I think Jonathan Legard is doing a good job as commentator. This is actually something I originally posted on the Digital Spy F1 coverage discussion thread, which is worth keeping an eye on if you have an interest in the way Formula 1 is broadcast.

I think just now is an apt moment to bring up something interesting that I noticed while watching a video of a classic F1 moment. In fact, it’s widely regarded as one of the most exciting pieces of racing of all time — Gilles Villeneuve vs Renè Arnoux at Dijon in 1979. In the commentary box is Murray Walker. But just as an experiment, imagine it’s Jonathan Legard.

I’ve transcribed some interesting bits (actually the majority of the commentary).

0:18 Renault LEADS Ferrari LEADS Renault – Lap 75.
0:55 It’s lap 75. Into the Parabolique. [Long silence.] Down to the double-left at la Bretelle. Villeneuve. Arnoux. Ferrari. Renault. [Long silence.] Round to la Combe.
1:20 …From la Combe, DOWN to the Courbe de Pouas.
1:36 Arnoux pops out and has a look. Arnoux has another look. And Villeneuve locks up his tyres. ["Say what you see", anyone?]
1:48 Into the left hander and right hander at Sabeliers. Down to la Bretelle again. Down hill. Very fast. Lap 76. 83 lap race.
2:07 Who is going to be second? There’s Villeneuve. Parabolique. Behind him… Arnoux. Renault first, Renault third, Ferrari second.
2:20 …as they go round… Bretelle. Up to la Combe. Lap 76.
2:35 [after a long silence] Keeping [?] round the Courbe de Pouas then they burst up over the crest.
2:45 It’s Villeneuve. This is the start of lap 77. And Villeneuve locks up the tyres again. And the order is Jabouille – Renault. And then Villeneuve in second place. Behind him is Arnoux in third position. Alan Jones in the Saudia Williams fourth. Jean-Pierre Jarier in the Candy Tyrrell is fifth. And Clay Regazzoni in the second of the two Saudia Williams is in sixth position.
3:28 Villeneuve second. Arnoux third. And they’re on their way.
3:34 Only three full laps at the end of this one.
3:44 [After a very long silence] Fourth gear. Up into fifth when they go over the crest of the hill.
3:55 …as they come down to the right-hander at Villeroy.
4:10 …as they go into the right-hander and the left at Sabeliers.
4:38 On lap 78. Round Bretelle.
5:07 Now we’re into the start of the 79th lap and last lap but one with Renè Arnoux second…
5:20 … on the last lap but one.
5:25 DOWN to la Bretelle.
5:52 This is the 79th lap in this 80 lap historic Grand Prix.
6:30 They bang wheels. He’s off. He’s off. And he’s back again. Renè Arnoux of the circuit and then back again.
6:40 Villeneuve goes over the corrugations.
6:46 As they go up to Parabolique in the 80th and last lap. [I haven't included them all, but he mentions that it's the last lap at least five times during the lap.]
6:56 To la Bretelle. 80th. 80th lap in this 80 lap race.
7:09 On the la Combe / Courbe de Pouas section.
7:25 Into the Courbe de Pouas they come [long after they've exited it].

For this great piece of racing, it’s not the greatest piece of commentary. It is not as though there isn’t enough on-track action for him to be talking about and reflecting on. And I was struck by just how many of the traits Legard is so heavily criticised for Walker exhibits in this clip.

He constantly refers to what lap it is. He can’t help but remind us over and over what positions the drivers are in, including at one point a full classification of the top six. And it feels as though half the time he is just saying what corner they’re going through, complete with “down the hills” and “up the hills”. Then there are the “say what you see” moments.

Of course, there are a lot of things in Murray Walker’s defence. Most notably, unlike today’s commentators, Walker is completely on his own. There is no co-commentator to ever save him when he’s lost for words, or to give him a chance to gather his thoughts. There is of course no pit lane reporter feeding him more information. And – this is a guess – but I would assume there was no Mark Hughes-type figure in the commentary box either. The TV pictures aren’t great either. I would guess also that he is doing it from a studio in London?

This was also – correct me if I’m wrong – only the second season where the BBC were covering every grand prix. On the other hand, Murray Walker had been commentating on motor racing for decades, though not with the same sort of intensity that any of today’s big-name commentators would.

I don’t know this, but is it possible that Walker did a lot of radio commentary, hence the “say what you see” moments?

My point is that I think a lot of the criticisms that have been levelled at Legard are very harsh indeed. When you watch a video of Murray Walker in the 1970s, many of the same traits are there. I know Murray isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but he became a massively well-loved household name and is one of the most famous sports commentators in the world. But he wasn’t born a great. It took him time to develop his technique and become the commentator from, say, the late 80s or early 90s that most people remember.

So I say people should perhaps lay off Legard a little. If Murray Walker can bang on about “down the hill” and “round the corner” during a hugely exciting piece of racing, I think we can forgive Legard for a “down the hill” or two during boring moments.

25 comments

End-of-season driver rankings: Top 5

22 December 2008 00:19

Categories: Opinion

The rest of the rankings came fairly easily to me. Perhaps that is because the spotlight is not on the lower positions so much. It doesn’t seem to matter so much whether I place Kazuki Nakajima 15th or 16th.

But the top five is really, really tough to get right. I keep on changing my mind, juggling the positions even as I write this post. Really, the number 1 position could be justified for all of these drivers. To put one of them fifth feels just wrong. But that is what I have to do.

5. Sebastian Vettel (11; 12)

I was very tempted to place Vettel higher than this, perhaps even in 2nd place. In the end, I think the young German still has more to prove before he can be that high. But there can be little doubt that Vettel will climb up these rankings next year.

In many ways, Sebastian Vettel’s first full season is just as impressive as Lewis Hamilton’s. After all, the Toro Rosso, while clearly a handy car in the right circumstances, is no McLaren. Mind you, it was an inauspicious start to the season, which saw him retire from four races on the trot, mostly as a result of accidents. But when the new Toro Rosso chassis started racing, things started to improve. Before long the car was well and truly in the groove, and Vettel rose to the occasion and performed magnificently on occasion.

The highlight was, of course, his unbelievable victory at the Italian Grand Prix. When he grabbed pole position in torrential conditions, it was a clear signal of his talent. But he floored the world by almost flawlessly taking practically a pole-to-flag victory in conditions that were far from easy.

Monza was a high watermark for the promising youngster, and it has to be said there were a few occasions where he didn’t shine nearly so brightly. But consistency will come with experience, and it is surely a matter of ‘when’, not ‘if’, Sebastian Vettel finds himself in with a shout of winning the Championship one day. Whether he will achieve that in next year’s Red Bull car is debatable, but there is no doubt that they have a major star on their hands.

4. Felipe Massa (5; 5)

I can scarcely believe that I have had to place a title contender in 4th position. What makes this all the more flabbergasting is the fact that Massa has undoubtedly raised his game, stepped up to the plate and shown that he is capable of performing at the sharp end of the grid more or less throughout the season. Few drivers can have improved their reputation so much in such a short period of time.

After a rather shaky start to the season that raised questions about the Brazilian’s ability to drive without traction control, Massa withstood the pressure and ultimately passed the test as convincingly as he could have.

Strong results at Bahrain, Spain and Turkey were perhaps not expected, but they did little to dissolve the widespread scepticism about his driving abilities. What impressed were his good drives at Monaco, France and Canada, where he pulled off one of the most amazing overtaking manoeuvres I have ever seen — an audacious double-move on Rubens Barrichello and Heikki Kovalainen.

The British Grand Prix was a major disappointment, with a decidedly sluggish pace at the back of the field complemented with no fewer than six spins. This cast doubts on Massa’s abilities in the wet, not helped by another mediocre result in damp Monza. However, in fairness, it appears as though the Ferrari was a particularly poor car for rainy conditions, as Räikkönen wasn’t exactly a star in the wet this year either. Aside from those wet races, Massa’s only other poor results came as a result of Ferrari foul-ups in Hungary and Singapore that cost him a sackful of points.

Massa was a true star of this season. He may not have had a perfect season, but no-one can really say that. His behaviour after the Brazilian Grand Prix was worth a championship in itself, and it is a shame that I am unable to place him higher than 4th.

3. Lewis Hamilton (3; 3)

Well, Lewis Hamilton did it. He won the Drivers’ Championship in only his second year, becoming the youngest ever World Champion. I wouldn’t doubt he deserved it. Overall, Hamilton did a great job this season, and a much more mature, conservative, restrained approach eventually helped deliver the goods — even though it almost looked like it was too conservative until the final corner!

However, a flawless year it was not. A number of lapses in concentration cost Hamilton dearly a few times during the season. There was the infamous crash with Fernando Alonso in Bahrain, when Hamilton got spooked as a result of being in the midfield. He was the main protagonist in the pitlane pile-up in Montreal, when he lost concentration and failed to notice a red light — an almost unforgivable error. Meanwhile, a highly erratic performance at Fuji raised question marks about the Brit’s ability to stay cool under pressure.

However, ultimately Hamilton was able to come up with the goods, and for that you have to take your hat off to him. A particularly strong point of the season was a dominant couple of races at Silverstone and Hockenheim. His drive at the British Grand Prix was among the most dominant I have seen since I started watching F1 in the mid-1990s. Meanwhile, his fightback from a compromised position in Germany as a result of a terrible strategy decision by McLaren was, dare I say it, Schumacher-esque. I wouldn’t say Hamilton is the rounded driver that Schumacher was, but with time that could well come.

2. Robert Kubica (1; 9)

Other drivers may have attracted spectators’ attention with glitzier, showier performances. Hamilton, Alonso and Vettel all shone in flamboyant ways. But Robert Kubica arguably did the most solid job of all the drivers in the entire grid.

Most of the other drivers on the grid also had a tendency to make mistakes. 2008 will be remembered for a lot of things, but flawless drives will not be one of them. However, Robert Kubica made very few mistakes throughout the season. Indeed, I cannot think of any real driver errors by Kubica, except for a spin in treacherous conditions at Silverstone.

In the process, he took a stunning — if slightly lucky — win at Montreal. And despite the fact that the BMW Sauber car clearly fell behind other cars in terms of development as the season went on, the Pole continued to punch above his weight. Most notably, Kubica started the Japanese Grand Prix extremely strongly until Fernando Alonso in the superior Renault car took him during the first round of pitstops.

Of course, at the end of the season the challenge of contending for the Championship proved too much for the Kubica-BMW combination. Fingers will always be pointed at the team’s decision to stop development of the car in order to focus on the 2009 effort. Only time will tell whether that was the right decision or not. But in the meantime, Kubica had a clutch of extremely strong results, but just one win. And even though he was always near the top, he never felt like a real Championship contender.

1. Fernando Alonso (8; 2)

I have long believed that Fernando Alonso is the best driver on the grid since Michael Schumacher retired. Beforehand, I may have been in a minority. People would have been more likely to cite Kimi Räikkönen or, latterly, Lewis Hamilton. However, I believe that the events of 2008 vindicate my belief, despite the fact that in terms of results 2008 was actually comparatively poor for the Spaniard.

The Renault car was clearly pretty poor when the season began. And as it became clear that Renault’s engine was falling behind in terms of development, things became even worse. It was difficult to see where improvement was going to come, and Alonso hit a mid-season slump. This was encapsulated by the fact that his team mate Nelsinho Piquet managed to grab an excellent 2nd place at Hockenheim. At that point, Alonso’s best result had been 4th at an attrition-hit Australian GP.

However, that very race was the turning point of Alonso’s season. From then on, he never finished lower than 4th, with the exception of the European Grand Prix at Valencia where Kazuki Nakajima put paid to his race before he had even completed a lap. In the last eight races of the season, Alonso scored more points than anyone else.

The Renault resurgence was completed with back-to-back wins in Singapore and Fuji. The Singapore victory did have an element of luck to it, but was no less remarkable for it. This was a sign that Renault and Alonso were back on the map. When it was followed up by a fluke-free victory in Fuji, we knew it was for real.

Alonso’s resurgence can partly be put down to Renault’s turnaround. Amazingly, Alonso seems to have avoided Renault’s worst season of recent years, 2007. Dare I say it, Renault are perhaps six tenths faster than last season. But even though the car has improved, Alonso has almost always retained his authority over his team mate Nelsinho Piquet. Alonso beat his “junior” team mate in all 18 qualifying sessions. No other driver on the grid can say that.

What a travesty that Alonso has missed out on the World Championship for two seasons in a row. The new regulations will mix things up a lot, but who is to say that Renault will be particularly disadvantaged? I think Alonso is overdue another title.

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