"Cato Batista" 22/04/2012 21:41:50 ID #154
Another great race, what a fantastic opening of the season we are enjoying. Before we know it there has been a power shift: Red Bull and Vettel were in control (the fourth different winner so far) but surprisingly it was Lotus on their heels with 2 drivers in the podium. After their earlier dominance McLaren and Mercedes faded out of contention. Yes, this is going to be a long and difficult year of forecasting Formula 1 racing.
We have a triple draw between Uwe, Matias and Erik with identical 9 points from golds in 1st-4th & 5th places. Without QF bonus points to account for they will have to take their personal battle to the next Grand Prix in Barcelona to declare a winner in Bahrain.
With popular favorites McLaren out and Lotus with 2 cars in the top 6 our marks were low and very close. Maria, Tim, Santiago and I were next with 7 points with 2 gold scores each. The Results page wasn’t pretty today; you’ll find many colleagues with meagre 3 points and in one case a futility record-braking score of only 2 points! (...say no names)
Eleven members predicted Vettel’s victory, all other votes for first place went to the McLaren drivers; nobody remotely thought of Raikkonen in the points, leave alone as high as his eventual second place, but Grosjean was picked by Rodrigo in 5th and Fredrik and rookie IanMac in 6th. Our best results came from Rosberg in 5th with 10 votes and Webber in 4th with 4 of us. This was the 4th straight 4th by the Australian in 4 races. Ample favorite for 6th place Alonso (15 members) never materialized as we left the 2nd, 3rd and 6th place columns without a single 3-pointer hit. I repeat, we have a long and difficult season a of us. (Isn’t that great?)
Uwe is now building an alarming (for the rest of us) lead in the standings: 38 points. Maria remains second (34) but everybody else is still in the twenty point-range! Champ Ian follows in 28 with the Spanish Armada (Santiago & Manbos) one behind. The battle for fifth comprises no less than six associates in 25 points: Fredrik, Curro, Joe, Lou, Tim & Matias, two points a of Rocco & Fernando. And then comes the basement struggle with only 2 points separating the bottom nine positions: Alberto, Carlos, Erik, Ricardo, Sebastian & me in 22; Ricardo 21 and IanM & Rodrigo, 20. That is 40% of us in the relegation zone!
We have a 3 week break before the next race in Barcelona May 11-13, where we shall see all the teams introducing significant upgrades that will make the field even more competitive. I’m telling you, this is only getting better and better.
Until then
Cheers
Cato