"Cato Batista" 16/04/2012 3:07:05 ID #148
It has taken them 57 years but now Mercedes has a winning Grand Prix car. With their tire problems solved Rosberg was in complete control for his first well deserved victory. Another great race dominated by pit stop strategy and the closest racing I’ve seen in F1. This is pretty exciting, we now have 3 different cars and drivers taking the first 3 events of the year.
Maria Elisa made history too, masterfully trashing all the boys to jump to second in the overall standings. Her 11 points was about double the haul of most of us thanks to gold scores in 3rd- 4rd -5th places. She was 1 point a of Carlos, the only 2 colleagues to score three 3-pointers. They were followed by Fredrik with 9 points and Champ Ian with 8. For the rest of us (except Matias with 7) this was a disaster: 17 of us only scored between 4 and 6 points!
Our expert panel wasn’t surprised by Rosberg’s maiden win: Carlos, Santiago, Lou, Ricky and Ricardo had the German in first. Our favorites to win in China were Button with half our predictions, three for Hamilton and single votes for Webber, Schumacher and Raikkonen. Our best paying positions were Button in 2nd, Hamilton in 3rd and Webber in 4th with 5 picks each. Four of you got 3-pointers for Vettel in 4th, the highest we placed the current Champion. Interesting than half the CFA members expected Alonso to pull another top-six finish; he was included in every position from 3rd to 6th. Our biggest disappointment was old Schummi with 18 of us expecting him to yield points, and the biggest surprise of the day, Grosjean in 6th was brilliantly predicted by Rodrigo.
Uwe carries on his 2011 form to continue to lead the standings thanks mainly to his 2 QF points. Maria is now challenging him 2 points behind (26-24) and she’s 2 a of new 3rd place Ian. Manbos has dropped from 2nd to 4th and seems that Fredrik is recovering his old form and is now tied at 20p with Joe. Things are very tight, there are 4 groups of 3 members separated by one point: Santiago, Curro & Ricky (19); Fernando, Rocco & Tim (18); Alberto, Carlos & Sebastian (17); and Matias, Ricardo & Rodrigo (16). The basement still belongs to me (15), rookie IanM (14) and Erik (13). No panic, long way to go...(talking to myself here)
There will be a Bahrain GP after all so we have a busy week a of us. By now you should have a better idea of how the season will turn out, it is time to choose your 2012 Champion, both drivers and makers, the top 6 places. If you’d submitted your picks already but had changed your mind (like me, not sure about Vettel anymore...) the deadline is this weekend before the race.
Stay tuned, I’ll get back to you on Thursday
Cheers
Cato