Abu Dhabi GP 2012 - Race

Ladies and Gentlemen,

It was total domination by Hamilton, he was 3 and a half tenths faster than second place Webber and still had some in reserve. Vettel had brake problems in P3 losing valuable time in preparation for QF,  his RB8 wasn’t the car 'on rails’ of lately on his way to third on the grid (he hit the wall in Q1). Alonso couldn’t improve his personal lap times in any of the final QF sessions to finish seventh, he admitted he couldn’t extract another drop of performance out of the Ferrari. Maldonado made another surprising appearance near the front this time in fourth place just ahead of Raikkonen, the Lotus looking like the3rd best car of the lot.

It was another difficult QF for us to decode: Fredrick was the best of us hitting a 1-2 for 2 points, same as Lou & Tim (1-3), another 9 colleagues pick up single points.

The grid for tomorrow:

HAM  WEB  VET*  MAL  RAI  BUT  ALO  ROS  MAS  GRO  (*see bottom)

If Red Bull introduced 3 stages of upgrades to the RB8 during the last 3 races, Ferrari is now using the parts designed and produced since they shot down their wind tunnel and moved to Toyota’s facility in Cologne:  front wing end plates (introduced in India) and one week later they are testing a new aero package – front wing, turning vanes (vertical pieces between the front wheels and the monocoque) and most importantly, rear wing. The biggest problem with the F2012 is that its rear wing performs below the extra 10kph top speed most cars can achieve under DRS, a huge disadvantage in QF when DRS use is free.  Seventh and ninth on the grid must have been a big disappointing for the Italians.

By all counts Pirelli has missed the intended target of 2 stops to cover the 55 laps race distance. Both compounds are showing little wear and their lap times are very close, Hamilton could have qualified on pole using the medium tyres!  So we can expect a one stopper and similar to India this could be another flat-out not-to-worry-about-preserving tyres kind of GP. The word on the pitlane is that Ferrari and Lotus have the best race pace, but their chances of making positions with an alternative strategy will not work with only one stop. As usual, the start could be the deciding moment, and then there is Maldonado’s potentially erratic behaviour in the thick of the front battle that could decide the outcome. 

No doubt we have another very complicated race to decipher in our hands.

And here go again: Cato  HAM VET  WEB  RAI  ALO BUT

Good luck, enjoy!

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