Vettel Wins Malaysia After Losing KERS

One of the main talking points after the hectic Malaysian Grand Prix (aside from the Alonso & Hamilton penalties) was the continuing troubles of Red Bull and their KERS.

On lap 29 we heard Vettel’s engineer Rocky tell him not to use the system any more.  This was after not being able to use the system at all in Australia.  Yet Vettel was still able to win the race at a canter, so how did it affect his lap times?

For comparison, I have compared Vettel’s lap times to those of Button, who finished in second.  This is because Vettel and Button were racing each other directly and also Webber may have also had KERS problems in the race, leaving some uncertainty over his true pace:

Fantasy Racers Canada

So, it’s time for my Fantasy Racers Analysis again.  Canada was a brilliant race – another classic that will be remembered as one of the best races of the season.

This race had everything – overtaking, strategy changes, passionate fans… I think it’s safe to say that Canada has been missed when it was not on the calendar!

Hamilton overtaking Alonso for the lead … yes, you read that correctly

Blunder on the Orient Express

So you’ve probably seen by now that a few drivers had a little scuffle during the Turkish Grand Prix a couple of weeks ago

Now, a lot has been said and written, lines have been drawn, but really nobody has properly explained what happened between the Red Bull and McLaren drivers which led to their respective incidents.  So I thought it would be a perfect reason to extract the data and look at the lap times…

Monaco – Driver Consistency

So… Monaco.  I had to drive and take a train across the country just to make it home in time for the race… but I did, and I plonked myself down on my mate’s couch with his big telly and watched it with a whisky and coconut water in hand and a nice meaty BBQ… Nice!

Fantasy Racers 2010 – Shanghai

That was a really fun race!  It was really great fun today and a classy win by Button.  There was action aplenty and racing through the field – although most of it was artificially caused by rain and Safety Car periods.  It would not have been such a good race had it stayed dry, but hey, if that’s what it takes to get an exciting race in 2010 then so be it.  We probably saw the best race of the year out there today.

Shanghai – Driver Consistency

Wow, what a race!  F1 certainly isn’t boring when you add water, eh?  It was great to see racing all the way through the field – the changeable conditions made for some great strategy calls too…

Shanghai Qualifying Analysis

So qualifying is over for the Chinese Grand Prix.  Not spectacularly exciting, but there was a bit of a mad dash at the end of Q3 for pole.  Red Bull took a one-two again, with Vettel taking the honours this time.  After the clarification about ride height systems and the negative comments directed at Red Bull, they would have found that result rather sweet.  We will see how their race pace is affected tomorrow though…

Fantasy Racers 2010 – Sepang

Note – this post was written the week after the Grand Prix due to the author being on holiday.  For posterity the post was written so that the data may be used in future Analyses…

So we got a full race then.  There was quite a bit of action on the track caused by faster cars coming through the field, so it was an entertaining race.  Finally a win for Red Bull and Vettel after terrible early season reliability.

Fantasy Racers 2010 – Melbourne

Wow!  What a race!  After the dull and boring opening race in Bahrain, we were treated to a spectacular show today.  Right from the first lap it was action aplenty.

Melbourne – Qualifying Analysis

So we move to the second Grand Prix in Australia.  After the let down that was the season opener in Bahrain, many have looked to this Grand Prix to see if the lack of action was due to the circuit or the rules.  I don’t think we’ll see a definitive answer this weekend, but the talk in the paddock seems to have been dominated by the issue…