Team assesments

Brawn (1st: 36 points): Outdone today, but this was largely due to a key characteristic of their car. It is very gentle with tyres, which means that in the wet, it struggles to keep them warm enough. This will provide them with an advantage in changeable conditions (such as a track drying out) and when it is very hot (or more generally, when the super-soft is in use). They still look good for the title, probably both titles. Prediction: CHAMPIONS
Red Bull (2nd: 19.5): Clearly the best car to have in the wet. When conditions were at or near their worst, the Red Bull was 2s per lap faster than anyone else (even Webber, whose visibility wasn't great behind his teammate). Also quick in the dry, which is usually more important for championships, but not as quick as Brawn. I'm unconvinced that they'll make the same progress as others with the rear diffuser, due to their exisiting system not being as suited to its introduction. Prediction: 2nd
Toyota (3rd: 18.5): A poor weekend for them, but Glock showed his strength in the wet, fighting throuhg to 7th. Will certainly win at some point this year, but may get overtaken by the more traditionally leading teams, later in the season. Prediction: 5th
McLaren (4th: 8): Crisis? What crisis? Today's performance will ease the pressure on the team, ahead of their FIA summons next week. Unless the FIA throw the book at them (which would be ridiculous, but not out of character) they are well placed to improve further. Strong development team can probably get them fighting for wins in the second half of the season. Prediction: 3rd
BMW (5th: 4): Should have had a podium in Melbourne, had a podium in Sepang and yet they were nowhere to be seen here in China. Heidfeld's strategy probably didn't help him out - his wet tyres were thoroughly worn out by the end of the race, having gone on during the safety car period at 1/3 distance. Will need to improve, and aren't due to release their new diffuser for a while, yet. Prediction: 6th
Renault (6th: 4): Alonso looked good this weekend, but Piquet was a disaster waiting to happen in the race. Admittedly he didn't have the upgrades that were on Fernando's car, but he must improve, a lot, quickly to keep his seat for the remainder of the season. The team have upgrades coming over the next few races, which should bring them into the fight for podiums. Prediction: 4th
Toro Rosso (7th: 4): Buemi keeps picking up points through great Sunday performances. However, as the other teams improve, that will become harder and harder. Buemi might manage 10 points this season, but Bourdais won't. Prediction: 9th
Williams (8th: 3.5): Having the second or third fastest car at the opening rounds and scoring only 3.5 points shows that it is what you achieve on the day that counts. Now that their rivals will be catching them up, they will struggle to improve on 8th in the table. Nakajima (like Piquet and the Force Indias) has yet to reach the top 8 in any qualifying session (Q1, Q2 or Q3) or the fastest lap rankings, or score a point in a race. His job will come under pressure mid-season, if that doesn't change. Prediction: 8th
Force India (9th: 0): A great shame for Sutil, that he couldn't bring home that 6th place. He'll have other chances, but not many. Unless of course, their Bahrain upgrade is as good as hoped. The team WILL score points this year, but not many and not enough to come 9th. Prediction: 10th
Ferrari (10th: 0): Another weekend and yet again they leave empty hooved. Massa's pace was strong, but reliability is clearly a problem, even without KERS. Raikkonen was fairly anonymous, after his second stop, ending the race 10th. They will come good eventually, but it will amount to damage limitation for the season. Their 2010 cars will carry numbers in double figures. Prediction: 7th

Predictions for the race

Unaccountably, I omitted my post-qualifying predictions from the previous post.

Here goes:

Win: Rubens (outqualified Jenson with more fuel, started better in Malaysia)
2nd: Webber (that Red Bull is quick, even if, fuel adjusted the Brawns were faster in Q3)
3rd: Button (May struggle in the early laps, unless he gets a good start)
4th: Trulli (Mustn't forget those Toyotas, they've been quick in every race)
5th: Alonso (His short 1st stint might help him to a top 5 finish)
6th: Hamilton (Has gained places at every race so far, and more than most/KERS will help)
7th: Heidfeld (Heavily fuelled, may benefit from rain, or else short soft-tyre stint/KERS will help)
8th: Glock (Might just fight his way through the field, as he did in Melbourne)

Hon mensh: Vettel (limited running imply reliability issues), Rosberg (anonymous in qualy, but still has a quick car), Kovaleinen (KERS will help, might last longer than a lap).

A few other points

My pre-race predictions of fuel stops:

Firstly, I can't be judged on those who brought their stops forward for wet tyres, but for the other drivers, I was closer with my guesses than either James Allen or the BBC pre-race show.

Vettel stopped L13 (2 later than Allen and the BBC predictions, 1 earlier than mine).
Rosberg Glock and Sutil stopped on L15 (as Allen predicted, 3 later than BBC, 2 earlier than mine).
Webber stopped L16 (1 later than Allen said, 4 later than the BBC, 1 earlier than my prediction).
Trulli stopped on L17 exactly as I predicted, and he weighed the same as Rosberg, Glock and Webber, so my assesment is reasonable (Glock surely pitted early to prevent both Toyotas stopping on the same lap).
Raikkonen stopped earlier than I imagined, and put on wets, on a dry track. Apparently Ferrari thought the downpour was starting on lap 18.
Button stopped exactly as I predicted, on lap 19, 3 laps later than James Allen's prediction and 4! laps later than the Beeb expected.
Barrichello stopped the following lap, one earlier than I imagined.

Basically, even with the fuel loads published, any guesses about fuel seem subject to a "give or take a couple of laps" degree of inaccuracy.

Last year's leading drivers [2008 points](2009 points so far):
1. Hamilton [98](1)
2. Massa [97](0)
3. Raikkonen [75](0)
4. Kubica [75](0)
5. Alonso [61](4)
6. Heidfeld [60](4)
7. Kovaleinen [53](0)
8. Vettel [35](0)

This only goes to show how different this year's pecking order is. We should allow for the fact that Vettel and Kubica came close to big scores in Melbourne, and that Malaysia was no normal race, but still Brawn have already exceeded their 2008 total (they managed that after one race!)

Malaysia - or Melbourne revisited

So the paddock and press arrive in Sepang, and start talking about the race ahead. Well, almost. As per Formula 1 ritual, they in fact are discussing stewarding decisions from the previous race (both Vettel's grid penalty, and the overturning of Trulli's penalty, without appeal and the disqualification of Hamilton, fo rmisleading the stewards).

Firstly, I'll re-reasses my predictions from the last race. By the previous scoring method (one point for each named driver appearing in top 8, 2 points for any correctly placed) I now score:
Thursday: 5/16 (4 drivers, Alonso correctly placed)
Friday: 6/16 (5 drivers, Alonso correctly placed)
Saturday: 3/16 (3 drivers, none correctly placed).

Now, how about some views on this weekend?

Firstly, the weather. Storms and heavy rain are predicted, and some are anticipating a premature red flag, due to poor visibility (either through the rain, or the darkness after rain delays proceedings). This favours weaker teams, as it reduces the significance of their lesser cars. It also favoured experienced drivers (or those who specialise in the wet, I'll name Button, Barrichello, Vettel, Sutil, Heidfeld and Webber as drivers who have taken advantage of poor conditions before). It should also favour those teams who have experience driving this year's car in the rain (all bar Toro Rosso, Force India and crucially Brawn).

Team-by-team:
Brawn:
Good wet-weather drivers, great tactician (Ross) but no wet weather practise. Hopefully, they'll be able to take advantage of Friday practise to get accustomed to the handling of their car in wet conditions. If it is dry, then the race is theirs. If it is wet, it will probably be theirs anyway.

Toyota:
Now second in the championship thanks to their "3rd and 4th" finish in Melbourne. They have some experience of their car in the wet, and Glock did well in such situations in testing. Should be well placed, and might well match their Melbourne form, barring accident or further penalties.

Renault:
Thrid in championship thanks to Fernando. Will suffer greatly here, but storms may provide Fernando with the chance to put in a virtuoso performance. Nothing else will save them from a zero-point weekend.

Williams:
Showed good pace last weekend, and may be able to take better advantage of it, now that they have put a race weekend behind them. Should score points, assuming they finish, and will almost certainly be in the front 3 rows on the grid.

Toro Rosso:
Joint fourth (technically fifth) in the table after their fortunate double-points finish of last weekend, they will be hoping for an equally chaotic race to further their chances of scoring points. I still feel the team is favourite for 9th place in this year's standings.

Ferrari:
Last year they were atrocious in the wet, but Kimi has performed well before. They will have a very tough weekend ahead of them if they want to score more than a few points. Any less, and there will be outrage in the Italian press.

BMW:
It will be interesting to see whether Heidfeld uses KERS again this weekend. It wasn't all that useful for him last weekend, but might prove crucial in chaotic wet situations. Should put one car in the top 6, and probably both in the top 10 in qualifying. They will also expect points for both cars, supposing again that they finish.

McLaren:
Many eyes will be on them as controversy yet again flies around Lewis and the team. They know that this will be a tough weekend on the track, and today's news won't help them to focus.
However, on a wet track, Lewis can amaze crowds, and stands a good chance of ending on the podium or in the wall. If it is dry, neither car will score.

Red Bull:
Very fast last weekend, I expect one of the cars to be light-fuelled to try and start from the front row (on softs if there is no rain). Both drivers are good in the wet, especially Vettel, so this could be their weekend (a win even, if anything happens to Brawn).

Force India:
With the greatest will in the world, rain, chaos and dodgy stewarding decisions are the only chance Force India have of featuring this weekend.

So, now for my Thursday predictions:

Win - Jenson Button
2nd - Rubens Barrichello
3rd - Sebastian Vettel
4th - Robert Kubica
5th - Lewis Hamiton
6th - Timo Glock
7th - Kimi Raikkonen
8th - Mark Webber

This supposes rain, and accidents wiping out some of: Heidfeld, Massa, Trulli and the Williams cars. Let's see if Friday practise will change my views - I'll let you know tomorrow.

2009 season prospects

This will be my final F1 article of the weekend (they'll recommence on Thursday or Friday, preceding the Malaysian GP next weekend).

I want to take a quick look at each team, to assess how strong they look for the season, based on their strengths and weaknesses in Melbourne.

Brawn GP:
Front row lockout, 1-2 finish. Everything's fine? Well, not quite. Their pit stops were atrocious (costing 5-10 seconds each, above what is normal). Barrichello's anti-stall kicking in on the grid also cost him dearly (well, as it turned out, it didn't cost any points, but it did make his life much harder).
Also, predictions that they'd lap the field were wide of the mark. Jenson was consistently a few seconds ahead of Sebastian Vettel and would have been under great threat from Robert Kubica, had the latter pair not taken each other out towards the end.
This shows that whilst the strongest team on the grid, not everything will go their way this season.

Red Bull:
Strong throughout qualifying with Webber P3 in Q1 and Vettel P3 in both Q2 and Q3. Webber's first corner accident cost him more dearly than anyone else (bar Heikki Kovaleinen) so we should discount his race performance (the only finisher to be lapped). Vettel consistently matched the pace of Jenson Button and would have finished 3rd, if only he'd let Kubica through more easily.
I feel they'll appear on the podium at more than half of this year's races, and probably win one or two races. Webber would dearly love to break his duck (longer than any active driver's other than Heidfeld) and I'll back him to manage it.

BMW:
Kubica didn't follow the same strategy as the Brawns, Williams or Vettel, and so it is hard to make a direct comparison as to potential. However, he was definitely in the mix for a win until the accident, without KERS, so should be considered a threat throughout the season. I'd even tip him as favourite for Sepang.
Heidfeld, in the KERS-equipped BMW suffered more than his teammate inn qualifying (finishing Q2 in 11th place). This might well indicate that the KERS isn't worth the lost ballast distribution, or might indicate nothing more than his inferiority to Kubica. Most likely, is a small mistake that cost a crucial tenth of a second and the critical lap. The field is so close, that such mistakes will be severeely punished, and Heidfeld has never been a strong qualifier, but always a much better racer (his race today was compromised at the first corner, in an incident in which he isn't enitrely without blame - he took a very tight line for someone with 2 cars inside them).
Probably will be fighting Brawn for both championships this season.

Williams:
Rosberg topped all three "meaningless" free practise sessions and set the fastest lap of the race. Strategically, they erred by leaving his final stint to be too long (his middle stint should have been lenthened when it became apparent, early on, how bad the super-softs became after 5 laps). He was also the only driver, other than the Brawns, to appear in the top 8 in every session that counted at all (Q1, Q2, Q3, the race and even fastest lap) so the car is clearly very strong.
Nakajima was overshadowed by his teammate, but, before his accident was running very well with a heavy car. Had he not crashed, he probably would have followed Barrichello closely until the Brazilian's pitstop and possibly got the jump on him throuhg strategy. Presumably he'd have been fuelled for a late splash-and-dash, just like Rubens, so would not have suffered as badly as Rosberg, and might have picked up a podium, given all that happened. However, such specualtions are useful only for passing time. The short version is that he clearly had a similar pace to the leaders, when adjusted for fuel (his car was the heaviest of the frontrunners).
This augurs well for the season, and I believe the team will get plenty of podiums. Their prospects are similar to those of Red Bull.

Toyota:
Qualified 6th and 8th, but started from the pits, due to an "excessively flexible rear wing". Finshed the race 3rd and 5th, demonstrating good tactics, good speed and everything required to be race winners. Trulli's 25 second penalty cost them a podium, but should hide their strength. They are probably only slightly behind Brawn and BMW, and appear justified in their decision to avoid KERS.

Ferrari:
Last year, both Ferraris retired from the Australian GP and yet they won the constructors championship. This year will be harder though. They have a performace deficit to Brawn, but one they can probably catch up once the teams return to Europe. Neither driver excelled today, and were comprehensively outdone by Kubica despite a similar strategy, so they definitely have work to do.
For those reasons, I rank them 6th at the moment, but with every prospect of improving.

McLaren:
Hamilton's 3rd place disguises their clear weakness. In no other session (that counted) did they trouble the top 8 (Q1,2,3, or fastest lap) with either car although Hamilton demonstrated well, the benefits of KERS (although the poor showing of the other KERS cars amply demonstrate the drawbacks).
McLaren are a big team, with massive facilities and the ability to develop greatly during the season, so those points for Hamilton may come in useful at the end of the season. 7th at the moment on performace (by my reckoning) yet a fair bet to end the season in the top 3.

Renault:
The other KERS team also had a poor weekend, masked by a decent result for their world champion (Alonso was promoted to 5th place by Trulli's penalty). Pat Symonds will not be kidding himself that their current 4th place in the constructors' championship is representative. However, this team has always shown itself to be good developers during a season (at least, when Alonso is around) so they too, cannot be discounted from challenging for wins, or at least podiums.
Currently 8th (by my reckoning) but will probably end the season in the top 5. This will, however require a lot of work, and possibly replacing Piquet with an actual racing driver (di Grassi seems to have the heart for it).

Toro Rosso:
One of only two teams to achieve a double points finish (albeit 7th and 8th) but their pace was lacking all weekend, and they will be doing well to reach Q2 at half of the races, and achieve points on more than half a dozen occasions. Buemi impressed today, on his debut, but then again, so did Mark Webber and Markus Winkelhoek. Will spend the season fighting to avoid the back row.

Force India:
Much closer to the field than they were last year, and with the benefit of a little McLaren magic, they may well find themselves in the mix for points several times this season. Sutil finished 9th today, but that will be hard to repeat in less chaotic races. I'd strongly recommend that they mix up their strategies to take advantage of the differences between the tyres this season (and to "do a Piquet" at some stage). Might manage 10-20 points this season, but it will be tough.


Overall:
KERS - didn't show itself to be an advantage this weekend, but it might at other races. We await with baited breath.
Level playing field - does anyone remember the days when cars would be lapped 3 or 4 times in a race, because that will only happen in exxceptional circumstances, this year. This level playing field will force all the big teams to "waste" a set of soft tyres in Q1 far more regularly tahn they would like.
Tyres - the super-softs were a disgrace to the sport this afternoon. Perhaps teams will learn that they are next to useless beyond 5 laps, and adjust their cars and strategies accordingly, but this will certainly add to the unpredictability of races.

F1 - again

To anyone who reads this purely for the Economics... this isn't for you.

Firstly, the grid (with estimated pit lap in brackets):

Front row: Button (20) Barrichello (21)
2nd row: Vettel (18) Kubica (15)
3rd row: Rosberg (18) Massa* (17)
4th row: Raikkonen* (18) Webber (20)
5th row: Heidfeld* (31) Alonso* (27)
6th row: Nakajima (27) Kovaleinen* (31)
7th row: Buemi (25) Piquet* (32)
8th row: Fisichella (30) Sutil (28)
9th row: Bourdais (20) Hamilton*(17) - Hamiton given 5 place penalty for changing gearbox
Back row: Glock (23) Trulli (19) - Toyota cars' times deleted for use of "flexible" rear wings.

*KERS-using cars. Should have an advantage off the line, we'll find out tomorrow how much.

My updated predictions:
Win - Barrichello
2nd - Button
3rd - Kubica
4th - Raikkonen
5th - Heidfeld
6th - Alonso
7th - Vettel
8th - Nakajima

Again, this assumes some failures to finish. Also, it utilises vast amounts of "wishful thinking" - will Rubens ACTUALLY be able to overtake Jenson? Who knows.

Australian GP

I'm officially excited about this race. Found out that the BBC website shows repeats of the practise sessions, so I can über-geekily watch everything. http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsport/formula_one/7967367.stm is the link for the first session (don't ask me how long it will stay live).

I promised further predictions after Friday practise, so here they are:

Win - Rubens Barrichello
2nd - Nico Rosberg
3rd - Timo Glock
4th - Jenson Button
5th - Fernando Alonso
6th - Kimi Raikkonen
7th - Kazuki Nakajima
8th - Lewis Hamilton

This assumes about a dozen people finishing, something going mildly wrong for Jenson and fairly majorly wrong for Kazuki.

Australian GP prediction #1

Before Friday practise, I will here predict the points positions. I intend to publish another set before qualifying (ie tomorrow) and YET another before the race. I also fully expect none of them to be right.

Win - Rubens Barrichello
2nd - Felipe Massa
3rd - Jenson Button
4th - Nick Heidfeld
5th - Fernando Alonso
6th - Lewis Hamilton
7th - Mark Webber
8th - Sebastien Buemi

These assume about 8-10 finishers, and a super-quick Brawn car. Tomorrow's predictions will overreact to testing form, whilst Saturday's will forget about reliability issues, most likely.