2012 German Grand Prix.

**Swami** · 07-19-2012, 07:29 PM

Hockenheim this weekend for the German Grand Prix and McLaren's upgrade must succeed if they have any chance of title success!

Swami

**Swami** · 07-20-2012, 07:35 PM

German GP: Pastor Maldonado quickest in second practice
By Andrew Benson
Chief F1 writer at Hockenheim Comments (11)
Williams driver Pastor Maldonado was fastest in a wet second practice session at the German Grand Prix.

The Venezuelan, winner of the Spanish GP in May , was 0.088 seconds quicker than Mercedes driver Nico Rosberg, with Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel third.

In the drier, but still rain-hit, first session, Jenson Button headed McLaren team-mate Lewis Hamilton by 0.498secs.

Michael Schumacher crashed his Mercedes coming into the Stadium section in the closing minutes of the second session.

The German legend lost the rear of the car coming through the fast fourth-gear right-hander called the Mobil 1 Kurve and spun across the track into the wall.

"Basically I was not fully concentrated. I was on the radio and I was doing some other changes to the car, and touched the white line. That's it," said seven-time champion Schumacher.

"Cosmetically it looks [like] almost all four corners touched on the barriers, so that's not the nicest way, but the impact wasn't too big."

But he said he was confident of a good weekend.

"It's OK. Any time we've been out, we've been top end."

“Basically I was not fully concentrated. I was on the radio and I was doing some other changes to the car, and touched the white line. That's it”

Michael Schumacher

BBC F1 technical analyst Gary Anderson said: "Last two minutes of the session and probably £200,000 worth of damage, so that will be an expensive night for Mercedes."

In the course of two sessions in tricky conditions, only two other drivers terminally lost their cars.

Toro Rosso's Daniel Ricciardo, in the second session, and Williams reserve driver Valtteri Bottas in the first beached their cars in the gravel after losing control during braking for the Sachs Kurve, the hairpin in the Stadium section.

Hamilton was two seconds off the pace of Button when the track was at its quickest and Anderson said McLaren would have to look at why that was.

Hamilton was also slower than Ferrari's Fernando Alonso, the world championship leader, when running in the wetter conditions towards the end of the session.

The teams were trying out upgrades aimed at improving performance, with greatest attention focused on McLaren and Lotus.

McLaren have introduced redesigned sidepods, aimed at improving airflow over the car and closing the gap in performance that has opened up between them and championship pace-setters Red Bull and Ferrari.

Previous winners
•2011 - Lewis Hamilton
•2010 - Fernando Alonso
•2009 - Mark Webber
•2008 - Lewis Hamilton

Lotus were trying out their own version of the 'double DRS' straight-line speed boosting device pioneered by Mercedes at the start of the season.

Unlike the Mercedes system, the Lotus device does not work by ducting air from the rear wing to stall the front wing.

Instead, there are air intakes around the roll-over bar behind the driver's head and a new central pylon in the middle of the rear wing.

It appears air is taken in through the first, through the car and up the second, stalling the rear wing further and giving an extra boost in straight-line speed.

It is not yet known whether the device is linked to the DRS moveable rear wing system or - as seems more likely - operates when the car is going beyond a certain speed.

The system is being trialled this weekend and the team have not yet decided whether it will be raced.

If it is, it will only be on Kimi Raikkonen's car as it is too much work to fit it on team-mate Romain Grosjean's in time.

As far as McLaren were concerned, Button had said on Thursday that McLaren were optimistic they would be a step forward.

"Here we come with mechanical upgrades, aero upgrades, so hopefully they will work well. I have to believe they will, they're very straightforward, so we should put them on and go faster. It's a pretty good chunk.

Drivers with more than one win at Hockenheim
•4 - Michael Schumacher
•3 - Ayrton Senna, Nelson Piquet
•2 - Gerhard Berger, Nigel Mansell, Alain Prost, Fernando Alonso

"You'd have to say Ferrari and Red Bull are the two who have stepped forward compared to everyone else and I think that's just big updates.

"Ferrari have been consistently fast since Barcelona [in May], where they had a big update and their results have shown that.

"We haven't had a big enough update to be in the mix. Here should be that update and I hope it takes us back to the front."

McLaren sporting director Sam Michael said: "Today is all about testing them and so far it's looking pretty good. We have new sidepods and a few other things under the skin.

"Basically the undercut hugs closer to the car so you're not pushing the air so far out before it gets to the Coke-bottle area. It's just a much nicer solution."

Anderson said: "McLaren are pretty confident in their updates - they have decided to just believe in the wind tunnel."

Mercedes driver Nico Rosberg will drop five places on the grid as a result of a penalty for changing his gearbox. Romain Grosjean of Lotus has the same penalty after changing his after the British Grand Prix.

Swami

**Swami** · 07-21-2012, 06:23 PM

German GP: Fernando Alonso takes pole position at Hockenheim
By Andrew Benson
Chief F1 writer at Hockenheim Comments (53)
Ferrari's Fernando Alonso took pole position in a thrilling wet qualifying session at the German Grand Prix.

Red Bull drivers Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber were second and third fastest, although the Australian will be demoted five places after a penalty.

McLaren drivers Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton qualified seventh and eighth but will start a place higher.

Mercedes' Michael Schumacher was fourth at his home race ahead of Force India's Nico Hulkenberg, also a German.

“We made a good strategy call doing a pit stop in Q3 and having very fresh tyres for the last few minutes and that helped us a lot improve the lap time”

Fernando Alonso

Williams's Pastor Maldonado was sixth, with Force India's Paul di Resta and Lotus's Kimi Raikkonen in ninth and 10th places and the first drivers not to benefit from Webber's penalty for a gearbox change.

Alonso and Ferrari were in imperious form in the wet conditions - the world championship leader did two laps fast enough for pole position and he ended up 0.405 seconds faster than Vettel.

Before the start of the final session, Alonso had said he felt the conditions were too wet for the cars to run.

He said: "It is good to check the circuit conditions and going into Turn 6 it was not easy for anybody.

"There was a lot of aquaplaning and we are doing 180mph there."

He said he felt he might have owed his pole to a decision to come in and fit fresh tyres for two flying laps at the end of the session.

"We made a good strategy call doing a pit stop in Q3 and having very fresh tyres for the last few minutes and that helped us a lot improve the lap time."

Season so far: in numbers
106 - The number of points separating Fernando Alonso from his teammate Felipe Massa. Hamilton leads Button by 42 and Mark Webber is just 16 points ahead of Sebastian Vettel.

Vettel said: "The lap was not completely clean. I think we had the pace to put the car on pole. I think the lap time was possible.

"We have to look at what Fernando said. Maybe that was a better way to do it. We are in the first row which should be good, starting the inside as well so we see what we can do."

At one point in the top 10 shoot-out Vettel was held up behind Webber and he complained on the team radio: "What is Mark doing holding me up?"

Afterwards, he said: "I lost the lap running into him but he had difficulty in these conditions and he probably didn't see me."

Webber said: "It was a very intense, tricky session for the drivers and engineers. It was a challenge for us. Sometimes to be in seventh gear wasn't possible, to use the Kers [power boost] wasn't possible. When you have wheelspin at 180mph it certainly gets your attention.

"But I was happy with my lap, I'm happy to be up here and from eighth we can still have a very good race."

Button complained that McLaren were still having problems getting their wet tyres up to operating temperature, an issue that has afflicted the team all season.

"The thing that really shows it's a weakness we need to improve on is that the pole position guy is three or four seconds ahead so he's obviously getting them [the tyres] working and we're not," he said.

Unlike Alonso, Raikkonen and Button, Hamilton did not come in for a fresh set of wet tyres for a couple of laps at the end of the session.

He had been fastest until three minutes from the end, when he started to slip down the field.

"I'm a bit disappointed with the end result of course," said Hamilton. "But we were looking good in Q1 in the dry and then in Q2 [in the wet] and it was looking OK and then at the end I don't understand how everyone went quite a bit quicker.

"We were a little bit unfortunate. Me and Jenson were the first two out and so we did our last laps first and the track just kept getting better and better.

"I had one lap at the end but I went straight off; it was like driving on ice for us.

"The great thing is we have big DRS down the back straight so hopefully we'll be doing a lot of overtaking [in the race]."

Last five poles at German GP
•2011 - Mark Webber
•2010 - Sebastian Vettel
•2009 - Mark Webber
•2008 - Lewis Hamilton
•2006 - Kimi Raikkonen

Rain hit before the start of second qualifying, leading to a mad scramble for all the drivers to get out and set a time before the conditions deteriorated.

The big losers among the top teams were Ferrari's Felipe Massa, Lotus's Romain Grosjean and Mercedes' Nico Rosberg.

All failed to get into the top 10 shoot-out, which was particularly bad news for Grosjean and Rosberg.

They qualified 15th and 17th but will both drop five further places as a result of penalties for changing their gearboxes.

Sergio Perez also drops five places after stewards ruled that he had impeded other cars in qualifying.

The Sauber driver had qualified 12th, but was found guilty of blocking both Kimi Raikkonen and Fernando Alonso in Q2.

Swami

**Swami** · 07-21-2012, 06:24 PM

Disappointing qualifying - hopefully the race will be better.

Swami

**Mrs. JR Ewing** · 07-21-2012, 10:35 PM

I have my fingers crossed!

**Swami** · 07-22-2012, 09:36 AM

Originally Posted by Mrs. JR Ewing

I have my fingers crossed!

Hopefully toes also!

Swami

**Swami** · 07-22-2012, 01:47 PM

Not good - Alonso wins from Vettel and Button (Hamilton DNF) though Vettel may lose second after a possible illegal overtake.

Swami

**Swami** · 07-22-2012, 06:29 PM

German GP: Fernando Alonso wins tense race at Hockenheim
By Andrew Benson
Chief F1 writer at Hockenheim Ferrari's Fernando Alonso beat Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel and McLaren's Jenson Button in a close fight to win the German Grand Prix.

The Spaniard became the only man to win three times so far this season.

He drove a controlled race and stayed just far enough ahead of his pursuers to maintain the lead.

Continue reading the main story
“Great strategy calls from the team to keep me ahead through the pit stops. I knew it would be a long race to the end”

Fernando Alonso

Button climbed up from sixth on the grid to pass Vettel at the second pit stops but was re-passed with two laps to go.

However, the Englishman was promoted to second place after race stewards gave Vettel a 20-second penalty for his overtake of Button on the penultimate lap.

Lewis Hamilton retired with gearbox damage after running well down the field following an early puncture. But he will not incur any penalty for a gearbox change because of his retirement.

The result extends Alonso's championship lead to 34 points ahead of Red Bull's Mark Webber who had a low-key race to eighth place, never showing any real pace.

Alonso said: "It was tough, not an easy race. Maybe we were not the quickest in dry conditions but we were competitive and it was enough to maintain the lead.

"Great strategy calls from the team to keep me ahead through the pit stops. I knew it would be a long race to the end, with Jenson putting pressure.

"But the car was feeling good on top speed and traction and that was enough to keep the lead into Turn 6, and after that overtaking is not so easy."

Use accessible player and disable flyout menusPuncture leaves Hamilton frustrated
The only consolation for Hamilton on the occasion of his 100th grand prix was that the McLaren showed encouraging pace following a major performance upgrade.

At one stage, Hamilton unlapped himself on Vettel - although not Alonso - as he attempted vainly to recover from his early set-back. A move which angered the double world champion.

Alonso was never very far in front but was always able to stay just far enough ahead of first Vettel and then Button to ensure they could not use their DRS overtaking aids to pass him into the hairpin at Turn 6.

It led to a tense grand prix in which the identity of the winner was always in doubt until Alonso took the chequered flag.

The Ferrari made a lightening start from pole position and although Vettel quickly closed up the initial gap Alonso had built on the first lap, the Spaniard was able to pull clear before their first pit stops to ensure he held the lead into the second stint.

Meanwhile, Button was fighting past Hulkenberg and then Schumacher, to move quietly into third place.

Vettel emerged from his first pit stop five seconds ahead of Button but the McLaren closed remorselessly on the Red Bull and passed the German by making his second stop a lap earlier.

Vettel emerged from the pits to find Button on his outside on the run to Turn 2, and the McLaren easily took the position.

Previous winners
•2011 - Lewis Hamilton
•2010 - Fernando Alonso
•2009 - Mark Webber
•2008 - Lewis Hamilton

Button was rarely more than a second behind Alonso from then until the end of the race but the Ferrari driver was always in control and in the closing laps he stretched away as Button began to lose grip in his rear tyres.

Rather than try to take the lead, Button had to spend the closing laps fighting off a late challenge from Vettel, who passed him at the Turn 6 hairpin on the penultimate lap.

Vettel said: "The pace was there but it was extremely difficult when I was close to Fernando and Jenson we seemed to lose a lot and not be able to stay close enough to try to something under braking.

"I am not entirely happy, it could have been a bit better if it was clean air most of the race but that was not the case. Second place was the best we could get today and I am happy with that."

Button said: "It was a close race and I couldn't quite get Fernando at the end.

"When you are in the middle of three you really have to fight and I was pushing a little bit more in the early part of the stint, whereas when you're in front you can coast a bit in the bits where you don't need to push.

"It was close but Fernando knows as we all do where to use Kers to keep someone behind you. I ran out of steam at the end of the straight and the gap was a little bit too big to get back.

German Grand Prix wins by team
•21 - Ferrari
•9 - Williams
•8 - McLaren

"But it was a fun race and it's nice to be on the podium again. I've had my feeling back the last two races but the pace hasn't been there [in the car], but today it was. We're there or thereabouts at the front, still a little way to go."

Raikkonen provided some exciting racing as he moved up from 10th on the grid.

On the way, Raikkonen engaged in top-class racing with Mercedes driver Michael Schumacher and the Force Indias of Nico Hulkenberg and Paul di Resta.

Schumacher finished seventh behind Sauber drivers Kamui Kobayashi and Sergio Perez. Hulkenberg and Di Resta took the final points positions in ninth and 10th.

Swami