Go Force India

Adrian Sutil’s heroics at the Monaco GP had greatly albeit briefly breathed hope in Force India fans and the teams camp, its all but gone now, the French GP saw them taking the checkered flag 18th and 19th. On this day (actually that day yesterday) Fisichella was the better of two, 18th. To be honest, no body - not the fans, the broadcasting channels/producers, commenters really care for what Force India is doing, having a team named “Force India” (”why force india” “why force india” “why force india”?????!!! :|) has changed nothing in F1, the battles at the sharp end are much more fun whatwith so much going on:

• Massa in great form
• Two new teams becoming competitive; Toyota and BMW
• Then there’s the new twist of Mclaren struggling
• Also, it remains to be seen what the reining world champ Fernando Alonso will be able to do in his home team, Renault.

As far as Force India and its drivers are concerned, its important to understand that they aren’t racing against the other teams really, view it as Fisi and Sutil racing each other and then maybe it’ll be some fun.

Anyway, here are the results of the French GP 2008:

1. Felipe Massa Brazil Ferrari-Ferrari 70 laps 1:31:50.245 –> Winner

2. Kimi Raikkonen Finland Ferrari-Ferrari +17.9

3. Jarno Trulli Italy Toyota-Toyota +28.2

4. Heikki Kovalainen Finland McLaren-Mercedes +28.9

5. Robert Kubica Poland BMW Sauber +30.5

6. Mark Webber Australia Red Bull-Renault +40.3

7. Nelson Piquet Jr Brazil Renault-Renault +41.0

8. Fernando Alonso Spain Renault-Renault +43.3

9. David Coulthard Britain Red Bull-Renault +51.0

10. Lewis Hamilton Britain McLaren-Mercedes +54.5

11. Timo Glock Germany Toyota-Toyota +57.7

12. Sebastian Vettel Germany Toro Rosso-Ferrari +58.0

13. Nick Heidfeld Germany BMW Sauber +62.0

14. Rubens Barrichello Brazil Honda-Honda +1 lap

15. Kazuki Nakajima Japan Williams-Toyota +1 lap

16. Nico Rosberg Germany Williams-Toyota +1 lap

17. Sebastien Bourdais France Toro Rosso-Ferrari +1 lap

18. Giancarlo Fisichella Italy Force India-Ferrari +1 lap

19. Adrian Sutil Germany Force India-Ferrari +1 lap

Rtd. Jenson Button Britain Honda-Honda 16 laps completed

The Monaco GP this week was awesome with all the rain and safety car conditions, cars were stacked close to each other for so much of the race and there were battles going on up and down the grid. And in all of this Sutil was lost somewhere while he was making progress, they only focused on him at the end part of the race.

This is so typical of the coverage of F1 we get. the back markers are ignored every single GP weekend, I mean they are always just showing what the Ferrari’s, the Mclaren’s and what Alonso is doing, the rest of the guys get short changed when it comes to TV coverage. Paradoxically, this also makes the point that if you want to be on TV, you must be at the sharp end, at least Sutil will now understand it; heck everywhere, people were talking about the sad end to his race!! And yet, Force India and the rest of the back markers got little TV time while the Monaco GP, wish the broadcast would be more even in the future and that they try and show all the fights for positions up and down the grid.

Well, the predictions that Alonso was going to rescue the French Renault team and bring them at the forefront again did take some time to come true but eventually they did and it happened on home turf. The Spaniard Fernando Alonso slices in between the two Ferrari’s at p2 just a thousandths of a second between him and first place man Kimi Raikkonen. Felipe Massa was third of course then and as you would guess the first 3 are followed by the Mclarrens and then the rest of the field.

So, the Spanish GP is one race no one should miss, two world champions Kimi Raikkonen & Fernando Alonso starting alongside on row one in Rival teams, I can’t wait for the action tomorrow already

Yesterday’s GP was without doubt the best race in the 2008 season so far for Vijay Mallya’s Force India; Fisichella finished 12th ahead of Lewis Hamilton on 13th but it wasn’t so good for Adrian Sutil who finished 19th on the Grid last of the cars to finish the race. For me the highlight of the race was Giancarlo Fisichella’s duel with Lewis Hamilton and Rubens Barrichelo. The one with Rubens was decided in the pits after the Brazilian driver had failed to pass Fisichella on the track completely. It must have hurt Fisi to loose the position to Rubens with a strategic error like this after keeping Rubens behind him for many many laps.

The one with Hamilton lasted for 3-4 laps somewhere during mid-race. Fisi’s Force India car looked as good as Lewis’s Mclaren corner-to-corner and even on the straights. The Ferrari engines under FI’s hoods could easily match Mclaren’s Mercedes engine out of the corners and on the long straights. I think Fisi was late on the power out of turn 14 which allowed Hamilton to close in on him and then get past finally. I was very very disappointed that Fisichella did not defend more aggressively; he simply let Lewis take the inside racing line and get past!! If he had blocked Lewis, I don’t think Hamilton could have made it around the outside. And to add to the story, Hamilton pitted in a lap or so after he got past Fisi which means that he was on a much lighter fuel tank and he still couldn’t match Fisi’s pace.

Anyway, the normally chilled out Lewis Hamilton was certainly pissed and he let Fisi know this with a hand signal while getting past which I don’t think was nice of him! He was not lapping Fisichella here, he was fighting for position, how could he expect Fisichella to simply move out of the way and let him go?!?! It was great the Hamilton finished Fisichella anyway!