EXPAT EXPLOITS 8/8/07

20 May 2013

This week around the globe

Another weekend, another Grand Prix and another completely reliable race for the Red Bull team. In Hungary, for the second race in a row both cars finished without any mechanical woes although this time, neither scored any points. Coulthard never really looked likely to do so but Webber fell foul, once again, to bad strategy from the team. It wasn't nearly as bad as that atrocious pit stop call in Canada, but the decision to leave Mark on a three stop strategy when most of his rivals switched to two stop races definitely cost him at least one point, if not two. Webber again out-qualified his team-mate to take 10th place and a spot on the dirty side of the grid. "I'd have been happier to qualify 11th" was his view of the result. After being 7th quickest in the 2nd qualifying session he had hoped that he would have had been a bit further up the grid. The outlook improved over night though when Fisichella was penalised for blocking Yamamoto (why?? - not why was he penalised but why in God's name would you bother?) during qualifying and so lined up 9th on the starting grid and now on the grippier side of the track. He made a fine start, getting past Trulli to end the first lap in eighth place and briefly bounced up to seventh when he passed Alonso who had run wide at the final turn. Alonso soon got back through and Webber ran the rest of the first stint in a solid and safe eighth. This became third for a while during the first pit stop window as he ran a few laps longer but when he stopped, the team turned him around quickly, not changing his three stop strategy as had most of the other teams. This call ended his chances. Through the remaining two stints Webber ran quickly and comfortably in seventh and eighth but had to pit from seventh for a final fuel stop with just 10 laps to go. A stop that dropped him to ninth behind the Renault of Kovalainen, and on a track on which Alonso in a McLaren, who was regularly two seconds faster, could not get past Ralf Schumacher's Toyota, Webber had sod-all chance of getting back into the points. Good to see that they seem to have their reliability issues sorted out but in the end, a wasted opportunity. Heading north to Finland and the 1000 Lakes Rally where Chris Atkinson’s Subaru team-mate, and former champ Petter Solberg had yet another retirement. Poor Petter actually looked scared from the cars handling and this time at least, was probably happy that his rally ended early. Chris Atkinson, on the other hand, started beautifully. He won the First stadium stage and then ran consistently in fourth place, increasing his lead over Petter's brother Henning with each stage. True, he also lost time to the three leaders on each stage but when those three are Loeb, Gronholm and "hairy" Hirvonen this is no disgrace. If you are wondering about the "hairy" nickname, just check out the footage of his sideways moment on day two. How he didn't roll beggars belief. On the final day Chris extended his lead over fifth place Henning Solberg through three blindingly fast stages and equalled his best finish this year to take fourth. This leaves him in seventh place in the championship with 20 points, just six behind team-mate Petter Solberg and only eight away from 4th place. Meanwhile over at Brands Hatch the Superbike boys were in action. Race one was dominated by James Toseland, but behind him was all sorts of fun. For the first few laps there was a fine squabble between Haga, Corser and Pole man Bayliss until the latter lost the front end trying to out brake Corser into Druids. After being taken out in the last round in Brno by Muggeridge, this was another blow to Bayliss's title hopes. The first three then settled down to a fairly steady pace each separated by about a second. Behind them was a fine duel between the two Suzuki lads until Kagayama lost it in a big way at Clearways leaving Biaggi in forth. This became third, and Corser moved into second when "Nitro Nori" Haga'd himself going off the road at the exit of Surtees and dropping well down the field before fighting back to seventh. Series returnee Steve Martin finished 11th on his Yamaha while Muggeridge was classified 19th, two laps down on his Honda. Broc Parkes turned things around for Australia by winning the Super Sports race on his Yamaha taking the lead after pressuring Craig Jones into dropping it at Clearways on lap 5. Parkes was then untroubled to the finish. Josh Brookes on the other hand retired after starting back in 15th. Race two of the Superbikes was another easy win for Toseland with the best of the Aussies, again Troy Corser finishing just behind his team-mate, Nitro Nori, in third. Bayliss had another troubled race slipping back to seventh by the finish. Muggeridge managed to finish this time, but back down in 14th and Martin could only manage 16th. This has effectively ended any chance of an Australian champion this year with Bayliss now lying fourth, 97 points in arrears with just six races to go. Corser lies fifth another 31 point back.