[Race] The GROAT - Round 1 - 2011 Nürburgring vs 1971 Monza vs 2000 Spa-Francorchamps

[crmalcolm]

2011 Nürburgring (Wikipedia)
At the start of the race, Mark Webber made a slow start from pole position; he 'bogged down' with too low revs, allowing Hamilton to take the lead. The Ferraris were on the inside and outside of Vettel as they approached the first turn, and Alonso managed to get ahead of Vettel. Massa had made another good start but after being on the outside of Vettel at Turn 1, he eventually slipped behind Nico Rosberg into sixth place. Jenson Button had a poor start, slipping down from seventh to tenth in the first lap. Contrastly, Michael Schumacher had another good start moving from tenth to eighth on lap 1. Meanwhile, further back Nick Heidfeld and Paul di Resta made contact and dropped to the back of the field. After that, Hamilton was leading the race from Webber, Alonso, Vettel, Rosberg and Massa. Sutil was in seventh, after a good start, followed by Schumacher, Petrov and Button completing the top 10.

On the fourth lap, Alonso ran wide at Turn 2 getting a wheel on the wet grass, forcing him onto the tarmac. This allowed Vettel to gain third place. Only a few laps later though, Alonso repassed Vettel into Turn 1. Later, on lap 16, Rubens Barrichello suffered an engine failure, however he was able to limp back to the pits.

Heidfeld received a drive-through penalty for causing an avoidable accident with di Resta, but did not have time to serve it. Whilst trying to make progress through the field, he was squeezed off the track by Sébastien Buemi at the chicane and crashed out. Buemi had to pit for new tyres, and was later given a five-place grid penalty at the next race, the Hungarian Grand Prix. Di Resta, fought his way through the field to finish in thirteenth by the end of the race.

Vitaly Petrov was defending very well against Button's McLaren for ninth place; whilst Felipe Massa overtook Rosberg's Mercedes for fifth place after Massa's Ferrari engineer, Rob Smedley, had told him it was necessary for his strategy to work. Button eventually passed Petrov and started closing on Schumacher. Before the first round of pit stops, Hamilton ran wide allowing Webber to come up the inside of him through the final corner. Hamilton instantly dived up the inside on the run down to Turn 1 and repassed Webber.

Vettel spun at Turn 10 putting him eleven seconds behind third placed Fernando Alonso, the first three positions were covered by just three seconds and Vettel was lapping half a second slower than them. At the pit stops, Webber pitted first in an attempt to get the undercut and came out behind Sutil, but managed to work it out, passing Vettel and catching Massa when Hamilton and Alonso pitted at the same time, bringing them just out of the pits as soon as Webber and Massa were braking for turn 1. Massa took the lead ahead of Webber, Hamilton and Alonso with Vettel pitting to ninth place. When Massa pitted he dropped to eighth, just in front of Vettel starting a new battle. After these stops Webber had undercut Hamilton into the lead – leading a race for the first time in the season – with Alonso in third position. During the pit stop phase the two Mercedes cars were closing on Petrov's Renault in the DRS zone leading to the Veedol Chicane. Rosberg passed Petrov on the straight and Schumacher followed him through. Schumacher later spun at exactly the same place as Vettel, falling behind both Sutil and Petrov.

It looked as if Sutil and Button's two-stop strategies were successful as Sutil got ahead of Rosberg in the later pit stops and finished the race in sixth place. Button was also going strong – catching and passing many drivers including Rosberg for sixth at Turn 1 when Rosberg outbraked himself and ran wide. Button, like Sutil, was only passed in the pit-line and not on the track, although his back luck continued from Silverstone and he suffered his second successive mechanical retirement, with a hydraulics failure. Only two laps later, Vitantonio Liuzzi became the fourth and final retirement of the race when his car had an electrical failure.

Towards the front, Massa and Vettel started to move through the field, passing Kobayashi and Petrov. In the second pit-stop phase Webber pitted first, but was lapping slowly after stop struggling to get the new tyres up to temperature. The mechanical grip of Hamilton's McLaren in cold conditions helped him, and he got past Webber in the stops with the opposite effect of the undercut. Webber tried to overtake Hamilton on the outside of Turn 2, Hamilton kept him behind. Alonso was the last to pit, and came out in the lead, but due to his tyres not being at operating temperature, Hamilton made an easy pass at Turn 2 and got past Alonso to retake the lead.

Hamilton was then first to pit for the medium compound tyres and got out in front of Alonso and Webber, he pulled away and took the race victory. All the drivers on three-stop strategies pitted for the primes in the last ten laps – not wanting to go on to the medium compound, which was 1.5 seconds slower per lap than the softer tyres, for too long. The battle between Massa and Vettel for fourth went to the pits on the penultimate lap, Massa had a slower pit stop than Vettel, and Vettel got out in front after he had not been able to pass on track. After the top 3, Vettel, Massa and Sutil completed the top six with Rosberg ahead of Schumacher, Kobayashi, from 17th on the grid, finished in ninth and Petrov completed the points finishers in tenth, ahead of Kobayashi's teammate Sergio Pérez. After the race, Fernando Alonso stopped his Ferrari on the circuit, and got a lift back to parc ferme on the sidepod of Mark Webber's Red Bull.




1971 Monza (www.motorsportmagazine.com)
With Ickx on the front row of the grid, and as far as the general public were concerned, having made fastest practice lap, the crowds really packed the Monza Autodromo on Sunday under a typical Italian sunny sky. From 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. there was a session of extra practice for anyone who wanted it and BRM used it for Siffert to bed in a new engine on P160/02, and Ickx tried the 1970 Ferrari on Firestone tyres, while Stewart tried a super-high fifth gear that would allow him to benefit from any slip-streaming without overstressing the Cosworth engine in his Tyrrell. Also Regazzoni, Cevert, Beuttler, Surtees, Hailwood, Schenken, Hill, Oliver and Peterson all used this extra session, but Amon was content to stay away and take his time over breakfast. During this session Hill had his gearbox seize two gears together and Hailwood’s engine had a persistent misfire, so between 11 a.m. and the 3.30 p.m. starting time Hill’s Brabham had a change of gearbox and Hailwood’s Surtees had an engine replacement using the one taken out of Surtees’ own car during practice, the Team owner having had a new engine installed.

Everyone who practised was on the grid, the line of paired cars stretching a long way down the track, and it was impressive that all but four of the entry had improved on the existing lap record and thirteen of them had improved on last year’s fastest practice lap, so it was obviously going to be quite a dice for the 55 laps, the race distance having been reduced from last year’s 68 laps in accordance with the CSI recommendations, though no-one seemed to know why 320 kilometres were decided as the maximum for a Grand Prix. Twelve-cylinder engines were dominating the scene, with Matra and Ferrari on the front row with two BRMs behind them, and as the cars were assembled on the “dummy grid” it was noticeable that Regazzoni’s Ferrari, 312/2 No. 5 not No. 7 that he recorded his fastest laps with, was well out of line in row four, alongside Stewart.

The twenty-three cars moved forward towards the start-line, Amon and Ickx brought their cars to a stop, engines screamed, the flag dropped and Regazzoni took his Ferrari down the outside of the grid line-up and was in the lead almost before the first row had got their wheels spinning. The grandstands shook with cheers and the whole Autodromo was really buzzing as Regazzoni led the opening lap of the 42nd Italian Grand Prix. There was no need to look down towards the Curva Parabolica to see who was leading at the end of the first lap, the tumult from the crowd spoke for itself, but Siffert had his BRM alongside the Ferrari as they crossed the line, the two Swiss drivers giving no quarter. Stewart was third, Ganley fourth and Peterson fifth, the two starting grid leaders, Amon and Ickx having been swamped by the excited mob behind them, and being sixth and eighth, respectively.

The race was on with a vengeance and Siffert was not going to mess about in second place behind a Ferrari driven by a chap from the “wrong side of the Alps”. Side-by-side they rocketed round the Monza track, the Ferrari leading lap two by half a car’s length, while Peterson was alongside Stewart, moving up to third place in the next lap. The third lap ended with the three “foreign tearaways” almost touching one another in echelon as they crossed the line, the order being Regazzoni, Siffert, Peterson and there was no nonsense about race-tactics, it was “Harry Flatters” for all concerned. On lap four there was a big reshuffle as Peterson took the lead with Stewart following him through into second place, and this pushed Siffert back to third and Regazzoni fourth, but it was all instant stuff for they were nearly touching one another. Ickx was in fifth place, and keeping out of the scrum because he doesn’t like this sort of racing, and Cevert had moved up into seventh place and took sixth place from Ganley on the next lap.

Amon was in trouble with his left front tyre coming up in blisters and dropped back to watch developments so that Gethin soon passed him. Almost unnoticed Marko had brought his BRM into the pits as the engine was not running properly, but he set off again only to have the engine die completely before he could get back to the pits. Equally unnoticed Surtees started lap 4 with his engine blowing up and as he walked back to the pits to sympathetic applause from the crowd he got some consolation when the main bunch of the racers went by to see that Hailwood had the second Surtees TS9 in there with them. For the fifth lap the first five cars kept their positions, as if taking a short breather after the initial rush, but on lap six Regazzoni was past Siffert and into third place and from the back of the field Schenken retired his Brabham at the pits due to the suspension sub-frame under the gearbox breaking and Moser gave up with a broken shock-absorber mounting on the Bellasi.

The leading bunch were lapping at just over 1 min. 26 sec., a speed of close on 150 m.p.h., 185 m.p.h. or more down the back straight, and still with their wheels almost touching one another. The afternoon heat was pretty severe and Ganley’s BRM was running hotter than desirable and Siffert found that when close behind other cars his water temperature was rising unduly, so he dropped back slightly and Cevert moved into fourth place. For a brief moment on lap eight Stewart took the lead but on the next lap Regazzoni got his Ferrari ahead to the delight of the crowds and then Peterson went into the lead again at ten laps, with the average speed now over 150 m.p.h. and on lap eleven Cevert went by Stewart and took third place.

Prize money was being given according to the race position at 13, 26, and 39 laps as well as the finish, and the first bag of lire went to Peterson, while Cevert snatched second place from Regazzoni, who was followed by Stewart, Ickx, Siffert, Ganley, Hailwood, Amon, Gethin, Oliver and Pescarolo, but the last two were out of touch with the draught of the leaders. Galli’s March 711 expired at the pits on this lap with electrical trouble and Jarrier’s March 701 had already been lapped. Nothing was settled among the first four cars and on lap 15 Cevert took the lead, with Stewart behind him and Peterson down to third place and Regazzoni fourth.

Then there came a major change in the order for lckx was clearly in trouble and Hailwood and Ganley went by the Ferrari, while Siffert dropped back dramatically to try and get his water temperature down. On lap 16 only one Tyrrell appeared out of the Curva Parabolica, followed by Peterson’s March and Regazzoni’s Ferrari; it was car number two, Cevert, for his team-leader was coasting down the back straight with a wrecked engine, the super-Cosworth having suffered a major blow-up. Hailwood went by in fourth place, followed by Ganley, Siffert, Amon and Gethin and Ickx was seen heading for the pits, his Ferrari engine having broken itself. Peterson now took the lead again and the cutting and thrusting was all over for a few moments. On lap 18 Regazzoni’s Ferrari engine broke and as the second Ferrari headed for the pits the Italian crowd were not at all pleased, but this let Hailwood take the Surtees into third place, with Ganley, Siffert, Amon, Gethin and Oliver following, while Pescarolo was much further back and on his own, and Hill, Beuttler, Fittipaldi, Bonnier and de Adamich were beginning to wonder where everyone had gone.

Hailwood was obviously getting into the swing of this type of racing and he not only caught Peterson and Cevert but got between them and then in front of them to lead the race on lap 25, a great moment for the ex-World Champion Motorcyclist and an even greater one for John Surtees, also an ex-World Champion motorcyclist, to see his own car in the lead of a Grand Prix. At the same time Siffert’s BRM had recovered its breath and the Swiss opened up again, passed all the young heroes in front of him and took the lead on lap 28.

At the end of the thirtieth lap the BRM, the March, the Tyrrell and the Surtees crossed the line almost side by side, and they very nearly ran right over Bonnier’s old McLaren as they lapped it. Behind them Amon was getting used to the handling of his Matra on its knobbly front tyre and passed Ganley and took fifth place, while Gethin was running in a lonely seventh place. Pescarolo had gone into the pits as his March 711 was swooping about down the straights due to the gearbox bell-housing, on which the rear suspension is mounted, cracking, and Beuttler was having a keen race with Hill down in ninth and tenth places, the lonely orange McLaren of Oliver being in eighth place. Siffert’s revival was short lived for his BRM suddenly got itself jammed in fourth gear and all the leading bunch went past him. There was no way of getting any other gear so poor Siffert had to resign himself going as fast as he could in one gear, easing off on the straights where he should have used fifth gear and stuttering out of the corners where he should have been in third gear.

This put him from the lead back to seventh place, and Cevert and Peterson continued to swap the lead with Hailwood behind them, between them and on lap 35 in front of them, and really enjoying himself leaning heavily on the two young “aces” in the corners. Not that anyone cared very much, de Adamich retired the Alfa-Romeo engined March 711 with trouble in the Alfa-Romeo port. While the three new-boys were playing games up at the front Amon decided it was time he joined in the race, the Matra-Simca being strong and healthy and fast on the straights, merely a bit odd on the right-hand corners, and in one lap he shot from fourth place straight into the lead, which he held from lap 37 to lap 41, with Peterson having a go at him on lap 40 and just failing to lead across the line, and Hailwood leading the Matra on lap 42 for a brief moment.

At 45 laps, with ten to go Amon had showed that the Matra V12 had got the race in the bag in spite of the “bubbly” tyre for though Cevert, Hailwood and Peterson were right with the French car they were not going to get in front of it on speed and power. Ganley still had his BRM in the wake of the leading group but had insufficient power to get in amongst them, his water and oil temperatures running high, but Gethin’s BRM was very healthy and he had been scratching away ever since lap 19 when he got rid of Oliver’s McLaren down in seventh place at that time. Slowly but surely Gethin had worked his way into the draught of Ganley’s car, which was always in the draught of the leading bunch, and he was using a consistent 11,500 r.p.m. in the gears, which was well over the normal limit, but the engine stood it without fuss.

With lap 50 approaching and only five to go the leading group began to flex their muscles for the final punch-up, and in readiness Amon took off his top face-visor which was dirty and oily, in order to see more clearly through the clean one underneath. Unfortunately, both came off and he was left with no face protection at all, and that was all hope of a last minute battle gone for he had to slow down and drop back behind Gethin who was about to pass Ganley. This left Peterson leading once more followed by Cevert and Hailwood as they crossed the line on lap 49, but they were swopping places all the way round the circuit, each one planning and practising his final manoeuvre, hoping the others would not see exactly what was happening.

It was still anyone’s race, and Hailwood led at 51 laps, just as Gethin passed Cevert and on lap 52 Gethin took his BRM into the lead. Poor Amon had fallen right back for in addition to not being able to see properly the Matra V12 engine now began to “hum” as air or vapour-lock affected the fuel-injection system. The battle for the lead was so wide open that happenings at the back of the field went unnoticed, and both Hill and Beuttler retired, the Brabham with another seized gearbox and the March with a broken engine. Throughout the race the Lotus turbine car had been whistling round at the back of the field, not going very well as it lacked power and brakes, but at least it was running through non-stop. Siffert had been lapped by nearly everyone and it says a lot for his tenacity that he kept going in his one gear, when many other drivers would have given up and gone home.

Lap 53 saw Gethin, Peterson and Cevert in echelon in that order as they crossed the line, each certain that they knew the other’s weaknesses in the sprint from the last corner and at the end of lap 54 it was Peterson, Cevert, Hailwood, Gethin. Any one of them could win and if they all made a nonsense on the last lap then Ganley could win, and none of them had ever won a Grand Prix before. It was truly the “dice of the debutants”. Down the back straight on the last lap Cevert led; under braking for the last corner Peterson went into the lead, and out of the corner Gethin was leading and it was all over, the BRM led up the finishing straight, the four of them closely bunched and lapping Bonnier yet again. The BRM got to the line first by mere inches from Peterson’s March, with Cevert’s Tyrrell and Hailwood’s Surtees only a few feet behind, and one had to realise that the 42nd Italian Grand Prix was over in 1 hr. 18 min. 12.6 sec., and the photo-finish was Formula One, not Formula Three or Formula Two or Formula 5000, though it might well have been, except that the average speed was 242.615 k.p.h. (just over 150 m.p.h.). The new generation had arrived with a vengeance.




2000 Spa-Francorchamps (Wikipedia)
The race began before 83,000 spectators at 14:00 local time, with air and track temperatures at 15 °C (59 °F); clouds, but no rain, were predicted for the race. The rain had stopped by the time of the race's start but there was standing water on the track, causing heavy spray and impairing visibility, meant that the event would start behind the safety car following consultation between the drivers and FIA race director Charlie Whiting on the track's condition; all cars except Pedro Diniz' had wet tyres. The race began with a rolling start without a formation lap. During the safety-car period, Diniz spun off; he was passed by Pedro de la Rosa, who received a ten-second stop-go penalty which he served on lap 13. The safety car entered the pit lane after one lap, and the cars were allowed to overtake after crossing the start-finish line. Häkkinen maintained his lead going into the first corner, followed by Trulli, Button, Michael Schumacher and Coulthard. Barrichello overtook Herbert for ninth place at the first turn. At the end of the first racing lap, Diniz dropped to the rear of the field. De la Rosa lost 16th position on lap three after running wide at turn 18, losing two places to Alesi and Verstappen.

Häkkinen began to pull away from Trulli. Although Button tried to pass Trulli on the fourth lap at the Bus Stop chicane, he ran wide and lost third position to Michael Schumacher. On that lap, Alesi was the first driver to pit for dry tyres. By the beginning of the fifth lap Häkkinen increased his lead over Trulli to ten seconds, ahead of Michael Schumacher, Button and Coulthard. Button attempted to overtake Trulli on the outside of the Bus Stop chicane, but left the inside open for Schumacher to pass him for third place. Schumacher then took second place from Trulli at La Source. Button attempted to follow Schumacher down the inside, but Button and Trulli collided. Trulli was sent into a spin, becoming the first retirement of the race. Button lost two positions to Coulthard and Ralf Schumacher in the incident. On the next lap Michael and Ralf Schumacher were the first leaders to pit for dry tyres, as Alesi began setting faster lap times than the front-runners. Häkkinen made a pit stop from the lead on lap seven, followed by Button, and re-emerged ahead of Coulthard to retain the lead. Coulthard made his pit stop on the following lap, re-emerging in ninth position.

All drivers made pit stops by the end of lap nine. The race order was Häkkinen, Michael Schumacher, Ralf Schumacher, Alesi, Button, Villeneuve, Barrichello, Frentzen, Coulthard, Diniz, Herbert, Irvine, Zonta, Salo, Gené, Verstappen, de la Rosa, Heidfeld, Wurz and Mazzacane. During that lap Barrichello overtook Frentzen for seventh, whilst Verstappen and Fisichella collided after Verstappen tried to pass the slowing Benetton at the Bus Stop chicane. Verstappen had front-wing damage, and Fisichella later retired with an electrical problem. By the beginning of lap 13, Michael Schumacher closed his gap from Häkkinen to about 4.6 seconds after four consecutive fastest laps. Later in the lap, Häkkinen touched a damp kerb at Stavelot corner and was sent spinning sideways at high-speed into the grass; Michael Schumacher took the lead. Nick Heidfeld was the race's third retirement when his car developed a mechanical problem during that lap.

Alesi, the first front-runner to make a scheduled pit stop on lap 18, rejoined in tenth. During the next two laps Salo passed Irvine for twelfth, whilst Barrichello made a pit stop from sixth position and came out in eleventh. By lap 22, Michael Schumacher had increased his lead over Häkkinen to eleven seconds. Ralf Schumacher, ten seconds behind Häkkinen, maintained a six-second gap over teammate Button. Michael Schumacher made a pit stop on that lap, emerging in third position. On lap 23 Barrichello passed Herbert for ninth position, and during the next two laps Villeneuve and Ralf Schumacher made pit stops. Button made a pit stop from fourth position on lap 26, and Häkkinen one lap later; Häkkinen was told by his team (on pit boards) to speed up to reduce the gap to Michael Schumacher, who had a heavier fuel load. Button dropped to eighth position, and Häkkinen came out behind Michael Schumacher. Frentzen and Coulthard made their pit stops together on lap 28, with Coulthard emerging ahead of Frentzen. On that lap, Barrichello passed Alesi for sixth position. Barrichello, setting the fastest lap of the race (1 minute, 53.803 seconds on lap 30), had consecutive fastest laps before making his second pit stop on lap 31. However, his car's fuel pressure dropped and he was pushed by marshals into the pit lane. Barrichello and Alesi (who had a similar problem) retired, and Button inherited fourth place. Salo was the final scheduled driver to make a pit stop, on lap 33.

At the end of lap 34, after all scheduled pit stops, the running order was Michael Schumacher, Häkkinen, Ralf Schumacher, Button, Coulthard, Frentzen, Villeneuve, Herbert, Salo, Irvine, Diniz, Zonta, Wurz, Gene, Verstappen, de la Rosa and Mazzacane. During that lap Michael Schumacher's tyres began to degrade, and he ran off the racing line to cool them by driving through water; Häkkinen gradually closed the gap. Coulthard, fifth, passed Button for fourth position on lap 37. Häkkinen tried to pass Michael Schumacher on the inside for the lead on the 40th lap on the approach to Les Combes, (after drafting behind him on the straightaway), but Schumacher blocked him to defend late in the attempt to hold onto his position. The drivers made contact, with Häkkinen receiving minor damage to his front wing from contact with Schumacher's right-rear wheel and forced to slow.

During the following lap, while both competitors were lapping the slower car of Zonta who was driving on the centre of the circuit, Häkkinen steered right onto a damp patch to pass Schumacher for the lead after Schumacher turned left believing there was inadequate space on the right. He kept the lead for the rest of the race, crossing the finish line on lap 44 for his fourth victory of the season, his first in Belgium and the 18th of his Formula One career in a time of 1'28:14.494—an average speed of 129.535 miles per hour (208.466 km/h). Michael Schumacher finished second, 1.1 seconds behind Häkkinen and ahead of Ralf Schumacher in third, Coulthard in fourth, Button in fifth place. Frentzen rounded out the point-scoring positions in sixth. Villeneuve, Herbert, Salo, Irvine and Diniz filled the next five positions. Zonta, Wurz, Gené and Verstappen finished a lap behind the leader, with de la Rosa and Mazzacane the last classified finishers.

[S griffin]

Although Nurburgring 2011 was exciting, I would never put it in the 'classic' race category. Monza 71 was an all out thriller and Spa 2000 involved one of the greatest drives and overtakes of all time, both provided by a Mr M Hakkinen. It's hard to pick between the two because they are both classic in their own right, but I'll go with Monza, it was action all the way