[Race] The GROAT - Round 1 - 2015 Hungaroring vs 1978 Scandi Raceway vs 2010 Hockenheimring

[crmalcolm]

2015 Hungaroring
Felipe Massa lined up incorrectly on the grid, causing the start to be aborted and another formation lap to commence. One lap was removed from the race distance and Massa was handed a five-second penalty.

At the start, Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Räikkönen gained the lead off the two Mercedes drivers, taking advantage of the slower starts from Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton. Hamilton ran wide and cut the chicane at turn six and dropped to tenth place. Further back, Nico Hülkenberg made up six places in the opening corners, jumping from eleventh to fifth, while Bottas and Ricciardo touched at the start, sending Ricciardo back to seventh while Bottas led Hülkenberg in fourth place. During the opening laps, Felipe Massa was able to hold Hamilton behind him, while Daniil Kvyat led his teammate Ricciardo through into sixth place on lap eight. Lap ten saw Hamilton overtake Massa for ninth, while Ricciardo edged out Hülkenberg for fifth position. Three laps later, Hamilton moved past Pérez for eighth.

Pit stops started on lap 14, when Bottas and Ricciardo were the first to come in, with Massa following suit a lap later, taking his five-second penalty. By lap 18, the two Ferrari drivers in front were unchallenged by Rosberg behind. Sebastian Vettel set a new fastest lap, being 2.7 seconds in front of his teammate, who was a further seven seconds ahead of Rosberg in third. Räikkönen lost one of his front cameras on lap 19, but did not opt to change his front wing. The same lap, Pastor Maldonado and Sergio Pérez touched going into turn one, with Pérez spinning in the process but being able to continue. Maldonado however was handed a drive-through penalty for causing the collision.

When Lewis Hamilton came into the pit lane on lap 20, he emerged slightly in front of Valtteri Bottas in fifth place. Rosberg made a pit stop for new tyres one lap later, choosing the harder medium compound. The two Ferrari drivers and Daniel Ricciardo followed in the subsequent lap, staying ahead of Rosberg and Hamilton respectively. Meanwhile, Romain Grosjean became the second Lotus driver to be penalised, receiving a five-second penalty for an unsafe release from his pit box. Hamilton was behind Ricciardo in fifth place at this point, who was running the harder compound tyres, eventually passing him on lap 29. By lap 33, Vettel in front was leading teammate Räikkönen by seven seconds, with Rosberg a further twenty seconds adrift. Meanwhile, Hamilton started to gain on his teammate, setting fastest laps to trail him by eight seconds on lap 36.

By lap 42, Kimi Räikkönen started to experience engine problems which turned out to be an issue with his kinetic electrical unit. This led to a loss in power which allowed the lapped Fernando Alonso to overtake him and Nico Rosberg to close in as well. One lap later, Nico Hülkenberg lost his front wing without evident reason. After the race, the kerbs of the Hungaroring were blamed for the malfunction, which sent Hülkenberg into the tyre barriers in turn one. The Virtual Safety Car was deployed, leading to both Mercedes cars pitting instantly, while both Ferrari cars did the same one lap later. By that time, the actual safety car was sent out on track to lead the field through the pit lane while marshals cleaned up pieces of Hülkenberg's front wing that littered the front straight, leading the field until the end of lap 49.

At the restart, Lewis Hamilton came under pressure from Daniel Ricciardo and both cars touched and took damage in turn one, handing Ricciardo the position. Hamilton was given a drive-through penalty for his actions. Meanwhile, Rosberg easily took second place from the troubled Räikkönen, who lost one more spot to Ricciardo just shortly after. Further back, Max Verstappen ran into the back of Bottas, causing Bottas to lose ground while Verstappen moved up to seventh. Nico Rosberg started to gain time on Sebastian Vettel in front, trailing him by 1.2 seconds with 18 laps to go. Kimi Räikkönen went into the pit lane on lap 53 and reset his engine, only to retire for good on lap 57. Sainz joined him three laps later with a fuel pressure issue. Pastor Maldonado was handed two more penalties in the following laps, for speeding in the pit lane and for overtaking behind the safety car. Max Verstappen was also reprimanded with a drive-through penalty for failing "to stay above the required time set by the FIA ECU during the deployment of the safety car".

By lap 63, three drivers were contending for the race victory. Sebastian Vettel was leading compatriot Rosberg by 0.8 seconds with Daniel Ricciardo another 0.7 seconds behind. Meanwhile, Hamilton made up ground and overtook Ericsson and Button to move into eighth place. When Ricciardo tried to overtake Rosberg one lap later, the two collided, clipping the Red Bull's front wing and giving Rosberg a puncture. Both headed to the pit lane, with Ricciardo emerging third, while Rosberg fell back behind Hamilton. Even though Daniil Kvyat was handed a ten-second time penalty for leaving track limits, he held on to second place for his first Formula One podium finish. Lewis Hamilton went past Romain Grosjean for sixth place on lap 67, closing on Fernando Alonso, but was eventually unable to catch him, who scored McLaren's best finish of the season up to that point. The race was also Honda's 350th Grand Prix as an engine supplier and the first time that the renewed partnership with McLaren scored a double points finish.

By winning his first Hungarian Grand Prix, and 41st Grand Prix overall, Vettel matched Ayrton Senna for third-most Formula One career wins. It was Ferrari's first win at the track since Michael Schumacher won in 2004. It was the first time since the 2013 Brazilian Grand Prix that any of the factory Mercedes cars failed to finish on the podium.


1978 Scandinavian Raceway

The 70-lap race was the only race to feature the Brabham BT46B "fan car", with which Niki Lauda took a commanding victory. Riccardo Patrese finished second in an Arrows, with Ronnie Peterson third in a Lotus.

Responsible for the Brabham win was clever thinking by Brabham's Gordon Murray, who was trying to eclipse Colin Chapman's ground effect invention on the Lotus 79, the skirted car that had swept the front row since its debut at Zolder. Center of the new Brabham BT46B concept was a large fan which drew air through the engine water radiator which was mounted horizontally over the engine. The fan also took ground effect to a higher level (at least engineering-wise) by sucking air from under the car, creating a partial vacuum and creating an enormous amount of downforce. The car appeared to contravene a rule which stated that moving aerodynamic devices were not allowed, but Brabham argued that the rules had been worded to ban devices whose primary function was aerodynamic. As the fan also cooled the engine, Brabham claimed that this, not aerodynamics, was its primary function.

Its legality was soon protested, but it was allowed to race, John Watson and Niki Lauda qualifying 2nd and 3rd behind the Lotus 79 of Mario Andretti (the two drivers did this as to not draw attention to the remarkable advantage that the fan would provide, qualifying on full tanks and in the words of Lauda 'doing our best to avoid pole').

At the start Andretti retained the first place, while Lauda got ahead of Watson; on the second lap he was passed by a fast Riccardo Patrese in the Arrows, and on the third he was passed by the other Lotus of Ronnie Peterson too; the Swede also passed Patrese, but had later to back off due to a tyre puncture. The order then remained the same until lap 20, when Watson was forced to retire by a throttle problem.

At the front, Lauda and Andretti were battling for first place, until the American made an error and was forced to let the Austrian through, and eventually dropped out due to a broken valve on his engine. Once a back-marker dropped oil onto the track, the Brabham was in a race of its own, seemingly unaffected by the slippery surface. In Lauda's biography, To Hell And Back, he wrote that, whilst other cars had to reduce speed to drive carefully over the oil, the Brabhams could simply accelerate (as the fan was activated by the gearbox to get around regulations, this meant that higher speed produced much higher grip) through the affected parts of the track. Lauda went on to win by a huge 34.6 seconds despite according to Lauda 'trying not to show how dominant the car really was', followed by Patrese and Peterson in a close finish; the remaining points went to Patrick Tambay, Clay Regazzoni and Emerson Fittipaldi.

After the race, the stewards deemed the car legal. Later, the FIA investigated the car, and corroborated Brabham's claim that the fan's primary effect was to cool the car, meeting the letter, if not the spirit, of the rules. The car was judged to have been legal as raced and the Brabham victory stood, but the car never raced again. It is popularly thought that it was banned, but it was actually voluntarily withdrawn by Brabham. This was arguably done by team owner Bernie Ecclestone to avoid a conflict with the other privately owned teams, whose support he needed. 1978 was the year that Ecclestone became chief executive of the Formula One Constructors' Association and led it through the FISA–FOCA war that would lead to the downfall of FISA and give FOCA the right to negotiate television contracts for the Grands Prix, effectively giving Ecclestone commercial control of Formula One which continued for several decades.


2010 Hockenheimring
The race took place in the afternoon from 14:00 Central European Summer Time (UTC+2). The conditions on the grid were cloudy before the start; there was an air temperature between 21 to 25 °C (70 to 77 °F) with a track temperature ranging from 28 to 35 °C (82 to 95 °F) and no rain was expected. The top ten qualifiers started on the super-soft compound tyre. As the five red lights went out to signal the start of the race, Vettel released his clutch pedal, found that he had poor acceleration driving off his starting position, but avoided stalling his engine. He drove right towards Alonso in an attempt to put the latter towards the pit lane wall heading into the first corner. Alonso was on the racing line and overtook Vettel. However, neither driver took the lead as Massa had made a fast start and passed both drivers around the outside. Button avoided hitting the back of Vettel's car by swerving and braking early for the first corner. Further round, Alguersuari committed to the braking zone late at the turn six hairpin, drove into the rear of his teammate Buemi, which removed Buemi's rear wing and his own front wing, and debris was littered across the track. Hamilton passed Webber for fourth place on the same lap. At the end of the first lap, the order was: Massa, Alonso, Vettel, Hamilton, Webber, Button, Kubica, Schumacher, Rosberg and Kobayashi.

Elsewhere, Force India committed an error when bringing their drivers in early. Liuzzi made contact with Sutil which damaged his front wing. The team had been expecting Liuzzi to pit before Sutil, but the latter was the first to arrive into the team's pit stall. It was only after both drivers had returned to the circuit that the team realised they had accidentally placed Liuzzi's tyres on Sutil's car and Sutil's tyres on Liuzzi's. Buemi was pushed back into his garage and became the race's first retirement with accident damage on the second lap. Hamilton was running close behind Vettel but despite his car's straight-line speed advantage, he was unable to affect an overtaking manoeuvre. Hamilton later dropped further away from Vettel. Trulli became afflicted with an gearbox issue which meant he was unable to select second gear, and his mechanics pushed his Lotus T127 back into his garage where they attempted to rectify the issue without success. Alonso recorded lap times faster than teammate Massa which reduced the gap to 1.1 seconds by the conclusion of lap six. Trulli was released from his garage by his team but drove slowly around the circuit and elected to retire on the next lap.

Massa responded to Alonso's quick pace with his fastest lap time to increase the gap by four-tenths of a second. Button ran wide at the first corner and fell further behind sixth-place driver Webber. Hamilton set a slow time which allowed Webber to close the gap to the former. Vettel became the first driver to make a scheduled pit stop for the hard-compound tyres on the 12th lap, and rejoined in sixth in front of Kubica. It was part of a strategy by Red Bull to place him into clear air in the hopes that he could make up some time on the leading Ferrari cars. Alguersuari drove alongside Yamamoto over the start/finish line and he made a pass for 19th entering the first corner on the same lap. Ferrari responded to Red Bull's decision by bringing Alonso and Massa in for their stops in quick succession, handing the lead to Button. Alonso rejoined ahead of Vettel, and was followed by Webber, but he exited the pit lane among a pack of slower cars and was immediately challenged by Kobayashi. Massa began to struggle with tyre temperatures and locked-up at turn two, and lost the balance of his car at the turn six hairpin.

Alguersuari overtook Glock for the 18th position on lap 17, and started to reduce the gap between himself and Senna. Button, who was still to make a pit stop, set faster lap times than other cars despite being on a worn set of soft-compound tyres. The battle between the two Ferrari drivers allowed Vettel to quickly close the gap. Alguersuari passed di Grassi to move into 16th place on the 21st lap. Alonso and Massa had caught up to slower cars by the same lap, which allowed the former to attempt a pass on the Brazilian by driving on the inside line heading into the turn six hairpin. But Massa held a quicker line leaving the corner which allowed him to defend his position. Alonso attempted to pass again heading into the following turn but backed out of the manoeuvre. He was angry and told his team "This is ridiculous" because he saw Massa placing him in danger of being challenged by both the Red Bull cars; it prompted intense discussion regarding the matter on the Ferrari pit wall. Yamamoto pulled over to the side of the track when his engine cut out on lap 19 while battling with both Force India drivers.

After passing slower cars, Vettel began to resume his battle with the Ferrari drivers. Button made a pit stop on lap 22 and reemerged in fifth position behind his teammate Hamilton. The Ferrari cars began to set faster lap times than the rest of the field as Massa started to pull away from Alonso and held a lead of three seconds over his teammate. Alonso responded to Massa's newfound pace by recording a new fastest lap of the race, a 1:18.075 on lap 28, having backed out to see how fast his car was in clean air, before the two drivers began to trade fastest times over the next three laps. Webber attempted to place pressure on Button in a battle for fifth place, although Button was using a defensive strategy by using his McLaren's straight-line speed advantage. De La Rosa caught up to Hülkenberg and passed him at the turn six hairpin on lap 35. Three laps later, Hamilton was instructed by McLaren to conserve fuel usage in the event they could use an aggressive fuel saving mode towards the end of the race.

By lap 39, Alonso had reduced the time deficit between himself and Massa as the latter was lapping the two Virgin cars. At the start of lap 40, Massa held a 1.2 second lead over Alonso, who in turn, was 5.2 seconds in front of Vettel. Hamilton in fourth place was 18.1 seconds behind, but was maintaining a steady gap to teammate Button in fifth. Webber was told by Red Bull over the radio to increase the gap to Button, because his car was suffering from an issue with its oil consumption, and was told that braking harder into the track's turns would possibly assist in moving some oil around the inside of his car. Petrov made an error which allowed Kobayashi to take advantage but Petrov held off the challenge. A radio transmission from Massa's race engineer Rob Smedley was intercepted on lap 48, with Smedley telling Massa, "OK, so, Fernando (Alonso) is faster than you. Can you confirm you understood that message?" Based on Smedley's tone, commentators surmised that it had been a coded message from engineer to driver telling Massa to move over and allow Alonso through.

Massa was slow to accelerate leaving the turn six hairpin on lap 49, giving Alonso the opening he needed to take the lead. Smedley was later heard apologising to Massa over the radio. De La Rosa made his solitary pit stop of the event for super-soft compound tyres on lap 51. Di Grassi, at turn one on the same lap, hit a kerb damaging his car's rear suspension, which rendered him unable to continue in the race. He was pushed into his garage by his team to retire. Vettel pressured Massa by setting consecutive fastest laps to reduce the time gap between them. Petrov was on course to score one point but was told by his team to shift early into seventh gear on lap 58 otherwise his maximum revolutions per minute would be changed to a lower setting.

De La Rosa attempted to lap Kovalainen around the inside of the second corner on the 60th lap but the two cars made contact. De La Rosa sustained damage to a section of his front wing while Kovalainen drove to his garage and vacated his car to become the Grand Prix's final retirement on lap 61. Vettel continued to push hard in his effort to pass Massa for second place, while Hamilton was told he was no longer required to conserve fuel on the 63rd lap. Button ran wide at the first corner on the penultimate lap of the race but continued in fifth place. Alonso maintained the lead throughout the remainder of the event and crossed the start/finish line on lap 67 to secure the 23rd victory of his Formula One career. Massa finished second 4.1 seconds behind, and Vettel was third. Hamilton secured fourth, with teammate Button in fifth. Webber reduced his pace to finish in sixth place. Kubica, Rosberg, Schumacher and Petrov rounded out the points-scoring positions. Kobayashi, Barrichello, Hülkenberg, De La Rosa, Alguersuari, Liuzzi, Sutil, Glock and Senna were the final classified finishers.