IIrina . Kiki . Liza . Mima . Natella . Saffron . Monika . Marina . Olga . Danielle . Luba
Race - (Sunday 27 April) - Kimi Raikkonen confirmed the Montmelo tradition of the pole winner wins by leading from start to finish ahead of his team mate Felipe Massa who never looked like challenging the Finn who snatch second place from the crowd´s favourite Fernando Alonso into the first corner. Behind Lewis Hamilton also made up a place by squeezing on the inside of Robert Kubica. The first lap caused the safety car to be called out on the first lap when Adrian Sutil ( Force India-Ferrari) and Sebastian Vettel (STR-Ferrari) had a coming together. Nelson Picquet (Renault) was also trying very hard, had an off, forcing him into the pits, and putting him well down the field. In his effort to move up the field again he went down the inside of Sebastien Bourdais (STR-Ferrari ) causing his retirement on the spot and Bourdais a lap latter, Bourdais not seeing the Brazilian coming up the inside. (They will have to do something about the current wing mirrors).
Alonso did not come in as early as expected but here on the pit stop Lewis Hamilton managed to overtake the Spaniard. Antony Davidson was the next retirement with the underfinanced Super Aguri (lt us hope they can find a sponsor) followed by Heikki Kovalainen ( McLaren-Mercedes) the Finn ploughed into the tyre barrier at turn nine after something broke on the left-front of his MP4-23, bringing out the safety car for a second time. Nick Heidfeld had to come in for fuel during this period and was penalized with a drive thru and 10 second penalty - (need to change this rule). Rubens Barrichello (Honda) lost a front wing in the pits and retired to be followed by Fernando Alonso whose engine gave up the ghost much to the disappointment of the 132,600 crowd, who gave him a standing ovation. The rest of the race was pretty processional, the only feature being the closeness of the first 4 cars – the winnner Kimi Raikkonen - Felipe Massa Ferrari (+3.2 secs) - Lewis Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes (+4.1 secs) - 4 Robert Kubica BMW Sauber (+5.6 secs) - Mark Webber Red Bull-Renault (+35.9 secs) driving a good race - Jenson Button Honda (+53.0 secs) getting his first World Championship points this season - Kazuki Nakajima Williams-Toyota (+58.2 secs) upholding Williams place after the retirement of Nico Rosberg ahead of the last points finisher, Jarno Trulli Toyota (+59.4 secs )
Practice (Friday 25 April) - Who was driver of the day – Fernando Alonso .( 1m 21.904) who in the closing seconds of took provisional pole, much to everyones surprise, only to have it snatched from him by Kimi Raikkonen.(1m 21.813) The Finn has looked strong all weekend, but in Q1 and Q2 did not look too happy and it seemed as his Felipe Massa .( 1m 22.058) might be the stronger of the two Ferrari drivers. He managed to put his first run together, but could not repeat it in his second run. Robert Kubica (1m 22.065s) had been consistent and was rewarded with 4th fastest time but the surprised Lewis Hamilton (1m 22.096s) was not too happy with his performance and would have preferred to start further up the grid. Team mate Heikki Kovalainen (1m 22.231s) joins his McLaren team mate on the third row, with Mark Webber (1m 22.429s) on row four for Red Bull, alongside Jarno Trulli´s (1m 22.529s) Toyota on. Nick Heidfeld (1m 22.542s) was ninth for BMW Sauber and at one stage did not look in Q2 looked as if he would not get into Q3., changing to the soft compound at the last minute which was worth it was reckoned half a second. Nelson Piquet (1m 22.699s) in just his fourth Grand Prix put the second Renault into the top ten proving that the team has improved and Pat Symonds said after qualifying that the Brazilian was on a different strategy to that of the Spaniard who tomorrow will want to win. Promises to be an exciting start to the race and tomorrow Spain could be jubiliant!
Kimi Raikkonen was fastest this morning (1:20.649) and again this afternoon (1:21.935). This morning it was Felipe Massa, Lewis Hamilton and Robert Kubica chasing him, but this afternoon it was rookie Nelson Piquet (1:22.019) and the crowd´s favourite Fernando Alonso (1:22.032) upseting the form book much to Renault´s delight ahead of Kazuki Nakajima (1:22.172) ahead of his highly rated team mate Nico Rosberg (1:22.266) who could do no better than seventh fastest time. Between the two Williams were the second Ferrari of Felipe Massa (1:22.229) and Mark Webber´s (1:22.238) Red Bull. David Coultard (1:22.289) put the second Red Bull eigth with the two Force India cars of Giancarlo Fisichella (1:22.383) and Adrian Sutil (1:22.548) completing the top ten. Lewis Hamilton this afternoon could finish no better than eleventh with Heikki sixteenth, suffering from mechanical problemsFernando Alonso - "Something strange needs to happen during the race if we want to reach the podium now. Hopefully this will be the first step we need to do during this season to be close to the podium. Sooner or later we need to start improving the car and I think this race will be the first opportunity to see if we are going in the right direction. It is true that every time I come here to my home grand prix I had always the possibility to fight for the pole position and fight for the victory.if not, the podium was a real possibility always. This year I don't think it is a real possibility, just a dream as it was in the first few races.
We had what we were expecting and we are quite happy with the car and the improvement we did. But, as I said, maybe we will not be happy anymore tomorrow when we see the others and they are quick as well.
I think we did a god job and probably the others teams did a good job as well. It is just a matter of which team took the biggest step and we are optimistic we can improve, but we must improve what we did in the first few races.
So let's start from this race.Spanish Grand Prix on ITV
Live qualifying Saturday 26 April 1210-1430 ITV1
Qualifying highlights Sunday 27 April 1030-1130 ITV4
Live race Sunday 27 April 1200-1505 ITV1
Highlights Sunday 27 April 2345-0040 ITV1
Highlights re-run Monday 28 April 1800-1900 ITV4
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