Mirror mirror on the wall... who's the fastest of them all!!!
WORLD champion Fernando Alonso ended a 20-race victory drought for McLaren with an easy win in the Petronas Malaysian F1 Grand Prix at the Sepang F1 Circuit on Sunday 8 April.
Briton Lewis Hamilton provided more cheers for the Mercedes-powered outfit when he took second place ahead of Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen, making him the first rookie in 43 years to clinch two consecutive podium finishes.
Alonso overtook Ferrari pole-sitter Felipe Massa as both cars headed into the first corner and had already built up a healthy lead of more than six seconds after the first 10 laps.
By the time the Spaniard steered his car to the pit wall as he approached the finish line to greet the cheering McLaren crew members, he had wrapped up the race by a margin of 17.557 seconds.
Alonso is the first McLaren winner in the Malaysian GP after Raikkonen in 2003. He is also the first McLaren race-winner since October 2005 when Raikkonen won the Japanese GP.
Hamilton also made things easier for Alonso when he passed both Ferrari cars after coming out of the first corner to move up from fourth on the starting grid to second.
However, Lewis Hamilton took the fastest race lap of the Malaysian Grand Prix on his way to second position behind McLaren-Mercedes team-mate Fernando Alonso. The first ten laps of the Grand Prix saw the rookie driver dropping roughly a second to his team-mate each lap, but with the Ferrari team tripping up, Hamilton was able to use his second set of medium Bridgestone tyres to make full use of the MP4-22 package and recorded his fastest lap of the race immediately after his first stop. That would later ensure that he had the gap to retain the second position.
Out front, lap times were not so important to Alonso who built up a solid cushion early on. The defending champion was able to control the race from the front, but was still the second fastest man in race conditions.
Felipe Massa had a race to forget after a number of errors, as he set the third fastest lap on his way to a disappointing fifth position while Kimi Raikkonen was fourth fastest on his way to third. While Hamilton proved fast after a short fuel at the first stop, Alonso, Massa and Raikkonen all set their fastest laps following the second stop – effectively after the race positions had been fundamentally decided.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but has Raikkonen opted to take the softer ‘medium’ compound mid-race when he was held up by Fisichella, perhaps his late race charge would have been enough to overhaul Hamilton.
Nick Heidfeld was fifth fastest on his way to fourth position while the notables include Giancarlo Fisichella who was just ninth fastest on his way to sixth in the race. Mark Webber struggled for race pace and it is therefore not too surprising he made no progress in the Grand Prix. Against the grain, Red Bull Renault opted for hard tyres at the start and medium tyres at the end allowing the Australian to close, but not pass rival Alex Wurz.
Top 10 fastest lap done...
1 .
L. Hamilton - McLaren Mercedes MP4-22 - 1:36.701(+0.000) Lap 22 2 . F. Alonso - McLaren Mercedes MP4-22 - 1:36.861(+0.160) Lap 42
3 . F. Massa - Ferrari F2007 - 1:37.199(+0.498) Lap 42
4 . K. Raikkonen - Ferrari F2007 - 1:37.228(+0.527) Lap 40
5 . N. Heidfeld - BMW Sauber F1.07 - 1:37.417(+0.716) Lap 55
6 . N. Rosberg - Williams Toyota FW29 - 1:37.704(+1.003) Lap 18
7 . H. Kovalainen - Renault R27 - 1:37.810(+1.109 ) Lap 41
8 . A. Wurz - Williams Toyota FW29 - 1:37.864(+1.163) Lap 19
9 . G. Fisichella - Renault R27 - 1:37.879(+1.178) Lap 44
10 . J. Trulli - Toyota TF107 - 1:38.016(+1.315) Lap 40
Actually, I'm not really a Formula One fan, but this race was really
AWESOME!!!
Sepang International Circuit.... you're standing in the eyez of the world!!
