So for the first time since race 5 of the season we have an F1 driver ranking post. While my feelings towards F1 were tempered slightly by the domination of king Vettel and the introduction of DRS it was still generally a good season. Possibly not up there with the last couple but fairly strong. How were the drivers though? Well Hamilton certainly struggled with his style not suiting a DRS / Pirelli tyre world. He made silly mistakes aplenty and looked like a rookie. This is the first season he has been outperformed by a teammate and that saw him slip. Heikki Kovaleinen continues his rise through the rankings. He has worked very well with a teammate not seeming to contribute much and moved Lotus near to the midfield. He deserve a high spot.
So 12 races in how have things changed in my rankings over the past 9 races? The championship battle has gone back and forth between the major drivers but this is about pace against teammates and general ability (plus possibly some deductions based on whininess).
I figure it would make sense to a do an annual F1 driver rankings that my friends can comment on or reply with their own lists. This would also make it possible to have some idea of how drivers are doing from season to season.
2010 rankings (after three races):
1. Sebastien Vettel
2. Lewis Hamilton
3. Fernando Alonso
4. Robert Kubica
5. Felipe Massa
6. Nico Rosberg
7. Jenson Button
8. Adrian Sutil
9. Rubens Barrichello
10. Mark Webber
11. Michael Schumacher
12. Heikki Kovaleinen
13. Nico Hulkenberg
14. Jaime Alguersuari
15. Timo Glock
16. Jarno Trulli
17. Vinatonio Liuzzi
18. Sebastien Buemi
19. Vitaly Petrov
20. Pedro De La Rosa
21. Kamui Kobayashi
22. Bruno Senna
23. Lucas Di Grassi
24. Karun Chandhok
You may or may not know that several months ago my friend Craig and I launched (well almost) our own hosting website. I’ll tell you more about that in another post in the future when we have finished tinkering. Part of that process meant signing up as being self employed, I thought that I’d take the opportunity to earn some extra funds and build websites for people in my spare time. Well the first of those websites has now been launched.
I asked my resident king of sports knowledge (I say king meaning he knows more than me) Trefor Little (aka my dad) to write down the top 5 sporting achievements of 2009. In no particular order then:
England winning the ashes
Andy Murray reaching Number 2 in the world rankings
Jenson Button winning the world championship
Usain Bolt breaking the 100m and 200m world records again
Manny Pacquiao becoming the first man to win seven different titles at seven different weights
Come back on the 4th for his list of the top 5 achievements of the decade. What do you think?
We arrived at the campsite around 3:30 on the Thursday and set up camp. Once this was done we headed off for a walk, we found the perimeter road around the track. We passed the entrance to the track and wandered all the way around the track to Vale which is about 2/3s of the way before finding a gate stopping as getting further… great. We therefore just sauntered back to the campsite for a BBQ
Jenson Button came into Formula One and impressed over his first season in 2000. He didn’t match his teammate but he showed promise and at times like in Spa he shone. For the next season he made the move to a Renault team that was still trying to find its feet in the sport. Over the course of the season he had some good drivers but finished well down on his teammate Giancarlo Fisichella. He stayed with Renault for another season and did better beating Jarno Trulli on points before making the move to BAR at the end of the season being replaced by Fernando Alonso who took the Renault to 55 points in 2003. In 2004 Button got 3rd in the championship with some brilliant drives in a BAR which matched his driving style. He then made the decision to move to Williams. A decision he then decided was not a good move and cancelled his contract before it started losing money to pay his way out.
The FIA last week announced a voluntary budget cap on the F1 teams. In exchange for keeping to a spending limit of £40 million a team gets an engine sans rev limit and some other tweaks that could see them being faster than their non budget capped cousins.
There has since been an outcry from some of the teams saying that they will reevaluate their participation in the series if this rule stays. Today Red Bull, Toyota and Ferrari said that if the rules came in they would leave the series. You also have to feel that Mclaren, BMW and Renault would not be the biggest fans of the new rules if those teams threaten to leave the FIA will take notice.
