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It hasn't been a memorable World Championship for Kimi Raikkonen at the wheel of Ferrari until now. The Maranello car is not competitive, unable to keep up with the two Mercedes, and in the recent Grand Prix races, it has also had to chase the two Red Bulls. While Alonso has somehow managed to reach the podium at least once, the Finn is far from achieving that. So, in Maranello, efforts are focused on closing the gap, at least concerning the teammate, hoping that at Silverstone, for the British Grand Prix, Kimi can find some satisfaction.
"Silverstone is always a nice challenge. It was useful to come to Maranello and talk to my engineers. We know how much we need to improve, and now we are thinking about the next race ahead. Silverstone is a circuit with great tradition, and moreover, you race in front of a knowledgeable audience that continues to support you regardless of the team you race for. The circuit has changed a bit in recent years, but I like it a lot; it has very fast corners and is always a nice challenge. Often it rains, and then everything risks turning into a lottery, but it will be the same for everyone. I can only say that we will try, as always, to do our best".
On Wednesday, July 2, 2014, Kimi Raikkonen meets with Ferrari President Luca Montezemolo and Team Principal Marco Mattiacci before continuing the day with a series of meetings alongside his race engineer Antonio Spagnolo and Technical Director James Allison.
"Various topics were on the agenda, including a discussion on the planned growth program race by race for this season, where Raikkonen provided further useful indications to direct the efforts of the technicians, and a first analysis of the work being done on the 2015 car. Parallel work and the sharing of ideas are particularly important in anticipation of the next season, being able to benefit from a certain regulatory stability to learn as much as possible from the current project and correct any technical deficiencies for the future".
It's not all over yet. In a season highlighting great difficulties for Ferrari, Fernando Alonso refuses to give up. Others are ahead, but the Maranello team will fight to secure a good position in the Constructors' World Championship. The Spaniard, on the eve of the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, expects a competitive Red Bull.
"Because this is a circuit where aerodynamics matter a lot, and they can show all their potential in high-speed corners. I also expect a very strong Williams, given that I don't think Austria was only due to the circuit, and we must continue to improve if we want to gain an advantage over our direct competitors".
Regarding his future after the expiration of the contract with Ferrari, the Spanish driver assures that he doesn't think too long term.
"At this moment, there are other priorities. I want to help the team and score as many points as possible, this weekend and throughout the season. This year in the Constructors' Championship, you can finish second or sixth with extremely narrow margins. If we want to improve for next season, we must do three things. The first is to get points: finishing sixth or seventh could hurt the team for next year, for example, from an economic point of view; the second thing to do is to test, especially on Fridays, components useful for next year; the third is to spend as much time as possible with the team. For this reason, on Sunday evening, I will return to Maranello to work the whole week in the simulator. Now is not the time to relax. This is the time to work because I want to give the team what it expects from me".
Like Felipe Massa, Lewis Hamilton, and Jenson Button, Fernando Alonso also supports the confirmation of the Italian Grand Prix at the historic Monza circuit, after Bernie Ecclestone opened the door to its exclusion from the calendar starting in 2017.
"I think we have to wait and see what happens. I believe Bernie has only answered a question, unofficially. As for us drivers, we cannot decide where to race but only try to offer a good show. Certainly, it's exciting to race on circuits where the stands are full, where there's great passion, and there's a great atmosphere, like Monza, Austria, Spa, and Barcelona".
After the contract expires with Ferrari in 2015, Kimi Raikkonen will leave Formula 1. The Finnish driver announces it himself at Silverstone on Thursday, July 3, 2014, responding to a question about his future:
"How long do you think you'll stay in Maranello? Until my contract expires. At that point, I'll probably stop".
On Friday, July 4, 2014, the two Mercedes are immediately ahead of everyone in the first free practice of the British Grand Prix at Silverstone. The fastest is the German Nico Rosberg, with a time of 1'35"424. The World Championship leader is more than 0.5 seconds ahead of his teammate, Lewis Hamilton. A good start for Fernando Alonso, who sets the third-fastest time, followed by Daniel Ricciardo, Kimi Raikkonen, and Sebastian Vettel. Seventh is Jenson Button, ahead of Daniil Kvyat with Toro Rosso. The top ten is completed by the Frenchman Jean-Éric Vergne with the other Toro Rosso and the Dane Kevin Magnussen with McLaren. The second free practice session of the British Grand Prix also sees the dominance of Mercedes cars. Compared to the morning, however, the best time on the Silverstone circuit is set by Lewis Hamilton, clocking 1'34"508, over 0.2 seconds faster than his teammate, Nico Rosberg. As in the first session, Fernando Alonso sets the third-best time, albeit 0.7 seconds adrift, followed by the Red Bulls of Daniel Ricciardo and Sebastian Vettel. The other Ferrari of Kimi Raikkonen is ninth, with a time of 1’36"554. It's a forgettable start for Williams: Susie Wolff, the first woman on the track in an official session twenty-two years after Giovanna Amati, stops after only four laps due to an oil pressure problem. Shortly after, Felipe Massa hits the barriers after losing control of his car at the exit of turn 15. The Brazilian, who will reach the milestone of 200 Grand Prix races on Sunday, damages the front left part of his Williams and risks missing the second session. Susie Wolff, 31 years old, the wife of Mercedes Team Principal Toto Wolff, replaces Finnish driver Valtteri Bottas at the wheel of Williams in the first practice session.
"It's very frustrating; I had prepared very well and couldn't wait to start. It's tough, but that's how it went. Now I have to wait for the next opportunity".
But you can also win without racing, sometimes. And that's exactly what happened to Susie Wolff, who, as mentioned, is the first woman to get behind the wheel of a Formula 1 car twenty-two years after Giovanna Amati. The precedent is not encouraging: the Italian in 1992 attempted in three different Grand Prix races to qualify for the Sunday race but failed all three times, thus perpetuating the age-old stereotype that women are less suited to driving than men. You can win without racing, it was said. But Susie doesn't think so. Or rather, not entirely.
"The problem is understanding what value we want to give to this possible victory. I, personally, don't race to prove that women can beat men by driving a car. But simply because I like racing, I like the adrenaline, I like lowering the helmet and braking at the last moment, at the exact point where a straight becomes a curve, then I like coming out of that curve and overtaking whoever is in front of me, be it a man or a woman. That's why I race, not for women's rights in motorsport. And for this reason, I cannot consider the finish line that I will cross this morning as a victory: I'm simply doing a test, driving on Friday. If anything, it's a starting point. I might reconsider my position when I participate in a whole race weekend, with practice, qualifying, and the Grand Prix. But a test, no, it cannot be a victory".
It may be, but the moment is still historic. Television stations worldwide, journalists, photographers crowd in front of Williams for hours, the team that has given her this opportunity. Photos and interviews abound, often with brutal questions. The most popular one:
"Is it true that you race because you are recommended?"
The allusion is to her husband, the Austrian Toto Wolff, someone who holds so many roles within Formula 1 as to justify any suspicion and malice. In short, he is the head and shareholder (30%) of Mercedes (the constructor that owns a team and provides engines to three other teams), a shareholder (16%) of Williams, as well as the manager of the driver Valtteri Bottas. People remind her of this, but she remains unfazed:
"I am very proud of my husband. But I am here only because I am fast. When I get in the car, I am alone. And in the end, the only and unequivocal judgment for a driver is the stopwatch. If today I have this opportunity, it's only because one day at the simulator I impressed Frank Williams, who initially didn't want me. And recently, in an unofficial test, I set a better time than Sebastian Vettel. Ask me if being Toto's wife has been an advantage? So be consistent and ask Nico Rosberg if being the son of a world champion has been useful or not. I believe it has. But I also believe that if Nico weren't damn fast, he wouldn't be where he is".
Fast, however, is also the blonde Susie. The times say it, but so do her colleagues.
"I was lucky to race with her a few times in the lower categories, and she was indeed very fast. Sometimes we even shared the podium. I hope she does well in Formula 1 too".
A hope that certainly won't please someone like Susie, who wants to be considered a rival, and therefore feared.
"It will only happen if I manage to get the right opportunity. I give myself two years; if I don't make it, so be it. If I do make it, maybe I'll overturn that damn stereotype, show that in an increasingly technological and less physical sport, the difference between men and women no longer makes sense. But, in that case, it will be only a side effect of my desire to race, not the result of a battle".
Meanwhile, with the World Championship firmly, and somewhat tediously, dominated by Mercedes, Formula 1 stops to watch the Football World Championship. After all, a match like Germany-France doesn't happen every day, and in the paddock, there are four German drivers (Rosberg, Vettel, Hulkenberg, and Sutil) and three French drivers (Vergne, Grosjean, and Bianchi), as well as all the personnel, engineers, technicians, and mechanics of Mercedes and Renault. In short: if there's a place where the European football derby is felt, it's the paddock. Where, on Friday evening, someone even thinks of moving the drivers' meeting a few minutes, as is customary, held at 5:00 p.m., the start time of the Maracanã match. According to what they amusingly tell at Mercedes, the most tense of all seems to be the current leader of the World Championship, Nico Rosberg. He is a big football fan and a decent footballer; before every Grand Prix, he spends hours juggling behind the motorhome. Also, he is a personal friend of many national team players (two of whom he was also involved in a unfortunate road accident with, during a Mercedes event in the German retreat in South Tyrol). Nico tried to ask for an exemption from the drivers' meeting, which, given the particular moment of the season - he is in the midst of the title fight against his teammate Lewis Hamilton - was denied. The same goes for Sebastian Vettel and the other interested drivers who will therefore be able to sit in front of the big screens mounted in their respective motorhomes only after the match has started.
The other side of this frenzy is the composed detachment with which the other European components of the paddock - Italians, English, and Spanish, in short, the disappointed ones - ignore or pretend to ignore the event. Above all, the Englishman Lewis Hamilton shines:
"With England out of the Brazilian World Cup and Murray out of Wimbledon, it will be up to me to represent the country as best I can; I'll do my best".
Perhaps taking advantage of Nico Rosberg's distraction. On Saturday, July 5, 2014, rain characterizes the third and final free practice session of the British Grand Prix. The Mercedes drivers, who dominated the first two sessions on Friday, remain in the pits. Fernando Alonso also decides to stay in the pits watching his colleagues, while Kimi Raikkonen goes out on track to try the intermediate tires, finishing tenth. At the top, therefore, are the Red Bulls with Sebastian Vettel setting the fastest lap in 1'52"522, just ahead of his teammate, Daniel Ricciardo. Following them are Pastor Maldonado, Romain Grosjean, and Adrian Sutil for a top-five marked by Renault. A few hours later, the first qualifying phase is strongly influenced by the presence of rain. The first driver to switch to slick tires is Jenson Button, whose time is canceled for crossing the white line that delimits the track with all four wheels. Shortly after, rain returns to wet the track, eliminating the two Ferrari drivers, the two Williams drivers, and the two Caterham drivers. Adrian Sutil, despite qualifying for the next phase, makes a mistake and gets stuck. In Q2, the rain intensity decreases, and drivers start running on intermediate tires before switching to dry tires in the final stage. In this phase, even Vettel has a time canceled, but the German driver still manages to qualify among the top ten competing for pole position. Esteban Gutiérrez damages the rear of his Sauber, while Pastor Maldonado stops due to an engine failure. In addition to them, the two Marussia drivers and Romain Grosjean are also excluded.
In Q3, Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton immediately take the top two positions after the first attempt. In the second attempt, Lewis Hamilton slows down, considering the track still slippery; thus, Nico Rosberg secures pole position, with four drivers separating the two Mercedes drivers. At the end of the session, the stewards relegate Pastor Maldonado to the back of the grid as the amount of fuel in his Lotus is less than what the regulations allow. The stewards allow both Caterham drivers to start, even though they both posted times higher than 107% of the Q1 leader's time. At the end of the session, one might say: and thank goodness Niki Lauda had sounded the alarm in the days that the Mercedes dominance is coming to an end: today - as usual - the pole position of the British Grand Prix was contested by Nico Rosberg. But the news of the day is another: the disaster for Ferrari. Never, in its history, had the Maranello cars started so far back on the grid. Only due to Maldonado's penalty do the two Ferrari drivers gain a position: Alonso will start sixteenth, Raikkonen eighteenth. A debacle due to the fact that the track was challenging (slightly wet), and rain suddenly arrived, and, it cannot be forgotten, that Ferrari waited too long to go out on track. The concept is explained very well by a racing veteran, Felipe Massa, also out of Q1 with Valtteri Bottas, like the Ferraris:
"We went out at the wrong time. We know it's raining, we know the weather is bad; we can't wait so long to go out on the track. We completely messed up the qualifying".
Massa speaks frankly. He admits the foolishness made in the pits. Alonso, on the other hand, does not and makes an almost philosophical speech:
"If everything goes well, there are only praises for the team, if everything goes wrong, it's a weekend of negative comments. Of course, it's not nice to be nineteenth and twentieth, but tomorrow we'll make a good comeback; there will be many opportunities, especially with such variable weather".
New hope for Ferrari fans? Not really: Alonso is upset because he then immediately says:
"Tomorrow we fight to the maximum to get some points, that's it. That's our situation. On the other hand, if I think that in Austria we had the best race of the year and finished fifth...".
Raikkonen, for his part, only explains that:
"It started raining in the second part of the lap, and we had slicks on".
Yes, but in this way, many fans are faced with a difficult reality, really hard to accept. The team principal of Ferrari, Marco Mattiacci, just before the qualifying session of the British Grand Prix, had explained that they have to work twice as hard as others in all areas. Perhaps at this point, it's not enough: they will have to work three times as hard...
"Of course, there are areas where others are more competitive, where they started investing and focusing much earlier than us. Having said that, we are aware and are putting together a strategy, a plan to close that gap".
Mattiacci also talks about the technical director of the Maranello team, James Allison:
"A very important figure, he is the synthesis man from a technical point of view, he is in charge of the development of the 2015 car, which naturally also involves the daily improvement of the 2014 car. The power unit area, the chassis area, all report to him, so we have clear responsibilities, clear leaders with specific targets. We are strengthening the structure around him, with people who are already within the company because we have many talents, but also by going to the market and looking for specific figures, without chasing exotic or glamorous names because Ferrari has a solid starting base. Today we see where Mercedes is; when they started two or three years ago to build an advantage of one second over the rest of the group. So, there is a lot of work to do. I don't want to give deadlines externally because then frustrations and illusions are created, and these are things that hurt the fans and ourselves. Working for Ferrari and being Ferrari obliges us to be first".
More than in the predictable rain at Silverstone, the new Ferrari of Marco Mattiacci is drowning in the swamp of Italian-made bureaucracy. Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen will start from the back of the grid for the British Grand Prix due to the most Italian of vices, that of entrusting the most important decisions to a cumbersome and heavy system, a web of delays and postponements capable of delaying everything, even the simplest of observations: it's raining. And so, in a situation of complex reading, like the one that was created on Saturday afternoon when the usual blanket of black clouds crowded the Silverstone sky threatening rain at any moment, the minds of the Maranello team got wet. Instead of doing what common sense would suggest (as Nico Rosberg brilliantly explains: "If you don't know what's happening outside, then go out and look"), Ferrari's engineers left Alonso and Raikkonen in the pits and started studying what others were doing (first Kobayashi and then Button), seeking an unlikely inspiration and ending up always copying others' choices, but always late, until, delay after delay, time ran out. At that point, the two drivers were forced to go out, but by then, they were in the worst possible conditions: with dry tires in a downpour. Little personality, little initiative, and a bureaucracy reminiscent of a ministry caused a disastrous performance. Fernando Alonso, now resigned to a season as a supporting actor, explains:
"The big teams have procedures that are too long when it comes to making decisions. I think we need to speed them up if we want things like this not to happen again".
Decidedly less present to himself and less aware of the team's problems, the other driver, Kimi Raikkonen, in trying to explain what happened on the track, finds nothing better than to dust off the most spectral version of himself, already known to fans since 2009, and pretend not to understand the questions that were asked of him, which were quite simple. Why did you decide to take such a risk in Q1 when it was enough to set the sixteenth time to move on to Q2? No response. To find a situation like this, you have to go back to the 2010 Malaysian Grand Prix when, also due to a predicted and misunderstood downpour, Massa and Alonso started in P21 and P19. It was Stefano Domenicali's Ferrari, the same one from which, no later than Friday, Marco Mattiacci, after sixty days of reflective silence, had announced his intention to deviate.
"Today, we pay the price for wrong strategic choices; I want to create discontinuity".
Certainly, in his speech, Mattiacci was talking about long-term strategic choices, certainly not about those of a group of engineers facing a downpour. But it is at least symbolic - as well as ironic - that not even twenty-four hours after those words, his Ferrari finds itself covered in ridicule due to a wrong strategic choice. Marco Mattiacci had also said:
"I want to replace the culture of caution with the culture of risk".
The problem is that you have to be able to afford the culture of risk. On Sunday, July 6, 2014, the weather at the start of the British Grand Prix is dry and sunny with the air temperature between 17 °C and 19 °C and the track temperature from 33 °C to 39 °C; no rain is forecast. The 52-lap race begins before 120.000 people at 1:00 p.m. with Rosberg making a brisk start to hold the lead into Abbey corner. Vettel in second has a slow start and Button and Magnussen pass him. Hamilton moves from sixth to fourth as Massa stalls from 15th. On the Wellington Straight, the rear of Räikkönen's Ferrari F14T car gets loose, and he drives onto the run-off area. He identifies a run-off area without grass to reemerge on the track, rejoining at an angle at 150 mph (240 km/h), causing him to hit a bump on a grass verge and unsettling his car. He is vaulted right at an angle and into the guardrail barrier close to the pillar of an overhead bridge in a 47 g0 (460 m/s2) impact. The Ferrari's right-front tire flies by Chilton, who has to duck his head to avoid being struck; his front wing and front-left brake duct are damaged. Räikkönen ricochets across the track and into the path of Kobayashi and Massa. Kobayashi grazes the front of the Ferrari and veers onto the grass; Massa applies the brakes upon seeing the impact, trying to spin to the right to avoid a T-bone collision. The rear of Massa's car makes contact with the front of Räikkönen's. A track marshal assists Räikkönen, who has hip and heel injuries, out of his car and into an ambulance for transport to the circuit's medical center. The safety car is deployed for a lap until Whiting discovers the barriers are dented and need repair and stops the race. Every driver is directed to stop on the grid. Damage to Massa's rear suspension necessitates his retirement. In the meantime, Chilton incurs a drive-through penalty for entering the pit lane under red flag conditions. Repairs to the barrier prevent the resumption of the race for an hour, five minutes until course workers are finished at 14:05 local time. The race is restarted behind the safety car with the drivers in the positions held before the suspension. Both Red Bulls switch to the hard-compound tires on the grid during the stoppage, and Alonso uses the softer compounds to improve the possibility of making a solitary pit stop by driving on the more durable harder tires later on. Rosberg is first, followed by the McLarens of Button and Magnussen. Bottas overtakes Kvyat at Brooklands corner to move into ninth, and Hamilton begins to challenge Magnussen for third. On lap three, Hamilton draws alongside Magnussen through Woodcote turn and passes him for third entering Copse corner as Magnussen runs off the track.
That same lap, Bottas overtakes Ricciardo on the Hangar Straight for seventh as Alonso passes Gutiérrez for twelfth. During the next lap, Hamilton draws alongside Button and overtakes him on the outside at Brooklands turn for second. Alonso passes Sutil for eleventh before Brooklands corner and then Bianchi for tenth as Hülkenberg loses sixth to Bottas in Stowe turn on the fifth lap. DRS is enabled on lap six. That lap, Alonso uses DRS to pass Kvyat on the outside leaving Woodcote corner and into Luffield turn for ninth. Ricciardo overtakes Hülkenberg at Stowe corner, and the subsequent loss of momentum allows Alonso to get by him around the outside at Vale corner for eighth on lap seven. On lap eight, Alonso uses DRS to pass Hülkenberg on the outside at Brooklands turn after a short battle. Further back, Sutil passes Bianchi for eleventh as Ricciardo battles Hülkenberg for eighth at Luffield turn on lap ten but cannot pass due to the latter's higher straight-line speed. Ricciardo tries again into Stowe corner and succeeds. On the inside at Club turn on the same lap, Gutiérrez attempts to pass Maldonado, who seeks to overtake Bianchi. Gutiérrez hits Maldonado's left-hand side; contact continues through the corner, and Maldonado is launched airborne off Gutiérrez's right-front tire. Gutiérrez gets beached in a gravel trap and retires with rear car damage. The first pit stops for tires occur on lap 11 as Vettel enters the pit lane to try and pass the McLarens; the faster Bottas, behind him, is thus freed to try to catch Magnussen. On the next lap, Ericsson's suspension fails on the Brooklands corner kerb, and he drives to the pit lane to retire. Alonso incurs a five-second stop-and-go penalty on the 13th lap because he is deemed to have been out of position on his grid slot for the restart. By the 14th lap, Bottas has caught Magnussen, and entering Stowe corner, uses his DRS and better speed to pass him on the outside for fourth. Alonso overtakes Magnussen around the outside of Stowe corner for fifth as Ricciardo makes a pit stop for the soft compound tires on lap 15. Two laps later, Bottas passes Button at Stowe turn for third. On that lap, Ricciardo passes Sutil on the approach to Stowe corner for ninth. Rosberg makes his first pit stop from the lead on the 18th lap. Hamilton leads for six laps; the plan is for him to run the middle stint on the hard-compound tires before his own stop at the conclusion of lap 24.
In the meantime, Rosberg begins developing gearbox problems on lap 20. As Alonso battles with Button, a stone lodges in his rear wing slot gap that remains there for the rest of the Grand Prix. He twice oversteers coming through Becketts corner as Ricciardo passes Hülkenberg for eighth. Rosberg has increased his advantage over Hamilton, whose pit stop lasts 1.7 seconds longer than expected as his hard-compound left-rear wheel is slow to install at his pit box, to six seconds. On the 25th lap, Vettel passes Magnussen for sixth at the exit of Luffield turn. Three laps later, Alonso overtakes Hülkenberg through Copse corner for eighth after the former takes his five-second stop-and-go penalty. As Hamilton reduces Rosberg's lead from six to four seconds within three laps on his newer tires, the latter has gear-selection problems. Rosberg attempts to change his gearbox's settings; this does not work as he slows at Village corner, and Hamilton takes the lead on the Wellington Straight on lap 29. Rosberg steers onto the grass down the approach to Becketts corner and retires due to his gearbox. Attention then focuses on the battle for third. Ricciardo's pit stop allows him to change his strategy into a one-stopper, as tire degradation rates are less than during the two Friday practice sessions. Bottas makes his second pit stop on lap 32 and emerges in third behind Vettel. Two laps later, Bottas glimpses space and passes Vettel for second on the Hangar Straight. Vettel immediately makes a second pit stop at the end of the lap. He rejoins ahead of Alonso in fifth place. Alonso twice passes Vettel around the outside at Copse corner during a duel for fifth between laps 35 and 36. On lap 37, Vettel has optimum tire temperature and uses DRS on the Wellington Straight to pass Alonso on the outside under braking. Alonso then goes across the front of Vettel leaving Brooklands corner to retain fifth. Vettel sees space to pass Alonso at Brooklands corner on lap 42, but the latter blocks his pass on the racing line. Three laps later, Vettel turns to the outside of Luffield corner. Although he does not pass Alonso, Vettel enters the straight faster than the former who reacts by turning to the inside past the former Grand Prix pit lane to block him. On the 47th lap, Vettel turns to the outside at Brooklands corner to draw alongside Alonso through Woodcote turn, but Alonso keeps fifth by braking later than him. Vettel is aided by the rear of Alonso's car stepping out into Copse corner and overtakes him on the outside for fifth. Once past, Vettel pulls away from Alonso.
In the meantime, Button draws closer to Ricciardo; he has made a pit stop earlier than the latter, and his two-stop strategy leaves him the faster of the two. Maldonado's exhaust fails on the 51st lap, and he retires at the side of the track at Abbey turn with smoke billowing from the rear of his car. Unchallenged in the final 23 laps, Hamilton achieves his fifth victory of the season, and the 27th of his career to equal three-time World Champion Jackie Stewart's race wins total. Bottas follows 30.135 seconds later in second, and Ricciardo is another 16 seconds behind in third. Button cannot get close enough to pass Ricciardo and finishes fourth. Vettel, Alonso, and Magnussen are in positions five to seven. Hülkenberg holds off Kvyat in ninth to take eighth, and Vergne is tenth. The final finishers are Pérez, Grosjean, Sutil, Bianchi, Kobayashi, Chilton, and Maldonado. Duels, incidents, thrills, and comebacks. The grace of a Sunday in the 80s lights up the British Grand Prix, demonstrating that much of the boredom that usually plagues this poor sport is due to the quality of the tracks where the races take place. Whenever the circuit allows it, Vettel, Alonso, Hamilton, Button, and all the others excel, to the joy of fans and casual spectators. Just as it happened at Silverstone. This does not mean that Mercedes' dominance has been even slightly challenged, on the contrary. Despite the gearbox failure in Nico Rosberg's car, the leader of the World Championship, albeit by only four points, the Anglo-German team returns home aware of being still by far the strongest.
"Well done, Hamilton. I feel sorry for Rosberg; now it will be a war".
These are the words of the non-executive chairman of Mercedes, Niki Lauda, commenting on the internal duel at the Mercedes team after today's result.
"The future will be tougher because the point difference is small. What will I say to the two drivers? I will let them drive as always; it's just harder on my heart. The better one will win".
Meanwhile, Lewis Hamilton tells the Mercedes team, just past the finish line:
"England! Great job. Sorry for yesterday. It was a fantastic race and a super weekend".
And he adds later:
"Now I'm four points behind Rosberg. This weekend once again proves that in Formula One, you should never give up. Yesterday, I didn't think I could do well in the last lap of qualifying; fortunately, today everything went the right way. My family and the many English fans accompanied me on this beautiful day and gave me an extra boost".
This certainty is reinforced by the excellent performance of Valtteri Bottas' Williams, powered by Mercedes, which surprisingly secured second place after a crazy comeback from the fourteenth starting position. The real news is that Lewis Hamilton has finally been able to take advantage of one of the many troubles that have befallen his teammate this season. He won a race without a story. And now that he is so close to his teammate, an exciting second half of the season is looming:
"I sought direct confrontation with Nico. I didn't get it, but I will make sure it happens".
Race number 200 didn't go well for Felipe Massa. Collided by Raikkonen's Ferrari right after the start, he was forced to retire.
"Did Raikkonen ask about me immediately? We drivers care about each other. On the track, we battle, but our health is more important. I'm glad he's okay, I'm okay, and hopefully, we can go to the podium in the next race. We have a competitive car. Bottas in second? He had an incredible race, everything perfect. We are fourth in the championship; it's positive, we could have been even further ahead".
Jenson Button finished the British Grand Prix in fourth place, ahead of Vettel and Alonso but behind, less than a second away, Daniel Ricciardo. The British driver says:
"It wasn't an easy race. We battled for a long time against Ferrari and Red Bull. We made several strides and finished the Grand Prix ahead of a Red Bull and a Ferrari. However, we are not entirely satisfied; it would have been nice to finish on the podium this race. We all strongly wanted at least third place".
In short, the race was exciting for everyone except Ferrari. The Maranello team is now condemned to another transitional season. Having accepted this, all that remains is to try to avoid making as many mistakes as possible. This mission failed miserably for everyone on Saturday but was partially successful for Alonso. The Spanish driver's race was beautiful. Lowering his visor, pretending to have a supercar under him, he started pushing like crazy. Starting from the back of the grid, after a handful of laps, he was already close to Button in sixth place, with whom he battled for about ten laps, often pushing the limits, both his and the track's, which is why he was summoned by the race director. After serving a five-second penalty, taken somewhat shocked and somewhat surprisingly imposed (it happened that at the start, Alonso moved about forty centimeters beyond the white line, a violation that had been forgiven in the past when committed by others), the Spaniard returned to the attack, engaging in a memorable duel with Sebastian Vettel, lasting about ten laps. In the end, he lost, also because his F14T was in terrible shape, but it gave rise to an extraordinary battle.
"I would have finished sixth even if I had started in pole position. Cars with Mercedes engines have such an advantage that we cannot go beyond the sixth position".
It's an unusual Fernando Alonso who faces the press at the end of the race. Serene and resigned. He knows he put on a show, but he also knows that the show was pointless.
"I fought with Vettel, and it was good for sponsors and Formula 1. But while I was doing it, I knew that sooner or later he would pass me. I was going through the perfect storm; I had a problem with the rear wing, and the electrical system had gone. I even called the pits asking if we should retire. They told me no, and right at that moment, Vettel arrived. We started fighting, but we were there, like ripe fruit, ready to fall".
The Spanish driver has no intention of getting into the details of the controversies surrounding his duel with Vettel (Vettel complained about Alonso's excessive defense, while Alonso criticized the fact that the German went off track to enter the DRS zone and activate the movable wing). In a moment like the one Ferrari is going through in the midst of a restructuring phase, every word is misunderstood and amplified. It's not escaping anyone that the Spanish driver and Ferrari's team principal, Marco Mattiacci, contradict each other throughout the afternoon, both on less significant matters (Mattiacci denies that the driver, frustrated by the difficulties of the F14T, ever considered retiring) and more important ones: Alonso claims not to have been involved in the team's revival project. This is denied by Mattiacci, who points out that both the Spaniard and Raikkonen are at the center of the Ferrari project. Meanwhile, the Spaniard simply says:
"How did I notice that Vettel used the DRS where he shouldn't have? We were going slowly, and we had time to notice these things. It was a nice duel. At that moment, the car had an aerodynamic problem; I had asked on the radio if we were retiring due to the rear wing issue. Then we had no more battery charge, and Vettel arrived at that moment; sooner or later, he would have overtaken us".
And Sebastian Vettel responds:
"I think it would be stupid for us to count how many times each of us goes a bit wide. With Alonso, it was a really nice and fair challenge. There were no problems, both regarding trajectories and the use of DRS. There is absolutely no war between me and Fernando. However, at the football level, there is a great rivalry. His Spain exited early; we Germans, on the other hand, are trying to win the World Championship".
Kimi Raikkonen's attitude is completely different. The Finn seems to be in the midst of an existential and technical crisis. After deceiving everyone with an impressive start, he went off track at the fifth corner due to his own fault, resulting in a spectacular and extremely dangerous incident: the car went crazy on the grass and then exploded on an irregularity in the asphalt. Completely out of control, it hit the guardrail head-on at 230 km/h, first and then against Massa's Williams. An impact of 47G from which Raikkonen emerged practically unharmed, with just a few scratches and a bruised ankle. Kimi Raikkonen is fine. After the nasty accident in the first lap of the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, the Finnish driver still feels pain in his left ankle and knee: however, these are just contusions. Raikkonen will be available for the German Grand Prix scheduled for Sunday, July 20, 2014, at Hockenheim, but Ferrari prefers to let him rest during the tests starting on Tuesday, July 8, 2014, at Silverstone. On the first day, test driver Pedro de la Rosa will be on board the F14T, while on Wednesday, replacing Kimi Raikkonen, Jules Bianchi, a driver from the Ferrari Driver Academy currently in Formula 1 with Marussia, will take to the track. Kimi Raikkonen's manager, Steve Roberson, says:
"Raikkonen has some abrasions on his leg and left ankle after the nasty blow suffered after the start of the British Grand Prix with his Ferrari ending against the guardrail barriers. There should be no problems seeing him on the track in the next race".
If on the track for a moment we saw the legendary 70s, with overtakes, comebacks, and thrilling incidents, outside the track, in the British Grand Prix paddock, the 20s are back in fashion. The blame for this second, less pleasant regression is attributed to Mexican Force India driver Sergio Perez. He, amid the comments triggered by the news of the return of a woman, British Susie Wolff, to the Formula 1 cockpit after 22 years, wants to express his opinion:
"Women? They are better in the kitchen".
To be fair, Perez's thoughts would be more complex than that (and somewhat disturbing). On Spanish TV Antena 3, he explains:
"Wolff is an excellent driver, but I would be uncomfortable having a female teammate. Imagine if she beats you... No, it's better for them to stay in the kitchen rather than in the car".
Obviously, his words are harshly contested by half the world; on Twitter (where he has 612.000 followers), Perez was hit by a predictable wave of indignation. So much so that shortly after the statement, he is forced to make an inglorious about-face.
"I want to clarify that I had no intention of offending. My words were distorted (they are actually literal, editor's note) and do not reflect a sexist attitude. However, I realize that my comment was out of place and unacceptable".
Luckily, Susie didn't have much luck on the track. After four laps, her Williams broke down, and she had to get out and walk, causing mockery in the paddock, which, it must be said, does not show excessive sympathy towards her. Just speak a bit off the record with other drivers to be reminded that Susie Wolff has done nothing special in her career to deserve the honor of a test driver position at Williams. She has never won anything in any series, they say, and if she's there now, it's only because she's married to Toto Wolff, head and shareholder of Mercedes (the company that, in addition to owning the eponymous team, provides engines to three other teams) and a 16% shareholder in the aforementioned Williams. In short, the boss of half the circus.
"Is a sport without women more chauvinistic, or is a sport where the only woman is the boss's wife?"
A doubt that Susie is not interested in at all. She wants to drive a Formula 1 car in a Grand Prix and has given herself two years to achieve it. In two weeks in Germany, she will drive for Williams again in a test, hoping that this time the car won't break down. And, in the meantime, she responds to Perez, like a true lady:
"Let it go; he was joking. I read his words the other night while cooking. I can only say that, as my family knows very well, I am much better with the steering wheel than with the stovetop".