NewsOnF1 - The Real Race - Round 5

That bit of the predictions came true. After that things moved a little away from the script. Barcelona doesn’t like Williams BMW. Williams BMW are not fast in Spain. If you can accept a gap of only a second to Schumacher senior then they have changed that. Williams BMW weren’t fast in Spain until today’s real race.

Maybe it is written into his contract. Kimi has to start from 5th?

Button got an excellent 6th with Trulli 9th and 1/3 of a second behind him. I don’t read too much into Trulli’s performance. He has been consistently slow over all practice sessions and only got up to the middle order on his final run. I suspect that it was a heroic effort that got him there fighting a car that hasn’t performed over the two days.

Coulthard 7th. Heidfeld in a very credible 8th and Frentzen, surprising even me (I had suggested he would be fast!), coming in 10th and ½ second plus faster than an Arrows is supposed to be. I guess somebody forgot to tell him and Bernoldi that the Arrows is not competitive and that Cosworth engines suck. Ohh no, that’s right, it’s not the engine; it’s the Jaguars aerodynamics fault now, isn’t it Eddie?

Jacques answered the question about his motivation, scoring 16th place only 0.4 seconds behind Panis (13th). Jacques should at least be happy that Eddie Jordan hired Sato, it ensured he wasn’t the worst Bridgestone performer out there.

The Toyota’s were where we expected them to be and Alex did manage to qualify and if he finishes tomorrow, given his pace, he shouldn’t be more than 6-7 laps down at the finish.

There were some Heroes today, Webber (again) performed superbly after losing a lot of set-up time in practice. Button put in only 7 of his allocated 12 laps and came very close to tipping Raikkonen out of 5th spot. Frentzen put Arrows back on the table and Fisichella showed that there is life in the Honda engine after all.

Michael stole pole from a very fast Barrichello in the dying moments at San Marino and did it again here. Even his prodigious luck can’t last and I believe we will see Rubens in P1 very soon.

Frentzen, Webber and Salo all maintained their perfect records and have gone to 5 from 5. Mechanical issues aside I don't see Frentzen being challenged all year, which is not a criticism of Bernoldi who I think will make it as a driver. Salo is also safe and Webber could probably push a broken car around the track fast enough to keep his records intact.

The Spanish GP 'Also Ran' Award.

The Also Ran Award for Barcelona goes to a consummate professional. Few drivers can equal Eddie Irvine’s polished performance in explaining why they didn’t do better. Only one can combine that talent with (the old) Rubens Barrichello’s abilities at self-delusion and convince himself that he is the best driver in the team. These combine to allow him to mix his aspirations and capabilities up and feel he is still World Championship material despite falling 0.15 seconds behind his opponent (again!)

No, dummy, I’m not awarding the award this race to JPM (who was once again battling with MS for an award 5 minutes before the end of the real race!).

Today’s Also Ran award goes to a man who has shown his worth over most of the season, convincing winning the weather lottery in Melbourne then at best just topping his opponent (by .03 seconds) once since then. The Spanish GP Also Ran Award is proudly presented to David Coulthard, a proud support driver to both of McLaren’s Flying Finn’s and in the best tradition of the current crop of Scottish drivers, a worthy recipient of all the accolades due the second best driver in the team.

The Spanish GP Qualifying Heroes

1. Mark Webber, 2. Giancarlo Fisichella, 3. Heinz Harald Frentzen

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The Real Race - Drivers Standings - Round 5

Grid	Driver	Car	Team	Wins	Losses	Best	QualiPoints
1	M. Schumacher	1	Ferrari (B)	4	1	1	42
2	R. Barrichello	2	Ferrari (B)	1	4	1	26
3	R. Schumacher	5	BMW WilliamsF1 (M)	3	2	3	19
4	JP. Montoya	6	BMW WilliamsF1 (M)	2	3	1	23
5	K. Raikkonen	4	McLaren Mercedes (M)	3	2	5	10
6	J. Button	15	Renault (M)	2	3	6	1
7	D. Coulthard	3	McLaren Mercedes (M)	2	3	4	8
8	N. Heidfeld	7	Sauber Petronas (B)	4	1	7
9	J. Trulli	14	Renault (M)	3	2	6	1
10	H. Frentzen	20	Arrows Cosworth (B)	5	0	10
11	F. Massa	8	Sauber Petronas (B)	1	4	9
12	G. Fisichella	9	Jordan Honda (B)	3	1	8
13	O. Panis	12	BAR Honda (B)	2	3	12
14	E. Bernoldi	21	Arrows Cosworth (B)	0	5	14
15	E. Irvine	16	Jaguar Cosworth (M)	3	2	13
16	J. Villeneuve	11	BAR Honda (B)	3	2	10
17	P. de la Rosa	17	Jaguar Cosworth (M)	2	3	11
18	M. Salo	24	Toyota (M)	5	0	10
19	T. Sato	10	Jordan Honda (B)	1	4	14
20	A. McNish	25	Toyota (M)	0	5	16
21	M. Webber	23	Minardi Asiatech (M)	5	0	18
22	A. Yoong	22	Minardi Asiatech (M)	0	5	21

QualiPoints are awarded in the same way points are awarded to the top 6 drivers in a race. (i.e. 10, 6, 4, 3, 2,1)

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