Yas Marine ... as last

Right I have an open bottle of red wine to help ... let’s go

It’s been a long hard road to reach the Yas marine in Abu Dhabi, 18 races spanning the globe from Europe, to America the Far East and now the Middle East to crown the 2010 Formula One world champion. There are three drivers in with a chance to take the spoils and lift the ultimate Cup in motorsport, Alonso, Webber and Vettel could take the title.

Alonso has had a blinding second half of the season out scoring all and sundry. But Ferrari got nailed for calling team orders in Germany before it was really acceptable. The FIA fined them and then ignored the howls of self-righteous indignation from the media. The other teams mostly shrugged and said, “We all do it ... just not so obviously” and got on with it. Redbull kept mentioning it now and again, generally when their boys weren’t leading the championship.

I don’t mind Alonso winning. When he’s good he’s a great driver to watch and you have to admire his ability to drive a team forward and make them work for him. But like Schumacher before him, his ruthlessness makes it hard to like the man.

Redbull have tried very very hard indeed to lose the Championship. But managed to sneak the constructors in Brazil last week, and might just take the drivers in Abu Dhabi. Depending on where Alonso is, Webber can ... or ... should take the title here. He has the fastest car and should be able to cruise it. But Vettel might yet throw a spanner into the works. If he’s leading and is required to move over to allow Webber to win and get enough points, do you think he would? The team say’s it’s up to the drivers to do the right thing. But Webber and Vettel dislike each other with a passion apparently. There’s no happy McLaren mateyness between drivers in this garage. After Webber basically claimed they all hate him at Redbull last week, I suspect they all now hate him. He’s been there since day one so to turn round and say they don’t want him was a bit disingenuous I though.

The thing with Redbull is you feel they should have won this month’s ago, yet have somehow missed every opportunity. Their drivers have hit people, the cars have had problems, engines have let them down but no more than Alonso’s Ferrari has.
Would I like to See Webber as the Champion? No not really, he’s done far too much whinging for my liking. He driven into other drivers and been overly aggressive when it wasn’t needed. Oh yeah he’s held his hands up when he was wrong, but then he’s whined that the team doesn’t like him and it’s all so unfair. Blah blah blah.

Vettel I don’t think is all that either. He ONLY seems to win when he’s on the front row of the grid. He’s not had a storming midfield run to claim a podium in a car that should on paper be able to cream the opposition. In Hamilton or Alonso’s hands that car would have been champion after Spa. And he waves his finger around when he wins a race. It’s only a small think and its ridicules to get annoyed by a German waving his finger around. But it get’s right on my tits.

There is also the sneaking suspicion that the Redbull car isn’t playing by the rules. Nothing has been proved, but after the floors and front wings of the cars started getting testing in Monza, Ferrari started winning more races. It might all be down to the blown diffuser and the rear end suspension, but at times they’ve been over a second faster than anyone else. That’s a country mile by today’s standards.

So Ferrari might have been really obvious about their “Cheating”, Redbull have been very clever about theirs.

Hamilton was undone by a single corner in Monza. If he’d not dived under Massa into the first chicane on the first lap, then he might be coming with a better chance of the win here. As it is, he’s going to need Webber to driver into Vettel (not unreasonable this year) and Alonso’s last engine to go bang before the final flag of the year. Which is not too farfetched, well okay it is. But it would make for a fantastic end to the season.

I’d love Hamilton to win the championship. I think he’s the only driver that just got on with it this year. Yeah he’s made mistakes, but he’s tried to win. He’s tried to overtake and make a race of it, but he’s also come up short and cocked it up. But just for telling Charlie in Korea that the track was fine and they should all be on inters as the rest of the Nancy drivers complained it was too scary, was the highlight of the year so far for me. He said in the BBC interview before the race in Brazil that motorsport should be dangerous, he is right. Motorsport is about speed and danger. Not parking it up when the track get’s a bit damp. I doubt he’ll win here. But I’d love it if he did.

Button hasn’t done too badly this year. A few good wins and safe comfortable year picking up points and not arsing around hasn’t set the world on fire. But he’s done the job McLaren wanted him to do. They needed a driver who could collect the points whilst their star driver went for the glory. Kovalinium couldn’t do that last year for them, and Button might just have sneaked the title if things had gone his way.
Considering almost everyone said he was going to get buried by Lewis, I think he’s come out of the year with his head held high and credibility intact. He’s still a pretty nice bloke and the fact both Lewis and Jenson are talking to each other still is probably down to Jenson more than Lewis. The team have harmony and two fast drivers. It’s just unfortunate that Lady Luck didn’t like their brand of Champagne.
So there you go.

That’ll be you top five, not necessarily in that order though.