Yesterday’s Canadian Grand Prix was a truly excellent race. Coming off the back of an exciting race in Monaco, it was hard to believe that Canada could match up but it more than managed to. The race had a fairly sedate start, though the track conditions were certainly giving all of the drivers a run for their money. Particularly the hairpin which had been breaking up during qualifying, meaning a protective resin had to be applied to the tarmac before the race. During the early laps, and indeed the whole race, drivers could be seen getting into huge slides coming out of the hairpin. It truly was a fascinating sight and we have to be thankful that traction control is no longer around to handle these situations for the drivers. Anyway, as I was saying, the race had a fairly sedate pace until Sutil managed to spin bringing out the safety car. This saw all of the leaders coming into the pitlane, once the pitlane had been opened, with Hamilton spending more time in his pitbox than both Raikkonen and Kubica meaning he was coming out behind the pair of drivers. Raikkonen and Kubica both spotted the red light at the end of the pitlane and accordingly came to a stop. Hamilton, and it has to be said Rosberg too, failed to see the red light. Hamilton ran straight into the back of Raikkonen immediately ending both their races, Rosberg slid straight into the back of Hamilton straight after.
So why is Raikkonen my hero you ask? The way in which he dealt with this cruel blow was amazing. Instead of getting angry, he just tapped Hamilton on the shoulder and pointed at him; before walking off. That you could see Hamilton cringing under his overalls and through his helmet probably tells you how embarrassed he felt about the situation. What of Kubica then? He was merely inches away while this incident took place, indeed it is miraculous that neither Hamilton nor Rosberg chose the BMW to slide into the back of. Kubica patiently waited for the green light and got back on with his race.
And what a race it was. Initially his BMW team-mate Heidfeld was instructed to let Kubica through, the only sensible choice given the different strategies the two drivers were on. Kubica was still stuck behind a number of slower cars however and had to wait for his opportunity to put the hammer down. He did this successfully, pulling out enough of a lead to re-join the race in front of his team-mate and continue onwards to the chequered flag. It was a thoroughly deserved race win for the pole, both his first and the team’s. Heidfeld was clearly upset, indeed I suspect he thinks he was asked to give up his race win by the team and it would surely have been a deserved race win whichever of the BMW drivers had got it. I hope Heidfeld’s first win is not long coming now.
Finally it is also hard to ignore the performance of David Coulthard, who managed to come through from 13th on the grid to take 3rd place in his Red Bull. Coulthard has had a tough year and it’s hard not to feel pleased for him. Additionally Felipe Massa deserves a mention for his obscene overtaking maneuver on Kovalainen and Barichello at the hairpin. Best overtake of the day by quite a long margin.