Sunday, November 23, 2014

The F1 Race in Abu Dhabi was Unusual but it Still Counts

The picture postcard ending for the season would have been 1-2 Mercedes with Hamilton winning it and Rosberg right behind him.  It was a picture postcard anyway as Abu Dhabi has an extraordinary track with all the elegance and opulence of Monaco but in an exotic different style.

But you know the race didn't end with a postcard finish.  Even so, Rosberg did a great drive with a broken car.  Every time he turned around something else broke but he kept the car fairly competitive until very late in the race.  I thought he showed a lot of heart as the team gave him the opportunity to retire but he insisted he wanted to finish the run.

It seemed Mercedes was dancing with the idea Hamilton's car was breaking as well.  They didn't mind the TV announcers getting that idea but it was hogwash as Massa came to discover when he tried to run him down.  Hamilton kept the margin between first and second exactly where it needed to be all day long.  It was a pro drive but it can't have been too exciting for him.

The real excitement was watching the dicing within the field.  The great joy to watch is Alonso as he makes what I see as the bravest moves in Formula 1.  It's not that he takes stupid chances but rather he knows precisely his skill and he's got a lot of it.

So after this race Alonso leaves Ferrari but Vettel joins next season as he thinks they have the ride for him.  Alonso goes to McLaren and it will be very interesting to see how it works out for both of them.

Congratulations to Lewis Hamilton, World Driving Champion 2014.


Thanks to TunnelBear for letting me set my location to UK for watching the BBC as I can't pick up Formula 1 any other way.  If your needs for this sort of thing are infrequent, you can probably use TunnelBear for free and it's, I think, about $40 US annually otherwise.

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