Buzzin F1 – Formula One Blog

British Grand Prix 2009

Yesterday saw the final race at the Silverstone circuit for the British Grand Prix dominated by the Red Bull Racing driver Sebastian Vettel, claiming his second victory of the season after qualifying in pole position.

This week it was announced that eight of the Formula One teams had failed to reach an agreement with the FIA and were planning a breakaway series.  However, Max Mosley seems adamant that a solution is possible and feels that things will soon be back to normal, it’s just a matter of time.

Many of the British fans were hoping that Jenson Button in the Brawn GP car would be taking the chequered flag at his home track, but after qualifying in sixth place on Saturday the 29-year-old blamed the temperatures of the track leaving him with cold tyres and unable to find grip.

As the race got underway, Vettel led the group into the first corner with Button dropping back to ninth after a terrible start.  Rubens Barrichello in the Brawn GP was in second ahead of second Red Bull Racing driver Mark Webber and the Williams driver Kazuki Nakajima, who qualified in his best ever position of fifth.

Kimi Raikkonen in the Ferrari was in fifth followed by Nico Rosberg in the second Williams, Jarno Trulli in the Toyota and Felipe Massa in the second Ferrari.

Button passed Massa on lap 2 as the Ferrari ran wide and on the next lap, Fernando Alonso in the Renault ran wide and forced Lewis Hamilton onto the grass as he rejoined the track.

Adrian Sutil, driving his spare car,  started from the pit lane after a spectacular crash towards the end of the qualifying session on Saturday, when he miraculously walked away from what was left of his Force India.

Giancarlo Fisichella in the second Force India made an impressive move as a battle was taking place in front of him between Nick Heidfeld in the BMW Sauber and Alonso, both drivers ran wide leaving a gap wide enough to let Fisichella take full advantage of their error.

Nakajima was the first driver to pit on lap 16, as was expected, while running in fourth place and on the following lap Raikkonen went in for his first stop and made his exit in front of Nakajima.

After the first group of pit stops, Vettel still led the race followed by Webber, Barrichello, Rosberg, Felipe Massa, Trulli, Raikkonen, Button, Nakajima and Fisichella.

On lap 31, Alonso ran wide allowing the British driver Lewis Hamilton in the McLaren to get through.  Nelson Piquet in the second Renault rejoined from his pit-stop in front of the fighting duo as Alonso slipped back past Hamilton at Chapel when the British driver ran wide before passing his team-mate Piquet.

On lap 35, Sebastian Bourdais in the Toro Rosso, ran in the back of  Heikki Kovalainen leaving the McLaren driver with a left rear puncture and a broken front wing.  It appeared that there was some sort of problem with the McLaren which had slowed, leaving no where for Bourdais to go.  On lap 38, Kovalainen returned to the pits once again but this time he retired his car to the garage followed two laps later by Bourdais.

In the second set of pit stops, Button moved ahead of Trulli and Raikkonen up to sixth position as Massa also jumped another place to exit in fourth.

Vettel crossed the line nealy 16 seconds ahead of his team-mate Webber and Barrichello in third.  Massa finished in fourth followed by Rosberg, Button, Trulli, Raikkonen, Timo Glock and Fisichella to complete the top ten drivers of the day.

Here are the results;

1. Sebastian Vettel Germany Red Bull-Renault 60 laps 1hr 22m 49.328s
2. Mark Webber Australia Red Bull-Renault +00m 15.1s
3. Rubens Barrichello Brazil Brawn-Mercedes +00m 41.1s
4. Felipe Massa Brazil Ferrari-Ferrari +00m 45.0s
5. Nico Rosberg Germany Williams-Toyota +00m 45.9s
6. Jenson Button Britain Brawn-Mercedes +00m 46.2s
7. Jarno Trulli Italy Toyota-Toyota +01m 08.3s
8. Kimi Raikkonen Finland Ferrari-Ferrari +01m 09.6s

all results unofficial