Driver of the Year
It’s been a strange year in F1, where nobody really seemed to want to win the Championship. Some notable performances came from those further down the field – Sebastien Buemi put in some great drives for a rookie in a Toro Rosso, Kamui Kobayashi came in for a highly impressive two race cameo at the end of the season, which managed to encourage Toyota to pull out of F1, and Nico Rosberg continued to outperform his car for the majority of the year. Sebastian Vettel was probably the fastest driver out there all year but needs to iron out the little mistakes he continues to make. Mark Webber was a good match for his team-mate and finally got the monkey off his back. But it would be harsh to say anyone other than Jenson Button was the driver of the year, given his awesome start to the season, and his last couple of impressive drives in Brazil and Abu Dhabi.
Team of the Year
Notable mentions in this category go to Force India, who improved massively throughout the year to finally earn their first ever points with 2nd from Pole at Spa for Fisichella, who promptly left the team, and also to Red Bull, who produced a fantastic car that they were able to modify successfully and which destroyed the field in numerous races. In an ordinary world Brawn GP surely have to take this category, given the extraordinary circumstances surrounding the salvation of the team, who then went on to utterly dominate the first half of the season. They lost their way slightly but managed to maintain their stranglehold. Honda must feel rather silly just now.
This however is no ordinary world. I’m giving the award to the BBC F1 team. No, we don’t really like Legard, Brundle’s gone off the boil a bit, Kravitz is still an idiot, McKenzie is a professional mute, and Jordan is a klutz. But put them all together and add in the thoughtful and insightful Coulthard, and the calm and surprisingly knowledgeable Humphrey, and you got a product that was a damn sight better than anything we’ve had in recent years. An excellent job from all concerned. Except Legard.
Flop of the Year
Coming close to taking the glory in this category are Heikki Kovalainen, Sebastien Bourdais, Nelsinho Piquet and Kazuki Nakajima, who had an absolutely dismal time in 2009, despite their respective teammates showing their motors actually had a bit of pace (relatively). However, given the burgeoning reputation he came into the sport with having won a GP2 Asia Series and been leading the charge for this year’s main GP2 title when he was called up in mid-season, Romain Grosjean was nothing other than a massive disappointment. When he wasn’t dog slow he was spinning, when he wasn’t spinning he was crashing. It says it all that he’ll be best remembered for hitting Piquet Wall one year on in Singapore.
Race of the Year
For all the hard work of the Overtaking Working Group, 2009 was not a classic year for racing, with characteristic processions in the likes of Barcelona, Valencia, Hungary and Singapore in particular. I enjoyed the German and Brazilian races which had plenty of incident and a pleasing final result, but my favourite race this year was the season opener in Australia. Not only was the race action-packed from start to finish, it had the fairytale conclusion of a 1-2 for a team who looked like they might cease to exist not long before, and well and truly brought the 2008 Champion down several pegs in the process. Gutted.
Drive of the Year
There are a few candidates for this one. I was particularly impressed with the wins for Webber in Germany and Brazil, and Vettel in Britain and Japan – four dominant performances in a strong Red Bull car. There were also some strong drives to victory from Button in the early part of the season, but given how dominant the Brawn was at that time I just can’t pick one of them. My vote goes to, against all the odds, Lewis Hamilton at the Hungarian GP. Out of darkness came light for McLaren with a superb drive from the 2008 Champion, a strong start and a good move on Mark Webber set him up for what would turn out to be a dominant victory which signalled McLaren’s return to form.
Fail of the Year
For this one I’m going to go for Donington Park’s epic fail of an attempt to host the British Grand Prix for 2010 onwards. When the plans were announced in mid-2008 many scoffed at the notion, and sure enough they delivered ammunition in spades as a supposed deadline was extended time and time again, only for the holding company to eventually go into administration and result in desperate talks for the race to return to Silverstone.
Quote of the Year
Nick Heidfeld takes this award out for his brilliant announcement to Martin Brundle on the grid at Suzuka that he was “the slowest in the ranking”, as in the top speed ranking, albeit in a rather Germanic way that sounded like…something else, and made us all giggle heartily at 5.45 in the morning.
Memory of the Year
My overriding memories of this year are not happy ones, in truth. My man had an absolute mare of a season in an absolutely awful Renault, but should have a shot at the title next season which will keep me somewhat happy. The amount of races which were just God damn awful processions was higher than ever before, God bless the new regulations. There was also the dashing of many dreams worldwide as Michael Schumacher aborted his return to the sport. Sadly though my main memory of this year is Felipe Massa’s accident in Hungary, and the ensuing chaos thereafter as nobody seemed to know what was going on (except for Eddie Jordan, who claimed he did, and turned out to be spectacularly wrong), and then the worrying days and weeks ahead as we worried if the amiable Brazilian would race again. Thankfully it seems that he will be back in 2010 and I sincerely hope he’s right back at the front. Behind Nando obviously.
Last year at this point I looked back over my pre-season predictions to see how foolish I looked, so I think I’ll do that again:
World Champion – Fernando Alonso - That went well didn’t it? Renault led me up the garden path with their form in late 2008 and actually had my hopes up. Grr.
Most impressive driver – I can’t tell if I said Vettel or Webber, I think I was going for Vettel. Either way, they both impressed everyone this year, so I’ll take that one.
Most disappointing driver – Lewis Hamilton – I put him on the basis he’d fail to defend his title, and he did, so he was in a way, but he did recover well to end the season 5th.
GP to set tongues wagging – Abu Dhabi – I guess in some ways it did, the track looked fantastic albeit with gimmicks such as twilight and that pit exit, but the Championship was over so nobody will really remember this race.
Most talked about team – Brawn GP – My finest hour. I tipped them as soon as they were rescued, and they didn’t disappoint me.
Least talked about team – Toro Rosso – On the scale of things maybe this is the right answer, but with the emergence of Bwemmy, maybe not.
Looking forward to most – Qualifying at Monaco – I can’t even remember if it was any good.
Who will be replaced first – Nobody – Well that was a fail. Bourdais was replaced by Alguersuari and Piquet lost out to Grosjean. Then there were the changes at Ferrari, and even Glock was replaced by Kobayashi.
Title decider – Abu Dhabi – Wrong. Just wrong.
TUF1WCIAWCC tip – Nico Rosberg – Wrong, amazingly. A well deserved win for the Rookie of the Year.
It was great fun bringing F1 2009 to you here on Patty, particularly sitting through many a Friday talking to nobody about Frappy. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did…
| < Prev | Next > |
|---|
