Brazilian GP Facts, Stats & Memoirs

With three rounds to go, the World Championship is still open. With Fernando Alonso now at 111 points and Kimi Raikkonen at 86, the difference is 25 with a maximum of 30 to be scored. This, of course, means that Alonso will be crowned Champion if he finishes on the podium on Sunday. Six points will make the Spaniard unpassable even if Raikkonen manages to win all remaining races.

In short, Alonso can let Raikkonen go and see what result he needs. First for Raikkonen means Alonso needs third, second means fifth, third means seventh and fourth means eight. Anything less and Raikkonen is eliminated even if Alonso doesn't finish another race.

One of the highlights of the Belgian Grand Prix was Tiago Monteiro's eight place. After his podium finish in the Indianapolis debacle, Monteiro scored his first real point. The only other point by a Portuguese driver was scored by Pedro Lamy, who finished sixth in the 1995 Australian Grand Prix, while driving for Minardi.

The Jordan driver is only the fourth from his country in Formula One. Lamy drove for Lotus and Minardi between 1993 and 1996, while Pedro Chaves drove for Coloni in 1991, but never qualified for a race. The first Portuguese driver was Nicha Cabral, who contested several races between 1959 and 1964.

With the European season now behind us, it's time to have a look at who was the strongest on the old continent this year.

Race           Winner
San Marino     Alonso
Spain          Raikkonen
Monaco         Raikkonen
Europe         Alonso
France         Alonso
Great Britain  Montoya
Germany        Alonso
Hungary        Raikkonen
Turkey         Raikkonen
Italy          Montoya
Belgium        Raikkonen

Driver        Points
Alonso          85
Raikkonen       69
Montoya         42
M.Schumacher    35
Fisichella      31
Button          30
Trulli          27
R.Schumacher    25
Heidfeld        22
Webber          18
Barrichello     13
Coulthard       10
Villeneuve       9
Wurz             6
Pizzonia         2
Massa            1
Monteiro         1
Klien            1
Sato             1
Liuzzi           1


Team          Points
McLaren        117
Renault        116
Toyota          52
Ferrari         48
Williams        40
BAR             31
Red Bull        12
Sauber          10
Jordan           1
Minardi          0

The battle between Alonso and Raikkonen wasn't affected all that much by the races outside Europe. Obviously the Ferrari, Jordan and Minardi drivers take a big fall when the non-European races are excluded. What is interesting to see is that McLaren outscore Renault by one points. The Championship leaders clearly laid the foundation of their lead with the opening three races in Australia, Malaysia and Bahrain. We'll have to see whether they can finish as strong in the final three races in Brazil, Japan and China.

This Week in History

While there is a Formula One race this weekend and there is a race at Brands Hatch this weekend, the two do not coincide. Twenty-two years ago that was different. Then, Brands Hatch was the scene of the 1983 European Grand Prix, round 14 of the Formula One World Championship. The event had actually only come onto the calendar halfway through the season, when it appeared the Grands Prix of New York and Switzerland would not be happening.

Free practice on Friday saw the battle in full swing right away. Prost set the tone with a 1:13.473, but Tambay was a mere 0.041 seconds slower in his Ferrari. Behind the two Frenchman it was Piquet, followed by Prost's teammate Eddie Cheever, both half a second slower. Arnoux's fifth position was somewhat disappointing, as was his full second off Prost's pace.

In the first qualifying session in the afternoon, it was the Lotus of Elio de Angelis and Nigel Mansell who set the pace. The Italian claimed provisional pole with a 1:12.342 after Mansell had been fastest for most of the session. Piquet in third was the only one to come close to the times of the Lotus. Behind the Brazilian times were close, as Prost, Patrese, Cheever, Arnoux, the surprising ATS driver Manfred Winkelhock and Tambay were covered by just half a second.

On Saturday, de Angelis went another three tenths faster to secure pole position, but it was not Mansell who shared the front row with him. Riccardo Patrese pulled a 1:12.458 out of the high hat to demote Mansell to the second row. This time the Ferrari drivers had the upper hand on the Renaults, claiming the third row behind the two Lotus and Brabhams. Behind them both Renaults were on the fourth row.

In the late September sunshine on race day, Patrese had the better start and grabbed the lead from de Angelis. Behind them, Mansell and Piquet followed with the Renaults and Winkelhock passing both Ferraris. Soon Mansell slipped down to seventh. After three laps Patrese and de Angelis had opened up a five-second gap to Piquet, who had the two Renaults and Arnoux behind him.

In the ninth lap Cheever was passed by Prost, after which he could concentrate on keeping his teammate's biggest rival at bay. Two laps later things changed at the front as an overoptimistic manoeuvre from de Angelis meant that both he and Patrese spun and, before recovering, saw Piquet grab the lead from them. For de Angelis it was the beginning of the end and two laps later he was forced to retire. This left Piquet the leader, ten seconds ahead of his teammate, who had Prost's Renault all over him. Cheever, meanwhile, was succeeding in enlarging the gap between Prost and Arnoux to four seconds.

For Prost there was no way to close in on Piquet, who in the current situation would take the Championship lead from the Renault driver. Whatever Prost tried, the gap remained ten seconds, while the rest of the field behind them was fading. In fact, after 35 laps Piquet added some speed and quickly added another five seconds before the pitstops. After 41 laps Prost went in, briefly losing second place to Mansell, who pitted on the same lap. Piquet was due in three laps later. The Brazilian's pitstop went far from fluent as a wheel nut gun refused to work, giving him an extra five seconds in the pits. So when all pitstops were done, the old ten-second gap was back.

Disastrous pitstops for Patrese and Cheever meant that third place was occupied by Tambay, ahead of Mansell. Nothing much changed until ten laps from the end when Mansell found his way past Tambay, who subsequently spun off with no brakes. In the end Piquet finally let Prost close the gap a bit, but the victory went to the Brabham driver without any trouble. Prost finished second, 6.5 seconds off, with Mansell third, ahead of Alfa driver Andrea de Cesaris and the Tolemans of Derek Warwick and Bruno Giacomelli.