Chinese Checkers

It is appropriate that Sunday's Grand Prix was held in China, for the race (indeed the entire weekend) represented the yin and yang of modern F1 - wet and dry, heroes and zeroes, Michelin and Bridgestone, Renault and Ferrari, daring and caution, strategic brilliance and tactical blunders, greybeard experience and rookie rawness, triumph and despair. And, ultimately and symbolically, one team dropping their champagne bottle while the other caught theirs.

For Ferrari's Michael Schumacher, the Chinese connection went beyond the yin and the yang. In the third last race of his career, Schumacher played like a master exponent of Chinese checkers, deftly ensuring that each move dropped him into exactly the right slot at the right time, and able to respond to any counter from his opponents.

For those Chinese F1 fans who rushed to snap up the dwindling tickets after Schumacher announced his retirement at Monza, it was the smartest move of their F1 spectating lives. Although there have been many races where Schumacher has showcased his skills to jaw-dropping effect, Shanghai must surely rate as one of the most improbable and satisfying of his career.

It started with the wet qualifying on Saturday afternoon. After the emotional high of victory at Monza, and even for a wet weather expert like Schumacher, the dark and sodden Shanghai track must have seemed like the path to purgatory.

There was no reason to suspect that Bridgestone would compete with Michelin's superior intermediate tyre in such conditions, and so it proved. The field duly split neatly into two halves. Never has the gulf between the tyre war haves and have-nots been as clearly defined - with one exception: Schumacher's solitary red B in the sea of blue Ms atop the timesheets.

It was an achievement in itself for Schumacher to get through to the third and final qualifying session. Early in the race, when he was not only able to hold station behind the Michelin-shod Honda of Rubens Barrichello, but to actually pass his former teammate - and then the other Honda of Jenson Button just five laps later - it gave the first inkling that this would be no repeat of Hungary. As the track dried and the Bridgestones started to bite, Schumacher wasn't just able to match the flying Renaults, but to start hauling them in.

It culminated in one of the most bizarre yet gripping duels of the season - leader Fernando Alonso struggling along at backmarker pace on his new front intermediates, Schumacher relentlessly hunting him down, and meat-in-the-sandwich Giancarlo Fisichella faced with the impossible task of being simultaneously slower than Alonso yet faster than Schumacher.

It was a credit to the Renault pair that Schumacher never once looked in danger during several laps of close dicing. First Alonso and then Fisichella let the faster Ferrari through without inviting contact.

Schumacher did have to put a wheel onto the grass to pass Fisichella, but that was due to the sheer speed differential as Schumacher (with tyres up to full temperature) closed down the struggling Renault with its new and relatively cold rubber. Fisichella had drifted left off the dry racing line at turn 1, and his movement back to the right seemed an obvious attempt to regain the dry line and grip, rather than a conscious effort to block Schumacher.

With Fisichella behind him, all that was left for Schumacher was to manage his pace and ride out the final fifteen laps to glory. Although even Schumacher must (once again) have been stunned at how unpredictable wet weather races can be, and how quickly they turn.

Fernando Alonso © LAT

For Fernando Alonso, it was a truly yin and yang race, in which he went from being comfortably the quickest (qualifying and the first stint) to almost the slowest car in the field (right after his pitstop) back to stunningly quick pace over the final dozen laps.

His fate hinged on the unusual decision to swap his worn intermediate front tyres for a fresh set at his first stop. Alonso was the only driver among the leaders to do so and paid a stiff penalty, losing more than thirty seconds to Schumacher over just 15 laps. With the benefit of hindsight, it seemed like tactical suicide. Yet it could so easily have worked out differently.

Alonso himself felt that his left front was worn dangerously just prior to his stop. If he'd kept the worn tyre on and had suffered a failure during the next stint, Schumacher would have left China with an eight-point WDC lead and the title would effectively be over. Alonso won his first title in 2005 by driving conservatively while Kimi Raikkonen was taking all the risks. Alonso can't be blamed for following the same approach this year.

If his tyres were indeed worn almost to the point of failure, it raises the question of whether Alonso pushed too hard during the first stint. If this was the case, one again cannot fault the Spaniard. It's happened time and again in F1 that a leader has stopped for dry tyres on a drying track while his pursuers continue on wets - only to have the heavens open on his out lap, necessitating another stop.

By opening up a lead of more than twenty seconds during the first stint, Alonso gave himself a measure of insurance against this eventuality. The advantage was there to be gained, he'd have been crazy not to take it.

The final factor was the unpredictability of the weather itself. If it had started to rain again following the first stops (and there was nothing to suggest that it wouldn't), Alonso would have looked like a genius. With a fresh set of intermediates, and Schumacher and Fisichella tiptoeing around effectively on slicks, Alonso's twenty-second lead would have doubled, if not more.

Through a combination of factors, including an agonisingly long second stop due to a problem with the wheel nut on his right rear tyre, Alonso saw almost certain victory slip away.

That, in itself, was almost predictable. Alonso cantered to an untroubled title last year. When his luck did turn sour, it was always going to turn really sour. There is no scientific explanation for it, and nothing that any driver or team can do to avoid it. It is just the fulfilment of the timeless truism that what goes around, comes around.

Michael Schumacher (Ferrari 248 F1) and Fernando Alonso (Renault R26) © XPB/LAT

For the third time in four GPs, Alonso left the weekend feeling short-changed. After his performances in Hungary, Italy and China, Alonso could justifiably have expected a 26-point haul. He's had to be content with just eight points. The two points he snatched from Schumacher in Turkey are scant consolation for an extended run of disappointments.

Mathematically, the title race is now a dead heat. However, Schumacher has the priceless edge of an extra race win. Michelin and Renault may have clawed their way back to relative parity with the Ferrari/Bridgestone package in the dry. However, Alonso cannot expect Fisichella to finish ahead of Schumacher in either Japan or Brazil.

Sharing the honours over the final two races, with one victory and one second place each, would give the title to Schumacher. So Alonso has a mathematically simple but practically daunting challenge for the next three weeks. Despite not having won for seven races, he must now go out and win the next two. Nothing less will suffice.

Schumacher, by contrast, has won five of those seven GPs. Taking just one more win from the remaining two races, and finishing second in the other, should be a snap. It's a credit to Fernando Alonso that, even for a seven times champion like Schumacher, that's going to be a lot harder than it looks.