Post-GP Stats Analysis: Europe

200 plus 2

Bridgestone celebrated its 200th race in Europe. That figure considers only the official involvement of the Japanese manufacturer since 1997 onwards. However, in the 1976 Japanese Grand Prix, Kazuyoshi Hoshino had Bridgestone tyres, and the same Hoshino as well as Noritake Takahara were on Bridgestones the following year at the same venue.

In the Belgian Grand Prix, Bridgestone will match Pirelli at 203 races; the Italian manufacturer stopped racing in Formula One in 1991. At the top of the chart, Goodyear participated in 495 races and stopped in 1998.

Qualifying notes

• Felipe Massa scored his 13th pole, moving up to the 20th all-time spot matching, among the others, his countryman Rubens Barrichello.

• Lewis Hamilton is the first driver in 2008 who was able to start from the front row in three consecutive races.

• For the first time, after 33 races, Robert Kubica qualified 3rd. It was the only spot in the top-10 he hadn't occupied yet.

• Kimi Raikkonen missed the front row for the fourth successive race, which didn't happen since the interval that separated the Malaysian and French Grands Prix last year, when Kimi didn't qualify inside the first two spots of the grid for seven straight races.

• Sebastian Vettel obtained his best career qualifying result with a sixth place and the best for Toro Rosso. In both cases the previous best performance was an eighth scored in Japan 2007 and Great Britain this year, also by Vettel himself. With the best performance in the second qualifying session, Vettel gave Toro Rosso their first official circuit record.

• For the sixth time this season Nico Rosberg qualified inside the top-10, in ninth. Street circuits seem to favour the German, since he obtained on four occasions these results in a street circuit: Australia, Monaco, Canada and Valencia.

• Best career result for Sebastian Bourdais and Kazuki Nakajima, with a tenth and eleventh place respectively.

• Worst season performance for Fernando Alonso (12th), who previously had his worst showing in Australia with an eleventh.

• Mark Webber equalled his worst performance of the season, a 14th he recorded in Australia.

• For the third time this year the Hondas were not able to reach Q2. This also happened in France and Great Britain.

• Rubens Barrichello qualified 19th or worse only nine times in his career, and the Valencia result marks his low point this season. He started 20th in France but only for a gearbox substitution.

• For the third time this season David Coulthard scored his worst result, a 17th, which he recorded also in Bahrain and Spain.

• For the fourth time in 12 European Grands Prix run Giancarlo Fisichella started from the 18th spot, and for the fourth time out of ten Jarno Trulli started 7th.

Race notes

• Felipe Massa scored his 9th win, matching at the 28th all-time spot his countryman Barrichello and giving Ferrari their 450th podium.

• With his ninth fastest race lap, Massa recorded his third hat-trick after Bahrain and Spain last year. Among the active drivers, Massa is now has the highest number of hat-tricks along with Fernando Alonso. At the top of the all-time list sits Michael Schumacher, with 22 hat-tricks.

• Third engine failure in the last six European Grand Prix for Kimi Raikkonen.

• For the first time this year, the fastest race lap was scored by a car carrying an even number.

• First back-to-back points finish for Timo Glock.

• After the European Grand Prix, Jarno Trulli can boast a unique pattern of results: he finished 14 times in fourth, 13 in fifth, 14 sixth, and 13 seventh.

• Nico Rosberg is back in the points after a six-race drought. In the last two seasons, this was the longest he stayed without points, equalling the Monaco-Europe interval of last year. In his debut season, 2006, Nico was outside the points for 13 races, from Spain to Brazil.

• Jenson Button is at his eighth race outside the points. To find a similar drought for Jenson we have to go back to the 2004-2005 seasons, when he didn't score points from the 2004 Brazilian Grand Prix to the 2005 US Grand Prix, for a total of eight races. His longest career drought is twelve races, from Malaysia 2000 to Great Britain 2001.

• For the first time after eleven races a Renault-powered car is not in the points.

• For the fourth straight race Red Bull didn't score points. This is the second longest drought in the history of the team after Turkey 2006-Spain 2007, when they were outside the points for eight races.

• The three oldest drivers of the paddock obtained their worst result in their European Grand Prix scorecard. They are Coulthard (17th), Barrichello (16th) and Fisichella (14th).

• For the first time in his career of 240 Grand Prix starts, David Coulthard took the chequered flag in last position. He was classified last also in the 2003 European Grand Prix and in the 2006 Turkish Grand Prix, but in both cases he had previously retired due to a spin and a gearbox failure respectively.