Talking Points: Behind the scenes of the European GP

Brawn vs. Symonds

The European Grand Prix was another great contest between Michael Schumacher and Fernando Alonso, but whether it was an actual race is a moot point. It was a game of chess, a battle of nerves between strategists Ross Brawn and Pat Symonds that as ever came down the timing of the pitstops.

It says a lot about modern Formula One that once he knew he was stuck in second, Alonso turned his engine down and cruised to the flag, doing just enough to keep Felipe Massa behind. The difficulties of passing, the points system, the need to save an engine for a second race... so many things contributed to that state of affairs.

But still, it's better to see two great drivers going flat out for two-thirds of a race, even if actual passing was never an option, than see someone disappear into the distance at a rate of knots.

The race followed on, of course, from a thrilling qualifying session, made all the more dramatic by the 'phantom' red flag, and then Giancarlo Fisichella's remonstration with a bemused Jacques Villeneuve.

But the real action came in that third session. Ironically on the very weekend that Bernie Ecclestone and others proposed the idea of going back to single lap running for the top 10 we had perhaps the best session under the current system.

Adding to the interest, for the first time Renault gave Alonso the luxury of two runs on new tyres, a ploy that Ferrari and Honda have used regularly this year. That - and the fact that he had no other worries (such as a double load of fuel) - helped put the Spaniard on pole by a little over two-tenths over Schumacher.

The Ferrari driver's gloomy reaction afterwards indicated that all had not gone well, and he had expected to annexe pole.

Ferrari technical director Ross Brawn admitted on Saturday afternoon that it was going to be a close one, with one or two laps deciding it. I saw him again on Sunday morning and wondered if he was really sure was that Renault would be stopping first. "I bloody well hope they are," he smiled.

So who would crack first and pit in the race? Eventually it was Alonso, but only just, coming in on lap 17. Schumacher pre-empted Renault by going quickly at just the right moment, cutting the gap from 1.2 seconds on lap 15, to 0.6 seconds on lap 16. Ferrari had a pretty good idea when Renault were going to stop, and Michael was ready to pounce.

However, one clear lap wasn't quite enough for the German to make the difference, although his in-lap was 0.225 seconds quicker than his rival's. Schumacher resumed right on Alonso's tail, and stop times suggested that there wasn't much in it in terms of how much fuel went on board.

Later, when the real story unfolded at the second round of stops, it occurred to me that Brawn had pulled a fast one. Did he bring Schumacher in with a spare lap still in the tank at the first stop, knowing that he couldn't get past, and then surprise Renault by using it at the second stop?

Renault technical director Pat Symonds wasn't convinced. Brawn, however, suggested I wasn't too far from the truth. Schumacher did have nearly a full lap in hand when he made that first stop, but there was no crafty strategy. The reason he didn't stay out until lap 19 was just that - it was nearly a lap of fuel, and nearly is not good enough.

"It was a little unfortunate, because we didn't quite gain a lap under the safety car," Brawn explained. "I think other people may have... It's where your lap falls, because even with the equipment we have, you never get a lap to be 18.0, it's always 18.2, or 18.3s.

"That lap was 18.97, and we could have taken a risk on going to 19, which I think would have really made the difference, but is it worth taking a risk in that situation?

'We knew that all being well, we would have another opportunity later in the race to attack again. We pretty much did what we did, we just didn't quite gain a lap under the safety car period."

The bottom line was that Schumacher had pitted a lap later, and had that 'spare' lap. So when he made that first stop in effect he only had to put a lap's worth more fuel in the car (or 1.03 to be precise!) in order to have a three-lap advantage at the second stop.

And three was more than enough to do the job, with more than a little help from Bridgestone, whose tyres were in extremely good shape at the end of the stint and allowed Michael to push as hard as he wanted - although he did get worryingly out of shape at one point.

Schumacher won the race with his speed on laps 39-41, and it's worth a look at the times to see just how much he was able to find once the Renault was out of the way:

Lap   Alonso     Schumacher
35:   1:32.871   1:33.359
36:   1:32.722   1:32.554
37:   1:32.532   1:32.523
38:   1:34.733   1:32.430    (Alonso pits)
39:   1:55.113   1:32.099
40:   1:33.707   1:32.167
41:   1:33.651   1:34.876    (Schumacher pits)

For those three crucial laps, Schumacher was around 1.5 secs quicker than Alonso, who had come out of the pits with a massive 22-lap fuel load for the run to the flag. Fernando also did not have the advantage of a new set of tyres for those laps - a legacy of the strategy of using the extra set in third qualifying - and thus he didn't have access to the 'golden lap'. But Symonds admits that it wouldn't have made much difference.

"No," he declares, "Because we would have gained 0.8 seconds, and we needed... it was huge, wasn't it? About 4.7 secs or something. It wouldn't have been anywhere near enough."

Of course, it's always easy to suss these things in retrospect, but the two-tenths margin Alonso had in qualifying suggested that he could have taken to the track with another lap in the tank for the run to the first stop, and that would have been very handy.

"We did have a little bit of margin, but I don't think that fundamentally it would have made any difference. The gap that we needed at the second stop, we simply couldn't achieve it, because the Ferrari was too quick at that point. It was very, very hard leading up to the second stop to get the gap that we needed. No matter what we did, Michael could respond."

McLaren: There or thereabouts?

When historians look back at the 2006 European Grand Prix, they will be astonished to see four cars from three teams covered by just 4.8 seconds. Kimi Raikkonen and McLaren were right there, and yet few probably came away with the impression that the car was anything like as competitive as that.

Kimi Raikkonen and McLaren teammate Juan Pablo Montoya during qualifying © Reuters

McLaren's problem at the moment seems to be finding the pure speed that is needed for qualifying, and that was exacerbated in Germany by tyre troubles. The tyres that the team chose for the weekend were simply not soft enough, and the drivers had a terrible time at the start of the weekend in trying to get into the operating window and find any grip. The situation did improve, but the team went into qualifying knowing that it was going to be a struggle.

In fact, Raikkonen's pace in the first two no-fuel sessions was better than expected, and it looked like he might even have a shot at pole. But the team decided not to get too carried away and opted for their usual 2006 strategy of a heavier fuel load.

If you know you can't qualify on the front row - and you don't have Renault's in-built ability to gain a place from third on the grid - then you don't join in the pole fight. So Kimi started fifth with what turned out to be fuel to run six laps longer than Alonso, and five more than Schumacher.

If he had been right on the tail of the others when they pitted, then the Finn would have jumped them. But the extra weight, and the fact that Schumacher's Bridgestones stayed so consistent, meant the leaders stayed tantalisingly out of Raikkonen's reach.

Pretty much the same happened at the second round of stops, and Kimi then had the frustration of catching the leading group, although to be fair Alonso had in effect given up to save his engine, and Schumacher had in turn moderated his pace and stage-managed the gap.

At Imola too we saw the McLarens catching up in the final stint, but at tracks where passing opportunities are rare, it's a case of too little, too late.

"Given where we were on Friday and Saturday morning, it was a reasonable outcome," says team CEO Martin Whitmarsh. "We selected a tyre, as did a number of the other Michelin runners, that was too hard here, and we then had difficulty getting it into the operating window. There are, with the benefit of hindsight, tyres within Michelin's portfolio that would have gave us more performance here. So that's the overall verdict.

"Kimi made a reasonable start, was within five or ten seconds of the lead throughout, and he led twice, obviously. We weren't quite there, close, we thought we might be able to sneak it by going long in the second stint.

"We had a bit of rear tyre drop-off in that stint as well. The first set of tyres was good, and even with a degree of engine conservation, we were able to catch up with Alonso [after his first stop].

'We gave Kimi the opportunity of a few more revs at the end to have a go, but he couldn't get by. So fourth and DNF is a disappointing result, but frankly we were conditioning ourselves for a much bigger disaster on Friday evening, so it's a reasonable outcome."

Kimi Raikkonen pits during the race © XPB/LAT

The tyre issue is incredibly complex right now, and it seems that in general finding the sweet spot - a function of track temperatures and so on - is harder than ever before.

When you've got to choose two types of tyre to take to each of 18 races, the development goalposts are constantly moving, and you have to gauge the weather a week or two ahead to hit factory production schedules, it's not always easy to get it right.

"In fairness," Whitmarsh continues, "Renault had the equivalent tyre issue to ourselves, so they had to deal with that, and Renault and McLaren have got to take the responsibility for that, with Michelin. Both teams had the capability of beating Ferrari here, had we been on the right tyres within the portfolio that could have been used.

"It came a little bit towards us. It was fairly desperate stuff Friday and Saturday morning, we got through qualifying in reasonable shape. After the race is finished you can say had we done this, had we done that, then we could have had a result.

"That's hindsight, and the fact is we didn't, while Ferrari did a good job in selecting their tyres, Bridgestone did a good job in producing those tyres. And they also had to have the pace and reasonable strategy to be able to get the job done.

"Given where we were, we had to go longer in the second stint, just a little bit, but again we had to try, because the only way we were going to sneak in front of any of the front three cars.

"Part of the job is working with your tyre partner, making sure you've got the right tyres, and we didn't. We've learned from that, and we'll do a better job next time. Overall, though, we were within 5-10 seconds of the lead throughout the race, we were there or thereabouts, the next car was probably a minute behind us.

"I know we will have a less conservative tyre choice at the next couple of races, that's for sure, and so will Renault, in response to that."

It can't be long before things fall into place for McLaren, but the team aren't going to win from the third or fourth row unless there's some major attrition ahead. The bottom line is that the car has to go quicker over one lap. It's such a huge change from last year, where we so often saw Kimi beat all-comers even with the heaviest fuel load.

"It's the story so far this year," admits Whitmarsh. "We haven't got it together, we haven't been on the sweet spot with tyres, car, engine driver to get the result that we're chasing. Do we believe that we're going to win some races? Yes. Is the title challenge getting tougher race by race? Yes, it is, but it's still early in the season.

"We're working hard on the engine and chassis to improve our performance. I'm sure Renault and Ferrari will. I think it will be those three teams that will be fighting over the race wins, unless some of the others make a significant step up from where they are now.

"I think we underperformed a little bit at Imola. I think we're there or thereabouts. Again, had we been on the tyres, I think we'd have beaten Ferrari, I think we would have been close to Renault as we were, but the tyre predicament that we had was the same for Renault as it was for us.

Montoya battles with Nick Heidfeld © LAT

"We were not quite there, I think at the end it was nice to finish within five seconds of the leader, but it's not so pleasing when you're not on the podium."

Spain could be a whole new story. Tyres are an even bigger issue at Barcelona than at the 'Ring, and as we've seen in the past, it's easy to make mistakes.

Montoya goes bang

More than one engine failed in Sunday's race, a reflection of the fact that development is pushing ahead and that drivers are being given more revs more often. Juan Pablo Montoya was on the second race with his engine, and in the latter stages he was out of the points, having made a bad start and generally got caught up in the wrong place at the wrong time.

"At the end, frankly we took a risk with the engine," said Whitmarsh. "After we emerged tantalisingly close to that gaggle of cars, we just said we're not here to finish a race, let's just turn the engine up and go for it, and see what can happen. That was a decision that we took, and we went for it.

"In fairness to Mercedes, we were trying hard, and pushing hard. There was a group of cars where, by going much longer on his second stint, he could have, if we had a bit more pace, popped out in fifth place, which is what we were trying to do. When we popped out in ninth place, we took a conscious decision to absolutely go for it, in the knowledge that this might bring about an engine failure.

"You've got to applaud that Mercedes Benz had the racing culture that says do that. It's very easy to say we'll cruise now to a comfortable ninth place. But that's not what we're here to do.

"I don't think we should come out of it with any criticism over the engine. The engines have a two-race life, and within that two-race life you've got to exploit the engine within the given parameters. We chose at the end to take the risk. We're not here to finish a race out of the points..."

Full marks for McLaren and Mercedes for going for it, then, but it's yet again an indictment of current F1. In the good old days, it used to be the drivers who took risks to gain positions in the closing laps, not those with a corporate reputation to protect...