Wet 'n' Wild: behind the scenes of the Japanese GP

Well before the Japanese Grand Prix weekend, it was apparent that Sunday would likely to be wet, and as time passed, that likelihood became a certainty.

Somehow the FIA managed to squeeze qualifying in on schedule on Saturday, despite the fog grounding the medical helicopter. That at least got one major hurdle out of the way and meant that Sunday could run as normal, at least until the 1:30 pm start time rolled around and someone - race director Charlie Whiting - had to make a call on what would happen.

Fog was less of an issue, but it rained all morning. In fact, by Fuji standards it wasn't too bad, and locals will tell you that it can be much, much worse. Nevertheless, it was apparent as the start approached that safety car driver Bernd Maylander rather than Lewis Hamilton or Fernando Alonso would lead the field into the first corner.

What came as a surprise was the ad hoc ruling that everyone should start on extreme wet tyres should the safety car be used.

This was an eminently sensible decision given that safety was an absolute priority for the FIA in the potentially treacherous conditions, but one that came couched in complex legalise as chief steward Tony Scott-Andrews sought to justify this unusual intervention.

That is presumably why it took so long for the decision to be signed off for circulation via the FIA email system used to send messages to teams. At the same time, hard copies were distributed in the media centre.

I only found out that something was up while networking on the grid. I was intrigued to see that all four leading cars had done their reconnaissance laps on intermediates, and while the rain had eased, it seemed pretty obvious that they were not the tyres for the job.

I asked former Nippon champion and Fuji expert Pedro de la Rosa what was going on, and he told me that the McLaren drivers had just wanted to check the intermediates in the conditions. They weren't a factor for the start, he said, because everyone would have to use extremes.

Interestingly, Hamilton was the only top guy with experience of the extreme wet, having used it briefly at the start of Q1 - which is why he very nearly missed the cut as a change cost him time.

While I don't know the rule book by heart, this extreme tyre rule seemed to be a new one on me, but folk from a couple of other teams confirmed it to be so. On arrival back in the media centre just before the start I found the relevant communication, which seemed clear cut.

Since most of the paddock knew about the ruling by that stage, it seems amazing that Ferrari had somehow failed to learn of this late change, but we have to believe the team's assertion that they didn't find out until after the cars had left the grid and Charlie Whiting radioed and asked why both drivers were on intermediates.

It was a good question even without the rule change. While I was talking to de la Rosa, Maylander came up and asked if the Spaniard knew what the McLaren drivers thought of the conditions. Pedro checked and said that while there were some rivers, it was drivable - but only on extremes.

I understand the Ferrari drivers did not feel very comfortable on their reconnaissance laps with the intermediates. Interestingly they had actually come quite late to the grid, at a point when the rain had eased off a fraction, so they actually got a better impression than they might otherwise have done. Had they come out a little earlier they might have been adamant that inters were not the way to go.

Leaving aside the miscommunication on the rule amendment, Ferrari were trying to be clever and they screwed up, it's as simple as that. Famously in Malaysia 2001 the red cars started behind the safety car on inters, and lo and behold, when it was dry enough to release the field, those tyres were just coming into their own. Which meant the cars didn't have to pit like everyone else.

But at Fuji even behind the safety car, with pressures and temperature suffering, they were a real handful. Massa spun (and of course got a drive-through for regaining positions), and Kimi had a moment too. It wasn't just the FIA's insistence that brought them in on laps 2 and 3, the tyres were simply unusable in the conditions. The fact that everyone else stayed on extremes for the duration was pretty good evidence for that.

McLaren F1 CEO Martin Whitmarsh certainly thought it an odd decision: "Honestly I don't think we would have done that, actually. But an instruction was issued at 12:37 pm that we thought made it fairly clear that we didn't have a choice.

"We received what we thought were relatively clear instructions that you needed to start the race on extreme wets, so to find that both the Ferraris were on standard wets was a bit disturbing for us!"

Added Ron Dennis: "We were surprise that they started on something other than the monsoon tyres, because effectively there was a communication that everybody had to start on those tyres. So it was very confusing to us."

Taking on fuel at that stop, and at another while the safety car was still running, made for a fascinating strategic conundrum. As the laps went by it became apparent that there was a scenario where one by one the leading cars would stop and drop down the order, and the Ferraris would creep to the front by virtue of having so much more fuel on board.

Fortunately by lap 19 the cars had dispersed enough water to make a green flag possible.

"I don't think many cars fell off the road on their own," said Dennis of the conditions. "Most of the incidents were cars trying to overtake each other. Obviously our drivers radioed that they were very comfortable to start the race. The FIA asked us to ask the drivers, both drivers said no problem to start the race. Visibility was a little bad, but the grip was fine."

Whitmarsh acknowledged that the team were keen to get the race going: "From a McLaren perspective, and that's not to criticise Charlie [Whiting] or anyone, but we are very partisan and we would have liked the safety car gone a lot sooner.

"We spoke to our drivers in a manner that the FIA could hear, and both of them were very willing for the race to start. I'm sure if I'd been on the Ferrari pit wall, I'd have been willing for the safety car to stay out for a lot longer. So it was a concern.

"They were nearly getting into strategically a good spot - the longer the safety car went round. If we're honest about it, those of us on the pit wall were starting to think that things were conspiring against us!"

The McLaren drivers had only a few laps in which to try and make an escape before their stops were due.

The safety car period had allowed them to at least save some fuel and extend their range, but Alonso had just eight laps under green before he came in, and Hamilton had just one more. Both cars were fuelled for the long run to the flag, which meant 40- and 39-lap stints respectively.

"Given where Ferrari were, by that time it was a no-brainer," said Whitmarsh. "Because even though we didn't have much time, if we could gain enough time and we could get out in front of Ferrari, then it was a no-brainer, other than you are going to put cars out that are very heavy, on tyres that you have to push to a level that you wouldn't normally wish to. So there was some risk.

"But strategically if we hadn't done that we could have been caught out, so we didn't have the choice. We knew there were going to be a few safety cars thrown out there, and under the current safety car regulations you can get horribly caught out; if the safety car is called at a critical time when you are about to pit, it's game over. That's a big worry. I think that is quite a big flaw in the current safety car regulations."

The stop sequence was to make life hard for Alonso. He dropped as low as eighth, not helping himself with a moment on his out-lap, and got caught behind a group that comprised Giancarlo Fisichella, Heikki Kovalainen, Robert Kubica and David Coulthard. Pitting a lap later, and with a 3-second advantage on Alonso before the stops, Hamilton came out safely in front of that whole group.

"A rather unlucky moment," Alonso explained. "Because I was fighting with Lewis, I was a little bit quicker in the first part, but it was difficult to follow that close, because I didn't see the corners with the spray and the water. And then when I pitted I was behind four cars, and when he pitted he was in front of four cars."

"The stop was just very long because we put fuel to the end of the race," said Dennis. "Fernando came out between three or four slow cars, and that hampered his progress through the field. Lewis did that extra bit of distance, which meant that when he stopped he came out in front of that pack.

"The stopping point was determined by the range of fuel, it wasn't determined by a particular strategy. We had to go as far as we could. We conserved a lot of fuel behind the safety car, but we were very nervous about a safety car being deployed at a time when we were vulnerable to losing the race because of that."

Lewis was soon ten seconds ahead of his teammate and looking good. We then had the bizarre scenario of Hamilton being assaulted by Kubica - who was penalised for his move on Lewis - and Alonso punted by Sebastian Vettel within minutes of each other. Hearts were pounding in the McLaren camp...

"Kubica made life interesting," said Dennis. "It was a very strange thing to do in such poor conditions. So Lewis was very lucky not to damage the car badly. There was some vibration coming from the car, which we were monitoring, but we could see it wasn't suspension. So we anticipated some body damage."

Both drivers survived, but within a few laps Alonso's race was over after a heavy impact with the wall. He didn't use the earlier contact as an excuse, but it seems that he would have been justified in so doing. Dennis was so frustrated that he couldn't even get the name of Fernando's assailant right.

"I think Veltins" - honest, he said it twice! - "made several mistakes in this race, and that was one of them. Once the car had been damaged it was very difficult for him to drive and keep the pace. He did a good job for a while, and then it got away from him when the water got a bit heavier. But he did a good job."

"Both our drivers were hit from behind today," said Whitmarsh. "Unfortunately for Fernando he was hit harder than Lewis. The floor was very badly damaged and flapping around, the rear pick-ups were damaged.

"We could see in the data that he had lost a significant amount of downforce and the overall balance of the car, so the likelihood of him aquaplaning was always going to be greater than it was for anyone else out there. He was going to battle on.

"We don't know in truth, there may even have been a mechanical failure. There's no evidence of it at the moment, but he's been hit quite hard, and maybe he had a problem. Even if he hadn't, it was quite understandable that he was driving a real handful of a car. He lost approaching 10% of the downforce, a sizeable amount.

"He's a phenomenal driver doing a great job. He did a great job all weekend, I'm sure he'd have got to the end without the damage to the car, and he would have been on the podium as well. It's a shame for the team that this wasn't the case. We're not chasing constructors' points as we ordinarily would be, but it would have been good to see another car in front of Kimi."

Alonso was gone, but life was far from easy for Hamilton, even under the safety car that his teammate's crash had generated.

"Lewis had quite a lot of pressure during those safety car periods," said Whitmarsh. "He had a driver behind who wasn't fighting for the championship and might have fancied his chances at a win. Certainly Mark [Webber] looked like he fancied his chances of having a go, and you can imagine if you were Lewis, that's a bit of pressure. Ironically of course whilst Lewis was concerned about having Mark up his tail, that Webber should get a teammate up his backside!

"One of the challenges that you had was tyre pressures and brake temperatures. We did alert the FIA that we think the cars are very close, and when you think the safety car is coming in you've got to be prepared, you've got to get some temperatures back into the brakes, put the pressures in, and that's very difficult. Your carbon brakes can glaze over as well, especially in these sorts of conditions. The reality is everyone was braking, and if you follow too close, you get the typical motorway incident."

The safety car gone, Lewis still had another 18 laps of racing to do, and plenty of opportunity to make a mistake. The fact that he didn't was further proof that he fully deserves the world championship that he surely now has at least one hand on.

"The challenge for a driver, especially leading the race, is to not drive too quickly," said Dennis. "And the challenge for the team is not to go over the top on slowing him down. So the real message was not to take risks, and keeping him informed of where the puddles were, where the heaviest part of the water was.

"So we were encouraging him to back off at Turn 4 and Turn 10, where we could see there was the most standing water. And of course we really had to look after the tyres, it's a long stint to do on the monsoon tyres.

"We had to be careful with information overload. There was so much, visibility was so bad you couldn't rely on pit signals, so we were feeding him the data. It was difficult to know how much to give him. But overall it was a tremendously well-disciplined race.

"We tried to do a very good job for both drivers. I think Fernando drove very well, especially after he had the collision with Vettel, and obviously struggled because he damaged his car. But in the end it was a race full of incidents and lots of pressure for the team. I think Lewis thoroughly deserved his race win. It was well judged.

"He did an excellent job, I think both drivers did. There were a lot of incidents in the race, but overall I thought he did a great job. I'm proud of the team. It was a stressful race with lots of possible variables.

"His racing performance has shown that he's very mature and very disciplined. I don't think anyone can question his ability. Our objective has got to be to concentrate on the next two races. We'll relax a little bit before China, but then really concentrate. That's the important thing. We don't want to make any mistakes between now and the end of the championship.

"The team is very quiet, and there is nothing other than calm, focused professionalism. We really want to concentrate on the remaining two races. Clearly this has put us in a strong position, but it's certainly not over for Fernando."

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