The philosophy of the Race

A few years ago we were used to the top teams trying different strategies in order to find an advantage, but in the era of control tyres we've become accustomed to seeing Ferrari and McLaren do exactly the same thing, with maybe a lap or three separating them in the pit stops.

Thus Lewis Hamilton's efforts on a three-stopper in Turkey came as a breath of fresh air, and provided us with an exciting afternoon. While it may have become clear well before the final stop that Hamilton was not going to beat Felipe Massa, his was a pretty good effort, and the strategic variety made for an entertaining afternoon. Even Ferrari team principal Stefano Domenicali was impressed by McLaren's approach.

"Of course the performance that we saw today of McLaren during the race was very good," he said. "And I always said that they are very strong, and I believe that. I think that today I saw another standard that is completely different from the past, that McLaren, in order to let's say attack us, changed the philosophy of the race, and changed the philosophy of qualifying, above all with Lewis. So I think this important, because also they have to react on the performance that we are doing."

Given that Hamilton had already spilled the beans in the post-race press conference, it was interesting that Stefano was keen to attribute McLaren's strategy to a response to Ferrari's recent dominance. In fact the truth was rather less exciting - the team put Lewis on three-stops as an emergency measure to avoid a tyre drama.

The situation had some similarities to the Michelin affair at Indianapolis in 2005, not least because it involved high vertical loadings through a single extremely high speed corner - a combination that puts extra stresses on tyre sidewalls. Except this time there was a major difference, since the problem affected not just one team, but one driver.

Hamilton of course had a tyre failure in Istanbul last year, which dropped him from third to fifth. That cost him three precious points, and while there were other late season dramas that contributed to him losing the World Championship, Turkey could have made a big difference.

Lewis Hamilton damaged his right front tire in the 2007 Turkish Grand Prix © XPB/LAT

Naturally McLaren fully investigated that incident at the time. Even before last weekend, the team had taken steps to ensure that it did not happen again.

"Lewis has a certain driving style which requires us to set the car and just loads up the front tyres a lot,' said Ron Dennis after the race. 'We're aware of it. All of the relevant data was provided to Bridgestone, and they felt it wasn't going to be an issue, but it proved to be."

It was in Friday practice that the team discovered that once again there was a potentially worrying issue.

"The answer is very, very simple - Turn 8," said Martin Whitmarsh. "We're very, very strong in high speed corners; we generate a lot of front end. In fact last year it was a chunking problem in the tyre, this was a delamination in the sidewall, so this was a different problem this weekend. We're generating high vertical loads through those corners, and I think Bridgestone acknowledge that."

The problem was examined overnight on Friday, and even before Saturday morning practice, the team was looking at three stops as a potential strategy, simply because it would break the race up into four bite-size chunks, and minimise the mileage run on each set.

"It was decided on Saturday before we were running in P3 as a consequence of durability concerns on the tyres," said Whitmarsh of the three-stopper. "So from that point on we knew that we had a problem there. Obviously we didn't advertise the fact, but with Lewis in particular, we had a problem.

"We took a number of measures with Bridgestone. We came here running the pressures and camber that they specified. We then increased the pressures on Saturday morning hoping that would solve the problem, and in fact Bridgestone were very confident that it would solve the problem. It didn't sufficiently to give us the comfort that we needed. We made some adjustments and we limited the range for the race."

As far as the team was concerned, there was a clear explanation as to why Hamilton was affected, and Kovalainen wasn't.

The McLarens of Heikki Kovalainen and Lewis Hamilton © LAT

"They've got a slightly different set-up, which puts a bit more load on the front tyres on Lewis's car. Lewis was reasonably aggressive through Turn 8 - very, very quick incidentally - but he changed his style and driving line on Saturday. On a circuit like this when you see there's a concern with tyres you've got to put safety first.

"We took a decision which I don't regret. I regret the fact that we had to make a decision, but we made a decision which was how do we run this race safely for Lewis? I think it was the right decision with the information that we had available at the time."

The bottom line was that Lewis went into qualifying knowing that he would have to make three stops, and that meant he absolutely had to be on pole to have any chance of converting that into a decent result. He had one advantage in that the schedule automatically meant he would be light - indeed he eventually came in on lap 16 compared with 19 for Massa and 21 for Kimi Raikkonen. But there were added complications.

As Whitmarsh noted earlier, he had to adjust his line for Turn 8, and more importantly, there was clearly some debate about which tyres to use. He felt more comfortable on the prime, which was of course a highly unusual choice for qualifying.

In the end he had to settle for third place, and his demeanour after the session indicated that things hadn't gone to plan. It wasn't hard to guess that he was lighter than his team mate (in fact it was by a significant amount), but we didn't know that he was also already committed to that extra stop.

Having gone straight into the FIA press conference he basically admitted that the choice of prime had been a mistake (although he emphasised that it was his choice) An hour or so later, having talked to the team, he had changed his tune. A cynic might think that his views had been 'corrected' by the management (a quarter of a century ago John Watson was given a dressing down by Dennis for referring to 'his' tyre choice rather than 'ours'), but it seems that Lewis really did take a look at the numbers and revise his opinion.

"Coming into Q3 I had to make a decision," said Hamilton. "The team rely on me to make that decision. At the end of the day I'm the one that's out there, I'm the only one that really knows what's going on. I think we actually did make the right decision. For us that was the best tyre to use, but at the time I thought this wasn't the tyre I should have used.

"I've just been looking at the data, and it was the right decision. I did the best job I could in Q1, in Q2 it was clear the soft tyre wasn't good for me, and my engineer just told me that my decision was right. The hard tyre was the right tyre for me. We [Lewis and Heikki] drive differently."

Lewis Hamilton in the qualifying press conference © XPB/LAT

He said he had good reason to look a little downbeat after the session: 'Whenever you go into qualifying you feel you just haven't done a perfect job. As I said, I feel the lap was good, but it wasn't good enough obviously. For sure we're third, and it's better than we've had for the last few races, so it's not all doom and gloom.

"We're in a position to be able to attack on the first lap, and I think we're going to be in a good position to challenge for the win. But it's going to be tough, it's always tough from the back. I want to win just as much as anyone else, and sometimes you feel if something's not 100%, then it needs to be improved."

On Sunday, it all came together. Crucially he jumped Kovalainen, who made a bad start from the dirty side of the grid. Aided a little by his three-lap fuel advantage he stuck with Massa through the first stint, Lewis on primes, and Felipe on options.

After the stops he surprised us all by not only reeling the Brazilian in, but passing him in great style. Both Ferrari drivers felt uncomfortable on their second set of options, and suggested that they might have done better on primes, but nevertheless there was a lot of Hamilton magic involved in that pass. He kept pushing throughout, and did enough to ensure that he stayed ahead of Raikkonen, an outcome that the team could not have predicted at the start.

"To be sub optimal in your strategy and be so close to winning shows that we were really, really quick,' said Whitmarsh. 'Lewis did a fantastic job. I guess Lewis in Q3 was the slip of the weekend, the durability of the tyres has been a setback to us but overall the team has done a fantastic job.

"The reality is that we wouldn't have three-stopped on either car unless we had to, and I believe that both cars had a reasonable chance of winning, had we been able to conventionally two-stop."

One question remained to be asked. Could Lewis still have won if he'd taken pole and been able to escape from Massa in that first stint? We'll never know.

"I would have said from pole it would have been difficult, but given the performance that he gave in the race he possibly could have done..."

Bearing in mind this was another Ferrari win, Ron Dennis was upbeat afterwards. He was keen to emphasise that without his first lap puncture, Kovalainen - on a relatively heavy load - could have been right there.

Heikki Kovalainen overtakes Nico Rosberg during his climb through the field © XPB/LAT

"I think he [Lewis] did a great job," he said Dennis. "He was very disciplined, he did everything that was asked. We asked him to overtake Massa and he did. That was quite impressive! It was if you can, do it, and he did, and he did it very cleanly.

"Heikki was very, very quick, he was a bit disappointed to get a cut tyre off a skirmish with Raikkonen at the start, but we picked that up with the telemetry. It was slow enough that we could do one lap behind the safety car, and avoid coming in with the pitlane closed. So that was a pretty good call.

"He would have been very strong. You can't predict, but he would have been very strong He had every opportunity today to win his first race. But that's life!"

There was no doubt that Dennis can now see light at the end of the (Monaco?) tunnel, as if he clearly feels that Ferrari's claim on the top step of the podium will end soon.

"I think we came here with the ability to get good results. I don't like saying we would have won, but obviously I don't think here was any doubt that Ferrari was pushing hard from beginning to end. It was a very close race. There's a long way to go. There's two points out of the lead, as it were, so a bit closer to Kimi.

"With all of these cars you're forced to compromise on trying to keep the rear tyre alive. It just requires a knife edge set-up, and getting it right is quite difficult. But we're getting more and more knowledge of the car, and in the end we're getting the job done. There's a long way to go. We're really looking forward to the rest of the championship, and of course there's a large quantity of development parts coming for Monte Carlo, so we're looking forward to it."

It's worth making a note of Ron's comments about tyres. This year in Monaco drivers have no traction control, and this is a track where TC was activated more than any other. The extra wheelspin could mean that rear tyres really take a battering, and some may make suffer if they make set-up compromises to compensate. It'll be interesting to see how that pans out...