Coming just a matter of weeks after Jenson Button broke his duck in Hungary, Felipe Massa's win in the Turkish Grand Prix has helped replenish the amount of race winning experience in the current F1 field.
In quick succession, previous race winners Juan-Pablo Montoya and Jacques Villeneuve departed the F1 scene. Massa's victory on Sunday, coupled with Button's win, means we are once again back up to 10 active drivers with previous victories.
Felipe Massa became the 97th man to win a world championship Grand Prix © LAT |
It's only the second time in the last 24 years that we've had back-to-back maiden wins - and the other time was highly contentious. After Kimi Raikkonen's Malaysian Grand Prix win of 2003, an error in timing and scoring meant he was originally declared the winner of the following Brazilian GP. Only when the error was corrected, several days later, was Giancarlo Fisichella credited with a slightly hollow first win.
Should the likes of Pedro de la Rosa, Mark Webber or Nico Rosberg need any inspiration for Monza, a win there would give us the first hat-trick of first time winners since 1982, when Patrick Tambay, Elio de Angelis and Keke Rosberg won the German, Austrian and Swiss GPs.