The Race of attrition: USA GP.

So last night I stayed up until 5am.. although i did sleep a little bit during the 125cc Bike race that was on just before the Formula One Grand Prix.

Channel TEN realised that the original telecast time was wrong as the race was set to start at 3am AEST instead of 4am. So they went straight from the Bike GPs into the F1 telecast at 2:45am.

A change in the grid due to penalties saw Liuzi start 2nd last (for an engine change) and Rosberg start last (due to missing a weigh-in after qualifying. Truili started from the pitlane because the team had to take the car out of parc-fermae conditions, to repair part of the car.

With the Ferraris on the front row they were set for a competitive race. Massa had a better start from 2nd on the grid and took the lead into the first corner. Alonso got past Fisi and almost past Michael into the first corner.

Around about the mid field, as they were heading through the second corner, Montoya got into the back of Kimi, which caused him to spin and bump Webber who made contact with Heidfeld. Heidfeld's car barrel rolled three times before coming to rest near the barrier. Jensen Button, Scott Speed, Christian Klien, and Franck Montagny were also collected in the mayhem. Button retired 3 laps later due to damage from the collision. The Safety Car was deployed immediately. In the old, and somewhat better days, the Race would have been stopped and restarted after the cleanup which would allow some drivers to take the spare car. But these days the rules don't allow it.

Although just a few years ago, the German GP when Schumacher went out on the first corner, they did red flag the race, even though they could have deployed the safety car.

Anyway, Channel TEN decided to go to an ad break almost immediately after the SC came out. 3 minutes later we re joined the coverage after missing 2 laps of SC. For some reason Daffy and Cromlin decided they had to say something after every ad break during the coverage. Even though the ITV guys had returned from their ad break. Sure the ITV guys love the british drivers, and moreso Button, but the ch 10 commentators talk up Webber's chances all the time. That's annoying at times.

I digress, back to the race and after the SC left the circuit, Massa got a huge lead over Michael, about 2 seconds cause the SC pulled off to the left at the last corner instead of entering the pitlane. At the first corner of the restart, Sato made a move on Tiago Monteiro, which took himself out and cause damage to Monterio's car, that later caused his retirement. After 9 laps we were down to 12 cars remaining in the race. It's times like this that I wish they would allow more teams to enter and have 26 cars on the grid. I suppose I just want it the way it used to be when I started watching the Grand Prixs.

Jacques Villeneuve's race came to an end on lap 23 when his engine expired causing the rear wheels to lock up. Albers had a transmission problem and retired on lap 37.

Fisi was being held up by Alonso for several laps, but eventually was allowed passed. Rubens was the first to pit for fuel on lap 24. Michael and Fisi both pitted on lap 29, with Massa and Ralf pitting on lap 30. The in lap of Massa was 2 seconds slower than Michael, which allowed Michael to pass him. Alonso led a lap before pitting on lap 31.

Alonso didn't have the speed in the car to catch the Ferraris or his teammate.
Truili, Liuzzi, Rosberg and Coulthard only pitted once during the race. This allowed Truili to get in between Fisi and Alonso. After the final pitstops Alonso found himself in 6th behind both Toyotas. Ralf retired on lap 62 allowing Alonso to take 5th, and the positions remained that way till the end. Luizzi got by Rosberg toward the end of the race to take 8th and the final point.

The final results are:

Pos	No	Driver	Team	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid
1	5	Michael Schumacher	Ferrari	73	1:34:35.199	1
2	6	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	73	+7.9 secs	2
3	2	Giancarlo Fisichella	Renault	73	+16.5 secs	3
4	8	Jarno Trulli	Toyota	73	+23.6 secs	22
5	1	Fernando Alonso	Renault	73	+28.4 secs	5
6	11	Rubens Barrichello	Honda	73	+36.5 secs	4
7	14	David Coulthard	RBR -Ferrari	72	+1 lap	17
8	20	Vitantonio Liuzzi	STR -Cosworth	72	+1 lap	21
9	10	Nico Rosberg	Williams -Cosworth	72	+1 lap	19
10r	7	Ralf Schumacher	Toyota	62	ret	8
11	19	Christijan Albers	MF1 -Toyota	37	Transmission	14
12	17	Jacques Villeneuve	Sauber -BMW	23	Engine	6
13	18	Tiago Monteiro	MF1 -Toyota	9	Accident Damage	15
18	14	Takuma Sato	Super Aguri -Honda	6	Accident-Monterio	18
7	15	Jenson Button	Honda	3	Accident Damage	7
16	3	Kimi Räikkönen	McLaren -Mercedes	0	Accident	9
17	16	Nick Heidfeld	Sauber -BMW	0	Accident	10
18	4	Juan Pablo Montoya	McLaren -Mercedes	0	Accident	11
19	9	Mark Webber	Williams -Cosworth	0	Accident	12
20	21	Scott Speed	STR -Cosworth	0	Accident	13
21	15	Christian Klien	RBR -Ferrari	0	Accident	16
22	23	Franck Montagny	Super Aguri -Honda	0	Accident	20