Formula One season review
Eurosport - Sat, 27 Dec 12:50:00 2008
Formula One should be looking forward eagerly to the year ahead after a thrilling 2008 season with new winners and 23-year-old Lewis Hamilton becoming the youngest world champion on the last lap of the last race.
Instead, with the global economic crisis squeezing sponsors and manufacturers alike, the playground of billionaires and big business has had to tighten its belt and prepare for a more frugal future.
Big-spending Honda and tiny Super Aguri will not be at the starting line in Australia in March, with the championship set to shrink to 18 cars if no buyer for Honda emerges in the next few weeks.
The next year will be far from easy but the cost-cutting measures, including cheaper engines and a ban on testing, should bring the sport back from the brink of disaster.
"I think this is probably the first step towards Formula One saving itself," said International Automobile Federation president Max Mosley after the wide-ranging package was rolled out last week.
That it should be Mosley leading the push illustrates how much the climate has changed in Formula One over the course of the year.
In March, the Briton's own future at the helm of the governing body was at stake after a British Sunday newspaper splashed details of his involvement in a sado-masochistic sex session with prostitutes.
Mosley fiercely resisted calls for his resignation in a saga that hung over the championship until the credit crunch started to bite and the realisation dawned that Formula One's free-spending, Champagne days were over.
The 2008 championship marked a series of firsts and lasts, with fresh faces entering the winners' circle and, in Hamilton, the first black champion and a role model to a whole new constituency.
Singapore, now established as the sport's jewel in the East, hosted the first night race to huge acclaim after fans had stifled a yawn at Valencia's less stellar debut in the European summer.
Next year will be Abu Dhabi's turn to impress with the season-ending race on a new harbourside circuit.
The coming season will see slick tyres replace the grooved rubber, very different aerodynamics and the advent of KERS energy recovery systems to transform heat from the brakes into additional power.
All the teams are starting with a fresh slate, something that Honda team boss Ross Brawn had been looking forward to after a dismal season, and even Hamilton cannot take anything for granted.
The Briton, his country's first champion since 1996, promises to be hungrier than ever after securing a championship that could easily have slipped through his fingers for the second year in a row.
Hamilton won fewer races than his main Ferrari rival Felipe Massa, the Brazilian who had one hand on the crown until the final seconds at Interlagos.
Formula One measures success and failure in milli-seconds and Hamilton rammed home that point by keeping everyone on tenterhooks almost to the end before sweeping past Timo Glock's struggling Toyota for the fifth place he needed.
After 18 grands prix and more than a thousand laps on five continents, the McLaren driver won by a single point.
Massa, noble in defeat, grew in stature and will be a real contender again next year. So too, Ferrari hope, will 2007 champion Kimi Raikkonen.
While the Finn had a disappointing year, despite Ferrari retaining their constructors' title, a younger generation came to the fore.
The most surprising member was Germany's Sebastian Vettel, triumphant in Toro Rosso's home Italian Grand Prix to become Formula One's youngest race winner at the age of 21 before leaving for Red Bull.
Poland's Robert Kubica laid down a marker for next year, seizing his and the BMW-Sauber team's first victory in Canada. A model of consistency after his big smash in Montreal in 2007, the Pole turned what could have been a two-horse race into a three-way battle for far longer than anyone could have expected.
Finland's Heikki Kovalainen crashed heavily in Spain but added his name to the list of winners in Hungary by emerging from Hamilton's shadow to take a lucky victory for McLaren after Massa was robbed by a blown engine in the closing laps.
Double world champion Fernando Alonso pulled off the comeback of the year with two wins in a row for resurgent Renault, a team most had counted out at the start of the season.
While the Mosley sex scandal took over from 2007's spy saga as the main talking point in the paddock, there was also the usual supply of controversy on the track along with some unforgettable action.
Hamilton found himself on the losing side in an appeal court hearing in September after being demoted from first to third in a Belgian Grand Prix thriller.
The Briton, who suffered racial abuse in Spain before the season started, was derided as a 'crash dummy' for accelerating straight into the back of Raikkonen's stationary Ferrari at a red light in the Montreal pit lane in June.
Massa also made hard work of his campaign, spinning repeatedly in the rain at Silverstone and suffering a botched Singapore stop in which his Ferrari trailed a fuel hose down the pitlane.
Canada and France, both axed for next year, followed Indianapolis off the grand prix calendar while Britain's David Coulthard, winner of 13 races for McLaren and Williams, called it a day at 37.
Brazilian Rubens Barrichello, who ended the season with a record 270 race starts, is likely to follow him out after Honda's demise.
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Comment 73 - 92 of 92
2008 Season Review
Summary
Lewis & Felipe were both as good as each other.
Lewis & Felipe Both made mistakes
McLaren & Ferrari were both as good as each other
McLaren & Ferrari both made mistakes
The race stewards made several mistakes with their judgments- which mainly favored Ferrari
In rainy conditions Lewis showed he can drive on the wrong tires
In rainy conditions Timo Glock showed that he can't drive on the wrong tires
The FIA decided to change rules as they saw fit to manipulate the points to make it a close finish - Lewis would have secured the drivers title with races to go otherwise
Small teams are allowed to take pole & race win as long as it doesn't interfere with both championships
That is my summary of the 2008 season.
HE LOST ALL RESPECT FROM THE DRIVERS
Then hes team mclaren cheat in stealing top f1 secrets in what was the biggest spy scandal in f1 history!!
They should of been banned for long Time but continued and so did mr hamiltons son continue bashing other drivers out of way in hes strive for the ultimate prize the F1 TITLE..
Soon came end of season and with all the bashing and stealing secrets from mclaren mr hamiltons son had blown it all again..OH NO HES FATHER CRY,,
OOHHH but wait a min ,, suddenly out of nowhere from over the horizon,
NO SURELY IT CAN NOT BE!!! YES ITS HIM DADDY ITS HIM DADDY!! cried baby hamilton
YES YES ITS FATHER GLOCK DADDY ITS FATHER GLOCK and the little boys dream came true...out of nowhare like an ALIEN arriving from Mars,,,faher glock had deliverd the ultimate prize to Mr hamiltons son....but the cost was so severve it ended forever F1 as we no it.
MERRY XMAS MCLAREN........FATHER GLOCK.......MCLAREN/HAMILTON CHEATIN S.UM
Take your point Junky but Yahoo do not like impersonation, so in this case it is worth doing.
btw pam_wallis60 is also this same person and they have a range of logins:
simioni44
ssussannah
iigor_k
llorretta22
fototedlondona4
quentin alora
thomsons34
aaronvincent
salsa747
-
This sick individual just posts to wind people up unlike mouron who has this fantacist thing - they are quite different.
I think this person is an Argentinian, so they were up very late posting their bile. I do hope they weren't waiting for me to post, cos I ain't been up long.
You can recognise them from their infantile language - look at posts 82 to 84 below.
Why bother reporting, when my posts accussing him of his racist nonsense get taken down.
Does that not tell which way the moderators swing?!!
Junky neither the Touronroute now posting or tourneo100 are our old mate Mourontoot (as we call him).
Just report Touronroute below for impersonation.
f1junky1000, WELL SAID MATE
So now racistroute has another alias aka tourneo100, you work on the cars during the race.
I watched the British GP from my house on the Tele and I am pretty sure it was more considerablely more than 10,000 fans for McLaren.
Once again your bigoted views on people is clouding your judgement to say the right thing.
Every turns and grand stand at Silverstone from the telle shows clearly that MAJORITY of the support is for Lewis Hamilton and McLaren.
I am sure your hatred must be killing you now!!!
Saying McLaren has only 10,000 fans at Silverstone is at stupid as saying Ferrari only have 10,000 fans at San Marino or Monza, get a life racistroute (touronroute)/Marnio from peru/Bernard/tourneo100.
I Tyson article 86 ,just quoting offical local estimate, and for your knowledge there is only 11 area's including bridge and you cant hear cheers from one part to the next. dont say what isn't true.
I TYSON, article (26) i to was at silverstone, it was estimated in local rags that Lewis Hamilton had 10,000 supporters cheering him on, could i please ask what part of the track you was, you must have very large ears, i actually work on the cars in the pit area.
racistroute aka touronroute, once again you make unsustantiated claims about McLaren support at Silverstone.
I suppose being an idiot and a racist fool comes naturally to you.
touronroute, I was at Silverstone this yr, your comment about only 10,000 Mclaren SUPPORTERS there, how you can make this claim ! when all around the track that's all you could hear was very loud cheers every time Lewis went through each part of the track, however they were even louder when MASSA WAS SPINING AND SPINING ! I kNOW THIS WILL PUT your claim STRAIGHT.
Not only that, 'but Lewis showed how much better he is and driving F1 CARS IN DRY OR WET CONDITIONS, THAT IS WHY HE IS N01 AND MCLAREN N01 TEAM
7777 that mac bill all backwards
now & forever
why do teams need 2 cars each
should be restriced to one per outfit
who started this idea of 2 each ??
NickTheCreePrees. WHAT IT MEANS IS YOU STUPID ENGLISH, THINK EVERYTHING YOU READ IS THE TRUTH, READY TO JUMP ON A BANDWAGON, BUT TOMORROW THE WHEELS WILL FALL OFF, AND BELIEVE ME BILLMACS WHEELS FELL OFF LONG AGO, GIVE HIM A OLD SAT NAV,
I like that Nick. Oh yes I read what I hear all right.
What do you know about this guy impersonating our beloved mouron?
BILL MAC. no thanks, you read everything you hear, thats why you are where you are, no where.
Yes everyone has been reading them! If you want to dispute this talk to BE not me.
BILL MAC, secret payments, from who, you been reading bernie ecclestones comments , what a fool you are.
Mouron I have just read the article that you cut, edited and pasted for your post.
This is not evidence of any wrong doing on the part of McLaren.
You added "Norbett Haug was not available for questioning on this unfair advantage"
So now it's only ferrari that can have an engine with the greatest power is it?
.
As we now all know the corrupt and rotten cheats in F1 are Ferrari. Secret payments from the FIA for breaking ranks with the other teams, flappy floors that were banned some years ago, using Alonso to fit up McLaren etc etc etc.
.
So Ferrari once a cheat always a cheat - your words Mouron not mine.
BILL MAC, and then they say fia is all ferrari, not on your life, how can anyone in life be satisfied if they know they have cheated to be in front, mclaren has, and allways will have all the world over to be a cheat, and once a cheat allways a cheat,they will do what ever it takes to be in front, but not in the interest in sport or peoples lives, there was 80,000 at silverstone this year with only 10,000 supporters for mclaren, everything speaks for itself.
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