By Matt Jones
July 13 2006

Regular RealHondaF1.com reader Matt Jones gives us his views on the two North American races, moving on to Indianapolis for the United States Grand Prix. Last year the Indy race saw all Michelin runners withdrawing due to safety issues regarding tyres, an incident we certainly do not wish to see again. It’s very much an incident filled race and to watch a Formula One car sweep around turn 13 onto the main straight is fantastic.

In qualifying the two Midland cars made it through to session two, showing some half decent pace. Shockingly, this demoted Jarno Trulli, who got caught out on the weighbridge. David Coulthard also missed the cut, while Nico Rosberg was sent to the back for missing a weighbridge call. Vitantonio Liuzzi who had an engine change, so also started at the rear of the grid.

With so many drivers missing the weighbridge, or having it affect their qualifying so much, perhaps it is time the FIA change the ruling on it to weigh the cars after the sessions in qualifying, rather than during the hectic 15-minute sessions.

Session two of qualifying handed us no real surprises. The Midland surge up the qualifying positions was halted, which was no real shock to anyone. Williams are looking more and more like a midfield team as the season progresses and it does not look to be getting any better for them in qualifying. Juan Pablo Montoya, who has been threatening to drop out of the top ten shootout for qualifying in recent races, finally did so and, this season perhaps more than last, Kimi Raikkonen seems to be showing firmly that he is number one.

Thankfully for us both Honda Racing F1’s made the final shootout, despite the car showing very little pace of late. We saw one of our better qualifying runs with Rubens Barrichello putting his car on the second row of the grid and Button on the third row with a heavier fuel load.

BMW-Sauber once again looked extremely strong, with both drivers making it into the shootout. The Swiss based team seem to be getting stronger and stronger and could well pose a threat to Honda’s position in the championship if we don’t buck up our ideas.

Michael Schumacher took pole with Felipe Massa alongside him and, from the qualifying form, Ferrari looked unbeatable, more so considering it was obvious Massa was going to be acting as ‘rear gunner’.

I did comment in my last report about Indy being very incident filled in recent years and that it was a perfect opportunity for the team to score a decent haul of points. Unfortunately what I was not counting on was one of our drivers being caught up in a multi car pile up into turns one and two.

The latter was very much a racing incident. It was obvious from the television footage that it stemmed from contact between the two McLaren drivers and, as a result, eight cars retired from the race including Honda driver Jenson Button - a very premature end to what was promising to be a more competitive race than we have seen recently. I had hoped that this situation was not going to be in the script, but it’s always the risk if you run heavy in qualifying and get mixed up in the midfield.

McLaren went heavy on fuel in qualifying which put them in amongst the midfield and both drivers took each other out into turn two. Little occurrences like these are surely not helping Montoya’s bid to remain at McLaren for 2007. Ron Dennis seemed to be directing heat away from his drivers but amazingly pointing the finger at Button who was minding his own business on the outside of turn two before being collected by Montoya.

Rubens brought Honda back to point scoring ways but, once again, out on track you got the impression that perhaps Jenson would have done just that bit more with the car in the same situation. It was a quiet afternoon for Rubens, who was unable to challenge an obviously struggling Alonso.

Not in the script was Massa pinching the lead off team leader Michael Schumacher, though it was blatantly obvious the team would make the switch and correct the positions. They did so in the pits, where Massa had an unusually slow in lap and Michael was able to pass him with ease. The ‘no team orders’ rule is a grey area and, with Michael challenging for the title, it was the only sensible thing for the team to do.

Unsurprisingly Ferrari went on to score their first one-two of the season, Massa putting in what was probably his strongest race to date for the team. Whether Ferrari can maintain such a dominating advantage over Renault remains to be seen, but I expect a much closer race between the two teams at Magny-Cours in two weeks time.

If this is the true pace of Ferrari from now then the championship race has been completely blown open. Unfortunately I think it was just a one off where Bridgestone tyres were just so much stronger and it showed with both Toyota’s lapping as fast as the Renaults. Perhaps Michelin simply went more conservative after the disaster that happened last year and who could blame them if they did?

Indy was the first time I think I have ever seen Giancarlo Fisichella outperform teammate Fernando Alonso on a level playing field. Giancarlo had been faster than Alonso all weekend, and managed to back that up with a solid display in the race to easily beat Alonso, who eventually finished a lowly fifth - his worst race position since Hungary last year, which just shows the quality and consistency he has shown in his driving. I fully expect normal business to resume in a couple of weeks at Magny-Cours. Surprisingly, Renault have retained Giancarlo for 2007 despite him not being able to challenge Alonso week in and week out.

Toyota looked very strong but also a touch fragile as well as Ralf retired from the race a handful of laps from the end. Jarno Trulli was helped by the massive accident into turn one and two, along with the safety car period, leaving him able to cruise up to the back of the points positions with a heavy fuel load and finish a very solid fourth place for Toyota. I think it’s highly likely that they were matching pace with Renault was simply supreme tyres that boosted them to such a strong result. I am still left undecided as to just how competitive the B-spec Toyota is.

McLaren went heavy on fuel in qualifying which put them in amongst the midfield and both drivers took each other out into turn two. Little occurrences like these are surely not helping Montoya’s bid to remain at McLaren for 2007. Ron Dennis seemed to be directing heat away from his drivers but amazingly pointing the finger at Button who was minding his own business on the outside of turn 2 before being collected by Montoya.

Williams were disappointing again. Mark Webber was one of the unfortunate drivers to get caught up in the first lap incidents, but Nico Rosberg had a sterling opportunity to score points. With only nine cars finishing the race, Nico could not manage to out pace either a Toro Rosso or a Red Bull Racing car. It’s looking increasingly likely that Williams are slumping to their worst ever finishing position in the championship since their debut season almost 30 years ago.

BMW-Sauber had their great points scoring record cancelled out at Indy, with Nick Heidfeld being flipped over into the gravel trap in the first lap mess and Jacques Villeneuve retiring a fraction of the way through the race. It was a disappointing weekend for the team who have looked increasingly strong.

Red Bull Racing managed to sneak a couple of points with David Coulthard. Under pressure Christian Klien was taken out in the first lap incident and it’s looking highly likely that Christian might not be in Formula one next season.

Vitantonio Liuzzi, who was able to overtake Nico Rosberg, brought in Toro Rosso’s first point of the season. Obviously the masses of retirements handed them the opportunity to score.

Super Aguri were left with another double retirement with Frank Montagny getting caught up in the first lap crashes. Takuma Sato was also involved in a crash with Tiago Monteiro, who was left displeased and seemingly felt the Super Aguri team were intentionally looking for him on track.

Midland also suffered a double retirement, which was disappointing after both drivers had their best qualifying for the team to date. On the bright side, Super Aguri’s launch of their new chassis has been delayed until Hockenheim so Midland are not under threat from them in Magny-Cours in a couple of weeks.

The race was incident filled, as predicted. Unfortunately all the action was over by turn 2 of the first lap, leaving us with a very small number of cars racing. By the end of the race the fans on circuit were probably getting a sense of déjà vu, with just nine circulating the track.

We are now back to Europe and, looking ahead, I have to admit I am still extremely disappointed that we will not be going to Spa this year, with only three of the races ahead whetting my appetite (Brazil, Hockenheim and Turkey).

As for Honda, perhaps things are not as bad as I originally thought. Hopefully we can start again with our consistent points scoring to keep the rejuvenated Toyota and BMW teams at bay in the championship. I think asking anything more of the team, such as chasing down McLaren, is too much to ask considering the gap in both performance and points.