Lewis Hamilton tried a sneaky three-stop strategy, Kimi Raikkonen fuelled up and ran a long first stint, but neither of them could find an answer to Felipe Massa who won the Turkish Grand Prix by the simple tactic of driving very fast from the front.
The perfect antidote to processional racing – today the lead swapped hands and raw speed was traded against strategy for a gripping race at the Istanbul circuit. You’d venture out to put the kettle on at your peril – but at least no drivers were felled by hitting stray dogs, as happened to Bruno Senna…
On the surface it looks like more of the same – Ferrari’s Felipe Massa on pole for the third year running and seemingly on his way to another big stack of points for Ferrari. But look a little deeper and this has the potential to be a really interesting race.
Adam Carroll’s hopes of winning the GP2 Turkish sprint race from pole ended with an early gearbox failure – but the prize for unlucky exits went to Bruna Senna, eliminated from the race after he hit a stray dog on the track.
Target Chip Ganassi Racing confirmed their status as the team to beat by seizing the first two qualifying positions for the Indy500 in a tactically intriguing pole shoot-out at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Adam Carroll will start on pole in tomorrow’s GP2 sprint race after his return to the series saw him squander an impressive qualification performance in the feature race to finish eighth.
Rookie Alex Lloyd will sit out weekend qualifying on medical advice after hitting the wall during Indy500 ‘Fast Friday’ practice.
Jay Howard has lost his chance to drive in this year’s Indy500 after his struggling team decided to drop him for the race and bring in veteran John Andretti.
A grumpy Lewis Hamilton struggled through qualifying at the Turkish Grand Prix and admitted to wrong decisions – but still managed to take third and expects to challenge the Ferraris.