Grand Prix 2012 Singapore Grand Prix Practice, Qualifying & Race Discussion

From the sunshine, trees and Ferrari madness of Monza to the water front and arc lights of Singapore, F1 begins the long haul end of the season with a night race at imaginatively named Marina Bay circuit. McLaren have won the last three races but Fernando Alonso still retains a significant margin in the Drivers Championship going into round 14. Last year was a Red Bull walk over but this year the Bulls have been somewhat castrated and Monza proved a real low point with a double DNF.

Lewis Hamilton's pole to flag win in Italy must give him great hope of chasing down Alonso's Championship lead, hopefully the on-going contract shenanigans won't distract him in the City State race. Don't under estimate Ferrari however, Massa showed good pace at Monza and Fernando Alonso is the only multiple Singapore GP winner in the field, one win behind matching Graeme Lawrence's three victories (look it up if you don't believe me).

After a pulsating second at Monza Sergio Perez must be hoping to go one better this race as his Sauber, through a combination of out right pace and strategy, was chasing down the leading McLaren towards the end in Italy. Whether their usual unusual strategy in Singapore will reap the same dividends remains to be seen, perhaps it's Kamui's turn?

The one man destruction derby that is Romain Grosjean will more than likely be back in the Lotus after Jerome d'Ambrosio put in a workman like, but less than stellar performance, standing in for the Frenchman. Kimi Raikkonen must be hoping the Lotus works better around the streets than it did on the high speed Monza track although fifth wasn't a bad result. Mercedes will, doubtless, continue in their position of best of the rest although Force India were their usual speedy selves around the open curves at Monza and will probably push the Mercs close.

Of the rest, what can you say? Williams - the tortoise and the hare incarnate, albeit the hare seems to have a habit of breaking a leg a little too often. Should we run a sweep on whether Pastor or Romain will punt another driver off first? The back of the grid are using the Noah principal and will come in "two by two", in qualie at least. This is a special race for Narain Karthikeyan as it marks the anniversary of his début at HRT having driven the Spanish shit box in free practice last year. Money well spent...

Pointless fact about Singapore: If you cross into Malaysia with less than 3/4's of a tank of fuel you will be fined $100 dollars.

Circuit write up is here: http://cliptheapex.com/pages/marina-bay-street-circuit/ enjoy!
 
Are the BBC showing this one live?

I'm glad Hamilton won last time out, Mclaren fingers-crossed have found the winning formula just need to keep up with the reliability and get both cars home by scoring big points :).

Thoroughly enjoying this season though :), i'm hoping Perez does well again this week :).
 
I don't think the material makes a lot of difference Mephistopheles once they're painted.

How many times have we seen drivers spin/lose control when going over a standard wet kerb, or even the rumble strips?
 
I think we're down to a 4 way championship with Alonso, Hamilton, Raikkonen and Vettel. But I think in the end it'll be a two horse race with the front two. While Kimi is mr consistency, if he is to take a second championship he does need to win a race (or two) before the end of the season and I don't think we've seen the last of the alternator problems at Red Bull and I think another DNF for Vettel would end his chances of a third straight title. Hamilton is 37 points behind Alonso but I think McLaren have the fastest car with Alonso in the third quickest car, although if anyone can outperform a car it's Alonso. Hamilton needs to close up an average of 7.4 points per race between Singapore and Brazil, which basically means that if Hamilton won, Alonso would have to finish second, but anywhere else on the podium and Alonso would have to finish 5th or lower, something he's only done 6 times this year, not a bad feat given there was 1 DNF which wasn't his fault and three of them came in the first four races when the Ferrari was no quicker than a midfield car. I reckon whoever wins the most races out of them two (along with no DNF's) will win the championship
 
This season seems to have Alonso written all over it. I do believe he is the best driver on the grid and demonstrates that fact each and every time he takes to the circuit.

I didn't think it would come true but Kewee called it early in the season. There is still time for someone to take the title (obviously) but I think it will take a monumental effort to do so.
 
Cheers Westy. I get the feeling he'll have another couple of strong races which should be enough, Singapore could be one of them but if he doesn't grab the title with a race to spare I'll be nervous. He'd only have to have a DNF in the last race and he could still loose it otherwise. The way he's driving though and with Ferrari's reliability hopefully he can do it. He's been the class of the field so far. :)
 
My head tells me the title is between Lewis and Fernando now but I can't help but remember that both Kimi and Seb have won titles when they've looked out of it before with fantastic end if season runs. Whilst I don't think Alonso and Hamilton are naive enough to only be watching each other and let someone else sneek in it has happened to many a driver.

As for Singapore I don't think the Mclaren advantage will be quite as large due to the nature of the track and we've seen Vettel and Alonso be mighty good round this one. I'm expecting a nail biting leader train of cars a bit like Monaco 2011. Maybe not a massive amount of overtakung but with the winner having to be absolutely mistake free. My kind of race actually.
 
Back to the normal rubber after the thin gauge used for Spa and Monza... which apparently evened up the field in terms of being able to "switch on" the tyres...

Usual suspects for mine... with FA, both Macca's, Kimi and both RBR's in the top 10 after qually... with a chance of thunderstorm forecast from here until next week... a little dash of rain and humidity could make it a very exciting race...
 
RasputinLives, I think both Lewis and Fernando are looking out for Kimi and Seb, but I really don't think either of them has the overall car to make a great late-season run like they did in 2007 and 2010.

For this race, I am curious to see if anyone (Sauber maybe?) is willing to roll the dice on a 2 stop strategy.
 
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