Auto-Racing @ MieNet: Details Worthy of Note in the Formula One 2004 Season: GP of the USA

The 2004 Season F1fan-eBook

Worthy of Note in the U.S.A.

The Indy Podium exhibited a mixture of delight and concern.

Takuma Sato was evidently overjoyed for his first Podium finish ever. But all were concerned for Ralf Schumacher, who had suffered a serious crash.

Brother Michael Schumacher, however happy for his unexpected win, dispensed with his usual victory jump on the Podium, though he and

Rubens Barrichello made sure that Sato's feat was celebrated with its due share of champagne spray.

More below.

The Williams-BMW Team has again had a frustrating GP weekend (see the Canadian GP), now in the U.S.: neither of their cars (fifth and sixth place on the grid) finished the race.

Ralf Schumacher had a violent collision, on the last banked turn. He had to be extracted from his car and was immediately air-lifted for a check-up in a local hospital. The German driver was initially reported to be OK, just undergoing precautionary medical tests.

The first concrete news, as issued in the US, is that he most fortunately wasn't seriously hurt, that he had suffered no more than concussion and general bruising.

Update on Ralf Schumacher: Back in Europe, however, the German driver was found to have sustained two fractures in his dorsal spine. As a result, he will have to be sidelined for a period that could last as long as twelve weeks, it has been announced.

The Schumacher brothers' manager, Willi Weber, however, has stated in an interview that he believes Ralf could be back on the F1 Grid already for the GP of Hungary or Belgium, given a positive prognosis he is to have heard from some of the doctors currently taking care of the German driver.

Juan Pablo Montoya, in turn, who had hurriedly been sent to the spare car, in the last minute, and thus started his race from the pits, was

black-flagged when there were only 16 laps to go (i.e., before the end of the race).

The Colombian was running in third, then, and had just started to look as if he'd be soon putting up a considerable challenge to the two Ferrari's, in the lead.

The reason for Montoya's elimination from the race was not totally explained, at first, except for the fact that it was related to the last-minute car switch.

A statement was later issued, explaining that the black flag had been waved at Montoya due to a breach of article 85 of the FIA sporting regulations (i.e., joining the race in a spare car, whereas the driver failed to leave the grid within 15 seconds of the start).

Montoya reportedly ran from the grid to the pits two seconds too late!

So a mere technicality has cost the Colombian at least 6 points. If added to the 12 points the

Williams-BMW Team had lost in the previous race (see here), the Team has now seen 18 Championship points (that would otherwise have been theirs) fly off the window, in just two races!

Meanwhile, the

Ferrari Team has been increasing their points tally with an equivalent number of points (18) per Grand Prix, at six of the nine GP's that have thus far taken place...

Though for quite different reasons, both R.Schumacher and Montoya have been reported quite angry at the way they have been dealt with in the U.S..

Ralf Schumacher is reportedly considering the possibility of legal action against those who put him through the medical check-up in the Indianapolis hospital, from where he was released with the diagnosis of a concussion and bruises.

The German driver has reportedly claimed that the two fractures later found in his dorsal spine could have confined him to a wheel chair for the rest of his life, had they been aggravated during his trip back to Europe.

F1's official doctor, veteran Prof. Sid Watkins, has been cited during Friday practice, at Magny-Cours (GP of France), as commenting that some fractures of the vertebrae, such as the ones suffered by R.Schumacher, "may remain masked for about seven days."

Anyway, R.Schumacher has been very, very lucky, indeed!
For if F1 cars have became safer and safer, nothing can spare the human body occupying a F1 cockpit, from the sudden deceleration that occurs within the human body, itself, at a violent crash.

The circumstances of R.Schumacher's accident, it should be added, seem to have motivated concern about safety procedures (on the part of some drivers, more especially), as well as about the speed of today's F1 cars.

Juan Pablo Montoya, in turn, has pondered that he had unnecessarily been exposed to a serious risk, whereas he was not even competing for anything at all (it could, after all, he has argued, have been his car, instead of his team-mate's, to have suffered that violent stunt, due to a flat tire caused by debris left over on the track, from the pile-up occurring right after the start).

Why did the Indianapolis' Marshals take nearly the entire race finally to blackflag the Colombian, for an infraction that had actually occurred before the start of the race?!...

F1 officials have been cited in defense of the Indianapolis' Marshals, as arguing that once black-flagged, a car cannot be re-flagged into the race. Therefore, official elimination from the race must be well-documented, when announced. Montoya's situation in the U.S. GP, had to be very well checked, witnesses verified, etc., it was reported in addition, as it involved a mere 2-3 seconds infraction.

Whichever view one takes, it is not difficult to understand the Colombian's anger at having literally put his neck at risk for nothing, for over one and a half hours, at the Indianapolis track, on that Sunday.

Rubens Barrichello finished his tenth consecutive GP in the points, at Indianapolis! The first race in this sequence was last Season's (2003) Japanese GP, which the Brazilian won.

This impressive mark of ten straight points finishes places Ferrari's Brazilian driver among a very selected elite of drivers (see here).

Among those currently lining up on the Grid, only three other drivers can boast membership in this selected club:

D.Coulthard (McLaren) and

R.Schumacher (Williams), each likewise with 10 consecutive points finish, and

M.Schumacher (Ferrari) who has the impressive mark of two straight sequences of (18 and 24) points finishes! Among these, however, only

R.Barrichello can improve his mark this Season.

See here who else is on this short honors list and during which period each driver achieved this feat.

Zolt Baumgartner (Minardi) scored his first-ever world championship point in the U.S., and possibly the first ever for a Hungarian driver.

This was Minardi's first point since Australia 2002!

At that time,

Mark Webber finished the race in fifth, for Minardi, just ahead of

Mika Salo's debutant

Toyota.
In the last laps of that GP, the Finn mounted a challenge, but failed to overtake the Australian. Both drivers finished the race two laps down, the Australian having lined up 18 whereas the Finn 14, on the Grid. Both drivers ran on

Michelin tires.
(For this GP details, see MieNet's 2002 Season F1fan-eBook, on-line version – there is a downloadable version available, which can be yours free of charge, if you'd like to have that handy F1 database.)

Takuma Sato, who had exited his last three Grands Prix with a smoking engine, fought hard to score the first podium finish of his F1 career, equaling Aguri Suzuki's third finish in the 1990 Japanese Grand Prix, the best race finish for a Japanese driver, to date.

B•A•R-Honda's Japanese driver had lined up third, on the Grid, but a late pit stop meant that he had to battle his way back through the pack.

For the

B•A•R-Honda Team inexplicably took no advantage of the two Safety Car periods, in order to call in their drivers for a pit stop, as was the case with most other drivers.

Today's result, along with Sato's first row (P2) on the Nürbürgring Grid (see GP of Europe), should account for an extra boost to Sato's already great popularity in Japan, as these results have made Sato the most successful of all Japanese F1 drivers!

Indianapolis marked Olivier Panis' 150^th GP, celebrated in style with the Frenchman's fifth place finish – his best this Season.

Rubens Barrichello (Ferrari) had not only been the pole sitter, but had had the edge over team-mate Michael Schumacher, and all other drivers, throughout the weekend. The fastest race lap was also Barrichello's.

All in all, were it not for the two Safety Car periods, the Brazilian seems to have had a very good chance of victory, given his superiority, the weekend through.

However, after the first Safety Car outing, Barrichello was apparently caught by surprise at M.Schumacher's promptly lining up alongside him, and overtaking, in the sequence. (The Brazilian alleged wheelspin, when interviewed, as the reason for his seeming vulnerability to his team-mate's sudden maneuver.)

Then, during the second Safety Car outing, Barrichello lost precious seconds, sitting on the pit lane: both Ferrari drivers had been called to pit at the same time, and Barrichello, who had then been running in second, had of course to queue behind his team-mate, and wait till the Ferrari crew had sent Schumacher off, in order to get the fuel and fresh tires he had been called in for.

This resulted in M.Schumacher's leaving the pits still in the lead, whereas R.Barrichello rejoined in fifth place.

Toward the end of the GP, Barrichello had worked his way up and was driving on the tail of his team-mate's Ferrari.

The Brazilian made an overtake attempt, to which M.Schumacher closed the door. After having had to put two wheels on the grass, so as to avoid contact, Barrichello may have pondered that it might not be worth risking any or all of Ferrari's 18 points (his P2 and/or Schumacher's P1), and the Brazilian seemed to accommodate behind his leading team-mate.

In a post-race interview, Ross Brawn reportedly named Barrichello the moral winner of the 2004 GP of the USA, adding that he felt that, if the Brazilian had not had that long wait in his first pit stop, he might have beaten M.Schumacher that Sunday.

Barrichello, in turn, seemed remarkably relaxed, in the winners' post-race interview, about his P2. He mentioned that he had imagined he'd win that GP, given his dominance on the weekend, and that it was of course disappointing not to get the win; he briefly referred to the pit stop just referred to, above, as well as to the wheelspin (referred to further above); but he quickly added that all of these constitute if's, which he prefers not to dwell on.

He concluded by saying that he wishes to deal only with facts, with what has indeed happened, and to be ready for what may come.

The serenity emerging from his comments was quite impressive for someone who had just faced that outcome of a racing weekend, as he had.

Curiously, in the previous U.S. Grand Prix (2003), there was also an inversion of places, however differently, and which then resulted in Barrichello's winning the race by mistake, do you remember?

M.Schumacher, who would have normally won that GP, suddenly slowed down before the checkered flag. Barrichello seemed not to have figured out his team-mate's intention (to get to the checkered flag in formation, as the German later explained), and so the Brazilian ended up crossing the line a split of a second ahead of Schumacher, in the confusion that ensued – but that was of course enough to take victory.

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