Formula 1 Race Twelve: Race

Rubens Barrichello is a lucky man. Lucky to be alive. Schumacher definitely deserves the 10 place grid penalty in Spa, but a lot of people will think he ought to be out of motor racing after such a bad move!

Red Bull had the car of the day. It was a second per lap faster than any other car, and Ferrari were faster than all the other teams. Vettel started in pole, and just kept Alonso from getting into first place off the line, although Webber fell into third. Then the safety car came out because of a lost part from Liuzzi's front wing, and all havoc broke loose. Only Vettel pitted for Red Bull, and ended up second as Webber kept going. With the road clear ahead, he shot far into the lead, and when his gap was wide enough, he pitted and continued in pole. Vettel, however, had a pit stop drive through penalty for falling too far behind his teammate under the safety car, and ended up third. He was unable to overtake Alonso for most of the race.

But Red Bull weren't the only team messed up by the safety car. As every team tried to get in their pit stop, Renault let Kubica go just as Sutil was coming into the Force India garage. They collided and Sutil retired, with Kubica retiring later. Meanwhile, Rosberg had a tyre come off, going flying through the other team garages, and fortunate to miss other drivers. Mercedes and Renault both get $50,000 fines, and Rosberg also retired. The other retirements were Alguersuari and Hamilton with various problems.

Aside from that, both Kobayashi and De La Rosa had good races, with De La Rosa getting his first Formula 1 points of the season. Now only the six drivers from Hispania, Virgin and Lotus have no points, but they also had a good race, with none of their drivers retiring.

Incidentally, there is a new phrase coming into F1 terminology: “do a Kobayashi”. After Kobayashi pitted very late in Valencia, other drivers seem to be spotting the advantages of this. With the faster-wearing Pirelli tyres, we're unlikely to see this in 2011, but Barrichello did it today, and his lucky escape meant he got a point out of it.