Red Bull wins 1-2 at Suzuka, title almost there

It was a race to forget for the McLaren Mercedes team where defending world champion Jenson Button and former title holder Lewis Hamilton who both drifted further down the pecking order after Button only managed fourth while Hamilton followed behind. 7 time world champion Michael Schumacher however had a good outing and finished sixth, one of his best ever. Kamui Kobayashi, racing in his ‘home’ race finished seventh, his personal best and perhaps due to the extra motivation made numerous overtaking maneuvers which was never seen before.

Nick Heidfeld of Sauber, Ruben Barcihello of Williams and Sebastien Buemi of Toro Rosso Racing finished the race on eighth, ninth and tenth spot respectively. With the win, Webber now leads the standings with 220 points while his team mate Webber has 206. Alonso in third place too holds the same points followed by Hamilton hangs on with 192 points. Button’s defence of the title looks as good as over where he now has 189 points. Felipe Massa of Ferrari has scored 128 points for the season which effectively rule him out of the running.

Suzuka, renowned for its sharp bends and almost impossible overtaking possibilities saw a lot of drama with 2 accidents taking place as soon as the race started thereby summoning the Safety Car after 5 cars crashing out in Turn 1. It was yet again a ‘good’ race for our own rookie team, Lotus Racing when Heiki Kovalainen and Jarno Trulli finished twelfth and thirteenth respectively ahead of the Virgin and Hispania drivers while this season’s surprise package, Adrian Sutil of Force India too had to retire in lap 44 due to an oil leak. With 3 more races to go, the fight for the title is set to be stiff competition but the next race, slated for Korea seemed a bit bleak as the organizers are racing against time to get the track ready for their turn.