Lewis spins Kimi wins.

Lewis Hamilton has the chance to wrap up the title with a 12 point lead with just this and Brazil left to go. Finishing ahead of Raikkonen and Alonso would seal the title but it is never that simple.

Friday saw a drama all of its own, the collision between Webber and Vettel had a new twist in it when footage filmed by a race fan and put up on you tube made Scuderia Toro Rosso team principal Franz complain to the stewards that Hamiltons driving behind the safety car was the cause of the collision between the Red Bull cars. Webber, Vettel and Hamilton all gave there version of events and rather than prepare for the race he had to wait whilst a decision was made if Hamilton was to be punished, Vettel already receiving a 10 place grid penalty. During which time Hamilton reflected on the situation " "There's been some real strange situations this year where I'm made to look the bad person and, by the looks of it, this weekend [I will] be given a penalty," said Hamilton

"If this is the way it's going to keep going it's [Formula One] not somewhere I really want to be.", A strong comment from someone in there first season, maybe it was said in the heat of the moment but the pressure of the title. After a few hours the stewards decided that no penalty would be imposed and that Vettel would to not have to take his 10 place drop.

This may of been a distraction before qualifying and the race but the qualification session itself presented its own problems namely in the form of a typhoon not to far away from china itself, this made the session interesting as there was a very strong chance of rain for the race. This meant a mixture of dry and wet set ups on the cars through the field, this is because of park Feme conditions the teams cant change the set up so what they qualify with is what they race with on Sunday.

Q1 Kimi Raikkonen who had been fastest in both Friday practices toped the time sheets for the first knockout session from Massa, Hamilton, Alonso. The session didn't go so well for Renault, Fisichella was knocked out and Kovalainen struggled but managed to get through to the 2nd knockout phase. From 17th to 22nd were Rubens Barrichello, Giancarlo Fisichella, Alex Wurz, Takuma Sato, Adrian Sutil, Sakon Yamamoto.

Q2 The 2nd knockout session had some surprises, Williams were struggling with Wurz in 20th Rosberg could do no better than 16th Davidson was stuck in 15th Kovalainen completed a bad day for Renault in 14th Trulli could only mange 13th, it was a better session for Toro Rosso with Vettel 12th and Liuzzi 11th. At the front Raikkonen quickest again from Massa Alonso 3rd from Hamilton. Making it through to the top 10 session on an upturn of form was Jenson Button.

Q3 The top 10 shoot out looked like it would be Raikkonen on pole but putting a superb lap together was Lewis Hamilton to take pole from Raikkonen, Massa 3rd, Alonso 4th and Coulthard a strong 5th in the Red Bull Ralf Schumacher 6th in a strong session for him 7th was Mark Webber 8th and 9th were Heidfeld and Kubica Button 10th.

The Race.

After qualifying Vettel received a 5 place grid penalty for blocking Kovalainen, and also the rain did come for the start of the race. No where near as heavy as it was in Japan but enough for all the field to start on the intermediate tyres.

From the start Hamilton got off the grid well Alonso went around the outside of Massa into turn 1 but Massa re-took him coming into turn 3, back at turn 1 Schumacher was recovering from a spin at the first corner ruining his 6th place grid slot. At the front Hamilton was able to pull away easily from Raikkonen who was losing around 5 to 6 tenths of second, Alonso was losing time and not able to catch and pass Massa, The title slowly slipping away from Alonso.At the back Barrichello clashed at turn 1 both continued but Davidson would later succumb to accident damage. The Toro Rosso's were to steadily moving up the field staking there claim for some points. Kovalainen was having a nightmare of a race struggling with understeer and fighting off Trulli for p11, Button and Schumacher would do likewise.

On lap 15 after building up an 8 second lead Hamilton was in for his first stop, this was earlier than expected but with the track still wet in places and random showers every now and then the team did not change Hamilton's tyres. Raikkonen meanwhile took the lead and his pace suddenly increased greatly setting fastest lap after fastest lap. By the time he pitted on lap 19 he had got the gap down to 4.1 seconds. Massa had pitted a few laps before and once the first stops had shaken out between the top 4 the order was Hamilton, Raikkonen, Massa. Behind them the battle for best of the rest was closely fort. On lap 19 Sutil spun off at turn one but managed to get going again, Schumacher on his recovery drive clashed with Liuzzi at turn 3 spinning back down the order. He had got ahead slightly of the Toro Rosso but closed the door too soon connected with the car and spun off again, rejoining to fight another day.

Then came a decisive point of the race by lap 24 Webber had pitted in from p8 and put dry tyres on. Wurz who was already on the drys started to set fastest laps. It was clear that as the track was dry tyres were the thing to have. What wasn't so clear was the weather, another shower was expected. On lap 26 Kubica switched to dry tyres, on the same lap Alonso passed Massa for third at the final hairpin, Massa however dived straight into the pits for dry tyres as he left the pits the rain returned with a light shower again. The fight for the lead was on as well Hamilton had got the gap up to over 5 seconds setting fastest laps just after Raikkonen had rejoined from his first stop. Raikkonen sensed victory and began to take huge chunks out of his lead by lap 27 with the rain now returned he was right on Hamilton's rear wing Hamilton losing 3 seconds in 1 lap his tyres now past there best. The top 4 had not changed there tyres on there first stops and it was clear that the tread was gone on both the Mclarens and the Ferrari's. They were no good in the wet with no tread and the lap times were slowing. The cars on slick tyres were finding it tough too, As Hamilton and Raikkonen exited the last corner on lap 27 the just lapped Schumacher ran wide and spun again this time into retirement, then as he was spinning Sutil smashed into the barrier on the pit lane entry ending his race. Rosberg and Kovalainen spun at turn one, Rosberg was being passed by both Renaults when both Kovalainen and Rosberg on slicks got off line on to the wet part of the track skating off on to the extra tarmac but both getting going again. Then came the turning point of the race and the championship.

Hamiltons pace had dropped dramatically and Raikkonen forced his way past after several different attempts around the track, the move finally working at turns 6 and 7 with Hamilton going wide and Raikkonen taking advantage. With Raikkonen 17 points behind Hamilton in the championship there was no need to fight the Ferrari driver, but the team decided to keep him out on badly worn tyres, Alonso who had been some 17 seconds behind at one stage began taking huge chunks of time out of Hamilton, in 3 laps he had closed the gap and there was nothing in it. Raikkonen had pulled away by 8 seconds in one lap, also was Trulli who had un-lapped himself and was giving Hamilton a hard time on lap 32 with Alonso right behind he shot into the pits flying past Trulli who may of slightly unsighted him as on the entry lewis was too quick and slid off wide into a gravel trap his car beaching itself. Disaster for the rookie as he was out of a race for the first time this season. The title would have to wait another round, more worrying for Hamilton was how high would Alonso finish, he could get the gap back down to 2 points if the Spaniard won, at this point of the race Alonso was catching Raikkonen.

Only trouble was that once both Raikkonen and Alonso pitted for dry tyres on lap 33 they came out 2nd and 3rd behind Kubica who had earlier made the switch to dry tyres. This could of been a great day for BMW as Kubica lead by 3-4 seconds from Raikkonen but just one lap latter Kubica pulled onto the grass his car sounding very sick. A golden opportunity for BMW slipped away. Mid field and Button was having the race of his season and passed Vettel for 4th and quickly began catching Massa in third. Button would still have to make one more stop but as he was setting fastest laps he looked sure to score some points. The Toro Rosso's were in 5th and 6th Vettel leading Liuzzi both were ahead of the "A" team Red Bull who had gotten there tyre strategy wrong. Fisichella did get past Liuzzi but once Fisichella had done his 2nd stop he had dropped to 11th and out of the points.

Raikkonen had managed to stabilise the gap to Alonso and it remained at around 8 seconds, Massa was a further 10 seconds behind Alonso and tried to catch him setting fastest lap after fastest lap trying to catch him, By the finish he had got the gap down to 3 seconds and the last lap of the race was the fastest set by Massa. But it was Raikkonen who had won from Alonso, Massa, Vettel a superb 4th from 17th on the grid after his penalty also making up for his error a week before. 5th was a season best for Button who finally managed to get Honda above Super Aguri in the Constructors championship, 6th Liuzzi being able to keep these points this time 7th Heidfeld in a disappointing race for BMW and Taking the final point for Red Bull was David Coulthard.

Race Bits

• Who on earth put that there?
  It seems strange that at a modern circuit like Shanghai where turn 1 had plenty of tarmac run off area that saved several drivers races that they chose to place a gravel trap on the turn in of the pit lane entry. Unluckily for Lewis that is where he recorded his 1st retirement of his F1 career, though he kept his spirits up and still believes he can win the title in two weeks time
  
  "You cannot go through life without making mistakes. But I am over it and we look forward to Brazil. The team will be working hard to make sure the car is quick enough there, and we still have points in the bag." Alonso on the other hand sounded as if was the one who had crashed "It will still be very difficult for the championship. I know that it will not be easy to take the four points off Lewis. I still need something really dramatic if I want to win." Only time will tell.



• Oh Yay! It's a 3 Way!
  Raikkonen's win and Hamilton's dnf means is 7 points behind with 10 points left Alonso 4 points adrift means that far from over. Raikkonen will need Hamilton to score no higher than 6th and Alonso 3rd to take the title meaning he can only hope he leads home a Ferrari 1-2 with Hamilton and Alonso taking each other off perhaps? It probably wont happen but stranger things have happened just ask Alain Prost.



• Ferrari 200 not out.
  This was Ferrari's 200th grand prix win since it has raced from the beginning of the championship back in 1950. Raikkonen Jean Todt was happy to point out the statistics "It is great to be able to celebrate Scuderia Ferrari's two hundredth victory in Formula 1, here in Shanghai, at the end of a difficult race, further complicated by the unpredictability of the changes in the weather. Kimi brings his total tally of the season to five and this is the team's eighth"



• Its Goodbye from me and possibly from him?
  Alex Wurz announced his retirement this weekend from F1 his poor qualifying has left him with too much work to do in the race and has been regularly beaten by his team mate Nico Rosberg. Wurz still has had some highs this season 3rd in Canada being one of them. Ralf Schumacher also announced he is leaving Toyota at the end of the season, Rumours suggest he may join the DTM or the WTCC but nothing has been confirmed, certainly not with any F1 team as of yet.

So the final round of the championship is at Brazil in two weeks time. One of Three drivers will win the title but who? no one truly knows.

Champ of the race: Vettel. After his disaster at Fuji he bounced back brilliantly to finish 4th.

Chump of the race: ever decided to keep Hamilton out on shot tyres. Not clever.

Move of the race: Raikkonen's pass for the lead. Had to fight for it but was worth it in the end.