All about Alonso’s perfect debut in red

In Bahrain we’ve seen three different concepts doing well. Red Bull has a aerodynamically almost perfect car, surprisingly gentle with the supersoft while pretty quick. Yet, and we had alerted to that, reliability is an issue, n’est-ce pas?

Ferrari has chosen not to fit the engine 100% horizontal, but to slightly incline it towards the front. That creates more room for a bigger diffusor. Their problem seems to be that of MercedesGP: The front end grip isn’t that good to match yet. That’s why they had tire issues when pushing with the supersofts.

McLaren has instead chosen a very long wheel base and an extreme aero package. But for this to work you need a smooth track and fast corners coming into long straights. Not the case in Bahrain and won’t be in Melbourne. They run the car on a soft setup and whenever the car begins to move much, the air flow underneath the car will vary accordingly and make the handling nervous.

Melbourne could well be best for Ferrari. Not sure if the RB6 will get tire temperatures up efficidently in the shadowy cool streets of Albert Park.

Button is a more suave driver than the aggressive Hamilton-style. He admitted he “under-used” the tires. He could have pushed harder. I guess he does struggle to get the front tires to work. As does Schumacher! Those narrow front tires aren’t helping. While Schumi will be pushing hard to get more front end downforce to help his case, it will be interesting to see whether Jenson is going to get what he wants in Lewis’ team…

Basically that’s wat we published in German in issue no.7, the English version still in the making. Why not have a look and download the latest issue for free www.p1mag.de. Nice pics it’s got, too