2009 F1 Review: Top 5 moments of the year

Dec. 27 (YF1) Daniel Chalmers reflects on some of the more memorable moments that took place during the 2009 Formula 1 season.

Webber winning his first Grand Prix
On his 130^th Grand Prix start Mark Webber earnt a much deserved F1 victory. He’s had a career full of bad luck and missed opportunities. You began to wonder whether he had once broken a mirror or ran over a black cat. However in the German GP he sensed he had a decent shot at victory, and grabbed it with both hands.

Sebastian Vettel was under pressure due to his first home race in a winning car, and Mark knew it. After what he thought was a missed opportunity at Silverstone he seemed more determined than ever.

It looked as if his bad luck was set to continue when contact with Rubens Barrichello at the start gave him a very harsh drive-thru penalty. But you sensed that this time Webber wasn’t going to let anything stop him taking this GP victory, and produced some incredible laps to fight back, and remarkably won the race. His emotion over the radio said it all. He had finally done it.

This victory came after a very difficult winter following breaking his leg, whilst helping others, on his annual charity challenge in Tasmania.

To his credit he just got on with his recovery with no fuss. To fightback from that, and win a race seven months after the accident, was an inspirational acheivement.

Button’s champion’s drive in Brazil
In qualifying he had an absolute nightmare, whilst team mate Rubens Barrichello had a dream taking pole position putting Jenson under real pressure. On Saturday night Button went back to his hotel with his title dream suddenly really starting to slip away from him. As it turned out this set up one of the best drives of the season the following day.

Overnight Button had a psychological battle with himself and won. Instead of keeping his chin down, he went back to the circuit with his chin up and set out to get the job done. He knew what the dangers were of the championship going down to the last race, as so often in a last race title decider the points leader has gone on to lose.

His overtaking in this race was sublime as it had been all season, and an absolute joy to watch. He was brave, daring and went for it. He simply decided that he wouldn’t leave Brazil without being the world champion.

Questions were raised about whether Button deserved this championship. After a laboured middle part of the season some of the criticism was perhaps justified. Importantly when it mattered most he pulled a big rabbit out of the hat. It was great to see Button win it in such an exciting way, rather than crawl over the line in Abu Dhabi.

The grid turning back to front in Spa
The great thing about 2009 was just how insanely close the grid was. By this time of the season there were a number of teams who could potentially win races when they got their act together.

In previous seasons we had been used to two teams dominating races with everyone else nowhere near, which got a bit predictable at times.

Spa was perhaps one of the most unpredictable, and open races in the entire history of the sport. All of a sudden Toyota, BMW and Force India turned up with cars capable of winning. Seeing a Force India taking pole position felt quite surreal, not only that, but on a very competitive fuel load. Nobody could have predicted it which what was so great.

The race itself was just as good with Kimi Raikkonen and Giancarlo Fisichella’s race long battle, which went right down to the last corner. If someone told you in Spa in 2007 that Force India and Ferrari would battle for victory two years later you would have laughed.

This race weekend summed up the 2009 season. Furthurmore it was great to see Force India finallly have a strong result to show for all their hard work over the last couple of seasons.

Finding out Massa would make a full recovery

Formula 1 has moved on so much on the safety front. Once upon a time each year drivers lost their lives. Since Ayrton Senna’s death in 1994 safety has come such a long way. We have seen drivers recover from huge crashes. Robert Kubica’s accident in Montreal was one of those, which could have easily resulted in a fatality 10 years ago.

Perhaps we have taken for granted that a driver will be ok after a big accident. Therefore Felipe Massa’s accident in Hungary was a big reminder to everyone in F1 that the sport is still very dangerous.

At first it looked like a simple accident but when Felipe Massa stayed stationery in his car we knew there was something wrong. Then we saw the replay of the spring falling off Rubens Barrichello’s car and hitting Felipe Massa on the head.

What followed was an extremely anxious wait to find out whether he was ok. This included lots of false reports claiming that he was in a life threatening condition, which really didn’t help.

Fortunately good news came through by the next morning that he was in a stable condition, with positive news from his surgeon.

Over the last couple of seasons Massa has turned into one of the F1’s best drivers, and before the accident was starting to come of age.

The fact that Massa has recovered, and is very likely to be racing in 2010 is nothing short of a miracle, but one of F1’s most welcome miracles.

The pre-season test in Catalunya

It’s difficult to choose Brawn’s best moment from 2009. Was it Brawn proving their pace was real with a crushing 1-2 in Melbourne? Or was it the tears on Ross Brawn’s face after confirming both championships in Brazil?

Their most pivotal moment of the season was arguably the very first time they pitted their car against their rivals. This was the big group pre-season test in Catalunya.

Whilst the future of Honda was being rumoured in the press the team in the background were building one hell of a car.

Rivals and journalists weren’t giving Brawn much hope of having a competitive season. Then came Jenson Button on the first day of the big group Catalunya test. On his first run of the first day he topped the timesheets immediately by 0.6 seconds.

The team ended up fourth overall on day one, and then topped the final two days.

The faces down the pit lane told the story. At Brawn there were smiles on everyone’s faces, and particularly wide on Button’s.

Everywhere else it was a mixture of stunned looks at Brawn’s pace, as well as the reality that even at this very early stage they were going to be hard to beat.

And with McLaren on the other hand struggling badly, we knew we were in for a remarkable and topsy-turvy year.

* Please note that these are Daniel Chalmer’s opinions and not necessarily the views of YallaF1.com

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