By Matt Jones
October 13 2006

Regular RealHondaF1.com reader Matt Jones looks back at the Chinese Grand Prix, sharing his views on the teams performance, and that of our rivals. With the championship race heating up quite nicely for the final few races of the season, every single point literally looks like it is going to count in selecting who will be crowned World Champion in 2006.

With the threat of rain all week in China it was shaping up to be another thrilling weekend of racing where, hopefully, we would see some great twists and turns in the championship race and another solid result for Honda.

In qualifying, both Toyota's were the highest profile victims of the unpredictability of the session, with Williams narrowly scraping through to the second round.

Qualifying was disappointing for the Ferrari team, with Felipe Massa receiving a 10 place grid penalty for an engine change and Michael Schumacher well over a second off the pace of the Renault's. It was looking like the Bridgestone runners would be struggling in the conditions, much like they were in Hungary.

Robert Doornbos, in his first F1 qualifying session, managed to get into the top ten and out qualify more experienced team mate David Coulthard - a very good display considering the difficult conditions.

Once again Honda Racing F1 looked very good in the difficult conditions, with Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello taking the second row of the grid right behind the all-Renault front row, putting us in a great position to challenge for a solid result. With conditions similar to Hungary, who knows what Sunday might bring for us…?

With a wet circuit for the race I was quietly confident that we would put on another good display in the wet. With the Bridgestone runners seemingly struggling in qualifying it looked like another stronger weekend for Michelin.

Unfortunately my optimism was short lived, as the Renault's scampered off at the start and Kimi Raikkonen stormed around the outside of both our drivers, leaving us well behind on pace once again.

Things were looking extremely good for the Renault team with Fernando Alonso pulling into an extremely healthy lead and Giancarlo Fisichella controlling the pace of the following pack. Unfortunately this was short lived after Alonso decided to pit and keep the same rear tyres but change the fronts, leaving him with no rear grip in his second stint. Although Fisichella did a superb job of defending Alonso for a number of laps, it became impossible and Alonso was left to fend for himself against a charging Michael Schumacher. The battle didn’t last long before Schumacher breezed by.

The usually efficient Renault team completely lost it in the pits, and on strategy. Pit errors cost Alonso 10 seconds, while deciding to leave Fisichella out until Schumacher had pitted gave Michael a lap to warm up his slick tyres whilst Fisichella was on his in lap. Once Fisichella got out on the circuit with slicks it was like sending a lamb out to the slaughter, and Schumacher easily got past. Ferrari is looking better and better for the drivers’ title.

Massa was disappointing and didn’t make much impression on the race, eventually retiring after hitting David Coulthard whilst trying to pass him.

Renault looked very good in China but both drivers were let down by poor team decisions and mistakes in the pit stops. Unfortunately, for Alonso, the wheels seem to be falling off at Renault whilst Ferrari can seemingly do no wrong. With two races left it’s looking like a very difficult job for them. One bit of good news for the team is that the constructors’ championship is in their advantage.

As for Honda, Jenson Button struggled early on with the rear tyres balding extremely quickly in the wet conditions, resulting in Jenson pitting 10 laps before his scheduled stop and losing a number of positions in the process. Once the track started to dry, the problems stopped and Button was able to lap very quickly and, in the final lap or two, took three positions.

Once again Rubens Barrichello came home with some solid points, though perhaps he was lucky get back at all after a last corner incident almost ended his race!

I was expecting a little bit more from Honda Racing F1 in the difficult conditions, hoping that we would shine again. Unfortunately, that was not to be. Jenson once again out performed Rubens, not just in the race but also in qualifying. Consider that he had eight more laps worth of fuel, yet set an identical time! With this season very much over for the team, after achieving the win and securing fourth place in the championship, perhaps it is time to concentrate on the chassis for 2007 and hopefully make it more competitive than this years.

McLaren’s Kimi Raikkonen was again let down by poor reliability, and is surely counting down the days until he is a Ferrari driver. Pedro de la Rosa once again was solid enough and is looking good to take the 2007 seat next to Fernando Alonso. Whether the rumours are true or not that McLaren will be giving Lewis Hamilton a race this season remains to be seen.

Toyota were nowhere in qualifying and nowhere in the race. The Bridgestone tyres were running quite nicely for Ferrari and Williams, so there is no real reason why both drivers were fighting with the Red Bull’s and the Toro Rosso’s. The big spenders are once again having a disappointing season after a competitive 2005. Thankfully for them, both Red bull and Williams have underperformed this season otherwise it would have looked a whole lot worse.

Williams finally scored their first point since May, although a single point in almost five months is hardly acceptable for the team who 10 years ago dominated the sport. Mark Webber did well to score from his grid position whilst Nico Rosberg once again had problems with his pace - the potentially great driver we all raved about at the opening race of the season has done nothing but disappoint since.

Red Bull narrowly missed out on a points position with David Coulthard, while rookie Robert Doornbos, after a great qualifying, had to pit on lap one to change a nose cone and never came back to make any impression in the race.

Scuderia Toro Rosso were looking good early on for points, but both drivers faded and once again disappointed as the race unfolded. It looks highly likely that they will finish the season with just a single point.

Super Aguri looked their strongest this season, with Takuma Sato giving a fantastic display in the race to finish 14th ahead of some of the midfield runners. Sadly celebrations were short lived, as Sato was deemed to have held up Nick Heidfeld for an entire lap before playing his part in the final corner crash, and duly disqualified. Sakon Yamamoto was once again well off the pace and, if the rumours are true that Anthony Davidson is favourite for the race seat at Super Aguri next season, Sakon must be the one leaving.

Spyker MF1 followed on the form of the team they bought, and I couldn’t help but feel that, if Super Aguri had a decent driver in their second car, they would easily have left Spyker at the tail end of the grid. Obviously nothing is really expected of Spyker this season but it will be interesting to see how well they do next year with Ferrari power.

The season has certainly flown past for me! With just two races left, and the two title contenders even on points, it’s looking like this could be the best finale to a season for a long time. I still favour Ferrari to win the championship despite Renault showing very decent pace at China, though the handful of errors by the Renault team could possibly be the errors that cost Alonso this season’s title.

As for Honda, once again we scored solid points. We are now scoring consistently week in and week out, which is fantastic to see after a very dry mid season, although we’re sadly stranded in fourth place in the championship with nothing left realistically to fight for. Another win this season of course would be fantastic but personally I’d rather see the team concentrating on next year’s package to ensure that 2007 is our most successful season yet.

Next stop is our home race. Hopefully we can pull something out of the bag and have a nice haul of points - with the forecast of rain it makes me even more confident that we can do well and who knows what might happen!