Chapter Text
Act I.
The Spaceship Era.
Chapter XVII.
Ferrari Strikes Back.
"Do you want me to do anything about it? Write an article with some bait in a different direction?" Roksana asked as I told her about the Harrison situation. I tried to focus on the racing that weekend, letting my people do a pretty good job of squashing the rumors about Anthony and I. That part was going well, most of the British tabloids dropped the story altogether, with one exception: a particular British rag is instead asking the question of "If not Harrison, who is Shchegolyayeva dating?" Evidently having come to the conclusion that I must be dating somebody. They are right, I will admit, but they don't know that they're right, and if they asked this question even two years ago, I would have no reason to be worried about because there would be nothing to find. Now though, there is something to find, so if they keep snooping, they might be able to figure something out about me and Roksana, which, unfortunately, is probably going to be worse for my career than any humiliating rumors about Anthony Harrison and me could be. I sighed to myself, wondering why the British press became obsessed with us all of a sudden. Anthony has an English mother, sure, but he's an American driver, and I feel like that tends to get animosity from the Brits more than attention, at least usually. While for me, I'm about as far from British as you can get in Formula One. Of course, we both drive for British teams, Harrison dominated the British Grand Prix, and the event in question happened at Silverstone, so combine that with the fact that F1 has a large audience in the UK, and that's probably as much explanation as the tabloids need. Still though, it is absolutely infuriating that we literally have accusations of the FIA President sexualizing Nazism, but the gossip pages would rather talk about my sex life.
On some level I knew this was probably going to happen at some point or another. The other drivers may treat me with respect once I've proven myself, but the common people that the vulgar press caters to. Well, they'll always just see me as some sort of novelty, the girly one that they could pair with the black one for some attention, and when that didn't work out, now they're trying to drag this out into some sensationalized storyline. I'm not saying that I regret anything with Roksana, far from it, but a part of me wishes that I was single and had nothing to hide right now so that I could just smirk and wait while they obsess over nothing, rather than having to worry about my very real relationship getting exposed. Instead, though, I have to try and hide this, make sure that my Middle Eastern or Central Asian sponsors never find out about this - not to mention there are plenty of western companies who probably see the harmless European male as a safer pick over the lesbian with a weird name coming from a weird country that nobody's ever heard of. I know I'm probably sounding like Roksana about all this, but the situation is making it about identity politics rather than something I consciously want, because no male F1 driver has to deal with this crap. Felipe Alvarez and Martin Weaver are close, but you don't see anybody proposing the idea that they're secretly gay lovers or anything. Meanwhile, I get caught in a picture with a male driver's arm around me and everyone jumps to it being proof of some sort of whirlwind romance going on right in the middle of the F1 paddock. It's ridiculous and it's a problem only I have to face.
"Thanks for the offer but no, I'd rather just not acknowledge this at all. These tabloids love when the celebrity gets mad and freaks out, because that just draws more attention to whatever the story is. I'm just going to keep it quiet and hope that they get bored sooner rather than later. There can't be that many more clicks left in this." I rationed, deciding that Roksana writing at article about this probably wouldn't be the best idea. Not to mention that, at absolute worse, someone could see through the article and guess that Roksana has a vested interest in my sex life, the kind of conclusion which is the exact thing that we're trying to avoid. I guess we just needed to avoid doing anything clearly romantic until this story dies down, which shouldn't be too hard, considering we're not particularly public about our relationship anyway. I don't need to be public about it either, I'm more than happy enough with what goes on in our apartment, our own little sanctuary without lights, cameras, or external pressures. A place where I don't have to worry about offending the sponsor on the cap I have to wear at every interview, a place where I don't need to worry about the fact that my actions are representative of a multinational tyre company like Bridgestone, and a place where I'm not an internationally known racing driver. A place where Roksana isn't an openly lesbian journalist writing in a niche space within a niche space and trying to make that into a career, with all the pressures going along with that. I just get to be a person, she just gets to be a person, and we get to be people together.
"Hey...you're in your head again, what's going on?" Roksana asked, gently, wrapping her arm around me and putting her left hand on my left shoulder, pulling me into a light hug. It was enough to ground me, bring me back down to Earth, and comfort me, without making me feel constricted.
"Nothing...just...it'll sound stupid." I blushed, looking down and to the left, as far away from Roksana as I could.
"I bet it's not." she smirked.
"I bet it is." I looked back at her, smirking in turn.
"Come on, what is it?" she asked, lightly, making it clear that she wanted me to answer, but she'd also be okay if I really didn't want to talk about it.
"Okay, okay. I love my job, I know I'm super privileged and everything, but I like this. Just this, you know? Sitting together, being comfortable, having some time off. It's nice." I answered, hoping that I didn't sound too ridiculous when I said I appreciate having a break from my life of flying around to all sorts of exotic places and living out my life's dream racing around the world. Then again, considering we're literally having a very stressful conversation about all the media attention having to do with my job, maybe it's a bit more believable than it would be in most situations. I guess the whole point is that I'm still not really good at this whole thing. I've gotten better I think, I know more and I'm getting more confident about doing things with Roksana in private, but I'm still not really cut out for all this. Quite frankly, I'm more built to drive cars than to be emotional. Going through puberty, all the time that kids spend figuring out what they like and having their first crushes and all that stuff, I was busy focusing driving progressively bigger and faster machinery. Hell, by the end of it, I was almost out of school more often than I was actually in school, getting help from a tutor while driving from track to track or even just between sessions during a race weekend. That left me with little time to interact with other people by age, and when I was on track, any potential friendships or bonds or relationships were strained by the fact that we were competitors. In those days, using a lot of spec cars and things like that, I couldn't be happy when a good thing happened to them, because a good thing for them was a bad thing for me, and vice versa. It's really only when you get to F1, where the machinery really makes a mountain of a difference, that I can be happy for my competitors.
I can't get upset when Anthony Harrison or Henrique de Matteo or anyone else wins a race because I know that my car isn't in contention to win a race. Therefore, all I can do is feel happy for them. On the other hand, the guys I can resent, those are the guys like Felipe Alvarez this season, like Martin Weaver, and, to an extent, like Tommy Koskinen, who have similar - or downright the same in the case of Tommy - cars to me. That might be part of the reason behind this recent falling out of sorts with Felipe, because last season I was always well behind him and he was always well ahead of me, so i could be happy for his results while he didn't have to think very much about me at all. Now though, he's one of the best drivers in the world and he's in a car that is at a similar level of performance as Williams, which means that when I get a good result, it's bad news for him, and when he gets a good result, it's bad news for me. Then take Canada for an example, a race that sort of represents the end of Williams' streak of good races, while representing the start of when Renault really got its act together. In that respect, the crash was kinda a turning point in the season. Add in the fact that, in one way or another, Felipe probably resents the fact that he's at a worse team this season - regardless of the fact that it was his choice to move - and there's a lot of factors behind why Felipe might have made those comments about me. Not that any of this justifies his behavior, of course. Anyway, enough about rivals or why it's hard to form relationships in a competitive environment, back to the emotions I'm facing here and now.
"You don't have to explain yourself. What you do is hard and stressful. You drive a 750-horsepower missile around in circles with nineteen other maniacs all trying to get into the same eight places that make a world of difference. You have to do all of this while a bunch of pudgy nobodies on the other end of a TV judge your every move and look for any reason to prove that their guy is better than you. You're allowed to want a break from that every once in awhile even if there are things about it that you love with all your heart." Roksana explained, justifying my feelings for me, all while pulling me down to the bed with her, wrapping her arms around my waist, pulling me in close so I was the little spoon, and then finishing up by whispering the last part of her speech into my ear. I know it wasn't necessarily about our relationship, but I knew I definitely felt something when Roksana whispered in my earing about 'love with all your heart.'
"So..." I breathed out, feeling better already "What you're saying is that I'm a maniac and you're a pudgy nobody?"
"Wow...I try to help you and you call me pudgy, I'm hurt." Roksana responded in such a way that I could practically hear the smirk on her lips, nevertheless, I couldn't help but feel a little bit hurt when she withdrew her arms from around me, even if I knew it was all part of the playful act.
"Hey, it was your words, not-" I argued, turning around as I did so, only to find my arguments silenced when Roksana leaned in and kissed me. I closed my eyes and sunk into it, a private, comfortable moment between two people who were in love, that's all it was. In that moment, I could forget about the fact that the British tabloids were taking an interest in my personal life, I could forget about the fact that the three-week break was going away quickly, and I'd probably have to get back on my fitness routine with Walentyna as early as tomorrow, and I could forget about the fact that I needed to learn a whole new track on the simulator before the race weekend starts. Right now, I could just be a person in love, that's all. Love. Not just a casual love you over the phone, but an actual being in love with someone. Wow, that's certainly a loaded idea, isn't it? Part of me felt that it was too soon to admit that, even to myself, but on the other hand, we've been together for over a year, and in that time, Roksana took me from not even being aware of my sexuality to going on my first date, having my first kiss, losing my virginity...all these things I never even thought about experiencing. Maybe love can be the next experience she brings me through and maybe, just maybe, that can be an experience that's new for the both of us.
Love or not, I didn't feel safe bringing Roksana with me to the race. So, even though Valencia wasn't very far from Monaco or from Marseille which, I suppose, was still her hometown even if she's moved in with me, she wasn't at the track with me. We couldn't risk letting the press get a potentially compromising picture of us, not while this story is still relatively fresh in everyone's mind. It's a shame too, because Valencia is kind of a beautiful city. Could the same be said about the track though? Well, the paddock was a pretty beautiful place, sitting right on the America's Cup Marina, and the parts of the track that looped around the marina looked pretty good too. The rest of the track, sector three in particular though, were a bit of a different story. It's very much a concrete jungle with the track below, walls on either side, a bit of paved run-off every once in awhile, and all the curves and turns being highly artificial. It was also basically perfectly flat. Of course none of those things were necessarily bad, but put together like this, I would be lying if I didn't say that it wasn't the best street circuit in the world. The fact that most of the scenery around the track consists of construction cranes and port equipment wasn't exactly helping. That being said, if the racing product is good - or at least if we can get good results here - I'd be pretty happy with it. As for now though, it seems like the track is an attempt by the city of Valencia to revitalize its seaside district...an attempt that might be a bit misguided considering the currently very concerning state of the United States' economy, something threatening to affect the rest of the world.
So, I wasn't exactly sure if this circuit was truly the best Valencia could offer, nor was I sure about the economics behind this project as a whole, but I think I'll have a better idea of what I think about the track once I complete my first lap. With the exception of Fuji, which was an old track but returning for the first time in decades in a new configuration, this was the first completely new track to Formula One during my time as a driver, and I was eager to experience it as FP1 began. The team sent me out on prime tyres for the first lap of the weekend, one of the first laps of the track period. The pit exit curved inside of turn one and released me into the path of turn two, the first braking zone of the track. That was when i started putting some heat into my tyres and brakes, working them up as I circled around, waiting to get back to the start-finish straight so that I could start my first lap in anger. Finally, coming out of the hairpin turn of twenty-five, I let the power down, letting the eight-cylinder Toyota engine in the back of Williams Racing machine breath as I fired it into the first section of the track, circling around the marina. First up was turn one, a flat-out sweeper to the right. Flat out in these conditions anyway, if I was in the middle of the pack during the first lap of the race, I might have some reservations about planting my foot down. At the start of FP1 though, there were only a handful of cars circulating, so I practically had the track to myself.
For the second time I hit the brakes going into turn two, back in familiar territory - as familiar as you can be with this track anyway - and headed towards the marina for but a moment before the track started to open up. Turn three was the first left-hander of the day and deposited me onto a short straight before a chicane made up of turn four to the left and turn five to the right. This was one of the few sections of track where there was a sizable amount of run-off on either side. It didn't last long though, because the walls seemed to close in again as I swept the car to the left through turn six and then back to the right through turn eight, cresting the marina. The next braking zone came with turn eight, effectively a hairpin to the right that seemed to slightly overshoot its mark - likely an attempt to encourage overtaking - meaning that the next corner, turn nine, was a kink to the left, realigning my car just in time to come onto the bridge. That's right, one of the features of the circuit was the modern, white swing bridge over the canal that connected the marina with the actual sea. It was a braking zone to the right, bringing us onto the track's longest straight. Well, I say straight, but turn eleven, a sweeper to the left, was about a third of the way down the straight. This is also the part of the circuit where the scenery started to change, no longer circling the marina, no longer seeing the bridge or the port cranes in the distance, now the scenery was becoming more urban. I imagine that many of these buildings are the old factories that the Valencian Community would hope to turn into refurbished luxury housing. Urban renewal aside, the straight needed to end eventually.
That came with the next likely overtaking zone on the track, mainly that of turn twelve, a ninety-degree right-hander. This opened a chicane that included turn thirteen, which was almost like they took a ninety-degree left-hander but chopped it down into a somewhat faster double-apex corner. Coming out of turn thirteen, there was just enough room to build a little bit of speed before hitting the braking and shifting down the box for the right-hander of turn fourteen, bringing me onto a sort of back straight for the track. A back straight which, much like the last one, began by sweeping to the left, which for some reason merited the classification of both corners fifteen and sixteen. That meant that when I reached the hairpin, with its Communitat Valenciana signage, the braking zone to the right was considered turn seventeen, despite fourteen having been the last real corner. Coming out of the hairpin, we were truly in the final section of the track now, with the hairpin quickly followed by a series of fast kinks: turn eighteen to the left followed by nineteen to the right and turn twenty to the right again. The steering wheel got to rest in the middle for a few seconds as I drove down the final straight. The straight had a few kinks in it though, so a bit to the right through turn twenty-one, a bit to the left through turn twenty-two, straight for just enough time to back a breath before turn twenty-three again kinked to the left. Then I swung to the car to the right for turn twenty four, a more substantial corner, and one that led directly into the final hairpin. If I wanted to pit, I would've taken a wider line through turn twenty-five before curving left into the pitlane like a letter U, instead through, I stayed out, and that meant that turn twenty-five was a sharp V. On the brakes, downshifting enough to ensure that I'll get good acceleration on exit, and then turn left before powering back up the box, unleashing everything I had to get to the line as quickly as possible. Finally I reached it, completing my first lap of the Valencia Street Circuit in free practice one, welcoming back the European Grand Prix to Formula One.
The European Grand Prix had once been an honorary title rotated throughout the various Grand Prix in Europe as a way of adding prestige, however, at some point, the title began being used for excess events in countries that already hosted F1 events. For instance, in the 1980s, when Brands Hatch needed to fill a slot on the calendar while Silverstone hosted the British Grand Prix, Brands would host the European Grand Prix, introducing the race as a standalone event. In 1993 the European Grand Prix would be in Britain again as a one-off event at Donington Park - a race famously won by Ayrton Senna in the rain - and in 1997, the European Grand Prix would host the controversial season finale at Jerez in Spain. The circuit most associated with the European Grand Prix, however, is the Nürburgring, which hosted the event as early as 1984, but it's primarily known for the era from 1999 to 2006 when the Hockenheimring hosted the German Grand Prix and the GP-Strecke at the Nürburgring hosted the European Grand Prix, the popularity of Wilhelm Ziegler being able to support two events. When Ziegler retired, that came to an end, and there was only one German race in 2007. Of course, with the two German circuits being competitors, there came some legal trouble and the 2007 event at the Nürburgring still had to be called the European Grand Prix, but we're in a new era now. Now it's Spain hosting two Grand Prix, bolstered by the popularity of Felipe Alvarez, no doubt - ironic given he was one of Wilhelm Ziegler's last great rivals - and Valencia is a whole new track created specifically to be the European Grand Prix. Before it was always existing tracks or one-off events at tracks like Donington, but now maybe the event will form a new kind of identity. If nothing else I'll say I enjoyed the lap of this place, I wouldn't call it one of my favorites but I definitely don't hold anything against it. Sure the scenery could be a bit better and twenty-five corners is a bit much, but as a driver, I hope to have better things to do during the race than think about the scenery, and a lot of those corners are flat-out nothing corners.
For the race itself, Henrique de Matteo started from pole, Anthony Harrison in second place, meaning the front row was taken up by the championship contenders. On row two was Piotr Kaminski in third and Matti Hamalainen in fourth, two men would could also find themselves firmly in championship contention if either of the front-row starters stumbles on the unknown streets of Valencia. Jyri Kaasalainen starts from fifth, where the sport's most recent race winner will have a hard time supporting his teammates from the dual Ferraris ahead of him, and Maximilian Renner lines up alongside, able to qualify concerningly well in that new Toro Rosso now that they finally have a hang of the new car. Ivan Tripoli in seventh and Victor Hartmann in eighth are more of the usual customers, but with Tommy Koskinen in ninth and myself in eleventh, separated only by the Toro Rosso of Maximilien Lecroix in tenth, Williams might finally have the chance to score some points again. Felipe Alvarez was lining up twelfth in front of the home crowd, while Fabian Schmidt was in thirteenth, and Martin Weaver in fourteenth. Filipe Yannick in fifteenth and James Buxton in sixteenth increased the number of potential rivals starting behind us today, further lifting my mood. Then there was Daniel MacGowan in seventeenth and Umberto Petronelli down in eighteenth. Rudolfo Goncalves and Lorenzo Barbaro, both having changed their gearboxes late on, will start from pitlane. So, when the formation lap completed, we had eighteen cars on the grid, two waiting in the pitlane so they could begin, and five red lights on the gantry above, just waiting to go out and unleash us.
The lights went out and I shot off the grid, speeding alongside the Toro Rosso as we reached turn one, but, as predicted, I had to lift just a bit through this corner. There were a lot of cars all around me and I needed the car to be stable and exactly where I wanted it, so I couldn't afford to push it too hard. So, I lifted on the outside, allowing Lecroix to defend his position, retaining tenth place. It didn't last long though, because I outbraked him in turn two and got my nose in front...only for him to remain on the inside line, again coming back at me. We were neck-and-neck going down to turn three but, with it finally being a corner to the left rather than the right, I finally had the inside line and thus the advantage. The Toro Rosso was still right behind me though, so I swerved to the left on the short shoot between the corners to ensure I would have the inside for the next corner. At the same time though, Felipe Alvarez followed me, also heading to the inside and hoping he could use my draft to overtake the Frenchman going into turn four. I braked for the corner, Lecroix did as well, not quite managing to outbrake me but definitely closing the distance - something which I imagine would compromise his exit in the long run - but I never got the chance to find out. You see, the problem is that it was fundamentally three cars all vying for the same position, I was the car that won out, and with Lecroix chopping across the nose of Felipe Alvarez who was basically divebombing the corner at that point, the Renault and the Toro Rosso took each other out, leaving Alvarez stricken in the chicane at his home race, and Lecroix limping back to the pits for a new nose.
The race calmed down at this point, with Matteo leading from Harrison, Kaminski, Hamalainen, Kaasalainen, Renner, Tripoli, Hartmann, and Koskinen, while I completed the top ten. The grid continued around the first lap in somewhat of a high speed procession, with turns five and six run under yellow flags due to the crash, and going back to green by the time we got to turn seven. There wasn't any overtaking going on into turn eight on this lap, nor through turn nine as we drove onto the swing bridge, fixed for the length of the race weekend, of course. My mind was briefly brought to the image of Henrique de Matteo and Anthony Harrison doing battle so intensely they didn't even see that the bridge was swung open, leading to Henrique going into the water while Harrison slammed the brakes and just stopped before the ledge. The idea was obviously more something along the lines of an old Warner Bros. cartoon rather than anything that would actually happen at an F1 race, but I had to admit, it was a bit of a funny visual, if only for me. Anyway, back to the task at hand.
I hit the brakes for turn ten and popped down the gears with my left hand as I did so, then I swung the car to the right as we reached the straight. I checked my mirrors for a moment, seeing that I had a bit of a gap to Fabian Schmidt behind - he had obviously been cautious going through the debris of the Alvarez-Lecroix incident, meaning I now had a few car lengths between me and him - while up ahead, my teammate was the car in front. Obviously I could and do race my teammate, but with a bit of a back between us, I wasn't going to divebomb or try anything risky on an untested track. I would bide my time and see how the situation develops. So, because of that, as we reached the chicane, there were no changes of position going on around me. So, we negotiated the chicane and a few other corners, before soon enough, we were on the back straight heading to turn seventeen. if a car could stick to the car ahead, turn seventeen could prove to be a good overtaking opportunity, but again, if there was action going into this corner on the first lap, it wasn't going on here. From here on out, it was a lot of tight, twisty, winding corners with the walls on either side, much of it taken at full throttle, so there wasn't an opportunity for much action, at least not until we got to turn twenty-five, the final corner. At that point though, the beginnings of gaps were forming as the cars started to string themselves out as we entered lap two.
Lap one, for better or worse, effectively set the tone of the race, since there really wasn't much of note going on. Maximilien Lecroix did pit for a new nose and all that once he got to the pits, but having had to do almost the entire first lap with a damaged car, and losing even more time in the pits, he wasn't exactly in contention, now was he? The car that started directly ahead of me was no longer a factor, I was in tenth, and my teammate was the car directly ahead of me, so Williams was already turning its attention to trying to use strategy to get both cars up into the points. This seemed like the best opportunity we were going to get in a long time. That's just kind of how the race went - the nearby barriers meant that overtaking was difficult so teams turned their attention to strategy, which meant that conserving tyres and fuel became critical to securing an optimal pit strategy - which only exacerbated the lack of on-track action. The first thing of any note that happened was during the first pit cycle, when, thanks to a fast set of in and out laps, I was able to get ahead of my teammate. I managed to stay within a second or two of Tommy during the first stint and once I made my stop, I was completely in clean air getting heat into my new tyres, while Koskinen was still circulating about a second off the car ahead on worn tyres. When Tommy did finally make his stop two laps after me, I was already up to speed and beat him into turn two, and I was able to consolidate that position as the nature of these cars on this track strung the cars out again. I was now up to ninth, meaning that Victor Hartmann was now the only thing keeping me out of the points.
So, as we settled into the second stint of the race, Henrique de Matteo led from Anthony Harrison, Piotr Kaminski, Jyri Kaasalainen, and Matti Hamalainen. Maximilian Renner was in sixth, Ivan Tripoli was in seventh, Victor Hartmann in eighth, I was in ninth, and Tommy Koskinen completed the top ten. There wasn't much going on just yet, but some things were becoming apparent: mainly that, once again, Henrique and Anthony were the class of the field, while Piotr Kaminski simply didn't have the kind of machinery that his title rivals did. Jyri Kaasalainen usually had decent pace in qualifying, but it was becoming evident that he simply wasn't a match for Anthony Harrison in the race; with Matti Hamalainen stuck behind his countryman, he wasn't able to make much of an impression on the cars ahead. Matti's best bet was for Ferrari to try and go on a contrary strategy compared to the McLaren in hopes of getting ahead, because passing was difficult on this track, but the Ferrari clearly had strong race pace in the hands of his teammate. Given clean air, the 2007 champion could easily be challenging Piotr Kaminski for a podium position instead of languishing in fifth. Of course, if Matti isn't able to pass Jyri, he'll have a hard time trying to pass Piotr once he catches up to the Pole, but even then, fourth is indeed better than fifth. I don't know, but I needed to think of something while only making incremental gains on Victor Hartmann ahead.
So, Ferrari needed to mix things up strategy wise to get Matti ahead of Kaasalainen, while I needed something a bit more drastic to get the job done on Victor Hartmann. That was the name of the game in the second stint. Well, Henrique de Matteo boxed first, switching from the option tyres to the primes, however, things got complicated as backmarker Lorenzo Barbaro was in the pits at the same time. As the Uruguayan was coming down the pits Ferrari inadvertently released the Brazilian into his path, and it was only some quick intervention from Henrique that avoided a crash. The Brazilian got going again and came out in the lead ahead of Anthony Harrison, but victory was far from certain for the Ferrari driver as everyone on the grid waited to see whether or not Ferrari would be slapped with an unsafe release penalty. Meanwhile, things went from bad to worse when a fuel rig issue for Matti Hamalainen led to the #1 car losing a place when the whole point of the strategy had been had been to gain a place on Jyri Kaasalainen. Instead, the Finn just doubled the amount of work he needed to do. Anyway, with Ferrari having absorbed all the bad luck the final stops would bring, I finally came in towards the end of the race to switch from the primes to the options, ensuring that I would be at my fastest in the final stint of the race, while Victor Hartmann was already wearing down his final prime tyres. I stopped in the box, the car went up, the tyres were switched, fuel loaded into the car, and I was released, none of the misfortune that befell the Ferrari crew.
"Okay good, good, good. Hartmann is slow ahead, you can get him." Peter encouraged through this radio and, true to his word, the one and a half second gap that Hartmann had over me evaporated, down to 1.2 seconds after the first lap, then just under a second after two laps, under seven tenths after three, and within half a second after four. I was on my fifth lap after the pitstop I was right under Hartmann's gearbox going into turn eight. The dirty air was hurting me, sure, but he was also diving me enough of a tow down the straights and I had enough of a speed advantage that I was pushing through regardless. I followed the German through turn nine and into the bridge, then closing in even more into the braking zone on turn nine. The BMW Sauber was able to get somewhat of a better exit out of the corner but the straight afterwards was long enough that it didn't matter, because I was gaining on him, gaining and gaining, and finally, I pulled to the right going into turn twelve, outbraking the BMW thanks to my fresher, grippier tyres, and got up into eighth place with ease, Victor Hartmann powerless to defend as his pace threatened to drop him even further behind. That eighth place would turn into seventh when Matti Hamalainen's engine gave out with ten laps remaining. This proved to be one of the few pieces of action in a race marked by just three retirements and zero changes in the top three.
The points-paying results for the 2008 European Grand Prix read as follows:
1: Henrique de Matteo - Brazil - Scuderia Ferrari - 10 points.
2: Anthony Harrison - United States - McLaren-Mercedes - 8 points.
3: Piotr Kaminski - Poland - BMW Sauber - 6 points.
4: Jyri Kaasalainen - Finland - McLaren-Mercedes - 5 points.
5: Ivan Tripoli - Italy - Toyota - 4 points.
6: Maximilian Renner - Germany - Toro Rosso-Ferrari - 3 points.
7: Tamara Shchegolyayeva - Kazakhstan - Williams-Toyota - 2 points.
8: Tommy Koskinen - Finland - Williams-Toyota - 1 point.
So, for the first time since Bahrain, Williams scored a double points finish, bringing my season tally up to 19, Tommy's up to 9, and Williams' up to 28. We were still sixth in the constructors' championship, but thanks to the fact that Renault failed to score today, we were just a point behind their tally of 29. Toyota, meanwhile, was solidifying their grasp on fourth by moving up to 34 points. Red Bull was still on 23 just behind us, while Toro Rosso was up to 11 points, thanks to the fact that Maximilian Renner has begun to outperform the senior Red Bulls as of late. Maximilien Lecroix hasn't quite been able to match his German teammate, but the Frenchman does still have two of those points to his name, so he is contributing. It's somewhat the same story here at Williams, where, as mentioned, I have double the number of points as Tommy and have now beaten him head-to-head 6 times to 2, despite the fact that he is beating me 8 times to 3 in qualifying. Granted, this weekend I was basically just behind him in quali, but the point remains, Tommy is a really good driver and has performed well all year long, he just hasn't been able to convert his qualifying positions into points. Some of that is bad luck to be fair, but one thing I have going for me this season is that I have converted bad starting positions to good finishing positions more often than not. Even taking into account my two retirements this year, I have scored points twice as often as I haven't.
As for the championship battle, well, Anthony Harrison retains the lead due to a smartly managed race, but Henrique de Matteo is once again his closest challenger, with Matti Hamalainen's ill-timed retirement hurting the Finn's chance of a title defense. Ferrari still leads the constructors' championship though, but with McLaren being very consistent lately, they have closed the gap a bit, while BMW Sauber is being left behind to an extent. BMW Sauber has a really good car this season, but it almost seems like the team has no greater ambition now that they've won that race, so despite the fact that Piotr is now doubt begging to be given a machine that can challenge for the title, BMW is lagging behind, and Victor Hartmann's pace here in Valencia is a clear example of that. A Ferrari retired, this should be a good opportunity for the BMWs, but instead, one of the cars slipped out of the points entirely without even the convenient excuse of a parts failure. Ultimately though, I knew that Toyota were going to have more good days this season, I knew that Renault were going to have more good days in the final races, so I'm going to appreciate the good days we have - especially the good days we have with both cars - and hope we can pull off a miracle in spite of the horrible pace we had at some of the European summer races.
The 2008 Superleague Formula season would kick off on August 31st, 2008 at Donington Park with two races at the British circuit. This would be followed by race weekends at the Nürburgring in Germany, Zolder in Belgium, Estoril in Portugal, Vallelunga in Italy, and finally finishing up with a race at Jerez on November 23rd, meaning the season would outlast the 2008 Formula One season. So, with the season about to kick off and excitement in the air about this interesting fusion of football and motorsport, AS Roma was doing a special event to unveil their challenger, the Panoz DP09 run by Scuderia Coloni-PASS, driven by Natasha Tsirinskaya, right outside of the Stadio Olimpico. So yeah, that's how I found myself in a 72,000 seat stadium in the Italian capital watching journalists taking pictures of my cousin sitting on the front wheel of the race car, holding her helmet on her knee, with the 2008-2009 Serie A squad flanking the car. Part of me noted the fact that that it was a men's football team and their car, yet the driver was a woman, which seemed a bit off - did AS Roma have a woman's team they could've used for this instead? I pushed that thought aside though, because, quite frankly, other than this unveil, I didn't think the club involved would have very much to do with the team or the championship. Quite frankly, AS Roma was just a glorified sponsor wrap on a car run by Umberto Petronelli's junior team, and the car itself was a modified American Champ Car with an American-made V12 engine, which was somewhat ironic considering the perception of football - soccer - in the United States. Reusing a car because the series went bankrupt a year later aside, I was just happy for Natasha, because not many junior drivers got to be the centerpiece of a major European stadium.
The car itself was red, orange, and white, with the club badge on the sidepod. A shield, red on the bottom, orange on top, with an orange monogram of A-S-R on the bottom and a white she-wolf on the bottom. This, naturally, relates to the founding myth of Rome, where the twins Romulus and Remus floated ashore along the Tiber river to be nursed to maturity by a she-wolf. Roma would join fellow Italian club AC Milan in this series, along with English clubs Tottenham Hotspur and Liverpool, Scottish old firm giant Rangers, and Germany's Borussia Dortmund. Clubs from from several other European clubs were represented, along with Al-Ain from the United Arab Emirates, Beijing Guoan from China, and two of Brazil's largest clubs in the form of Flamengo and Corinthians. I admit that there are definitely some major players in football missing - the likes of Manchester United, Barcelona, and Real Madrid being among the most obvious absentees - but the fact of the matter is that the championship, without even having proven itself, has already attracted the likes of Liverpool and AC Milan. A year and a half ago those clubs were facing each other in the 2007 Champions' League final, so yeah, some pretty damn big names, paired with a proven car and a powerful V12 engine. There's also the fact that, in many ways, the series doesn't submit itself at Formula One's feet - it has four more cylinders, a similar power figure, and even ran on Michelin slick tyres rather than the grooved Bridgestones we have in Formula One nowadays. Now, F1 cars are still ten or more seconds a lap faster, mainly down to factors such as lower weight, better technology, competition driving down lap times in a pressured situation that simply doesn't happen in a spec series, and the fact that F1 cars can rev to 19,000, rather than Superleague Formula's 11,000 - 12,000 under push-to-pass - meaning we got more out of our V8s than they got out of their V12s. Still, the point remains, these were far from go-karts, and the drivers in this series included F1 drivers, A1GP talents, Champ Car alums, and a smattering of high level junior drivers, this was legitimately a desirable place to go to for drivers who didn't have opportunities in Formula One. And now Natasha got to be a part of that.
"Would you like an autogr - oh, hi." Natasha asked as she finished signing something for someone else before properly turning to face me, face blushing with embarrassment as she just realized what she asked me.
"Yes actually," I smirked, quickly presenting the guest pass Umberto Petronelli provided me with. Nat smiled, shook her head, but proceeded to sign the pass regardless. I walked away happy with it, having turned a mere forgettable access pass that I would have probably thrown away into a legitimate, signed souvenir from a major next step in my little cousin's racing career. I recognized that we weren't actually blood related - at least not in any meaningful way - but we were practically raised together, and I have always considered her family, so, if I'm going to be collecting various trophies, race suits, helmets, and other memorabilia items from my racing career, I might as well start collecting things from her racing career as well. Later this week, on the same track that Ayrton Senna once put together one of the greatest wet weather performances of all time, Natasha will contest two races, both worth fifty points, and attempt to ensure that her brilliant, brilliant form from the GP2 Asia series earlier this year translate to Superleague Formula again. The cars are different and the racing may be in Europe rather than in Asia, but the goal remains the same: race as hard as you can, finish as high as you can, and ensure you impress people in Formula One in the process.
Speaking of Formula One, the Belgian Grand Prix comes a week after the opening Superleague Formula event, and the long, fast run through the Ardennes will no doubt be a chaotic event even by the standards of a chaotic season. You combine the best drivers in the world with one of the best tracks in the world and the rising pressure of a championship battle nearing its final crescendo...Belgium is going to matter a lot, as is Monza, as is the new night race in Singapore, the East Asian double with Fuji Speedway in Japan and the Shanghai circuit in China, before finally coming to a finale in Brazil on the great Interlagos circuit. The way this season has gone, there is no doubt in my mind the title fight will make it all the way to the finale.
It was somewhat of a bag of mixed fortunes for the two of us when the Sunday of the Belgian Grand Prix rolled around. Natasha, to her credit, got off the line with a brilliant start in Superleague Formula, finishing second in her first race for 45 points and tenth in the second race for 18 points. The total of 63 points from the Donington Park weekend brings her up to 63 points, putting her fourth in the championship behind fellow junior drivers: Ezequiel Martinez for Liverpool, who was on 79 points, and Shandar Khan for PSV Eindhoven, who was on 72 points, and Goncalo Borja for Sevilla who was on 68 points. Former Formula One driver, Robert Deschamps, driving for Italian team AC Milan, was just behind Natasha on 59 points, meaning that the title battle seemed just as tight, if not tighter, than what she had to deal with in GP2 Asia. As for me, well, I wasn't so lucky, because I qualified down in eighteenth for the Belgian Grand Prix, and Tommy wasn't better off considering he was only in fifteenth place. I was outqualified by my teammate yet again, but I was still close enough that I could out race him, not that I thought that points would be on the line for either of us. That being said, I had a hard time predicting where either of us would finish, assuming we finished at all.
The reason for this was that the track was basically still drying from morning showers as the formation lap began, so, the track was slippery to begin with. Add to the fact that it was overcast and more rain was predicted to come during the race, nearly everyone was starting on the option tyres, since none of us expected for us to be on these tyres for particularly long. The fact that we were on the softer, faster tyres also increased the chances of an accident happening on the still very slick track, so again, there was certainly a risk involved, and any of us drivers could be caught out in these conditions. I guess the only thing I could do, as I arrived back on the grid about three minutes later, is try to survive and hope to be rewarded with points at the end of it. Red light after red light came on, elevated on the gantry above us, the tension building more and more until finally all five lights were on. That particular moment is probably the most agonizing moment in Formula One, where every bone in your body is ready to blast off the grid, but you know a race-ruining penalty will come your way if you move even a split-second too early. Holding and holding and holding until the lights go out and then facing wheelspin immediately as the tyres struggled to grip into the slippery surface beneath them. As myself and all the other drivers struggled off the grid, Filipe Yannick on the prime tyres and Ivan Tripoli next to him, were able to get rocketing starts.
Tripoli didn't last long though, because in turn one the Toyota got rammed from behind by Maximilien Lecroix, who locked up into the corner. Lecroix's teammate, Max Renner, also locked up, but he was able to avoid hitting another car, meaning the Toyota was the only one suffering diffuser and gearbox damage because of the Toro Rosso's synchronized lock-ups. That's not to say that they were the only ones to have a bad time in La Source though, because Hartmann and Kaasalainen banged wheels in the hairpin as well. Finally, while I was cautious on the brakes and trying to avoid all of this, far from happy on the slippery surface going into the corner, I got clattered into by Umberto Petronelli for good measure. The Force India was left with a broken front wing and a front left puncture form running over his own debris, while I continued through the corner, turning all the way to the right and then putting down the power on the short downhill straight.
"Is the car okay?" I asked over the team radio, making sure that I wasn't nursing a slow puncture of my own after that lap one, turn one contact.
"No visible damage, continue. If you feel something wrong let us know, otherwise, it's business as usual!" Peter Malmedy gave my orders through the radio, making it clear what was expected of me on the track not very far at all from his ancestral homeland.
"Copy," was my monosyllabic response before throwing the car to the left for Eau Rouge, back to the right up the hill, and the cresting it to the left again as I ascended Raidillon, having completed one of the most classic and historic corners in Formula One. This brought me onto the Kemmel straight, which was so very straight that there was a small kink in the middle of it that was counted as turn six, the second such nothing corner on this track, continuing the tradition set by turn one. Anyway, the Kemmel straight was a mild incline all the way up before we finally reached the first sector line of the race, opening sector two with an immediate braking zone into turn seven to the right, followed quickly by eight to the left and then nine to the right as we completed the Les Combes complex. Now at the top of the circuit - both in terms of the map and the terrain - we began the descent with turn ten, the Bruxelles hairpin. Coming out of Bruxelles, the descent accelerated, plunging downhill through the no-name left-hander of turn eleven, before the ground finally started to even out as I reached Pouhon. Lifting, downshifting, and even dabbing the brakes in these conditions, I threw the car into the first apex of turn thirteen, and then lifting again as I threw the car into the second apex, still very much aware of the slippery conditions. I wasn't even entirely aware of what position i was in right now, my full focus was on keeping the car between the white lines.
Pouhon was followed by a short straight before I braked for the right hander of turn thirteen which was almost immediately mirrored by turn fourteen, Campus, though this time to the left. Another short blast down a straightaway before braking and turning to the right for Stavelot, the edge of the circuit, and crossing the sector two line on corner exit. Now on the last bit of lap one, I turned to the right again for turn sixteen, powering down on corner exit as the modern Spa-Francorchamps layout rejoined with the classic layout, flat-out for a long section of track as I threw the car to the left and left again through Blanchimont, keeping the power down as much as I could before finally hitting the brakes for the bus stop. The tight, forty-five degree corner of turn nineteen was to the left followed by turn twenty to the right as the current bus stop layout made a sort of Z-shape before connecting the back stretch with the main straight. I applied the power gently down the still slippery start-finish straight and finally crossed the line to complete the opening lap. One down, forty-three to go.
While I was just trying to survive on lap one, Matti Hamalainen was making progress forward, having overtaken his teammate for second place down the Kemmel straight, and now coming into the lead as Harrison spun in turn one. The American quickly recovered, but he had lost the lead to the reigning champion, rejoining in second ahead of Henrique de Matteo. Things went from bad to worse for McLaren on lap ten, when Kaasalainen spun Weaver out, leading to the young Finn receiving a drive-through penalty, eventually dropping him down to fifteenth. Unfortunately for me, I was just behind him at this stage, so I didn't get to capitalize on his misfortune. Things would stay rather unfortunate for me because, when I took my first pitstop a little more than a fourth of the way into the race, I found that conditions weren't feeling any better now than they were before. It was still too slick for the dry tyres but nowhere near wet enough for either of the two wet-weather compounds. It was this miserable middle ground where neither tyre was able to function properly. I would, however, gain a place when Filipe Yannick crashed out, and that also lessened Renault's chances of being able to maximize a race where Williams simply had no pace.
The second stop would come on lap thirty-three, but I was back in the pits not ten laps later when the rain finally came, and came heavily at that. Meanwhile though, the most important events of the race - likely what would be one of the most important events of the championship - occurred. Anthony Harrison caught up to Matti Hamalainen and attempted to repass the Finn into the bus stop, but the American overshot the corner and overtook off-track. Anthony slowed, allowing Hamalainen to get a nose ahead, but the American sped back up and outbraked Matti into La Source, retaking the lead. McLaren and Harrison would maintain that, to the letter of the law, they returned the position they gained off track, fulfilling the regulations, and then regained it immediately afterwards. Ferrari and Hamalainen, however, argued that Harrison did not truly surrender the position and thus violated the spirit of the regulation by strategically playing the procedure. The end result of it was that Anthony Harrison was slapped with a twenty-five second time penalty while Hamalainen decided to lose control and clatter into the barriers on lap forty-two, ending his day. Down in fourteenth on a new set of wets, I got to experience that from a front row seat considering I was being lapped. In any case, when accounting for Anthony's penalty...
The points-paying results for the 2008 Belgian Grand Prix read as follows:
1: Henrique de Matteo - Brazil - Scuderia Ferrari - 10 points.
2: Victor Hartmann - Germany - BMW Sauber - 8 points.
3: Anthony Harrison - United States - McLaren-Mercedes - 6 points.
4: Felipe Alvarez - Spain - Renault - 5 points.
5: Maximilian Renner - Germany - Toro Rosso-Ferrari - 4 points.
6: Piotr Kaminski - Poland - BMW Sauber - 3 points.
7: Maximilien Lecroix - France - Toro Rosso-Ferrari - 2 points.
8: Martin Weaver - Australia - Red Bull-Renault - 1 point.
So, Henrique de Matteo closes to within two points of Anthony Harrison, Felipe Alvarez takes a big haul of points for Renault despite his teammate's retirement, and Williams finishes twelfth and thirteenth, Tommy and I finishing line-and-stern a lap down. Toyota and Renault were now tied on 34 points, Williams continued to sit on 28, Red Bull moved up onto 24 points, modest gains but more than we could do, while Toro Rosso was improving quickly to be on 17 points. Honda, with their points tally of 14, was now ahead of only Force India and the extinct Super Aguri team. The one good thing about being a Williams driver after a race like that is that I get to be blissfully free of the massive controversies going on at the front of the field.
McLaren made it clear that they intended to appeal the decision, Ferrari made it clear that they did not believe that Harrison returned the position correctly, and various figures within the sport were giving quotes weighing in on the issue. I opted not to give a statement, mainly because, quite frankly, I don't want to touch this issue with a ten foot pole. I can see McLaren's side, i can see Ferrari's side, and I can see how everyone would try and use this situation to their advantage.