It feels as though the 2010 Turkish Grand Prix has yet to end. Nine days after the two Red Bull’s clattered eachother with one-third of race remaining, there has been constant feed from commentators, agitators, the team and of course, the drivers themselves. Red Bull have apparently cleared the air between their two stars – the young antagonist, Sebastian Vettel and the victim apparent, Mark Webber – and attached a perfectly posed photograph of the two together as “proof”. Formula 1, however, is much like the world of celebrity entertainment and once the seeds of mistrust are planted, it is difficult to dig them up again without unsettling the soil – if Vettel and Webber were a married couple, they would be on the front cover of OK Magazine in a second demanding extortionate divorce settlements.
There have also been minor grumblings between the team-mates at McLaren, but with the fallout at Red Bull looming large, it was really difficult to care. For all that the Austrian mess put the sport on the front pages of newspapers, it really did overshadow what was a wonderful race and it will inevitably be the focus once again as the Formula 1 world moves back to Montreal.Absent from the calender for the first time since 1987, last year’s Championship sorely missed the trip to North America. Featuring some long straights, slight kinks and a myriad of mid-speed corners, the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve represents a test of how to set a car up for a fast run.
However, it is the track’s slow first turn otherwise known as “Virage Senna”, the L’Epingle hairpin and the Wall of Champions chicane – so named because Damon Hill, Michael Schumacher, Jacques Villeneuve and GT Champion Ricardo Zonta all crash into it during the 1999 event – that represent points where a good slow speed balance is necessary. The circuit is known for huge opening lap shunts as the entire field pours into the bottle-neck first turn, that has either brought out the safety car or even the red flag, often depending on the resultant carnage.
To show us around the 2.7 mile circuit in the Red Bull simulator is, once again, 2010 Formula 1 Championship leader, Mark Webber.
