Former Jordan chief engineer Gary Anderson reckons Ferrari's two-stop strategy helped Felipe Massa take the chequered flag at the Turkish Grand Prix. But could McLaren's safety-first approach and Lewis Hamilton's second place finish pay off in the long run?
"It was an interesting race, with lots going on and teams using different strategies. McLaren chose a three-stop strategy because of the way their car uses its tyres. Last year in Turkey, Lewis Hamilton had a problem when his right front tyre delaminated and blew up. He lost third place and ended up fifth.
Bridgestone microscopically analyse every team's used tyres, and they will have told McLaren that they thought that the same thing could happen again. McLaren could have decided to risk it, but after what happened last year, they chose not to. So you have to reduce the run distance – and the only way to do that is to do three stops. Of course, Bridgestone will have kept all this secret from Ferrari, otherwise they could have changed their strategy accordingly. The first they'll have known about it was at Hamilton's first stop – for me, the 'Make it happen' moment of the race.
There's no black-and-white reason why this problem only applies to the McLaren. If there was, they'd fix it. Sometimes if you work the front tyres harder, it makes them perform a bit better. You have to find a compromise – getting the performance out of the tyre without abusing it too much. It's possible that the only corner in Istanbul that's making it difficult is Turn 8, which is exceptionally long and fast. In which case they'd say, OK, one corner's going to hurt us this year, but the overall performance gain is worth it.
Ferrari went for a two-stop strategy, but the key to their victory was the performance of Felipe Massa, who's dominant at the Turkish GP. He's won from pole three times in a row now.
Felipe likes a car that understeers a bit, and in Turkey that's not a big penalty. He's brave, so he's good in quick corners, and there are plenty of those in the Turkish circuit. But I always hated it whenever a driver 'liked' a circuit: if you've got the talent to lift your game at one circuit, there's no reason why you can't do it at others. To win the championship, and for the team to have faith in you for the championship, you need to be on it every weekend.
I thought Nico Rosberg did well from 11th on the grid to finish eighth and get a World Championship point. But the team are going to have to look at the qualifying pace of the car and try to break into the top 10. Look at Kazuki Nakajima's crash at the first corner. Not his fault, but that's unfortunately the price you pay if you get stuck at the back of the grid. Most of the big accidents happen back there. Whereas up at the front, people are trying to survive because there's a bigger picture than just the one race."
