Aussie Grit (28 page)

Worse was to come: on lap 1 Rubens got things wrong at the start, suddenly found a gear and dived under me. That pushed me into Heidfeld’s BMW, knocked off my car’s nose and cost me a lap. In the end I tootled around at the back of the field to get some mileage on the car and was last man running by the finish. Sebastian picked up a 10-place grid penalty for Malaysia for allegedly triggering a fairly spectacular accident with Robert Kubica in the other BMW. Things could only get better, but at least I could report that I was pretty happy with how my recovery from injury was progressing.

Next stop Sepang, Malaysia, where we made a little bit of history as the first F1 race to be stopped since the very
wet Adelaide Grand Prix back in 1991. The drivers had already been in two minds about Melbourne’s decision to switch to a twilight race with a 5pm start: the light was very marginal and the sun was just so low. It was a very different set of conditions for us. When you’ve got all day to have a 90-minute race and you pick the worst hour-and-a-half to have it, you have to ask why. We knew exactly why we did it: because of commercial rights back in Europe and the television audience. But next up we were taken aback by the Malaysians’ decision to have a late afternoon start of their own, for the same commercial reasons. It’s pretty obvious to anyone who has ever been there that there’s a decent chance of rain around that time of day, and so it turned out. Not right at the start: we got away under a very threatening sky, but the rain only began around lap 22 of the scheduled 56. Fernando immediately went off the track and most of us dived for pit lane and wet-weather tyres. Within a few laps it was clear that ‘inters’ were the tyres to be on rather than full wets, so I pitted again, only for the rain to intensify, prompting another unscheduled call to the pits to change tyres yet again. The downpour began on lap 30 and three laps later, when it was clear that the weather had gone beyond F1 cars’ capacity, the race was suspended.

That’s when the most intense action of the day began – on the starting grid. TV viewers may remember seeing me moving from car to car, talking to some of the other drivers. In my role as a GPDA director I was making sure that we were all on the same page, because very often the guys talk a good game when there’s no pressure, no big decisions to be made, and then promptly crumble under the pressure from their teams. But my feeling was that even though there was
going to be potentially a very, very good result for me at the end of it – I was fourth when the red flag came out – if any of us lost the car on the straight there was a disaster waiting to happen.

Fans will ask, and legitimately, why the best drivers in the world are not prepared to go out and race in the rain when they pay their money and stand there to watch us. All I can say is that when you can’t control the car in a straight line, never mind through the corners, because the aquaplaning is so bad – your car is sitting on a film of water, not the tarmac – then even the best drivers in the world simply can’t race each other. Skill is taken out of the equation; luck comes in, and even those of us who take risks for a living see no reason to tempt fate.

I have raced in some horrendous conditions and enjoyed the challenge, provided it was in one or two sections per lap, but this was quite different. So I asked some of the guys their opinion.

‘It’s crazy,’ they said – they were with me.

‘Well, what are you doing sitting in your car?’ I asked. ‘It’s just not sending the right message. These guys will override us if we don’t take a bit of action. We don’t have to go crazy – let’s just see if it blows over and we can go from there.’

A few of the drivers got out of their cars.

‘It’s not about your team, it’s about you,’ I told them. ‘Is it safe? Can you race? No, of course you can’t, let’s just wait a little bit.’

Lewis Hamilton was right behind me, in fact they pretty well all agreed. We had to come up with something better than sitting there like lambs, then before we know it we find we’re out behind the safety car and then we’re racing
again because no one took a stance. I wanted to make sure we took control of the situation. Fernando and I were both out of our cars, intending to wait until the rivers cleared on the straight – which they never did – because if you’re not in your cars what are they going to do? I remember speaking to Dietrich on the phone. ‘Tell them, Mark, tell them: you can race another day,’ were his exact words. It was good to hear, since he was the guy who paid my bills. It was so obvious: there are other days to race, it’s not that desperate. But the drivers get almost brainwashed by other people into believing that we have to do it. In the end we didn’t have to race because the weather took another turn for the worse, but I still wonder what might have happened if it hadn’t. I ended up sixth, because the result was called according to the race order on lap 31. For only the fifth time in F1 history and the first time in the 21st century, half-points were awarded.

Sadly in 2014 we saw exactly how badly things can go wrong in such conditions when Jules Bianchi crashed at Suzuka during the Japanese Grand Prix. He lost control at Dunlop Corner and his car collided with a tractor crane removing a car that had crashed at the same spot a lap earlier. While some tragic accidents in motor sport can be attributed to sheer bad luck, others have contributing factors: the race start, the pressure to finish the race before sunset, worn-out intermediate tyres in increasing rain, and one of the toughest corners in the racing world. Scenarios like that have made the drivers take a strong stance and that’s why I was so vocal in Malaysia that day.

As things turned out, Sepang was good practice. The next race in Shanghai was also wet, and this time we made
history of a quite different kind. To start with we qualified in a Red Bull Racing best-ever pole position for Sebastian and third for me. When it rained, we spent the first six laps behind the safety car and curiously enough Sebastian, who had punted me from behind in similar conditions two years earlier in Fuji, was lucky to escape undamaged when Sébastien Buemi’s Toro Rosso did the same to him. As the race unfolded it became obvious that in those conditions it was only ever going to be between the two of us. Sebastian stopped for tyres on lap 36 and I followed him in a lap later, after which the instruction came to hold station and run to the finish. We secured the first 1–2 finish in the team’s history and I can tell you it felt great to get the ‘real’ Red Bull team up onto that podium. It was an incredible day for the team and a great reward for the people who had shown faith in me and stood by me in those difficult close-season days. ‘Now I’ve just got one more step to go,’ I said after the race. My pace all weekend had been terrific. I knew I wasn’t a million miles away and that my day would come.

*

In sport, momentum is everything. After that historic Red Bull 1–2 in Shanghai, JB and the Brawn team went on to win in Bahrain, Spain and Monaco. But while the juggernaut rolled on, we were building up a pretty decent head of steam in our own right. Sebastian claimed second spot in Bahrain, which was consolation for the team after Adrian Sutil compromised my weekend in Q1. The German driver thought I was on an ‘out’ lap, which his Force India was on at the time. He was penalised for baulking me, but the
damage was done: starting 19th on the grid is no good anywhere and Bahrain was no different as I finished 11th.

In Barcelona I qualified fifth but a strong middle stint in the race saw me come through for third place and my fourth F1 podium. A landmark of sorts loomed when we headed for Monaco, and this one really was quite special for me. It was my 127th Grand Prix start, which meant I would be Australia’s longest-serving F1 driver: Sir Jack took part in 126 World Championship races, while our second World Champion, Alan Jones, started 116. The problem from my perspective was that they had won 14 and 12 World Championship races respectively; my 126 starts so far had not yielded the victory I was so hungry for. The hunger wasn’t satisfied on the beautiful Mediterranean coast, either. A single run in Q3 was a tactical error and meant I started eighth on the grid, but another good middle stint earned me fifth place.

In Turkey next time out I qualified fourth, with Sebastian on pole again, then equalled my best-ever F1 result with second behind Jenson. Again the second stint was the deciding factor, then I was defending well against Sebastian when we got the call to save the cars as I was the faster driver and we duly came home for a 2–3 finish.

Looking back now, there was a taste of things to come even at that 2009 race in Turkey. Sebastian was on pole but finished third; he made a mistake by running wide on the opening lap and letting Jenson into the lead; he was fuelled lighter and made three stops to my two. Seb came in after 15 laps; I set purple sectors galore (when you are the quickest driver in a session or race in a particular sector of the track, the timing screens show your time in purple) and
came in on lap 17. When Seb pitted for a second time after 29 laps I pushed hard again before making my second and last stop after 43 laps. Seb was back for his own last stop after 48 laps and then closed the gap to me to just over a second before the telephone call came.

I had laid the foundation for my second place in that middle stint and all the signs were that he wasn’t too happy with how the race had panned out. That race brought a first test for the Red Bull Racing engineers when it came to having their two drivers on different strategies, and managing the driver reactions. On this particular occasion, Sebastian was furious that his strategy hadn’t worked and it was to become a trend. Whenever I was on a different strategy, especially when it had worked to my advantage, he would ask incredulously, ‘How is this possible? How is Mark ahead?’ or even, ‘How is Mark quicker?’ It seemed the thought of me simply being quicker was not one he could entertain! There always had to be another reason why. Over time I realised his meltdowns came when he thought he had done enough when in reality, he hadn’t. To my way of thinking, if you get done fair and square on the day you should take it on the chin, but Seb’s arrogance meant he simply couldn’t comprehend how it had gone wrong and would take it out on the team or, rather, want the team to do something about it.

Guillaume Rocquelin, aka Rocky, Seb’s engineer, was the only man in the team who would tell it to him straight. I’m sure some of Seb’s behaviour was down to his youthfulness, but the team’s executive management repeatedly allowed him to get away with it. No one was ever big enough to pull him into line, tell him that kind of behaviour wasn’t
acceptable. He was treated like a favourite son, which meant he would throw his toys out of the pram from time to time when he didn’t get his own way. Even so, I couldn’t help but try to cut him a bit of slack because I got to know his family a little and I liked them. Despite the language barrier, you could tell they were decent people with a good set of values. Essentially he was a good kid at heart but the team allowed him to behave like a spoilt brat.

At the height of Red Bull Racing’s success our post-race debrief would involve up to 25 people plus another 10 or so back at the Milton Keynes factory linked up by video stream and radio. Everyone would listen as we gave individual breakdowns on how our race had gone before the race engineers and other departments contributed. The meeting could take between 90 minutes and two hours – often longer than the actual race! Seb may have become a four-time F1 title-winner but he was also a world champion at talking! His ability to recall and relate fine details post-race to key personnel was certainly a strength of his, although I did get the occasional kick under the table from some of the engineers as he could be patronising! The meeting would end with Christian and Adrian giving their take on the race, Adrian clearly with an engineering focus. What I loved about Adrian was his attitude. The race result was generally invisible to him; even if we had dominated with a 1–2 finish, fastest lap, pole position and fastest pit stop, he was still always pushing the team to improve and that’s why we were as good as we were.

Looking back on it now, neither Seb nor I knew at the time how significant Istanbul Park 2009 would be for our relationship within 12 months. For the moment we had a
good rapport and enjoyed a professional relationship. The key ingredient was that we shared a common goal to lift the team’s performance and I thought the chemistry among us all was exceptional. In fact we were on a rocket-ship, and it was on the launching pad.

The rocket really started to lift off when we went to Silverstone and claimed Red Bull’s second 1–2 finish of the season. Seb did a good job in qualifying to take pole but I had an awkward moment with Kimi Räikkönen when I caught him on Hangar Straight as I was trying to commit to Stowe Corner. It cost me a front-row start as Rubens pipped me to second. Kimi and I went chest-to-chest in an alpha-male moment on the drivers’ parade lap the next day as he hadn’t found my comments about him perhaps having drunk too much vodka all that amusing! My race was jeopardised as well: I was bottled up behind Rubens for the whole first stint, only a good first stop letting me get ahead of the Brawn and set off in pursuit of Sebastian, but by then it was too late. I have to be honest, I was disappointed. It really grated on me that Seb had won the British GP because victories were now on the table and he had won what I considered to be my ‘other’ home race.

Still, it was a second Red Bull Racing 1–2, and this time it was in the dry and totally credible. Ann and I joined the team and celebrated wildly at Christian’s Oxfordshire home, where he and his long-term partner Beverley always threw a team barbecue after the British GP. One of the lasting memories of those annual get-togethers was the sight of Adrian tearing up the perfectly manicured lawns by performing donuts in one of his or Christian’s exotic cars, usually with a drink in hand. Adrian might be F1’s biggest
geek but ply him with a few drinks, and you’ll see another side of him! He’s great fun when he’s off-duty.

On 11 July 2009 my Queanbeyan mate Brad Haddin scored a century for Australia in his maiden Ashes Test in Cardiff. I wasn’t there: I had urgent business of my own in Germany. But I did follow the boys’ progress on the television in my hotel room, and maybe I drew some inspiration from what they were doing in the baggy green caps of Australia, because that day I went out and claimed my first pole position in Formula 1 at the Nürburgring, the home of that year’s German Grand Prix.