MOTORSPORT: A few Webber perspectives

It's not driver error that Webber's in the pits again
The Mark Webber knockers will be out in force again after his horror Japanese Grand Prix, but let's get a few things in perspective.

Sure, Australia's Formula One driver has now gone five races without a solitary point. Despite that, Webber remains ahead of the past two world champions -- McLaren's Lewis Hamilton and Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen -- in this year's championship.

Webber is still fourth in the championship -- on 51.5 points, to Raikkonen's 45 and 43. A damn good effort for the season that considering how competitive Hamilton has been in the McLaren in the second half of the season.

Hamilton has won two GPs and had two other podiums in the past six races. And Raikkonen has been consistently bringing the Ferrari home high up.

Raikkonen's finishing record over the past six races, since Webber won the German GP on July 12, has been 2, 3, 1, 3, 10 and 4.

Webber's only points since that memorable Nurburgring victory came from third place two weeks later in Hungary. He will be gutted that his world title challenge evaporated so quickly and so limply, especially when we saw yesterday how quick the Red Bull Racing RB5 car still is.

But how much of it is down to Webber's driving and how much to mechanical frailty or pure bad luck? It's much more the latter two than the first.

We all remember those first seven years, after the glorious start in Melbourne in 2002, of woe. The signs of hope, his speed but ultimately disappointment at Jaguar, Williams and in the early days with Red Bull Racing.

It seemed though, on July 12 this year, that Webber's fortunes had changed. The most optimistic of Webber's supporters may have felt the floodgates were about to open for him in the way they did for Alan Jones in 1979-1981. But since Hungary it has been back to the days of old for Webber.

We are reminded today of the horrible luck that the great New Zealand driver Chris Amon had in F1. It is this author's belief that Amon was a better F1 driver than Webber, but in 96 GPs he never won one.

Amon's luck was so wretched that the great American Mario Andretti once said that if the Kiwi had become an undertaker people would have stopped dying.

Webber at least has got that one GP victory under his belt, and deservedly so, but after the past five races his luck again looks about as good as Amon's was.

Now the Aussie's crash in practice at Suzuka on Saturday may have been his fault rather than that of his RB5 car.

Webber says the RB5 "bottomed out pretty hard" coming into the Degner curve and "that sent me wide and into the barrier". The car could not be repaired in time for qualifying, so Webber had to start from the pitlane.

It was always going to be uphill from there, but to have to pit twice in the early laps because of a loose headrest cannot have been driver error.

Later it was a puncture that brought him in again. Now punctures can be bad luck or a driver not avoiding whatever causes that puncture. Again he's entitled to the benefit of the doubt.

Webber may have contributed in some small part to his miserable results of the past five races, but mechanical issues and that notorious ill-luck have been much bigger factors.

He did set the fastest lap of the Japanese GP late in the race, but none of this is to pretend that Webber is any (regular) world-beater. He's a very adequate F1 driver -- and has been for a long time now.

Webber's young German teammate, Sebastian Vettel, on the other hand, is a world-beater. At just 22 years of age, Vettel has now won four GPs after his success at Suzuka. This was another superb performance from him. Absolutely faultless.

Vettel is in the class of Hamilton, Fernando Alonso and Raikkonen. Webber, sad to say as an Australian, is not. And, as good a qualifier as Webber usually is, Vettel has comprehensively outgunned him on that score this season.

Robert Kubica may be in the big league too, and his last lap at Suzuka was a reminder of that after what has been a miserable season for the Pole at BMW-Sauber. And, if Kubica perhaps is in that Hamilton, Alonso, Raikkonen, Vettel league, then Nick Heidfeld,either is too or is very close. And Nico Rosberg too.

So if F1 hit its lowest point a couple of weeks ago with revelation of how Flavio Briatore and Pat Symonds conspired to force Nelson Piquet Junior to crash in last year's Singapore GP, Vettel's imperious performance at Suzuka -- and, in the bigger picture, the array and depth of talent on the F1 grid now -- is a cause for celebration.

And a reason to look forward to the remaining two GPs this year -- in Brazil at the wonderful Interlagos circuit in two weeks, and the new season finale in Abu Dhabi another two weeks later -- and to the years to come.

Vettel's victory yesterday has brought him up to 16 points behind BrawnGP's Jenson Button, who collected only one point for eighth place in Japan -- while his veteran teammate Rubens Barrichello got two points from seventh and is 14 points behind the Englishman going to Brazil.

Raikkonen came in a whirlwind two years ago to snatch the world title ahead of Hamilton.

Vettel and Red Bull will have to continue their Suzuka form -- and Brawn, Button and Barrichello fall in a huge hole -- for the German wonderboy to take the title. As brilliant as Vettel is, he has made several mistakes this season and may yet to come to rue the 2009 season as the one in which he let a world championship get away, although one surely awaits him before too long.

Barring a Vettel miracle, or a lesser one for Barrichello, this is going to be Button's year. The shine has been taken off it in this author's eyes by Button and Brawn's form of late.

But if the title were to be decided purely by the number of race wins, as Bernie Ecclestone wants, or as it is by accumulated points, the Brit wins either way -- so he deserves it.

Perhaps a fairytale Barrichello success would be the best outcome this season, as this will his last shot at it if, as seems likely, he is headed to Williams next year.

Barrichello may yet race two full decades in F1, but he's not going to be winning races, let alone a world championship, with Williams. Nonetheless, he was on the grid before Giancarlo Fisichella arrived and will be there after the Italian is gone.

Fisi has been a big disappointment in his three outings with Ferrari since taking over from Luca Badoer as the injured Felipe Massa's substitute -- and after such a stirling swansong for Force India with that second place at Spa in Belgium.

The window to a Ferrari seat perhaps simply opened too late for Fisichella, and its KERS (Kinetic Energy Recovery System) may have been a complication for him. But on his form in the past two races we wonder what value Fisi is going to be to the Scuderia even as a test driver next year.

All of the above overlooks that Toyota has been second in its past two GPs.

Yesterday it was Jarno Trulli who finished closest to Vettel. In Singapore it was Timo Glock in second place, but he could not race at Suzuka after injuring a leg in a huge crash on Saturday.

The Japanese giant is knocking on the door of a breakthrough GP victory, although it must not be forgotten that Vettel and his RB5 promptly put four seconds on Trulli and his Toyota in that final four-lap sprint after the safety car had been out at Suzuka.

We're not convinced that Toyota will continue in F1.

Neither Trulli nor Glock has been retained for next season, and with most of the top talent fitted into the jigsaw puzzle for 2010 the signs are rather ominous to us.

With Honda gone and BMW going, it would be disappointing to see Toyota pull out, especially now that it is so close to winning. Yet it made its F1 debut the same day as Mark Webber -- in Melbourne in 2002.

Despite his horror run, Webber at least has got one win under his belt.

For Toyota to depart now would be a pity -- and a huge waste.

Formula One drivers' world championship standings after 15 of 17 rounds -- Jenson Button (Great Britain, Brawn-Mercedes) 85, Rubens Barrichello (Brazil, Brawn-Mercedes) 71, Sebastian Vettel (Germany, Red Bull Racing-Renault) 69, Mark Webber (Australia, Red Bull Racing-Renault) 51.5, Kimi Raikkonen (Finland, Ferrari) 45, Lewis Hamilton (Great Britain, McLaren-Mercedes) 43, Nico Rosberg (Germany, Williams-Toyota) 34.5, Jarno Trulli (Italy, Toyota) 30.5, Fernando Alonso (Spain, Renault) 26, Timo Glock (Germany, Toyota) 24, Felipe Massa (Brazil, Ferrari) 22, Heikki Kovalainen (Finland, McLaren-Mercedes) 22, Nick Heidfeld (Germany, BMW-Sauber) 15, Robert Kubica (Poland, BMW-Sauber) 9, Giancarlo Fisichella (Italy, Force India-Mercedes) 8, Adrian Sutil (Germany, Force India-Mercedes) 5, Sebastien Buemi (Switzerland, Toro Rosso-Ferrari) 3, Sebastien Bourdais (France, Toro Rosso-Ferrari) 2.

F1 constructors' world championship standings --  Brawn-Mercedes 156 points, Red Bull- Renault 120.5, Ferrari 67, McLaren-Mercedes 65, Toyota 54.5, Williams-Toyota 34.5, Renault 26, BMW-Sauber 24, Force India-Mercedes 13, Toro Rosso-Ferrari 5.

And that's four years straight, after three successive Australian Rally Championship successes -- so a title every season for seven straight years for the Subaru star.

Crocker and co-driver Ben Atkinson, competing for Singapore's MotorImage team, dominated the sixth round of this year's Asia-Pacific series in sweltering conditions in Indonesia at the weekend.

Crocker now has one more Asia-Pacific title than his late Subaru mentor, the great New Zealander Possum Bourne, and Swden's Kenneth Eriksson.

Asia-Pacific Rally Championship standings after five of six rounds -- Cody Crocker (Australia, Subaru Impreza WRX STI) 63 points, Katsu Taguchi (Japan, Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IX) 36, Emma Gilour (New Zealand, Subaru Impreza WRX STI) 34. The final round is in China on November 14-15.

Loeb turns the blowtorch on Hirvonen in WRC
The World Rally Championship will go down to the wire, with France's champion of the past five years, Sebastien Loeb, just one point behind Finland's Mikko Hirvonen after the weekend's Rally of Spain.

Loeb won on the asphalt at Catalunya on Spain's east coast for the sixth time, and the fifth straight year, after having the new Rally Australia in northern NSW stripped from him hours after the finish last month for a suspension infringement.

Taking his sixth win of the season, Loeb finished 12 seconds ahead of Citroen teammate Dani Sordo, and a massive 54 seconds ahead of Ford rival Hirvonen.

The Citroen one-two gave the French car maker the manufacturers' world title.

The final round which will decide the drivers' title is the Rally of Britain in Wales on October 23-25. A win there will clinch the title for either Hirvonen or Loeb.

World Rally Championship driver standings after 11 of 12 rounds -- Mikko Hirvoenen (Finland, Ford Focus) 84 points, Sebastien Loeb (France, Citroen C4) 83, Daniel Sordo (Spain, Citroen C4) 58, Jari-Matti Latvala (Finland, Ford Focus) 39.

WRC manufacturer standings -- Citroen 151 points, Ford 130, Stobart-Ford 73, Citroen Junior 42, Munchi's Ford 23.

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