Suzuka, a place of disappointment for Ferrari

Going into the final race of the season, Mika Häkkinen led the championship with 90 points, while Michael Schumacher was hot on his heels with 86.
On Saturday, Schumacher secured pole position.
On the first formation lap, Jarno Trulli’s Prost stalled on the grid, forcing the start to be aborted.
On the second attempt, Schumi’s Ferrari stalled. The German was forced to switch off the car and restart from the back of the grid.
Schumacher staged one of the most spectacular comebacks of his career. On lap 28, two backmarkers, Esteban Tuero and Toranosuke Takagi, collided, scattering debris across the track. The Kaiser drove over the debris, sustaining a slow puncture that caused his rear-right tyre to blow out on lap 31, forcing him to retire.
Schumacher’s exit from the race made Mika Häkkinen world champion whilst the race was still underway.

Friday got off to a bad start for Irvine, who finished the first practice session 1.5 seconds behind Häkkinen. The situation worsened on Saturday during qualifying, when Irvine was involved in a spectacular crash. Whilst attempting to improve his time, he lost control of his Ferrari at the left-hand corner of the track. The car’s brakes locked up, it went off the track and crashed head-on into the tyre barriers, spinning several times and being completely destroyed. Incredibly, Irvine emerged unscathed and returned to the pits and took the spare car to try and improve his time, but without success. In the end, he qualified in fifth place.
Throughout the race, he found himself stuck behind Olivier Panis’s Prost, losing precious seconds that ruled out any chance of challenging the leaders Schumacher and Hakkinen, who went on to win the world championship with a two-point lead over the Irishman.

On arrival in Japan, the penultimate round of the season, the title battle was at its most intense. Michael Schumacher and Fernando Alonso arrived at Suzuka level on 116 points in the standings.
The build-up seemed to favour Ferrari: in qualifying, Felipe Massa secured pole position, with Schumacher alongside him on the front row. Alonso, however, was stuck in fifth place, behind the two Toyotas.
The race got off to the best possible start, with Schumacher easily overtaking his team-mate Felipe Massa, taking the lead and beginning to manage his advantage.
Suddenly, however, as he approached the straight, a thick cloud of blue smoke began to billow from the rear of his Ferrari. The engine, after 112 Grand Prix races without a single failure, had just failed spectacularly. The car slowed down dramatically, and Schumacher was forced to pull onto the grass, retiring from the race.
All Alonso needed was a single point, which he secured at the following Grand Prix in Brazil, to be crowned world champion.

Ahead of the Japanese Grand Prix, Fernando Alonso led the world championship standings with a 29-point lead over Sebastian Vettel. However, the weekend looked set to be an uphill struggle for Ferrari.
Saturday’s qualifying session confirmed the worst fears: Sebastian Vettel secured pole position, flanked by Webber. Alonso, however, was hampered by an unfortunate incident: whilst completing his decisive lap in Q3, Kimi Räikkönen went off the track at Turn 14, bringing out the yellow flags which forced Alonso to slow down. The Spaniard thus finished with the sixth fastest time.
At the start, Alonso set off from sixth position. At the first corner, he found himself in a very crowded situation. Whilst trying to manage the space, Kimi Räikkönen’s Lotus made contact with his front wing, puncturing the rear left tyre of his Ferrari. The F2012 spun off onto the run-off area, forcing Alonso to retire immediately.
The race was dominated by Sebastian Vettel, who secured a solo victory ahead of Felipe Massa and Kamui Kobayashi.

Vettel was coming off the back of a crash in Malaysia, where he had collided with Nico Rosberg at the start in the first corner, breaking his suspension and forcing his rival’s Mercedes to retire.
Despite everything, Vettel took comfort in one certainty: Suzuka was his favourite track. He said: “This is the time of year when you really feel the car beneath you and understand what it’s capable of”.
On Saturday, Vettel set the fourth-fastest time. However, the penalty he received at Sepang cost him three places on the starting grid.
At the start, Seb got off to a good start and, in the first two laps, overtook Daniel Ricciardo and Sergio Pérez, quickly closing in on Max Verstappen.
He matched Verstappen’s pace, but the Dutch Red Bull driver made an early pit stop. Ferrari chose to extend the second stint, but the decision proved to be a mistake.
Another difficulty was posed by the lapped cars.
He crossed the finish line in fourth place losing every hope for the championship.