Valencia and The 'Value' of Vettel

In the wake of Canada, Valencia was always likely to wilt somewhat in terms of excitement. That being said, at least there was overtaking at all, before the critics bite too hard, it's worth taking into account how difficult it clearly is to pass in Valencia, even with the double DRS zone. With that out the way, on to the criticism!

First target; Pirelli. I'm unsure whether they truly warrant this, but I'm an unheard of and completely unread blogger and they're a multi-million pound company, so.... yeah, I'm well aware my thoughts will have no influence whatsoever. My concern stems from something I think I heard during the practice sessions from the commentary team, they were saying that Pirelli were making steps to increase the endurance of the tyres because of concerns it was making them look bad as a tyre company. This is just speculation from what I gather but if there's any truth to it then shame on Pirelli, it's simply insulting to the viewership of F1 that Pirelli think that if we see degrading tyres in the race, we'll think they'll degrade the same on our cars. With cars as technologically advanced as F1 cars, designing a range of tyres with degredation rates evenly spaced must be incredibly difficult, especially since they can't test on current cars. You'd have to be an idiot to draw any conclusion other than Pirelli must be bloody good at making a tyre fit for a purpose, and assuredly, they're not making tyres for road cars that start degrading after 30 miles.

Second Target; Renault. Not much needs to be said here, once again strategy execution was poor, unquestionably outsmarted by Toro Rosso, Force India and Sauber and coming away with 1 more point than they frankly deserved today. Both Nick and Vitaly drove reasonable races today but the team are asking miracles from them if they expect placings higher than achieved today.

Lastly, I want to say something with regards to Vettel. I offer the possibility that his strength is a psychological one, he's still young enough to not question himself or second guess but when he matures and perhaps begins to question his ability, he may start to slip. That being said, he's likely to be a competitive driver for at least the next decade in F1, someone else needs to get a foothold though and perhaps start taking away some of those statistics he values so much since he's clearly taking confidence from the breadth of his dominance, not just the race wins. Of course, it's come up a few times now this seasons, comparing the Red Bull-Vettel partnership to the Ferrari-Schumacher one, always with negative connotations attached but this is misleading. On the face of it, it may appear as if the young German's dominance is making the sport boring, on the contrary, I think it has the effect of spacing the excitement, creating peaks and troughs rather than an even plateau across the season. After all, would Button's victory in Canada  have been as spectacular if missing from the list of his achievements there was overtaking the dominant championship leader on the last lap after putting him under uncharacteristic pressure? I don't think so. Every story needs a 'villain' and for now, this is what Vettel will be for everyone outside his circle of fans. Hell, I openly dislike Alonso, but I'd be lying if I wasn't quietly hoping for a last minute surge of pace to put him ahead of Vettel.