With five laps remaining in the Spanish Grand Prix Ferrari fans finally got to see the duel they’ve been waiting for. Kimi Raikkonen held position in front of his teammate Fernando Alonso, who was racing in front of his home country. Alonso tried sticking his nose under Raikkonen a couple times before finally being able to make the move with three laps remaining. Alonso then put Raikkonen far back in the rearview mirror on the way to the finish.
Unfortunately for Ferrari fans the duel they’ve been waiting for was a fight over sixth place at a circuit where Ferrari put both cars on the podium, including a win for Alonso, a year ago. Mercedes were once again dominant at the front of the field. So dominant in fact that after Raikkonen was put aside by his teammate Mercedes drivers Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg lapped the seventh placed Finn while they fought for the win. Hamilton held on for his fourth win in a row over his teammate Rosberg, who was really bringing the fight in the final laps closing a four second deficit down to just over half a second at the finish. Daniel Ricciardo rounded out the podium finishing third and Sebastian Vettel had an amazing drive to fourth after a grid penalty put him 15th on the start of the race.
While the results for Ferrari weren’t exactly what they wanted, both cars were more equal to each other for the first time this year. Raikkonen had been outperformed by Alonso quite handily throughout the year before the race at Catalunya. He was able to outqualify Alonso and even though Raikkonen spent the majority of the race driving his F14-T sideways off the corners he was at least closer in performance to Alonso.
Ferrari President Luca Di Montezemolo is still not happy with the team results thus far though. After some team meetings over the last week Di Montezemolo is expectant to see better results for both cars heading into next month’s Canadian Grand Prix. They seem to be trending upwards despite neither car being able to podium in Spain. Marco Mattiacci has spent just his second Grand Prix weekend as Team Principal and finally Raikkonen is showing signs of life and being able to run on pace with Alonso. A podium in China and both cars being equal to each other in Spain will hopefully mean more improvements moving forward to Monaco and Montreal over the next month.
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