This season seems to be brewing up just right, with no clear monopoly by any of the drivers, the championship seems open. Most predict it to be a four way battle between Fernando Alonso, Felipe Massa, Kimi Raikkonen and rookie Lewis Hamilton. But it would be unreasonable to expect Lewis Hamilton to pose a great challenge in his rookie year.

Even though Ferrari seemed to outclass the McLarens on Sunday’s Australian Grand Prix, their reliability issues were also magnified with Felipe Massa’s catastrophe of a race. And even in previous F1 seasons, its been observed the teams which start well ahead are not necessarily going to be ahead for the whole season. It isn’t very difficult to play catch up especially for the top teams, just gotta figure out what went wrong.

Another advantage for Ferrari according to McLaren and Renault are the Bridgestone tyres. They claim that Ferrari is more used to the Bridgestone tyres and hence understand them better and hence their machines are made to perform better on those very Bridgestone tyres. True to a small extent, but F1 is all about adaptation for the best. If you have got to deal with a new thing, its much better to embrace it ASAP , than cry about the other one knowing it better , such a waste of energy.

As far as the drivers go , everyone has got his own reason to win. Felipe Massa after being in Michael Schumacher’s shadow for so long, will certainly want to stamp his authority in the Ferrari team as the veteran driver. Kimi who is new in the Ferrari team will want to do the same for him. Ferrari is known for having favourites and second strings. Both Kimi and Felipe would love to be the favourites and hence get better team support. Fernando Alonso would like to make a hat-trick of F1 titles. And one is of the opinion that the team change could not have come at a better time for him, Renault seem to have lost their sheen and McLaren seem to have regained theirs. Lewis Hamilton, the rookie, how much he would like to be the ‘Rookie of the year’ , the first rookie to win a F1 title would be a great achievement and he certainly has the machine to achieve that, but does he have the nerves ?

All this and a lot more in store in the 2007 formula one season !!!

Malaysian Grand Prix is on 8th April 2007