Davide Valsecchi and Luiz Razia go head-to-head in Singapore Showdown

Home » F1 Blog » September 20 2012 at 14:24 | posted by Paul Crossling | Comment with facebook

Photo: Down to the wire: Valsecchi vs Razia for GP2 2012 crown (awesome videos!)

A weekend in which anything could happen...

This weekend in Singapore, as Fernando Alonso, Lewis Hamilton, Sebastian Vettel and co. continue their fight over the Formula One crown, the slightly smaller prize of the GP2 Championship will be awarded in a Singapore Showdown.

The two rivals are Davide Valsecchi driving for DAMS (the team that Romain Grosjean won the 2011 title with) and Luiz Razia (driving for Arden, owned by Christian Horner and GP2 team of Heikki Kovalainen and Sebastien Buemi).

After a tight season that started at the Malaysia Grand Prix, and has supported the Formula One series in every event apart from Canada, it is Valsecchi that goes into the finale with a sizeable twenty five point lead.

The feature race in GP2 carries the same scoring system as the Formula One system, plus four bonus points for pole position and two for fastest lap, in the sprint race the top eight are reversed and the system used is 15-12-10-8-6-4-2-1 for the top eight, plus two points for fastest lap.
So far the breakdown of the points:

Malaysia Feature Race
Valsecchi: Second with pole and fastest lap (24) - Razia: Winner (25)
Malaysia Sprint Race
Valsecchi: Did Not Finish (0) - Razia: fifth (6)
After Malaysia Razia leads 31-24

Bahrain 1 Feature Race
Valsecchi: Winner with pole and fastest lap (31) - Razia: second (18)
Bahrain 1 Sprint Race
Valsecchi: Winner (15) - Razia: second (12)
Bahrain 2 Feature Race
Valsecchi: Winner with fastest lap (27) - Razia: fourth (12)
Bahrain 2 Sprint Race
Valsecchi: third (10) - Razia: second with fastest lap (14)
After Bahrain Valsecchi leads 107-83

Spain Feature Race
Valsecchi: fourth (12) - Razia: eighth (4)
Spain Sprint Race
Valsecchi: third (10) - Razia: winner with fastest lap (17)
After Spain Valsecchi leads 129-104

Monaco Feature Race
Valsecchi: fourth (12) - Razia: fifteenth (0)
Monaco Sprint Race
Valsecchi: Did Not Finish (0) - Razia: sixth with fastest lap (6)
After Monaco Valsecchi leads 141-110

European Feature Race
Valsecchi: eighteenth (0) - Razia: third (15)
European Sprint Race
Valsecchi: tenth (0) - Razia: winner (15)
After Europe Valsecchi leads 141-140

Britain Feature Race
Valsecchi: seventh (6) - Razia: fifth (10)
Britain Sprint Race
Valsecchi: second (12) - Razia: winner (15)
After Britain Razia leads 165-159

Germany Feature Race
Valsecchi: thirteenth (0) - Razia: seventh (6)
Germany Sprint Race
Valsecchi: seventh (2) - Razia: tenth (0)
After Germany Razia leads 171-161

Hungary Feature Race
Valsecchi: second with fastest lap (20) - Razia: third (15)
Hungary Sprint Race
Valsecchi: fourth (8) - Razia: third (10)
After Hungary Razia leads196-189

Belgium Feature Race
Valsecchi: third (15) - Razia: sixth (8)
Belgium Sprint Race
Valsecchi: Did not finish (0) - Razia: twentieth (0)
After Belgium scores tied 204-204

At this point it came down to a four race shootout for the title but in the home of Valsecchi it was all to go wrong for Razia.
In qualifying Valsecchi was fifth, while Razia struggled to twelfth. In the feature race Razia was attempting to move through the field to close the gap on his rival, but his car was stuck by Fabio Leimer at the second chicane.

He attempted to re-join the race but was beached on the Kerbs at the Roggia and was out of the race for the first time this season.
Worse was to come as Valsecchi finished sixth to score eight points, and earning himself a third placed grid slot for the feature race, while Razia was forced to start twenty fifth as a result of his retirement.

Valsecchi took full advantage of the opportunity he has been handed, he won the sprint race to score a further fifteen points, while Razia scored nothing after a battling drive only took him to sixteenth.

After Italy Valsecchi leads by 229-204

While Valsecchi seaming has one hand on the title already, it is not beyond the realms of possibility that he could have a bad weekend with Razia takes the wins and steals the title.

With twenty five for a feature race win, all it would take in a retirement or non-score for Valsecchi with a win for Razia and the scores will again be level going into Sundays mornings sprint race.

Both drivers are deserving of the title, they have both held the championship lead five times from the eleven rounds, Razia has the most race wins by four to three, which could be vital if the scores are tied after all the racing is over, but all of Valsecchi’s wins have come in Asia in the early part of the season.

The fun part of GP2 is that it is impossible to predict. Both drivers have had outstanding seasons and the only guarantee for this weekend is that it is going to be close… but I think it will be Valsecchi.