Lotus Racing F1 Team Race Report: Brazilian GP

F1 goes back to South America. The Interlagos Curcuit plays host once again to the Brazilian GP from 5th to 7th November. This year's edition saw yet another wet qualifying Saturday when overnight rain drenched the track with water. The session began under light drizzling conditioning, where Lotus Racing F1 Team's drivers Jarno Trulli and Heikki Kovalainen qualified 19th and 21st respectively. But the shock of the day came from an unlikely driver in the form of Williams F1 Team's Nico Hulkenberg when the young German took pole position ahead of the five drivers in contention of taking the driver's championship title. Hulkenberg raced to the front of the pack with a time of 1:14.470, more than a second ahead of Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber, both of Red Bull Racing. McLaren Mercedes's Lewis Hamilton started 4th while his team-mate Jenson Button ended qualifying on a lowly 11th, citing the car's brake balance as the main problem for his disappointing performance. Scuderia Ferrari's Fernando Alonso began the race next to Hamilton in 5th. Race day on Sunday witnessed Red Bull Racing taking the constructor's title with yet another Vettel-Webber one-two finish while Button, current champion and one of the five title contenders, conceded his chances of defending his title after finishing 5th and saw the other four drivers extending their points in the title race. Current championship leader Alonso has 246 points to Button's 199 with once race remaining and 25 points up for grabs, effectively ending any of his hopes and chances of taking the title back-to-back with two different teams. The race was a pretty straightforward affair with Force India's Vitantonio Liuzzi the only racing casualty of the day after getting into an accident on lap 49. The race saw Hulkenberg, who finished 8th, getting overtaken by the others on start-up at the first corner. Alonso, on the other hand, raced a brilliant race to keep his hopes for a 3rd title alive with a 3rd place finish. Hamilton, who ended up 4th and has a total of 222 points remains mathematically still in contention but logically he is already out of the running unless the remaining drivers all did not finish the next final race at Abu Dhabi in a week's time. 2nd in the driver's championship is Webber with 238 points and team-mate Vettel a place behind, 7 points down. Webber could still take the title if the Red Bulls finishes the Abu Dhabi GP with another one-two, only this time with him ahead of his team-mate. Lotus Racing meanwhile finished 18th and 19th, with Kovalainen ahead of Trulli as the team edges closer to 10th place in the constructor's standings.