His main rival, teammate, Nico Rosberg, beat him to pole position once again by some margin, but a bad start let Lewis ahead. At half distance, Rosberg suffered an ERS, losing a substantial amount of power from his hybrid engine, which relegated him to 14th. Nico's declaration to stay out until the end of the race when his team suggested he retire the car was very bold, it implies that Rosberg is a man, a man who will never give up on his chances. He will be hoping that 2014 won't become his only challenge for the title.
This benefited the two Williams cars. Felipe Massa appeared to try and run to the end on his second set of tyres and a first win for him since 2008 beckoned, but he ran out of grip and a second stop left him in a comfortable 2nd, Felipe beaten to the victory by just a few seconds. Valtteri Bottas completed the podium despite a poor start, making it Williams' best finish of the year. I'm just praying that Sir Frank and co. will earn more results like that in 2015 and beyond, Williams are one of my favourite teams.
Best of the rest was surprisingly Daniel Ricciardo. Ricciardo, arguably the driver of 2014, started from the pitlane along with outgoing world champion teammate, Sebastian Vettel after Red Bull's RB10 chassis were found to have illegal flexing front wings. Ricciardo started behind Vettel but got ahead on the first lap and passed through slower traffic with ease. He stopped as late as lap 23 out of 55 from 4th, which was eventually where he finished, despite starting 20th and having a car that was down on power!
Vettel, in the last race of one of the greatest team-driver pairings in the sport's history, had a low-key exit. Not only did Ricciardo get ahead of him yet again, but he got stuck behind Kevin Magnussen for a very long time, while other drivers including his teammate found a way through no problem, even if Vettel had a weaker engine. On the same strategy as the rest, he came home 8th, at the same track where he won by over half a minute last year, and clinched his first title back in 2010.
In what might be his last race in a 15-year career, Jenson Button justified a seat at McLaren in 2015, with a solid drive, starting 6th and finishing 5th. He put Kevin Magnussen to shame once again, the Dane continuing his run of less-than-average races by finishing in a miserable 11th, although, like Button, he deserves a seat next year at Woking.
Force India corrected a failed aero concept going into Brazil and their improved form continued in Abu Dhabi. Both cars, despite a poor qualifying, ran long in both stints, and in both ran in the top 5 before pitting. They came home well in the points, ahead of Vettel.
Ten years ago in 2004, you'd have expected Ferrari to lock out the front and easily win the race with a 1-2 finish courtesy of Michael Schumacher and Rubens Barrichello here (the Yas Marina track only hosted its first race in 2009).
But in the present day, all they all could get was 9th and 10th in qualifying (before the Red Bulls were excluded) and the same positions in the race. This has been a truly dreadful year for Ferrari, with their lead driver Fernando Alonso leaving, presumably for McLaren, while their once title-winning driver Kimi Raikkonen continues to loiter around in the midfield. Just recently there has been the announcement that team principal Marco Mattiacci has left. Ferrari has continued its downfall from grace of the early 2000s with stories like these to tell. Remarkable.
Toro Rosso saw both cars start well, but Jean-Eric Vergne, in possibly his last GP in F1, finished out of the points while Daniil Kvyat, starting an impeccable 5th, made an early tyre stop and would probably have finished in the points but for a mechanical problem. Good luck to Kvyat next year as he goes to Red Bull.
Lotus and Sauber were off the pace as usual. Romain Grosjean couldn't do much with the nightmare that has been the twin-nosed, evil handling E22, while Pastor Maldonado's blew up in a sheet of flame. If only there were more turbo failures like that this year (grumble...)!
Sauber made history, but of the very wrong kind. Not once in their 20-plus year history, even in their worst seasons, have Sauber failed to score a single point, but this year, with points going all the way to 10th place in races, they have achieved a total of... 0 points. And to think that this team was contending for wins and podiums just two years ago. Adrian Sutil and Esteban Gutierrez are now staring at retirement for both and on the back of the season, justifiably so.
Caterham used the method of crowdfunding to get them into the Abu Dhabi event, and with teams stopping or slowing development on their cars for the final races, they weren't too far off the pace. Kamui Kobayashi, a great driver of recent years, retired in what will probably be his last F1 race, in a career that saw him score a podium at his home race in Japan 2012. Briton Will Stevens made up the numbers by entering what is probably going to be his only ever Grand Prix start. Stevens qualified last, but made no mistakes to speak of, diced with Alonso shortly after the Spaniard made his first stop and finished just 1 lap down, on the same lap as the Saubers, Grosjean and the cruelly defeated Rosberg.
And that closes a fantastic season, one with so many great moments on track, but off track, a year that shows that Formula 1 is taking a bad path, which is killing itself and its popularity. Either way, my main attention for 2015 will be the performance of the drivers and teams, the possible emergence of Forza Rossa and new rules such as standing starts at Safety Car restarts.
Whatever, we have less than 16 weeks til we find out! :)
written by Carlos Barton
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