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The Roar

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Suzuka the sternest test for Rosberg and Hamilon

Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes. (photo: CHRISTOF STACHE/AFP/Getty Images)
Expert
2nd October, 2014
2

A walk through the gates at Suzuka has an immediate emotional effect.

The famous Ferris wheel looming large over the circuit and the gentle but productive hum of team cargo being offloaded into the paddock push all else from one’s mind, including the events of two weekends’ past.

Marina Bay’s game-changing race is a distant memory for Formula One, and the championship finds itself in a state of full reset with just five rounds before the end of the season.

There is no better place for this epic final showdown to begin than Japan.

Between the Suzuka Circuit and the previous Fuji Circuit, Japan has played host to the climax of many a title duel, and spectators here have witnessed some of the sport’s most spectacular and iconic Grands Prix.

In 1976 Japan hosted the titanic conclusion to the battle between James Hunt and Niki Lauda, and returned the Briton’s first and only world title in classic Japanese storm conditions.

A modern classic was provided in 2005, after rain on Saturday produced a jumbled grid. Kimi Räikkönen had his work cut out from him from P17 and dutifully scythed through the field to pass Giancarlo Fisichella for the lead on the final lap.

Meanwhile, the newly crowned champion Fernando Alonso executed one of the decade’s boldest overtaking manoeuvres when he passed Michael Schumacher around the outside 130R.

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However Suzuka will always be remembered as the arena for no fewer than three flashpoints in the long-running feud between Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost.

The first was in 1988, when Senna, who had qualified on pole, stalled on the grid and fell to 14th. A characteristically aggressive drive set up a battle with Prost on lap 28, with Senna snatching the lead – and the title – from his teammate.

The duo’s Japanese battle descended into infamy the following season when the two collided at the chicane late in the race, allegedly because Prost deliberately turned early. Senna, with a damaged front wing, rejoined the race and went on to take a memorable victory to keep the title fight alive – but the celebrations were cut short when the governing body controversially disqualified the Brazilian for disobeying track limits and handed Prost the championship in the process.

The conclusion of the pair’s epic Japanese showdowns came just one year later. Senna, after putting his car on pole, was furious that his place on the grid was moved to the dirty side of the track. Prost, starting alongside him for Ferrari, predictably got the better start, only for the two to collide in the first corner and abruptly end the title battle in favour of Senna.

It is fitting, then, that a nation with such a rich history of Formula One rivalry should open proceedings for 2014’s race to the finish.

Just three points divide Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg, and both men have signalled they are adopting a ‘full attack’ strategy – much to the unease of the Mercedes team, once must assume.

Singapore was more than a turning of the points table for Lewis Hamilton, it was confirmation that he finally has a psychological edge in this fight.

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Within an hour of getting out of the car last race, the 2008 World Champion was already talking about Japan. Hamilton has never finished higher than third at Suzuka, and he desperately wants his page in the sport’s history to show he mastered one of the world’s greatest circuits.

Rosberg, on the other hand, appears to be mentally at sea. The Singapore Grand Prix, a race he himself described as the most difficult weekend of his career, compounded his public dressing down after the Belgian Grand Prix and limp-wristed defence of his lead in Italy.

After holding total control over the title for so much of this season, the German has had the rug pulled from beneath him; the calm in his eyes has been extinguished by the knowledge that the next two months of his life will be a dogfight with the man sharing his garage.

With one eye on his teammate and the other on the title, the next five weekends will prove both mentally and physically exhausting for Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg, and there is no sterner test to begin with than the sweeping bends of the Suzuka Circuit.

Bring it on.

Michael Lamonato will be tweeting from Suzuka this weekend with the deeply uncreative handle @MichaelLamonato

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