Formula 1 - 2012 - What A Year (BBC1) - MKV - [[OptimusPr1me]]

The 2012 Formula 1 season was one of the most exciting and eventful in history, a championship in which ultimately excellence on both the athletic and technical front triumphed over an unpredictability that had appeared as if it might over-ride both.
The longest campaign in motorsport history fell into a series of neat chapters. For a long time, a driver in an inferior car performing at a level of consistency rarely achieved looked poised to pull off one of the most remarkable championships in history. In the end, though, one of the greatest brains sport has ever seen got on top of the challenges presented by a pre-season change of rules and another driver - also an extraordinary talent - wrote his own place in the record books.

Seven different winners in the first seven races made 2012 very different from the domination with which Sebastian Vettel and Red Bull controlled the previous season, with 11 wins and 15 pole positions in 19 races.

The German, who did eventually end the year as champion, spent most of 2011 saying he had never taken his success for granted. But in an exclusive interview for BBC F1's season review programme he admits that the lack of success did come as a bit of a shock. "In 2011, winning so many races, it was never expected when we arrived at the track that we would come to the circuit and win," he said.
"But we were always in a very strong position, and in a way I probably now have to admit you get, not used to it, but somehow in the back of your head you have the expectation of being able to fight for the win. And at the beginning of this year we were simply not in a position to fight for the victory." In fact, it took until the fourth race of the year in Bahrain for Vettel to win for the first time and he was not to do so again until Singapore at the end of September.

The German's closest challenger at the controversial desert race, held against a backdrop of political turmoil, was the Lotus of Kimi Raikkonen, who had returned to F1 after two years in rallying. Raikkonen's ultimate pace was not quite there in the first half of the season, the Finn more often than not being beaten in qualifying by team-mate Romain Grosjean, but he showed admirable consistency in the races.
In the end, Raikkonen did not win in Bahrain - coming from 11th on the grid had taken too much out of his tyres and in the one chance he got to pass Vettel he hesitated and chose the wrong side.

He has yet to prove that he can consistently get the best out an inferior car, as Alonso and Hamilton can, but in a competitive one he is formidable. "For me in time he will become one of the greats of the sport," Jordan says.Hamilton's woes with McLaren made his decision to join Mercedes for 2013 all the easier, and that move directly forced Michael Schumacher into retirement. The great German's comeback did not go as he planned, although his final season was undoubtedly the best of the three. Schumacher's departure means 2012 will be unique for now in having had six world champions racing on the track.