2011 was a good year for F1, the stats are excelent, more over taking thanks to a combination of aero changes, the Drag-Reduction-System (DRS), the Kinetic Energy Recovery System (KERS) and the tires that gave tremendous grip, for a while.

But it could have been more competitive. Perhaps we were just spoiled by maybe the best championship in the history of the sport in 2010. With Kimi Raikkonon returning for 2012 (admittedly with Lotus) there are 6 world champions on the grid, and that’s got to be good.

Lets be clear, Vettel won his second world championship in style. It became little predicable and was wrapped up with four races to go. But such was the speed of Vettel and the Red Bull that there was little real doubt after Valencia. The constructor’s championship (which is what the teams get paid by) was tied up one race later.

Vettels ability in the first couple of laps to pull out a significant lead over everyone was astounding. That first lap was critical and made it clear that baring a mistake, everyone else was running for second.

The 2010 Championship will be decided this weekend and on recent performances and assuming the cars are reliable, it seem likely that at the end of the day the top three will comprise Vettel, Webber and Alonso in some order. While I don’t think you can count out Hamilton, his McLaren has been a little off the pace of the three drivers ahead of him in the championship.

There are many, many permutations, but to keep it simple we’ll just have a look at a few. If Alonso is first or second he walks away champion, no matter who finishes around him. If Webber wins Alonso has to be third or worse for the Australian to be crowned. Vettel needs even more luck to go his way; if Vettel wins Alonso needs to be fifth or worse.

For Lewis Hamilton to regain the drivers’ title he needs a lot to go his way. First he needs to win, and then he needs the other three contenders to finish either out of, or well down the points. Nothing else will do. This seems unlikely at best, but he has the chance to play spoiler should he be able to mix it with the Red Bulls and Alonso it up front. Let’s not for get both Hamilton and Also have quick team mates who are capable of winning races. Neither Button or Massa have been on great form recently, but both could make life difficult for others on their day.

As much fun as the speculation is, the question I have is what if Vettel is leading going into the last lap and Webber is behind him and Alonso third or fourth? Would Vettel pull over for the Australian and give his teammate the championship. Of would he try to hold onto his position for another win this year?

Clearly the relationship between the two Red bull drivers is not great, and that’s to be expected at this point in the year after they have gone after each other so hard for 17 races now. I’m not sure any professional partnership between two competitive sportsmen would do well under this pressure.

So what’s the team been saying? Team principal Christian Horner “if we find ourselves in a position where one of the drivers can win the world championship, then the drivers will do whatever is necessary to ensure as a team we achieve the best result.” That seems clear, if they should find themselves in that position then Horner expects Vettel will allow Webber though and do what he can to hold off Alonso. I’m sure it would not be easy for Vettel, but the team employs him.

Later in the week Red bull owner Dietrich Mateschitz, the man who founded the energy drink company threw a turd into Christian Horners’ “everyone is doing their job” punchbowl. He was clear he wants the drivers in win, but no team orders. He’d rather they fight it out on the track.

Talking of team orders, at Hockenheim Alonso gained an extra seven points when Massa pulled over to let him through into the lead. Take those points away and Alonso leads Webber by only one point and Vettel by eight. That would have meant that Abu Dhabi this weekend would have been a winner takes all race for the three of them.

F1 doesn’t have a “play to the rules’ mentality, it’s about winning and nothing else. If Red Bull were not to enforce some kind of team orders for Vettel to help Webber, should the situation arise, it would reinforce the idea that Webber is done with the team after this race. Would the team rather wait until next year in the hope that for Vettel will be their first champion? That seems rather far-fetched, even in the cynical world of F1.

There have hints from Webber that there have been team orders to hold position rather than race each other in the recent races, rather than risk another accident like turkey where Webber was taken out by Vettel. I can’t imagine either driver holding back in Abu Dhabi with the title on the line.

Of course, part of what makes F1 so fascinating is the politics and intrigue that run through the paddock and despite all this speculation into tactics and what if’s, we have a race to run. Once again Red Bull probably arrive as favourites for the race. But Alonso has beaten the red bulls in three of the previous five races and is not far behind them in race speed. He’s not been as good in qualifying, he’s also the only one of the three that’s been in the position of winning the championship before.

With the pressure on all the title contenders so intense, will that be a deciding factor? Or, with all the contenders worried about engine mileage under F1′s eight-engines-a-year rule, will it be reliability that wins the day? It’s difficult to believe that after such a great year of racing that it will all go down without one final twist in the season. It could be reliability, it could be teammates, it could be a desperate lunge for position or even a mistake under the incredible pressure, but it will be fun to watch.

The race is on Speed TV in the US at 4:30am Sunday morning.

Let’s do a little speculating; how good a chance did Lewis Hamilton really have of winning in Korea?

While the drivers were circulating behind the pace car (lap 4-17) we got to listen to the radio conversation between Hamilton and his race engineer Andy Lathum on the broadcast. Of the drivers at the front Hamilton seemed to be the one most keen to get the racing going.

Unfortunately, when the safety car did pull off on lap-17 he was slow to react and got overtaken by Niko Rosberg at the restart.

As it happens, that may have been a little luck. Rosberg got taken out on the next lap by the spinning Webber, it would have been Hamilton that had been collected by the out of control Red Bull driver.

During the race Alonso lost second place to Hamilton because of a slow Ferrari pit stop. The team had problems when he changed from wet to intermediate tyres. This meant that he came out in third behind leader Vettel and Hamilton (who had pitted the previous lap).

The following lap Hamilton braked way too late into turn-1 and ran wide into the corner. This opened the door wide open and Alonso comfortably took second place back. It was a mistake by Hamilton rather than a daring, brilliantly executed pass.

This meant the Ferrari driver, not Hamilton, took the lead when the Renault engine in Sebastian Vettels Red Bull comprehensively let go on lap 44.

A quick summary of this years engine rules (as I understand them), a driver is allowed eight engines, no rebuilds. It’s up to the teams and engine builders as to how they swap the eight engines in and out of the cars to manage all qualifying, practice and racing. Renault said the engine in Vettels car was about 1600KM into its 2000KM design life when it let go.

Back to the question I asked. If he had not made the error into turn-1 could Hamilton have kept the lead, or was Alonso that much faster?

So it’s speculation time… Alonso was clearly faster than Hamilton at the end of the race. McLaren’s tyres were heavily worn, which caused the car to understeer (contributed to the mistake? Maybe), but Hamilton had pretty much matched Vettel and Alonso for time. The gaps had stayed fairly consistent between the cars before and after the round of tire changes.

I think he could have held Alonso off for the win, stay on line and it’s very, very difficult to get past.

If Hamilton had hung on and won, that would have given the McLaren driver a 14-point turnaround against Alonso and put him right into the center of the drivers’ championship battle. Today he is 21 points behind Alonso, had he kept his lead he’d be only 7 points behind.

Lets be clear Vettel looked very, very fast, but Alonso seems to be capable of a very similar pace and was probably the best driver on the day. Alonso stayed out of trouble, looked comfortable and never let a botched pit-stop get to him. He was given a couple of opportunities on the track and took then decisively.

Three wins in four races, and his sixth podium in the last seven races. He is clearly the on form driver, Ferrari has given him a competitive and reliable car and it’s up to him and the team to make it happen.

Clearly Hamilton’s mistake made life more difficult for himself, but there are lots of points left and after Vettels DNF a lot of teams will be even more worried about engines over the next couple of races. This is fun.

After a couple of disasters in Singapore and Japan when they needed good finishes the hopes of the drivers championship for the two McLaren drivers seems to getting a little more remote. Last weekend in Suzuka Hamilton had an off on Friday, got given a five-place penalty for changing his gearbox and finally had issues with the new box and was without 3^rd for a significant portion of the race.

Jenson button never had the pace of the RedBull drivers, went with a different tire option that the rest of the front runners, a gamble did not pay off.

So, not a good weekend for McLaren, the problem is that it comes in the back of another poor team performance in Singapore, where Alonso’s Ferrari led lights-to-flag. There Hamilton did not finish for the second race running and Buttons fourth place dropped him even further away from the championship lead.

1. Weber – 220
2. Alonso – 206
3. Vettel – 206
4. Hamilton – 192
5. Button – 189

There are three races left, Korea, Brazil and Abu Dhabi, with seven points between first and second it means Weber needs to beat Alonso and Vettel at least once more. With Alonso and Ferrari making such a strong move up the leader board over the last 4 or 5 races it sets up a very interesting finish.

It’s difficult to say the two McLaren drivers are out of the chase, but it’s a win and a bit more between Hamilton and Weber. For either of the McLaren drivers to win this the drivers above them need to start having reliability issues and collecting DNF’s.

Hamilton has failed to finish in 3 of the last 5 races, this run of bad form has occurred on the higher speed circuits that (Belgium, Monza and Japan) that earlier in the year seemed to suit the McLaren over the RedBull chassis.

Vettel feels he is in a “very good position” in the title race. Over the last few races Webbers main contender has changed from Hamilton, to Alonso and Vettel. Fourteen points is not much of a gap and this year’s championship looks like it’s going to the final race.

After the minor front wing argument in Silverstone where the RedBull management was clear the driver leading the championship would get some level of preferential treatment. Many feet that (and rumour supported) Vettel was the favoured driver inside the team and that’s not changed. However Webber has a fourteen point lead in the championship.

After his win at the British GP at Silverstone Webber said on his team radio: “Not bad for a number two driver.”

RedBull have already thrown away a 1-2 finish in Turkey when Vettel and Webber collided. Vettel was forced to retire and Webber finished third. The team can’t allow that to happen again, it will be interesting to see what Vettels reaction would be if the team asked him to put aside his own interests to support Webber in the fight for the championship.

The constructor’s championship is not wrapped up either. After Japan RedBull have a 45 point lead over McLaren. This is not much, allow the two RedBull drivers to race one another and it is a mistake away from allowing McLaren back into the championship.

Assuming the circuit passes inspection this week the circus is heading to the unknown in Korea, no one has even turned a wheel there yet, another interesting race in a couple of weeks.