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Kate's Dirty Sister, Mansell's tears and women in F1

This week Steven Lynch takes a look back at some of his favourite questions (and answers) of 2010

Sebastian Vettel has a unique relationship with his car © Getty Images

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Last year Sebastian Vettel named his cars "Kate" and "Kate's Dirty Sister". Has he named his car for this year? asked Leif Erikson from Australia

Sebastian Vettel did indeed do very well last year, especially after crashing "Kate" at Melbourne and replacing her with "Kate's Dirty Sister", in which he won four races. This year he has a new car, the Red Bull Renault RB6, and the name he has chosen this time is "Luscious Liz". He said at the start of the season: "There's no real explanation behind it, we all sort of like the name. I hope she won't need a sister - I hope to tell you after a couple of races." And, after a couple of near-misses in Bahrain and Australia, Luscious Liz did Vettel proud in Malaysia ... and later on too!

Sebastian Vettel never led the drivers' championship until the end of this year's final race. Has any other world champion managed this? asked Brian Dalton from Essex

Rather to my surprise I discovered that two other drivers - both Britons - had also grabbed last-gasp glory. In 1964 John Surtees never led the championship until the closing laps of the final race: after Jim Clark made the running in the early part of the season Graham Hill did well, and by the time the final GP of the season started in Mexico Hill had 39 points, Surtees 34 and Clark 30. Hill soon ran into mechanical problems, and Clark seemed set for the title when he built up a commanding lead (he had won more races than Hill or Surtees). But shortly before the end Clark had engine trouble, and he dropped out with a lap to go (he was eventually classified fifth). This put Surtees up to third, which would still have left him a point behind Hill - but as luck would have it the man in second place was his Ferrari team-mate Lorenzo Bandini, who slowed down and let Surtees past to become the first - and still only - driver to win world titles on four wheels as well as two. Something similar happened in 1976, when James Hunt never led the drivers' championship until the final race, when third place in the rain in Japan put him one point ahead of Niki Lauda. That was the year when Lauda had built up a commanding lead in the championship before his horrific crash at the Nurburgring. Just like Vettel this year, neither Surtees nor Hunt had ever headed the table before, either in their championship year or previously.

Marquis de Portago and Peter Collins before the start of the Mille Miglia Road Race in which the tyre on the Marquis's Ferrari burst causing a fatal accident © Getty Images

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This multi-talented individual was Alfonso de Portago, a Spanish marquis, who co-drove a Ferrari to second place in the British Grand Prix at Silverstone in 1956. He drove the first 70 laps before handing over to Peter Collins, who completed 30 more: they finished a lap down on the winner, Juan Manuel Fangio. On horseback de Portago twice attempted the fearsome fences of the Aintree Grand National, as well as taking part n the Cheltenham Gold Cup. Just to complete the set he also represented Spain in the bobsleigh at the Winter Olympics, finishing fourth in the two-man event in 1956. His sporting achievements were almost as impressive as his full name - Alfonso Antonio Vicente Eduardo Angel Blas Francisco de Borja Cabeza de Vaca y Leighton - and a love life which would keep several gossip magazines going these days. Perhaps inevitably, "Fon" de Portago was killed at the wheel of a car: aged only 28, he crashed towards the end of the Mille Miglia sports-car race over public roads in Italy in May 1957. His co-driver and 12 spectators also died, leading to the end of the Mille Miglia as a serious race.

My father told me about a driver whose entire Formula One career lasted a couple of hundred yards. Who was this unlucky driver? asked Peter Norris

The man with the shortest Formula One career of all is Marco Apicella, whose only Grand Prix came in his native Italy in 1993. Driving a Jordan after the mid-season retirement of Thierry Boutsen, Apicella qualified towards the back of the grid at Monza. At the first corner he was a blameless participant in an incident involving JJ Lehto which also put Apicella's Jordan team-mate Rubens Barrichello out of the race. Apicella's suspension was damaged, and he could not continue: his race - and, as it turned out, his F1 career - had lasted a few seconds and about 800 metres.

Fernando Alonso won the controversial 2008 Singapore GP after starting 15th on the grid. Is this a record? asked Darrell Faber

Fernando Alonso did indeed win that race - during which his team-mate Nelson Piquet junior was apparently ordered to crash deliberately - after starting 15th on the grid. Rather surprisingly, perhaps, six other GPs (and the Indianapolis 500 in 1954, when it counted towards the F1 world championship) have been won from even further back. The record is held by Britain's John Watson, who started the 1983 United States Grand Prix West at Long Beach after starting in 22nd place out of 26 on the grid. The McLarens had problems coping with a bumpy track during qualifying - Watson's team-mate Niki Lauda started 23rd and finished second - but it all came right in the race. Watson made a bit of a habit of this sort of thing: the previous year he had won the Detroit GP after starting 17th on the grid.

Nigel Mansell after stalling his Williams on the final lap of the Canadian Grand Prix © Sutton Images

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I think the only driver to suffer this particular misfortune is Britain's own Nigel Mansell, in the Canadian Grand Prix of 1991. Mansell beat the pole-sitter, his Williams team-mate Riccardo Patrese, off the line in Montreal, and settled in to what appeared to be a commanding lead. On the last lap, having led the whole way, Mansell was enjoying the applause and adulation from the crowd ... a little too much. Going round the hairpin near the finish he was waving to the spectators, allowed his revs to drop too low, and the engine stalled (some versions of this story have Mansell accidentally flicking off the ignition switch while waving, and others blame the car's electronics and not the driver: probably only Nigel and the Williams team know the truth!). A surprised and delighted Nelson Piquet swept past to win the race for Benetton. Meanwhile the rather embarrassed Mansell never did get his car started again, and was classified sixth.

Who once won a Grand Prix despite being fourth at the start of the last lap? asked Robert Lavender from Mitcham

This lucky person was Jim Clark, who won the Belgian GP at Spa in 1964 despite lying fourth when the last lap started. Dan Gurney was leading with one eight-mile circuit to go, but ran out of fuel; Graham Hill inherited the lead, but his fuel pump broke. That left Bruce McLaren in front, but then he ran out of fuel almost in sight of the line, and Clark swept by to win in his Lotus. But Clark hadn't seen the other cars drop out - and although he was shown the chequered flag at the end the confused organisers had already waved it at several other cars too. But the drama still wasn't over: Clark himself ran out of fuel halfway round his slowing-down lap. He stopped near Gurney, and went to commiserate with him ... at which point they heard a loudspeaker announcement saying that Clark was the winner.

Which passing manoeuvre do you consider to be your favourite one in the last ten years, and why? asked Khairil Abdullah from Malaysia

From the last ten years the one I remember best is Juan Pablo Montoya's move on Michael Schumacher at the end of the finishing straight at Interlagos in Brazil in 2001. It was only Montoya's third F1 race, yet he got inside Schumacher (the reigning champion, after winning the third of his seven titles in 2000) and held his line, forcing his way through. Extending it beyond your ten-year qualification, I think my favourite passing move was pulled off by Nigel Mansell in the Hungarian GP of 1989. Mansell, in a Ferrari, was close behind Ayrton Senna's McLaren when they came up to lap Stefan Johansson in an Onyx. As Senna moved out to pass Johansson Mansell swept inside him and overtook both of them to take the lead: Mansell ended up winning, despite having started from 12th on a circuit where it is notoriously difficult to pass anyone.

Why are there no female drivers in F1? Are they not allowed? asked Martin from London
They certainly are allowed, and indeed one has actually scored a world championship point - or half a one, as the race concerned (the 1975 Spanish GP) was shortened by an accident. Lella Lombardi drove a March 751 to sixth place in that race at Montjuich Park in Barcelona. The first female GP driver was another Italian, Maria Teresa de Fillipis, who took part in five races in 1958 and 1959 without managing a point. Since then Desiré Wilson, Davina Galica and Giovanni Amati have been fleetingly involved in F1. But it seems only a matter of time before a female driver makes the grade: Danica Patrick, for example, has raced with some success in America, becoming the first woman to win an Indycar race (in Japan in 2008). She also led the 2005 Indianapolis 500, before finally finishing fourth.

The coming season looks like being one of the most even for some time [You were right!]. What is the record for the most successive Grands Prix with different winners? asked Charles Bromige from Bath

There was a remarkable sequence in 1982 of nine successive races which were won by different drivers. It all started when Riccardo Patrese won the Monaco GP in a Brabham, then John Watson (who had won the race before Patrese) won the Detroit GP in a McLaren despite starting from 17th on the grid. Then Nelson Piquet (Brabham) won in Canada, Didier Pironi (Ferrari) in Holland, Niki Lauda (McLaren) in Britain, Rene Arnoux (Renault) in France, Patrick Tambay (Ferrari) in Germany, Elio de Angelis (Lotus) in Austria, and Keke Rosberg (Williams) in Switzerland. Arnoux then won the Italian GP to end the sequence. Rosberg's victory - his only one of the season - helped him secure the drivers' championship, although Pironi had been leading the table until he broke both legs in a bad accident in Germany. Rosberg and Mike Hawthorn (1958) are the only drivers to take the world title after a season in which they won only one race.

I know that Britain's Mike Hawthorn became world champion in 1958 even though he only won one race. But who has won the most races in a season without becoming champion? asked Albert McKenzie from Clacton

Mike Hawthorn did indeed win the world championship in 1958 despite only winning one race (Stirling Moss, who finished second a point behind, actually won four). Keke Rosberg in 1982 also managed this peculiar feat (the next five drivers in the standings all won two races each, and overall there were a record number of 11 different race winners that year). The most wins in a season without winning the championship is seven, which has rather surprisingly been achieved on no fewer than four occasions: by Alain Prost twice, in 1984 and 1988, by Kimi Raikkonen in 2005, and by Michael Schumacher in what we all thought was his final season, 2006.

Who is your own favourite F1 driver, and why? asked Simon Collins

Well, as I was growing up Graham Hill was a very dashing figure, what with his raffish moustache and amusing way with words. At some point I got hold of Hill's first autobiography (Life at the Limit) and thought it was a cracking read. F1 seems to have been a lot more fun back in the 1950s and '60s ... but also far more dangerous. A driver from a slightly later era I always admired was Mario Andretti, the world champion of 1978, as he seemed to be able to drive anything: on his F1 debut, in the 1968 United States GP, Andretti stuck his borrowed Lotus on pole position. After that watching Nigel Mansell was a thrill, if a painful one at times (see the question above!), and some of his races with Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost were absolute classics. These days I like watching Fernando Alonso carve his way through the field, and enjoyed this year's healthy rivalry between Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton, and Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel.

If you want to ask Steven a question, use our feedback form. The most interesting questions will be answered here every other Friday. His long-running Ask Steven column on Cricinfo remains one of that site's most popular features

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