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I thought I should dig up this thread I posted at the very beginning of the season, and see how many of the premature conclusions proved to be spot-on...

1. Sebastian Vettel will win the WDC. This is HIS year!

>>> What can I say? I am obviously a genius!!


2. Ferrari will win the WCC. Massa/Alonso is an awesome combo, but neither can beat Vettel, alas Webber won't score enough to give RedBull the double.


>>> Uhmmm. But close. Ferrari almost won one title And who would know that Massa has such a pathetic crap-out?


3. Button made a HUGE mistake coming to McLaren and having to face off with Hamilton. Hamilton will demolish Jenson all year, but not challenge for the title.

>>> Pretty much true! Hamilton is clearly the faster of the 2, and now that Jenson's #1 on the car is gone, so is a lot of the luster. It still was a better decision than staying at Brawn/Mercedes, though!



4. Schumacher's comeback will be a failure. He doesn't like the understeering car, and Rosberg will beat him this year - prompting the old master to retire after this season. Rosberg is the REAL DEAL! A legend in the making.

>>> What can I say? I am a genius!!



5. Force India will score points regularly this season and be the best of the rest, but Liuzzi will be dumped for diResta. He's clearly slower than Sutil.


>>> Hmyah, so they weren't the best of the rest... but who could foresee the renaissance of Renault? Other than Renault, they were, erm... almost basically the best of the rest. And like I said, Liuzzi sucks, so if it wasn't for him, they'd have beaten Williams. And he SHOULD have been replaced with di Resta... and I hope he WILL be for 2011!


6. Alguersuari STILL doesn't deserve the ride. All that testing mileage, and he's still slow.

>>> Still fails to impress me, although he seems to at least have matched or even surpassed Buemi, but that could be more a measure of just how miserable Buemi is doing these days. In with Ricciardo!!


7. The new teams will bring up the rear of the field for most of 2010 with no realistic chance of beating any of the established teams. None of them will score a point, unless there is some unimaginable carnage during a race. Even then, Virgin and Hispania look far from being able to finish races at this point. Trulli's and Kovalainen's careers are over. DiGrassi won't make an impact against Glock this year, and be replaced too.

>>> Spot on! At least Kovalainen seems to have done himself some favors this year.


8. Karun Chandhok is amazing, being less than 2 seconds behind Senna on even just 7 installation laps. This guy is going places!

>>> Not far from the truth, at least compared to Senna he did well. We may see more of him.


9. Webber will lose his RedBull seat for 2011, since he is clearly not keeping up with Vettel.

>>> OK, he did keep up. And I am happy he did. Remains to be seen what happens to the seat, if the switch and/or retirement rumors are to be believed.


10. Petrov is the next Alguersuari.

>>> Even though he's the "Rookie of the Year", that's pretty much spot on. Considering how much Kubica has scored in the same car, Petrov fails to impress me, despite his Alonso blockvaganza.


11. This is Barrichello's last season. He's got his hands full with Hülkenberg, and losing to him won't make him look good enough to add another year.

>>> Totally wrong, eh? I wouldn't have thought it would be Hülkenberg who gets the shaft at the end of the season...


12. Kobayashi was a flash in the pan, and he'll fade away, getting beaten by a senior citizen on comeback.


>>> Thankfully totally wrong, too! The kid is here to stay!


13. Kubica is going to have exactly the same kind of year he had last year at BMW.


>>> Wrong again. He's definitely had a pretty darn good year, all things considered.


So there you have it. Win some, lose some...