The horse prances at Sepang

German precision and Italian passion.

Ferrari is back. Mercedes tripped over their strategy or rather the lack of it. The safety car also helped Ferrari. But that takes nothing away from what Ferrari achieved as a team. As they say luck is where preparation meets opportunity.

Amazing what changes over a span of two weeks. After the race at Melbourne the f1 fratenity was in a tizzy on how strong Mercedes was and how their domination would be bad for the sport. Even the drivers at Mercedes seemed apologetic about it. Fast forward to Sepang, we had a Ferrari split the Mercs in qualifying and go on to put together a brilliant race to finally take the chequered flag. And what a race. 16 laps left and 13 seconds behind, Hamilton had a chance if it had not been for the decision to put on the hard compound for the last stint. What was required was 1.42.7 which was a tough ask from the hard compound even with the talented hands of Hamilton guiding them. 

Ferrari's decision to stick to their two stop strategy and stay out during the safety car period proved to be spot on. Harks back to the inspired strategies at Ferrari during the Ross Brawn era. The 2.4 second pit stop gave Vettel a chance to come out just behind Rosberg and build a 23 second gap over Hamilton when the Mercedes driver pitted for the second time, which equates to the time needed to pit and come out without losing track position. Lewis being Lewis whittled the gap down to around 19 seconds to ensure that he gained track position when Vettel pitted for the second time. But even with a relatively slower 3 second pit stop, Vettel's race pace ensured he came out just ahead of Rosberg and around 9 seconds behind Hamilton who had one more pit stop remaining. However having used their softer compounds during qualifying, Mercedes put out Hamilton on the hard compound which just did not have the pace required to reel in the leading Ferrari.

Lost among all the action at the front was Raikkonen who rounded out the top four positions. Starting 11th after a spot of bad luck in qualifying, a puncture in the race pushing him dead last, he put together a superb drive to finish 4th and complete a very successful weekend for Ferrari. Misfortunes aside he may have made it two podium steps for Ferrari. 

It was a strong comeback for the sport as well with a very close fought race up and down the order. Be it the young chaps at Torro Rosso out classing their seniors at Red Bull, the close fights between Force India, Lotus and the Red Bull, the fights between the Williams drivers the race never had a dull moment. A word in for Max Verstappen - who came in for a lot of flak for being introduced into F1 at such a tender age. Over the last two races he has shown what a good pair of hands he has, indulging is some close wheel to wheel racing with Valtteri Bottas. F1 is tough politically and if he has the head to deal with all the mind games, I think we are looking at a future world champion in the making. The talent is definitely there.

McLarens did better but still have a long way to go before taking the fight to the leaders. The races in Europe will be the ones that separate the men from the boys and confirm whether Ferrari's form is enough to beat the Silver Arrows. Here's to what looks set to be an awesome season of racing.

10 Java Articles from JavaCodeGeeks

JavaCodeGeeks had an interesting collection of Java articles. Read them at - http://www.javacodegeeks.com/2015/03/10-java-articles-everyone-must-read.html. 

Driving the Hyundai Grand i10 AT

Released in India in 2013, the Grand i10 with it's mature styling that has enough interesting elements to add the required pizzaz to the design still sells in commendable numbers, regularly featuring in the monthly top 10 in terms of sales numbers in India.

At the time of it's launch, I was hunting about for an automatic for my wife. The Honda Brio was too expensive and the Suzuki A-Star too small to be used for anything more than the office commute. I had zeroed in on the Hyundai i10 AT when the Grand was launched. However the lack of an AT option at that time , meant that I dropped it from my list. However the build and the quality of interiors did impress me when I took a quick look inside.

Forward to 2015 and I was evaluating an AT option for one of my relative. Now the situation was reversed. The Grand has an AT option and the regular i10 does not. More than the space and overall capability of the car, I was interested in checking out the performance of the AT version.

The Grand i10 AT is available in the top end Asta spec only. This fully loaded version has keyless entry, electrically folding mirrors, turn indicators on the wing mirrors, automatic climate control among others.

Stepping into the vehicle brought for the test driver, I was immediately wowed by the quality of the interiors. Every touch point had a feeling of quality and the fit an finish was spot on. You could easily be mistaken for being in a car a segment or two above. Definitely miles ahead of the regular i10 which was a trendsetter in it's class when launched.

The Grand i10 uses the same 4 speed auto box that first saw duty in the venerable first generation Santros. Using the box in my i10, I can attest that it is is leagues behind the current crop of AT boxes. It does the job and that's about it. The extra horses in the 1.2 Kappa ensure that the blunt transmission is masked to a certain extend. But in the Grand i10, Hyundai has also added an additional gate which allows you to use the gear box in a trip-tronic mode...tipping forward to go up the box and down to go down.

Slotting the gear box into Drive and moving off, the car immediately felt composed and solid. The suspension has a new found maturity and composure, with a good balance between ride and handling. Of course being a Hyundai the suspension tilts towards the softer side but not in a way that creates an unsettled ride like in the i10, i20 and the Verna a generation before.

A little into the drive I checked out the tiptronic function. The i10 has an O/D switch on the gear lever, that ensures that the gear box stays a cog lower than what it normally would select. This helps in overtaking but the triptronic feature is much better in this regard. As you slow down the box automatically downshifts (if you don't) in this more, but holds the gear for upshifts. However for a quick overtake the engine turns raucous and  feels fizzy. Progress is quick though and get the job done for a reasonably quick overtake.It's a step forward but Hyundai seriously need to bring in a good 5 speed auto to replace this box.

Interior space is very good with rear legroom matching if not better than premium hatch a segment above. Boot space is adequate for the size of the car.

Fuel consumptions is a serious archilles heel for this box and in the i10 it gives you figures close to a BMW 5 series petrol in the high single digits and lower double digits (8 - 12 kmpl) especially if driven with anything more than a light foot. In a heavier Grand i10 I don't expect this to improve by much even with the recently improvements that Hyundai has made in engine efficiency and tuning of the 1.2 Kappa.

This is a car that you would go for if you were looking for a small hatch with excellent interior quality, space and features, a good design and decent performance trump over the requirement for a good mileage.