F1 Racing Thread

[AtiFCOD]

It was a very cool race.
Alonso disappointed me a bit when he started a bit earlier than the others (newbie mistake), tho it was a big accomplishment to finnish at 4th place after getting his penalty.

 

[palku]

Still early to tell, who will win the coveted F1 champ. Only 11 points separates 1-4 and only 4 points more from 5-7. But then again its much interesting at this kind of pace where drivers are bunch so close with one another. points wise that is.

 

[Pothole]

Looking like a Red Bull 1-2 in Spain, they seem to have finally solved their reliability probs, at least in qualifying. MS likes his new machine too and out did his team mate for the 1st time this season.

 

[SPCotter]

Yeah, Red Bull alarmingly quick, Hamilton is on the clean side of the track so I imagine with the long run to turn 1 he could get ahead of both red bulls if he can get away smoothly, tuck in behind Webber and make good use of the F Duct. For the sake of both drivers I think they need Vettel to chop Hamilton at the start and make it as difficult as possible for him to jump the pair of them, other than that and any rain, it should be a walk in the park for them tomorrow! Expecting a boring race tomorrow if it's dry, Barcelona is always a bit of a yawn

 

[SPCotter]

^^^

How well orchestrated was that start from the Red Bulls? Reminiscent of Raikkonen and Massa at Brazil 07, race over lol

 

[Pothole]

A pretty boring race for sure, time these kind of tracks were put out to pasture.

 

[SPCotter]

I enjoyed Button's battle with Schumacher even though he didn't manage to get past, and chuckled as the Spanish crowd roared as Hamilton careered into the tyres with two laps to go. Other than that it was pretty lame, nowhere near as bad as Bahrain mind!

They've progressively made Barcelona worse the past few years imo, shortening the straight after Campsa, and then sharpening the following left turn which before was a gentle curve, there used to be a chance to overtake under braking there and cut back after, and the new chicane hasn't appeared to make overtaking into turn 1 any easier. The bikes still use the old configuration and last years Moto GP race was brilliant!

 

[amagic]

Excellent M. Schumacher was 4. in Spain ok i know with lucky.
Mercedes GP cars not too good too slowly that was max.

 

[amagic]

Schumi was the best in the last bend.

 

[Pothole]

Schumi finished 12th, illegal move penalized 20 seconds instead of a drive through penalty. How anyone could say Barcelona was boring after watching Monaco is cracked.


PosNoDriverTeamLapsTime/RetiredGridPts16Mark WebberRBR-Renault781:50:13.35512525Sebastian VettelRBR-Renault78+0.4 secs318311Robert KubicaRenault78+1.6 secs21547Felipe MassaFerrari78+2.6 secs41252Lewis HamiltonMcLaren-Mercedes78+4.3 secs51068Fernando AlonsoFerrari78+6.3 secs24874Nico RosbergMercedes GP78+6.6 secs66814Adrian SutilForce India-Mercedes78+6.9 secs124915Vitantonio LiuzziForce India-Mercedes78+7.3 secs1021016Sebastien BuemiSTR-Ferrari78+8.1 secs1311117Jaime AlguersuariSTR-Ferrari78+9.1 secs17123Michael SchumacherMercedes GP78+25.7 secs71312Vitaly PetrovRenault73+5 Laps141420Karun ChandhokHRT-Cosworth70Accident231518Jarno TrulliLotus-Cosworth70Accident19Ret19Heikki KovalainenLotus-Cosworth58Steering18Ret21Bruno SennaHRT-Cosworth58Hydraulics22Ret9Rubens BarrichelloWilliams-Cosworth30Accident9Ret23Kamui KobayashiBMW Sauber-Ferrari26Gearbox16Ret25Lucas di GrassiVirgin-Cosworth25Wheel problem21Ret24Timo GlockVirgin-Cosworth22Rear suspension20Ret22Pedro de la RosaBMW Sauber-Ferrari21Hydraulics15Ret1Jenson ButtonMcLaren-Mercedes2Engine8Ret10Nico HulkenbergWilliams-Cosworth0Accident11

 

[Egon Towst]

Schumi finished 12th, illegal move penalized 20 seconds instead of a drive through penalty.

Served him right, too, the cheating has-been. :laugh:

 

[SPCotter]

The penalty will be reversed on appeal, I am willing to put money on it!

Surely if the race finished under safety car, there would still have been yellow flags to the line, regardless of the safety car pulling in. Green flag means go racing, whether you race karts or F1 cars, and I'm not sure Damon Hill is the most appropriate person to be dealing with incidents involving MS

 

[Egon Towst]

The penalty will be reversed on appeal, I am willing to put money on it!

Surely if the race finished under safety car, there would still have been yellow flags to the line, regardless of the safety car pulling in. Green flag means go racing, whether you race karts or F1 cars, and I'm not sure Damon Hill is the most appropriate person to be dealing with incidents involving MS

You are not wrong about the irony of having Damon Hill presiding over that decision.

I wouldn`t be so sure it will be reversed, though. The rule book seems very clear:

Article 40.13 of the FIA regulations states: "If the race ends while the safety car is deployed it will enter the pit lane at the end of the last lap and the cars will take the chequered flag as normal without overtaking."

The reason the safety car pulls out of the way at the last moment is so that its presence doesn`t spoil the finish-line shot for the photographers. However, overtaking during those last few metres is not permitted and Schumacher was clearly out of order.

 

[SPCotter]

The rule book is very ambiguous! At Melbourne 09, when the safety car pulled in on the last lap, yellow flags and SC boards were still being used on the straight. There was no reason for the safety car to be out on track, under normal conditions it would have come in (and the teams were told this, I don't know if you saw Ross Brawn showing a print out of the communication from race control), the debris had been cleared, it can be interpreted the race did not finish under the safety car, even though it was deployed as the last lap started. There is no need for race control to tell the teams that the safety car was coming in that lap, if they were not allowed to race, as you say the saftey car comes in on the final lap anyway for the sake of the leading car crossing the line first, and the only reason Schumi got past was because Alonso got a swapper on as he accelerated hard out of rascasse, that itself is hardly suitable behaviour under safety car conditions?

I'm open to bets on this fwiw

 

[Egon Towst]

There is no need for race control to tell the teams that the safety car was coming in that lap, if they were not allowed to race, as you say the saftey car comes in on the final lap anyway for the sake of the leading car crossing the line first,

I do see your point, but did race control really intend that they should resume racing for such a tiny fraction of a lap ? That would be a pretty odd decision, if that were the intention.

I guess we will have to wait for the outcome of the appeal.

 

[Egon Towst]

Latest news is that the team have accepted the stewards` decision and do not plan to appeal.

 

[SPCotter]

Yeah, good job I didn't bet on it!

Looks like the regulations will be revised now. It's a shame MS got penalised over a misunderstanding, or at least the rules don't allow for a simple reversal of position.

On a funnier note, apparently Chandhok dragged Barrichello's steering wheel all the way to the tunnel, and when he was done with it Bruno Senna ran over it for good measure, when Williams got the wheel back, it still worked!

 

[Neoblast]

The red bulls are the best so far, they have the best car, even though alonso made one hell of a race not everyone is able to get past all those car starting from the pit lane...

 

[AtiFCOD]

Schumi finished 12th, illegal move penalized 20 seconds instead of a drive through penalty. How anyone could say Barcelona was boring after watching Monaco is cracked.

That move was very interesting. I guess nobody, even the teams did know about the rule. Everybody thought that it was allowed to overtake at the last two corners. Shumi was very unlucky there.

 

[ChuckyEgg]

yey, pole again for Webber, and a 1, 3 for RBR. Can Webber make it 2 poles/wins in a row. And McLaren in at 2 and 4.

Button needs to get up within the top 2, preferably.

Being a McLaren fan I'd like to see a 1,2 to McLaren with Button winning, but quite happy with another Webber win, as I am a fan. The main thing for now is that Ferrari and especially Alonso are out of or have poor points.

My prediction for tomorrow is Hamilton win with Webber 2nd, Vettel 3rd and Button 4th

Alonso will no doubt catch up, but probably won't be able to pass Massa, as per usual.

 

[Pothole]

Reverse the Button Vettel result and I agree, I think Hamilton will win the drag race to the 1st corner and Button will get a tow from him to pass Vettel.

 

[SPCotter]

Doubt Hamilton will get the jump, the dirty side of the track is er, very dirty at Turkey and during practice I think it was Hamilton I saw have a poor getaway from a practice start. However I think Hamilton may have the race pace to beat Webber tomorrow!

 

[ChuckyEgg]

Yey, McLaren 1,2 with a win for Hamilton...excellent race.... I'm very happy with that.

Hamilton win, though by default... naughty Vettel ./smack

Jeez, Vettel is definitely in the bad books for preventing a RBR 1,2, by running into Webber as he overtook.... big oops for him

 

[SPCotter]

I'm not sure on the last comment, Christian Horner was all going on about how the drivers should give each other room, which seems a coded way of saying Webber should have yielded . Was watching the F1 Forum after and there were all sorts of conspiracies being flown around with Vettel being told to turn his engine up etc. The head honchos Horner, Newey and Marko seemed very luvvy duvvy with Vettel when he went to the wall and it was interesting to hear Martin Whitmarsh say he woudn't have been hugging Vettel after that incident!

To get to the point it does appear that the top brass view Vettel with rose tinted spectacles, and Webber should rightly feel aggrieved. It will be interesting what the fallout will be after the debriefs etc. and the word coming out of Red Bull in the next few days. It was interesting to hear the likes of Eddie Jordan making comparisons with Alonso at McLaren, the bigger outcome of this could be Webber feeling isolated, if indeed Horner doesn't shift his viewpoint, and it may not be so 'straightforward' getting Webber to sign on for another year, quite frankly it is somewhat insulting that they appear to have Mark there as a top driver to 'push' Vettel, and offering him one year extensions, he's not *that* old at all. I wouldn't be surprised if Webber and his management will be getting some eager phone calls from Stefano Domenicali and Eric Boullier within the next two weeks, offering him the chance to jump ship.

But what a race!

 

[Pothole]

I think tbh that both drivers experienced the 'red fog', Webber wasn't exactly squeezing Vettel but he wasn't giving him any room either. Vettel didn't need to 'jink' to the right and if he had just held his line I'm sure Webber would have had to go wide into the left hander and Vettel could have been clear. I think when Vettel made the move right he didn't expect the car to move so suddenly. I don't think Webber should complain too much, after all had he and Vettel ( who he must consider his biggest threat to the championship ) finished 1-2 he would have increased his lead on him by 7 points, with Vettel getting none he actually increased him by 15. Although Hamilton & Button were 'lucky' to get the finishes they did, it must be frustrating to have the faster car (except for the negative camber turn 8) and a track where overtaking is possible, they would probably have finished the way they did anyway. Hopefully KERS will be back next year as these 'safer' tracks and dirty air problems make for not very exciting racing.