Lewis Hamilton said he’s glad races have not been “manipulated” in 2010 – a reference to being stripped of his Belgian Grand Prix win in 2008?
Links
Behind the scenes at the Abu Dhabi GP (BBC, UK only)
Lewis Hamilton said one of the best things about the 2010 season has been that races haven’t been “manipulated” as in recent years.
Hulkenberg proposto alla Ferrari (Autosprint, Italian)
Rumours in the Italian media claim Nico Hulkenberg will join Ferrari to replace Felipe Massa.
Mubadala sells Ferrari stake for ??122m (Financial Times)
“Mubadala, one of Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth investment vehicles, has sold its stake in Ferrari, the luxury carmaker, back to Fiat for ??122m, according to reports.”
Pastor Maldonado Q&A: F1 is the next logical step (F1)
“The reason is to be able to do all four test days and to get as much mileage as possible. The next two test days will be with the new Pirelli tyres – and that is extra important. It will be new to everybody so we are all starting from the same level.”
Williams opts for ‘battery’ KERS in 2011 (Autosport)
Patrick Head: “I think it’s fairly well known that we’re going to be running a battery system.”
Santander still banking on Alonso (Who Are You, Anyway?)
“Banco Santander, the multinational financial group which sponsors both Ferrari and McLaren (although in the latter team its branding appears only on the drivers’ overalls), has released figures from the Media Sports Marketing and Havas Sport consultants estimating the bank’s return on investment (ROI) from its F1 sponsorships at ??270million in 2010, up from a previous estimate of ??250million.”
Lotus Confirm 2012 Engine, Aero Kit (Speed)
“A third automobile manufacturer will join the IZOD IndyCar Series in 2012, as Lotus will build an engine and aero kit for the next-generation car in the series.”
Comment of the day
Pinball embodies the spirit of F1 Fanatic with this comment on the future of the Australian Grand Prix:
I’d love to see a politician stand up and say "Look we’ve decided to renew our contract for the Grand Prix. Yeah it’s not profitable, but who cares, it’s SO FREAKIN’ AWESOME".
Punball
From the forum
Anyone fancy a F1 Fanatic meet-up in London?
Happy birthday!
No F1 Fanatic birthdays today. If you want a birthday shout-out tell us when yours is by emailling me, using Twitter or adding to the list here.
On this day in F1
One year ago today I asked whether Kimi Raikkonen would be missed has he bade farewell to Formula 1.
Over 6,000 responded and the overwhelming answer was yes. In fact, 21% said they’d stop watching F1 altogether, so I don’t suppose any of them are reading this.
More than half said they would miss the world champion. One year on, with a new world champion crowd, has anyone changed their mind?
Read more: Will you miss Kimi Raikkonen?
Stefanauss
19th November 2010, 0:32
Ironic. He won that championship because of the points messed up by the most manipulated race ever.
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
19th November 2010, 8:17
Which was?
Tom Moloney
19th November 2010, 8:31
Spa 08, I’m guessing.
F1iLike
19th November 2010, 15:01
How is cutting the corner to attack at the next corner okay?
Anthony
19th November 2010, 18:19
How is breaking and giving the place back not okay?
Havergal
19th November 2010, 8:42
I imagine he means Singapore 08, which Massa said cost him the championship after ‘crashgate’ was uncovered. I’d say that was more manipulated than Spa!
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
19th November 2010, 8:57
Can hardly blame the stewards for that one.
Havergal
19th November 2010, 10:33
Indeed not, I meant Stefanauss at the top of this thread meant that one. I’m sure Hamilton himself was talking about Spa!
Ricky Bobby
19th November 2010, 17:44
Singapore cost him the championship because the pitstop was a disaster, he got the green light whit the fuel hose still attached and lost an awful amount of time (from first to last). It didn’t have much to do with the crashgate.
Stefanauss
20th November 2010, 15:13
I absolutely meant Singapore.
Stefanauss
20th November 2010, 15:30
I know stewards were not involved, but i don’t think it’s relevant, at least irony-wise.
Also, hard to believe Lewis would have something to say about/against manipulated races only if it’s because of the stewards.
Massa was easily leading that race over Lewis.
Singapore 2008 was manipulated by Renault.
As a collateral result, Lewis gains championships point insted of losing them over Massa.
Lewis won for just 1 point.
There is no “Massa says it cost him the WDC”. It cost him the WDC.
knoxploration
19th November 2010, 0:49
I’d say Hamilton’s comment is more of a reflection on the fact he was allowed to blatantly disregard the rules entirely, without any consequences whatsoever (the most grievous example being weaving to prevent the driver behind passing — completely unsportsmanlike behaviour from a supposed world champion.)
Ned Flanders (@ned-flanders)
19th November 2010, 2:12
Presumably you’re refering to Malaysia 2010? Yeah it was a bit naughty, but it was hardly as though he was doing it to block the driver behind, he was doing it to break the tow.
He was actually weaving away from Petrov, who was following him wherever he went. I don’t know the rules so perhaps I’m wrong, but I assume there was a bit of a grey area in the rules so he got away without a penalty. No need for yet more Hamilton bashing
Pinball
19th November 2010, 2:17
I’m not a huge fan of Hamilton but I don’t see any problem with what he did in Malaysia, it wasn’t blocking. Petrov was the one voluntarily following Hamilton each time Hamilton change direction to keep the tow. I was actually one of the more interesting moments of the season.
Eric M.
19th November 2010, 3:38
Wrong or right, it was fun to watch!
Jack Holt
19th November 2010, 9:15
Yeah, I agree – naughty of Hamilton but hilarious because he wasn’t trying to block Petrov, it just looked like he was shaking off an overly matey freshman. :D
Have to agree with Hamilton about the stewarding this year too, I think it has been superb, Jean Todt deserves a huge cheer for the quiet way in which he has transformed the stewarding. This season I had a lot of confidence that the stewards were making the right calls for the right reasons – in marked contrast to the past few seasons. Todt’s quiet approach to reforms has been just what the sport needed, restricting the drama to what happens on track.
Mike
19th November 2010, 11:42
Erm… guys… I’m not so sure it’s about whether he blocked Petrov or not, but rather, whether it was dangerous to do what he did.
Which, looking at how easily Webbers accident with the Lotus occurred, you could easily argue that it was dangerous.
Having said that I’m (very) glad about the more lax attitude as well! Let’s hope it stays that way!
Oliver
19th November 2010, 12:24
I agree Ned, Even the rules was specific about cars moving in the braking zone because that is what driver had always complained about. No mention was made about cars moving mid way through the straights especially when not blocking.
How would that be interpreted if there was debris on the track at various points along the straight, or if the lead driver is avoiding patches of water.
Richard S
20th November 2010, 12:57
I’m with Ned and co on this one. It was great driving by LH and one of the most exciting moments of the season. LH was trying to break the tow and not weaving in the breaking zone so no chance of Petrov doing a Webber. Great stuff.
BasCB
19th November 2010, 6:44
If you refer to Malaysia 2010, please check your reality again. Sure it was a grey area that was cleared after the race, but it was hardly something you could call “blatant disregard of the rules entirely”.
Surely it is miles away from Germany 2010, Singapore 2008, Jerez 1997 or controversies like Suzuka ’89, and Spa 2008 or Monza 2006 or even the infamous “lie gate” in 2009.
I fully agree with Hamilton, that the Stewards were far more reasonable with their interferance this year, only giving penalties in clear cases.
Todfod (@todfod)
19th November 2010, 6:46
I agree. i think Hamilton got away with a couple of penalties this year. He also managed to actually get lucky with one of the penalties handed down to him in Valencia.
SamS
19th November 2010, 7:32
The Moving/weaving isnt actually in the FIA ruling it is a drivers agreement and there cannot be punished by the FIA, unless a accident is caused by the weaving.
Mike
19th November 2010, 12:21
As I understand it, there isn’t a rule specifically outlining how a pass can occur, but there is a section outlining racing incidents, which include events with or without an actual collision. So the stewards would have the power to penalise Hamilton on that, should they have wanted to.
Compare this to them penalising Schumacher for squeezing Rubens. Schumacher received a penalty, but no actual collision occurred.
Ricky Bobby
19th November 2010, 17:47
Pretty bad but overtaking the SC is much worse. And the penalty was ridiculous and innefective. A black flag would have been the absolute minimum.
Anthony
20th November 2010, 16:32
totally agree with you on this one. The SC ruined Alonso’s race….
Patrickl
24th November 2010, 1:44
and nearly Hamilton’s when the SC went over the pit exit line.
Victor. (@victor)
19th November 2010, 1:01
Love the COTD!
And Hulkenberg to Ferrari is just a ludicrous rumour.
Pinball
19th November 2010, 2:06
I think AUS_Steve deserves the COTD. I just stole his best line and used it in my comment.
Stephen Jones (@aus_steve)
19th November 2010, 2:21
you said it how a politician would man..
no hard feelings.. you deserve it
glue (@glue)
19th November 2010, 1:04
the races aren’t less prone to be manipulated, Hamilton’s simply gotten his head straight and stopped making stupid and controversial blunders (admittedly, not only him)..he’s flown well below the radar this season, it’s not a coincidence that he’s been penalised less
glue (@glue)
19th November 2010, 1:10
obviously I meant to write “manipulated”, I’m not condoning his previous penalties as immensely unfair
glue (@glue)
19th November 2010, 1:08
and yeah, I do still miss Kimi and now that the season is over my mind keeps thinking what would have happened if he hadn’t gotten dumped for Massa
but anyway, the season was no less exciting just because he wasn’t there by any means
HounslowBusGarage
19th November 2010, 9:22
I thought Kimi got dumped for Alonso.
Maybe they should have dumped Massa instead and kept Kimi and Fred in the team.
glue (@glue)
19th November 2010, 10:06
yeah, that’s what I meant..they didn’t choose Alonso over Kimi to race, they chose Massa over Kimi to stay
Patrickl
24th November 2010, 1:46
Kimi was paid the big bucks because he was supposed to lead the championship challenge. Massa is there as a second driver.
Now they pay Alonso the money to give them the championships. Makes no sense to pay Kimi a fortune to be the no2 driver.
Larcem
19th November 2010, 1:19
I wonder what does the Mubadala news really mean. Is it because Ferrari lost the title, or something similar?
BasCB
19th November 2010, 6:49
No, it means FIAT used the option to buy those stakes back. That probably means FIAT is doing OK and has the money, while Mubadala has lost a lot of its funds in the last couple of years and probably welcomes the deal as well.
Alex
19th November 2010, 8:11
There are rumors going that FIAT wants to sell (a part of) Ferrari to Volkswagen (VAG). They have money and FIAT needs money to buy a bigger stake in Chrysler.
BasCB
19th November 2010, 9:36
And a couple of weeks ago there were also rumours about VW wanting to buy Alfa Romeo. Only these rumours come from remarks by several VW officials stating, they would be interested as well as having the money to do so.
FIAT reacted to the Alfa Romeo rumours with insisting, they had no intention to sell it to any competitor.
With Ferrari actually bringing in large dividends they would be even less willing to sell that, leaving VW the option of buying stocks on the stockmarket, if they are available.
matt88 (@matt88)
19th November 2010, 15:47
i heard of FIAT selling Alfa Romeo (aaaargh!), not Ferrari. VW are unhappy ’cause they wanted SEAT to become their Alfa (in fact they stole their main designer, Da Silva) while FIAT are focussing their attention on Chrysler and American market, so Alfa could be sold. I don’t hope so, it would mean that another legendary Italian brand goes to German hands (as Lamborghini).
Larcem
19th November 2010, 12:05
aaahhh I see. for a minute I was thinking that the repercussions of the title loss were becoming a bit exagerated!
MtlRacer
19th November 2010, 1:42
Which Lotus? All the controversy over the different versions and uses of Lotus are confusing and honestly becoming rather ridiculous.
Pinball
19th November 2010, 2:19
I think it’s Group Lotus, the people who own the production car group.
US_Peter (@us_peter)
19th November 2010, 2:41
Yeah, it’s Group Lotus, i.e. Proton, not Team Lotus i.e. Fernandez and Gascoyne. Maybe this is a sign that they’ll focus their efforts on Indy since the US is their biggest market, and leave F1 to Team Lotus… *fingers crossed*
BasCB
19th November 2010, 6:52
Hm, to me that sounds far to sensible and businesslike to appeal to Bahar and Group Lotus. But I agree it would be the sensible and fan friendly thing to do.
If Group Lotus focusses on succes in Indy and build a US fanbase and customer base and Fernandez keeps Team Lotus on course to improve and warm the fans hearts in the rest of the world that would give the car company a very good perspective, if only they get to actually build the cars to fit that.
BasCB
19th November 2010, 7:01
I really feel upset when hearing Bahar talking about Lotus Cars being succesfull in F1 and IndyCar in the past, they have never been in it!
And I am curious, what engine they will supply for Indy Cars as a “lotus engine”, as even the car company never built its own engines. Will it be a Toyota engine (their current partner, and Toyota could build on their Indy experience) a Renault (would Renault build it in France?) or a Cosworth (they have pretty recent experience as well) that will be rebadged as a “Lotus”?
DeadManWoking
19th November 2010, 9:11
The engine will be a Cosworth, Lotus is partnered in Indycar with KV (Kalkhoven/Vassar) Racing. Cosworth is currently owned by Gerald Forsythe and Kevin Kalkhoven.
BasCB
19th November 2010, 9:38
I would suppose so, but then again, doesn’t it make to much sense to do that?
I wouldn’t be supprised if Bahar announced next week, that they will be building that engine in house and continues to state he will bring his own engine into F1 come 2013.
US_Peter (@us_peter)
19th November 2010, 23:57
That would probably be frowned upon by Renault.
Stephen Jones (@aus_steve)
19th November 2010, 1:52
ahah pinball good idea for the COTD! =P
and also, this hulkenferrari rumour sounds strangely likely..
My2Cents
19th November 2010, 1:55
Kimi is a spoiled, playboy poor example with racing talents never fully developed because he couldn’t get past the child in his mind and lucked into an F1 title because of superior equipment.
Vettel is the same sort of child driver but minus the playboy negatives and has proven himself a more suitable Champion than Kimi could ever be.
Kimi can’t even cut it in the WRDC and I hope he never sets foot in F1 again.
David A
19th November 2010, 11:40
He did not luck into an F1 title. No-one, except perhaps J. Villeneuve, lucks into an F1 title with their superior equipment. He earned it by ramping up his performances in the second half of the season, beating a childish couple of drivers who were in the best cars.
wasiF1
19th November 2010, 2:26
NO, for me I still miss Kimi Räikkönen & as long as I will watch F1 before the start of every race I will be thinking about one of the fastest driver who will be missed by many around the world.While I am writing this I am thinking that whether Kimi would have been a better driver in this no refuelling car? Remember in 2005 he used to start at the back of the field in many races with a heavy fuel load so when everyone did two pit-stop he did only one. May be this will be a answer that we may never know.
Regis
19th November 2010, 3:32
I miss Kimi sooooo much… i hope he comes back in the future.
Rocky
19th November 2010, 4:06
Perhaps in Webbers RBR seat??
plushpile (@plushpile)
19th November 2010, 5:06
Seriously? You haven’t given up on that prospect yet?
sato113 (@sato113)
19th November 2010, 3:58
lets face the truth. compared to Alonso’s raw speed, Massa is a bit cr*p. as much as i love him, he’s just plain slow. bridgestone’s or not, let’s not make excuses. Ferrari has no place for slow drivers. fair enough too.
also how do sponsors like santander actually make money through sponsorship? it’s not like people see their logo and instantly change their bank account to them…?
BBT
19th November 2010, 8:59
I’m changing away from them, every time I see a GP it reminds me how bad their customers services are.
GeorgeTuk (@georgetuk)
19th November 2010, 12:31
Sponsorship is never much of an exact advertising science.
Its all about having your brand in more places so that when people thinking banking they think Santander and it also helps to be associated with a winning or high performing team/product.
Vodafone have taken it to extremes and sponsoring more than most, McLaren, the cricket…and loads more.
bananarama
19th November 2010, 12:43
There are acouple of ways they could calculate that. The most prominent one would be looking at their media coverage and calculating how much it would have cost them to do that much advertising. There are a lot of other things they could calculate aswell, could expand on that if anyone is interested :-P
Melchior (@)
19th November 2010, 5:25
Hammy did get away with a couple of indiscretions this season where he should have been penalized.So i guess he should be thankful of the greater leeway in the interpretation of the rules;)
f1yankee
19th November 2010, 7:29
more double standards from f1 drivers and fans alike. 2010 had some dreadful officiating. forget what hamilton said, what he meant was:
“i’m glad my rivals suffered some terrible officiating, while i was effectively not penalized the 2 times i was caught cheating. sure, i took 1 for weaving, but i passed the safety car and qualified underweight… and we laughed.”
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
19th November 2010, 8:13
Apart from Hockenheim I can’t think of any truly bad examples off the top of my head. I thought Vettel getting a penalty for hitting Button in Spa was a bit much, but we didn’t have any Spa ’08 or Fuji ’08 moments
Chippie
19th November 2010, 10:45
The officiating this year has been so much better. Even Hockenheim the race stewards slapped them with the biggest penalty they could, it was the WMSC which failed. Fuji 08 was a disgrace, especially Buemi’s penalty for colliding with Massa.
David A
19th November 2010, 11:41
Buemi did not drive in 2008…
bananarama
19th November 2010, 12:47
Schumacher Monaco comes to mind for example.
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
19th November 2010, 12:55
That was bad, but it was more a product of poorly-written rules than bad stewarding. And give them credit, they sorted the rule out not long after.
BasCB
19th November 2010, 7:30
Here’s another article about what Tavo Hellmund is up over in the USA (from the Austin Chronicle) http://www.austinchronicle.com/gyrobase/issue/story?oid=oid%3A1115650
This goes into great detail about what is exactly going on with permits, and gives more of an idea what Tavo is planning for the future.
DeadManWoking
19th November 2010, 10:29
I expect that Hellmund will get the track built and ready for the race in 2012. What I don’t expect to see are the huge crowds that Indy was able to generate for F1. Austin TX is a long way from anywhere in the US (except for the Dallas and Houston metro areas) which makes flying in for the weekend a must. It’s 1500 km to Atlanta, 2000 km to LA and 2500 to 3000 km to the northeast population centers.
Yesterday’s roundup link to Abu Dhabi’s TV audiences http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2010/11/11548.html underscore how small the US fanbase is when compared to this from Speed http://formula-one.speedtv.com/article/speed-live-from-historic-f1-finale/ .
Nielsen estimates that there are 120 million households with TV in the US. A 0.51 rating means that only 1/2 of one percent of them were tuned in to the Brazilian GP or 600,000 households and that’s the highest rating for many years. The average F1 TV audience in the US is more like 1-3 hundred thousand compared to the 2-5 milion that watch NASCAR races. This is in a country with 4-6 times the population of Germany, Italy, the UK, France or Spain. Hellmund has some serious promotional work to do.
MajorMilou
19th November 2010, 7:55
Hamilton never punished for what he does such as the pit lane incident with Vettel, the weaving, the passing the safety car (penalized but much later), etc.
Alonso punished with an immediate drive through in British GP after passing Kubica. They were side by side in a chicane and Kubica doesn’t leave any space, where is Alonso supposed to go? Especially that Mansell was the driver steward that day, he should have known he would have done the same thing as Alonso…
Anyway, overall I do agree with Hamilton, because I want to see these guys race and in 2008 I remember penalties being handed to everyone for no valid reason.. So it is better in 2010. But it’s funny and ironic that Hamilton is the one to say so, he who has probably benefited the most of it (except in his accident with Webber in Singapore, where I still hold Webber accountable 100% because he was already behind, and also got away with it).
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
19th November 2010, 8:10
Exactly the same as what happened with Hamilton and Raikkonen at Spa two years ago and exactly the same penalty. We’ve seen other incidents with other drivers since then that were treated in exactly the same way.
The only mystery about what happened at Silverstone was why Alonso thought he might get away with it.
Wasn’t Vettel the one pushing Hamilton towards the pit boxes?
BBT
19th November 2010, 9:01
Yes Keith.. correct if there was a penalty to be given, which there wasn’t it should of been to Vettel.
MajorMilou
19th November 2010, 9:03
I’m probably not the most impartial observer, being a long time Ferrari fan. But if you take the 2008 at Spa incident, I don’t think Hamilton should have been punished that day: none of what he had done was dangerous and he had given back position to Raikonnen, I thought that whole “he didn’t give it back long enough” thing was a bit ridiculous.
But that was back in 2008 when penalties were being handed out for nothing. In 2010 with the addition of a ex driver as race steward, we saw a lot less of these penalties. And the only one of the main contenders who did have one without any prior warning, on his first questionable move of the season, was Alonso (the worse in that particular incident was Kubica retired a lap later… so it really didn’t give him any advantage). While Hamilton this year did get away with quite a few questionable moves. So did Webber whenever he is defending a position.
Anyway, that’s not really the point, I do agree with Hamilton: let the drivers do their thing as long as it’s not dangerous (for example, Schumacher v. Barrichello was pushed a bit too far for everyone’s safety, so I agree with a penalty for Shumacher, and that it’s not against basic sportsmanship (such as unnecessarily cutting a corner to gain position on these new tracks with no grass or sand, like not even trying to make the corner) :-)
Back in 2008 especially it was like every passing move was likely to result in a penalty for one of the two drivers involved. I’m glad those days are over!
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
19th November 2010, 9:39
I’m with you on this – I don’t think drivers should be able to push rivals off the track and enjoy the protection of the stewards.
But at least, on this occasion, they were consistent.
Jack Holt
19th November 2010, 9:25
He wasn’t penalised for cutting the chicane, he was penalised for not giving the place back after overtaking unfairly.
MajorMilou
19th November 2010, 9:43
:-) Again, we really don’t have the same vision of what was unfair here. Alonso comes up side by side before the left turn. He remains side by side (and on the same level, Kubica at this point is no longer in front) during the left bend, leaving Kubica some space. Then they get in the right bend, still side by side. Kubica goes in and hits the inside curb. Again, where is Alonso supposed to go? I don’t think there is anything unfair in what Alonso did, forced to pass on the inside to avoid a collision that would have been caused by Kubica. How is that unfair, when Webber forcing Hamilton to retire in Singapore because he can’t stand being passed is considered fair game?
Anyway, if we disagree, we disagree :-)
I just like it better when the guys can race and attempt a overtake move without thinking, “this is going to end in a penalty”.
Jack Holt
19th November 2010, 10:01
Well we agree on your last point, the less penalties the better, it’s racing not crown green bowling. :)
The Webber/Hamilton incident was pretty poor of Webber, but then Hamilton did leave him a gap big enough to get into but not big enough to get through which was asking for trouble. I think Webber wasn’t penalised because Hamilton sort of invited the accident.
I don’t remember the Kubica incident too clearly, but my impression at the time was that Alonso should have given back the place. The difference with it and Webber/Hamilton is that Alonso had the opportunity to make amends but chose not to. I suppose I’m saying that Alonso could have tried to muscle his way past and bashed Kubica off the road and that would have been OK, but he decided both not to risk his own car AND take the place from Kubica, which isn’t right.
MajorMilou
19th November 2010, 10:35
OK, that’s a very good way to put it, now we do agree :-) A bit naive on the part of Alonso not to immediately give back the position.
@Keith: I don’t comment much, but love your website. Keep up the good work! :-)
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
19th November 2010, 10:47
You’re welcome :-)
graigchq
19th November 2010, 12:23
in any race, if you overtake and end up using run off or corner chicanes to make your move and you end up ahead, you have to CONCEDE your position to the driver you ILLEGALLY overtook.
This is standard, all racing games of any sim-class calibre include these rules, and in the top form of motorsport, you’d think that Alonso would know that an illegal overtake will be punished if he doesn’t give the position back immediately (or within a couple f corners, when it is safe to do so).
Doug
19th November 2010, 8:40
What a season, I’m still buzzing and I’m not even a Red Bull fan! I can see us talking about this season till the first practice in March 2011.
It would be great to see an article on all the steward decisions this year (be it the big teams or the small teams), to see how consistant they were. I think overall they have been alot better then previous years except I agree that decisions could have been decided alot quicker. I appreciate they have to watch the replays from different angles and speak with the teams to get their opinion however there should be a standard that all penalties are issued within 10 minutes of the incident (I was going to say 5 laps however the length differs between Monaco and Spa)
verstappen
19th November 2010, 9:35
What a season indeed. I was thinking about the ‘yearclip’ which was shown on dutch TV. I really liked it this year. Especially the way they used the audio of the radiotraffic. So here it is and hopefully, the international F1 audience of F1Fanatic can provide us all with their countries year overviews.
provided that FOM doesn’t interfere.
verstappen
19th November 2010, 9:41
(sorry for the language in the comment above)
Here is a link that works!
Jack Holt
19th November 2010, 9:42
BBC1 has the F1 season review at 1pm on Saturday, should be worth watching!
SparkyJ23 (@sparkyj23)
19th November 2010, 10:25
Great clip verstappen
Shame that the FOM has its head up its ass with regard to actually showing highlights.
That BBC program in its entirety will not be as entertaining as the clip posted by verstappen.
Eddie Jordan’s sheer hypocrisy coupled with his idiocy when asked a simple question just drives me up the wall. Throw in Legard and its just a car crash saved by Coultard & Brundle and the racing.
Absolute genius…
Icthyes (@icthyes)
19th November 2010, 9:36
Wow, what a load of sour grapes from the haters.
I actually think Hamilton was referring to Alonso’s and Ferrari’s comments after Valencia. A nice little dig ;) It’s a clever tactic – if someone tries to talk about something he supposedly did this year, all he has to do is drag up Hockenheim and trump it.
What worries me is that stewards are still too ready to punish the lesser drivers and teams for 50/50 decisions. It gives the impression that they’d like to do it across the board but are too scared of controversy.
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
19th November 2010, 9:40
Good point, hadn’t thought of that.
Steph (@)
19th November 2010, 10:02
I wonder if Felipe ever reads the news or if he’s just given up by this point. Ever since he got the drive there’s been some rumor that he’ll be replaced.
If he does get dropped for the Hulk then there will be one person I imagine who’ll be irritated as he’s seemigly been after a Ferrari drive for a while and that’s Kubica. All that time talking up Ferrari and Italy just for Ferrari to nab young Hulk and raise him up while Fernando’s their main man.
I could see why Ferrari would go for Hulk but it’s Ferrari and the seat everyone wants so I’ll not start crying yet until something has been announced :P :)
bosyber
19th November 2010, 10:56
Maybe Kubica should go talk with Weber and Ferrari and offer up his seat to Huelkenberg for a switch, and some money to Renault :-p
Calum
19th November 2010, 10:22
I don’t think it was necessarily a dig at the Spa 2008 stewards to be honest. Perhaps more surprise at getting way with so much rule breaking this year.
How many times could Hamilton have been punished this year and all he got was warnings (weaving) and multiple reprimands (unsafe pit release).
Heck there was even instances in qualifying when the stewards didn’t even react! Eg to his wheel to wheel with Massa at Abu Dhabi – both drivers extremely lucky to escape punishment in that instance. Similarly he broke the rules and got pole for doing so in Canada – and went on to win the race – so would it be fair to say cheating pays, it certainly did for Lewis in Canada 2010.
In Valencia he was able to jump the safety car and keep second place while other drivers lost valuable track position – some said it was Hamilton using his initiative, but it broke the rules and saw him properly punished – no warning – no reprimand – he received a drive through, but still held the 2nd place finish. Other teams can’t complain for Valencia – Hamilton manipulated the race and receive his penalty – he just lucked out that day so the drive through didn’t affect him.
It was clear to see that Hamilton got let off lightly over the course of the season.
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
19th November 2010, 10:33
I think you’re a bit preoccupied with Hamilton. For example, the were plenty of other contentious pit releases that went unpunished.
The stewards eased up pretty much across the board and I say that’s a good thing – we don’t want them jumping on every tiny little thing and spoiling races by handing out loads of penalties.
DeadManWoking
19th November 2010, 10:49
For those of us not in the UK, did Kravitz actually interview Hamilton or merely quote him? In either case did Hamilton say anything beyond your quote?
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
19th November 2010, 10:55
It’s a quote reported by Kravitz.
kubi
19th November 2010, 22:49
and any time hamilton is attacked you jump like a cat to protect him. you are obsessed with him aren’t you keith?
David A
21st November 2010, 1:14
Not any time, but just when people like you and Calum attack him with nonsensical statements.
Sean
19th November 2010, 16:32
Oh, dear. Cheating in Canada. Really.
I also heard from a friend of mine that Lewis put two cubes of sugar in Jense’s tea, and only got a reprimand for it. Everyone knows he only takes one. He could get away with anything, that boy.
This is hyperbole.
Hockenheim was the nearest we saw to actual cheating this year. There was a written rule, it was broken very blatantly, with lies and evasiveness from the drivers and entitlement-driven bluster and petulance from the management, and the WMSC soft-pedaled and let them take 7 WDC points in exchange for $100k in pocket money. Or one one thousandth (!!!) of the amount Mosley slammed McLaren with for being in receipt of the papers Stepney gave them 3 years ago. That’s the only real travesty in the rulings and decisions this year. The rest of it was fine, give or take, and for the first time in probably well over a decade, there was little to see in systematic or structural FIA bias in 2010. I cannot tell you how refreshing I find this. Various drivers did various things this year and were treated more lightly and reasonably in general than in previous seasons. This is because something happened at the FIA last year that moved it from being a hyper-partisan, dictatorial, self-interested and serially corrupt entity, to something that was more pragmatic and, evidently, at least trying to act in good faith.
Spa ’08 was theft, pure and simple. So was the penalty against Hamilton in Japan the same year, the only time in F1 history I ever saw someone penalized for outbraking himself and losing several places as a result. These were clearly and transparently a subset of Mosley’s attempts, through Alan Donnelly, to hammer McLaren and Dennis at every turn, a highly personal grudge issue that we know goes back through the decades, probably as far as the early 70s. The day Dennis stepped down, it stopped, and then Mosley was mercifully ousted by more sensible people, and was replaced by a grown-up. Simple as that. The fact that the contrast is so stark, that it looks like soft-pedaling on Hamilton to those of us who became so accustomed to seeing them get penalties for sneezing, is just that – an illusion caused by high contrast levels.
In 2006, they tried to lift the title from Renault and Alonso (ironically enough) with that grotesque penalty in Monza, following a ruling that passive dampers that are fully inboard and see zero airflow, were (all of a sudden, and contrary to prior views) moveable aerodynamic devices. It failed, but only because the lead Ferrari driver threw away points on four occasions with driving errors, and Alonso did not. In 2008 they lifted more than one result from McLaren and soft-pedaled on a much worse pit release by Massa than Hamilton vs. Vettel this year. This also failed, but only at the final corner of the final race. 2010 was the least egregious of the three but it also saw the title come close to landing in Ferrari’s lap by significantly less than the 7 points by which they cynically manipulated the WDC, mid-season. These are the FIA-led and sanctioned travesties we should be talking about, not whether Hamilton should have been pushed down the grid for running out of fuel in a qualifying session.
Jean Todt, I fully expected you to be a continuation of the illustrious lineage of Balestre and Mosley, two more appalling and vindictive individuals than which it would be hard to find, anywhere or in any sport. That you are clearly not is something for which I eat humble pie every day, and am sincerely and deeply thankful for.
Ricky Bobby
19th November 2010, 18:01
Totally agree. The theft of a position by HAM. Which was justly punished, for once. Not like so many other thefts that weren’t
Sean
19th November 2010, 19:06
Sorry, but that’s just cobblers. They were side by side going into the chicane (actually LH slightly ahead if memory serves), Kimi pushed him clean off the track and LH backed off and let him fully through again, moving left-to-right while entirely behind the Ferrari as he did so. The “wait one more corner before re-passing” nonsense, never written down of course, came about in the driver’s briefing for the following race, after a bunch of confused drivers wanted clarification about what the heck that penalty was for and how they were supposed to avoid the same fate. It was pure garbage, made up on-the-spot after Mosley’s right-hand man Donnelly (now removed from the same role in the Todt org) led the “investigation” and was the only person who interviewed Hamilton, but kept his name off the steward’s verdict letter. It was a shameful set-up, made worse by the fact that Kimi was a sitting duck at the time and ended up binning it anyway.
Regarding “so many other thefts that weren’t punished”, please provide the list to substantiate your claim, with details, explaining where and how LH stole positions and escaped punishment for doing so. I wait with bated breath.
Ricky Bobby
19th November 2010, 19:27
Sorry if you aren’t able to see them, I can’t cure voluntary blindness.
kpcart
19th November 2010, 19:29
Kimi didnt push him clean off the road, Hamilton put his car their, (dont blame kimi for hamiltons mistake which gave him an advantage for the next turn!)Hamilton wouldnt have braked to that position if their was a concrete wall there. then he didnt give enough spave back to kimi before re overtaking. its simple, he could have completed the turn by breaking more, which means he then wouldve been further behind for the next turn, where he wouldnt have been able to pass if he hadnt cut the chicane and got as close as he did. All Hamilton did after taking the turn illegally was pull back from kimi just enought to pretend he is far enought behind to have anoter go at kimi and then re-overtook him, but realistically, if he had made the turn legally (or hit the wall if there was a wall there), then he would be too far behind to make the move at the next turn. His shortcutting was a benefit to overtake at the next turn, and RIGHTLY he was punished for it, otherwise it would have been a manipulated result by a spoilt brat.
Sean
19th November 2010, 20:41
Ricky Bobby – “voluntary blindness”? Way to avoid the question, dude. I’m still waiting for the list. After all there are, quote: “so many” examples that it should be easy for you to rattle them off.
kpcart – you’re in a minority on this and there are self-proclaimed Ferrari supporters on this very thread who thought LH’s penalty in Spa was wrong. If there was a concrete wall there’d have been some really horrific injuries at the end of lap 1 of this year’s race, but a pretend concrete wall is not the same as a real one, is it? Kimi gained positions on the La Source exit while going off track at the ’09 race start and I didn’t hear much from the Ferrari fans about concrete walls on that day.
Prisoner Monkeys (@prisoner-monkeys)
19th November 2010, 10:26
Red Andy (@red-andy)
19th November 2010, 11:33
To me, what the rules actually are is less important than whether they’re enforced consistently. And you have to say, with a few exceptions, the stewards have done pretty well on the consistency front this year, as well as being more lenient overall.
The only exceptions, I would say, were the 5-second penalties for speeding under the safety car in Valencia (should have been in-race drive-throughs for all involved, not post-race penalties), and the team orders debacle in Hockenheim (inconsistent, as I’ve repeatedly said, with previous uses of team orders by several teams). But on the whole the stewarding has been really improved this year.
Guio Oblepias
19th November 2010, 14:21
on a side note, anyone else notice Felipe’s new helmet design?
any word on whether this is just a testing helmet or if it’s what he’s gonna be wearing next season? it’d be a shame if he lets go of his green and blue helmet, IMO. it was one of the better looking ones on the grid…
Steph (@)
19th November 2010, 18:45
Yep, I saw. I don’t think he’ll change his yellow/green/blue helmet or at least I hope he doesn’t!
djdaveyp85
19th November 2010, 19:00
I think it is his new Helmet now he drives for the team and not himself!
djdaveyp85
19th November 2010, 19:01
He is also changing his name to Ferrari!
David A
21st November 2010, 1:22
Changing the helmet design to have more red, I know someone who did that!
BasCB (@bascb)
22nd November 2010, 10:14
Alonso also wore one like that on the next testing day. I suppose it’s just them testing a new helmet version before it goes into production.
MasterManipulator
19th November 2010, 14:30
On a non Hamilton-related issue, I am keen to see Sato start kicking some butt in the IRL with the new Lotus-provided upgrades. There is no reason that guy should be running mid pack given the median grade of driver in IRL. Then he needs to come back to F1.
DaveW
19th November 2010, 15:12
Mubadala Deal
Major potential upshot here is that it put FIAT in a position to sell off or IPO it’s italian sports car subsidiary.
Speculation abounds that VW has some euros buring a hole in its pocket. I think they also had a look at Alfa Romeo, which may be more likely. After all, with Porsche, Lamborghini, and Bugatti in the stable, who needs Ferrari? Of course, wouldn’t it be grand to have Alfa Romeo back on the grid as the brand of the much rumored VW F1 project.
chemakal
19th November 2010, 15:46
HAMILTON OF COURSE, who else could have done such statement? How ironic is that??? Man, you should have your helmet permanently on.
Let’s have a quick season review:
Malaysia – Weaving to avoid Petrov passing, changing direction 4 times (2 times max allowed) – NO PENALTY
China – Racing alongside (on the wrong side) Vettel in the pits. Lucky no crew was nearby – NO PENALTY
Canada – brakings the rules 3 times: getting off a running car in the track-pushing the car, not arriving in time to verification area, no petrol to be inspected (that was his only pole position 2010) – ECONOMIC PENALTY, but from now on if an other driver does it…
Valencia – unsportive move blocking the Ferraris behind the safety car intentionally, then Whiting waiting over 20 laps for penalty – DELAYED PENALTY (on purpose??)
He must referr to himself when saying that races have been manipulated in previous years. Some video footage:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwm4iqWS8v0&feature=fvw
Jack Holt
19th November 2010, 16:37
Cheer up chemakal, here’s a better video –
Sean
19th November 2010, 16:41
Unfortunately, four weak examples don’t add up to one strong one.
Breaking the rules three times in Canada, I like that one.
Ricky Bobby
19th November 2010, 18:05
Of course, so that it would be inefective.
Even if it took risking the life of the steward who took the bottle from the track. A SC would have converted the penalty in an effective one, so it was out of the question.
Anthony
19th November 2010, 18:54
Malaysia – Weaving to avoid Petrov passing, changing direction 4 times (2 times max allowed) – NO PENALTY (Changing direction is not allowed more than 2 times ONLY if the driver behind is going to pass… braking a tow is not forbidden)
China – Racing alongside (on the wrong side) Vettel in the pits. Lucky no crew was nearby – NO PENALTY (Vettel was pushing him to that side, see the footage again)
Canada – brakings the rules 3 times: getting off a running car in the track-pushing the car (THERE’s NOT A RULE BLOCKING IT), not arriving in time to verification area (WHERE’S THE RULE?), no petrol to be inspected (that was his only pole position 2010) (HE TURNED THE ENGINE OFF TO LEAVE ENOUGH FUEL TO BE INSPECTED) – ECONOMIC PENALTY, but from now on if an other driver does it…
Valencia – unsportive move blocking the Ferraris behind the safety car intentionally, then Whiting waiting over 20 laps for penalty – DELAYED PENALTY (on purpose??)
Sean
19th November 2010, 20:03
These claims are so clutching at straws it’s sad to see.
Regarding Valencia, you need to get your facts straight, and get over yourself. It was not “over 20 laps” for the penalty to be imposed. It was actually 11. That is, 7 to start the investigation and 4 to issue the penalty. “Over 20” was a false claim made by Alonso, who by this time had completely lost his composure (and even got passed by a Sauber for position, the poor thing). Check the facts here:
http://www.yallaf1.com/2010/06/29/report-whiting-made-right-calls-in-valencia/
And the reason it took as long as 11 was that Whiting was dealing with a slightly unusual situation where an F1 car had done a backwards somersault at 150+ and landed upside down, before skewering the barriers, still at high speed. He also had to wait for the helicopter footage to arrive for review of the LH incident, because the Hamilton onboard was inconclusive (which might just be why LH himself was not sure if he had beaten the SC to the line or not). Not that I expect any of this to mean anything in your world of victimization and conspiracy.
I have been critical of Whiting for various things (I actually worked with him once doing the pitlane LAVAG testing, at Spa in 1997, he seemed a sincere and reasonable guy at least), but in this case I’m only glad that he was doing his job rather than some rabid Ferrari fan who can only see one thing.
Further, the idea that Hamilton cunningly co-ordinated the whole thing to intentionally put the SC between him and his pursuers is laughable, first from his onboard, and then from the helicopter shot (at the 52s point on this video):
https://www.racefans.net/2010/06/28/did-hamilton-try-to-stop-alonso-getting-in-front-of-the-safety-car-video/
You accuse him of being “unsporting” (unlike Hockenheim 2010, I guess), asserting clear intent, and I can only say that if that was planned on his part (missing the SC cut-off line by a miniscule time margin, a couple of meters in distance, and presumably safe in the knowledge of how long it would take Whiting to stabilize the situation and knowing what kind of penalty he would issue), then the man is an absolutely frightening genius of monster (actually supernatural) proportions, and we should all be simply in awe of him. Actually we should probably grab the garlic and a stake or two.
Of course the truth is that a ton of things were going on and there was a lot of luck involved. LH was actually unlucky to miss the SC cut-off by a tiny margin (Vettel was already gone, of course, and if he’d kept his foot in it he’d have had time to spare) but even luckier to have enough laps to put distance to 3rd place before taking the penalty, so he could maintain position, just like Rosberg had done earlier in Singapore. Alonso was just unlucky to catch the SC when he did. One of the reasons I dislike SC interventions is because it always penalizes someone and helps someone else, but if you’re going to have them then you can’t argue that Webber’s crash, probably the biggest of the season, was not cause to deploy it.
More intelligent commentary on the matter here:
http://www.pitpass.com/fes_php/pitpass_feature_item.php?fes_art_id=41275
Overall, through the course of the season, Alonso was not especially unlucky – for example, two of his wins came as the direct result of mechanical failures for Vettel, and he got away with 7 points for the sham in Germany. Neither was Hamilton especially lucky, having his wheel fail so close to the end in Barcelona, his gearbox fail in Hungary, or being hit twice by Webber (Australia and Singapore) only for Webber to continue and score points but for LH to DNF on both occasions. You’re warping the truth and writing a revisionist history when you take things that are just luck and ascribing more sinister motives to them.
kubi
19th November 2010, 23:23
it took 17 laps from hamilton to serve his penalty. you can argue that 5 of them were under safety car from 11th to 15th which is even worse for charlie and stewards to delay the decision till lap 25 because for 5 laps the pace was slow and they could review the tape much faster than they did starting the investigation as soon as it happened the incident between webber and kovi happened at L10 hamilton served his drive through at L28. so there is no seven to start the investigation and 4 to issue it (I don’t think you can separate the starting of the investigation with the issuing of the penalty) but are 15 laps to start the investigation and issue the penalty the penalty and 3 laps which hamilton had to serve it.
just to get the facts straight as you said
Jack Holt
19th November 2010, 16:37
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpo8RDyOEWY&feature=related
kpcart
19th November 2010, 19:16
Well Hamilton should be more greatful for being given a free ride into the top echelons of motorsport from his junior years. He has always had the best equipment and has hardly had to work for anything in his life. I saw the incidents in the last race of the season, cutting dangerously and arrogantly infront of Bruno Senna to get into the pits in a practise session, and then driving offline in qualifying giving Massa the impression he is being let past… only for Hamilton to almost cause an incident and then arrogantly speaking over the radio that Massa tried to taking him off? and he got off for both those incidents, when realistically he should have got demoted on the grid for both, so i dont know what the hell he is talking about. Nothing has been manipulated before, only he has manipulated to lose the championship by having 4 incidens at the end of the season, crashing out of the championship lead in race race he should have won (monza) and crashing in singapore, then making 2 identical mistakes in 2 races (losing it under brakes when pressure by Alosno in final 2 races). That and bad strategy on his part at the start of the season. He sounds like a sore loser looking for someone to blame. With Redbulls errors he could have won the championship this year, but team errors aside, Hamilton had the most driver errors of anyone, and also got of from being punished by stewards many times, so he should be looking and assessing himself before judging the stewards.
Sean
19th November 2010, 20:29
Content-free rant.
Yes, I’m sure you work harder than Lewis “has hardly had to work for anything in his life” Hamilton, which is why you’re sitting on your rear end, criticizing his work ethic, while he’s a top F1 driver and WDC. I guess McLaren keeps him on the payroll for charitable reasons, then.
Alonso crashed at Monaco and started 20-somethingth, jumped the start in China, walked into a costly and easily avoidable penalty at Silverstone and crashed out at Spa in probably the simplest unforced error of the season (he wasn’t even racing anyone at the time).
Vettel crashed into Webber in Turkey, into Button at Spa and threw the win away in Hungary by not knowing the SC rules.
Webber simply harpooned Hamilton from behind in Melbourne, after going off earlier at turn 3 trying to do the same thing and handing the position to Massa, threw the win away by binning it in Korea, hit the back of Kovalainen in Valencia, causing the most spectacular accident of the year, hit Hamilton again after being passed by him in Singapore and shared no small part of the blame for the collision with Vettel in Turkey.
The truth is that ALL the leading drivers made errors this year, and they were really serious errors in several cases. Taking cases like HAM losing a position to Alonso in Korea while racing (where was Button in Korea, in the same car, or in Brazil for that matter?) and then saying “Hamilton had the most driver errors of anyone” is just wish fulfillment on your part, and way wide of the mark. It’s simply not true.
DaveW
19th November 2010, 21:35
That is what was so awesome about this season, looking back, basically every screw up and every time a steward scratched his nose, could have decided a championship position. The pressure on these guys was immense; they had to avoid any mistake at all, but also seize every possible advantage that would not be punished. And then if they drop a tenth or two in their performances in qualifying or over do an in lap people are straight on their case. Overall, we saw very consistent and excellent performance from these guys performing at the absolute limit.
Sean
19th November 2010, 22:27
DaveW – agreed. It was an epic year.
I think you sum up something I’ve been mulling over, which is *why* all the leading drivers made significant errors this year, several in some cases.
I have been wondering, is it because teams are hiring younger and younger drivers? Is it because they can’t test outside a simulator? Is it the result of no traction control or driver aids? Is it because we had more wet races this year? I think these might all be factors, though the older guys like Webber still bin it just as often, it seems (Button made fewer errors, and drove more conservatively, but finished even further adrift of his team mate overall). But I think the sheer competitiveness is the key, as you said. Look at Abu Dhabi qualifying, Webber was half a second off and it was like the ground had opened up and swallowed him. I loved the turbo era, the Senna/ Prost era and the mid-70s, but I don’t think being half a second off usually had such severe consequences (Prost might be half a second off Senna and still start on the front row, for example) and I think you’re right about how important tenths have become.
I’ve also been willing to cut Alonso and Hamilton some slack in this context, because they were chasing two blue things that were often just in a different league on pace. Arguably Vettel and Webber should have done better (though they weren’t helping each other) but if you were among their pursuers, it really was **** or bust, all year. This is why I think that saying, for example, LH cost himself the WDC by making contact with Massa at Monza or letting Alonso get by in Brazil is just wrong. If he hadn’t been going flat out all the time, he wouldn’t have been in the hunt in the first place. It’s an environment where you have to drive out of your skin or be eaten alive.
When you add the competitive situation to the fact that we are now rid of Mosley and all his divide-and-conquer machinations, it makes me a very happy F1 fan.
ecclestoned
20th November 2010, 9:09
“I miss Kimi sooooo much… i hope he comes back in the future.”
And I miss Michael Schumacher.No, of course not this one,the previous one!
The one they had to black flag in Silverstone and disqualify for 2 more later races(after some Babylonic confusion between the Benneton pits and the stewards) for twice overtaking some driver(forgot his name)in the warming lap,because he had won 6 out of the 7 previous races and finished 2nd in the other race being stuck in fifth gear during 2 pit stops and most of the race.The stewards also disqualified his win in Francorchamps when they saw his wooden plank was overly scratched.Besides, what’s up with this wooden plank now?do they still watch it?Can’t remember having heard it being mentioned in the last 10 years.I know it has to be in 1 piece, 1000 mm long and 5 mm thick.
At least in those days the regulators could lift a racer out of the game for 4 races to get everything exciting again.And excitement they provided back then in 1994.Hell, Schumi even had to torpedo this driver(keep forgetting his name)in the very last race to safeguard his first WDC!
Stefanauss
20th November 2010, 15:57
I honestly think that when Kimi is focused and motivated is the faster on the grid.
Yes, maybe the above description is enough to say that he is not a true champion, but it is enough for me to say: yes, i still miss him and not let my hopes that he will come back.
kpcart
21st November 2010, 5:10
@sean. the concrete wall part is not that relevent, what is relevent is hamilton did not make the corner, and then used that as an advantage to repass kimi. im not a supporter of either driver, but you obviously are of hamilton. hamilton needed to give more space back, not pull straight back into the slipstream, because if he had made the corner, he would not have been that close in the slipstream to pass into turn 1.
I dont care about the other kimi incident, as that is not the incident i am talkling about, but to comment on that one, i dont think a punishment was needed there, because it was an anomoly that he gained time (although its not proven he did), as usually you go slower off the racing line, and it wasnt a short cut like hamiltons, infact it was a longcut.
Jack Holt
21st November 2010, 11:51
The stewards decision was ridiculous, do we really want them splitting hairs to that extent? Raikkonen squeezed Hamilton off track, Hamilton overtook and then gave the position back, as they crossed the line Raikkonen was ahead and faster than Hamilton. It was 50-50 in my view, once the stewards are getting into hypotheticals such as “well he didn’t break the rules, but would he have been further behind if he’d not cut the chicane” then most F1 races will end up in the courtroom.
Spa 2008 was probably the most exciting race finish I can remember, that’s what I want to see when I tune in to races.
Stefanauss
21st November 2010, 12:42
Hamilton started that lap 1-1.5 cars behind Raikkonen and finished that half a car behind Raikkonen. Do you know what that means? His laptime was *faster* than Raikkonen’s. He was in a track position he wasn’t supposed to be. He achieved that faster laptime by cutting the chicane. When you do that in qualifying, your laptime get canceled. If you cut the last chicane, your next laptime get canceled.
The “No Overtaking @ Next Corner” Rule followed by that episode is merely an extension of this.
Jack Holt
21st November 2010, 13:39
Perhaps his lap time was quicker because he was quicker than Raikkonen? That’s how it seemed to me.
But even so, I don’t think the sport ought to go down that path, wheel-to-wheel racing as at Spa 2008 should be encouraged, not penalised because of such nebulous concepts as hypothetical degrees of advantage. Do you really want every cut chicane and conceded position to be followed by an inquest on relative advantage? It sounds a bit tedious to me.
kpcart
21st November 2010, 16:36
oh dear… the likes of @Jack Holt. god dammit, kimi didnt sqeauze him he had the racing line and used it to block the pass attempt!! nothing malicious in it!! hamilton put himself in that position, and had to cut the chicane to make the turn! its so easy to understand, why cant you! then hamilton DID NOT give enough position back to kimi, he just placed his car in the slipstream which made another pass attempt not within the spirit of the sport and not within the rules, and as such was punished justifiably. People are so blinded when defending their favourite drivers. Either way Hamilton proved in 2007 and again this year that he needs no steward interference to LOSE a championship. He is greatfull for this year because he would have lost it by far more then he did!
Stefanauss
21st November 2010, 17:12
Of course he was quicker than Raikkonen. Just, he was on a different, shorter track.
And yes, i do want that, really, because i want overtaking moves to be done *on the track*.
And the encouraging part is non-sense. They are racing drivers, if they need to be encouraged to do wheel-to-wheel racing, allowing them to cut corners they are supposed to drive around, they also need to find another job.
Sean
21st November 2010, 18:10
Regarding Kimi’s “long cut”, kp, that one is really easy. As they’ll tell you in even the saddest racing school, the shortest route is a fundamentally different thing from the quickest one, which is why there’s such a thing as the racing line.
To take one example, at Magny Cours drivers were penalized if they put all 4 wheels off track at the exit of the final chicane, for the exact reason that a wider exit line meant they could exit faster and so gain an advantage *while off track*. I believe Bruno Senna lost a high grid position for the GP2 race for that exact reason. Nobody claimed that the wider exit was slower or no advantage, on the basis that it was wider and therefore a “longer” route. This argument is completely bogus.
Drivers take the longest route possible at every corner exit which is why you see them using the kerbs coming onto straights. Where the track is wider they take an even longer route. Simple.
In Kimi’s case in 09, he gained more than one position *while off track*. As I recall, he was 5th before he left the circuit and was 3rd, with a momentum run for 2nd when he rejoined. It was blatant and it made a hollow mockery of the hair splitting garbage that came out of all your mouths after Spa 08. If you were to call Kimi’s case as illegitimate on the basis that he very obviously gained both time and position by going off track, then at least you would have some platform of credibility when you spout off about HAM at the chicane. You accuse other people of fandom and bias, but here you want to have your cake and eat it, and you have undermined your entire position on ’08.
Sean
21st November 2010, 18:46
Stefanauss – oh, boy. Really? Is that seriously your argument?
if LH started the lap 1-1.5s behind KR, as you say he did, and yet they were at least side-by-side in the braking area (as I guess you would not deny they were) BEFORE KR’s hip check and LH’s chicane-cut (in other words, before the question of whether and to what degree LH conceded the position on the pit straight even became a question), then on what basis can you possibly argue that the lap time advantage came from cutting the chicane?
You know, there’s the small matter of their performance disparity through La Source, Eau Rouge and Kemmel, Malmedy, Rivage, Pouhon, Fagnes, Stavelot and Blanchimont to consider here. You know, corners, at racing speed, in wet weather, on the longest lap on the F1 calendar.
When you say things like “he was in a track position he wasn’t supposed to be”, it’s almost as if you believe that if you start a lap and gain a second or more on someone over a 4.3-mile lap, then you have cheated somehow. That you are duty-bound to hold position and keep a respectable gap to the guy in front of you.
LH was plain quicker, pure and simple, as everybody saw. Yours is one the worst arguments I’ve seen on this topic, and I’ve seen some really terrible ones.
Stefanauss
22nd November 2010, 0:57
Sean, are you kidding me? Seriously, did you even read what you’re replying to?
I clearly said Lewis Hamilton was 1-1.5 CARS (as in car length) behind Kimi Raikkonen, not 1-1.5 seconds (which means ~40 CARS, assuming an average speed of 150 kph in the final Spa segment).
LH was plain quicker is clearly a statement about his global speed during the slippery-track final stage of the GP. I never tried to denied that, never tried to say KR deserved to win, nothing similar. It has nothing to do with the episode we are discussing.
If LH had not cut the chicane he would never have been in the position he found himself on the straight, ready to attack at the next corner. If he had drove around the chicane, after failing the pass attempt and thus far away from the optimal exit path, he would never have been able to go full throttle that early. He would have fallen from 0 cars gap in the chicane attempted pass, to at least the same gap of the previous lap.
I hope it is now clear.
Sean
22nd November 2010, 3:32
Sorry, but your argument, as written, was bunk whether it’s car lengths or seconds you’re measuring the gap with.
Here’s what you said:
“Hamilton started that lap 1-1.5 cars behind Raikkonen and finished that half a car behind Raikkonen. Do you know what that means? His laptime was *faster* than Raikkonen’s. He was in a track position he wasn’t supposed to be. He achieved that faster laptime by cutting the chicane”.
The claim that whatever gain (time or distance) LH made on his laptime (your word) was the result of cutting the chicane, rather than in their speed difference over the 4.3 mile lap, was a ridiculous claim. It’s signal vs. noise. That’s all.
To your revised point, I fully understand the argument that had LH backed off at some arbitrary point in the dogfight and followed KR through the chicane, then he *might* have crossed the line further behind the Ferrari than he did. But then again he *might* not have done. It’s a purely speculative claim, either way. They *might* have crossed the line side by side, or closer than they did on either lap, or with precisely the same gap as they did. Neither you, I nor the stewards has any way of knowing, and this is the key point. Since they seemed to be enjoying very different, and varying, grip levels at this point, as evidenced by the ease with which LH outbraked him into La Source, then it’s entirely possible that LH would have made exactly the same move down into La Source anyway, but I don’t need to prove that that *would* have been the case, in arguing against the fairness of the penalty. For the penalty to be fair, you have to show beyond reasonable doubt that he made a clear gain, and you can’t do that, and the stewards couldn’t do that. Put simply, LH was zero car lengths behind KR at the turn-in point, and yet was fully behind the Ferrari after KR regained the position, AND going more slowly (by definition, otherwise he couldn’t have given the position back). No gain. Then KR went and binned it anyway.
In the event, what kind of passage LH would or might have had through the chicane was rendered a moot point, because KR drove deep into it, he actually took a more aggressive line to the left of the track than you would normally take, and hip-checked LH off the road. Nothing wrong with that, it’s part of racing, but there’s nothing wrong with what LH did either. He gave back the place and carried on racing. Everything was fine until Mosley stepped in, through Alan Donnelly, took away a fair win and handed it to his chief rival for the WDC.
Sean
22nd November 2010, 3:52
Oh, and the fact that McLaren even went to Whiting to make sure the move was OK, and he confirmed that it was, and the stewards (sorry, I keep saying stewards, I mean Donnelly of course, who we know led the whole thing) took none of this into account, before Mosley told us that Whiting’s word has no weight in such a case and they shouldn’t listen to him, was just the salt in the wound. Later, in Japan, LH missed his braking point at turn 1, something many drivers have done over the years, and he paid the price, by running wide and losing places. Again, no harm, no foul, silly Lewis, pure racing risk and reward. But they slapped him with a penalty for that one, too, didn’t they? Both cases were unprecedented in F1, with no equivalent, before or since.
It should be clear from my earlier comments, that this is not just a partisan rant. I argued against the treatment in 2006 of Alonso and Renault, neither of whom I have any particular regard for (I rather dislike Alonso, and share most peoples’ view of Briatore). It was corrupt, and F1 under Mosley really was a horror.
Stefanauss
22nd November 2010, 6:50
Sean, i don’t know why you’re feeling the need to show your unbiased comment records, i didn’t say anywhere you’re a LH-fanatic or something.
Also, don’t know what Alonso, Renault, Whiting, Donnely, Briatore, Japan, has to do with this.
First, i want to answer you specifically.
All of your *might*s are completely misplaced. The gain doesn’t lie there. You said it yourself: LH was at 0 car lenghts behind KR at the turn-in point and then he had the same distance gap at the breaking point of La Source. But they both were running at totally different speed. More than 2.5x the speed in the last corner. It’s elementary Physics that it makes a *massive* time gain for LH. This is not speculation, it’s fact.
And then, the only thing LH did beetween the two 0-car-lenghts stages of this controversial move was cutting the chicane and accelerate while being off-track, before slowing down by an arbitrary (and WRONG!) amount. There is no way LH could have gained this time legitimately: he was in front of KR after the cut (massive time-gaining!), then trying to let KR in front to the least possible extent (while both massively increasing their speed, meaning he was losing his gained time at too much slower rate than he should have!) and then breaking in the exact moment KR was fully in front again (gained-time it’s still almost completely there! too late Lewis!)
The gain is there, and it’s not speculative.
You’re right that it was unprecedented.
Do you know why is that? Because it’s impossible for a driver to give position/gain completely back and still be able to overtake again at the very next corner.
Before and since, i only ever saw driver gave the position in a perfectly clear way. That’s the point in giving the position back, you do it clearly, to prove you didn’t get advantage and avoid the penalty. The only subtle move of this kind i saw was by LH. But the fact that it was unprecented does not mean the penalty was unfair or that the whole thing should have been overlooked. The rule was there already, no gain allowed. The stewards, or whoever took the decision whether or not Lewis gained something, took the right decision to me.
Jack Holt
22nd November 2010, 7:16
They didn’t have the same distance at “the braking point” to La Source, they had totally different braking points; Raikkonen crossed the line a car length ahead of Hamilton and pulling away, but he braked much earlier than Hamilton into the first corner. No amount of off-the-top-of-the-head statistics and spurious claims to “elementary physics” is going to change that.
I asked you a question earlier: Do you really want every cut chicane and conceded position to be followed by an inquest on relative advantage? It sounds a bit tedious to me. Thank you for answering it, even if in a somewhat roundabout manner!
Stefanauss
22nd November 2010, 7:54
Sorry for not answering directly Sean, i was in a previous message draft but then deleted for some reason. I thought it was somewhat rethorical.
I’ll do it more clearly now if you let me: there is no need to. It was just Lewis who adopted this abnormal conduct, and it didn’t require me such an inquest to address that. Nor the stewards.
Beside the fact that KR was a car ahead while crossing the line is false (just take a video and grab the frame), the pulling away was not enough, not even close to that, and here is the problem. I clearly stated why is that before, but you seem to ignore it, probably because you’re too bored with notions like speed, distance and time. Which is kinda funny for a motorsport fan.
And again, there is no point in talking to me about how good was LH in outbreaking KR, i have never said anything about the actual overtake move and the fact that “spurios claims” (funny description for physics) i made before “are not going to change that” is meaningless, because they were never meant to.
All i ever questioned about was LH unlegitimate track position. He did the move starting from this unlegitimate position, thus the whole move is flawed and deserved the penalty.
Jack Holt
22nd November 2010, 9:09
Stefan, I’m not Sean (though he does seem to talk a lot of sense) and I’m not claiming that Hamilton made a super-special out-braking move into T1 – Raikkonen braked incredibly early into La Source, just like he braked incredibly early into the last chicane because he had NO grip. Here’s the only video I’ve got of the fight –
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FzNZSaKOsQ
– as they cross the start line Hamilton is either completely behind Raikkonen, or overlapping by no more than a few inches.
Or bored with people dressing up conjecture as fact.
And yet it did require the stewards, followed by an inquest in which they ‘reinterpreted’ or ‘clarified’ the rules and changed the race result retrospectively. That’s what happens when you go from a rule that says give the place back to one which says return the same degree of advantage, people break out the telemetry and the freeze frames and race results are altered days after the chequered flag. I don’t reckon that represents a step forward for the sport.
Stefanauss
22nd November 2010, 11:14
Jack Holt, sorry i mistook you for another commenter. Please excuse me. My excuses goes also to Sean.
It is a complete wheel at least. Either way, it’s not “fully behind” or “a car behind”.
Yet again, why do you keep talking about KR early braking or lack of grip? How these two factors have influenced LH track position on the straight compared to KR’s exactly, which is all i’m arguing about?
Gaining time is an advantage.
I’m not conjecturing such advantage. I showed you how and why this is an advantage.
If you think i haven’t, tell me which conjecture i introduced as a fact.
It took about an hour and a half for the stewards to ratify what has been clear to me (and them of course, given they started the breach procedure) since the very beginning. LH cut the chicane and gained an advantage. Almost every post-race decision took approx. this time to arrive, often more than that, so it was a relatively easy decision to take. I was referring to that, to the easiness of establishing the advantage took by LH when i said i wouldn’t call it “such an inquest”. Of course then McLaren appealed, and freeze frames and telemetry dance started.
You, and BasCB, seems to be surprised rules get interpreted and clarified, when this happens every year, both on technical and sporting side.
It’s always a shame when results are altered days after the race, or even hours, but if i think some rule was broken, either in the letter on in the spirit, then it’s obvious for me to think it’s better altering than leaving as it is.
It is correct when you say that the rule has been modified to INCLUDE (not to fit) that case, because previously there was no mention about gaining an advantage in the International Sporting Code, but it’s like you’re trying to say it’s an entirely different rule or it’s a wrong rule. Drivers must race on track all time doesn’t have to me genetically modified to deduce it’s there for a reason and that an advantage is not allowed to be gained running off the track.
@ BasCB
I don’t feel i’m crusading anything. We are debating, aren’t we?
I watched the video many times. 6 months before, 5,4,3,2,1, today before replying. It’s one of my fav on YT, because i feel the same way about the amazing battle. Maybe the only different is that i saw both a great battle and a pending penalty going on.
Never disputed that, never mentioned the horrible year for the stewards, i agree with all of these things. My only point is that this particular penalty is deserved.
BasCB (@bascb)
22nd November 2010, 10:27
Sorry to join into your crusade Stefanauss (and kpcart) but please have a look at the video Jack Holt includes in his post and then read on here.
Done?
This excellently captures, what is going on on track and why I strongly feel it was a very bad stewarding call to punish Lewis Hamilton here. I will try to sum up why:
1. We saw an amazing battle on track by Lewis and Kimi. Both went to the wire to get ahead, and both went off track at different moments in time.
Ultimately Kimi dropped it after being long past Lewis and Lewis did not gain any advantage in the race from the whole thing.
2. Looking back, we expect this to be punished, but that is because the rule was reinterpreted after the penalty to make the penalty fit a crime. Watching it at the time I saw nothing except a great battle going on (later marred by the penalty).
3. This penalty was one of a whole range of bogey penalties in the same year, a lot of them hurting Lewis, some even handing Massa an undeserved advantage (Bourdais penalty). Therefore I can see why Lewis states he is happy to have better stewarding.
Therefore I am very glad the stewarding is starting to get back to normal, with penalties handed for obvious cases (Schumi pushing Rubens, Alonso not handing back the place kept to Kubica, Heidfeld holding up Rosberg in Brazil, …), but letting the drivers fight it out on track.
An interesting point made above in the comments is, that Hamilton is commenting not on Spa 08, but having a dig at Ferrari’s comments after Valencia. That makes sense as it is your genuine psych battle going on between the drivers.
Jack Holt
22nd November 2010, 13:30
@ stefanauss
You can’t say Hamilton gained time, because you don’t know how far back he’d been if he’d followed Raikkonen (who had no grip, remember) around the corner. Would he have been so far back that he’d not have been able to challenge for the first corner? Who knows? We can only offer conjecture.
Hamilton was overlapping Raikkonen when he was squeezed off track, he was perfectly within his rights to take to the escape road in order to avoid a collision, as long as he gave the place back – which he did.
As they crossed the start line Hamilton was behind and slower than Raikkonen, that should have sufficed – certainly Charlie Whiting thought it did – it was Raikkonen’s inability to brake which cost him the corner: Raikkonen had the advantage into La Source, he just didn’t have the grip.
And that’s why Raikkonen’s grip and braking point are important, because we can’t say with any confidence that had Hamilton followed him around the corner the outcome would have been any different; perhaps in a dry race, but not at Spa in the rain, when the performance differential between the two cars was so enormous.
It should have all been rendered moot anyway, after Hamilton took to the grass to avoid Rosberg he handed Raikkonen a huge advantage which was almost immediately squandered when the Ferrari driver span, resumed and then crashed. In the light of all that, continuing to conjecture about a possible time advantage in the run to La Source seems perverse.
Stefanauss
22nd November 2010, 17:57
I can say LH gained time, because i don’t need to glance at the parallel universe where LH and KR both did the corner to say so. I was never taking that into account and conjecturing about what their position, path line, behaviours, etc. could have been. This is for two reason:
1) Penalties are not awarded because of something a driver could have done. They are because of what has actually happened, and LH gained time to KR comparing to their last, actual, on-track position.
2) From the moment LH runs off track to the breaking point of La Source, he never had again the previous gap (in time) to KR, he was always, in every moment closer to KR. Yes, he was slightly behind KR on the finish line; Yes, he was slightly slower; Yes, he was completely behind KR at the breaking point; No, this does not suffice at all. Their mutual positions being restored just prior to La Source hide the massive time gaining LH achieved and maintened pretty much intact in the run to La Source, as i explained earlier. This is no conjecture, it’s not based of what could have happened, does not need to take grip level into account, breaking point, let alone the spins and nearly-crashes/crashes LH or KR had 4 kms after. It’s there for anyone willing to see it.
Previously and since LH move, any other driver i saw cutting the chicane while attempting to overtake and then giving back position, whether at the next corner or a few more corners later, he followed his competitor through at least another corner. In doing so, the situation prior to the overtaking attempt is completely restored, without any reasonable doubt.
If LH had followed KR though La Source, an even slower turn than the chicane, situation would have been clearly, definitely restored even if he kept his advantage in the run to La Source, because it would have mean he didn’t use that advantage and then that advantage would have been gone for good. But he did, attempting to overtake KR while being closer than he should have been. And this is why this particular (please, stop fussing about how many poor decisions stewards took in 2008 like it were an evidence that this particular decision was wrong) penalty is fair to me.
Jack Holt
23rd November 2010, 7:15
Simply untrue. The video shows that Hamilton is halfway alongside Raikkonen when the Ferrari driver begins to squeeze him off track and he’s still overlapping Raikkonen’s rear wheel when he cuts the chicane. Although he emerges out ahead of Raikkonen it is clear that he cedes at least this much advantage.
Irrelevant. Most times when you give back a position you don’t have an opportunity to counter-attack. On this occasion Raikkonen was so slow Hamilton had a chance to get the position back. There was nothing in the rulebook to prohibit Hamilton for challenging Raikkonen a La Source, and the idea that he’d have to queue behind Raikkonen while the Finn struggled around the corner is ridiculous, what if there had been another car on their tail, would that car be given carte blanche to overtake the pair of them while Hamilton dutifully waited for Kimi? What a nonsense!
One can’t go around rewriting the rulebook after the event because their favourite driver didn’t win, that’s just farcical. Even worse you’re asking drivers to show the etiquette of ballroom dancers, I prefer my racing to be just like we saw at Spa – drivers at and over the limit, pushing the rules but not breaking them. They certainly shouldn’t be punished by rules which are drafted after the event.
Stefanauss
23rd November 2010, 12:03
This is NOT about position. NEVER been. Stewards didn’t punish Hamilton because he had not given the position back, they punished him because he gained an advantage (as clearly stated in FIA documents, read them in the case you haven’t), and he USED IT. Oh boy, if he used it.
Ok, that’s it. I’ve been hoping it wouldn’t eventually get to this, but i’ll show you the math. You can snort now if you want, fine, but this is a freakin’ scientific sport TOO, cars, strategy, it’s part of the game.
DATA: http://www.racecar-engineering.com/imageBank/s/spa2.jpg
KR-LH DISTANCE @ LAST CORNER: Slightly overlapping, which means ~1 car, which means 4m.
ESTIMATED SPEED @ LAST CORNER: Given they both ran wide because they were fighting, 60 kph.
GAP: 4/(60000/60/60) = 0.240s
KR-LH DISTANCE @ BREAKING POINT OF LA SOURCE: a car plus a 1/4? Let’s say 6m.
ESTIMATED SPEED @ BREAKING POINT OF LA SOURCE: 250kph, highly underestimated.
GAP: 6/(250000/60/60) = 0.086s
2/3 of the gap is gone, and guess what? LH was even going SLOWER, by definition, because he gave back position. Thus, he gained so much time, and the only thing he did to actually gain something was cutting the chicane, which is not something you can gain time with. What if Hamilton had not gained anything from his manoeuvre? What the distance should have been at the last point he could still have decided not to use his advantage, La Source breaking point?
0.240x(250000/60/60)= 16.7m, 3 cars beetwen them!
Then LH decided to overtake. In doing so, he also made use of the closer he got to KR because of his cut.
Would LH have succeded in overtaking KR anyway, even being 10m further away?
Would LH have been as close as he was to KR if he hadn’t cut the chicane?
_This_ is completely non-relevant. It DIDN’T HAPPEN. It’s totally in the range of possibility: it may have been; it may have not been. Completely useless in determining the fairness of the move.
There is no “most times”. It was just this time. Unprecedented and unrepeated.
The other car argument is irrelevant too, because had another car been present on LH tail, LH would have gain an advantage to the third car too, in defending himself.
This is total rubbish, just for the sake of implying “i truly love racing, you don’t” because i want LH penalised. You’re failing to understand that we want exactly the same thing, the only difference being that i think a RULE WAS BROKEN. Not pushed, broken.
And here we are to the Rewriting The Book part. We all previously agreed the rule was “clarified”, “interpreted” or “rewritten” (as one wishes) to “include” or “fit” the case (as one wishes).
The bits of ink this case has led to are “Should a car leave the track for any reason, [..], the driver may rejoin. However, this may only be done when it is safe to do so and without gaining any advantage”. Nowhere, EVEN NOW, there is a rule which states drivers must wait one further corner after cutting a chicane while attempting to overtake before attempting another overtaking manoeuvre.. This was merely a clarification by the FIA that doing otherwise represents an advantage.
So no rules have been ADDED.
So the points is: Did LH break the regulations then in force?
He did not? Then it means the rules back then allowed a driver to gain as much advantage as he wished by running off-track. Which is plain ridicolous to argue.
Nowhere in the Sporting Rules, in the Sporting Code, and in the Driver Code of Conduct is said the driver has to give back position or wait to overtake or anything similar. Both NOW and then. It’s always come down to “not gain any advantage”, which is something trivially obvious. The only difference is it is now stated outright. Which means the rules have been CLARIFIED.
Stewards has not invented any rule. Even if they were biased against LH as you seem to say, they did not need to rewrite/draft anything to punish him. They just gave their answer to the question: has LH got an advantage?
Which is all it has to be analysed about, even if you want to show how biased and eager to penalised LH the federation was, start by explaining how LH did not get any advantage. Because drivers have never been allowed to do so, before, during and after 2008 Belgian GP, under any set of rules ever in force, rewritten or clarified, it doesn’t matter.
Jack Holt
23rd November 2010, 12:34
Unfortunately for you, asking drivers to do those kinds of calculations is unrealistic: they can’t accurately measure their distance to the other car nor ascertain the speed of each car. Hamilton wouldn’t have known he gained 0.16s, nor would his team. And nor would racecar-engineering.com, without spending several hours analysing data. You’re living in a fantasy world if you think it’s practical to apply such calculations whenever someone cuts a chicane, and the idea that racing should be regulated to such heights of prissiness appals me.
Some people watch F1 for the spectacle and others watch to see their favourite driver win and feel miffed if he doesn’t, I guess you’re in the latter camp. This is my last post on the subject, I think we’ve beaten it into the ground.
Sean
22nd November 2010, 14:34
I have nothing much else to add to this and I think Jack and BasCB have done a good job of stating the case (thanks BasCB for reminding me about Bourdais getting the penalty in Japan that Massa should clearly have got for driving into him, another grotesque call; context IS relevant, as always, when you’re looking at the pattern and one-way nature of the rulings). But w.r.t. this question of where they were *as they crossed the line*, I’m wondering why we are talking about this? What is so special about the start-finish line? It’s an arbitrary point on the circuit and what matters is whether LH gave back the place, which he clearly did, because he ducked fully behind the other car and was going slower.
Another way of putting it is that when Alonso passed another car on the grass at Club corner at Silverstone this year, nobody made reference to where they were w.r.t. each other as they crossed the start/ finish line, to determine whether he had conceded the advantage or not. It’s a small point but I don’t want to get hung up on what the gap/ overlap was at the line, surely it’s irrelevant in and of itself?
Jack Holt
22nd November 2010, 15:33
B
Sean, you’re probably right – I was hoping to show that Hamilton was behind and slower while they were still in an acceleration zone, but then got sidetracked into debating the positions of the two cars as they crossed the line!
As well as the absurd penalty for Bourdais I seem to remember Massa escaping punishment for an unsafe release at Valencia… which, due to my aversion of interfering stewards I was very glad of at the time, but which with hindsight appears yet another dodgy decision to favour Ferrari. The stewarding for so bad in 2008 that even Heidfeld spoke out against it, and he could hardly be described as confrontational!
Stefanauss
23rd November 2010, 18:40
Oh. We moved from “LH got no advantage” to “LH couldn’t possibly have known”. How about that.
I live in such a fantasy world that I knew straight away a penalty was pending, without the need of any of the calculations that appals you. It took just some basic logic to grasp where the advantage lies, and 100x that time just to write it down here in the comments.
If everyone wouln’t possibly have known, i wonder why McLaren felt the need to immediately ask if the move was ok; shame they were told wrong. It would have been so difficult to analyse the situation that it took Race Direction just 2h (LH move 15:21; Penalty 17:35) to award the penalty, which was basically the time to call and hear from LH, KR, and team managers; a procedure they immediately started, since what happened was crystal clear, if i recall correctly they didn’t even ask for telemetry datas.
No other driver but LH ever tried sippping back the position they took after cutting a chicane in order to grant themselves an overtaking opportunity at the next corner after giving back position, which is something they could always be able to try, not being mandatory to give it back immediately. Either LH is smarter then the hundreds drivers who gave back a position after a cut, or they know what LH couldn’t have realistically know.
I was counting down to this.
You’re right. You’re guessing. Pretty much everything you did up until now.
Sean
24th November 2010, 15:22
Stefanauss,
Since you persist with the pedantry about this…
Do you agree that Kimi gained a clear advantage by leaving the circuit at the start at Spa in 2009, yet escaped censure for it, allowing him to take that win over Fisichella by the narrowest of margins? And that others have done the same thing also without censure (for example Sutil on Badoer at Pouhon in the same race)?
The very least I expect from someone still claiming to know the unknowable about Spa 08 (your attempt to quantify the so-called advantage was clever, but since you based it on reference “data” from only nominal dry weather conditions, based on some arbitrary car in a typical case only, and did not and cannot account for the wild-card factors of the changeable grip conditions as well as the big traction disparity between the two cars at that point, it’s all still conjecture), is consistency.
If you agree that KR *should* have received a penalty in the latter case, and didn’t, and Ferrari was therefore gifted an opportunity at an illegal win, then OK, you are in my view still making claims to know what you have no way of knowing about 2008, but at least you can claim to be consistent (since the 2009 case was much more clear-cut than 2008). If not, you are revealing your true motives of partiality (I honestly don’t know if you are a Ferrari fan or have other reasons for being especially rabid about LH, since I haven’t read your other posts, so it’s a serious question).
Stefanauss
25th November 2010, 16:31
First of all, save the pedantry bit for yourself. Either you’re willing to debate the issue, or you’re not. Should that be the case, stop commenting altogether. If this has gone too in-depth and detailed than you had the will to discuss it’s not my fault, none of my problems, and doesn’t make me pedantic just because the objections i received were completely out of target.
I think KR should have been penalised for overtaking using places other than the track. It was even worse, overtaking *instead* of giving back position.
Sutil was even more grotesque.
LH penalty in Fuji 2008, it was mentioned before, was total rubbish.
I’m no Ferrari fan.
Do you need to know anything else? Perhaps my opinion about every episode in LH’s career?
Please explain to me how come all of this adds anything to the truth/untruth of my arguments. You have not read anything else from me (that’s because there are pretty much none, i discovered this blog less than a month ago) and yet you’re assuming i’m inconsistent (about what? silence?) and i’m being “especially rabid” about LH. This has nothing to do with LH and everything with the complete fairness (and the absolute need of it to clearly address this unprecedented episode) of the penalty, which i’m strongly supporting.
You called my “attempt” clever, but yet you failed to understand the point of it.
It was not meant to quantify the advantage, it was only meant to show there *definitely* is an advantage. It does, because it does not rely on anything of the “unknowable” and it has not the need to. The only thing it’s relying on are the mutual positions of the cars (unchanged, and it is no conjecture unless you want to claim there was space for a full formula 1 car beetween them at the breaking point, let alone 3 cars as i mentioned before) and the ~200kph difference in speed beetween the two stages (which is no conjecture, unless you want to claim they were running at 250kph in the chicane).
Even though the “unknowable” doesn’t matter, You’re also wrong about wild-cards not being considered because “unknowable”. Here is why they are and why they wouldn’t need to be:
1) Data are underestimated. On purpose, I choosed them to show the smallest advantage possible, and yet it is definitely there.
2) Each and every one of the wild-cards you mentioned translate themselves ultimately in the driver’s position on the track at any given moment. Which is precisely the only thing needed and, as said before, not conjectured.
3) Each and every one of the wild-cards you mentioned were in favour of Hamilton at the point of the race, but were useless to him in the exact stage the breach took place, which is Leaving-The-Track/Breaking-Point. He didn’t turn at the corner, so how much more grip he had is irrelevant; He had to ease off the throttle to let KR through him, so any big traction disparity was gone until La Source exit.
4) Find me at least one single penalty report that ever dealt with the terms “changeable grip” or “big traction disparity” or “dropping tyres temperature” or anything similar. You can’t, let alone them being a mitigating circumstance for the driver who supposedly breached the rules that need to be taken into account before awarding him a penalty.
Sean
29th November 2010, 21:24
Sorry for the long delay – I have been very sick for several days and out of action.
Please understand, Stefanauss, I was asking your opinion about the KR incident in ’09 as a serious question, which is why I described it as a serious question, rather than pre-emptively assuming you were being inconsistent or partisan. I suspected you might be, but it sounds like you are actually not one of those people (like we heard from earlier in the thread), who claim Kimi’s off + gain was somehow OK and yet Lewis still deserved his penalty. There are many people who do that and they’re just trying it on. In your case, fair play and congratulations on being that reasonable.
Since you acknowledge the unfair advantage of KR and Sutil, then at least you’re accepting that the implementation of penalties for off-track advantage has been unfair. But I would say it has been worse than that.
I’m glad you agree that LH’s penalty in Japan was also “rubbish”. I’m guessing you might say the same of the god-awful Bourdais penalty, as most do. Your comment at the start of the thread about LH being the unwitting beneficiary of Renault’s Singapore ’08 ‘manipulation’ may have sidetracked me here. Those calls in Japan, plus the fact that Massa got away with the unsafe pit release in Valencia, led me to the unavoidable conclusion that LH was treated significantly more harshly than others in ’08, to his detriment in the WDC, before you even consider the penalty at Spa and the backdrop of Mosley’s ongoing personal attacks on Dennis. So, I’ll always reject any suggestion that Massa was somehow robbed of the ’08 WDC by the horrors perpetrated by Briatore and Piquet (there’s always the contingency problem in any case, namely that you can’t predict what that race outcome and subsequent race outcomes would have been in the absence of that dastardly plan in any case, and you always end up talking about butterflies, weather patterns and chaos theory if you try).
Anyway. Re: “either you’re willing to debate the issue, or you’re not”, I certainly am and I still think your deterministic claims to show an advantage are flawed and arbitrary. For example, to establish the starting point, you say:
KR-LH DISTANCE @ LAST CORNER: Slightly overlapping, which means ~1 car, which means 4m.
No, it doesn’t.
You go on to estimate the gap before La Source, from which you claim “2/3 of the gap is gone”, but you are starting from a completely and conveniently (for you) arbitrary point.
What is this well-defined starting point, that gives us this magical 4m figure, and where in the rule book is it written that this is the official ‘start of the incident’? Before the braking area for the chicane? Somewhere in the braking area? The turn-in point? The moment Kimi’s line diverged to the left and it became clear that he was giving LH nowhere to go? The actual white line (clearly too late by any measure)? At the turn-in point, as close to a decision point for both drivers as anything I can think of, LH was actually ahead, so more than 4m from where you claim he was w.r.t. KR. That wipes out 100% of the delta you’re claiming to be able to demonstrate. And yet after he gave back position, he was clearly behind. This is a fact. The argument you and others made when this was pointed out to you, is that if LH had backed off (the hypothetical ‘concrete wall’ scenario) and followed KR through the chicane, then he couldn’t have been as close as he was to KR going into LS, but we have no way of knowing that because it didn’t happen. To your specific points 1-4:
No you didn’t. You chose them, including the 4m starting point, to favour your argument. If you ‘underestimate’ to the greatest arguable degree, then you go from a negative advantage for KR, to one that is more than a car’s length (to use your own estimate) before they brake for LS.
“Wild cards” refers to the grip/ launch disparity in the case YOU raised, which is the hypothetical case where LH follows KR through the chicane, where YOU go on to speculate about how close he would have been before La Source. In the case of what actually happened, you are right, there is no need to consider wild cards or speculate, and since what actually happened is they went from LH ahead or at least level with KR, to LH clearly behind, then there is no case to answer.
Same as item 2. We’re talking about 2 different things. As things were, he had to give back position to concede the advantage, not some mystical 4m, x car lengths or any other figure. You’re the one that asserted that the comparison is between where he was before LS, and where he would have been if he’d backed off and gone through the chicane, which is the only case where wild cards come in, and remain relevant.
I don’t need to.
It says everything to me that Whiting, now miraculously reinstated as the authority in such matters after Mosley’s post-race claim that he had no such authority at Spa (after he had advised McLaren that the move was fine) showed up at Monza and told the driver’s briefing that the new rule (sorry, “clarification”) was to wait one more corner before passing in such a case. Note: nobody, including the stewards after Spa, ever attempted to solve the problem, like you did, by using formulas and doing sums. If these things were defined and quantifiable, there would be no need to issue a decree like that. They could simply have said “LH should have fallen x car lengths behind but he only fell x-a car lengths” and show their working. “Wait another corner” is actually a reasonable solution to the problem they made for themselves, given the fact that the launch and end points will always be arbitrary (how to quantify a case like Kimi’s in ’09, where he had clearly gained positions but had a additional momentum run to make another one beyond Eau Rouge, for example?). The problem is, of course, that the new ruling was made only AFTER it had been used to take somebody’s win away.
It has also been notable to me that teams continue to expect Whiting and his minions to issue instructions and guidance during the races. For example, when Alonso cut the corner at Club and held his position against the Renault, they were evidently waiting to be told to give the place back, and not expecting to be simply issued with a penalty. It backfired when the Renault dropped out of the race, leaving the officials with no option but to issue the penalty. It’s odd, isn’t it, that Whiting is still the go-to guy even though you have this glaring case where Mosley told us it was McLaren’s fault for listening to him in the first place.
Malcom
7th December 2010, 1:19
Something that Lewis was very concerned with during the 2008 season, was being called in during qualifying sessions for weighins. Monza was a good example of that, and it occurred during another race. Vettel probably wouldn’t have won at Monza in 2008 if Hamilton wasn’t called in during Q2.