2012 Monaco Grand Prix lap charts

25 comments on “2012 Monaco Grand Prix lap charts”

1. 

   Tom (@newdecade)
   27th May 2012, 22:34

   How can webber on fresh softs lose over 3 tenths a lap average to vettel, over 15 laps, whose softs were 30 laps older? F1 doesn’t make sense any more…
   1. 

      Fer no.65 (@fer-no65)
      27th May 2012, 22:42

      @newdecade try thinking again and you might find the answer. And it’s no different to other times in F1.

      They basically struggled to get the softs up to temperature, so as Vettel was on warm tyres (that were holding pretty well in terms of degradation) he was faster. They said it after the race…
      1. 

         Ivan Vinitskyy (@ivan-vinitskyy)
         27th May 2012, 23:25

         No way it took so long to get them up to temperature, look at other cars who changed them: Perez and even one of Marussia cars were setting purple sectors as soon as they put new tires.

         My guess is they were conserving tires.
         1. 

            raymondu999 (@raymondu999)
            28th May 2012, 5:04

            @ivan-vinitskyy Did you factor in the track temperature cooling down? Don’t be so quick to judge.
2. 

   Fer no.65 (@fer-no65)
   27th May 2012, 22:38

   What happened to Alonso in the first couple of laps?. Looking at the graph, he was losing a lot of time, and suddently, he started gaining a lot of time…

   Webber was slowing the pack down?
   1. 

      Tom (@newdecade)
      27th May 2012, 23:03

      try thinking again and you might find the answer ;)

      Apparently he was conserving the tyres to exploit them around the first pit stop window and it paid off. During the first stint running he could afford to drop time to Hamilton as the risk of losing track position was almost non-existent, and gaining it back was easy.
      1. 

         DaveW (@dmw)
         28th May 2012, 0:22

         It was also a big help that he man behind was his teammate and if Massa and an opportunistic move by Massa obviously was not going to happen.
         1. 

            Gill (@gill)
            28th May 2012, 7:06

            Its always a pity when people dont give ALonso’s intelligence the respect it deserves. He nursed his tyres initially and when the pit stop was near, he ate into Hamilton’s lead rapidly doing fastest laps one after the other. He mostly keeps all the cards while racing which makes him the best driver out there.
   2. 

      Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
      28th May 2012, 9:01

      @fer-no65 This is from F1 Fanatic Live just after lap 16:

      Massa asks why Alonso is going so slowly and is told he’s saving his tyres

      https://twitter.com/f1fanaticlive/status/206723031840731137
      1. 

         bosyber (@bosyber)
         31st May 2012, 9:30

         @keithcollantine, I still wonder why McLaren didn’t catch that and respond by warning HAM to also slow and save tyres more until end of stint, it might have kept him ahead of ALO (and then Vettel later?).
         1. 

            bosyber (@bosyber)
            31st May 2012, 9:31

            …. especially as HAM had already warned (or did so not much later?) the pits that his pace was making it hard to keep the tyres okay long enough.
         2. 

            Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
            31st May 2012, 11:00

            @bosyber I don’t remember hearing a message to that effect – doesn’t necessarily mean there wasn’t one, of course. Presumably they were hoping they’d get the first chance to pit among the front runners, and use it to jump Rosberg.
            1. 

               bosyber (@bosyber)
               1st June 2012, 6:21

               Oh, that might well have been the plan @keithcollantine, good point, thanks.
   3. 

      egsgeg
      28th May 2012, 9:23

      1) ALO was staying out of the dirty air by keeping back. This saved his tyres.
      2) ALO was backing the guys behind him up, placing them in his hot air, damaging their tyres.
      3) ALO used his preserved tyres to then overtake HAM, and would have even if HAM had a perfect pitstop.
      1. 

         egsgeg
         28th May 2012, 9:24

         I suspect Web was told to do the same towards the end of the race – and probably should have done it in the first stint before his pitstop.
      2. 

         mainsa (@mainsa)
         28th May 2012, 13:18

         don’t you think Alonso could have passed Rosberg or even Webber at the pit stop if he had made 2 more laps before stopping? He was the quickest by far at lap 30.
3. 

   sumedh
   28th May 2012, 3:01

   This problem in “turning on” the softs seems to have affected only Webber. Other drivers set quick laps immediately after they came out of the pits.
   I am not accusing Red Bull of making Webber slow down so that Seb could gain a few positions. I am just saying that no other driver had that problem and Mark should look into why he did.
   1. 

      raymondu999 (@raymondu999)
      28th May 2012, 5:11

      Actually in the first phase of the soft stints for the leaders WEB was pulling away, albeit only 1-2 tenths a lap, from ALO and ROS
   2. 

      Mike (@mike)
      28th May 2012, 14:42

      I am not accusing Red Bull of making Webber slow down so that Seb could gain a few positions.

      And even if you did, it would be nothing short of a master stroke of team work on Red Bulls part.
4. 

   Leo B
   28th May 2012, 11:06

   While Webber was doing a solid string of 1.19.5’s after his pit stop, Perez dipped into the low 1.17’s. It’s no doubt Webber was going much slower than he could have gone. He kept the gap to Vettel at a steady 16 sec, ensuring to be ahead after Vettel’s stop and conserve tyres at the same time. It’s easy to criticise Webber for trying to win at the slowest possible speed, but the real blame for the lack of on-track action lies with the guys behind not trying harder to make something of this processional affair.
5. 

   AdrianMorse (@adrianmorse)
   28th May 2012, 19:47

   I’m still confused what happened with Hamilton and McLaren between laps 35 and 46. In the press conference afterwards, Webber mentioned that the ‘magic number’ was 21 seconds (for stopping and coming out in front). From laps 35 to 46, the gap between Hamilton and Vettel was around that number. Was McLaren really asleep all that time? The radio message from Hamilton telling his team that “the tyres won’t last long at this pace” (I don’t remember exactly which lap, and anyway, we don’t know when it was sent) suggested that they did tell him to get a move on. Also, on the lap that Vettel was coming in, Hamilton was ‘going green’ in all sectors of the lap, suggesting his team had radioed that he had to push that lap. Finally, the gap between Hamilton and Alonso in those laps was always around 2 seconds, so Hamilton certainly had room to get a bit closer without getting into dirty air, if he could.

   Was Hamilton complaining needlessly, or did his team really give him too little information, too late?
6. 

   AndrewTanner (@andrewtanner)
   28th May 2012, 23:40

   Crazy to see how many people were still criticising Pirelli after this race. I think the only high-factor tyre deliberation in this race was to see whether or not you should pit for inters. Seemed like a sensible decision to me!
7. 

   DVC (@dvc)
   31st May 2012, 3:39

   Schumacher was really pulling in the lead group until his car developed a problem.
8. 

   bosyber (@bosyber)
   31st May 2012, 9:41

   Having stopped wondering what McLaren/HAM were doing, and looking at Button, it’s a bit worrying that he was slower near the end of his stint than just about anyone (Kovi ~equal, and really seems only Narain, and maybe Glock losing more time to Vettel at that point? gosh), so no wonder he didn’t end up ahead of Kovalainen then. They might as well have brought him in earlier, giving him super soft tyres to try and at least get ahead. Not McLaren’s weekend indeed.
   1. 

      bosyber (@bosyber)
      31st May 2012, 9:44

      Oh, I forgot to put Ricciardo in the graph, that’s who Button was stuck behind. Still, same thing: might have been better to pit him, considering how hard it is to pass at Monaco, take changes on blocking others on old tyres near end of race, rather than be blocked that way (or spinning out in exasperation).

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