2007 Japanese GP - Race 15/17

Slam62 said:
you obviously know nothing about engineering or the process of designing an F1 car, the car was finished way before Frederico got there.
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Sorry dude, but as I understand it, the car is developed over a period of months and even years (using technology and knowledge from previous models of cars, to incorporate into the newer cars, albeit bound by a new set of rules and regs).

A driver arrives in the Winter and begins testing, bringing with him his own testing and communication skills. The car usually gets faster as they understand the car better. The team learns how to set the car up better as the months/races role on. Also, new parts are constantly developed, right throughout the season.

Hence, the car is not "finished" before the season starts - its an on-going process of continual improvement, from week to week, month to month and race to race. This is the reason why we see on many occassions, the best car in Race1 isnt necessarily the best car in Race16.
 
From James Allen's race review:

What happened at the start with Ferrari’s tyres?

This is a strange one, especially given Ferrari’s close communication with the FIA.
At 12.15pm local time, some 75 minutes before the race start, the stewards sent out a message to all teams, via email, that extreme wet tyres should be fitted to all cars for the start.
The media received it well in advance of the race – it seemed to be common knowledge. Ferrari say that they received this email at 1.37pm, seven minutes after the start.
Sporting director Stefano Domenicali says that normally any vital information is sent out with a receipt to be signed for by the team manager of each team and he is shocked that this information wasn’t sent out that way.
After the race he was given an apology by the stewards, who accepted that Ferrari had not been properly informed.
All of the other teams received the email and acted accordingly. Massa went to the grid on extreme wet tyres, while Raikkonen went on shallow wet tyres and told the team that these would be fine for the start under safety car conditions.
Massa was switched onto them too and then once the race started and the stewards saw that both Ferraris were on shallow wets, they called them in.
It’s ironic that emails should cause Ferrari so much pain here, when they were the decisive factor in the Spygate hearings which handed them the constructor’s world championship at McLaren’s expense!
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Ironic isn't quite the word I'd use....I should think heads are getting knocked together right now as Ferrari and the FIA work out what happened on their respective ends. The FIA appear to be taking the blame - no doubt the usual whingers will be pointing to that as Yet Another Example Of Pro-Ferrari Bias™, to which I say 'balls'. A pro-Ferrari FIA would have let them carry on using the shallower wet tyre, or would have made abso-bloody-lutely certain that they didn't go out on the other tyre in the first place.

I did get up for the race, but on account of being incredibly drunk from my uncle Jed's 50th b'day party I didn't actually see much of it before watching the tape delay re-run. It turns out that drinking lager, champagne, red wine and grappa in one evening does strange stuff to your body. Does to mine at any rate....
 
Slam62 said:
Fred behaves like a caveman and can only say "Yabba-Dabba-Doo," shortening it to "YABBA-DABBA!!!" when he gets really mad

At least the Cobbler could drive the wheels off a car, Fred is a plodder with a spoilt brat streak

Any one who really thinks a racing car becomes really quick and reliable because fred drove it for an hour is seriously deluded.
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Plodders do not generally win races, or world championships, with any regularity. Alonso has, and can therefore hardly be considered a "plodder".

Perhaps you are thinking of someone else. Olivier Grouillard? :D
 
Bennah said:
Who actually watched it live this morning? I woke up at around 4am to watch it but fell asleep again. When it came to watch the race re-run, good job I did'nt watch it live, 24 laps was it behind the safty car at the start, that would have been a bit boring to watch.
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I did :p

I couldn't make out if it was exciting or boring to be fair. On one hand they could go racing any lap or Mclarens have to pit for fuel so had to stay glued. On the other side I was hoping that it wasnt going to be called off completely.

They should have maybe delayed the start 30 mins?
 
I watched it live yes. God knows what they would have done if the race was delayed, because the re run was on only a couple of hours after the actual one and then the rugby was on.
Was really pleased with all the post race coverage though. Thumbs up to ITV :D
 
Well Damon won a few and Ralf and Villeneuve and Rubens and Massa and Montoya and Coulthard and Piquet and Mansell and Watson and Berger and Alesi and Arnoux and Jabouille and Reuteman and Jones
 
Received e-mail or not, why on earth did Ferrari send out cars with intermediates? :confused: It was clearly way way way waaaaaay too wet to properly run such a tyre. And the forecast showed no sign of things changing. Why would they do this? It's almost as though they made a mistake and when they took the covers off realised they were the wrong tyres but it was too late!
 
Slam62 said:
Well Damon won a few and Ralf and Villeneuve and Rubens and Massa and Montoya and Coulthard and Piquet and Mansell and Watson and Berger and Alesi and Arnoux and Jabouille and Reuteman and Jones
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Right.... what's that got to do with the price of fish?
 
Duke said:
They should have maybe delayed the start 30 mins?
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I was thinking that when I saw that the race was started behind the safety car for such a long time.

I guess it would have been best to get the cars into the pits and send out the safety car every 5 - 10 mins to check if the track was decent to race on...

Next week the times are a little better, so I think I would be up for them unless, Im on the beer the night before :p
 
Bennah said:
I was thinking that when I saw that the race was started behind the safety car for such a long time.

I guess it would have been best to get the cars into the pits and send out the safety car every 5 - 10 mins to check if the track was decent to race on...
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I was surprised the AMG didn't have the fuel to finish the race either really!
 
Slam62 said:
Well I think Fred should scurry of back to Renault then and we'll find out.
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That would be very interesting. If after he re-joined Renault, they rose to the top again, that would be more than a coincidence and would prove what a fantastic driver he is.

Slam62 said:
Using your logic any team Fred drives for will turn into world champs.
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Not necessarily. M.Schumacher had an uncanny knack of joining a team that wasnt a championship contender and then turned them into one. We saw this with Benetton and then with Ferrari. Only a great driver has this ability. We have seen now that Alonso also shares this ability, in that Renault/Benetton were nowhere for quite some time. Alonso joins and 2 seasons later he wins the world title and then does it again the following year. The year after that, he leaves and Renault are once again, middle of the pack.

Its just far too much of a coincidence that MS and FA, both have done this with their respective teams.

I think Alonso can have a winning effect on a team, but only if that team is "almost there". He wont be able to turn a Spyker into a world beating team, but he could probably turn a BMW (ie. a team that is "almost there") into a world beating team.
 
Well, that was certainly interesting! I said to my dad that I doubted that any racing would happen at all because of the conditions, and before you know it, they were off and racing! I really didn't have a clue who was going to win, I had £10 on Kimi, thinking that he had the biggest balls of the lot and could make up serious ground, but he did well to finish 3rd. I feel so sorry for Vettel and Webber, they were running fantastic races until the accident!
 
DickyDavis.jpg


DD *** :D
 
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