Australian Grand Prix 2012, Albert Park Circuit - Race 1/20

dannyjo22 said:
Do you think though there's another team out there which could take him as an undisputed no 1 to rebuild his confidence if it did happen.

Certainly not Ferrari or Red Bull, maybe Merc depending on MS.

How about this, Indy? Better for his bint and maybe better for his style of racing. He would still get paid very well and his personality would make him even more money and fans.

As I say it's pure speculation, he could just as easily turn this round and beat Button over the season. As I said last year Button had his best ever season, Lewis had his worst and the gap wasn't huge.
Click to expand...

I firmly believe he will be in Red Bull next year.

Others, including the makers of Inside Grand Prix believe he will be in Mercedes next year.

I don't think he needs undisputed number 1 status. I just think he needs attention. He was the golden boy of F1, and then Vettel took that away from him, and now Button is taking the attention away from him at McLaren. A high profile move to someone like Red Bull would get him the attention he seems to need. I think its more about feeling important than being number 1.

But its all speculation on my part. We shall wait and see. There no chance he would go to Indy car though. Firstly, its not been his dream, and secondly he would walk all over them out there.
 
Setroc said:
Looking at the 6 laps before Hamilton pitted, we have vettel catching by

1 tenth
0 tenths
3 tenths
0 tenths
2 tenths
3 tenths

and at the point of Hamilton's pitstop, he was still 1.6 seconds ahead of Vettel. Add this to the fact that the first person to pit is the one with the advantage during the pit stops, and it would have been basically impossible for Vettel to make up the gap.

Hamilton just doesn't seem like a happy bunny right now, so I think we'll see Button winning the inter-team battle again.
Click to expand...


The first person to pit usually has an advantage, but it's not certain. Vettel could have jumped Hamlton or been right on his gearbox. Either one of them could have had a problem with traffic. How fast was Redbull's stop compared to McLaren? We can't compared that as RedBull had plenty of time due to the safety car.

What i'm getting at, is the SC didn't necessarily change too much. 2nd place was there is Hamilton wanted it, he just didn't have the outright pace.
 
When his F1 career is over, sure, but thats a looooooong way off yet. He is still in the top 3 or 4 drivers in F1.

And Montoya went to NASCAR.
 
I still havent gotten around to watching the race, blame my mate texting me the result at half 7 yesterday :mad:. Will do it later tonight and Ill post my views.

I just dont understand why people are disappointed by Lewis' performance, havent you either gotten used to it and perhaps realised that he over-achieved in previous seasons; or pragmatically thought that at least the car seems to be up at the top at the start of the season and a podium is a good start as any, he hasnt lost the championship or a good/great season after the first race...

My view is that once he realises he isnt the best thing in sliced bread and accepts that mistakes that happen are his own he will become a far better driver. You can only get better once you identify your flaws and attempt to fix them and he still hasnt done one or the other yet. In case of knee-jerk posters thats a general point and not reflective on yesterdays race which as I stated I havent watched...

ps3ud0 :cool:
 
Last edited:
If you watch the race you will see that anyone would have been a bit annoyed at starting pole and coming 3rd after the race he had. All the reaction is because its just seen as Lewis being a grump, again.
 
Shimmy said:
The last 2 points occured behind the safety car.

Jenson enquired about his brake temperature as they will get cold behind the safety car, his race engineer then informed him to use KERS as it was a bit cold from not being used behind the safety car.

His fuel consumption dramatically improved behind the safety car for obvious reasons.
Click to expand...

The safety car period wasnt THAT long was it (yes , as I said earlier consumption would improve, but to make 20-30 lap difference is pretty huge within a few laps)

Do KERS units get that cold so quickly normally?

dannyjo22 said:
It's extremely weird how often you get these sort of messages between lewis and his team, being coaxed to stay with it when for some reason he want's to come into the pits.

It's as though when he's beaten he's head just goes.

I find it odd that as a rookie he dealt with Alonso's mind games far more than Buttons more subtle approach. Is that because he knew back then that Ron was 100% in his corner?

I'm going to find the battle between these two far more interesting than the title battle this season. First blood to Button.
Click to expand...

Ive been thinking this too - there was also a bit just before the first pit stop I think where it appeared that the engineer had to tell LH when his tyres had gone....I might be reading into it more than there is, but thats what it sounded like

Kimi said:
Im not to worried for Mercedes pace, Schumacher had gearbox problems pretty much from start so its not to bad that he was unable to keep pace, also remember this year they are not chasing the car, but chasing performance, the W01 was the wrong wheelbase and took until Spain to change it, from there they were chasing their tails again, the W02 had massive cooling problems until early mid season, this time, there are no 'massive' problems, so its good for the future.

Im putting a bet on Mercedes pole in Malaysia, the long straights will really suit it, predicting a strong race for Schumi there
Click to expand...

Why do you think Merc gearbox was already going before lap 11? MSc seemed to be going well for first 10 laps (he got into 3rd and stayed there until gearbox let go on lap 11, right infront of SV) - he also wasnt massively slower than LH at that point


edit - I cant see Lewis going to RBR willingly , the team is so firmly around SV Im not sure why he would want to (if it was equal driver status I would agree with Skeeter, but it isnt by any means imo). If they discover a massive car advantage through the year then so be it, but equal or favouring (even slightly) McLaren.....hmmm not so sure.
 
Last edited:
englishpremier said:
The first person to pit usually has an advantage, but it's not certain. Vettel could have jumped Hamlton or been right on his gearbox. Either one of them could have had a problem with traffic. How fast was Redbull's stop compared to McLaren? We can't compared that as RedBull had plenty of time due to the safety car.

What i'm getting at, is the SC didn't necessarily change too much. 2nd place was there is Hamilton wanted it, he just didn't have the outright pace.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure I agree with the bit about the SC.

There was nothing to suggest that, had the SC not come out and force LH to drive a slow out lap, SV had the jump on him. Part of the reason they pitted both McLarens on the same lap was to avoid SV getting the undercut.

Once he was stuck in 3rd I agree with you — he didn't seem to be able to attack Seb, and towards the end it looked as though his tyres were shot and he was struggling to keep Webber at bay.

Even when he was within a second of SV he didn't seem to be able to take advantage of the DRS. If the rumours of the fuel-saving are true it partly explains why he couldn't go balls out but it does feel like he's holding back a bit after last year.

In fact, the same could be said after the first pit stop when he took an age to get past Perez. The car clearly has the pace advantage so why LH didn't maximise it is beyond me...

Another thing I don't understand is why JB appeared to have a lot more pace than LH throughout the race. Surely the benefit of clear air isn't that great?
 
Skeeter said:
If you watch the race you will see that anyone would have been a bit annoyed at starting pole and coming 3rd after the race he had. All the reaction is because its just seen as Lewis being a grump, again.
Click to expand...
I see no problem in him being grumpy, Id be the same, but lets be honest, he does play the victim card a lot, unfortunately its a taint he will carry for his whole career, just look at Schumi as a comparison...

I view it similar to footballers that are known to dive, not getting what was a stonewall penalty...

Anyway I need to watch this race to provide any full formed and useful comment.

ps3ud0 :cool:
 
Panzerbjorn said:
I'm not sure I agree with the bit about the SC.

There was nothing to suggest that, had the SC not come out and force LH to drive a slow out lap, SV had the jump on him. Part of the reason they pitted both McLarens on the same lap was to avoid SV getting the undercut.

Once he was stuck in 3rd I agree with you — he didn't seem to be able to attack Seb, and towards the end it looked as though his tyres were shot and he was struggling to keep Webber at bay.

Even when he was within a second of SV he didn't seem to be able to take advantage of the DRS. If the rumours of the fuel-saving are true it partly explains why he couldn't go balls out but it does feel like he's holding back a bit after last year.

In fact, the same could be said after the first pit stop when he took an age to get past Perez. The car clearly has the pace advantage so why LH didn't maximise it is beyond me...

Another thing I don't understand is why JB appeared to have a lot more pace than LH throughout the race. Surely the benefit of clear air isn't that great?
Click to expand...

once JB got past LH seemed to go into sulk mode again...it's as if he thinks he shouldn't have been beaten off the line and his head goes down. Then JB gets first choice of pitstops etc. and LH is compromised a bit....and in the end he gets 3rd place. I mean, look what happens after the SC, after 1 complete flying lap JB was almost 2 secs ahead of SV and LH and could have romped away if the car had a tiny bit more fuel...
 
Panzerbjorn said:
Another thing I don't understand is why JB appeared to have a lot more pace than LH throughout the race. Surely the benefit of clear air isn't that great?
Click to expand...

LH just didnt have the pace .

Even when he was in 2nd, and far outside the "disturbed air" behidn JB's car, he couldnt make up the difference.

Upto about 1 - 2s behind another car its free air, and yes it is an advantage , but within that 1 - 2s the air flow becomes disturbed and therefore aero kit on teh car (which everything is built around) isnt as effective....although Ive never seen figures to say any % difference in performance in relative positions

3dcandy said:
once JB got past LH seemed to go into sulk mode again...it's as if he thinks he shouldn't have been beaten off the line and his head goes down. Then JB gets first choice of pitstops etc. and LH is compromised a bit....and in the end he gets 3rd place. I mean, look what happens after the SC, after 1 complete flying lap JB was almost 2 secs ahead of SV and LH and could have romped away if the car had a tiny bit more fuel...
Click to expand...

Why was Lewis compromised during any pitstop? That first stop was on the optimum lap for both of them wasnt it?
 
FrankJH said:
LH just didnt have the pace .

Even when he was in 2nd, and far outside the "disturbed air" behidn JB's car, he couldnt make up the difference.

Upto about 1 - 2s behind another car its free air, and yes it is an advantage , but within that 1 - 2s the air flow becomes disturbed and therefore aero kit on teh car (which everything is built around) isnt as effective....although Ive never seen figures to say any % difference in performance in relative positions
Click to expand...

That's what I thought, the clear air thing shouldn't make that much difference.

What I was getting at was why was he off the pace? Especially after being so fast on Saturday?

Do we agree with 3dcandy and it was his head going down after losing 1st place to JB off the start or was there something else going on?

It's well known that he tears up his tyres more than JB and he was definitely struggling with tyre degradation towards the end of his stints.

Just seems like there's more to it than that...
 
He always seems a bit moody to me. If he thinks he should have won and the fault was not his. However he must have had a telling off as he no longer blames anyone like he did in the past and always overpraises the team.

Would he have got out in front of Vettel if they had waited one more lap on the second stop rather than doing that fancy double pit stop.
 
People are looking waaaay too much into this LH thing. It's the first race of the season FFS! Any driver who is competitive would be grumpy at firstly losing pole, and then coming third to their team-mate.

Plus pace on a Saturday and a Sunday can be different, it's no surprise to see Button being better on race day and Hamilton being fast on single lap runs in qualifying, that was pretty much the case all of last season.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom