Bahrain Grand Prix 2015, Sakhir - Race 4/19

Arrivabene used to work for the same company for me and having met him a few times on/off the track, I can definitely say he is a legend. Really humble guy and hopefully he can help advance Ferrari to some success.

Overall a decent race today, hopefully the ferrari & mercedes battle grows more competitive with each race
 
Jono8 said:
What makes you say that?
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I meant WCC.... they're apparantly going to get a further boost in performance at teh Canadian GP, spending a few tokens and gaining 20-30 extra HP... with Rosberg's confidence getting ripped to shreds and with the fact that teh Ferrari is a very good car, coupled with a brilliant driver pairing. Vettel and Kimi have the bit between their teeth - the second half of the season could see the pair consistently getting 2nd and 3rd on the podium with a few wins imo... their reliability is also incredible... both Mercs had reliability problems today... all added up they could well be in with a good shout of the WCC imo.
 
Kimi looking absolutely ecstatic at coming second today :D

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smr said:
with Rosberg's confidence getting ripped to shreds and with the fact that teh Ferrari is a very good car, coupled with a brilliant driver pairing. Vettel and Kimi have the bit between their teeth
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Brilliant driver pairing? That's a bold statement for this year so far, so far we have seen kimi barely show up except for this race which coincided with vettel seemingly having an acid trip.

Hamilton is untouchable right now and Rosberg while a whiner is a consistent high point scorer. It's going to take a mighty jump ahead of mercs development curve to make a convincing case for Ferrari to take control of this championship.

These comments from lewis after the race suggest a very comfortable driver-

"A good day at the office, a good sunday drive today"
"For me, I'm just really I had pace. I could answer to whoever today"
"When I need to pull it out, I can pull more out of this car. I was coming around Turn 6 and just thought, 'I love this car!'"
"The brake by wire goes into fault mode. So the pedal doesnt go hard, it goes long. I was able to reset it and carry on"

F1madness
 
Just watched the race. The BBC were praising Rosberg for his 'improved driving' and overtakes but to me, it looked like he single handedly cost Mercs the 1-2.

Poor qualifying and then misjudged the first turn which cost him crucial time as he got stuck behind both Ferraris.

Hamilton was probably happy though! :p
 
CaptainRAVE said:
Hamilton was lucky that he didn't have the braking issue earlier on!
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It sounds like the brakes didn't fail, he explained that they went into a default mode for some unknown reason but after changing settings they came back. Effectively the amount the pedal travels is controlled electronically. They have pedals set pretty hard as you don't want to completely extend your leg with full pressure all race. He said all of a sudden the pedal just went right to the floor which it does as default mode, changing settings it worked again.

That it happened on both car at the same point somewhat suggests a bug in the code somewhere that caused it rather than a problem with the brakes themselves. Still, not ideal and happened at the wrong corner at the wrong time for Rosberg so I genuinely feel bad for him about that. Though much as with his "had I gotten pole I'd have definitely won the race" attitude last race, he had the same "without that problem I'd definitely have come second"... a tad irksome. Kimi still had tires left and that car has good straight line speed. I thought with another drs straight left to go and having cleared that last traffic and been really close he might well have gotten him into the first corner on the last lap, possibly elsewhere but that was the most obvious chance.


20-30bhp isn't all it's about though. Downforce, the merc can go faster if it dropped some downforce, though obviously you can bolt on a bit more down force if you have more engine power without the drag slowing you down. It should help but there is nothing to say Merc won't bring their own 20-30bhp update and effectively cancel out any advantage.


I think one of the most interesting changes we'll see through this season is the Vettel/Kimi battle. Vettel is all smiles and friendly now but if Kimi starts leading him in the title fight, if he starts taking points off him by actively passing him on track or beating him in qualifying. Things could look very different if/when Vettel is in a real fight against Kimi.

For Hamilton though, Vettel, Kimi and Rosberg sharing out second places is as much as he could hope for. He was what, trailing Rosberg by what 4 points after the 4th race last year, this year he has a 27 point lead on 2nd place.
 
muon said:
You obviously weren't concentrating very well.
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dalin80 said:
There is this thing in motorracing called the 'undercut' where the cars that pit first get an early lap on a faster tyre allowing them to gain, in this case around 1.5 to 2s a lap on those who pit after. Most teams pit the driver who is ahead first to secure the higher value place, merc didn't this time which with a slow stop knocked about 4.5/5s off his lead.

Don't worry! Keep watching races and you will get the jist of them eventually!
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You two must know more then Merc\Hamilton as they said it was the front tire wheel nut problem that mad him lose 5 secs.

", but as Hamilton exited from his first stop, a slow 3.7sec after difficulty with a wheel nut, he found his mirrors filled with Rosberg and Vettel"

Keep up lads\gals please :)
 
It simply didn't he was stopped in the pits for 3.7 seconds, it was 1.2 seconds slower than Vettel's pitstop, you can't turn 1.2 seconds slower into 5 seconds however you try. It's PART of the reason the gap was reduced, but it was a 6 second gap or so, it was about 1 when he came out, a 1.2 second slower gap does not lose you 5 seconds.

That was the reason for the slow stop, the amount of time he lost to Vettel was because they pitted Rosberg first.
 
deuse said:
You two must know more then Merc\Hamilton as they said it was the front tire wheel nut problem that mad him lose 5 secs.

", but as Hamilton exited from his first stop, a slow 3.7sec after difficulty with a wheel nut, he found his mirrors filled with Rosberg and Vettel"

Keep up lads\gals please :)
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A 3.7 second pitstop doesn't lose you a 6 second lead.

Vettel's pitstop was 2.5 seconds from memory.

Like I said, need to concentrate more on what is actually happening.
 
Quartz said:
You mean you missed him fighting through the field in Malaysia where he started 11th and got a puncture early on? And he finished 4th in China.
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Kimis been good. Compared to recent years he's been great. Vettels just been a bit better so far.

What were Vettels lap times like when he was stuck behind Bottas? Was he being held up and being a bit poo at passing, or was Bottas on the same pace as Vettel had been showing previous and was genuinely on a par with him?
 
Sparky? He's never really been back here since he lost his cool when people started wishing Vettel would crash and die.

Shame, he's a decent guy. I imagine him and a lot of the staff in RBR have loyalty to the job/factory rather than the company who owns them. A lot of the factory staff remember the Stewart days.
 
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