European Grand Prix 2012, Valencia - Race 8/20

[Reaper 392]

heres a video with an onboard shot. he was trying to turn away from hamilton but he did so far too late. as soon as he was clearly off the track he should have conceded and got out of hamiltons way. obviously not so much that he would be way behind hamilton for the next couple of turns, but enough not to run into hamilton.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLA5_ZjdBTI


*edit*
explained things a bit better

 

[sunama]

He did try and come back on track correct, but he was not aiming for Lewis, once on the kerb he was turning left but the car due to being in the kerb went straight into Lewis, it was a mistake by Pasta nobody has denied that but there was no intent to cause a collision IMO.

Yep.

If there was intent, he would only be spoiling his own chances of scoring points, given that his nose would almost certainly be damaged, if he intentionally t-boned Hamilton.

It was nothing more than a reckless racing incident, for which Maldo has already been punished (20s/1pt penalty) - minor penalty, which is about right.

 

[Skeeter]

So what about the Vergne penalty then? 10 places and a fine for another reckless racing incident?

 

[Deleted member 651465]

The one with him actually on the kerb bottomed out turning left but the car goes straight, as I said, posting pics before the kerb and after the kerb is really not what I am saying Sky showed it plenty in slow motion.

Give over. At no point did he need to turn hard. If he was bottoming out then his first instinct would be "avoid the collision" and turned left.

He was already off the circuit in the first screenshot, so he could easily have gone straight and come out right behind Hamilton.

 

[Skeeter]

I agree 100%.
The problem is Hamilton is the one who loses out on points.
So by all means, he can claim the moral high ground, but if he loses the title this year by 5-10 points, we will return to yesterday's incident. Claiming the moral high ground could cost him the title.

A championship driver must learn to pick his battles and understand that some drivers are to be avoided (Maldo, Massa and Kobayashi), while other drivers can be trusted to race closely, lap after lap, without major incident.

Alonso and Vettel both understand this. At present, Hamilton does not.

And we would be back here again if Hamilton had let him by and then lost the title by 1 point.

 

[Energizer Bunny]

F1 drivers should not have to learn to let reckless drivers by for fear of them causing an accident. The reckless drivers should be penalised or if necessary removed from the sport. The arguement that some drivers are dangerous so let them through is utterly crazy. Aside from anything else what kind of driving behaviour would that encourage?

What if the situation had changed slightly and Hamilton's tyres had been fine, but PM simply had a mildly faster car? Should Hamilton have thought 'well I have the car to easily hold this position but on the other hand this is crazy Maldonado and he will drive into me, so better let him go'?

 

[Skeeter]

Exactly. The idea that Hamilton should have let him past because he should have known that he would crash into him is crazy.

If a driver's poor driving is so widespread that other drivers would rather give up a place than risk getting involved in any sort of battle with them, then they don't deserve to be on the grid.

Maldonados driving has been bad, but not bad enough that every other driver should fear getting near him. If that were the case the drivers would have spoken up and he would be banned.

 

[Demon]

Just watching the video on board with PM, clearly when he has all 4 wheels off the circuit he still has his foot in and is steering right, not even a hint of backing off, he only steers left when he realises the car is on the kerb and he's totally balls'd up, from then on he's still trying to fight a slide..

Totally and utterly foolish driving and no matter who he was attacking, that deserved more of a penalty then Schumi not braking early enough, or any of the other more understandable accidents we've seen lately.

 

[CaptainRAVE]

Even if he didn't turn into Hamilton, he doesn't seem to ease of the throttle which in that position is going to have exactly the same effect anyway.

 

[Weebull]

Yeah...off the kerb. Turning left. No aiming whatsoever.

When someone decides to drive like that attempting to avoid a collision doesn't even come into it.[/QUOTE]

Heh. I like that if you actually watch the video linked to above me, you can see that this pic is clearly from a point where his steering wheel was going crazy post-crash. Nicely selective.

I don't think Maldonado took out Hamilton deliberately, I just think he was extremely stupid in trying to get back onto the racing line when he was off the track, and side-by-side with a car that wasn't. Back off or cut the corner. Those should be your only options.

 

[robbiemc]

So to summarise: Lewis will return to his natural, balls-out driving style that many here seem to think is 'best'.
(Even though he decided to change to 'consistent points based results' for this season.)

Remind me how that worked out for him last year?

 

[mranderson]

Massa must be very disappointed not being able to catch and T-bone Hamilton himself.

 

[ThestigGT999]

Massa must be very disappointed not being able to catch and T-bone Hamilton himself.

why would he?

 

[Mr Men]

Give over. At no point did he need to turn hard. If he was bottoming out then his first instinct would be "avoid the collision" and turned left.

He was already off the circuit in the first screenshot, so he could easily have gone straight and come out right behind Hamilton.

Did you even watch the in car? He was turning left, the car went straight due to being on the kerb and not responding to steering, even Karun a F1 driver explained it on Sky... he could have gone left after being pushed wide, he never, saying he aimed for Lewis is what I am saying is not true, it was a accident.

 

[Janesy B]

Yeah riding the kerbs that he turned right on to instead of cutting and rejoining after Hamilton.

 

[Mr Men]

Yeah riding the kerbs that he turned right on to instead of cutting and rejoining after Hamilton.

To be honest, why should he drive over dirt and speed bumps? Lewis pushed him out there. If Pastor just let Lewis hit into him rather than go off track to avoid it would that have been the better idea?

 

[Deleted member 651465]

Did you even watch the in car? He was turning left, the car went straight due to being on the kerb and not responding to steering, even Karun a F1 driver explained it on Sky... he could have gone left after being pushed wide, he never, saying he aimed for Lewis is what I am saying is not true, it was a accident.

http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i37/Ferrari27/be29910b.jpg[iMG]

[IMG]http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i37/Ferrari27/350ca3e5.jpg[img][/quote]

I don't buy the "he crashed in to Hamilton on purpose" story, but he clearly should have backed off the power and taken to the escape road.

Had he made the move stick on the kerb then fair enough, but he was never going to keep that line. Not to mention the way in which he rejoined.. It wasnt a case of riding the kerb around, he plain sailed off the track and chose to turn immediately back on as Hamilton was on the apex.

My opinion of him is low, but it could have been any driver and I'd say the same. He'd lost the move in a superior car, but didn't think of the long game (as pointed out in commentary moments before it all went wrong).

 

[Kenai]

To be honest, why should he drive over dirt and speed bumps?

Because he was off the track and quite clearly not doing so led to him smashing into the side of another car.

 

[utajoker]

So Hamilton try's to defend one position in the last 2 laps and gets taken out through no fault of his own so he is now automatically back to his 'hot headed' and 'irrational' driving style of old?

 

[sunama]

Exactly. The idea that Hamilton should have let him past because he should have known that he would crash into him is crazy.

Its not crazy.
If you are an intelligent/top driver, you need to do the following, while driving:

assess the drivers/cars around you all the time.
assess the condition/ability of your car.
assess the conditions of the track.
...and many other things. It is this ability to multi-task which makes a WDC.

There is absolutely no way that you should be treating every single driver in exactly the same way. You have to pick your battles carefully.

Notice that Alonso never seems to end up in these kinds of situations and he was the leading driver in the last race, who overtook the most. Why do you think this is? Coincidence?

From a racing point of view, Hamilton did nothing wrong and Maldo was more to blame, HOWEVER, Hamilton is the guy who lost out on the points and he is the title contender.

So far this season, Hamilton has changed his driving style. He isn't driving balls-to-the-wall and this was working for him nicely. He was leading the title race, having won only 1 race. This is what you call championship driving. Playing the long game. The 1 moment so far this season where he has decided to fight (as he used to do) and boom, he gets himself involved in an incident and drops 20 points behind the leading WDC.

He can continue to race hard, balls-to-the-wall, but as we saw last year, he will crash, a lot OR he can approach the championship as he did in the first 7 races of this year and be a championship driver. It really is his choice.