Indian Grand Prix 2011, Buddh International Circuit - Race 17/19

[FrankJH]

That isn't the main point though, the crazy thing here is HOW he achieved the fastest lap.

Is it really though

Brand new track naturally getting faster and faster every lap of the weekend

Overly conservative tyres that were seen NOT to wear out on any car on the grid

Every lap of fuel in the tank is worth .....4/10 th's is it?

While the RB was faster than majority through the weekend, it would be interesting to see if the gap between the average lap time on the last lap and SV's time was that much larger (this difference would say to me whether it was that good a lap or just the three factors above all together )

Not trying to knock SV at all - just trying to get to the bottom of the facts

 

[Skeeter]

I'd guess that given the cause of the suspension failures for Massa was so obvious (clouting those big orange kerbs) they won't feel the need to investigate.

But loads of people clouted those kerbs over the weekend, some getting very airborne.

If the FIA aren't concerned, I would certainly hope that Ferrari are. Maybe they were testing some 2012 suspension?

 

[Demon]

Not at all, but I'm under no illusions that this forum is devoid of Hamilton fanboys who are convinced that their boy can do no wrong and every stewards decision against him is a conspiracy. And yes, there are also plenty of folks who go the other way and think that he's arrogant and overly aggressive and never going to win another world title.

And then there's people like me, piggy-in-the-middle, hoping that he finds some proper form next year to placate both sides of what has become a particularly dull argument....

I just don't see this great swathe of 'fanboys'.. I see some fans, and plenty of rational conversation, there is 1 or 2 'out there' kind of people (on all sides), but that doesn't constitute anything to get overly worried about.

If anything, you say you are piggy in the middle, but you seem far too concerned IMO about other people's pro-Hamilton opinions, just let them be, you are in danger of looking like you are being a deliberately anti-Hamilton..

But loads of people clouted those kerbs over the weekend, some getting very airborne.

If the FIA aren't concerned, I would certainly hope that Ferrari are. Maybe they were testing some 2012 suspension?

I don't think anyone went over the orange kerbs as often as Massa.. the energy being put into the suspension in that short period of time must be massive.. when suspension can break from relatively minor wheel to wheel contact, that doesn't stand out as being overly out the realms of normality, well to my untrained eye!

 

[JRS]

ou seem far too concerned IMO about other people's pro-Hamilton opinions

Actually, I'm rather more concerned about the anti-Massa opinions. I realise that to many of you being someone who isn't anti-Massa is the same as being anti-Hamilton, but really it isn't

 

[Sparky]

Is it really though

Brand new track naturally getting faster and faster every lap of the weekend

Overly conservative tyres that were seen NOT to wear out on any car on the grid

Every lap of fuel in the tank is worth .....4/10 th's is it?

While the RB was faster than majority through the weekend, it would be interesting to see if the gap between the average lap time on the last lap and SV's time was that much larger (this difference would say to me whether it was that good a lap or just the three factors above all together )

Not trying to knock SV at all - just trying to get to the bottom of the facts

Every car on the grid was in the same situation though,was it not?

 

[3dcandy]

the only driver who appeared to get anywhere near Vettel was Button, and he backed off on the last lap. Doesn't mean he'd have beaten him though...

 

[sunama]

Every car on the grid was in the same situation though,was it not?

Nuts, what is your take on it?
He is your driver, so I'm sure you know more than any of us here...was it a good lap and also did he turn off KERS completely for that lap?

 

[Sparky]

According to Rocky, yes he did.

 

[Demon]

Actually, I'm rather more concerned about the anti-Massa opinions. I realise that to many of you being someone who isn't anti-Massa is the same as being anti-Hamilton, but really it isn't

I'm still not seeing all this mass irrational hysteria against Massa though, it's like a couple of negative comments and you are calling people fanboys..

I don't like Massa, but I don't hate him.. I do think he has his part to play in a lot of the incidents (not all), you seem to infer that makes me a fanboy because you don't agree anything bad should be said about Massa? Isn't that irrational in itself, or do I need a drink, and totally missing your point? As you seem to be largely on the ball with these things?

 

[deuse]

Actually, I'm rather more concerned about the anti-Massa opinions. I realise that to many of you being someone who isn't anti-Massa is the same as being anti-Hamilton, but really it isn't

I don't know what's up with Massa this season but when he gets into 50/50 back off or crash he picks to crash.

Take monaco 2011 Lewis overtaking MSC at the first corner it was similar to sunday
Take a look http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nHzVjQP1hU MSC knows the score and keeps the outside line.

Now take a look at the first lap at the same race where MSC overtook Lewis at the hairpin bend http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=587_VMPgIo0&feature=related
about 30 secs in and you will see that lewis moves over.Again another 50/50 crash or give way Lewis gave way to MSC.

Now when Lewis went to overtake Massa at the Hairpin, massa moved over so much that if Lewis never hit him
then Massa would have hit the RB car in front(I think it was RB)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXDmqjnPG7k 25 secs in and you will see how close it was.

I,m not a Massa hater but he is picking the crashing option to much.

 

[Flibster]

Have the FIA said anything about wanting to look at Ferrari's front suspension? I know when another team (RBR?) had a couple of failures the FIA investigated to make sure they weren't to fragile?

DC had several failures at low speed, however in this case, I think that trying to monster the giant wotsits may have been the cause.

 

[Eriedor]

And then there's people like me, piggy-in-the-middle, hoping that he finds some proper form next year to placate both sides of what has become a particularly dull argument....

I wouldn't quite call you piggy in the middle, your earlier post was suggesting Hamilton was deserving of a penalty for forcing someone onto marbles........honestly!

 

[Skeeter]

I wouldn't quite call you piggy in the middle, your earlier post was suggesting Hamilton was deserving of a penalty for forcing someone onto marbles........honestly!

And here lies the problem...

Just because someone has an opinion one way or another on an individual incident doesn't suddenly cement them into the extreme fanboy/hater camp for the drivers involved.

 

[JRS]

I wouldn't quite call you piggy in the middle, your earlier post was suggesting Hamilton was deserving of a penalty for forcing someone onto marbles........honestly!

See below:

Just because someone has an opinion one way or another on an individual incident doesn't suddenly cement them into the extreme fanboy/hater camp for the drivers involved.

But hey Eriedor - that's fine. You want to paint me into the anti-Hamilton camp, you go right on ahead. Ignore every post on here where I've defended or praised him. After all, every other ****** does

 

[FrankJH]

Every car on the grid was in the same situation though,was it not?

yur missing my (badly phrased point)

The RB was faster than anyone for majority of the weekend - and whatever it was there was an average time advantage SV had during majority of that time, (whether it was 1st lap out on Friday,

IF the average time on the last lap was a lot larger than during the most part of the weekend then SV has done very well, if however the average difference was pretty constant......it doesnt prove anything at all going fastest on the last lap (as this is exactly what the car has shown is capable all weekend)

ie - it would be very interesting to know relative to their fastest lap of the race how fast everyone was going on the last lap - SV had the fastest car of the lot so he gets the glory ( and apart from the odd blip around the pit stops, and a couple of other individual laps - he was always amongst the fastest if not the fastest every other lap of the race)

 

[Mr Men]

Webber on the Massa penalty

You could argue all day about the rights and wrongs of the latest crash involving Lewis Hamilton and Felipe Massa but it was a 50-50 incident in my opinion.

The corner they collided at is quite a quick one - fifth gear at about 135mph - so the brakes don't go on much.

It's very difficult to pass there but Lewis got a good run off Turn Four and got down the inside of Felipe.

It was the age-old thing. Lewis went for it, Felipe was still going to commit to the corner, then Lewis tried to back off and couldn't.

F1 is getting into a bit of a road-car culture with penalties. The attitude seems to be that someone must be to blame when there is an incident.

In this case, the stewards thought Felipe could have given Lewis a bit more room and therefore handed him a drive-through penalty.

Yes, Felipe could have made space for Lewis but, in my view, it wasn't clear-cut.

The drivers have always said that they want the stewards to be consistent - and, to be fair, that's what they are trying to be.

If someone's had an absolute howler, then fine, give them a penalty but sometimes it might be better just to say it was one of those things - what we call in F1 "a racing incident" - and let it go.

Does not seem much support from current drivers if any for the stewards decision, hopefully Herbert is not back in any such role again His explanation of the penalty was quite ludicrous and full of holes.

 

[Skeeter]

Herbet's explaination was fine, you simply can't turn in knowing that doing so will cause contact.

However, Mark does raise a good point. There were a couple of incidents on the first lap where blame could far more easily be handed out, yet they went down as 'racing incidents'.

 

[Mr Men]

Problem is when Lewis hit into Massa at Japan, they said he took the same line every lap so that was ok, even though he knew Massa was there, well so did Massa in India. Herbert also told us that Lewis was trying to back out of it, but couldn't because he was on the dirty part of the track, why would Lewis be trying to get out of it if it was not going to cause a collision? Massa had no way of getting out of it, Lewis put his car in a place where a collision was inevitable, if Felipe magically vanished Lewis was not making that corner, he was in the dust and had braked well too late to stop. But we can debate that all day, the problem is giving a penalty to Massa has not got very much backing.

DC, Wurz and Brundle and even Autosport are others I have read who found it a very strange decision to give Massa a penalty.

 

[Skeeter]

The whole argument about Japan was that Lewis didn't know Massa was there, with all the talk of useless mirrors and how he should have been able to hear him, etc. So they are completely different events.

 

[Mr Men]

Yeah he never seen him for sure But you will just disagree with anything I say so let's not bother

Massa should have lied and said his mirrors were rubbish too and got Stefano to say F1 needs to look into the matter