Malaysian Grand Prix 2013, Kuala Lumpur - Race 2/19

Wonder if Ferrari will fuel Massa for like 5 laps tomorrow just to get in front of Vettel and hold him up for Alonso. :D
 
Webber unhappy at not being allowed in to change tyres, or just missing getting across the line before lights went red?
 
Someone should deliver a big wheel of cheese to Pirelli's HQ with a note attached - try this construction - may last longer.

These tyre's are utter garbage. If the hard tyre is blistering after only a handful of laps, whats the point of them?
 
Oh look, the same that has happened in every qualifying for years, the best drivers don't NEED to show their pace to get through to Q3, so they don't wear down tires when they don't need to.

Lets see, WE've had Brundle bang on about Mclaren looking close, loads of people about Mclaren looking good in changing conditions PURELY because he put in the fastest lap on inters while everyone else had given up on the inters(but would all have gone faster if they stayed on them) and people talking up Rosberg, again including Brundle, outperforming Hamilton because when it doesn't matter Rosberg was faster, and when it mattered, Hamilton blew Rosberg away......

Will people ever learn, Hamilton ended up 8/10th's up on Rosberg when actually going for fastest time, and outperformed him both in race and quali pace last week.

Some guys have a pace, find it, stick on it, other guys drive within the limit because they can replicate that over and over again and compare setups better, then they put in an ultimate lap when required.

Bit of a shame that not many people copied Vettel in getting new tires, it seemed painfully obvious everyone on fresh tyres would beat the rest, and Hamilton was the fastest of those on older tyres. Its early days yet but last year Merc made a lot of strategy errors and we're already seeing signs of the same. Going for a 2 stop last week, not putting on fresh rubber this week, Hamilton might well have been looking at pole on fresh inters.
 
Someone should deliver a big wheel of cheese to FIA HQ with a note attached - try this construction - may last longer.

These tyre's are utter garbage. If the hard tyre is blistering after only a handful of laps, whats the point of them?

Corrected :)
 
seems like a default win.

Red Bull are potentially the worst on their tyres of the fastest 5 teams, default win was said last week and they looked closer third fastest in the race, at best.

No way a default win, and being Malaysia, expect rain and a lot of luck with who stops first, or who delays, rain stops and gets lucky with 2 less pitstops than everyone else. The one thing about Red Bull is calling strategy, best/most consistently correct calls on strategy for 4 years.

Well expecting Ferrari to destroy the grid at the start of the race. Being further up if anything for me this has got Ferrari win written all over it. I'll be pretty surprised if Vettel gets to the first corner still in the lead. Its possible Hamilton could do well as the Merc is a good starter, and Webber in 5th probably isn't a threat off the grid :p
 
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From what we saw at Australia, I'd be very surprised if Vettel is still in the lead at turn 2.

Isn't Vettel the fastest starter in F1?
I can only recall once when on pole, he wasn't leading at the end of the lap. Every other time, when on pole, he leads at the end of lap 1.

Webber on the other hand, is a disaster when it comes to starts. His car regularly malfunctions at the start of the race, he then gets eaten up by the slower cars and then proceeds to play catchup for the entire race.

I think the winner tomorrow will be that which is kindest on his tyres and from what I understand, this is Vettel's problem.
 
Bit of a shame that not many people copied Vettel in getting new tires, it seemed painfully obvious everyone on fresh tyres would beat the rest, and Hamilton was the fastest of those on older tyres. Its early days yet but last year Merc made a lot of strategy errors and we're already seeing signs of the same. Going for a 2 stop last week, not putting on fresh rubber this week, Hamilton might well have been looking at pole on fresh inters.

On the other hand, it may come back to bite the top three in qualifying and play into the hands of those drivers that only used a single set of inters during Q3.

If there is rain tomorrow then Vettel and the two Ferraris will have one less set of fresh inters for the race.
 
Isn't Vettel the fastest starter in F1?
I can only recall once when on pole, he wasn't leading at the end of the lap. Every other time, when on pole, he leads at the end of lap 1.

Webber on the other hand, is a disaster when it comes to starts. His car regularly malfunctions at the start of the race, he then gets eaten up by the slower cars and then proceeds to play catchup for the entire race.

I think the winner tomorrow will be that which is kindest on his tyres and from what I understand, this is Vettel's problem.

No, red bull suck off the grid, its just the fastest cars off the grid, Merc and Ferrari were rarely in striking distance last year, with Ferraris in 2/3, that won't be the case tomorrow. Ferrari gained more than anyone throughout last year off the grid, getting to 3rd from 6th is great, but from 2nd = lead. Vettel often only had to beat Webber, and the Mclaren was often better but not SO good that it could take the Red Bull, but Hamilton very often got into a fight for the lead by the first corner rather than Red Bulls being comfortable into the first corner.

Also with Red Bull 1 and 2 they often spread themselves across the grid making it hard to overtake and Webber moving backwards scaring everyone behind :p I wouldn't be remotely surprised if Ferraris blow past Vettel starting from so close behind and without Webber to defend and get in the way of them. Whichever way Vettel defends will likely allow a Ferrari through on the other side, you'd expect he'll be planning to block Alonso rather than Massa.
 
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On the other hand, it may come back to bite the top three in qualifying and play into the hands of those drivers that only used a single set of inters during Q3.

If there is rain tomorrow then Vettel and the two Ferraris will have one less set of fresh inters for the race.

True but most of the commentary over the last couple days generally suggests that here its either drying so quickly that while the inters wear, you get to drys very quickly or its so wet you stay on wets for ages. At other races as the track drys you might do 15laps on inters before slicks are good, here it can be 5 laps. The full wets are maybe a bigger risk, if its full wet conditions all the way through but then again it will likely be so slow, safety car or red flagged.

Its definitely possible but I don't think new inters will make a big difference tomorrow.
 
Ferrari don't care if he stops soon after! :D

That's a good point actually. :)

If it would have gone on for a few more minutes then I think Mercedes would have pole now.

RedBull went for the chance of it being too wet and so pole was theirs.

Looks nicely set up for tomorrow even with him on pole
 
The main disadvantage with the Sky coverage at the moment is that every ad break has that god awful Santander ad with Jenson Button, Rory McIlroy and Jessica Ennis. They're all so wooden you could be mistaken for thinking it was a Ronseal ad.

Meh, make a cup of tea or got to the toilet.

What ad breaks are for.
 
So were the ferraris on fresh inters for their lap aswell?

Also,as mentioned earlier in the thread,the commentators are awful.Croft going on about Rosberg out performing Hamilton "again" after q2 had finished. Now do they get these jobs??
 
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