Singapore Grand Prix 2011, Marina Bay Street Circuit - Race 14/19

[dannyjo22]

Think youll find it did - too many people have rose-tinted glasses when it comes to Senna...

ps3ud0

Ok explain how it did him harm?

He's remembered as the greatest of all time in the main, along with MS of equally dubious tactics. Most of the time people jumped out of their way when they saw them coming.

People will be far more cautious of Lewis as well. That will help him. Better to have all the crashes when you are not in a championship contending car I think.

Whe he had a championship challenging car he won it and lost one to kimi due to Mclarens internal battles between himself and Alonso. It's not like he's throwing titles away or even that many race wins. Hell it's not even affecting constructors titles.

 

[ps3ud0]

Pretty sure he, like Lewis, lost a championship because of their driving style/attitude, not because the eventual winner was the better driver at the time.

Its just amazing that people like MS are considered pantomine villians when Senna wasnt that much better at sportsmanship and was just as ruthless and dangerous, yet is considered the greatest of all time. To paraphrase its 'just another example of peoples memory of F1'...

So glad its ok to crash when you dont have a championship contending car (am joking)

ps3ud0

 

[sunama]

I belive a cirtain brazilian driver in the 80s/90s going by the name of Senna also had a similar style. Didn't do him any harm

But Senna didnt have as many accidents as Hamilton is currently having.

At present Hamilton seems to be involved in at least 1 incident, every other race.

Canada was a little ridiculous, because he was on the track for only a few laps in that short time he collided with Webber (I think it was) and went off the track trying to overtake MSc. I'm not going to mention the Button crash as I don't believe he was to blame for that one.

It must also be pointed out that every driver/sportsman goes through bad form. The problem with Hamilton is that his bad form seems to be lasting many races and this is the worry.

Also, somebody above stated that Alonso was reckless last year, yet we are singing his praises this year. First off, for me and for many, last year, Alonso was the driver of the season. The reason for this is that he was the highest scoring driver in the 2nd half of the season, in a car which was not the best. Furthermore, he made RBR work very hard to beat him. It was only when they sold him a dummy (to cover Webber) and encouraged him into a bad strategy that they beat him to the title. Otherwise, Alonso would've won the title last year. Also, in the last race of last year, Alonso tried very hard to get passed Petrov. The problem was that the track did not allow overtaking. Alonso was pushing so hard, he even ended up going off the track. But crucially, he did not crash (which is Hamilton's problem, this year).

You also have to consider that although Alonso had an average 1st half of last season, he still absolutely hammered his team-mate into oblivion. This is something that Hamilton has not been able to do.

To compare Alonso in 2010, with Hamilton in 2011, is wrong as there is no comparison.

Personally, I feel that Hamilton has actually gone backwards and is currently not driving as well as he did in 2007/8/9/10. His weakness this year has been his recklessness.

 

[sunama]

People will be far more cautious of Lewis as well. That will help him. Better to have all the crashes when you are not in a championship contending car I think.

Hehehe....good point.

 

[Cool Breeze]

The bottom line is controversy is good for the sport, always has been always will be, Lewis is just fueling those needs just now, next season it will be some other poor bugger (I hope, though I am more from the Hill / Jenson era.

 

[FrankJH]

Pretty sure he, like Lewis, lost a championship because of their driving style/attitude, not because the eventual winner was the better driver at the time.

Its just amazing that people like MS are considered pantomine villians when Senna wasnt that much better at sportsmanship and was just as ruthless and dangerous, yet is considered the greatest of all time. To paraphrase its 'just another example of peoples memory of F1'...

So glad its ok to crash when you dont have a championship contending car (am joking)

ps3ud0

Well to be fair its only been since Senna crashed that the FIA have been in some cases tough on dangerous driving and safety in general.

Before that Senna taking Prost out and vice versa was all in the name of motorsport.

If it happened now I think the stunt in Australia that gave Schumi his first title would get him banned (or at least like 97 have all the ppoints for that season taken away), rather than the rather blase attitude that occured that year

 

[Abraxaz1]

also I've seen it a few times that Massa approached Hamilton privately and Hamilton basically told him to **** off...so that's why he decided to show the camera's what he thought. Hamilton's petulance is why Massa responded like he did. Also, Hamilton swore at Massa on the tv...if you listen carefully! I'm all for giving the guy a break, but sometimes he deserves the ** Please fully star out swearing *** he copping....

No offence but masser deserved to be told where to go, it was more unproffessional to do what he did, which was to try and publicly humilate Hamilton. Its Not his job to pass judgment, what has he ever done? nothing hes a has been. He blames everyone else for his ****-ups, such as diving on marbles in the tunnel in monaco, he should have given the place to hamilton but he didn't.
The sooner Ferrari get rid of hima nd get a better quality secound driver the better, they just don't want to because of his accident.

Hamilton just needs a decent car underneath him, atmoment hes trying to get more performance from a car and its just not responding leaving to him pushing the car beyond its limits, also dosnt help with him expecting the same racecraft as himself. Look at the lewis vs MSC battles, respect both ways others seem to think planting the car on a apex or closing the door is the only way to race.

I honestly feel that next year will be a redbull whitewash, cant see redbull producing a poor car as theres no significant regulation changes that can effect next years car greatly.
Hopefully Ferrari or Mclaren can produce a massive turn around next year but i really doubt it.

Major thing that winding me up, is a co-worker (austrian) boosting that its a austrian team owning the f1 season, its not like the top guys are all british or the cars built in milton keynes... only thing that is austrain is the money.
Just annoys me for some reason no idea why

 

[dannyjo22]

When Massa came at Hamilton, Hamilton should have asked him where Alonso was his puppet master and does he have to always walk infront to Alonso to give him a tow.

He doesn't need to swear at him just remind him he's the new Irvine.

 

[JRS]

He has been tremendous fun to watch!

Really?

It's just, I'm struggling to remember a truly great drive from him all year. China was good, especially given the drama before the start. And I suppose Germany was pretty good, with him holding off the Red Bull and Ferrari cars until it was time for the harder tyre compound to go on and he could pull away. And he pushed Vettel all the way to the flag in Barcelona. But those races have been mired in a sea of utter....well, 'meh' at best (he's finished 4th or lower eight times this season) and 'crap' at the other end of the spectrum.

Monaco was a horror show. The clash with Alonso in Malaysia was ridiculous. I'm not sure what he was thinking at Spa when he basically drove into Kamui Kobayashi in the braking zone for Les Combes. Hungary showed up his shortcomings in panic-and-crisis situations with the weather and strategic problems being compounded by him dropping the car and not bothering to wait for the advancing pack of cars to get by before launching into a recovery turn. The less said about his attempt at overtaking Button in Canada the better. He was completely ineffectual behind Schumacher in Monza.

This is Lewis Hamilton. The driver who damned near won the title at his first attempt, and probably would have if McLaren hadn't been so bloody stupid in China - every TV camera in the world showed that his tyres were coming apart. The driver who won the title in 2008 in spite of at least one seriously bad call by the stewards (that would be Spa, for the Lewisterical ones amongst you who do so love to keep score of every time your boy is wronged). The driver who took a McLaren that was a starting money special at the start of the year in '09 and made it a race winner by the end.

To see him down in fifth in the title race, with only four podium finishes so far....unless he has a phenomenal run into the end of the year he's going to be one of my major disappointments of the season.

 

[Jono8]

Possibly. All sportsmen go through bad patches though

 

[The_Abyss]

The way Hamilton is driving at the moment it looks like having other drivers on the track is a major inconvenience to him. Same with tyres going off or weather changing. He just drives like it is a series of 1 lap charges, and everyone else should get out of his way.

Personally I think he's lost belief in the car and has written this year off. This was typified in Singapore when he basically asked if it was worth carrying on. Nobody does that.

 

[CaptainRAVE]

I honestly thought that in 2009. Big changes afoot and I thoroughly expected McLaren to handle it a lot better than everyone else and dominate. Instead we had a freak Brawn car that got so far ahead nobody had a chance of catching them, despite RBR emerging from the pack and staying there since.

Once the 2013 rule change takes place, I don't see RBR staying where they are now. 2009 was a tricky one since there had been a big rule change, and both McLaren and Ferrari had been fighting it out for the championship right to the end of the previous season.

I am still laughing at that Massa video from the weekend, he really is useless

 

[gord]

Personally I think he's lost belief in the car and has written this year off. This was typified in Singapore when he basically asked if it was worth carrying on. Nobody does that.

So you are criticising him for fighting back from well down the order to finish 5th because he asked whether he could get points out of the race?

I'd rather have my driver ask the team whether the race is on than go charging around for no reason. If it wasn't they could have run a test session and kept the engine in top condition.

 

[3dcandy]

and you know he'd have been crucified if he did that gord...honestly, he would!

 

[gord]

and you know he'd have been crucified if he did that gord...honestly, he would!

Exactly my point. I just don't see how you can criticise him for using all the resources at his disposal and fighting back based off of that information.

 

[3dcandy]

Didn't criticise him for fighting back...however smacking into a car a race is a different matter! lol

 

[The_Abyss]

So you are criticising him for fighting back from well down the order to finish 5th because he asked whether he could get points out of the race?

I'd rather have my driver ask the team whether the race is on than go charging around for no reason. If it wasn't they could have run a test session and kept the engine in top condition.

No, you misread what I said. I said that I think he's lost belief in the ability of the car to deliver, which resulted in the comment he made. A McLaren could easily go from 20th to a points finish in less than half a race, yet he was questioning whether it was worth it.

That suggests that either he doesn't believe the car can do it, or that it simply isn't worth sweating his **** off for 2 hours just to get a couple of points.

Either explanation isn't really satisfactory thinking for someone who aspires to be at least a double WDC.

 

[gord]

Didn't criticise him for fighting back...however smacking into a car a race is a different matter! lol

No my comments are about what Abyss wrote.

No, you misread what I said. I said that I think he's lost belief in the ability of the car to deliver, which resulted in the comment he made. A McLaren could easily go from 20th to a points finish in less than half a race, yet he was questioning whether it was worth it.

That suggests that either he doesn't believe the car can do it, or that it simply isn't worth sweating his **** off for 2 hours just to get a couple of points.

Either explanation isn't really satisfactory thinking for someone who aspires to be at least a double WDC.

You are inferring way too much from what he asks. He asks "Could you please give me some info on what I'm doing? What we're racing for? How quick I'm going?".

He's not asking the philosophical "Why am I here" in the middle of the race. Lewis has just been in the wars, penalised, is over a minute back from where he was. He wants to know what the revised strategy is from the team. How hard should he be pushing etc. The question is not a result of lost belief, he wants a realistic, practical evaluation of what is happening.

 

[The_Abyss]

I think that's actually pretty subjective. The tone of the response back from the pit was not however - it was very much 'yes it is still worth racing - there will be a safety car'.

 

[Sparky]

Once the 2013 rule change takes place, I don't see RBR staying where they are now. 2009 was a tricky one since there had been a big rule change, and both McLaren and Ferrari had been fighting it out for the championship right to the end of the previous season.

I am still laughing at that Massa video from the weekend, he really is useless

So this year they just decided not to bother, dont get that quote at all. Guess we shall see when 2013 gets here,going to be interesting however it pans out i reckon.