Hamilton and Alonso penalized by FIA

[manchild]

Perhaps that's correct spelling in Scottish English?

[CHT]

Hamilton mentioned he expected to be penalized and accepted the penalty. Is there another conspiracy behind this?

[jamsbong]

When I saw the replay right after the accident between Alonso and Hamilton. Alonso appear to close up to Hamilton so quickly. I wonder if Hamilton deliberately slowed down and initiated the collision?

I think the stewards should look at the telemetry. Also, Alonso should protest.

[shamikaze]

When I saw the replay right after the accident between Alonso and Hamilton. Alonso appear to close up to Hamilton so quickly. I wonder if Hamilton deliberately slowed down and initiated the collision?

Me thinks you are reading too much into this. The explanation could be as easy as that Lewis had reached the preverbial "cliff" of his tyres, explaining him to go wide in the 5xth lap (i think it was) and later even pitting for new tyres. I'd say tyre-degradatino was the cause of Lewis's increase in laptime. For the biggest part of the race, the mcL's (both) easily had the upper-ground over the Ferrari's.

This also reminds me, someone should rewrite that song and now sing "Alonso, Massa is faster then you ...." )

[jamsbong]

Shamikaze, I guess you're right. The new tyres do play a heavy role in slowing cars down. On hind sight (it is easy to say that), Alonso should have been more patient.

Although, I am not so much in favor of Alonso's penalty since he already served a self-inflicted penalty of changing the car's nose. But then, I suppose it made no difference in the end.

[Dragonfly]

It's of course the responsibility of the chasing driver, but I'd imagine that in the wake of the McLaren the front of the Ferrari was not so responsive to driver input and several thousandths of a second were enough to clip the rear tire.
For me it's a pure racing incident and even recent history shows (Australia - 2011) that others went unpunished even when taking another car out of the race.

[zeph]

Uncle Joe goes off on a tangent:

https://joesaward.wordpress.com/2011/04 ... -analysis/

[Just_a_fan]

@zeph

Other than the bit at the end where he throws out some random idea as to why Alonso hit Hamilton, it looks a reasonable review of the situation.

I don't buy Alonso hitting Hamilton on purpose. He knows the front wing is too fragile for that.

[andrew]

The incident which caused Hamilton’s penalty was timed at 17.20 and the incident which caused Alonso’s penalty was timed at 17.22. Given the lap times involved one can say with some certainty that Hamilton’s penalty related to a move on lap 45, while Alonso’s penalty was linked to the collision on lap 46 that led him to pit at the end of the lap.

Some certainty!!!!

It was on the rudy TV for all to see so there is no dubiety about what happened when!

I don't really see what he is getting at here except, stating the obvious, and trying to look for a plot by the evil Ferrari to try and alter the course of the championship.

[WhiteBlue]

http://www.planet-f1.com/driver/3213/6867391/-Alonso-raised-Hamilton-weaving-issue-
We did not see anything in the commentary box that raised alarms but the stewards have access to far more footage and data than we do and I suspect they want to set a precedent in this new style of F1 racing... We did not hear about Hamilton's potential penalty during the race because the issue was only raised by Alonso and Ferrari afterwards. Alonso was also penalised 20 seconds after running into the back of Hamilton but, given he did not damage the Briton's race at that point, I would have thought having to pit for a new nose was penalty enough.

I was pretty sure something like this had happened to trigger the unusual steward decision. If Alonso had kept his gob shut both penalties would in all likelihood not happened. With the complaint the stewards had no option. They had to look into things.

A pity that Alonso did not suffer as much as Hamilton for triggering this charade. We don't need penalties for what is essentially a bit of aggressive racing.

[andrew]

A pity that Alonso did not suffer as much as Hamilton for triggering this charade. We don't need penalties for what is essentially a bit of aggressive racing.

Yes, Alonso used his powers to make Hamilton weave!

Both drivers were at fault in 2 seperate incidents and regardless of what went on between the teams and stewards, both drivers have been correctly punished.

[forty-two]

Wow, first I find myself agreeing with WhiteBlue and now with Andrew!

Well, 2011 is already an interesting year!

[andrew]

Ye Gods!!! I'm off for a lie down now!

[WhiteBlue]

It is correct that the stewards had to punish both men after the complaint drew attention to detail that were only visible by additional data gathering devices and video not broadcast. That inspection went on after the race.

In the interest of Formula1 and motor racing in general it would have been better if that investigation had not taken place. Thus I still conclude that the Alonso/Ferrari complaint was detrimental.

[volarchico]

^^ +1. I don't think anyone is arguing that what Hamilton did was against the rules. Or that Alonso ran into Hamilton. Those are both pretty clear from the video! However, the point being that there are lots of cases of the "Hamilton" move throughout the race that were ignored. The only reason that this specific example was awarded a penalty and the others were not was that this incident was requested to be looked into after the race. If what Hamilton did was SO clearly in the wrong, there were still enough laps in the race to award him a penalty during the race - not this retroactive crap that changes results after the checkered flag has waved.