Belgian GP 2011 - Spa-Francorchamps

[marcush.]

the point is : he put himself in a crash position for no reason .
It did not gain him time
It put his own race at risk
he did not know if Hamilton was aware of him and gave himself and hamilton no breathing space to go .just not very clever.

Hamilton obviously is to blame ,no question did he judge the situation wrong but kamui had given in anyways why make it tight in that situation...

[Gerhard Berger]

So he's obliged to lift because he some how knew Hamilton was going to cut across him?

I don't think (I hope at least) that no one is asserting that he was obliged to... However, it would have been sensible to do so, he said this himself, that he ended up in a place he didn't really want to be. Hamilton cutting across – no he wasn't meant to predict that in any way, Hamilton took himself out there. That said, Kamui was in a pretty silly place.

Well the post i quoted did state the need for Kamui to lift.

I see nothing wrong with the positioning of Kamui's car. He's on the racing line and sticks to it. Lewis is inside of him and slowly veers towards him.

[Gerhard Berger]

the point is : he put himself in a crash position for no reason .
It did not gain him time
It put his own race at risk
he did not know if Hamilton was aware of him and gave himself and hamilton no breathing space to go .just not very clever.

Hamilton obviously is to blame ,no question did he judge the situation wrong but kamui had given in anyways why make it tight in that situation...

So basically drivers should avoid going near Hamilton's car because it puts their own race at risk.

[beelsebob]

I see nothing wrong with the positioning of Kamui's car. He's on the racing line and sticks to it. Lewis is inside of him and slowly veers towards him.

And you don't see it as normal for drivers to re-take the racing line after defending? That's pretty much the done thing for all times when the driver defending thinks the job is done because the other person is too far back.

Kamui should have seen that the job was done, and lifted a little... Hamilton certainly shouldn't have assumed that the job was done.

[Gerhard Berger]

I see nothing wrong with the positioning of Kamui's car. He's on the racing line and sticks to it. Lewis is inside of him and slowly veers towards him.

And you don't see it as normal for drivers to re-take the racing line after defending? That's pretty much the done thing for all times when the driver defending thinks the job is done because the other person is too far back.

Kamui should have seen that the job was done, and lifted a little... Hamilton certainly shouldn't have assumed that the job was done.

It is normal, but only once they have fully passed the other car.

If the job was genuinly done, then there would have been no need for Kamui to lift.

[beelsebob]

It is normal, but only once they have fully passed the other car.

If the job was genuinly done, then there would have been no need for Kamui to lift.

Agreed – so what I'm saying is with kamui only barely along side he could have thought reasonably "hey, there's a fair chance with the --- mirrors these cars have, and the fact that I'm in a blind spot that he's going to think the job's done and move across. Because of that, I'm going to lift a little and enter the corner marginally slower. It's going to get me tucked up right behind him and I might have a chance into Rivage if I really think I can get him back."

He didn't have to – but it would have been sensible.

[FrukostScones]

Basicly Kobayashi had the right to race Lewis, but with a broken front wing in a slower car, trying to retake position on a dangerous part of the track, knowing how stubborn the (then title contender) is, this was a fairly stupid move by Kobayashi!
And Hamilton did not swerve, it was all predictable for Kobayashi... but Kobayashi had to be overmotivated again... and brake to late!

If Kobayashi really said that he did not want to retake position, then he lied!(or he was not sure what he was doing, what would be scary).
And no, I m not a Hamilton Fanboy! Maybe I m not even fan of him.

Lewis needs to sit down and watch the last few years of Alonso's greatest overtaking hits to learn how to overtake without driving into the other car!

it's only a movie, keep repeating it's only a movie...

[Mr.S]

I agree with macush too in this regard. The whole wheelbase issue can barely given them a couple of tenths of more.


The car lacks severe downforce. Look the car was down 2.5s in qualifying in Spa & 1.2s in the race(PER LAP DATA). Spa is supposed to be their 2nd or 3rd strongest circuit after Monza & maybe Montreal. When the pull the gap down to 0.6-0.7 odd in qualifying atleast that will be what is closing the GAP.


The Rosberg situation you already know.The car was set-up for qualifying & was horribly slow in the race,that & Rosberg pullung together a fantastic lap caused the gap to come down to 0.5s otherwise it should have been 1s + like usual. I dont think they have closed the gap. I think the front teams are going furthur way.

[richard_leeds]

Peter sauber doesn't pay him to roll over and play dead when Lewis, mark, Jensen, alonso or button steam up along side of him!

The irony is that we saw Alonso fall in line when he was overtaken at this race. Of course I'm not saying he was obliged to, just that he did.

Hamilton had overtaken 3 (?) other mid-field cars after his pit stop before he got to Kobyashi, and those other cars had all fallen in line once he'd passed them, so you can see why he expected the same with Kobyashi. Of course Lewis was wrong to assume but you can see why he did so.

[dren]

The laps at Spa are quite a bit longer. The car looked better in high fuel race trim than it has in a while. The cars finished on the lead lap. This is partially due to the long lap and the safety car though. The cars didn't look slower than the last few races. They were right about where they expected to be. Hamilton crashed out and Massa...well who knows with Massa.

I don't think they set up Rosberg for qualifying. He was way off the pace there. The car was most likely set up for a dry race.

[Ray]

[richard_leeds]

Sorry Strad - I know I shouldn't add the thread, but I'm genuinely interested about what is going on in someone's head to cause them to make elementary errors.

One expects rookies like Maldonado to have moments like that, but not someone with Hamilton's talent, experience, and much faster car on an otherwise open track. Curious isn't it?

[Mr.S]

Look Spa pace was below my expectations. With all those straights I expect Merc to be comfortably within 1 second in qualifying. I also expect that if there are races where they could challenge for podiums then it will be either of Spa,Montreal or Monza. The first lap & starts has more to do with the driver's capability & the Merc engine in the straight.

You could see how Rosberg fell off as soon as he got overtaken. Anyways I think Rosberg car is set-up slightly more towards qualifying than Michael. Michael was at 14th & Rosberg started at 5th & got to 1st pretty soon. Michael had to claw his way through traffic sometimes getting stuck behind slower cars. Yet he finished before Nico. I think it is partly due to statefy,partly due to MSC & partly to the fact that his car maybe was setup more for qualifying.

[F1PuertoRico]

i watched the KOB- HAM incident a lot of times and what i see is:
1) KOB still have space to move left before hitting the grass.
2) KOB start turning before HAM even a couple of feet behind.
3) HAM looks straight when got hit by KOB.
4) KOB have the whole picture of what is happening.
5) Look at your left mirror while turning right at speed is not right.

[myurr]

Sorry Strad - I know I shouldn't add the thread, but I'm genuinely interested about what is going on in someone's head to cause them to make elementary errors.

One expects rookies like Maldonado to have moments like that, but not someone with Hamilton's talent, experience, and much faster car on an otherwise open track. Curious isn't it?

All the top drivers can and have made 'elementary' errors like that. But everyone has their favourite driver and their favourite driver to dump on, and that is what ends up driving these debates. Take the Alonso incident further up the thread - elementary error by your judgement and that is from a two time world champion widely regarded as the most complete driver on the grid. Look at all the mistakes Schumacher has made in the last two years, despite 20 years of experience. Look at Webber in Valencia on a very slow back marker last year, or Vettel in Spa last year losing control pulling out of a slip stream.

It happens to all these guys because they are driving on the absolute limits of what their machinery is capable of doing, and no matter how fast or experienced they are they rarely have the luxury of leaving any room for even minor errors. And being human they all do make minor errors and misjudgements here and there. And the more you end up having to fight through the field the more opportunity there is for mistakes and minor errors - any of those guys can cruise at 97% of the cars performance when out front and drive error free lap after lap. All of them will make mistakes when pushing 100% and fighting their way through the field, some they get away with some they do not.