Lewis Hamilton has secured his second Formula One World Championship title following victory at today's Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. Hamilton never came under any threat after reliability failed Rosberg. Williams' Felipe Massa and Valtteri Bottas completed the podium.
gray41 wrote:I actually really want Lewis to put the 1 on the car, maybe with a push from Merc and a bit of thought he'll go for it.
Toto Wolff has no problem with it and why should he. 44 is a special number for him, he won karting titels with that number and now a F1 world title. A bit like Rossi's 46.
Maybe Lewis also thinks that the #1 is cursed. In 2009 he had to defend his title with a dog of a Mclaren. He was nowhere that season to be even considered a contender for the title.
Guys, Regarding Rosberg's failure. Could it be his own making. Read on Matt Somers twitter that he predicted failure couple of laps earlier because of brake bias at 62. I noticed the same thing in Quali as well. So in summary Nico in his quest to extract more performance in quali damaged ERS.
gray41 wrote:I actually really want Lewis to put the 1 on the car, maybe with a push from Merc and a bit of thought he'll go for it.
Toto Wolff has no problem with it and why should he. 44 is a special number for him, he won karting titels with that number and now a F1 world title. A bit like Rossi's 46.
djos wrote:I would suggest that is just simple risk management by Lewis - he knew that he could get to the end with his current power levels and simply didn't want to take any risks at all.
But the point was that the radio messages made it sound like turning the engine up/down is done from the pit which would be illegal
the driver sets the engine mode as instructed from the pits ; after rosberg having turned the engine up against instructions earlier in the season in an attempt to beat hamilton both drivers were told that they must always follow instructions as the pits know best
to the optimist a glass is half full ; to the pessimist a glass is half empty ; to the F1 engineer the glass is twice as big as it needs to be
in common with someone who posted earlier I nearly didn't watch the race because I was afraid of a result which would have ruined the season for me with it's sheer injustice ; nor did I want to see any schumacher tactics to steal a result
but in the end I took a double dose of beta blockers and watched fairly calmly
in the end I was more relieved than elated , any other result would have been a travesty
to the optimist a glass is half full ; to the pessimist a glass is half empty ; to the F1 engineer the glass is twice as big as it needs to be
Sorry, but the truth is that Hamilton is the WDC of him and Rosberg. No matter how big the mistake in qualy was, the Mercs were always 1-2. Secondly, even if they got to the back somehow (failure in qualy or other reason), their >1s gap over their closest contender (translated sometimes into ~2s compared to the cars around) meant that overtaking was a formality. How is that a remarkable and flawless season for anyone else other than the technical team who built this car?
Both of them made huge mistakes and, with a smaller gap between Merc and the other teams, they would've had very big problems in the races as a mistake wouldn't have meant 2nd instead of 1st, but rather 5th instead of 1st. Also, you can't say that Hamilton set his car for races and that's the reason why he didn't beat Rosberg in qualy. You could see the lock-ups and the mistakes, those wouldn't have happened if everything was planned to be better in the race.
I don't rate Vettel very high, but his dominance in a car that had a much smaller gap compared to the opposition was much executed much better.
"As a kid, I didn't like pizza, but I remember often going out for dinner with Lewis and Nico," former F1 race winner and rally driver Robert Kubica, who raced the pair in 2000, told BBC Sport. "They would even have races to eat pizza, always eating two at a time.
"There was always competition. They always wanted to win, to beat each other. But they didn't fight. It was friendly competition. There was always laughing afterwards.
"We had so much fun. We were friends. It was nice. We were normal kids. I have good memories of growing up with them."
"If the only thing keeping a person decent is the expectation of divine reward, then brother that person is a piece of sh*t"
alexx_88 wrote:
I don't rate Vettel very high, but his dominance in a car that had a much smaller gap compared to the opposition was much executed much better.
One big difference is that Vettel had number 1 driver status and a relatively weak team mate. The Mercedes drivers had to fight each other for every pole, every point.
Also, with Vettel looking so poor this season one is tempted to ask whether he was actually getting everything out if his dominant car. Perhaps it was actually more dominant than we saw but he didn't extract it all.
If you are more fortunate than others, build a larger table not a taller fence.
MercedesAMGSpy wrote:
Toto Wolff has no problem with it and why should he. 44 is a special number for him, he won karting titels with that number and now a F1 world title. A bit like Rossi's 46.
Maybe Lewis also thinks that the #1 is cursed. In 2009 he had to defend his title with a dog of a Mclaren. He was nowhere that season to be even considered a contender for the title.
this is the advantage lewis has now though. last time he won the title in 2008, at the end of a regulation era and mclaren got it wrong with the new regs. now he has won it at the start of an era, and its likely merc will only build on this. it looks unlikely this will be his last title in the next few years he wins. i think he will get another 1, maybe 2.
It's difficult to predict it. He has a very tough competitor in the same car. Nico Rosberg will come back stronger next year. Nico never had a teammate in F1 that realistically outperformed him, meaning all those years in f1 he never had a bigger incentive before then he currently has, to work harder and become better then ever before.
Rest assured, Lewis and Nico will continue to make eachother's life very miserable on the track.
Indeed. I wouldn't be surprised if we see a very strong Nico next year. On the other hand, I wouldn't be surprised to see a more confident Lewis as well. This year, he has been on the back foot from day one, only to catch up with 5 wins and then be on the back foot again. Realistically, he was never really leading the championship by any margin until the very end of the season, up at which point, there was already a huge amount of pressure not to make any mistakes as any DNF would be championship deciding.
I think if Hamilton hadn't had that DNF in Australia and technical issues this year, the mental advantage he would have captured through his wins would have been even more substantial and perhaps, the WDC have been decided earlier as a result. How next year turns out, I think will especially matter on how it plays out and who is on the back foot. It could either be very one-sided or closely battled as this year. I wouldn't be surprised if it goes either way IMO.
Not for nothing, Rosberg's Championship is the only thing that lends credibility to Hamilton's recent success. Otherwise, he'd just be the guy who's had the best car. — bhall II #Team44 supporter
I think Vettel was acing it in 2011 and 2013 - even Lewis or 'Nando would've had trouble besting him in the same car. But quite honestly, the lack of a planted rear thanks to EBD exposed his weaknesses this season. He really gelled with those cars. He can take comfort tho in the knowledge that not many will become a quadruple WDC.
Education is that which allows a nation free, independent, reputable life, and function as a high society; or it condemns it to captivity and poverty.
-Atatürk
Just rewatched the race and realized how many gremlins was in Rosbergs car; As he failed to break for T1 on lap 40-something, his DRS was open when he applied the break. An onboard showed this.
I must say that Rosbergs sportsmanship was superb in and after the race. His wish to finish the race gave me alot of sympathy for him.
