2012 Hungarian GP - Hungaroring

[dxpetrov]

Well, you can all just bang your heads down on how Hamilton could;ve gone faster, but he confirmed in post race interviews that he was slower and that the only thing that saved him was his pole and good strategy.
No, McLaren was only 3rd fastest in race trim, however it sounded unpleasant to some in here... =D>

[Richard]

"Fastest" only matters twice in F1 - qualifying and the start. After that the objective is to be fast enough to use the optimum strategy, and the optimum strategy may not involve being as fast as possible, ie optimising fuel and tyres.

Also a car on old tyres defending against the car behind will not be as fast as a car on fresh tyres in clean air.

Any attempt to definitively judge the relative speeds of closely matched cars in the confusion of racing is impossible, and in my experience mostly attempted by those pursuing a fanboy agenda.

My conclusion is that one car was fastest by far when it mattered most, and that car went on to win the race. Anything else is as productive as reading tea leaves.

[NathanOlder]

Yeah, at the end of the day,

Mclaren were fastest in FP1 by 0.576 to Ferrari
Mclaren were fastest in FP2 by 0.185 to Lotus
Red Bull were fastest in FP3 by 0.093 to Mclaren
Mclaren were fastest in Q1 by 0.118 to Force India
Mclaren were fastest in Q2 by 0.347 to Red Bull
Mclaren were fastest in Q3 by 0.413 to Lotus
Mclaren were fastest in 69 laps by 1.032 to Lotus.

Fastest car ......?

[Nando]

It was fast enough let´s just say that

[NathanOlder]

Yeah, that'll do nicely =D>

[dxpetrov]

Yeah, that'll do nicely =D>

Whatever makes you happy!

[myurr]

Yeah, but Raikkonen's fastest lap was on tyres over 20 laps old indicating he too could have gone faster in his last stint. Although Adam Cooper did a review of the race in the subscriber's section of Autosport.com and he says Raikkonen's mediums weren't new but rather a scrubbed set.

Which still doesn't give a definitive answer as to which of the two was fastest per se, just means they were both not going as fast as they could, for different reasons.

Hamilton's fastest lap was on a set of tyres that were 25 laps old! But otherwise that's all true, there was a lot of tactical driving going on between the two at the front. Kimi close Hamilton down but certainly wasn't going flat out at that point because, as you point out, he went quicker in the previous stint with more fuel and older tyres.

[siskue2005]

There has been clarification of what happened at Hungary race start


Now we know, that infact Michael was in the wrong grid slot, infact he parked his car 19th on the grid instead of 17th where he qualified. As this fan video proves. As a matter of fact seen in this video, Koabayashi firstly parked in P17 for a short moment, and since Michael was right behind him he then parked in 19th, not seeing that Kobayashi then re-accelerated to find his ordinary grid slot.

Norbert explains, “Firstly Michael thought that the yellow flag was there because of another driver and then he turned the engine off because of the overheating problem. Then when Charlie got a message from Kovalainen and De La Rosa, that they were in the wrong grid position he decided to have another formation lap, but then Michael had already turned off his engine.

Sabine continues: “Michael parked his car right behind Kobayashi. Where he focused on the starting procedure and looking after his overheated engine, then he did not notice that Kobayashi, then accelerated to take back his initial grid position. Then suddenly Michael was in the wrong position, it all was very weird.”

Sabine concluded that “when Michael saw the yellow flag, he then just turned off the car because of an old habit and to preserve the engine.”

http://mercamgf1-fans.com/2012/07/31/mi ... lot-video/

[Richard]

Thanks for the quote. Shame people slammed the Merc team for letting Schumacher down when in fact it was a mistake by Koabayashi.

[Nando]

It was deifnitely a mistake by Schumacher.
He can blame Koba all he want but it´s his job to make sure he´s in the right spot, not Koba.

[simieski]

Thanks for the quote. Shame people slammed the Merc team for letting Schumacher down when in fact it was a mistake by Koabayashi.

I don't think it was kobayashi who turned his engine off

With ref to the eng overheat...
Considering that Schumacher was one of the last drivers on the grid this lends itself to a car issue or either an improper parade lap in car procedure causing the overheat.

[siskue2005]

It was deifnitely a mistake by Schumacher.
He can blame Koba all he want but it´s his job to make sure he´s in the right spot, not Koba.

People line up behind the cars in front of them
They can't see where their correct grids are, there are no grid numbers on the track
What are you suggesting? He should have parked his car ON TOP of Koba's car?

[siskue2005]

Thanks for the quote. Shame people slammed the Merc team for letting Schumacher down when in fact it was a mistake by Koabayashi.

I don't think it was kobayashi who turned his engine off

With ref to the eng overheat...
Considering that Schumacher was one of the last drivers on the grid this lends itself to a car issue or either an improper parade lap in car procedure causing the overheat.

He turned off his engine coz of over heating

[Richard]

Actually the links noted above say that turning the engine off was standard practice in Schumacher's Ferrari days, but not now. So that was driver error too. Oh and speeding in the pit lane is another driver error.

[siskue2005]

Now I remember....back then if there is yellow flag just before race start all the mechanics would come and every car will be mended for few minutes and a 5 minutes delayed start is issued....that's what happened in 1998 Suzuka race.
This new rule was brought around 2008 ? 2007?