German GP 2010 - Hockenheimring

[zgred]

I was joking there mate ...germans are a bit lousy with humour you know...

Sorry, little bit late for me - I am quite opposite to German in a way

[ringo]

Whiteblue is nowhere to be found, now that focus has shifted to the time attack king aka Vettel.

He promised he would comment after the race, because I have a poor perception of the drivers.
Now Vettel has proven time and time again that he wastes pole positions, especially when he has fair competition. He also shows that he is very impulsive, leaving a highway for Massa to waltz through into first.

You know what guys like rosberg would give for a pole position and a leading lap in a home GP? Horner must be wondering what he has to do win a WCC.

Vettel can't handle Alonso, it was a cake walk race for Alonso like I said. Vettel is still one of my favoured drivers, but he's fighting above his weight class, trying to psyche out Alonso. What did he come over on alonso for, to say hello?
Those tricks don't work on the top guns.
Vettel should have went straight and try get him elsewhere.

[Super racing]

Maybe Vettel should have won a Euro F3 or a GP2 championship before he was given a shot at F1

[marcush.]

Ah yes, the ledgendary German sense of humour!

At least it stayed dry for the race.

f1technical raindancers lost out big time... you need more practise.
did it ever rain in hungary during the GP? that ´d be a challenge....

and with reference to the two REDBULL drivers,i´m pretty sure we all know that a lot of drivers currently in F1 would do equally well in THAT car.
For me it is fact that :Hamilton would lead the championship now driving for Redbull as well ,same goes for Button,Alonso,Schumacher,Barrichello...to name a few.
for me the pair is very unconvincing when they face the slightest trouble..(overtaking backmarkers,less than perfect starts,etc..)

[komninosm]

Both Smedley and Massa did everything they could to get Ferrari into trouble for this team order advantaging Alonso. Smedley could not have been any more obvious in his radio calls and Massa also made the deliberate slow down obvious.

To me this indicates that they were both royally pissed off and wanted to demonstrate that to the world. Still if Massa eventually gives testimony that he agreed with swapping race positions Ferrari may get away with it. The whole thing is very political and difficult to predict.

Hmm, a bit of a conspiracy theory, but I tend to agree. Considering Red Bull did a similar thing in a previous race (well Webber and Vettel crashed, but that's because Vettel is an @$$ and chopped the line), why would Ferrari screw this up (the appearances) so badly?

[Goran2812]

Smedley and Massa had that talk on purpose... That tone of voice from Rob,those words, were used just for one thing... To bring Ferrari trouble and for everyone to hear...
And all of this crap from Domenicali and Massa and Alonso only buries them deeper...

[komninosm]

Both Smedley and Massa did everything they could to get Ferrari into trouble for this team order advantaging Alonso. Smedley could not have been any more obvious in his radio calls and Massa also made the deliberate slow down obvious.

To me this indicates that they were both royally pissed off and wanted to demonstrate that to the world. Still if Massa eventually gives testimony that he agreed with swapping race positions Ferrari may get away with it. The whole thing is very political and difficult to predict.

So you think its Massas fault?

Well great race and really great job by Massa, he deserved to win.
To say "You saw it, there is nothing more to say" is so clear that it wasn't his idea to let Alonso pass in his own free will.

Well i hope Ferrari will at least lose their Championship points of this race.

I want them to keep the points. They had too many bad weekends.
If only Massa just came first i would be more happy about the ferrari turn around.

But it's one thing i rate about Hamilton, he wouldn't take that place. He would rather fight for it.
Alonso should have radioed in and signal them "no Massa is faster", to keep the race going.
Last week he said he wants to win on his own merit; now he goes back on his word.

What you say about Hamilton seems a fair assessment, but I sure would like it put to the test one day.

[WhiteBlue]

In my view the teams should have the right to issue unconditional team orders. At the end of a championship campaign half a point can decide if you win or loose. It does not matter one bit if that point was lost in March or October. You simply loose if you allow your drivers to have the tail wag the dog.

Team order is like pregnancy. You either do it all the way or you don't. Driver selection, renumeration and team order was the sovereign right of team principal who payed for the drivers and the cars. In Austria 2002 the hacks and some fans pressured the FiA into an idiotic rule change. Yes, the team order rule is nonsense in my considered view. Call it opinion and say it is not technical. No it isn't. But it is the way things have been handled in F1 for 52 years and have been handled well.

Nobody earns the right to take away the team principal's prerogative by watching the race and a bunch of TV adverts or by paying his TV taxes or pay TV subscription. You have a right to watch the teams fight it out against each other. Anything beyond that is foolish imagination. If a team wants a certain finishing order for their drivers they usually have the means to get what they want. Perhaps in extremes they have to wait a season but they will get there.

To try to suppress team decisions by a rule is populism of the worst sort. You create the illusion that drivers are all equal for the teams. They are not. They receive different renumeration according to their market value and most often they receive different support inside the team. Some teams do not care who wins in their car as long as both drivers have a numerical chance. Other teams have a number one driver for their very own reasons. IMO that is something the teams have to decide for themselves. F1 is not the Roman Circus Maximus where the people decided by their thumb what the outcome of the spectacle had to be.

So it is not for the FiA to control the teams for some imaginary fan satisfaction and ensure that both drivers are treated as equal. This kind of control is realistically never possible and creating the illusion of such a control is foolish. Remember the FiA observer in the McLaren garage in 2007. In the end Ferrari went away with the championship. Nothing makes the foolishness of the team order rule clearer. For the sake of an illusion the team was made to loose. Perhaps the fans got what they wanted but they got it by making a joke out of the governing body and by crippling McLaren.

Unfortunately we have the rule and the rule must be applied now to protect Massa's perceived rights to equal treatment. So I see no way that the FiA can let the result of the race stand. Alonso received an illegal advantage of seven points over his other competitors to the WDC. This advantage will have to be taken away again. If they do not do at least that, the rule will go from foolish to ridiculous. If the reports on this page are correct Massa first made a silent protest on track and in the press conference and then told the stewards he made the decision unaided all by himself. If it really happened that way he also deserves punishment for lying to the stewards. Liegate II is upon us apparently.

Finally Ferrari will have to be penalized beyond the immediate € 100,000 penalty. They need to loose all the constructor points from this race or incur a fine which is equivalent to the points scored. Say their budget is $400 mil. The points scored so far is six times what they made in this race and they may score another 200 points this season. Based on that the fine should be the twelfth of their budget. So they should either loose 33 points or get fined $ 33 mil. It would be felt in the pocket.

And finally Jean Todt should get his act together and abolish the current team order rule for the end of the year.

[Ganxxta]

Smedley and Massa had that talk on purpose... That tone of voice from Rob,those words, were used just for one thing... To bring Ferrari trouble and for everyone to hear...
And all of this crap from Domenicali and Massa and Alonso only buries them deeper...

Well if it was on purpose, than both of them, Massa and Smedley have no future at Ferrari, Massa should look for a new contract for next year and cancel his Ferrari one. Go to Renault instead of Petrov or Kubica(to Ferrari, if Kubica wants to be Nr.2) would be an option. I'm sure Kubica would have no problem to fight with his teammate and not to whine when he is behind Massa.

@WB: you are typing always so much

[Shrieker]

What you say about Hamilton seems a fair assessment, but I sure would like it put to the test one day.

Wasn't he tested in Istanbul ? Wasn't he challenged and overtaken by his team mate when his team assured him that Button wouldn't take advantage when he had to save fuel ? Didn't he fight back IMMEDIATELY and retake the position ?

That's what I call character. Alonso may be the Lion who gets saved by the rat, but Lewis is the Honey Badger. You can't make one of those yield.

I wonder what Alonso would have done in a similar situation. Apart from crying on the radio (ok I know, Lewis does whine on the radio every once in a while too).

[ringo]

Come to think of it, ban on team orders does protect the rights of the drivers to do the best that they can. All drivers are in it to win; it's a shame if that is taken away from them. So I am for team orders, but then it can be abused and effectively stifle a driver's career.

About the race now,

De La Rosa did better than his teammate here, he could have posible made his way back to the points. He fought like Hamilton, having to overtake poeple twice.

Petrov had a good race as well. The williamses messed up the start, had good pace, but too close in pace to the mercs to do anything.

Shumacher and Rosberg did their best with what they had.


And the race highlight for me was the Hamilton overtake on Webber on the outside in lap 1. It was reminiscent of his move on Rosberg in australia. That set the tone of the race for Mclaren. Alonso and Massa lap time battle was also good up to the felipe baby abortion orders.

[WhiteBlue]

Alonso's mistakes were not necessarily racing mistakes. He doesn't usually set a foot wrong when defending or attacking. His last mistakes were regulations based such as jump starting or passing off track.
While Vettel's have all been car control mistakes. We have seen these in silverstone, turkey; this year and last, and generally he's not proven to be a guy that can defend under pressure for many laps. He's been too fast lately to be in that situation, but now we get to see it, ie if all goes well for him and alonso in the first lap.
The better or faster man wont necessarily win. The man who blinks first under the pressure will lose.

We have Vettel, Alonso, Massa, Webber, Button, Hamilton, all in competitive cars, that's a lot of tension form such a short lap around, factor in back markers and things get more interesting.

I predict Alonso outbraking Vettel into the hair pin on lap 3, Vettel coming over and touching, loses a little ground then has to defend from Webber who passed Massa on lap 2. Vettel under pressure for his Home GP.

Vettel once again had a problem to get off the line cleanly and was passed by both Ferraris. I fail to see how that was any different to a botched start by jumping the lights. Jumping a start is even more of a mistake in my view as it is not a problem with the equipment but a totally unforced error by the driver.

Your predictions did not come true with regard to

1) Alonso out braking Vettel. Vettel again did it all to himself by making a bad start.

2) Vettel touching Alonso. Did not happen.

3) Vettel to have to defend against Webber. Webber never played a role in Vettel's race.

4) Weber passing Massa. Massa was way ahead in P1 after turn one.

5) Alonso being ahead of Massa. Massa took the lead over Alonso.

A case of crystal ball not working IMO. Alonso finally did top all his silly hand waving he did over the years by openly demanding team order on the radio. Is that the guy who you think is the master of on track passing?

Other than the first lap melee and the Ferrari team orders an extremely boring race. I almost fell asleep. Shame on Bernie for botching up the race track. It is supposed to have three passing points but why did we see tons of passes in Silverstone and nothing in Hockenheim?

[komninosm]

Q. (Miran Alisic, Korpmedia) I have a question for Sebastian. I think you had some not similar but close situations with Mark as well. Do you feel proud that what has happened at Ferrari today hasn’t happened in your team?

SV: Don’t you have another question maybe? Yeah, maybe they should have crashed. I don’t know, I haven’t seen the incident. I was too far back. I always saw them going into the hairpin when I was coming out of turn five, so I don’t know what you’re all talking about. I can guess but I don’t know. For sure my advice would not be it’s better to crash because also then you get a lot of questions that you have to answer so…



Vettel [-X [-X

edited for clarity

[WhiteBlue]

So what? That was a very good answer in my view to a silly question. Vettel could not have known half of what the reporters knew about the race. How can he make a judgement without a review and some briefing?

After the boring race I should probably run the Hockenheim 1997 DVD again and watch Berger win a proper race.

[komninosm]

I think team rules should be allowed.

First, because they make sense: from sponsors to teams, everybody is here to make as much money as they can. Leaving money in the table would be silly. Letting your drivers fight each other and risk getting them both to not finish would be downright dumb.

Disagree. How will sponsors make more money from a Alonso Massa 1-2 instead of the other way around?! Also you could argue that the sponsors did rather well after the Redbull turkey affair! It is too early to make this call, Massa was only 8 old style points behind before today.

It is not too early at all. And the sponsors wouldn't make more money of the reversed 1-2, but they would make more money if a Ferrari driver wins the championship. Lapped cars made Alonso lose a 2nd (and maybe even a 1st) in Canada, the safety car in Valencia costed him another 10-15 points, and the double penalty for a single offence in the UK a few others. Had Fernando been within 20 points to the WDC lead, you wouldn't have seen this. But 45 points behind with 9 races to go? Don't be naïve.

BTW: This is Grandprix' race review of Canada 2008, for those interested:
http://www.grandprix.com/gpe/rr792.html

What double penalty did Alonso get? Your bias is overflowing mate.
Also why are you quoting the Canada 2008 GP? What's the relevance? You're too vague.