Are we seeing a Vettel era?

[Gerhard Berger]

I don't think we can really do it for penalties; they were dished out because of a certain reason. Why do you say Lewis was a likely 3rd in Hungary? The Mclarens; as I remember it; were getting clotted by some half a second a lap by the Ferraris; and by some 1.5 seconds a lap by the Red Bulls. The McLarens were nowhere near them.

Of course we can do it for penalties, because some penalties were more costly than others.

Lewis was 4th when his gearbox failed (quite comfortably ahead of Massa). I think it's quite likely that Vettel may have come out behind Lewis after his penalty (though i could be wrong on that )

[mnmracer]

How many points were lost by bad luck in 2010?
What counts as misfortune: mechanical failure, being crashed in to by another driver
What does not count as misfortune: wrong tactical choices, crashing their own car, penalty by the driver’s own doing

• Sebastian Vettel lost a net 63 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Jenson Button lost a net 23 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Lewis Hamilton lost a net 17 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Mark Webber lost a net 7 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Fernando Alonso gained a net 19 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune from his direct championship competitors.

Full article

[Gerhard Berger]

How many points were lost by bad luck in 2010?
What counts as misfortune: mechanical failure, being crashed in to by another driver
What does not count as misfortune: wrong tactical choices, crashing their own car, penalty by the driver’s own doing

• Sebastian Vettel lost a net 63 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Jenson Button lost a net 23 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Lewis Hamilton lost a net 17 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Mark Webber lost a net 7 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Fernando Alonso gained a net 19 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune from his direct championship competitors.

Full article

Briefly skimmed through it, and there's way too many things i disagree with.

I'ts very difficult (and quite pointless) to write an alternative F1 history. Changing one thing, has a knock on effect on other things. Not sure why mechanical failures are classed as bad luck wrong tactical choices (in many cases by race engineers) are not. Besides, these things are all part of F1 and what make it such an exciting sport.

[Mandrake]

The article is written without a bias for any driver. Of course it could all have come different, but all in all I think it's a pretty good summary of what could have been possible.

@ Gerhard, of course you find many things to disagree with.....In that article Vettel's performance looks pretty solid, something you apparently don't want to see

[Raptor22]

How many points were lost by bad luck in 2010?
What counts as misfortune: mechanical failure, being crashed in to by another driver
What does not count as misfortune: wrong tactical choices, crashing their own car, penalty by the driver’s own doing

• Sebastian Vettel lost a net 63 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Jenson Button lost a net 23 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Lewis Hamilton lost a net 17 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Mark Webber lost a net 7 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Fernando Alonso gained a net 19 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune from his direct championship competitors.

Full article

Briefly skimmed through it, and there's way too many things i disagree with.

I'ts very difficult (and quite pointless) to write an alternative F1 history. Changing one thing, has a knock on effect on other things. Not sure why mechanical failures are classed as bad luck wrong tactical choices (in many cases by race engineers) are not. Besides, these things are all part of F1 and what make it such an exciting sport.

??? But thats exactly what you have been trying to achieve. Discredit Vettels performance through providing an alternate history. now when confronted with facts you twist and twirl like a twist and twirly thing.

[Gerhard Berger]

How many points were lost by bad luck in 2010?
What counts as misfortune: mechanical failure, being crashed in to by another driver
What does not count as misfortune: wrong tactical choices, crashing their own car, penalty by the driver’s own doing

• Sebastian Vettel lost a net 63 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Jenson Button lost a net 23 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Lewis Hamilton lost a net 17 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Mark Webber lost a net 7 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune.
• Fernando Alonso gained a net 19 points due to mechanical failures and other misfortune from his direct championship competitors.

Full article

Briefly skimmed through it, and there's way too many things i disagree with.

I'ts very difficult (and quite pointless) to write an alternative F1 history. Changing one thing, has a knock on effect on other things. Not sure why mechanical failures are classed as bad luck wrong tactical choices (in many cases by race engineers) are not. Besides, these things are all part of F1 and what make it such an exciting sport.

??? But thats exactly what you have been trying to achieve. Discredit Vettels performance through providing an alternate history. now when confronted with facts you twist and twirl like a twist and twirly thing.

I think you need to re-read the last couple of pages. I havn't been trying to do that at all.

[Gerhard Berger]

The article is written without a bias for any driver. Of course it could all have come different, but all in all I think it's a pretty good summary of what could have been possible.

@ Gerhard, of course you find many things to disagree with.....In that article Vettel's performance looks pretty solid, something you apparently don't want to see

True, in the article his performance looks solid. But the article is pure fiction. It's not what actually happened!

[mnmracer]

The article is written without a bias for any driver. Of course it could all have come different, but all in all I think it's a pretty good summary of what could have been possible.

@ Gerhard, of course you find many things to disagree with.....In that article Vettel's performance looks pretty solid, something you apparently don't want to see

True, in the article his performance looks solid. But the article is pure fiction. It's not what actually happened!

Rather, I believe it shows who has actually performed solid or not, rather than a driver's performance being tainted by influences out of his control.

Of course there will always be some people that think one thing or another should have happened, but it is irrefutable that Sebastian Vettel has lost an immense amount of points due to circumstances outside of his own control; much more so than any of the other drivers.

[Richard]

I think what mnm has done is worthwhile exercise and it has a methodical approach. Yo may disagree with a few points here or there, but it does show how much Vettel's season was hampered by problems outside his control.

Thanks mnm!

[Gerhard Berger]

The article is written without a bias for any driver. Of course it could all have come different, but all in all I think it's a pretty good summary of what could have been possible.

@ Gerhard, of course you find many things to disagree with.....In that article Vettel's performance looks pretty solid, something you apparently don't want to see

True, in the article his performance looks solid. But the article is pure fiction. It's not what actually happened!

Rather, I believe it shows who has actually performed solid or not, rather than a driver's performance being tainted by influences out of his control.

Of course there will always be some people that think one thing or another should have happened, but it is irrefutable that Sebastian Vettel has lost an immense amount of points due to circumstances outside of his own control; much more so than any of the other drivers.

It has no logic. It writes an alternative history without mechanical failures and some racing incidents. Why not write an alternative history where Red Bull didn't have the fastest car, and someone else did? Because the how fast the car is, is after all largely out of the drivers control.

There are way too many "what ifs" during the season to make anything irrefutable. Better to stick to what actually happened, rather than adjust all the good and bad luck that each driver had.

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

I see gerhards point.

Some drivers garner the unforunate reputation of being "car breakers". Just as Vettel is faster in the RB7 than Webber, Webber also appeared to have the more reliable RB6.
Could it be down to more than just mechanical failure? You can't ever be certain.

There is speculation that Webber cannot fully utilise the exhaust blowing tech... Something Vettel can. Could there be a discrepancy that has been ironed out in the transition from RB6 to 7 that has seen Vettel maintain his speed yet not the reliability problems? I think there is correlation, but again it's not a certainty.

[raymondu999]

I see gerhards point.

Some drivers garner the unforunate reputation of being "car breakers". Just as Vettel is faster in the RB7 than Webber, Webber also appeared to have the more reliable RB6.
Could it be down to more than just mechanical failure? You can't ever be certain.

Yep. I always saw speed and reliability to be linked to be honest. Every second Newey/Oatley/Fry spends making a car faster, is a second they didn't spend on reliability.

There is speculation that Webber cannot fully utilise the exhaust blowing tech...

I think you'll find it's the other way around - everyone has said Mark was the one who best adapted to the exhaust blowing and the throttle-sensitivity of the downforce; and changed his driving style to suit it. But when the overrun blowing was introduced; the throttle sensitivity of the downforce was eliminated; and you didn't need special driving lines to maximize the EBD. Pat Symonds also noticed it and said as much in his F1 Racing mag column; and Mark Hughes also said it in his column; either in Autosport or on the BBC website, I forget which. i.e. Webber is slower than Vettel on the whole; but he was better able to maximize the system (without overrun), which basically made up for the natural speed differential between Webber/Vettel.

[beelsebob]

Yep. I always saw speed and reliability to be linked to be honest. Every second Newey/Oatley/Fry spends making a car faster, is a second they didn't spend on reliability.

Not only that, but every bound shed trying to make the car lighter/have a lower CofG, or every degree rise caused by trying to bunch heavy (and potentially temperature sensitive) components up near the bottom of the car costs reliability. There are certain places where you have a flat out choice – this can be fast, or it can be reliable. The RB7's KERS system seems to be one of those, they can stick a KERS system in, but because of the constraints on where they put it to make the car fast, it's horribly unreliable (though admittedly they seem to have got on top of that now).

[raymondu999]

Yep; making a car faster; means that you're making the system load the suspension more, load the tyres more, etc.

JET - found it. http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/motorsp ... 127533.stm

At this part of the season, Webber was genuinely able to get more from the car's exhaust-blown diffuser.
In its initial form, this component required a very specific driving technique to maximise the time on open throttle - which increased the downforce boost from the exhaust plume - and Webber was superb at it, consistently squeezing just that little bit more from it than his team-mate.
Vettel continued to be better at living with a little bit of entry oversteer, and that ability to adapt to the car moving around him was maybe partly why he was not as insistent on adapting his technique to a feature that calmed the rear end as soon as you got on the throttle.
From Valencia onwards however, the Renault engine was running software that retarded the ignition off-throttle, using the extra heat created to maintain exhaust flow to the diffuser even off-throttle.
Suddenly that downforce boost was there even during braking and Webber's specialised technique was no longer required. That improvement, in other words, took away a key Webber advantage

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

That's the one ray,

Ok I stand a little corrected on the blowing, but my point is that the reliability may hamper a certain driver simply because of style.
Odd how I remember it the other way round Maybe confusing it with 2011 !!
Not saying it's a dead cert, but having Renault entrails deposit themselves onto the track or at the very least try to do so, then there is a question mark.