Are we seeing a Vettel era?

[raymondu999]

Yep; it's likeI said earlier. Speed and reliability are interlinked. Seb used to like cutting corners and lengthening the exits at every possible corner. Take for example how he bashed the exit of Turn 1 in his Hockenheim pole:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7KU_O663mA[/youtube]

While the driving line might probably have allowed him to carry a bit more speed through, the kerb strike like that would have definitely have hurt the suspension.

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

Agreed ray.

Although veering straight back on topic, it's amusing to me that over half the readers on this topic feel we are not seeing a "Vettel era".
Back to back championships don't count? Along with a good run in 2009 and a (probable) win cabaple car in 2012, I would say this is a Vettel era.

[Mandrake]

To be fair, the car is designed to take that kind of torture. Failing brakes (a problem that often occured in 2010) "could" be down to the driver, but that would be visible in the telemetry. The sudden failures were not down to Vettel being a car breaker.

[raymondu999]

@JET - I think it's more the definition of era rather than anything. 2 years by definition actually isn't quite enough to define an era...

[Gerhard Berger]

To be fair, the car is designed to take that kind of torture. Failing brakes (a problem that often occured in 2010) "could" be down to the driver, but that would be visible in the telemetry. The sudden failures were not down to Vettel being a car breaker.

I think some people may think Vettel is a "car breaker" due to simple correlation rather than any actual evidence.

I'm more inclined to believe the theory that Newey pushes the boundaries of a car, which leads to some failures, and this is especially prevalent in the early iterations of the car.

[Gerhard Berger]

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.

I also read from other sources that Webber is much smoother with the throttle mid corner and on the exit of corners (similar to Schumacher's driving style) whilst Vettel's style is more like Senna's, and he likes to constantly tap the throttle during a corner in order to find the limit.

Herbert probably explains there difference between the 2 styles better than i did here: (at about 1:00)

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtaV_cOGgTM[/youtube]

[raymondu999]

I get what you're saying, Gerhard, but the whole point is that Pat Symonds/Mark Hughes have noted that Mark has changed his driving style for the EBD - so driving styles that existed BEFORE that wouldn't matter much...

[CHT]

Record 14 poles this season.

[Gerhard Berger]

Record 14 poles this season.

He's equaled the record of Mansell and has the chance to beat it in the next race.

Still Mansell did it in 16 races

[raymondu999]

There's a statistics thread: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=10745

Gerhard i agree that right now Mansell's achievement is more special as that means he had less races not on pole. However, Vettel has more work to do to equal that number, so in a way it's catch 22

[manchild]

I was lured out by this pole record "equalization". It took Vettel 18 races to achieve 14 poles, while Mansell's did the same out of 16 races. Even if Vettel scores another pole, that still won't be grater number of poles relative to number of races in a season. This is simply biased sensationalism in absence of really big news from F1.

[mnmracer]

I was lured out by this pole record "equalization". It took Vettel 18 races to achieve 14 poles, while Mansell's did the same out of 16 races. Even if Vettel scores another pole, that still won't be grater number of poles relative to number of races in a season. This is simply biased sensationalism in absence of really big news from F1.

Biased sensationalism is disregarding how Vettel did it with a car only a fraction faster on average in qualifying, rather than the multiple second advantage that Mansell had over the other cars.

[raymondu999]

Martijn, no one is denying that. But 14/16 n pole is no doubt more impressive than 14/18.

The real contentious point will be if Vettel gets pole in Brazil - is 15/19 more impressive than 14/16? In a way; you could say there was no guarantee Nigel would've gotten another pole even if 1992 had 3 races added. Vettel had to achieve more poles to get 15/19; but he achieved less with his opportunities (percentage wise)

[MIKEY_!]

That's easy, 15/19 makes 78.9% while 14/16 is 87.5% so vettel's percentage on pole is lower than mansell's.

They are just numbers of course.

[mnmracer]

I'm not denying that either; I'm the stat-man, remember
But calling it 'biased sensationalism' is just so far out wrong, it irks me.
But worry not, I have my writing hat on again, and I've got a pre-pre-race read coming up.

Hmmm.... I'm thinking of growing a 'stache:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIMWudFLsaY