Malaysian GP 2012 - Sepang International Circuit

[NathanOlder]

Martin Whitmash just saying they had to hold Lewis in the pit as Massa was heading down the pit lane.
Does anyone think Red Bull's release of (i think) Vettel in the pit stops was dangerous. Think it was a Lotus or Williams coming into the pits and Vettel was released right into the path of the oncoming car

Vettels release was dangerous and it was the Lotus of Raikkonen could see it clearly from above the Ferrari pits.

Should of received a dangerous release penalty...but oh well..

Glad it wasnt just me who noticed this

[GrizzleBoy]

Sorry to burst your bubble our suite was above Ferrari and we could clearly see Hamilton went passed his marker thus making the rear jackman having to move further forward hence why you all would of seen the rear come up so late.

HAM's long(8.1 second) stop was because they spent 4 seconds trying to rip the tape off the front brake ducts. His first stop was slow mainly because he had to wait for Massa to flash by. But both stops were at least 1 and probably 2 laps after when they should have been. Hamilton lost at least 15seconds because of poor pit strategy/stops today.

This.

Indeed.

Also, what's up with Button still having the first decision on tryes, even with Hamilton in front?

[stefan_]

If you feel like "We need that position" as in "We need P2 because we haven't been on that god damn podium for so long and we are drooling about it and you are so close to your best performance in F1, don't risk of blowing it" is a team order, than what about "Mantain the gap" and "Your engine is running hot. You need to BACK OFF Sebastian". Come on guys...be serious. Don't feed this useless discussion.

[WhiteBlue]

Congratulations to Alonso and to Perez who found a courageous race strategy and made it stick.

Red Bull and McLaren beaten well under value. The race never made it under 1:40 per lap which denied them the usual advantage they would have had in the dry. Red Bull were not particularly clever with the tyre strategy and always 1 step behind the best stopping teams.

Schumacher, Button and Vettel were all pushed out of the top ranks by inexperienced newbies. Katikeyan should get a penalty for not respecting blue flags and ruining the race for two top drivers.

Hamilton suffered two imperfect pit stops. He could have got a better result. Webber and Räikkönen got very solid results, well done to them as well.

Senna got some nice points for Williams.

Rosberg and Massa had bad races which will not help Massa to keep his seat. Sutil could be lucky when Ferrari have some management capacity available to think about a replacement. They would be well advised to react quickly to this situation. It is something that can be done relatively easy to avoid criticism.

[Hail22]

Ah thats what it was tape? i thought there was debris (watching it via my own eyes not BBC/Sky).

[Websta]

It wasn't a deliberate off-track excursion, but the radio message was definitely a key factor as to why he went off. He was simply doing too good before the message to think that it didn't have an impact. I won't say he went off track deliberately, but the message unnerved him massively.

I would agree with this.

It was a very negative sounding message that even left me feeling a bit down, let alone the driver.

I believe the message was more to do with Perez hanging the car out over the wet kerbs - he went off cause he came too hot into the corner didn't he? I don't think he would try to go faster if he was being told to hold station.

[King Six]

I don't think Sergio would have complied with any request to back off anyway, there is nothing to suggest that he had any intention of holding station after his off - He had the hammer down hard and reeled back 4 odd seconds off Alonso's lead. Whilst it is undeniable that this sort of tactic is right out of the Scuderia's play book and, as Shrieker points out, they have a lot of influence over Sauber, there's little evidence to suggest that they were ordering Sauber to reign Sergio in today. At least at the moment.

The fact that he was so good vs Alonso until the message should speak for itself (he did recover afterwards though). At the very least it unnerved him, he won't admit it obviously, but it obviously played a part on his mindset under the helmet.

[zeph]

Martin Whitmash just saying they had to hold Lewis in the pit as Massa was heading down the pit lane.
Does anyone think Red Bull's release of (i think) Vettel in the pit stops was dangerous. Think it was a Lotus or Williams coming into the pits and Vettel was released right into the path of the oncoming car

Vettels release was dangerous and it was the Lotus of Raikkonen could see it clearly from above the Ferrari pits.

Should of received a dangerous release penalty...but oh well..

Glad it wasnt just me who noticed this

Me 3.

[Giblet]

Indeed.

Also, what's up with Button still having the first decision on tryes, even with Hamilton in front?

Button may have made the call himself, and asked if Hamilton was coming in first.

No harm no foul if the case.

[Giblet]

Schumacher, Button and Vettel were all pushed out of the top ranks by inexperienced newbies.

Buuuuuuut, Vettel ran over his wing. How is that NK's fault? he does that quite often when passing other cars, as I have pointed out before.

What possible reason could Vettel have for cutting in so early?

Your boy made a boo boo WB

[Tubbs]

about $5millon for a F1 car, gets held up 4 seconds by the mechanic fumbling with a 2 dollar piece of tape hahaha

[Hail22]

You do all realise with all radio messages they're scrubbed, monitored and cheked for specific technical language, swearing, etc.

So the message would of been transmitted a good 3-4 turns before it was heard by viewers thus this "omg look he went off after the radio transmission"

[Shrieker]

If you feel like "We need that position" as in "We need P2 because we haven't been on that god damn podium for so long and we are drooling about it and you are so close to your best performance in F1, don't risk of blowing it" is a team order, than what about "Mantain the gap" and "Your engine is running hot. You need to BACK OFF Sebastian". Come on guys...be serious. Don't feed this useless discussion.

As much as it's disgusting, team orders are legal now. A deal between 2 different teams however is match fixing at it's best. You say Sauber haven't gotten a poidum in eons.

Well guess what. They've never won a race and I haven't ever seen them come so close. A simple question of "do you want Ferrari engines for next year?" would've been a strong enough incentive.

So the message would of been transmitted a good 3-4 turns before it was heard by viewers thus this "omg look he went off after the message transmission"

What if it was a lap or two before he went off ? It's no proof that there wasn't a request.

[zeph]

Katikeyan should get a penalty for not respecting blue flags and ruining the race for two top drivers.

Looked to me like Vettel was in the wrong there.

Schumacher, Button and Vettel were all pushed out of the top ranks by inexperienced newbies.

Buuuuuuut, Vettel ran over his wing. How is that NK's fault? he does that quite often when passing other cars, as I have pointed out before.

Exactly.

[GrizzleBoy]

It wasn't a deliberate off-track excursion, but the radio message was definitely a key factor as to why he went off. He was simply doing too good before the message to think that it didn't have an impact. I won't say he went off track deliberately, but the message unnerved him massively.

I would agree with this.

It was a very negative sounding message that even left me feeling a bit down, let alone the driver.

I believe the message was more to do with Perez hanging the car out over the wet kerbs - he went off cause he came too hot into the corner didn't he? I don't think he would try to go faster if he was being told to hold station.

Possibly, but hearing things like that on your radio can affect your mentality and concentration a whole lot.

When you're in the zone and have complete confidence that you're about to win your first GP ever and then get a message that you're possibly doing something wrong and you need to be careful, it would definately add some extra worries or tentativeness that wasn't there before.

Its a shame that this is an issue though and will stop Perez from truly enjoying his immensely awesome drive.