Is Hamilton desperate or what?

[gridwalker]

I love the fact that Spa produces races of such epic quality that we are still discussing them 2 years later ...

[vall]

I like Spa and it indeed produced great races, but in this particular case the last 3 laps were so exciting only because of the rain.

[komninosm]

He was wrongly penalised, Charlie told the team he had sufficiently given back the position, which he did, huge difference between what LH did and Alonso did this weekend.

but that is all old news

I suppose feathering the throttle letting a guy through and gunning into a straight isnt getting an advantage!
How on earth would he have done that following Raikkonen through a corner may I ask?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FzNZSaKOsQ[/youtube]

Going by how the Stewards treated Ferrari-Alonso, Hamilton should have been warned 3 times that he had to let Rai pass him and then get no penalty because Rai crashed that lap and made it irrelevant. That penalty to Hamilton was "evil". Alonso should still get penalized for Kubica though. Different case slightly, he never let Kubica past and went on to pass Alguersuari and Kubica retired several laps after that.
Why did Kimi even weave like that? Maybe he was losing the car in the breaking, maybe he was panicking slightly. Hamilton had to pass him there.

[ringo]

Most drivers panic when THE BOSS is in their mirrors.
Same reason Alonso botched his start at silverstone.
Lewis has that "track presence" like young shumacher. I don't think any driver out there, aside from Alonso, can live with these 2 within 5 car lenghts of them for 10 laps.

[andrew]

Most drivers panic when THE BOSS is in their mirrors.

How'd you figure sports fan?

I don't buy the whole drivers panic when they see cetain other drviers in their mirrors. These guys are all top of their game and I doubt that any of them panic.

[Giblet]

I don't think anyone panics, but I would think when THE BOSS is filling your mirrors you can expect a good and hard to fight off passing maneuver.

More so than say, Massa.

[andrew]

I whole heartedly disagree with your opinion about THE LOSS though will agree that something should be expected!

[ringo]

I whole heartedly disagree with your opinion about THE LOSS though will agree that something should be expected!

You couldn't even add a little meat to the letters!

[andrew]

That better?

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

Personally, I see Kubica as someone who could take Hamilton and push him over the edge.
Not just in terms of driving, but his unflapable personality.
Heidfeld kept Kubica honest for some of the time at BMW, but how much of this is down purely to Heidfeld or BMW? Who knows?
Rosberg is another I would like to see compete in the same car as Hamilton.

And here is a shocker that every one will probably disagree with.
Kamui Kobayashi. I think the boy is bloody fantastic!

Hamilton isnt desperate, but put him in a car with a bloody nosed challenger in the same mould as him, like Kubica, Rosberg(weakest of the 3 imo) or Kobayashi, Someone who has "no fear", And you will see a frown wrinkle develop very quickly on Hamiltons brow.

Really dont want to big up Kobayashi, as its almost like he is "my" secret. But is mighty impressive and his onboard vids really are brilliant if you think he drove an average Toyota twice and an even less worthy Sauber for half a season(getting better admittedly).
How far back does he do Buemi from here?
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rKbMp_CQCLE[/youtube]

Thats a good 5 car lengths in the braking zone. And Buemi is no mug.

[marcush.]

How much did Kobayashi test in 2008 for Toyota? it is not like he had that much experience when thrown into the water last year..very impressive ,very impressive this might be the first japanese Gp winner in the making..Sauber has done well to sign him.

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

Peter Sauber aint dumb.

Anyone could see his talent last year, I want to see him in a Mercedes or Mclaren harrassing so called superstars....

[ringo]

Personally, I see Kubica as someone who could take Hamilton and push him over the edge.
Not just in terms of driving, but his unflapable personality.
Heidfeld kept Kubica honest for some of the time at BMW, but how much of this is down purely to Heidfeld or BMW? Who knows?
Rosberg is another I would like to see compete in the same car as Hamilton.

And here is a shocker that every one will probably disagree with.
Kamui Kobayashi. I think the boy is bloody fantastic!

Hamilton isnt desperate, but put him in a car with a bloody nosed challenger in the same mould as him, like Kubica, Rosberg(weakest of the 3 imo) or Kobayashi, Someone who has "no fear", And you will see a frown wrinkle develop very quickly on Hamiltons brow.

Really dont want to big up Kobayashi, as its almost like he is "my" secret. But is mighty impressive and his onboard vids really are brilliant if you think he drove an average Toyota twice and an even less worthy Sauber for half a season(getting better admittedly).
How far back does he do Buemi from here?
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rKbMp_CQCLE[/youtube]

Thats a good 5 car lengths in the braking zone. And Buemi is no mug.

That's what fresh soft tyres do for you. But i agree kobayashi is good, he made those moves stick. He had some flashes of briliance in brazil and abu dahbi as well, but he's not close to challenging Hamilton. Neither is Kubica.
Kubica was cut down in a braking show down in china against hamilton.

I don't think he can last 10 laps in a fight, but he's the closest thing to hamilton, if we consider his beast like tenacity. He is still unproven fighting against top drivers like Alonso, though we nearly had that fight in silverstone.

Him, Hamilton and Alonso are in their own league when it comes to monstrous driving though.

here's the china battle.[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QaSCFbXt8h4[/youtube]

watch from 7:27, kubica didn't show much here. However it would be interesting to see him in a top 3 car.

[PlatinumZealot]

Kubica is a defending beast, but I have never really seen him chop somebody's head off like Hamilton.

[myurr]

In my view the top drivers at the moment are, in order: Hamilton, Kubica, Vettel, Alonso, Rosberg. I think that Kobayashi could join the tail end of that group through sheer fighting spirit but I'm not sure he could quite crack the top 3. Last year I wouldn't have rated Rosberg so highly as he was still a bit hit and miss, but this year I think he's stepped up to the challenge of a prestigious team mate and has raised his game.

The only reason I have Alonso fourth and not second is that I honestly think the pressure has overcome him this year. He went to Ferrari expecting to get back into the championship fight, and it's just not happening for him. The car is merely okay, with flashes of pace but not consistently enough from race to race, and both he and the team are making far too many mistakes.

Webber, Button and Massa are probably best of the rest. All three can be near unbeatable on their day when the car is just right, but they all make too many mistakes (Button more so in qualifying than the race) and aren't good enough when the car isn't quite right. I've placed Vettel ahead of them as I think he has more raw pace, but when things aren't quite right he does seem to lose a lot of his speed. So whilst I've placed him third I think that's still subject to review.

I'm still interested to see where Schumacher can end up in the driver rankings, but so far this season he has done little to justify his drive let alone place amongst the top 5 or so drivers. This is probably due to a nasty combination of being race rusty, his driving style not suiting the current cars and therefore needing time to adapt, and having a mediocre car, but by now he should be at least pushing Rosberg whereas just as often as not he is still several tenths away on pace.

Behind them are numerous fine drivers but no one who stands out. Rubens is a good guy and good fit for Williams as they try to recover, Sutil has a lot of potential and is driving pretty well this year, Petrov has been hit or miss but I think he deserves a second year, I expected more of Hulkenberg but again I think he has done enough to justify a second season, Kovalainen and Glock probably deserve better cars, Liuzzi has had a couple of fairly good races but I'm not convinced he's good enough for F1, Senna and Chandhok both deserve a proper season in a proper F1 car, and de la Rosa is probably playing a large part in Saubers recovery (if his test drivers reputation is deserved) and he faired well against Koby early on, but I think he's fading a little bit. Probably still worth keeping around for Sauber for one last year.