2013 German GP - Nurburgring

[Huntresa]

Very promising news
Lotus confirms 'plenty' of new parts on way
Lotus trackside operations director Alan Permane has said the Enstone-based outfit will have 『plenty』 of 『interesting new parts』 to test at Silverstone next week.
Lotus took a 2-3 finish at the German Grand Prix last weekend, with Kimi Raikkonen challenging Sebastian Vettel in the closing stages and eventually finishing just one second back.
The squad will now be out to maintain that form after a disappointing few races in Britain, Canada and Monaco.

「We』re very happy to be back on the podium again after a short spell of somewhat bleak races,」 Permane told Lotus』 official team website. 「Both cars ran faultlessly from start to finish and for a good portion of the race it did look like we would be able to take the fight to Sebastian, but ultimately we didn't quite manage it.
「The win may have eluded us, but to have both drivers pick up silverware and also outscore our rivals in the Constructor's Championship means we can't be too disappointed.」

「We've now got the Silverstone test to prepare for – with plenty of interesting new parts on the way for assessment – so there's actually not much in the way of rest before we head to Hungary,」 he added, 「but we』ll be looking to head into the shutdown on the back of another good result to give everyone a satisfying and well-earned break.」

As for what cost Raikkonen the win at the Nürburgring, Permane felt the time lost early on was crucial.
「The damage was done when Kimi was held up by Lewis after his first pit stop [on lap 8], but he came back fighting at the end of the race to finish a very close second with a little help from the safety car. We did consider running him on a two-stop strategy, but it would have meant an incredibly long final stint and ultimately represented a sizeable risk, as we could see the tyre performance dropping.
「The path we chose guaranteed second place with the possibility of a late charge for the win, while the alternative – despite also offering the potential for victory – would have very likely resulted in the tyres falling off a cliff and dropping Kimi behind Fernando [Alonso].

「To be honest we did expect slightly more performance from his final set of soft tyres, but he was right with Sebastian at the end so I think the right call was made,」 Permane concluded.

What Permane is saying doesn't make sense at all.
1. “The damage was done when Kimi was held up by Lewis after his first pit stop [on lap 8], but he came back [..]" Truly remarkable statement. Damage was not done - because safety car made it completely irrelevant. His logic is broken. And what damage was that? Being slower on softs than Hamilton making mistakes on his outlap on mediums? Surely it was possible to get in front after the stint on softs, the evidence is there.
How about damage from holding faster team-mate on softs:
- let's say 2 seconds lost behind Raikkonen
- 0,6/0,7 lost on tyre change only compared to Raikkonen/Vettel
- RG would have been in front of Button after 1st stop add some tenths lost while overtaking him
= Instead of over 4 seconds 1-2 seconds with 6 laps fresher tyres. Getting in front of Vettel was even more possible with optimal strategy and pitstops. Theoretical but if we're talking about pace comparisons and "damage was done" scenarios.

2. "Little help from safety car"? Safety car ruined all the advantage Lotus had. Not only over the drivers behind (10 s gap) but also over Vettel from longer, faster first stint = 6 laps fresher tyres to play with in two further stints. 10s and 5 laps fresher (vs KR) tyres is little in F1 now?

3. “To be honest we did expect slightly more performance from his final set of soft tyres, but he was right with Sebastian at the end so I think the right call was made,” Well yes of course, about the right call. And the opposite about "right with Sebastian". Outside of DRS for all but the final lap is "right with Sebastian"? Not a millisecond fighting for the win. How can anyone serious write something like this?

Add all that together and considering Red Bull were in clear air for most of the race, E21 was easily match for them without safety car. Pace on "qualifying tyres" giving advantage, which wasn't that common this season. Very competitive even with unlucky safety car. Tyres and timing of third pitstop (wrong on purpose) made it impossible to judge the pace on softs, using first stint as an indication of pace ("expected performance from softs" part).

Funny how someone who works within the team and was on site and has seen the data etc etc etc can be wrong and you obv so right

[MarkedOne8]

iotar are you mentioning 2 seconds Raikkonen lost behind Grosjean in later part of the race, or Grosjean lost in first stint behind Raikkonen? If it is that Raikkonen lost behind Grosjean then I agree. Grosjean wasn't faster in first stint. Kimi could have easily be even faster but he was behind Mercedes in first stint. I admit Grosjean did better job in first stint. I was surprised when I saw he managed to stay longer than Kimi while being until then on the same strategy. Kimi somehow shoot his (probably front) tires.

If F1 races were driven like time trials in Rally, Lotus E21 easily for the win. They are really screwed up in terms of strategies when they are in traffic. Who isn't screwed in traffic? Well, traffic is bad for every single car in F1, but this team too often gets stuck. Top two grid rows results in qualifying is must for this team. They need to get in fight with Mercedeses and Red Bulls in order to prevent them from locking two first rows.

Looks like the new kevlar belted tyres are not against E21. The high temperatures certainly didn't do bad for E21 either, but one thing puzzles me. Kimi won one and only race this season in quite cold conditionts, right? What is bigger problem for this team - traffic which means just bad qualifying pace or temperatures? The temperatures were quite high in Bahrain too during Saturday but that didn't help them.
So, my conclusion is the traffic - just bad qualifying pace.

[Boudica]

iotar are you mentioning 2 seconds Raikkonen lost behind Grosjean in later part of the race, or Grosjean lost in first stint behind Raikkonen? If it is that Raikkonen lost behind Grosjean then I agree. Grosjean wasn't faster in first stint. Kimi could have easily be even faster but he was behind Mercedes in first stint. I admit Grosjean did better job in first stint. I was surprised when I saw he managed to stay longer than Kimi while being until then on the same strategy. Kimi somehow shoot his (probably front) tires.

Grosjean wasn't faster then Kimi, and Kimi's tyres wasn't wearing off. They were all stuck in a cue after the start, Kimi was 0.7 behind Lewis, and Grosjean was about the same distance away from Kimi. Their were doing very simular times because both were stuck in traffic. Grosjean just had the advantage of getting 5 laps in clear air, while Kimi was stuck in traffic.

Kimi: Grosjean:
1:41.100 1:41.977
1:38.718 1:38.553
1:37.509 1:37.592
1:38.082 1:37.867
1:37.863 1:38.019
1:38.134 1:38.124
1:37.515 1:37.598
PIT 1:37.643

Kimi's tyres wasn't go off, they jsut pitted Kimi early to cover for Lewis, usually this is a good tactic to use. But in this case it wasn't a good decision because the soft tyres were still a lot faster then the new medium tyres, and they placed Kimi directly behind a lot of traffic, Kimi lost 10 second in traffic and a place to Grosjean. Permane is right with what he said.

If F1 races were driven like time trials in Rally, Lotus E21 easily for the win. They are really screwed up in terms of strategies when they are in traffic. Who isn't screwed in traffic? Well, traffic is bad for every single car in F1, but this team too often gets stuck. Top two grid rows results in qualifying is must for this team. They need to get in fight with Mercedeses and Red Bulls in order to prevent them from locking two first rows.

Looks like the new kevlar belted tyres are not against E21. The high temperatures certainly didn't do bad for E21 either, but one thing puzzles me. Kimi won one and only race this season in quite cold conditionts, right? What is bigger problem for this team - traffic which means just bad qualifying pace or temperatures? The temperatures were quite high in Bahrain too during Saturday but that didn't help them.
So, my conclusion is the traffic - just bad qualifying pace.

The team has been doing better in cold races year, although they still really struggle in the rain and we have seen a lot of rain effected weekends this season, especially in qualifying. They might have done a bit better in qualifying if there weren't so many rain effected qualifying sessions. They could also use some improvement on their strategies, in the last two races they have made Kimi lose positions in the first stint. It isn't good to lose positions in the first stint because the cars are still close together and you get a lot of traffic, and when you cant qualify at the front, you cant really afford to lose more places.

[warwick]

iotar...
You're sounding like a broken record really.
No matter how and what Kimi does you start picking the dirt and make excuses how everyone is on Kimi's side and how he really is the most slow driver in F1 (reading between the lines of you post).
And it's ok, you can have your opinion, no problem with that. But why not just openly admit that what ever Kimi does, it is never enough for you? Why bother pointing that out every time? Because that really seems to be the case.

Judging the pace of Kimi and Gro on first stint is futile, as they both were behind Lewis who were slower. He was the plug for Kimi and Gro.
Gro did longer stint, but then again we don't really know if Kimi's tyres were really shot or did they play it safe to call him in first and while left Gro out found that the tyres did hold up. It seems that their aim with Kimi was to get past Lewis on the first pitstop as the overtaking was proving to be difficult. But they just messed it up really.

[iotar__]

iotar...
You're sounding like a broken record really.
No matter how and what Kimi does you start picking the dirt and make excuses how everyone is on Kimi's side and how he really is the most slow driver in F1 (reading between the lines of you post).
And it's ok, you can have your opinion, no problem with that. But why not just openly admit that what ever Kimi does, it is never enough for you? Why bother pointing that out every time? Because that really seems to be the case.

Judging the pace of Kimi and Gro on first stint is futile, as they both were behind Lewis who were slower. He was the plug for Kimi and Gro.
Gro did longer stint, but then again we don't really know if Kimi's tyres were really shot or did they play it safe to call him in first and while left Gro out found that the tyres did hold up. It seems that their aim with Kimi was to get past Lewis on the first pitstop as the overtaking was proving to be difficult. But they just messed it up really.

It's better to sound like a broken record than making no sense at all, so spare me personal remarks, patronizing tone, conjectures and whining about some dirt and get straight into based on facts discussion, will you? There's no need for "leave Kimi alone" childish whining. Seeing that you "just registered" - we're discussing formula 1 race here.

1. Firstly we DO know who was faster on softs in the first stint, plenty of physical evidence for that:
- pace after Raikkonen stop the main one, you can compare lap times, considering that just before the pitstop you push 100%, and of course there were couple of laps without Hamilton for comparison
- Also length of the stint, earlier pace in the stint. We DO know as much as we know anything in F1. Also Raikkonen's pace on softs in the last stint , not perfect (different fuel) but even if you take into consideration "used" tyres comparison to Alonso it didn't look good. "To be honest we did expect slightly more performance from his final set of soft tyres" says it all

2. Just to be safe? What does it even mean? What was the risk? Losing position to who exactly? Explain yourself. Pit him to see how tyres hold up and what then? Go back in time and stay on the track? You're not making any sense. The idea was to be faster on softs than Hamilton making mistakes on his outlaps and get in front of him. Not fast enough on softs to do that, no big deal, happens all the time if you ask me but not some unlucky "damage" as Lotus claim.
3. Hamilton's pace was really slow comparable (slightly better or worse) than Button's, being behind him for so long is not an achievement. Again no big deal but it lasted too long to call it some unlucky "damage".

Since you couldn't be bothered to quote anything I assume you agree with every other point? What do you think about decision to pit early Grosjean (3rd pitstop), overlooked nonsense and proof of lying about split tyre strategies. The situation is: new mediums and spare "used" mediums as opposed to Vettel's new. What does the team do? Not keep him as long as possible (preferably longer) and go for softs. Or even mediums if Vettel pits earlier.

No - what they do is they pit him early, he ends up behind Vettel of course because tyres are good enough to not lose pace for him. And it's game over - earlier pitstop, "used" tyres, behind in dirty air. How can they even pretend it was some strategic decision? Apart from forcing RB to do something and making Raikkonen's life easier. Or being a guinea pig for tyre pace, easier to choose softs later.

I think we've covered everything based on facts, multiple times now

Edit: Just to finish this nonsense and be done with it without multiplying posts:
- above discussion is of course irrelevant because of safety car
- I saw somewhere (Allen?) where they keep saying about "undercut" (3rd stop). Undercut is used when tyre performance is dropping so new tyre/old tyre ratio gives an advantage and expected longer stint is not a problem. It was way too early for that, that's why Vettel could easily respond. Let's not pretend that it was "undercut".

[raymondu999]

I just noticed this. When Bianchi stopped, and Chilton moves to pass him, Chilton uses the second chicane (not the F1 one) - is this actually legal? He does so before any safety cars - he does it under double yellows. Obviously "extenuating circumstances" are at play, but it's still odd, no?


Chilton passes Bianchi - everything normal, he is poised to take the line for the usual chicane.


Chilton makes a decision - he will change to the other chicane. Notice his head is leaning to the right, to the second chicane, and his wheels are no longer turning left


He has turned out and is pointing for the second chicane apex


He takes the second chicane

[SectorOne]

You need to look at how he gets out of it, then decide if you think he gained meters and speed on it.
I personally think he lost time because he tries to make it then bails out, probably distracted by his teammate.