2010 F1 Season

[BezerkR32]

i dare say there would have been a dont come monday dealt out. Commentary guy in pit lane reckons he saw it and told the mclaren guys, but the thing still hurt itself in that short period of time. did it do the warm up lap or did it fail during it? cant remember.

Hopefully the culprit is now repairing Trabants in some Russian outpost on the edge of the arctic circle

[Scottydoo]

i dare say there would have been a dont come monday dealt out. Commentary guy in pit lane reckons he saw it and told the mclaren guys, but the thing still hurt itself in that short period of time. did it do the warm up lap or did it fail during it? cant remember.

It made the warmup lap, got taken out before the start, then died behind the 1st safety car I believe

P.S Long time reader first time poster in here. Hi everyone

P.P.S. I think Vettel is great but I LOVE seeing him so frustrated when Webber out drives him lol

Go Webber

Edited May 17, 2010 by Scottydoo

[God_speed]

The Motor Report, 18th May:

F1: Williams Admits Losing Webber 'A Mistake', Red Bull Keen To Keep Him

Hilarious. Williams is in such a shambolic state...

[sh@un]

And it's seems Williams may have been part of the reason for His and Nico's lack of success.

They're currently behind Force India in constructors points. A long way from the glory days of the 80's and early 90's

[God_speed]

If what Sir Frank says is to be taken as true, how is it a multi million dollar outfit with the heritage and experience of Williams cannot even deduce (with a reasonable degree of accuracy) the extent to which their success / failure was due to the driver, team members, or the car?

In a sport where every variable is controlled to the nth degree, that counts as a fairly large error of judgement.

Having said that I hope we're not getting our hopes up for nothing and Webber can use this momentum.

[sh@un]

With 13 races still to run, there's a loooong way to go yet.

[dezz]

Said Head: "He was very quick over a single lap but in our view he had an occasional tendency to make mistakes in the race and suddenly go off.

In 2006/2007 he wasn't what he's shown this year. Fair enough a lot may have been because of the car, but he also made stupid moves and always found himself in trouble, which a good driver wouldn't be doing week in week out.

Also, he's winning from pole, and especially at Monaco that's not saying much, apart from being fast and reliable. If he can't win from 2nd, 3rd, 4th place on the grid, then he'd wanna keep qualifying P1 for the rest of the season.

[iamhe77]

If he can't win from 2nd, 3rd, 4th place on the grid, then he'd wanna keep qualifying P1 for the rest of the season.

Sounds like a simple and reasonable solution

[Beer Baron]

Said Head: "He was very quick over a single lap but in our view he had an occasional tendency to make mistakes in the race and suddenly go off.

In 2006/2007 he wasn't what he's shown this year. Fair enough a lot may have been because of the car, but he also made stupid moves and always found himself in trouble, which a good driver wouldn't be doing week in week out.

Also, he's winning from pole, and especially at Monaco that's not saying much, apart from being fast and reliable. If he can't win from 2nd, 3rd, 4th place on the grid, then he'd wanna keep qualifying P1 for the rest of the season.

fair enough he made mistakes, but it's precisely because of poor car performance that drivers get tempted to make the silly moves or that they get frustration. on the whole webber has coped pretty well with sub-par cars and has at times been able to drive them far beyond their potential. evidence of that is that having now had some time in a car that IS performing well those silly mistakes just don't appear any more. I don't think you can say a "good driver" wouldn't have made those mistakes as webber is most definitely a good driver. he's finally putting vettel to the sword who people seem to regard as the second coming.

it's a bit harsh to put the bloke down because he qualified the best and then won the race without having to pass people. and for that matter no one else rose from 2nd/3rd/4th to jump up and take the win either. his win last year where he copped a drive through and still won the race was pretty special.

And think back to China where Seb struggled with setup until followings Marks setup and finding the speed and confidence in the car. Then the last two races it seems Webbers pace has been superior. Perhaps the RBR updates are proving a little difficult for Seb to get his head around...whilst fall right into the sweetsport for Webz?

yeah I think it shows that mark has big involvement in the car development and direction and lots of feedback in the car set-up. like you say vettel has struggled before until getting the gun set-up info from webber. maybe webber has learnt his lesson and is keeping some of his sweeter set-up tips to himself now and vettel is struggling for that last bit of pace without them? dunno but webber has always been good at setting up a car to it's potential and seems to do well in getting the engineers and mechanics behind him. he spends lots of time at the factory etc and is always first to thank the guys who build and set-up the car for any success he has.

[Snowman]

fair enough he made mistakes, but it's precisely because of poor car performance that drivers get tempted to make the silly moves or that they get frustration. on the whole webber has coped pretty well with sub-par cars and has at times been able to drive them far beyond their potential. evidence of that is that having now had some time in a car that IS performing well those silly mistakes just don't appear any more. I don't think you can say a "good driver" wouldn't have made those mistakes as webber is most definitely a good driver.

Slightly off topic - but a great example of a comparison to this point is James Courtney in the Super Taxi's. He used to do some really dumb things on the track but now he has a good car and is driving with some of the best smarts I have seen on a race track. EG on the weekend at Winton when he half punted Lowndes in the flip flop and just let the result be corrected to avoid a penalty and waited a bit longer for another propper crack at a passing move. In the past he would have just kept barging through until a black flag was thrown at him.

I think Mark is doing the same thing - think back to the stupid pit lane move at the Ring last year that cost him a drive through only to finally get his first win regardless. I think in the past he may have been a bit on the agressive side as he felt he needed to in order to get a result where as now I think he knows results will come so has a more level head. I was actually suprised to see Louise show some restraint at turn 1 at Monaco on the weekend when he was basically wheel to wheel with The Kub but gave up on not only that position but to Massa as well. I'm sure in another life he would have taken all 3 of them out in an attempt to jump to P3 off the line.

Anyways - whats the chances both Mac and Fez will give up on the gentlemans agreement and bring back KERS before years end? They are both missing out on their free 2 spots at the start this year badly!

[God_speed]

yeah I think it shows that mark has big involvement in the car development and direction and lots of feedback in the car set-up. like you say vettel has struggled before until getting the gun set-up info from webber. maybe webber has learnt his lesson and is keeping some of his sweeter set-up tips to himself now and vettel is struggling for that last bit of pace without them? dunno but webber has always been good at setting up a car to it's potential and seems to do well in getting the engineers and mechanics behind him. he spends lots of time at the factory etc and is always first to thank the guys who build and set-up the car for any success he has.

Good point, part of what gave the Schu such success was both his willingness and ability to provide solid feedback on the car to his technicians.

Meanwhile, surprised that Rubinho wasn't slapped with a penalty of some sort for tossing his 200 grand steering wheel out onto the track for Ham to run over?

[djr81]

The Motor Report, 18th May:

F1: Williams Admits Losing Webber 'A Mistake', Red Bull Keen To Keep Him

Hilarious. Williams is in such a shambolic state...

You are going to have to point out the funny bit.

What Williams/head have said is

A: Spot on in terms of Webber throwing the car at the scenery in races (prior to this year anyway).

B: Doubtless accurate in the sense that having lost a major sponsor they couldn't afford to pay a big salary as it would have reduced the money available to spend on the car.

Reality is not every team has either a car company to prop it up (eg Ferrari & FIAT) or a wealthy owner (eg Red Bull, Force India). Williams is one of the very few teams that don't have either. Economic conditions at the moment makes it very, very hard for them. A circumstance which is, apparently, hilarious.

[sh@un]

Since when do F1 steering wheels cost 200K?

If my car'd have tried to kill me, I would have thrown it too

[dezz]

Thought they were something like 50-60,000 pounds, and that was a few years ago...so may be worth more these days...Not too far off 200k

[God_speed]

You are going to have to point out the funny bit.

What Williams/head have said is

A: Spot on in terms of Webber throwing the car at the scenery in races (prior to this year anyway).

B: Doubtless accurate in the sense that having lost a major sponsor they couldn't afford to pay a big salary as it would have reduced the money available to spend on the car.

Reality is not every team has either a car company to prop it up (eg Ferrari & FIAT) or a wealthy owner (eg Red Bull, Force India). Williams is one of the very few teams that don't have either. Economic conditions at the moment makes it very, very hard for them. A circumstance which is, apparently, hilarious.

Just a bit of hyperbole. I don't want to see Williams fail; I'd like to see a revival. I just found it amusing how the evidence apparently suggested that at that point they thought it was more him than the car, as I explained in my 11.11am post.

In any case the timing of his quote is probably premature; he obviously deserves some respect for eating humble pie if that article is to be believed; but we'll see if Webber's form can continue this season.

I've been a Webber fan for some time, but I have said before that I believe he can be supremely quick (particularly when out in front or in qualifying), but he doesn't do so well in close quarters with other cars (i.e. when trying to overtake on a charge or defend his position).

RE the steering wheel, sorry; I was sure I picked that figure up from the commentary somewhere. $200K does seem a bit high in retrospect. I remember them costing $20K in the late 90s but have no idea how much for one now.

[Do-Luck]

I read about $50k on ESPNF1

Quick point though, Rubens was facing the wrong way, in the middle of the track, which cars do hit at around 120mph, so maybe he wanted to get out and behind the barriers quickly, thus chucking his wheel on the ground?

[Roy]

What Williams/head have said is

A: Spot on in terms of Webber throwing the car at the scenery in races (prior to this year anyway).

At Jaguar I remember a big stack a Brazil in the wet on the start finish line. I remember him and Heidfeld i think coming together once. Fisi in Malaysia. I remember in the sphincter of the universe, cant remember if it was Williams BMW or Cossie but was messy back in 14th or something and tangled with Schuey.

So i remember tangles with other cars, often being punted in th etough 6-10 grid positions off the start line, but never remember him throwing it off the road. I think about the only instance i remember of that is Japan last year but that was well after he left Williams.

You cant make claims that he was throwing the car at scenery or having too many at fault accidents. He had accidents as he was trying his heart out in a pretty quick but mega unreliable car. The falling a few positions in races could be questioned, and fair enough if they claied his race pace was lacking rather then throwing at at the scenery. But even that claim is unfair. I think he simply made less mistakes in quali and got more 99% quali laps then those around him who at 90% right qualified behind him. Over the course of a race of 60 laps or so the genuine pace of the car over a race distance is shown and Webber never sucked there compared to Heidfeld or Rosberg.

Heidfeld capitalised from tough pit call at Monaco, an acco with Fisi in Malaysia and several other times when Webbers car failed while ahead of him. So i love Williams and want to see them at the front...but with a hack like Sam Micahels steering the ship its laughable that they claim that a driver of Webbers ability was the problem. The car was never consistantly quick enough or reliable enough for them to make that statement!!!! (IMO )

If BMW thought Williams had their shit together they would not have left. If they thought it was the drivers that were the problem then they wouldnt have taken the out of contract Heidfeld with them and try to take the contracted Webber with them as well. Mario made public his respect for Webber and desire to have him in the team, but conceded contractually wasnt a possibility at the time.

So again Williams, get rid of the guy who you SHOULD BLAME for the car's lack of pace. Sam Michaels, I love the guy being an Aussie and all and going to the Uni down the road from mine....but the car is simply not designed well enough! Budget may be part of the problem, but can in no way be blamed for the lack of their success, even the year Montoya won their last GP they sarked balls with a big budget for most of the year until an opportunistic win at years end. 2004 happened to be Sam Michaels first year as Technical Director at Williams, but he had held a Senior Engineering position for 3 years before that!

He needs to move on, they need new blood in this area...so again IMHO and 2c worth

[sh@un]

I notice Heidfeld is very much waiting in the wings at Merc GP

[Kinks]

Mercedes not appealing Schu penalty

http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2010/5/10807.html

MERCEDES GP PETRONAS were fully aware of article 40.13 which states that no overtaking is permitted if the race finishes under safety car conditions. However we believed that the combination of the race control messages 'Safety Car in this lap' and 'Track Clear' and the green flags and lights shown by the marshals after safety car line one indicated that the race was not finishing under the safety car and all drivers were free to race.

This opinion appears to have been shared by the majority of the teams with cars in the top ten positions who also gave their drivers instructions to race to the finish line.

It was clear from our discussions with the stewards after the race that they understood the reasons for our interpretation and acknowledged that this was a new and previously untested situation but ultimately disagreed with our interpretation.

There have obviously been some discussions behind closed doors about this, they are discussing 40.13 at the next working group meeting. On face value there were green flags shown. Green means race, and that's the end of it. The flags are the cardinal rule in motorsport and if the race was still under the safety car they should have shown yellow flags to the start/finish line indicating overtaking was not allowed.

[dezz]

Shafted.

Alonso clearly thought it was green, or he wouldn't have come out of the corner oversteering and wouldn't have been passed