2010 F1 Season

[lmanion]

I dont see why they felt the need to create confusion by changing the rule. For as long as I can remember it has been you cant overtake after a safety car until after the start/finish line and it didnt seem like something that needed changing.

Its the second time this year an incident has come from this after webber got punted off at the restart in China when homo and vettel decided to try and scream up the inside.

But as the rules stand the race wasnt finishing under safety car the track had been cleared and green flags were shown which meant as soon as the safety car was in they were racing from this new line to the finish as they would have been had it been any other lap of the race

[djr81]

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

My thing with Webber is that he on occasion does try too hard. Too often he bins the car or spears off when he should be more circumspect. Maybe Melbourne this year is an example of that. Bottom line is I reckon Webber was fed up with the Williams unreliability and saw better opportunities elsewhere. I sort of doubt he would have stayed anyway.

BMW wanted to do the whole thing - car, motor etc. Point being is they never bettered what they achieved with Williams. So maybe in retrospect they were a bit misguided about it all.

It is hard to judge Sam Michaels work now because you never really know how constrained he is with budgets & personnel. I am guessing it is not all sweetness & light in that area for Williams at the moment. I have my doubts on how good the Cosworth motor is too to be honest.

[scarface_au]

Mercedes not appealing Schu penalty

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

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.

It's absurd. It makes a mockery of the "green flag" finish. I would like to see a gentleman's agreement between the drivers that next time this happens, they slow down to 20 km/h instead of driving over the line at speed, just to make the point that even though the green flag is out, they can't race.

It's a sham. Why not finish behind the safety car if they can't pass anyway?

[scarface_au]

My thing with Webber is that he on occasion does try too hard. Too often he bins the car or spears off when he should be more circumspect. Maybe Melbourne this year is an example of that. Bottom line is I reckon Webber was fed up with the Williams unreliability and saw better opportunities elsewhere. I sort of doubt he would have stayed anyway.

You say he's trying too hard, I say he's trying hard enough. It's an incredibly fine line between a hero move and an accident, and no one will get it right all the time. I think Webber has crashed less than some, and at least a couple of his crashes (I believe Brazil was mentioned?) were in nasty conditions that could have tripped anyone up.

Every driver goes through a maturation process. Some do it quicker than others, e.g. Hamilton, who's driven like a veteran almost from day one, and others take longer, or never manage it at all. He's a much wiser driver now than he was in his Williams years, and two wins back-to-back will do him a world of good. I think we will see less of him "trying too hard" and more composed, dominant drives like the last two weeks.

[nismoman]

^^ My sentiments exactly.

[Marco-R34GTT]

I think this whole Monaco farce is encouraging me to try and obtain some footage of the 1979 French Grand Prix.... Such nonsense! I'm still disappointed FOTA didn't break away, now look what we're left with....

[sav man]

wasn't Burnie the leader of FOTA?

[Marco-R34GTT]

wasn't Burnie the leader of FOTA?

Nah, the bernster is the chief of FOM - Formula 1 Management.. Probably the major loser if the FOTA split went ahead, he would've had the commercial rights to, well... Sweet FA...

(and no FA doesn't = Ferdando Alonso!)

[scarface_au]

wasn't Burnie the leader of FOTA?

I believe you are thinking of FOCA, the organisation Bernie led from 1978. I believe it was similar to the FOTA we have now.

[Kinks]

Every driver goes through a maturation process. Some do it quicker than others, e.g. Hamilton, who's driven like a veteran almost from day one, and others take longer, or never manage it at all. He's a much wiser driver now than he was in his Williams years, and two wins back-to-back will do him a world of good. I think we will see less of him "trying too hard" and more composed, dominant drives like the last two weeks.

Hamilton has been a good steerer but he is increasingly turning into a whiney bitch eg "why do i have to look after the car we're only at half distance".

it's well known that at monaco the speeds are low enough that most cars struggle with brake temps because there is not enough forward motion to cool them. red bull fit a secondary air duct to their cars for monaco. Louise just doesn't understand the importance of car management.

[Marco-R34GTT]

http://en.espnf1.com/f1/motorsport/story/17707.html

I must say I pretty much agree... Even though they didn't do much in F1, I think Toyota are ultimately worse off without the sport, and as well the sport is too worse off without the world's largest car maker... Shame really that it didn't work out..

[BezerkR32]

i agree with toyotas sentiments though, cant see too much f1 technology being thrown at the new hybrid camry, unless it has kurs device lol. It would be better if we could get closer to the action, be able to talk to pit crew, not necesserally drivers but get a bit closer.

http://en.espnf1.com/f1/motorsport/story/17707.html

I must say I pretty much agree... Even though they didn't do much in F1, I think Toyota are ultimately worse off without the sport, and as well the sport is too worse off without the world's largest car maker... Shame really that it didn't work out..

[djr81]

http://en.espnf1.com/f1/motorsport/story/17707.html

I must say I pretty much agree... Even though they didn't do much in F1, I think Toyota are ultimately worse off without the sport, and as well the sport is too worse off without the world's largest car maker... Shame really that it didn't work out..

Sounds like a pretty poor excuse for what was ultimately a pretty poor program.

If they want prodution car cred they need to go back to the WRC - but maybe just cheat a bit less this time.

[Marco-R34GTT]

I wonder how much F1 derived technology in in the new Lexus LF-A though??? Utter cobberwhobble imo, as if there isn't at least SOME technology trickle down from the racing machines to road cars...

[dezz]

Sounds like a pretty poor excuse for what was ultimately a pretty poor program.

[scarface_au]

I wonder how much F1 derived technology in in the new Lexus LF-A though??? Utter cobberwhobble imo, as if there isn't at least SOME technology trickle down from the racing machines to road cars...

Bugger all I think. When you think about it the applications between F1 and road cars are nothing alike. F1 engines are 2.4 litre V8s revving to 17,500 that only have to do 300 kms at a time. Road car engines are much bigger, have much bigger cylinders and only rev to half the rpm of an F1 engine. Same principle follows for nearly every other component. Car manufacturers tend to talk about their cars being "F1-inspired", which as far as I can tell means the engineers have F1 posters on the walls of their offices.

Put it this way, I'd want to hear specific examples before I drew any parallels between a road car and an F1 program.

[nismoman]

There is some merit in looking at F1 contributing to the general improvement of production road vehicles.

Lets not forget, the use of lightweight materials such as carbon fibre, titanium and other exotic alloys in exhaust and suspension components. The use of paddle shift gear boxes, even Mazda 3's come with this technology now. Carbon ceramic brakes as used on some of the more expensive sports cars.

[djr81]

There is some merit in looking at F1 contributing to the general improvement of production road vehicles.

Lets not forget, the use of lightweight materials such as carbon fibre, titanium and other exotic alloys in exhaust and suspension components. The use of paddle shift gear boxes, even Mazda 3's come with this technology now. Carbon ceramic brakes as used on some of the more expensive sports cars.

I disagree with that.

What F1 does is define what is fashionable on road cars. It has very little to do with technology.

Lets be honest do you reckon Force India give a stuff about what technology is in your next Corolla?

[lmanion]

Its probably got more to do with we will see the new technologies on road cars further down the line but F1 is where these things are usually introduced. It may take 10 years or more I mean how long had F1 been using paddle shift gearboxes before they were used frequently in road cars?

We may not even hear of new things until a few years time when a new road car comes out with something that has been developed from F1 technology

[djr81]

Its probably got more to do with we will see the new technologies on road cars further down the line but F1 is where these things are usually introduced. It may take 10 years or more I mean how long had F1 been using paddle shift gearboxes before they were used frequently in road cars?

We may not even hear of new things until a few years time when a new road car comes out with something that has been developed from F1 technology

You hear of them if you follow Ff1.

Anyway I would like to know when the following items will be seen on my next road car:

13" rims.

Pneumatic valves on the motor.

Inconel exhausts.

Wooden plank underneath to mess up the aero.

F duct.

Oh bugger lets go old school:

Active suspension what happened to that?

Aluminium monocoque chassis - where are they?

Sliding skirts.

Fuel that makes your eyes water & gives you cancer.

Lithium anything. Berillium anything.

The linds is endless. The amount of F1 tech that transfers to road cars is almost non existant. Some of the fashion makes the leap across.

Don't for instance think that the gearboxes on the race cars have anything in common with anything seen on a road car. It is just fashion. Having said that the new Porkers gearboxes are a good thing. Shame the F1 motors can't do direct injection.