F1 at Spa - the aftermath

[mo]

Just reading this thread now for the first time and I have to say I'm quite surprised by the reaction to the penalty and the subsequent appeal. 

All the drivers I've heard talking about it agreed with the penalty (except Heiki). Lewis in his initial statement said that the team had asked him to let Kimi back through again after he had taken the place in La Source.
To me this says it all, and MacLaren appeared to have changed their story by race end, and to have jumped on the media bandwagon afterwards

This highlights the constant battle between the views of the drivers and the views of the media/viewers; the media and viewers of course want to see more overtaking, but it is not acceptable that drivers should have to loose positions in this manner just to slake the thirst of the viewing public.
This is why the drivers themselves in the majority agree with the penalty, not because they are jealous of Lewis as I read in some ridiculous tabloid. Drivers need to stick together on these matters, to prevent the sport from becoming a contrived TV show for ratings purposes.
If overtaking is difficult or rare then the problem is with the cars or circuits. Drivers should not be allowed overtake like this simply because its difficult to get past otherwise.

Hamilton is a great racer and would likely have passed Kimi before the end of the race if he bided his time a bit. Leaving aside the black and white (or grey) legal side of things, personally I think it was a bit unsporting, as were some of his chops across peeps in braking zones in the wet last week too.
He's a good enough driver to do well without such moves, and will probably deservedly win the championship anyway. But if he doesn't it certainly would be silly for him to blame the FIA or Ferrari.

[Jure]

I believe I told you guys appeal would be inadmissible.  FIA documents&rules are fun to read.

IMHO the only good thing (apart from the fact that certain someone driving car No. 22 might actually look up word "gentleman" in the dictionary) that can come out of this mess is professionalization of race stewards.

[Mark J]

regarding the other drivers opinions, i thought it interesting when they brought that point up with Nikki Lauda and Jackie Stewart and they both said 'well they would say that, as they are all ego-ists and all have something to gain by LH/mclaren being punished '

just saying... 

[mr_oily]

Yep I had to chuckle too Mark, surprised to see Nico agree though...obviously really believed what he was saying.

Guaranteed to offend, I thought Sniffpetrol was entertaining this month - http://www.sniffpetrol.com/

[Mark J]

LOL Oily  thats a great site, had me laughing out loud 

[Dave 'Gizmo' Gymer]

I now consider F1 to be in the same bracket as wrestling, ie. not a sport, just lowest common denominator 'reality TV' type nonsense. As such I will not watch any more of it until there is a fundamental shift in how things are run.

[H@L9000]

As you guys have said, what a complete waste of time and money.

So a carefully selected group of supposed racing experts (the stewards) make a decision and then in order to appeal, the case is taken to the courts. The courts consist of a group of people that know nothing about racing, which in this case is highly complex, consisting of some of the most modern, ground breaking technology know to man. Any decision that is made is going to be complete nonsense in my opinion. Who has the best lawyers/money will win as in all high profile court cases. Racing should not end up in court unless there is a 'criminal' element to sort out.

The mess that this situation has become has been mainly fueled by the seemingly random choice of penalty. I cant remember seeing a 25 second penalty in F1 before, maybe before 2001 (sorry if this has already been mentioned, the vast array of F1 stats in this thread is bewildering) .

[purdie]

I've decided now that the main option is to put barriers across all of the chicanes, don't have to be concrete but something that would at least take a wing off.........then people wouldn't try silly manoeuvres like Lewis around the outside out that chicane 

I watched in total 3 hours of the Spa 24hrs and no one was overtaken on the outside into the new bus stop.....it dont work 

[purdie]

...and for the record IF the BBC take on Mark Blundell next year ( ) they need to sort of his crap grammar.....

[mo]

I now consider F1 to be in the same bracket as wrestling, ie. not a sport, just lowest common denominator 'reality TV' type nonsense. As such I will not watch any more of it until there is a fundamental shift in how things are run.

Personally I think F1 is more watchable and interesting now than any time since the early 90s. The last three seasons have been excellent compared to the 10 before. If there was an Irish guy showing the talent of Lewis I'd be even more immersed in it. Surely when he overcomes the might of the FIA trying to scupper him, and becomes world champion then you'll be interested again, no?

...........
I cant remember seeing a 25 second penalty in F1 before, maybe before 2001
 ...............

The 25 sec penalty was introduced after Schumi won the (British?) Grand Prix in the pit lane while serving a stop/go penalty.
The decision was made then that if there was not enough laps left to serve the penalty during complete laps of the race then a time penalty would be given after the finish.

[Steve Holmes]

So they waste everybody's time and money, gathering team representatives, lawyers etc only to decide they dont need a hearing anyway as its 'in-admissable'   

Good time to be a lawyer........time to re-train. 

Ah well, back to the controversy racing this weekend, wonder if we'll still get the 'no, after you, I insist' antics with people running 1 mm wide at chicanes,  or will normality return?

[Joss]

Phoenix Wright woulda found a way to get Ham off the hook. And it woulda been more dramatic too! Probably have solved the Stepneygate thing during lunch time as well

[Napo]

The fact is if you guys were upset about a race you would have mentioned it on this forum as was done on this thread. And if you look at the fuji thread, not one direct mention about Raikkonen going offline clearly taking advantage. You were all happy Hamilton won.

Fuji totally failed to be controversial in that respect - Spa would have been equally uncontroversial save for the unwanted, uneeded and undesirable meddling by the stewards, at the Evil Red Team's behest. It's that meddling with a result which has people up in arms - Hamilton won the race fair and square after Kimi binned it and the amended results reflect only the Red bias of the FIA, not who deserved what with their on track performance.

Exactly! So now that Hamilton got a penalty let's give kimi a penalty! If Hamilton had won and Kimi still went around offline like that no one would care. all I'm saying is you can not use the kimi going offline because it's not the same situation. There's no same offence. These 2 situations are completely different.

[Dave 'Gizmo' Gymer]

Exactly!

He says, as if I'm agreeing with him.

[Zacari]

The problem is Napo, that they are both the same type of offence- both drivers supposidely 'gained and advantage' over the other through those two separate maneuvers.  If Lewis is subject to the strict letter of the FIA law, then Kimi should've been treated the same way.

If you want to be totally picky about it, Kimi even used it to pass Lewis at the next corner, as the backmarker caused Lewis to go wide, and Kimi snuck through the gap- which he may not have been able to do had he taken the previous corner correctly.

Care to argue the Ferrari case in that one, or do you see I have a point?

I hope this night race malarky turns out to be a good one, even the race at Monza hasn't wiped this rubbish from my memory!