Abu Dhabi GP 2010 - Yas Marina Circuit

[Shrieker]

And you forgot Kovalainen in Valencia, even though some say that wasn't really Webber's fault either.

Thank you. That makes 5 then...

For example his Collision with Massa at Monza just this year was his own fault for sticking his nose down the inside when he didnt have the racing line, Massa did.

Webber is certainly guilty of making mistakes and Melbourne is certainly one of them but to accuse him of zero race craft is ridiculous and holding Webber accountable for Turkey is just ludicrous!

Last word.

Five times mate. Five times. That's what ludicrous. And giving Hamilton's brief contact with Massa as an example just doesn't fit, sorry. One small brush in 19 races is to be expected. If it happens 5 times in 19 races, there's something wrong there (and neither of those were "your typical racing contact").

Someone surely must make a video of it.

[andartop]

Fact is, Webber got 4 victories this year and was pretty damn close to winning the WDC. That is 1 more victory than Hamilton, 2 more than Button, and 4 more than the likes of Massa (ok, 3), Schumi, Rosberg, Kubica. Even with the best car you don't win Monaco and you don't enter the last race challenging for the WDC without the skills. The only reason Red Bull might not want to keep him in the team would be because he is too good for a Number 2 driver. However, Red Bull apparently do not have a Number 1 and Number 2 driver, so they should keep him.

ALL title contenders made numerous silly mistakes this year, but fanboys will always be blind to their favourite driver's own mistakes.. I like to think that was because the competition was so tight.

[tok-tokkie]

Bit of a disappointing race otherwise after all the talks and analyses of possible scenarios, team orders, crashes etc I bet not even the most pessimistic of fans could have predicted how poor the action would actually be in the title deciding race, considering some of the fastest car/driver combinations were stuck for most of the race behind theoretically slower combinations..

...

Last but not least, well done FIA for planning the last race of 2011 in Brazil. Here's hoping that it will always be Brazil or Suzuka!

Theres now talk of Abu Dhabi having its first raft of changes done to it;

* Firstly, drop that stupid 5-6 chicane and have the cars race from 2-3-4 down to turn 7, but make turn 7 tighter to make a overtaking point there.
* Second is that chicane at the end of the back straight being tightened, if not make into a hairpin somehow.
* Finally the corner at the end of the bent back straight being made into a tight left hander as well. But there is more overtaking there than any other corner on the track, posibly leave as is???

Also the turn coming out of the Hotel underpass should have its wall brought out to the trackside to make it more Monaco-eske and the penultimate turn should be sorted out as well, allow the drivers to run out wide the way they were going in practice and make the last corner a "staged braking zone" from the curvature of the penultimate corner making it a mistake bringer??? Whilst they are at it, id also make Turn 1 tighter to have a semi overtaking zone here, or mistake bringer as well.

The reason for 2011 having the Brazilian GP last is because of Logistics, its easier to have the teams go from India to Abu Dhabi and then to Brazil and not India-Brazil-Abu Dhabi. Seemingly the plans are for India to replace Shanghai in 2012 so the Indian GP will go to the start of the 2012 callander.

Goodness I hope they fix this stupid Micky Mouse track. Good drivers in good cars stuck behind slightly(?) weaker combinations & nowhere to even have a go at overtaking. Killed the whole spectacle. And Tilke has given us plenty more with exactly the same design flaw.

[netoperek]

Goodness I hope they fix this stupid Micky Mouse track. Good drivers in good cars stuck behind slightly(?) weaker combinations & nowhere to even have a go at overtaking. Killed the whole spectacle. And Tilke has given us plenty more with exactly the same design flaw.

Kubica overtook Sutil and Kobayashi nicely, when his strategy demanded that he did, so overtaking is obviously possible there.

[Miguel]

Because he's not good enough when the chips are down, and so it proved this weekend. I've predicted what would happen to Mark in other threads from his past Formula 3000 exploits amongst other things, and I was proved dead right. Yesterday was just a very bizarre and sad throwing in of the towel that seems very familiar to me.

You do realise that RB used Webber yesterday as a bait to get Alonso to pit, right? Webber had to defend a 7 point advantage with respect to Vettel... but was 4 positions behind in the grid. He didn't benefit at the start, gaining no positions. At that moment, Webber's championship was over. Even more so when, after the normal pit stop, Alonso and him had lost two positions against two cars with ludicrous top speed.

Had Alonso overtaken that Renault within 10 laps, Webber should have tried. But, you know, some people have attacked Alonso for trying to overtake Petrov in the last lap because "it didn't change anything". I suppose these guys don't care about racing at all.

[dave34m]

You do realise that RB used Webber yesterday as a bait to get Alonso to pit, right?

Haha, that real funny.

[autogyro]

Well the race organisers have designed the cars for next year (with the adjustable rear wings and KERS only used as they say), not the teams.
So the results wont mean a thing.

[djos]

Fact is, Webber got 4 victories this year and was pretty damn close to winning the WDC. That is 1 more victory than Hamilton, 2 more than Button, and 4 more than the likes of Massa (ok, 3), Schumi, Rosberg, Kubica. Even with the best car you don't win Monaco and you don't enter the last race challenging for the WDC without the skills. The only reason Red Bull might not want to keep him in the team would be because he is too good for a Number 2 driver. However, Red Bull apparently do not have a Number 1 and Number 2 driver, so they should keep him.

ALL title contenders made numerous silly mistakes this year, but fanboys will always be blind to their favourite driver's own mistakes.. I like to think that was because the competition was so tight.

+1

Some of the Fanboi's around here have a seriously distorted view of anyone that isn't their fav driver!

I'm a massive Webber fan but at least I can honestly point to his actual mistakes and and be critical of them. I may not be a Nando or Lewis fan but I seriously respect their abilities and dont fling names at Lewis because he's only raced ever raced for well funded teams through his career!

[segedunum]

Show me one other "#2" driver who is consistently that close to their "#1" driver and consistently bagging the kind of points needed for the WCC?

Webber has never been a number 2. He had that championship in his hands, and neither Vettel, Red Bull or anyone else could take it away from him. In reality, he should have taken that championship long before Alonso or Vettel got a chance.

He also won't be there next year because he's too tall and too heavy.

[djos]

Show me one other "#2" driver who is consistently that close to their "#1" driver and consistently bagging the kind of points needed for the WCC?

Webber has never been a number 2. He had that championship in his hands, and neither Vettel, Red Bull or anyone else could take it away from him. In reality, he should have taken that championship long before Alonso or Vettel got a chance.

He also won't be there next year because he's too tall and too heavy.

Seg I'll assume English is your second language (Im not trying to be being rude), the quotation marks are used sarcastically.

[segedunum]

Seg I'll assume English is your second language (Im not trying to be being rude), the quotation marks are used sarcastically.

No, they're not. It's funny that that's what you think you're being.

[djos]

Seg I'll assume English is your second language (Im not trying to be being rude), the quotation marks are used sarcastically.

No, they're not.

Hey who wrote that, Me or You? That's right Me and I know how I wrote it!

[zeph]

This is taking the thread somewhat OT, but I feel I have to throw in a word for Webber here. I wrote this on another forum, so please forgive the copy/paste:

The weird thing is, before the start of the season Horner etc. were quite open about Vettel being the #1 driver. He was their champion-to-be, the team was focusing on him. It wasn't a big secret or anything. Nobody cared. It was when Webber started beating Vettel that it became a problem.

Webber was on a roll after Spain and Monaco and on his way to another dominating win in Turkey, when the team definitely tried to hand Vettel the win, but he took himself out instead. Afterwards, Webber looked friggin' scared, but he kept his mouth shut, in spite of Marko's and Horner's lame statements about "giving room". That's when the whole thing was blown open.

RBR never claimed equal treatment for both drivers until recently. I do not think that they have outright sabotaged Webber's bid for the title, but to me it is clear as hell they did not support it.

Hey, the Vettel merchandise was ready at the start of the season. He appeared in the RedBull commercials in Europe, not Webber. As a prodigy of the RedBull junior racer program he is their poster boy. Raised and made a champion by RedBull. A true present-day sports-fairytale brought to you by the same drink that "gives you wings". Do you really think they are going to let Webber piss on that parade?

And oh yeah, Bernie Ecclestone said Vettel was going to be the WDC this year before the start of the season. But hey, that's just Bernie talkin'...

[segedunum]

Hey who wrote that, Me or You? That's right Me and I know how I wrote it!

No....you don't. That's what's sad about it. You might believe you're trying to be 'sarcastic' (looking up what sarcasm means might help), but since Mark Webber actually believes he's a number 2 and that's how he justifies things to himself there's not a drop of sarcasm or double meaning in there.

[gridwalker]

... maybe I should have asked on my team radio, please ask Vettel how much he wants to pay me to help, and then we go to Ferrari and ask them the same too. Then whoever gives the most, we see.

Vitaly could have been on to a winner with this : we all know that Ferrari would have been happy to pay at least US$100,000 for that kind of assistance