Malaysian GP 2012 - Sepang International Circuit

[Giblet]

Great images Giblet. To me that just shows that NK was following the racing line whilst SV was off line but trying to return to it. Reinforces my view that SV had plenty of room to the right but chose instead to take a line that cut across in front of where NK was going to naturally drive.

Edit: Should add that NK was also fractionally to the right of the line the others were taking (20cm maybe?) but that could have been easily explained by his earlier wobble giving a desire to keep away from the curbs plus his lower speed not taking him out as wide as the others.

Looking at those images, it starts to look more like a racing incident with a skew towards NK, but its clear it was avoidable by both parties.

[raymondu999]

Great images Giblet. To me that just shows that NK was following the racing line whilst SV was off line but trying to return to it. Reinforces my view that SV had plenty of room to the right but chose instead to take a line that cut across in front of where NK was going to naturally drive.

Edit: Should add that NK was also fractionally to the right of the line the others were taking (20cm maybe?) but that could have been easily explained by his earlier wobble giving a desire to keep away from the curbs plus his lower speed not taking him out as wide as the others.

Looking at those images, it starts to look more like a racing incident with a skew towards NK, but its clear it was avoidable by both parties.

Agreed. Vettel's approach I guess was too on-edge; in conditions that were already edgy anyways.

[myurr]

Apparently he said on RTL (I think?) that he just felt it was wrong to not try for the flag. Nothing to do with the NK collision in particular.

If it can be taken at face value...

[kilcoo316]

Looking at those images, it starts to look more like a racing incident with a skew towards NK, but its clear it was avoidable by both parties.

Disagree with the underlined bit.


It is clearly and plainly 100% Vettel's fault.

NK followed the racing line which was from the corner exit, diagonally across the subsequent straight to the next braking zone.

SV cut across the racing line and hence cut across NK.



I'm actually quite surprised there has been significant argument about it - I'm even more surprised the stewards seen fit to find NK guilty.

[Hail22]

Great slow frames Giblet.

Look at Vettel in the first image, he had quite a bit of understeer (no traction), this proves how vital the EBD was to Red Bull or it could prove how impatient Vettel was in catching a driver who would not easily yield his position (Hamilton).

[Shrieker]

Very bizarre the best drivers out there seem to be unawares about perimeter of a typical formula 1 car .Vettel,Hamilton,Button ,Rosberg ,Webber all seem to fall into this trap and even Schumi had his oops ,i lost my front wing moments..

Trap it is indeed, and it's called ego.

Sadly, it looks like you have to be an egomaniac first to be a top tier F1 driver. The self belief has to be so high, they just can't maintain the same level of commitment without it. It's a sharp edge, those who know how to reign their ego when required will win more often than those who can't.

[WhiteBlue]

I really don't see how NK could have done much more without slamming on the breaks or going off the circuit.

All Vettel needed to do was stay off-line for another second. Considering how variable the line had been all race, this surely wouldn't have been an insurmountable handicap in his pursuit of victory.

The video shows once again the misleading commentary of the British commentators. It wasn't Vettel who moved once they were side by side. It was NK who left the outside of the track and moved inside on Vettel.

At no point did Karthikeyan leave the track in the video. Why do you keep saying that?

You are obviously a bit confused. I was talking of NK leaving the edge of the track towards the inside, not the outside.

[Hail22]

You are obviously a bit confused. I was talking of NK leaving the edge of the track towards the inside, not the outside.

NK is clearly following Charles Pics racing line, thus he is driving the way he should be (unless you want an accident on the greasy grass?).

Vettel had three car widths of space to go far outside of NK and do you see who would of been in front of Vettel if he did pass NK sucessfully? Charles Pic like Vettel would try a move at Turn 9 on a slower car such as the Marussia, thats a bottle neck of destruction.

Vettel is clearly lacking in competence, humility, patience. So stop being oppositional and start eating the humble pie.

[WhiteBlue]

WhiteBlue your biggest problem is that you are doing exactly what you accuse others of doing and inventing rules.

I have no problem at all. I have never invented a rule. It is you who keep doing this based on a majority of British commentators who cannot be bothered to analyse the available material in depth and made some stupid, inappropriate comments.

The two rules you think NK breached are as follows:

20.5) As soon as a car is caught by another car which is about to lap it during the race the driver must allow the faster driver past at the first available opportunity. If the driver who has been caught does not allow the faster driver past, waved blue flags will be shown to indicate that he must allow the following driver to overtake.

16.1) Incident" means any occurrence or series of occurrences involving one or more drivers, or any action by any driver, which is reported to the stewards by the race director (or noted by the stewards and subsequently investigated) which :
16.1.d) Caused a collision

Those are excerpts of the sporting regulations which have been applied by the stewards. They are by no means a complete quotation of the applicable regulation sections. I have quoted the steward's document in full text and the full text of the relevant sporting regulation sections. I have no idea why you feel the need to cut and paste some of the regulation's wording. For instance you do not show the other sub sections of 16.1 which also deal with different infractions of the overtaking rule.

From those rules you then go on to assert:

The whole sequence of events up to the point where NK and SV were side by side is is largely irrelevant to the incident because SV had the right to maximise his pace and optimise his racing line.

I have to correct you because you are taking my post out of context. The sentence you quoted above applies to the sequence of events that occurred prior to the racing incident. All I have done is separating the video evidence into relevant sections and irrelevant sections. Your elaborate considerations before that point have no bearing on the legal appreciation of the following incident. This the point I was making. It has nothing to do with the issue on hand. All the stuff that occurred before the two drivers pulled alongside isn't relevant to the legal question. The only point of concern is whether there was sufficient lateral separation. You know my view on that point.

The rules do not say that. How on earth do you get from "must allow the faster driver to pass at the earliest possibility" to "has the right to maximise his pace and optimise his racing line"? The reason I keep asking you to quote rules is because you have quoted a couple of rules and then made all kinds of assertions about them like this one that simply are not true.

You can't just state things like this and have it accepted as fact if you repeat it over and over.

You don't seem understand how evidence and circumstantial observations should be separated. At least you don't seem to understand when I'm containing the evidence and when I'm making remarks on circumstantial embroidery. Please understand that some of the track action is completely arbitrary and irrelevant to the legal situation. The sooner we can agree on that, the better for a reasonable debate. One has to put a marker down where the evidence starts. It would be unreasonable to include the restart of the race behind the safety car. It is equally useless for the purpose of determining NK's culpability to consider the event's before the actual pass. To be clear I am referring to the begin of the two cars overlapping as the "pass".

In my humble opinion the fact that Vettel had a speed differential and 15+ metres of track to play with was enough to ensure NK complied with 20.5. He let Vettel pass, he didn't try and block him.

The speed differential is irrelevant to the question who caused a collision. NK obviously allowed a partial pass to Vettel, but in the terminal phase of that pass he pulled his right front wing into Vettel's left rear tire. He claimed traction problems for that mistake but there is no evidence that he had any traction problems at the exit of the corner where the accident happened. This is the focus of the legal issue. NK had the option to continue to follow the edge of the track. He did not do this. §20.5 makes it clear who has to yield in this situation and must get out of the way. NK did not comply with that duty by pulling his car towards the inside of the track.

But that wasn't enough for SV. He took an unnecessary risk in going past NK more closely than he needed to and by not turning to follow the racing line but instead going straight and requiring NK to do the same.

This your interpretation, which I have rejected several times as faulty. If Vettel had been too close - and all video material suggests he wasn't - the stewards would not have put the blame for causing a collision on NK.

Finally you state:

I have pointed out the reason why the three corner rule is not applicable - because the duty to let pass ASAP is unconditional with regard to a collision. The three corner rule only applies to denying a legitimate pass, (§16.1.g&f) which wasn't the case here.

What is unclear about that quote? I'm only saying that the stewards and I considered §16.1.d (collision) to be relevant. F&G are not applicable for this incident. Do you deny this?
You have introduced the question of the three corner rule. At this point I'm only showing you that the three corner rule wasn't applicable because it refers to sections F&G only.

So you believe that if NK had swept to the right earlier and blocked Vettel from overtaking for a further three corners that this would have been fine and acceptable according to the rules?
The underlined passage is also your interpretation of the rules and not written fact. Is this why you believe NK is at fault for Button losing control of his car and sliding into him? I don't think much of the world is going to agree with you on that one...

Another useless exercise of paraphrasing and going off topic instead of dealing with the issue on hand. Please do me a favour and stop the silly theoretic manipulations you seem to enjoy so much. I will take them apart as you post them. And you will not make points in a fair debate.

[Hail22]

[...]

The ruling has been made NK was penalised, Vettel is a Brat and is at fault in my view, and I shall leave you to your armchair commentating as unlike you I was actually there

But in closing let us remember

Fuji 2007
Melbourne 2009
Istanbul 2010
Spa 2010

[...]

[WhiteBlue]

Vettel had three car widths of space to go far outside of NK ..

Wrong reference! Vettel was to the inside of NK at the point of the accident.

..and do you see who would of been in front of Vettel if he did pass NK sucessfully? Charles Pic like Vettel would try a move at Turn 9 on a slower car such as the Marussia, thats a bottle neck of destruction.

I don't even understand what you are talking about. Please restrict your comment to the accident situation if you address me. That is the issue I'm trying to clear up here.

[kris]

Would the stewards/driver's represntative deciding penalities have access to telemetry data when they decide to take action or are they also limited to video footage?
Could it be that the telemtry should some abnormality before the collision that they decided to penalise NK?

[GrizzleBoy]

Would the stewards/driver's represntative deciding penalities have access to telemetry data when they decide to take action or are they also limited to video footage?
Could it be that the telemtry should some abnormality before the collision that they decided to penalise NK?

They gave the slowest, non point scoring car that was already at the back of the field a 20 second time penatly.

What changes? Nothing, pretty much.

When you look at it like that, it's not so much a penalty as it is the FIA doing the bare minimum to stop the "big boys" crying that he "got away" with sabotaging them.

[kris]

Would the stewards/driver's represntative deciding penalities have access to telemetry data when they decide to take action or are they also limited to video footage?
Could it be that the telemtry should some abnormality before the collision that they decided to penalise NK?

They gave the slowest, non point scoring car that was already at the back of the field a 20 second time penatly.

What changes? Nothing, pretty much.

When you look at it like that, it's not so much a penalty as it is the FIA doing the bare minimum to stop the "big boys" crying that he "got away" with sabotaging them.

That would be at the risk of accusing the stewards of bias. I believe this might not the first or the last time they have been accused of that

[kris]

Comparison of Pic's line

Apologies for stoking the fire further..
But doesn't it look like the rear tires of NK are further away from the kerb than that of Pic?
Also the static part of the pic also shows NK tires more near to the kerb than at the point/or just after the point of contact

Could it be that NK steered a bit more to the right to get back to the racing line assuming the VT had already been past him.

This does not discount the fact that VT had more room to the right and better grip to have easily overtaken him from the right (birthright of the racing line or not)