2016 Japanese Grand Prix - Suzuka, 07-09 October

[Nathanael F1]

Another race, another stupid Ferrari strategy. Why does VES keep getting away with dangerous moving-under-braking racing?

[SectorOne]

https://streamable.com/zdqo
Can you prove moving like that under breaking is illegal by the actual written rules?

With regards to moving under braking there's a gentleman's agreement among all drivers that you do not, under any circumstances move during the braking phase.

Verstappen just chooses to ignore it. But it will be interesting to see what happens in the future because Whiting and the race stewards have talked to him this time. Wonder why..

No that's incorrect, it's in the sporting regulations.

Are you referring to this?

"Manoeuvres liable to hinder other drivers, such as deliberate crowding of a car beyond the
edge of the track or any other abnormal change of direction, are not permitted."

I´m talking about a specific agreement which is not in any regulations.

[i70q7m7ghw]

"Manoeuvres liable to hinder other drivers, such as deliberate crowding of a car beyond the
edge of the track or any other abnormal change of direction, are not permitted."

I´m talking about a specific agreement which is not in any regulations.

Yes, and moving in braking zones is covered by that regulation. There's no gentlemen's agreement as such, it's more of a directive from the FIA which they can and do enforce under clause 27.8 of the sporting regulations.

[PlatinumZealot]

Hamilton has defended Verstappen again. At least he is consistent.

[Edax]

Hamilton has defended Verstappen again. At least he is consistent.

I guess he didn' t want to gain a price behind a stewards table. Seeing how much he is a Senna fan it wouldn't suprise me if he wasn't thinking of '89 and didn't want to be the Prost of this story. Fair to him.

I'm not sure whether the appeal would stick anyway. The move itself wasn't punishable as IMO Ham was much too far back and the directional change very minor and towards the apex. The only thing is that it comes on top of a string of similar moves, one of them in particular ( on RAI). The stewards could write out a punishment based on the sum of those moves, although keeping a tab on drivers is not in line with the rules.

Actually I wouldn't mind that. I think the judgement and free interpretation of a good set of judges is always preferable to strict adherence to a rulebook. The FIA came down pretty hard on HAM himself early in his carrier to correct his enthousiastic defending style and see where it has brought him.

[iotar__]

Hamilton has defended Verstappen again. At least he is consistent.

A. Situations were not the same (compared to Hungary and Spa), similar driving but considerably lesser transgression here. Just awkward and panicky, that's not how you should drive in F1 but at least only one late move this time.

Versappen hasn't moved an inch since previous ones and sooner or later he'll pay for it. He already is looking at attempts against Kvyat and Ricciardo recently. One trick - hesitant game of chicken and if it doesn't work no B option.

B. IMO it's not about consistency but more about media persona. I doubt it's honest, especially pretending Spa wasn't dangerous and dirty. Same for Alonso and (this one I'm sure about) Button's constant over the top Hamilton support, 'he's soo quick',' he's so unlucky', 'he drove into me what was he thinking' (Ger '14), 'scratch that it was nothing' .

That's how you build marketing value I guess, telling crowd what they want to hear. Judging by ridiculous driver of race (?) voting in Canada (Bottas), Singapore (Rosberg) that's what reddit type of people are buying.

[Manoah2u]

Kudos for Rosberg on winning this race. Did all he needed to do, perfectly so. From Qually to race. Hard to see this championship slipping away from him now.

Lewis definately making a mess of this weekend all by himself. Should have jumped back on as hard as he could, instead all i seen all weekend was a absolute mess. I don't know
where his head's at, but it's not where it should be. The press conference games were an odd thing to see the weekend start with but in the end a clear signal he's not doing what
he should - focusing completely on winning and surpassing himself. I don't know what that start was about but it was a real real mess. Atleast he admitted it was a screwup, but
well, he lost the race - and a more decent chance at the WDC - by that mess. I feel like it started with the 'test start' from the pitlane. he was taking a lot of time and though he got
away fairly well, it all seemed messy to me - or should i say, not flowing well.
Lewis, if you lose this WDC, you did it yourself with this weekend mate. Tech issues are out of your own league, but this was a model weekend to do all you could to still grab it.

Ferrari once again completely throwing their chances into the trash. Vettel drove his heart out and had a absolutely great first stint, but once again the tactics were abismal, and
i kinda feel the same for Kimi. That Ferrari belongs further up front all year long but they're completely and utterly completely blowing their chances by absolute unforgivable
planning mistakes. Are they just rolling dices to decide what to do or what?

I actually thought Vettel might have a chance on even undercutting Rosberg but that was out real fast with the non-existant tactics. Ferrari needs to get their things sorted.

Verstappen doing a magnificient job. Moving under braking wasn't really the sweetest move but i feel it's being exeggarated as usual. It was too late in the race for Lewis to still
make a real difference. I don't get why he didnt get to actually overtake him in the laps leading up to that. He had DRS, he had all open but never managed to. Great from Max to
thus defend to make a pass virtually impossible. Besides, max would have still kept Lewis behind even if he didn't move under that braking zone, one might argue Lewis perhaps
would have a better chance coming out after that corner afterwards, but it's still guessing.

Ricciardo and Perez underwhelming this race. Hulkenberg and Bottas 'meh', enjoyed Massa this race though.

All in all a race that more or less was defined by the start, and afterwards really nothing 'too exciting'.
Next 3 races are exciting venue's, let's see what's happening at COTA. Nico can be WDC next race.

[zac510]

https://streamable.com/zdqo
Can you prove moving like that under breaking is illegal by the actual written rules?

Nobody can - only the race stewards can.

Race stewards are very fallible, what I asked for was an analysis of actual written rules and video footage.
You're welcome to butt in with actual logical attempts to answer my question in SectorOne's place, but if you're just going to use worthless aphorisms please stay out of it.
(my question is serious and matter-a-fact, I'm not trying to "trap" SectorOne or argue with him pedantically)

No need to get angry - it did sound like you were trying to set up an unfalsifiable argument (or trap as you called it), so thanks for pointing out that you were really only after analysis.

[SectorOne]

"Manoeuvres liable to hinder other drivers, such as deliberate crowding of a car beyond the
edge of the track or any other abnormal change of direction, are not permitted."

I´m talking about a specific agreement which is not in any regulations.

Yes, and moving in braking zones is covered by that regulation. There's no gentlemen's agreement as such, it's more of a directive from the FIA which they can and do enforce under clause 27.8 of the sporting regulations.

We´re talking about two different things here.

[GPR-A duplicate2]

Lewis definately making a mess of this weekend all by himself. Should have jumped back on as hard as he could, instead all i seen all weekend was a absolute mess. I don't know
where his head's at, but it's not where it should be. The press conference games were an odd thing to see the weekend start with but in the end a clear signal he's not doing what
he should - focusing completely on winning and surpassing himself. I don't know what that start was about but it was a real real mess. Atleast he admitted it was a screwup, but
well, he lost the race - and a more decent chance at the WDC - by that mess. I feel like it started with the 'test start' from the pitlane. he was taking a lot of time and though he got
away fairly well, it all seemed messy to me - or should i say, not flowing well.
Lewis, if you lose this WDC, you did it yourself with this weekend mate. Tech issues are out of your own league, but this was a model weekend to do all you could to still grab it.

I am not sure how many mortals can put forward performances like a 2014 and then a 2016 pre-summer. For someone who had loads of mentality issues in the past, to have kept composure and do what he has done, is in itself a huge achievement.
Psychologically speaking, every time a driver sits into a car and has no guarantee of how the start is going to be like, especially having earned breath taking poles, it's a nightmare situation. On top of that, a constant worry at the back of the mind that anything on the car can pop, doesn't make it any easier. I am surprised that it didn't took toll on him way earlier. But he has reached a point where he is sure that the championship is now out of reach, so it's a natural time to vent out the frustration. Lewis hasn't lost the championship, the car has let him down.
Shame on Mercedes that they couldn't do anything to help the situation, except for giving stupid reasons on each failure. They started having start problems from Hungary 2015 (when they went for single clutch before the regulations kicked in for Spa), but didn't really do anything to fix it.
Congratulations to them, they have achieved something that no other team has done before. Engineering a championship win for the weaker driver !!!

[ChrisDanger]

Congratulations to them, they have achieved something that no other team has done before. Engineering a championship win for the weaker driver !!!

Do you really think they would do this? Two questions: Are you a Hamilton fan? And is this a hunch, or do you have irrefutable proof? Because there's a glittering pattern of light reflection coming from the top of your head as you say this.

[Vasconia]

Congratulations to them, they have achieved something that no other team has done before. Engineering a championship win for the weaker driver !!!

Do you really think they would do this? Two questions: Are you a Hamilton fan? And is this a hunch, or do you have irrefutable proof? Because there's a glittering pattern of light reflection coming from the top of your head as you say this.

Dont loose time trying to find sense to stupid comments of fan boys who cant accept that their idol can make mistakes.

[Vasconia]

Perfect race for Nico, he was the fastest one on qualy, he did a good(but not perfect) start and his pace was consistent. He controlled other drivers pace and he achieved an easy victory. But make difficult things look easy is one of the best characteristics of Nico. Well done.

Terrible start for Lewis and a pretty mediocre first stint, he sounded defeated on the radio. Fortunately he was much better in the second half, showins his true pace and his car´s true pace, they have always one second more when its needed, amazing.

I need to look more carefully to Max´s defensive move but it looked hard, but not as hard as previous ones. Anyway he was second when the the RB was not enough fast to be on the podium. Excellent job.

Sebastian and Kimi did a great race, he showed how good they are! , but Ferrari.... oh come on! they had the podium on their hands! what an stupid strategy, really.

[Vasconia]

If people really think Ferrari's strategy is bad then you must be over-rating their car. It's well clear of 4th best but finishing the race where it belongs. Strategy can't fix a slow car.

They were clearly faster tan RB, so they should have finished 3th and 5th. They should have covered Sebastian´s position pitting earlier and using the hard tyres.

[zac510]

I respectfully disagree. It might have put them in 3rd for a while but he'd have been under a lot of pressure from Hamilton for a lot of laps.
The car reminds me of the Mercedes of a few years ago (2012-13 ish) that used to qualify well and run up the front of the race for the first stint but then fall back by the end as the other cars managed the tyres better during the changing track grip, fuel weight, etc.