2017 Bahrain Grand Prix - Sakhir, April 14-16

[Wass85]

I doubt very much Hamilton had trouble with his DRS, there was no mention of it whatsoever from him and the team.

[basti313]

HAM's blocking of RIC deserved all of the 5 seconds absolutely. It harmed another drivers race and it was dangerous. HAM'a driving the second half of the race was impressive to watch.

Dangerous...... deserved yes but dangerous ?

We was driving in the pit late at 40kph instead of 50kph, how is that dangerous ?

Why this nonsense about "dangerous" here? The rule is clear, he impeded where it is not allowed and got a penalty for it. Nothing to discuss. No one in F1 talks about "dangerous".

[basti313]

I doubt very much Hamilton had trouble with his DRS, there was no mention of it whatsoever from him and the team.

Usually they do not have DRS when they press the button slightly too early. Ros had this problem several times...

[basti313]

Rubbish, Bottas was demonstrably slower and deserved to be moved over.

And yet Lewis couldn't get past him on his own merit. Had to rely on team orders to get past a slower car. Pretty poor, don't you think?

I'm not a Lewis fanboy but I doubt he'd have had much trouble considering he was 1.8 seconds a lap faster. Mercedes moved Bottas out of the way because they thought Lewis still had a chance to catch Seb and win the race. Any delay to Bottas being passed jeopardized this.

Ham having a chance to catch and overtake Vet is something I still do not see. The tire advantage was maybe a second to 1.5 sec. Clearly not enough to catch Vet and miles away from overtaking. Some claim Ham had much more pace then Bot in the second stint...still he could not overtake.
Merc used the Q mode on their engine to squeeze another half second out of it to catch Bot. One could clearly see, that Ham had most advantage in S1 where the engine counts, not in S2 where the newer tires compared to Vet and Bot.
For me this was a clear teamorder move with having the driver championship in mind. Nothing else.

[Wass85]

I doubt very much Hamilton had trouble with his DRS, there was no mention of it whatsoever from him and the team.

Usually they do not have DRS when they press the button slightly too early. Ros had this problem several times...

Well that's driver mistake if that's the case, likely brought on by the speed of his teammate.

[iotar__]

And yet Lewis couldn't get past him on his own merit. Had to rely on team orders to get past a slower car. Pretty poor, don't you think?

I'm not a Lewis fanboy but I doubt he'd have had much trouble considering he was 1.8 seconds a lap faster. Mercedes moved Bottas out of the way because they thought Lewis still had a chance to catch Seb and win the race. Any delay to Bottas being passed jeopardized this.

Ham having a chance to catch and overtake Vet is something I still do not see. The tire advantage was maybe a second to 1.5 sec. Clearly not enough to catch Vet and miles away from overtaking. Some claim Ham had much more pace then Bot in the second stint...still he could not overtake.
Merc used the Q mode on their engine to squeeze another half second out of it to catch Bot. One could clearly see, that Ham had most advantage in S1 where the engine counts, not in S2 where the newer tires compared to Vet and Bot.
For me this was a clear teamorder move with having the driver championship in mind. Nothing else.

Here we go again, 'I'm not a fanboy' doesn't add any weight to your arguments:

- Where were those overtakes on merit on the first stint, even with the help of Mercedes that can't put the right pressure into tyres of some drivers pure racers Vettel and Hamilton couldn't even muster an attempt. They wait for easier solutions.

- It's always easier to theorise about suitable fiction of pace instead of reality of blunders and team orders. Cheating FIA with penalties, cheating teams that instead of forcing drivers to earn it on track chose winners before races and crowd that embraces this fiction.

- Sainz got away lightly, RB driver bonus again, Maldo for less got full drive-through and 10 places grid. BTW are they saving on cameras? There was no good shot of the incident. Same for Perez and Stroll. How are they making decisions?

[djos]

They should have at least made them switch back positions after realising Hamilton couldn't catch Vettel, Bottas earned his position by out qualifying Hamilton yet they threw him under the bus.

You clearly missed the past where Lewis offered to give the place back if he wasn't able to reel in Seb, which he was able to do.

[djos]

Here we go again, 'I'm not a fanboy' doesn't add any weight to your arguments:
[/quote]

Well I'm not, I'm a Danny Ric and Fernando Alonso fan boy.

[Wass85]

They should have at least made them switch back positions after realising Hamilton couldn't catch Vettel, Bottas earned his position by out qualifying Hamilton yet they threw him under the bus.

You clearly missed the past where Lewis offered to give the place back if he wasn't able to reel in Seb, which he was able to do.

So why didn't he hand the place back then?

[Edax]

And yet Lewis couldn't get past him on his own merit. Had to rely on team orders to get past a slower car. Pretty poor, don't you think?

I'm not a Lewis fanboy but I doubt he'd have had much trouble considering he was 1.8 seconds a lap faster. Mercedes moved Bottas out of the way because they thought Lewis still had a chance to catch Seb and win the race. Any delay to Bottas being passed jeopardized this.

Ham having a chance to catch and overtake Vet is something I still do not see. The tire advantage was maybe a second to 1.5 sec. Clearly not enough to catch Vet and miles away from overtaking. Some claim Ham had much more pace then Bot in the second stint...still he could not overtake.
Merc used the Q mode on their engine to squeeze another half second out of it to catch Bot. One could clearly see, that Ham had most advantage in S1 where the engine counts, not in S2 where the newer tires compared to Vet and Bot.
For me this was a clear teamorder move with having the driver championship in mind. Nothing else.

Have you seen the second formula2 race? That guy closed down a 31 second gap in 12 laps to win the race.When the tires go down they go down quite steeply. If Vettel would have hit the cliff Hamilton would have had a chance.

[iotar__]

They did hesitate to shaft Kimi in China though, and that cost Vettel a chance at challenging Hamilton. ...

They did. But that was at off chance. Vet didn't stand a chance in China, not with the gap. ...

If we are comparing these two situations (and we should) I think we should at least get the facts right...

http://i64.tinypic.com/14d27oi.jpg

http://i65.tinypic.com/9amedk.jpg

HAM was closer to VET yesterday (after the SC went in) than VET was to him in China at the same time. However, in China both Ferrari drivers were on the same tyres (if I'm not mistaken), it was evident that Kimi can't overtake Dani and it was evident that Seb was faster. After the gap was 5s to Hamilton, Ferrari really had to give Kimi the order and race could have been on from that point. They didn't and that was race for first place over. Later Seb overtook Kimi and Dani and maintained the gap to Lewis. In the final stint he caught him up a bit, but Hamilton was managing his race just as Seb was yesterday.

And let's not kid ourselves with the fact that Lewis was catching Seb after Bottas let him trough. Seb was on SS tyres for 22-23 laps, just as much as he was on S later. By the time Lewis got within 6s off Vettel, Vettel should have been in the pits if it weren't for Dani, who they had to get clear off in their out-lap window and not risk getting stuck behind him.

My point is (and I sense it got lost a bit ) - Merc were right to give Hamilton the place and try to win this race, but Ferrari in China had an even better reason to do so, in my view. They didn't and it could cost them in November...

- No, situation were identical when it comes to probabilities, closer or not closer the chance wasn't there, it's binary zero and one. It's just excuses for cheating team orders and fake championship. Same results too, the rest is pointless theory instead of facts.

You forgot or missed on purpose differences
- Bottas was quicker in qualifying, he deserved to be in front Raikkonen is was and will be slow, he was in this situation by accident
- Vettel was second, Hamilton in China was in front the whole race, In Bahrain it was Bottas leading.
- Bottas had wrong tyre pressure, Hamilton lost the start, Hamilton got himself stupid penalty. How does that affect their 'right' to carry him in this race? Behind those pretended numbers (closer) the only argument is "I liked it", as always .

- you say Raikkonen couldn't overtake Ricciardo pretending that it matters, Vettel couldn't overtake Raikkonen, not even attempt, If one side is used to justify team carrying drivers why can't the other be used against it?

- Hamilton couldn't overtake Bottas that's why they used team orders on top of splitting tyre strategies in his favour. The latter shows they didn't wait for pace but it was purposeful before any pace difference happened. Weird pace difference too. It wasn't about slowing down or delaying it was about switching places, the end.

[djos]

They should have at least made them switch back positions after realising Hamilton couldn't catch Vettel, Bottas earned his position by out qualifying Hamilton yet they threw him under the bus.

You clearly missed the past where Lewis offered to give the place back if he wasn't able to reel in Seb, which he was able to do.

So why didn't he hand the place back then?

Because Bottas couldn't keep up, it's not like the red bull guys who've actually kept pace with the sister car and then handed the place back when they couldn't capitalise on it.

[Wass85]

I'm still not buying the DRS explanation for Hamilton not getting pole, why wasn't it mentioned by Hamilton or the team after qualifying?

[basti313]

I'm not a Lewis fanboy but I doubt he'd have had much trouble considering he was 1.8 seconds a lap faster. Mercedes moved Bottas out of the way because they thought Lewis still had a chance to catch Seb and win the race. Any delay to Bottas being passed jeopardized this.

Ham having a chance to catch and overtake Vet is something I still do not see. The tire advantage was maybe a second to 1.5 sec. Clearly not enough to catch Vet and miles away from overtaking. Some claim Ham had much more pace then Bot in the second stint...still he could not overtake.
Merc used the Q mode on their engine to squeeze another half second out of it to catch Bot. One could clearly see, that Ham had most advantage in S1 where the engine counts, not in S2 where the newer tires compared to Vet and Bot.
For me this was a clear teamorder move with having the driver championship in mind. Nothing else.

Have you seen the second formula2 race? That guy closed down a 31 second gap in 12 laps to win the race.When the tires go down they go down quite steeply. If Vettel would have hit the cliff Hamilton would have had a chance.

The F2 is running completely different tires this year. There is simply no cliff on the F1 tires this year.
Merc hoping for a cliff on Vet's S tires during the remaining 24 laps, while he did 24 laps on SS before is a good joke...

[basti313]

I'm still not buying the DRS explanation for Hamilton not getting pole, why wasn't it mentioned by Hamilton or the team after qualifying?

You do not have to buy it. It was quite clear, that the wing was closed. I guess they just do not talk about it, because it was the usual "pressed the button too early" problem. DRS was working before and after this lap. No repair in parc fermé....so no mechanical defect.