2017 Belgian Grand Prix - Spa Francorchamps, 25-27 August

[NathanOlder]

There was an interesting conversation on SKY F1.

They commmented about Hamilton and how he will go down in history. He is going to have a record which puts him in the conversation every time they talk about the best ever.

They made a fair point in that we don't see it ATM as he is here and now but when he is gone from F1 he will leave a huge hole to fill. In great cars of not it still takes a driver with amazing skill to go level with Schumacher in 48 races less than the great man. I doubt he will get to MS's wins (I think he will be close) but it's obvious that the pole record is shortly going to be his and by the end of his career he will be miles ahead.

Senna had almost as many pole positions in a lot fewer races, not always in cars capable of winning championships - unlike Lewis. It takes skill, but skill is not enough...

Lewis has a fair load of Poles in cars unable to win titles. 2009 2011 and 2013 were cars that had no chance of winning titles due to the strength of the opponent's yet lewis was in to double figure pole positions in these 3 years combined. Senna (who i think was the best ever) only had 2 poles in 2 years in 92 and 93. So to say Lewis has always had the car to do it is wrong. Lewis had 4 poles in the 2009 Mclaren. Against the Brawn and Red Bull! Thats pretty impressive.

[NathanOlder]

I cannot believe they gave 10sec stop-go penalty to Kimi. That is the same penalty Vettel got for headbutting Hamilton in Baku. Wow!!!!!!!!!

Now, a car travelling at 320kph with people on the race track is so much more dangerous than playing bumper cars at very low speeds. No lifes were at risk in Baku whereas in Spa they were. Just a spontaneous tire explosion and Kimi has no control over the place he is going to crash into.

As for the "oh my gawd F1 drivers need to be role models" discussion: I would love to crash my car into another car on the highway every second day. People pull out right in front of me, block the fast lane, run 10cm from my boot, if I was rich and did not have to care I would just plow into them as well. At least in the heat of the moment. And I'm very likely not the only one.

But if you did this and got penalty points for it and then a driving ban, even if you were rich, you wouldnt do it. Maybe once only.

[marvin78]

Oh could we please discuss this matter for another time and for another 4 weeks? Some people cannot let go.

[GPR-A duplicate2]

Senna had almost as many pole positions in a lot fewer races, not always in cars capable of winning championships - unlike Lewis. It takes skill, but skill is not enough...

Somehow there is this myth about Senna and not being in capable cars. So let me decode here ONCE AGAIN.

This is "Elio de Angelis", who was driving lotus in 1984 and 1985. Lotus was the third best team in 1984. More like today's Red Bull. Elio got one pole that year. Senna arrived at Lotus in 1985 and did a good job in 85 & 86 and got 15 poles. The fact is, no one can drive faster than a car can go. That Lotus deserved a better driver and Senna was it.


In 87, it was Mayhem from Williams and it was Nigell all the way. Senna got a solitary pole. And then he landed in those monsters (MP4/4, 4/5, 4/6 and 4/7) that McLaren manufactured (just like the W05, W06 and W07). No one can argue the fact that, those cars were simply the dominant breed. 92 and 93 was once again Williams domination and Senna got a solitary pole in both years. As he saw that McLaren is waning, he wanted to jump into a Williams for 93, but Prost blocked him and ultimately he did go to Williams.

Arguably those Lotus cars were good enough for pole and he got them. Credit to him for that. He got 44 poles in those dominant McLaren cars. Nigell and Vettel did what Senna did when the car was dominant. Once Hamilton got dominant cars in 14, 15 and 16, he did what Senna and Nigell did. Just like Senna had 87, 92 and 93, Hamilton had 09, 10, 11. But the difference is that, those bad seasons were longer for Hamilton, than for Senna for the number of races held. If Nico Rosberg was a Gerhard Berger or Webber, the numbers for Hamilton would have been staggering.

Nothing to take away from the absolute legend of Senna, but I have put things in a little more perspective.

[TAG]

I have some gripes with these Hamilton glorifications....

Look at the past years where Hamilton got so many Pole positions being in the most dominant car ever, especially in Qualifying. He only had to fight his own team mate

He was a rookie, coming up against a very experienced two time world champion. He shouldn't have won any if they were merely glorifications. Ricciardo got a lot of bonefides showered upon him when he showed up in Red Bull and handily beat his team mate. David and Goliath results deserve the glorification.

I seriously hope no one gets to touch Michaels victory record because the way he achieved it was magical.

Did you catch the personal message Michael's wife Corinna wanted Ross to deliver to Hamilton on Saturday?

[Shrieker]

@Vanja,
TwanV,

I'll quote the exact rule:

sporting regulation 20.4.

20.4 Any driver defending his position on a straight, and before any braking area, may use the full width of the track during his first move, provided no significant portion of the car attempting to pass is alongside his. For the avoidance of doubt, if any part of the front wing of the car attempting to pass is alongside the rear wheel of the car in front this will be deemed to be a 'significant portion'.

As you can see, there's nothing in the rules prohibiting a driver from going for a diminishing gap. As is clearly stated, the car ahead MUST watch out if the front wing of the attacker is alongside his rear wheel. The only reason Perez wasn't penalized for his mistake was the fact that it was his team mate. When was the last time that you can remember an inter team 'incident' had been penalized ?

[TAG]

On the first pit stop series, did Raikkonen slow some to try to block Lewis before he pitted? I thought Lewis caught up to him rather quickly. (And then ate him alive!)

To answer my own question, Lewis gained 2.5 seconds on lap 14 alone so I am guessing Raikkonen was in the backing up mode.

Ferrari would never ask Kimi to do that, there is no number one or number two driver at Ferrari, because some of the fanboys here said so.

[basti313]

Nothing to take away from the absolute legend of Senna, but I have put things in a little more perspective.

In all these off topic nonsense posts about Nr1 status, Vettel DSQ and Schumacher performance a really nice to read post =D>

I agree. There is always a car that plays the big role. When top car and top driver performance comes together we can see dominance. Most "exciting" championships were simply down on mediocre performances of the drivers in the top cars.
At the moment it seems to me, that it may be a good second half of this season. I can not see one car in front and two top drivers battling it out. =D>

I have some gripes with these Hamilton glorifications....

Look at the past years where Hamilton got so many Pole positions being in the most dominant car ever, especially in Qualifying. He only had to fight his own team mate

He was a rookie, coming up against a very experienced two time world champion. He shouldn't have won any if they were merely glorifications. Ricciardo got a lot of bonefides showered upon him when he showed up in Red Bull and handily beat his team mate. David and Goliath results deserve the glorification.

I do not get the point....if a top class rookie, backed over years in a McLaren or RedBull driver program, moves into F1 I expect him to beat the old blokes in Q. These boys are there, because they are blistering fast over one lap.
On the other hand we have clearly seen that these boys are sometimes too young to deliver in the race. I still believe, that both Vet and Ham could have won the championship easily in 2007 and 2009 with just a little bit less throwing away easy points.

[TwanV]

@Vanja,
TwanV,

I'll quote the exact rule:

sporting regulation 20.4.

20.4 Any driver defending his position on a straight, and before any braking area, may use the full width of the track during his first move, provided no significant portion of the car attempting to pass is alongside his. For the avoidance of doubt, if any part of the front wing of the car attempting to pass is alongside the rear wheel of the car in front this will be deemed to be a 'significant portion'.

As you can see, there's nothing in the rules prohibiting a driver from going for a diminishing gap. As is clearly stated, the car ahead MUST watch out if the front wing of the attacker is alongside his rear wheel. The only reason Perez wasn't penalized for his mistake was the fact that it was his team mate. When was the last time that you can remember an inter team 'incident' had been penalized ?

Not sure what your point is Shrieker, how is this applicable to OCO driving himself into a wedge? I don't see Perez changing directions (which is what these particular set of rules are about I believe).

[Shrieker]

TwanV,

Perez is changing direction from the left side of the track to the right. It could be argued he was doing it to take the racing line going into Eau Rogue, but there's still plenty of distance before the corner to do that. No, he was squeezing Ocon into the wall to intimidate him. And intimidate he did. We know this because Ocon clearly tried to back off thinking "this crazy maniac is going to slam me into the wall". And that's exactly what would've happened. And all this time Perez knew precisely where Ocon was.

[Phil]

Before this topic goes to ****, here are some interesting points by AMuS:

- Mercedes (according to Toto) took out some wing to have a better top-speed at the expense of S2. This hurt their overall lap time but they felt they could get away with it and better defend on the straights.
- Hamilton lifted purposely a bit before Eau Rouge to yield less of an advantage to Vettel on the safety car restart. Thanks to this, he could just defend the lead.
- The safety car helped Hamilton according to Mercedes because there was some concern over a blister on the right-rear tire. The safety car gave them the opportunity to pit.
- Mercedes chose soft because they didn't have a fresh US like Ferrari. They also felt that their car is better on the soft and it'd be the better tire if Hamilton could somehow defend his position after the restart.
- Mercedes has more options with the ERS deployment. Hamilton was able to deploy all his energy on the straight, where as the Ferrari started derating towards the end of the straight.

Cheers Phil

[FrukostScones]

Vettel just pulled out of the slipstream much too early. IMO.
If he had executed a better slipstream management, then he would have had a chance to surprise HAM in the braking zone.

[fiohaa]

For me the only way you can measure just how dominant a car really was is to look at where BOTH cars finished. So - take Schumacher. I would say the only years he had a dominant car was 2002 and 2004, because in both occassions Barichello finished a comfortable 2nd.
In every other year, it was Michael maximising the car to its limit, and it wasn't all car - because just look where his teammates ended up in the championship table.
Out of the 7 titles, i'd give 2 of them as gimmes - so he's a solid 5x world champion, with 2 free ones - (although he arguably worked hard to get to that position, and 2 free ones was his reward for putting that time and effort in.................Unlike Alonso, who cries and runs away).

If you look at Ham's career, the only time he's been in a dominant car has been 14-16.
I would say michael has had Podium capable cars his entire career apart from 91,96, 05, 10,11,12. So thats 6 years out of19 where he did not have consistent podium capable cars. - 32%
Ham's career is what, 2007 to now, so thats 10 years. He has not had podium capable cars in 09, 13. So thats 2 years out of 10 =20%.

so in that respect, Ham's achievement makes total sense..... he's been in a better car for a longer %, and he's had a dominant car for 3 years vs michaels 2. The fact that he's done it in fewer races also makes sense.
thats not to take anything away from the achievement - it takes a driver of his calibre to actually do the job in the first place and get the poles he's had.

[fiohaa]

Vettel just pulled out of the slipstream much too early. IMO.
If he had executed a better slipstream management, then he would have had a chance to surprise HAM in the braking zone.

he said in the post race interview that in hindsight he should have backed off a little bit more to then gain a longer tow and more top speed. but this was limited anyway because ham had recognised this and lifted off to stop vettel from gaining a tow.
vettel himself said it was 50/50 - and that if he had backed off more, and not pulled the move off, then he'd be questioning himself as to why he backed off by so much.
and you have to then factor in the random variable - that Ham was also backing off to not give Vettel the slipstream he wanted.

it was a judgement call, it would have taken a computer to work out exactly how much to back off by to give the correct amount of tow to give enough of a speed difference..... vettels good but he ain't that good!

i don't think the outcome could have been any different.

[FrukostScones]

Vettel just pulled out of the slipstream much too early. IMO.
If he had executed a better slipstream management, then he would have had a chance to surprise HAM in the braking zone.

he said in the post race interview that in hindsight he should have backed off a little bit more to then gain a longer tow and more top speed. but this was limited anyway because ham had recognised this and lifted off to stop vettel from gaining a tow.
vettel himself said it was 50/50 - and that if he had backed off more, and not pulled the move off, then he'd be questioning himself as to why he backed off by so much.
and you have to then factor in the random variable - that Ham was also backing off to not give Vettel the slipstream he wanted.

it was a judgement call, it would have taken a computer to work out exactly how much to back off by to give the correct amount of tow to give enough of a speed difference..... vettels good but he ain't that good!

i don't think the outcome could have been any different.

yeah, good info.. but he still had that mega tow (cant get much closer) ! all HAM did was prob to cost them 1-3kph, and might caused VET make the move to early...