2013 Indian GP - Buddh

[Vasconia]

Romain is doing a grat job in the second half of the season, he has improved a lot and his driving is now more constant and less risky. I hope Lotus can give him and his teammate(hope Hulk) a good car nex season.

His race yesterday was absolutely brilliant. The best of the day, perhaps alongside Vettel, who is smashing the field.

[Kiril Varbanov]

Are Lotus going to ride the PR wave?

[turbof1]

To be honest, it served him right. Kimi took the liberty to act like a spoiled brat, Lotus take the liberty to make fun of him about that. Karma is very serious business at Lotus.

[munudeges]

Amazing how that works...

As long as you don't have to pass anyone, brake into a corner with anyone in front of you etc. etc........

Nothing has changed, and yet people persist in thinking it has or it will. Ditto Maldonado or Perez.

[Bob Brown]

To be honest, it served him right. Kimi took the liberty to act like a spoiled brat, Lotus take the liberty to make fun of him about that. Karma is very serious business at Lotus.

Clearly, you do not know the situation at all.

1. That was the first communication to Kimi on the radio and it was during the high speed corner. How would you like it if you were driving that fast through a corner and someone shouted in your ears? He told Permane that he would let Grosjean pass, but if you were to do it in the fast corner, you would have to go fast as well so you don't lose the car by slowing down in the middle of a turn suddenly. Grosjean didn't know how to pass properly, as evident in his time in Formula 1, and his whining about Guttierez in the race. Just look at Alonso turn his frustration into an actual pass instead.

2. The minute the Kimi to Ferrari deal was announced, certain Lotus personnel started acting cold towards Kimi. This is very similar to Hamilton's announcement from McLaren to Mercedes. The reports of employees not wanting to share too much with Lewis in terms of data and also bonding because they then saw him as a competitor from another team. Remember spygate? Nobody wants to give another team technical information, which is even more important in a time where new technical regulations are going to start.

If you want to talk about Karma, then you should look at how Lotus who was nowhere before Kimi arrived now acts towards the one guy who made them relevant these past 2 years. Without Kimi, they would have had a pay driver and he and Grosjean would've brought Lotus to a great 7th place in the Constructors, if lucky.

[Blackout]

Amazing how that works...

As long as you don't have to pass anyone, brake into a corner with anyone in front of you etc. etc........

Nothing has changed, and yet people persist in thinking it has or it will. Ditto Maldonado or Perez.

Until Hungary, Grosjean was number one on the list of the drivers who did/had to do the largest number of overtakes. How many cars did he touch or crash into ? only one in Monaco (the only weekend were he did big mistakes) How many other cars did he touch until now ? very few and not much more than the best. (Hungary/button was the only real mistake he did)
''Nothing has changed''... lol

Gro is fast since Bahrain where his team finaly solved his kers/braking mapping proplems and he's consistent since Monaco. He did very few mistakes since. The team didnt help him much because in many qualies and races he didnt get all the new updates compared to Raikkonen (but that didnt hamper him much; example: Germany and Hungary) and his car lacked reliability. He lacked some luck on few occasions too. Obviously the ones who say he was underperforming or doing too many mistakes are biased or didnt really watch F1 lately.
Now with the new tires which suit him well and an equal car to Raikkonen's (they are running the same updates since Spa) and a reasonably reliable car (he lost a podium in Singapore though, due to technical problems), he shows his real level. Period

[turbof1]

1. That was the first communication to Kimi on the radio and it was during the high speed corner. How would you like it if you were driving that fast through a corner and someone shouted in your ears? He told Permane that he would let Grosjean pass, but if you were to do it in the fast corner, you would have to go fast as well so you don't lose the car by slowing down in the middle of a turn suddenly. Grosjean didn't know how to pass properly, as evident in his time in Formula 1, and his whining about Guttierez in the race. Just look at Alonso turn his frustration into an actual pass instead.

I personally don't find that a reason, but an excuse. First of all, I think that if you are able to shift 50-60 times in one lap, adjust the brake bias every corner, and change several setting throughout a race, that you should also be able to handle a message during a high speed corner. Second of all, Massa was coming up. Had Kimi stalled Grosjean half a lap further, I believe Massa would have overtaken both of them. So it was urgent. I am not going to talk about Grosjean's past, that is very irrelevant to this discussion. However, the attempt from Grosjean to overtake Kimi was a valid. Kimi on top of that had all the time to let him past, but he blatantly ignored the order. For all that Grosjean did for him, Kimi should have had the curtosy to allow Grosjean through, swift and clean.

2. The minute the Kimi to Ferrari deal was announced, certain Lotus personnel started acting cold towards Kimi. This is very similar to Hamilton's announcement from McLaren to Mercedes. The reports of employees not wanting to share too much with Lewis in terms of data and also bonding because they then saw him as a competitor from another team. Remember spygate? Nobody wants to give another team technical information, which is even more important in a time where new technical regulations are going to start.

Yes, and I am sure Kimi got the same treatment when he left Sauber for Mclaren, Mclaren for Ferrari and probably also when he got kicked out at Ferrari. That isn't about 'acting cold', but about professionalism: you can't expect that a driver keeps getting vital data once it is known he is leaving. You'll get the same treatment in any company where you have mid to high level position. That isn't personal, just the company protecting its intellectual property.

Clearly, you do not know the situation at all.

Oh I know the situation, I just have a different opinion about. Now I respect yours, I'd like you to do the same.

[foxmulder_ms]

This is a nice comment summarizing situation quite well. We will see how it turns out next year... In my opinion Lotus will not be on podium at best mid-field.

jonmar says October 28, 2013 2:29pm

I haven't had any respect for the leadership of Lotus for a while now and here's why: Kimi is the reason why the team finished 4th in the points last year. Kimi is the reason why the team still has an outside chance at 2nd this year. While Romain was crashing into everything that moved last year Kimi scored podiums and a win and over twice the points Romain scored. While Romain struggled in mediocrity this year Kimi scored even more podiums and another win. While the team was again late in paying him his salary Kimi still worked as hard as he could to give the team results. The team desperately tried to keep Kimi for next year but he decided to move on and suddenly the team's attitude changed. Instead of acting professionally and with respect towards Kimi and being grateful for the work he has put into the team, they instead started working actively to try to get Romain to beat Kimi in every race. This is because they have to make the team look better for investors. Allison, several engineers and Kimi left. Suddenly the team doesn't look so good anymore so they have to try to make Romain look like he can beat Kimi regularly to say "look we don't need him anyway". They are acting with total lack of respect towards Kimi and it shows clearly in the radio communications. In Korea they wanted Romain to beat Kimi and were clearly upset when he failed. In India Permane's language to Kimi was totally inappropriate and just shows the disdain they have for a driver who gave them the success they have had. This team is entirely without class and I'm glad Kimi only has to put up with them for three more races.

[Blackout]

''a nice comment summarizing situation quite well'' what a load of BS.

Yeah, Permane or even the whole team Lotus is sabotaging Kim's car... and maybe they are putting a V10 bi-turbo on Grosjean's car instead of the V8 in order ''to make him look good and strong'' for the sponsors...

[foxmulder_ms]

''a nice comment summarizing situation quite well'' what a load of BS.

Yeah, Permane or even the whole team Lotus is sabotaging Kim's car... and maybe they are putting a V10 bi-turbo on Grosjean's car instead of the V8 in order ''to make him look good and strong'' for the sponsors...

I cannot wait next year

[RubberSoul]

That "worst possible strategy" moved Grosjean from P17 to P3.

No, Romain had 12 laps in first stint coz he started on fresh tyres
Kimi pitted on 6th lap as he started with the tyres he qualified , and trying to do 54 laps on medium is worst possible strategy!

After being stuck behind Hulk, Kimi would not have finished ahead of him. After the Sauber stopped for the second time, there was no way Kimi was going to leapfrog him hence lotus tried to run him to the end.

I beg to disagree, see the attached figure. The necessary lead was about 21 to 22 s before pitstop in order to stay ahead.
Kimi had 23.8 s on lap 44 for instance, which was more than enough. He could even have increased that by having a few fast
laps before the pitstop.

[Undead_Mud]

Hulkenberg posted on Facebook, the reason for the retirement was a break disc failure at the front left.
Source: https://www.facebook.com/NicoHulkenberg ... al?fref=ts
"Hey guys,

after first check of my car, my racing engineer told me the left breaking disc had broken and was the reason for the unplanned pit stop and me dropping out of the race.

Too bad I didn't get to score points, I would have loved to!

I am leaving to Abu Dhabi now.

Greetings Nico"

[stefan_]

I don't take anyone's side on this one, but:

All oppinions about the Raikkonen-Permane radio, team attitude towards Kimi and sabotage paranoia are from outsiders who don't know what's actually happening in the team.
On the whole Lotus - Raikkonen story, I think the one who owes a slight bit more to the other is Kimi. If he ended up at Williams in 2012, he would have probably be looking to start rallying again next year. It's not an easy thing for a team to take a risk with a driver who did anything else but F1 for two years and one who had an unsuccessful first stint in F1 (quite disastruous to be honest), so Lotus has to get some credit for that. It happened to work with Kimi, that's all, no one could have predict that.

Can't help myself thinking that it's funny how people made Raikkonen a hero after he snapped twice at the team in Abu Dhabi 2012, there were no harsh reactions when team orders were in Kimi's favour or when Alan told Grosjean to have a "big f***ing smile" on the podium, but are calling Lotus idiots because they snapped at Kimi now. Hypocrisy at its best.

And yes, after their main driver signing with Ferrari, it was a normal thing for Lotus to start and be more cautious about what they share with Kimi.

[RubberSoul]

I ran a couple of comparisons between Kimi and Romain in order to see where the differences were.

Here's first the the laptime comparison



It can be seen that up to lap 44-45 or so Kimi was as fast or faster, but then his tires started to degrade.
After pitting on the penultimate lap, his lap time was about 3 s faster than Romain's on the last lap.

And here's another comparison:



This shows the same thing: Kimi was generally faster up to lap 44 or so. The difference was in the beginning where Romain was
running much slower laptimes for the 3 first laps. This combined with the fact that he had a new set of tires enabled him to pit much later on lap 13 vs. Kimi on lap 7. Kimi's race was ruined by the overheating brakes and poor strategy. His first pit stop was more than 3 s longer than normally because they had to cool down the brakes. Kimi said that he had virtually no brakes during the 20 first laps: whenever he was running close to another car his brakes overheated and faded.

[johnny99]

I couldn't agree more. I have worked on the pit wall long enough to know that Kimi's response, "leave me alone" although quite funny, was disrespectful to say the least. he works for 1.5 hrs in the the racecar every 2 weeks, while the people on the pitwall work 24/7 to put him there.

John

I don't take anyone's side on this one, but:

All oppinions about the Raikkonen-Permane radio, team attitude towards Kimi and sabotage paranoia are from outsiders who don't know what's actually happening in the team.
On the whole Lotus - Raikkonen story, I think the one who owes a slight bit more to the other is Kimi. If he ended up at Williams in 2012, he would have probably be looking to start rallying again next year. It's not an easy thing for a team to take a risk with a driver who did anything else but F1 for two years and one who had an unsuccessful first stint in F1 (quite disastruous to be honest), so Lotus has to get some credit for that. It happened to work with Kimi, that's all, no one could have predict that.

Can't help myself thinking that it's funny how people made Raikkonen a hero after he snapped twice at the team in Abu Dhabi 2012, there were no harsh reactions when team orders were in Kimi's favour or when Alan told Grosjean to have a "big f***ing smile" on the podium, but are calling Lotus idiots because they snapped at Kimi now. Hypocrisy at its best.

And yes, after their main driver signing with Ferrari, it was a normal thing for Lotus to start and be more cautious about what they share with Kimi.