2013 Bahrain GP - Sakhir

[ringo]

Webber and Hamilton was the best fight of the race IMO. That's how it's done. Very pretty fight in terms of the attacking lines.

I'm still shocked at Button's tequila remark by the way. Showed he lost his cool under pressure from Perez.
Perez could have finished in 5th had they let him through. He was right on the back of the webber hamilton battle.

[Emerson.F]

IMO some perspective is missing. McLaren is fighting for every point here. The last thing they want, as a team, is to slow each other down by having two drivers battling each other agressively. At the time of the battle, Button was ahead and probably was more trying to maximize his tyres for his strategy then waste his rubber on his in hin view over enthusiastic team mate. A puncture would have been fatal, epic fail, no matter who is at fault.

Unfortunately, the broadcast i was was watching didnt make it too apparent if they were on the same strategy. it would have made sense for the team to intervene, tell them to play nice and/or wave the quicker driver through, in the hope to maximize their result as a team.

As a spectator though, it was great entertainment. i still think though - team mates need to have respect and give more space. the battle today was messy and dangerous - i cant remember Jenson and Lewis being that agressive to each other.

Thats really not the point here, the piont is about Withmarsh and Jensen criticising Checo when looking at the replays every statement made by these two snakes was debunked and clear for the world too see.

They are already plotting againts Sergio when he is was driving the wheels off that Mclaren.
Clearly they thought it was neccesary too make it clear that it was Sergio who was too agressive while it was JB who was Running him wide and braked mid corner (Everyone who races knows this trick) while Sergio was about too make the pass stick. Clear manipulation off the facts and clearly trying too save his own skin. Seems a bit like Canada 2011 "What is he doing" remark while he ran Lewis into the wall.

[beelsebob]

IMO some perspective is missing. McLaren is fighting for every point here. The last thing they want, as a team, is to slow each other down by having two drivers battling each other agressively. At the time of the battle, Button was ahead and probably was more trying to maximize his tyres for his strategy then waste his rubber on his in hin view over enthusiastic team mate. A puncture would have been fatal, epic fail, no matter who is at fault.

Unfortunately, the broadcast i was was watching didnt make it too apparent if they were on the same strategy. it would have made sense for the team to intervene, tell them to play nice and/or wave the quicker driver through, in the hope to maximize their result as a team.

As a spectator though, it was great entertainment. i still think though - team mates need to have respect and give more space. the battle today was messy and dangerous - i cant remember Jenson and Lewis being that agressive to each other.

Thats really not the point here, the piont is about Withmarsh and Jensen criticising Checo when looking at the replays every statement made by these two snakes was debunked and clear for the world too see.

They are already plotting againts Sergio when he is was driving the wheels off that Mclaren.
Clearly they thought it was neccesary too make it clear that it was Sergio who was too agressive while it was JB who was Running him wide and braked mid corner (Everyone who races knows this trick) while Sergio was about too make the pass stick. Clear manipulation off the facts and clearly trying too save his own skin. Seems a bit like Canada 2011 "What is he doing" remark while he ran Lewis into the wall.

Agreed, I would find it very hard to pin either incident on Perez. The one where they touched was rather 50/50 in my mind, but the latter one, where Perez was simply run off the track was Button's fault clearly. I was very surprised he didn't get penalised for it, there are rules that explicitly ban doing what he did. I wasn't very impressed when checko did it to Alonso either.

[Traction]

Ross Brawns take on the Mercedes performance problems in the race..

“We struggled badly in the early part of the race when the track temperatures were at their highest. This is an issue we have to address and we will continue working on solutions to improve our performance in this area. In the second half of the race, as the track temperatures cooled somewhat, our pace was not bad - particularly with Lewis. We got two cars home in the points, both drivers enjoyed some exciting wheel-to-wheel racing and the pit crew delivered some great stops. Lewis and Nico did as good a job as possible with the car we had this afternoon but it was a case of damage limitation for both of them. However we must make it a priority to cope better with elevated temperatures: the tyres are the same for everybody and we are not performing as well as our competitors in these conditions.”

[oT v1]

Anyone think Perez could have had a shot at DiResta if he was released earlier??

Overall i dont think its right to blame Button or Perez for racing hard, Button's status, and ego, was on the line and for Perez he had every right to push on for a result after the year he's had. The team are to blame (if there must be some).

[beelsebob]

Anyone think Perez could have had a shot at DiResta if he was released earlier??

I don't really see that, no

Overall i dont think its right to blame Button or Perez for racing hard, Button's status, and ego, was on the line and for Perez he had every right to push on for a result after the year he's had. The team are to blame (if there must be some).

Agreed, a lot of Button's comments sounded like a desperate attempt to not lose face/number one status in the team.

[Traction]

IMO some perspective is missing. McLaren is fighting for every point here. The last thing they want, as a team, is to slow each other down by having two drivers battling each other agressively. At the time of the battle, Button was ahead and probably was more trying to maximize his tyres for his strategy then waste his rubber on his in hin view over enthusiastic team mate. A puncture would have been fatal, epic fail, no matter who is at fault.

Unfortunately, the broadcast i was was watching didnt make it too apparent if they were on the same strategy. it would have made sense for the team to intervene, tell them to play nice and/or wave the quicker driver through, in the hope to maximize their result as a team.

As a spectator though, it was great entertainment. i still think though - team mates need to have respect and give more space. the battle today was messy and dangerous - i cant remember Jenson and Lewis being that agressive to each other.

Thats really not the point here, the piont is about Withmarsh and Jensen criticising Checo when looking at the replays every statement made by these two snakes was debunked and clear for the world too see.

They are already plotting againts Sergio when he is was driving the wheels off that Mclaren.
Clearly they thought it was neccesary too make it clear that it was Sergio who was too agressive while it was JB who was Running him wide and braked mid corner (Everyone who races knows this trick) while Sergio was about too make the pass stick. Clear manipulation off the facts and clearly trying too save his own skin. Seems a bit like Canada 2011 "What is he doing" remark while he ran Lewis into the wall.

Seems like there was fair amount of praise for Sergio..

Martin Whitmarsh, McLaren team principal
“The 2013 Gulf Air Bahrain Grand Prix was a fantastic motor race, and I’m sure it was hugely entertaining for the tens of millions of viewers who watched it at home as well as for those lucky enough to be here at Sakhir to see it for real. Checo drove his best race for Vodafone McLaren Mercedes so far, passing both Fernando and Mark in the closing stages, to finish a fighting sixth at the flag. It was a very good drive, especially when you consider that he was able to maintain such strong race pace despite having sustained damage to his rear wing and one of his front-wing endplates. Jenson would have finished right up there, too, had he not had to make an extra tyre stop with just 10 laps to go. Nonetheless, he, too, finished in a solid points-scoring position. The two of them spent much of the afternoon in close proximity to each other - sometimes in nail-bitingly close proximity actually - but that’s motor racing. Both Jenson and Checo are fast, forceful and hungry for success - and that’s exactly how it should be. It’s called racing, and we at Vodafone McLaren Mercedes always allow our drivers to race. It’s what this sport is all about. Having said that, it’s probably fair to say that Checo was a little too combative with Jenson this afternoon, and I think he knows that. From here we travel back to Woking, where we’ll work hard on our upgrade package for Spain, where in three weeks’ time we hope to continue the process of demonstrating the fruits of our steady development of MP4-28 into the competitive machine we need it to be.”

[raymondu999]

Fantastic race. First non lame, tire dominated, race in 2013. Wonder what Perelli will do in follow up races where they used medium/hard last year... I'm also wondering about Hembrys crap comments about "Medium tires will decide the race today"...

I don't think it was a crap comment. I think what he meant was, the hard could comfortably do a two-stop, if you could get the option to do it.

As for rebull, i'll admit Vettel is starting to look like a great driver. Yes he has superior machinery, but i feel he is using it very well, and he's also using the tyres well also. In fact i don't think he even needs to be a very fast driver with the way how he is using his skills to win races. He knows the car is fast and he is doing just enough to keep it in the operating window while staying out of trouble.
Webber is the total opposite, for some reason he's too slow to understand that wheel to wheel racing isn't necessary in some phases of the race. It's only necessary at the start, on an outlap and on the final stint. Webber was too wild driving over other cars among other shenanigans, that's why he'll never be able to beat Vettel.
He looked like he was in a good position to challeng vettel. At one point he was 6 seconds behind Vettel, then he threw the race down the drain after that.
Ferarri will come back strong next race. They just had a lot of bad luck today. Both cars had the pace and i beleive Alonso would have won after the pitstops and long stints. He did well to come up right behind webber.

It's nice to hear you sing another driver praises from time to time. Not sure I agree that Ferrari would've won though. I don't think they had the pace to go with Vettel.

[WhiteBlue]

It’s probably fair to say that Checo was a little too combative with Jenson this afternoon, and I think he knows that.

Exactly what I thought about it. Some Checo fans need to dial back their rhetoric a bit methink.

[WhiteBlue]

Not sure I agree that Ferrari would've won though. I don't think they had the pace to go with Vettel.

Yeah, that is all speculation. We have no way to know how fast Ferrari would have gone and we cannot know either how much Vettel had in hand. I suspect it was massive. At one point of the race he had 50 seconds on the two stoppers. I suspect he could have gone at least 30 s faster if he needed to.

Anyway you have to give credit to Alonso, he drove a very fine race to recover from 14th to 8th and could have ended P5 if not for Ferrari's wrong tactical decision to let him use the DRS button after the first forced stop. It must be depressing for Fred to see it all go potty. Now that he has a seriously fast car Ferrari serve him a string of unforced errors. Letting him go and not box on lap 1 in China was plain stupid and unsafe. We all sa how his left front wing pillar was completely snapped off. How on earth can you think the wing would have remained attached any longer. It was a small miracle it held almost a lap. So how hard must it be for the driver to have this kind of shitty decisions making in two consecutive races. I bet he lost something like 16 point all together not by the root problems he had but by the wrong tactical calls.

[oT v1]

It’s probably fair to say that Checo was a little too combative with Jenson this afternoon, and I think he knows that.

Exactly what I thought about it. Some Checo fans need to dial back their rhetoric a bit methink.

Its not about having a driver bias, Jenson set a pretty robust tone between them, running his quicker team mate off track etc! Perez, however, flinched first and made the slight error out of turn 4 so he'll be seen as the villain.

[example]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yXQki6y ... youtu.be&a[/youtube]

1.03-1.10

[Phil]

IMO some perspective is missing. McLaren is fighting for every point here. The last thing they want, as a team, is to slow each other down by having two drivers battling each other agressively. At the time of the battle, Button was ahead and probably was more trying to maximize his tyres for his strategy then waste his rubber on his in hin view over enthusiastic team mate. A puncture would have been fatal, epic fail, no matter who is at fault.

Unfortunately, the broadcast i was was watching didnt make it too apparent if they were on the same strategy. it would have made sense for the team to intervene, tell them to play nice and/or wave the quicker driver through, in the hope to maximize their result as a team.

As a spectator though, it was great entertainment. i still think though - team mates need to have respect and give more space. the battle today was messy and dangerous - i cant remember Jenson and Lewis being that agressive to each other.

Thats really not the point here, the piont is about Withmarsh and Jensen criticising Checo when looking at the replays every statement made by these two snakes was debunked and clear for the world too see.

That might be your point, it wasn't one I was argueing. I don't have the privilege of Sky broadcast, so the comments post race by Whitmarsh or Button are/were unknown to me. I was merely commenting on what I saw during the race and how the agressive battling carried some bad blood to the post race interviews. You may also realize upon closer inspection that I wasn't siding with one driver over another in my post either, but trying to make a point how the situation might have looked from Button's or the teams view.

Unfortunately (or fortunately), the tyres are what they are. I can full well understand a point that a driver driving for the team, does not want to compromise his own or the teams potential for points by engaging in dangerous or agressive battles against his team mate who should be racing with the same plan in mind.

McLaren is in a special situation - they are not WDC or WTC contenders currently and with the loss of their biggest sponsor at the end of the year are very much in damage limitation. They are effectively battling for scraps of points so far. How well the tyres cope is still a pretty big unknown for many of them - and engaging in many on track battles will only make it more difficult to make their tyres last. It's a bit like some midfield teams, like Sauber, who are desperate in need of points and in a situation like that, you don't want your drivers taking each other out when a decent result is on the table.

I really am not sure which driver, Button or Perez, was in a stronger position at the point when they met on track. Given that Button stopped again later, one would assume Perez, though that is something I will check when I have time to re-watch the race. I think this could have ended badly here for McLaren and I can understand, if Button is a bit upset, by nearly being rear-ended up by his team-mate. Now, he might have braked at the apex (I haven't seen the post race analysis - RTL sucks) but from the live coverage and onboard view, it didn't look like it. Fair enough if I'm wrong and if he did in fact do exactly that, I'll be interested if Button will address that in some interview as it would indeed require some explaining.

One way or the other - as a team, this is something you don't want to see, especially not in the situation the team is in.

[GrizzleBoy]

I've been looking around on the internet for that interview and can't find one that includes the part where they go to Antony Davis showing the onboards and asking Jenson what he things of them, to which Jenson pretends he couldn't see the screen and couldn't hear the questions.

[Emerson.F]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yXQki6y ... youtu.be&a[/youtube]

1.03-1.10

1:35 and on just made me puke. He keeps brabling about how great jensen is and that Checo needs too calm down. Jb got owned today and they feel the need too make it seem as if Checo is a trouble maker and Jb is the best thing since sliced bread.