Italian GP 2010 - Monza

[747heavy]

strong race from Alonso and Ferrari,
great execution, and being quick when one has to.
Looked like a very calculated, well executed win/race.

Good race from Button, I think he made the best out of it.
He looks a bit like Prost in the way he races to me, he has a efficient, clinical approach. He knows, that you win a championship on your bad days, not on your good days.
Not the most spectacular racer, but I have respect, admiration for his efficency.
Surprising to see that the high DF setup was holding up that well, he was
not much of a sitting duck.
The F-ducts seem to be more efficient then I would have thought - so hat´s off to the guys,who dreamed them up, and made them work.

Costly mistake from Hamilton, but that´s racing, life will go on, but a bad day like this can cost him/one a WDC.

For once good strategy from RBR with Vettel, and a good race from him. Making the soft tire go the distance, and keeping his cool during the engine/brake hicup.

Average race fom Webber - IMHO.
He will need to get his starts sorted if he wants to be a WDC contender on merrit. You are not allways as lucky, as he was in Spa, to come back after a bad start.
He played the number game, and hold it together, so off to better hunting grounds for RBR now.
A solid race, but nothing to write home about.

Decent race from MGP, seems the car is not that draggy and the engine has some grunt, to push it down the straights. If they have a chassis stiffness issue, it will not show up that dramaticly in Monza, as you go down straights for a long time.

I´m a bit disappointed with the performance of the Force India´s and would have expected Kubica, a little bit higher up the order.

[one_o_six]

Sorry if this has already been mentioned; does anybody know the accurate stop times of Alonso and Button?
T.I.A.
J

[horse]

does anybody know the accurate stop times of Alonso and Button?

This is from the BBCs live text commentary:

Lap 38: He does! Alonso's pit stop was 3.4 seconds and the Spaniard maintains the lead coming into the first corner. A Ferrari leads the Italian Grand Prix. Massa is now in.

Lap 36: Button is in - the pit stop is 4.2 seconds.

[mep]

The F-ducts seem to be more efficient then I would have thought - so hat´s off to the guys,who dreamed them up, and made them work.

Yep I had the same impression.
Especially on the McLaren the system seems to work better than expected.
I think it helps more in qualy. During the race the tries go and this reduced the advantage you have in corners more and more.
Hamilton made a big mistake during first lap. It destroyed his race and made it for Button almost impossible to win. Hamilton could have made a early pitstop and therefore put massive pressure on the Ferraris to stop. Otherwise they would have end up behind Hamilton after their stop.
Without Hamilton it was Button to make a decision.
Going early to pit was no option because the Ferraris would have been much faster. Later in the race there was the danger the Ferraris pit before and get enough time on a single lap to end up in front of him when he pits a lap latter.
A very nice tactical race like in the old days.
I haven't seen those for a while now.

[one_o_six]

does anybody know the accurate stop times of Alonso and Button?

This is from the BBCs live text commentary:

Lap 38: He does! Alonso's pit stop was 3.4 seconds and the Spaniard maintains the lead coming into the first corner. A Ferrari leads the Italian Grand Prix. Massa is now in.

Lap 36: Button is in - the pit stop is 4.2 seconds.

Thanks.

[raymondu999]

Alonso's first win on "pace" this season. No unwell redbulls to help him, nor team orders. Felipe was 3rd and couldn't take Jenson on so team orders could only have helped him take 2nd.

[ringo]

Yes i also prefer a race down to the last laps, not just pit stops.
Jenson fuel saving was a bad reminder that we're not in the good old refueling days again.
Time attack racing as we had today is really the exciting part. The overtaking is the cherry on top.

Was there any way button could stop the mighty Alonso?
I enjoyed the last lap coming round to the finish, kind of felt sorry that ferrari hadn't won here in a while. Happy times for them again.
Incase some are wondering, when Hamilton's out i support Alonso (sounds counter intuitive). So i enjoyed the podium celebration somewhat.

[raymondu999]

I wonder though. Monza is notoriously low on laptime detriment due to fuel effect, and I suspect engine power would play a big part of laptime especially in monza. I wonder if they would've run flat out until the very end.

[horse]

Was there any way button could stop the mighty Alonso?

Average lap speed of Monza is 240 kph. Alonso's pit stop was 0.8s faster than Button. That 0.8s at average lap speed equates to about 53m of track. So if Button had a similar pit stop time he would have been leading into turn one after Alonso's stop.

Whether he could have kept the super quick Alonso behind him was another matter. But the pit crews played a massive part today.

[andrew]

Looks like the radio chap from HRT is ok thankfully.

http://motorsport.nextgen-auto.com/HRT- ... Monza.html

[Ray]

Not exactly true. He was in Alonso's shadow, and Massa could have braked as well,or simply stick to the outside curb. No car was in his way really.
Going for a non existent gap only happens when the other car is clearly ahead or is guarding the inside.
Massa hit him in the back too before the front wheel, so it was more like Massa ramming his way through. Massa could easily have ridden the curb, but he wanted to eliminate the man that took the 2008 championship from him, he enjoyed it.

It's funny how Massa didn't see anything. I think he knew exactly what he was doing. He spent so much time explain his actions as well, which is a sign of guilt.
It's Hamilton's fault for believing Massa would fear him and give room. It's Massa's fault for ramming his depleted uranium battle tank into Hamilton, knowing full well it wont even scratch the paint.
I'd say it's a racing incident, but nowhere near Vettel's recent stupidity.

Maybe he explained himself fully because of people that are so damn biased they won't believe him. I cannot believe how you can consider that malicious, oh wait I can. It was a racing incident, get over yourself. Jesus Christ, you'll make up any story to satisfy your morbid love for a man that races a car. He got hit, Massa closed the door because they are racing for position. Not everyone is out to get Hamilton. Chill ... out, no need for your ... conspiracies. And yes, that is an attack on the poster, ....

[freedom_honda]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9I7FE2XP3I

Yamamoto's pitstop accident.

[horse]

Urg. The lollipop man was a total dick. This is why pit crews should wear a different colour overall to the car.

[Pup]

Yes, he clearly had it out for the guy.

[andrew]

Urg. The lollipop man was a total dick. This is why pit crews should wear a different colour overall to the car.

Someone mentioned earlier that there would have been an unexpected extra person in the pit stop. Can you confirm that the lollipop man knew of the radio guy's presence? You lambast the lollipop man then cite the colour of the teams overall as the problem - which is it?