Chinese GP 2011 - Shanghai

[Poleman]

It was a great race,in fact one of the best lately...Webber did an extraordinary climb back to third place from 18th but yet its nothing that we never seen before done by guys in dominant cars.

Hamilton today showed his raw racing spirit and he went with all guns blazing.Button/Rosberg/Massa/Vettel 4 shots to glory.Thats top class. =D>

Good to see Mercs upping their game...I wanted to see Schumi higher though. =D>

[andrew]

But they could logically complain about Button, couldn't they?

They could but who lost out the most? Vettel was still going to win until the curse of the Pirellis struck and Button was overtaken in the pitstop. It would be pointless as there is nothing to gain.

[andrew]

Fastest laps:

[Steven]

What is doubly fail for Red Bull is that they knew how bad the prime tyre was due to Webber's first stint. He was much slower than the leaders, couldn't overtake back markers, even went off track, and ended up pitting relatively early due to his lack of progress. The signs were there that the two stop wouldn't work, yet they stuck with it.

You can't quite compare Webber's first stint to Vettel's last one. Webber was stuck behind other cars that has KERS and DRS employed because they were queuing. Mark obviously didn't have KERS and was unable to gain much places at that time. Even without realising his strategy was unfolding ok as he had 3 stints of unused options left.
Secondly, Hamilton did go quick on the primes, the only differences was he needed 6 laps less from them. Apparently that is a massive difference for these Pirelli tyres.

[myurr]

The point was that it's not unique and therefore very unlikely to have been deliberate. People were trying to flag it up as being something so unusual that there may have been something suspicious about it, however there have been several previous instances of something like that happening.

I'm sure Red Bull could complain, but Button was the only real loser in that incident anyway. To me it's like a driver running wide and losing a position. Sure technically it's illegal to have all four wheels off the track, but they've already lost out because of it so there's no point in applying a further penalty.

[marcush.]

One things for sure:
unused softs are gold for the race ..Hamilton admitting not going for a second run in q3
was giving him a distinct advantage for the race ...
Vettel and RB sticking to their two stop startegy was a genuine fail...Webber almost catching him from p18.. LKERS will be thgeir neckbreaker ..this time Vettel had the issues and Mark apparently not. With Mclaren so reliable and near in terms of speed will not wait for them to sort their issues.They got 3 weeks of development with rigtesting now but Marko already admitted they feel the lack of experience having not campaigned kers before plus Newey opting for a very complicated setup....

HRT 1second quicker than Virgin in the race!

[Tamburello]

That list of fastest laps tells you all you need to know. Had Vettel pitted with Rosberg's last box, he would have easily caught up with the pack.

[Giblet]

I think HRT and Luizzi deserve a round of applause. To be only 2 seconds slower than Vettel for fastest lap has to be a boost.

[myurr]

What is doubly fail for Red Bull is that they knew how bad the prime tyre was due to Webber's first stint. He was much slower than the leaders, couldn't overtake back markers, even went off track, and ended up pitting relatively early due to his lack of progress. The signs were there that the two stop wouldn't work, yet they stuck with it.

You can't quite compare Webber's first stint to Vettel's last one. Webber was stuck behind other cars that has KERS and DRS employed because they were queuing. Mark obviously didn't have KERS and was unable to gain much places at that time. Even without realising his strategy was unfolding ok as he had 3 stints of unused options left.
Secondly, Hamilton did go quick on the primes, the only differences was he needed 6 laps less from them. Apparently that is a massive difference for these Pirelli tyres.

Sure there are different circumstances, but they would have known that Webber's degradation at that point was worse than those ahead of him on the options, and that calling on those tyres to do a long final stint was unlikely to work out.

If anything I think McLaren reacted as much to Webber struggling on the hards as being stuck behind the cars in front, and that pushed them into switching into a 3 stopper with that unusually short first stint.

[i70q7m7ghw]

You could see Jenson was looking down, he glanced up and was probably quite suprised to see the Red Bull mechanics. I think the embarressment was punishment enough! If there is something in the regulations, I would hope he simply recieves a fine, we really don't need race results altered for things like this, no advantage gained.

[myurr]

One things for sure:
unused softs are gold for the race ..Hamilton admitting not going for a second run in q3
was giving him a distinct advantage for the race ...

I think we'll see them all do this in Turkey. With turn 8 I wouldn't be surprised if that race was a 3 / 4 stopper rather than a 2 or 3.

[i70q7m7ghw]

[myurr]

In fact I wonder if we could even see a McLaren try and qualify on the hard tyre in Q3 getting it out of the way in the first stint and saving two sets of soft tyres for the race.

[i70q7m7ghw]

Here's a strategy for you. One/two sets of primes for qualifying, save all softs. I reckon the top running cars could get through to Q2 on primes, then it's all about how far in to Q2 you can get. You could use all of your new primes as if they were qualifying tyres, then start on old primes do a few laps, pit and come out in clean air.

Also, P11 on the grid on a new set of Options could be like pole position, especially if you get a good start.

[Tamburello]

There is certainly not many reasons why you should do two runs in Q3 unless there's changeable weather on the horizon.