Bahrain GP 2008

[donskar]

Great race for Ferrari and Massa. Can we now give him a bit of credit and stop the rubbish? Vettel, Kubica, Rosberg, et al may become great F1 drivers; Massa is already a very good one and is young enough to get even better. And, yes, when he is on and Kimi is NOT having a great day, Felipe can beat Kimi. It doesn't take Machiavellian machinations: Kimi is human and Massa is fast, especially from the front.

As a Ferrari fan, glad to see Hamilton fall flat. As an F1 fan, good to see him prove he is human. He made a poor start, then misjudged speed/distance and ran up Alonso's rear. No need to get into brake-testing or conspiracies - Hamilton is a great F1 driver, but a human being.

Wow, that Renault wing is STRONG!

Need help understanding what Kubica was on about "oil on the track" allowing Kimi to pass him? Did someone lay down oil on the recon lap?

Wish I had written it down, because my wife made a very appropos comment about DC. Basically, "He always seems to cause other people to have accidents." NOT, "DC ran him off the road," but "causes others to have accidents." Sad to say it, but DC has regressed to the point where his role seems to be to act as a badly designed moving chicane. Yes, I KNOW, he is paid to stay in front of other drivers, they all are. But there comes a time when continuous blocking is simply dangerous (and against the rules in some cases.) BMW, Williams, Renault, McLaren - all have found and successfully elevated young drivers into F1. I'd like to see Red Bull do the same. Whatever became of their young driver development program. How about swapping Vettel for DC?

[donskar]

Allan, you're not overreacting:

i gotta say, i've never been a fan of alonso before or his driving, but enough is enough... Im seriously fed up with all that rubbish that he lifted or slowed down or brake tested or whatever u wanna call it... I wonder how people can just ignore that this is a double world champion we're talking about here, and so far Mr. Hamilton's records can't even be compared to Alonso's! just because he's british and he's supported by all the media doesn't mean he's god, or that he doesnt make mistakes!

!!

You are speaking for me and many others. Hamilton is a very good driver. But he is also human. And AT LEAST two years (two WDC) from matching Alonso.

So far, Kovalainen is actually outdoing Hamilton. I think Hamilton will win more than one driver's Championship, but I also remember Baghetti, who won the first GP he ever entered. He never won another.* There are a lot of factors that could delay Hamiltion's ascendancy.

*For the F1 historians out there, I believe Baghetti did win another non-championship GP (they had them back in the 60's)

[Saribro]

Im seriously fed up with all that rubbish that he lifted or slowed down or brake tested or whatever u wanna call it...

http://www.itv-f1.com/Feature.aspx?Type ... n&id=42261

The more you look at the incident the more you realise that there was no moment when Alonso lifted or braked. He just didn’t accelerate out of the corner as much as Hamilton, who took the whole blame for scoring no points today.

The stewards took no action and McLaren did not protest. Pat Symonds showed a few of my colleagues the telemetry and the throttle trace is constant.

[allan]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOj6E2XRGDs
checkout 1:21

[ben_watkins]

Interesting to see that onboard footage, at 1m21, showing the bridge wing on Hamilton's car rip off!

Any idea if the wing distruction was due to an earlier contact or if it was a manufacturing fault?

I'd probably go with previous contact, as we've never seen the bridge wing fail like that before..

I think the idea of a lift/brake test by FA can be put well to bed and peeps should calm down. Hamilton had a bad weekend and FA is lucky the Renault rear wing is as strong as it is!

[sebbe]

Hamilton messed up his start, then tried to overtake alonsos renault but misjudged and smashed his nose on the rearwheel of the renault.

Thank you P_O_L! You summed up Hamilton's own stupidity very well.
You see there's another way of criticism? One that doesn't include us getting mad at you.
I can understand you hating stupid remarks about Hamilton being the greatest ever; I felt the same about certain comments about "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named". But sometimes you go too far in your posts.


I'm a Hamilton fan (not from the very beginning, he's earned my respect) but I think he really screwed it up this time. On the other side, he's not able to come back from a mistake like Kimi/Alonso and a lot of other guys. I hope he's learned his lesson:
You screwed it up, next thing you have to do is calm down and try to overtake by making clever moves. Nobody will criticize you if you start playing too safe from that point!

[johny]

Extracted from autosport:

Q. Can you run us through what happened with Lewis Hamilton? The closing speed seemed quite dramatic for cars coming out of a corner?

FA: Yes. On lap one, he touched me in Turn Four in the rear diffuser. And then on lap two he jumped over me on the straight. I don't know what happened. I was flat out...the McLaren is quite quick on the straights.

[Belatti]

The difference between Fisichella and Alonso in this race was the same as it used to be in 2005 and 2006 seasons between both drivers, with the exception that this time Fisico is driving a snail.

So, was Sutil overrated? Was Fisico underrated?
3 races with FI and 3 races where Fisico does more than expected with that car.

Sebbe, with "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named" do you refer to Michael Scum-maker?

[sebbe]

Sebbe, with "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named" do you refer to Michael Scum-maker?

Yeap, the same shoe-maker you're talking about. The big fat liar, the big fat cheater. The one who realized that it was worth kissing FIA's arse rather than being a bad boy, the one who had an entire team and rubber factory working for him (usually cheating for him). The one who needed a sidekick in the next garage...
I could go on and on, but then I would be like P_O_L

[allan]

Sebbe, with "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named" do you refer to Michael Scum-maker?

Yeap, the same shoe-maker you're talking about. The big fat liar, the big fat cheater. The one who realized that it was worth kissing FIA's arse rather than being a bad boy, the one who had an entire team and rubber factory working for him (usually cheating for him). The one who needed a sidekick in the next garage...
I could go on and on, but then I would be like P_O_L

congrats!!!! ur even worse than he is!

[bhall]

Any idea if the wing distruction was due to an earlier contact or if it was a manufacturing fault?

The moment when the video switches from Raikkonen's onboard to Hamilton's seems to be a split-second after the first contact between Hamilton and Alonso. Looks like Hamilton drove into the back of Alonso resulting in the bridge wing being cracked, and ultimately coming off altogether a second or two after that. There was no apparent damage to the main wing.

It's interesting that the video also shows the loss of the bridge wing long before Hamilton slammed into Alonso's rear wheel in the second, more severe contact, and that he was able to maintain pace without the bridge wing intact. This flies in the face of what McLaren are now saying that the wing came off just two seconds before the second impact, and that that sudden loss was the reason for the impact.

I don't know why McLaren can't just say, as Hamilton readily admits, that it was his own fault.

[sebbe]

congrats!!!! ur even worse than he is!

Coming from a guy with that avatar?
I don't think so.

[P_O_L]

The difference between Fisichella and Alonso in this race was the same as it used to be in 2005 and 2006 seasons between both drivers, with the exception that this time Fisico is driving a snail.

So, was Sutil overrated? Was Fisico underrated?
3 races with FI and 3 races where Fisico does more than expected with that car.

Sebbe, with "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named" do you refer to Michael Scum-maker?

I was a big fan of fisico for years. I think he has a feeling for the throttle that is similar to Senna and Schumacher. Maybe thats why he performs really good now that tc is gone. Lets not forget sutil is an awesomely fast dude.

The only area where fisico lacks is the killer instinct i guess. Someone mentioned fisico always does well in cars that arent really good, but when he had championship winning material he doesnt know what to do with it and turned in some mediocre races in 2005 and 2006.

[allan]

congrats!!!! ur even worse than he is!

Coming from a guy with that avatar?
I don't think so.

u know what u absolutely right... ur arguments are completely legit =D> ! i should have kept my mouth shut

[Project Four]

Fair play Felipe Massa, great performance all weekend under pressure and converted performance to race win. I still have my doubts, and we need to judge his performance not just on one race as he always goes well at Bahrain.

BMW' looking very good and looks like we are going to have a three way fight, but Ferrari at the moment looking fast and stable.

Poor weekend from Lewis, and agree with waht other people have said, he as yet, has not done what Kimi and Fernando can do namely win or get big points when things are going wrong. Another good performance and result from Heikki (only for P_O_L he is perfoming much better under Ron Dennis).

Lastly, very good drive by Fernando with a damaged car which was in no way his fault that Lewis drove into the back of him.