Eventfull F1 race in Valencia SPOILER

[Geronimo '74]

Good job Vettel!!

Spectacular crash Webber!

Has anyone seen my beer??


FWIW, IMO Webber is partially to blame for his own crash too. It wasn't all Kovalainen's fault. Luckily nobody got hurt!

[Jim Richards]

Alonso needs to change his diaper.

[Geronimo '74]

True, I guess. Although I think he's a good driver.

[sammyg2]

The steward laid down the rules prior to the race. No racing back to the pits behind the safety car. Ferrari listened and followed the rules as explained.
No one else did. Ferrari was in 3rd and 4th, and following the rules resulted in them coming out of the pits in 10th and 15th.

Prior to the crash by the out of control dumass who doesn't know how to use a brake pedal, Alonzo was only a few seconds behind hambone.
Hambone hit the pits a full 20 seconds before alonzo.
Naw, no cheating going on there! He just magically made up 15 seconds, under a yellow, after the steward told everyone they are not to race back to the pits.
The cheaters will all get slapped hard, except for hambone. He'll probably get away with it. Again.

[Zeke]

I have my DVDR set to record F1 and because of a channel change, I missed it. Not happy.

[Turbo_pro]

Originally Posted by Jim Richards

Alonso needs to change his diaper.

Alonso is always crying about something. Today is no different.

I have always been a Ferrari fan but Alonso makes it hard. Just like Kobe and the Lakers.

One's a black mailer and the other is a rapist. They're both big babies.

[javadog]

Originally Posted by sammyg2

The cheaters will all get slapped hard, except for hambone. He'll probably get away with it. Again.

Yeah, all the drivers who cheated (apart from you-know-who) each got a whopping 5 second penalty.

BFD. I mean, why bother?

I've got this one taped but I'm not sure I'll bother watching it...

JR

[sammyg2]

Originally Posted by javadog

Yeah, all the drivers who cheated (apart from you-know-who) each got a whopping 5 second penalty.

BFD. I mean, why bother?

I've got this one taped but I'm not sure I'll bother watching it...

JR

No kidding. 5 seconds? what a joke.
Should have been 5 positions each.
The moral of this story is to completely ignore the safety rules and race as fast as possible under yellow. sure you'll get a 5 second penalty but you'll gain up to 6 positions.

[David]

They didn't really explain what Hamilton did, but it seemed to me he timed it to where he passed the safety car at the line with only a few feet to spare so the Ferrari's had no chance to stay ahead of the SC.

I don't know what the rules are for this but if he violated the rule he got off way too easy.

The Webber crash scared the crap out of me. It wasn't the flip I was worried about but the head first crash into the tires.

[Eric Coffey]

Originally Posted by David

They didn't really explain what Hamilton did, but it seemed to me he timed it to where he passed the safety car at the line with only a few feet to spare so the Ferrari's had no chance to stay ahead of the SC.

Yeah, the safety car passed the "safety-car-line" before Hammy (which is just before the end of pit-out) but Hammy still slipped past prior to the corner. He would have actually been ok if he didn't slow up, and just passed the line first.

[Joeaksa]

Originally Posted by Geronimo '74

Good job Vettel!!

Spectacular crash Webber!

Has anyone seen my beer??


FWIW, IMO Webber is partially to blame for his own crash too. It wasn't all Kovalainen's fault. Luckily nobody got hurt!

Do not agree about the Webber situation. Faster car coming up from behind has the responsibility to see and avoid, neither of which Webber did. He was far too close to the Lotus and hit it. End of story.

[Joeaksa]

Originally Posted by Turbo_pro

Alonso is always crying about something. Today is no different.

I have always been a Ferrari fan but Alonso makes it hard. Just like Kobe and the Lakers.

One's a black mailer and the other is a rapist. They're both big babies.

Boy, spot on Sir! I owe you a drink sometime.

Agree on all counts!

[URY914]

I think it was about 90% Webber's fault. He is the overtaking car and knows how fast he is closing. He should have gone wide around him.

[Mothy]

From the in car footage it looks like the Lotus went to move over (left) but Webber followed him over then missed the braking mark - the Lotus suddenly lost speed (brakes) and Webber hit with spectacular result.

How strong are those tubs these days? 10 years ago he would have had multiple leg and neck injuries - 20 years ago he would be in a body bag. Even with a strong tub, to go from that speed to stop without his brain and internals bouncing around inside his body shows how much shock the tyre barrier and the tub absorb.

And he slowly got out of the car and walked away, jumped in the back of the officials car and they took him for a checkup (and a fresh set of pants).

Tim

[Zeke]

Originally Posted by URY914

I think it was about 90% Webber's fault. He is the overtaking car and knows how fast he is closing. He should have gone wide around him.

I only saw the snippet on Speed. The car ahead looked to slow suddenly and not entering the turn at a racing pace. I've done this same thing in karts hitting a slowed kart in front and flying thru the sky. Twice. I know I was on my line each time but failed to react to what happen in front of me in literally a split second.

AFA as the Speed Report goes, I only saw their take on the various deals with the safety car and the red light at pit exit. F1 needs to get it's sch!t in order.

Again.

[Red Baron]

Yah, it wasn't even close...

[herr_oberst]

As bad as the Safety Car situation is in F1, (and boy did they drop a load on this race - what an abomination), it is ten times, no, ten thousand times better than Nascar. I really wanted to watch the two road course races a couple of weeks ago, but FULL COURSE CAUTIONS for single car spins had me thinking of all kinds of other stuff I could have been doing, and soon was.

Full course cautions for single car spins on a road course. It's a wonder those events ever end. 3, 4 laps behind the pace car while bubba and his brother bubba blabber on and on in the booth. Not once, but many times in the course of a race.

In the case of this mornings F1 - Best case scenario would have been for the SC to pick up the leader, (pits closed instantly upon SC implementation), drive one slow lap while the field bunches up, open the pits. ALSO, because the teams have to double pit, the second car pitting needs to be able to return to the race in his original order.

Any car who chooses not to take advantage of this scenario, either by staying out to pick up track position, or pitting with one lap to go to take advantage of fresher tires would be able to do so.

[emcon5]

Originally Posted by Red Baron

Yah, it wasn't even close...

It wasn't even close. What do you think that image shows?

[javadog]

If you watch the video, Hambone was behind the safety car and holding station about 1 car length back until the safety car passed the "safety car line" and then he accelerated and went by it. It's pretty blatent when you look at the video.

JR

[Joeaksa]

Which video are you talking about. The one I saw on Tivo showed all three cars coming very fast down the straight then starting the corner. As they turned the safety car was coming out of the pit exit but unless Hamilton wanted to do a panic stop (and thus have the red cars run into his rear end) he was ahead of the pace car ....

Still, he was given a penality and he preformed it. Rejoined in the same position he was in the beginning. End of story. Any egg on the faces belongs to the stewards from that point on regarding Hamilton IMHO.