Things I learned from today's F1 GP
 

Japanese GP is always entertaining. Red Bull is hard to beat. We may soon be hearing "La Marseillaise". Kimi will pass you anywhere especially if he's not supposed to. Eddie Jordan is an a*s. Podium interviews still suck.

Very adequate summary. :)

Great race from Grosjean, but I feel like his team screwed up their strategy. He went from 1st to 3 as they rotated through the final pitstops.

It's too bad that Webber didn't pass Grosjean right after his pitstop. It would have been nice to see him try to pass Vettel for the lead.

Overall, good race. Too bad Hammy retired after his flat.

Both Webber and Grosjean's teams screwed the pooch on their strategy.

Hulkenberg drove great.

Suzuka is an automotive bucket-list quality track.

Red Bull didn't screw the pooch, they screwed Weber, and clearly intentionally.

It ended exactly how they wanted it to end.

Biz as usual.

BTW: Have Dish Network - talk about getting screwed. So you have to get the top tier package with all the cr@p channels just to get F1. However, I just happened to find F1 televised on a Spanish channel - INCLUDED with the basic programing package. DISH Network sucks.

Eddie Jordon is fun, at least he can discuss racing. How about in 10 years, wait now, Kimi doing the post race interviews. Well, it could happen, would we all not all laugh our ass, s off.

Vettel went longer at pace than Webber in this race as well as most races this year.
The tire strategy was based in the ability to preserve tires and still maintain a winning pace.
If Webber could have gotten past Grosean in the last stint he would have had a great shot at Vettel. We all know Vettel is hard to pass in fresh air but that was his best (Webbers)shot.

The tyre strategies for each driver:
.................................Stint 1...... Stint 2....... Stint 3 ...... Stint 4
Sebastian Vettel ........ Medium (14) Hard (23) Hard (16)
Mark Webber .........Medium (11) Hard (14) Hard (17) Medium (11)
Romain Grosjean ........Medium (12) Hard (17) Hard (24)
Fernando Alonso ......... Medium (13) Hard (17) Hard (23)
Kimi Raikkonen ........Medium (11) Hard (20) Hard (22)
Nico Hulkenberg ........Medium (10) Hard (19) Hard (24)
Esteban Gutierrez ....... Medium (9) Hard (21) Hard (23)
Nico Rosberg ........Medium (12) Hard (12) Medium (15) Hard (14)
Jenson Button ........Medium (8). Hard (15) Hard (17) Medium (13)
Felipe Massa .......Medium (11) Hard (17) Hard (25)
Paul di Resta ........Medium (10) Hard (16) Hard (27)
Jean-Eric Vergne ........ Medium (7) Hard (14) Medium (17) Hard (14)
Daniel Ricciardo ..........Hard (21) . Hard (23) Medium (8)
Adrian Sutil ..........Medium (8) Hard (19) Hard (25)
Sergio Perez ..........Medium (12) Hard (18) Hard (12) Medium (10)
Pastor Maldonado ...........Medium (9) Hard (19) Hard (24)
Valtteri Bottas ...........Medium (8) Hard (19) Hard (25)
Charles Pic ............. Hard (17) Medium (18) Hard (17)
Max Chilton ......... Medium (11) Hard (18) Hard (23)
Lewis Hamilton........ Medium (1) Hard (6)
Giedo van der Garde...... Medium

I wonder what would have happened if Webber had just kept his third set and nursed them to the finish. Seems like he had enough cushion to lose a second a lap.

I can't understand why they brought him in so early on his first stop. If his times weren't dropping, they don't gain anything in terms of strategy, they just reduce the chance to change strategy later in the race.

JR

Red Bull is shaping up to be the most cutthroat team in terms of having a clear number 1 drvier. I wouldn't be surprised if Riccardo only lasts a season before moving on once he realizes he will always get 2nd choice on tire strategy (that can be changed at any time to accomodate Vettel), his car will be used both as a test mule for new parts and as a repository of potential spare parts for Vettel, and he will experience mysterious failures and fires that his teammate never seems to have.

Mumbles doing a post race interview? That would be great. Wouldn't understand a word but it would be fun to watch.:D

I don't understand why Webber is walking away from it, Surely Lotus would take him, no?

I expect because Porche made it worthwhile for him.

Webber can be at the top of the sports car world or be the perpetual second fiddle to Vettel. Maybe he doesn't have confidence in any other team overcoming Newey.

Next year should be interesting, unless Newey designs another superior car.

I also can't help but wonder if Räikkönen leaving to go to Ferrari is a mistake. Imagine the mess that team's gonna be.

There's a guy here at work who is a huge Kimi fan. I run into him maybe once a month. I bumped into him last week and asked him about Kimi. He just shook his head. He said that he doesn't think Kimi has the temperement to overcome Alonso's cunning and treachery.

McNish thought it would be easy to climb back into a prototype after his stint at Toyota in F1. Some would say the transition was not that easy or successful.

Webber hasn't been in a competitive P1 level car since Mercedes in the late 90's. I don't think this transition will be as easy as he thinks. Porsche has a lot of talent in its driver's pool. Why they are going with Webber for this big step is beyond me.

I dunno... I think Riccardio has a similar Red Bull pedigree to Finger Boy. That might earn him the chance to prove his worth. With that being said, I have no doubt they will but the full weight of the team behind whomever proves to be the stronger of the two...

I'll just throw a little more conspiracy out there about the Red Bull team.

Webbers car was clearly faster the Grojeans. He caught him with ease, then all of the sudden he couldn't pass on the straight, using DRS?! Me thinks the team remote controlled the mapping so he would be stuck for a while and Vettel could get away. Yeah, yeah, its far fetched but I wouldn't put it past them.

Teams can't change the engine mapping remotely. Telemetry goes one way, car to pits.

JR

It's interesting to watch hate rear it's ugly head. A head that splits open to spew the silliest nonsense.:confused:

It's a great sport that has great teams and drivers that share the spotlight if not the glory. Give the hate a rest.

I wondered the same things during the race. Webber was very upbeat after the race. I wonder how he feels now, after he's had a chance to debrief with his team.

It was interesting to hear Vettel's near-despair during his radio transmissions at the end of the race. I've never heard him like that before. Sounds like he was seriously concerned Webber was going to eat him up with ease.

At least someone got over on Vettel this weekend: ;) ;) ;)

Lewis Hamilton Plays With His Balls, Shakes Sebastian Vettel's Hand - YouTube

He's done that many times before. This week he was a little more animated than normal. It would be interesting to have more access to the team-driver radio transmissions. We get to hear just a fraction of them.

Vettel has talent but it seems he unravels a bit at times, when under pressure. No idea why... it doesn't seem like he lacks confidence when he is out of the car.

JR

Coffee on screen...

That's pretty hilarious, but completely classless, IMHO. Looks like something Kimi would do... or a 3rd grader. That's just gonna piss Vettel off and he's going to extract revenge on the rest of the field.

I wonder the same thing, Alonso has already been throwing barbs out to the press. Ferrari has looked pretty dupe ever since acquiring Alonso. Alonso tries to center it all around him, and there are two cars out there. The Alonso/Massa pairing was not going to win a WCC. Maybe, maybe, a a WDC, but not WCC. Kimi/Massa would be good, and Kimi/Alonso is a great unknown to probably everyone. Kimi, follows the $$$, as he expects if they have the faith to pay him that much, that they also expect the results - and it takes a good car to get those results.

I disagree. If Ferarri had a reasonably competitive car, (Really, if Red Bull wasn't so far ahead of the rest of the field) they could do both. The fact that they have done reasonably well despite the quality of their cars the last few years is because Alonso is punching so far above the weight of the car.

Alonso & Kimi should do fine, if the Scudaria manages to put a decent car under them.

Ferrari isn't going to have an F1 car next year.

Because of rules changes (V6 engine), they're going to call it a Dino ;)

Finally watched the race. Webber got screwed. Vettel sounded like a baby. Grosjean did proud. I'll be glad to see this season end.

A pretty accurate analysis from Keith Collantine.

"Raw pace"

Nobody doubts that Vettel is the faster driver. The question in my mind was whether or not Webber could have held onto the lead had he not stopped that last time. If you look at the lap charts, the tire degredation wasn't bad. Then, throw into the mix that there was traffic in the last half dozen laps of the race that slowed everybody down, so those laps would have been easy on the tires. He had a big lead before his last stop....

JR

The best collection of minds on the pit wall (RBR), reading a terabyte of data, anodized that data and determined that Webber would have finished behind Grosjean. Unless you believe that Webber was sabotaged by RBR (reminiscent of the grassy knoll), it's hard to argue with the call.

Or, you can accept what they said which was they used two different strategies for their drivers, as it was a close call between which one was better to beat Lotus. The strategy was set before the race and they chose to not modify it. I think Webber had a 14 second lead with about that same number of laps left and it's one thing to catch him and another to pass him. He's hard to pass.

Like I said, it just seemed odd that they pitted him so early, well before the tires went off and kept him on short stints. There is usually a saftey car in the Suzuka race, so running longer stints would seem to have been the better strategy.

If I was Webber, I might have argued that last call and stayed out. I'd rather have a victory in my last year than another second or third. No risk to his title hopes, Red Bull's position in the constructor's championship, or his job.

JR

Sound analogy. Webber should have said. " I'm stayin' out, mate "

Interesting assessment of the Red Bull strategy call:

http://www.jamesallenonf1.com/2013/10/analysis-did-red-bull-favour-vettel-over-webber-in-japanese-gp-strategy-calls/

In which case , he (Webber) might have finished a fading 3rd. Good? probably not.
Instead of having a chance (if he could pass Grosjean) for at least a battle with Seb.

Check out Vettels second stint and the speed late into the run. That's were the race was one.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1382041745.jpg

Yeah, but look at Webber's third stint...

JR

My read is, w/ 14 laps to go Webber is ahead by about the same number of seconds. If he stays out and loses less than 1 sec/lap, he wins, Vettel is second, RB is 1-2. If he stays out and loses more than 1 sec/lap and Vettel successfully passes him, RB is 1-2. Only if he loses more than 1 sec/lap and both Vettel and Grosjean successfully pass him, does RB fail to finish 1-2.

Instead, they chose a strategy that has RB 1-2 only if Webber can close about 10 sec in 14 laps on Grosjean and then successfully pass him.

Seems that if your goal is RB 1-2, the higher odds is to leave Webber out. But if your goal is RB 1-2 with Vettel 1, then they did the logical thing.

Vettel 1st India = WDC, but Fred and Blondie know the secret now...
2014 gonna be good for Scuderia