F1 Fanatic round-up 9/7/2010

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After the surprising development yesterday evening, today we’re waiting to find out from HRT why they’ve replaced Bruno Senna with Sakon Yamamoto. Just don’t expect it to be along the lines of the Comment of the Day.

Here’s today’s round-up:

Links

Safety car procedures revamped (Autosport)

“The FIA has also reacted to the problems drivers had of breaking the delta time in Valencia, after only finding out about the safety car towards the end of the lap, by making it clear that they will be exempt from the new safety car speed limit for the final 200 metres of the lap.” Oh good, now it’s even more complicated than it was before..

Vodafone McLaren Mercedes F1 Team Unveils Hospitality App (Brand Republic)

Special app for those lucky enough to attend an F1 race with McLaren.

Didier Perrin: "We want to keep providing a good show which is one of our trademarks now" (GP2)

“The target was to design a car as close as possible as an F1 car, not only in terms of looks, but also in terms of behaviour. The aerodynamic is based on what is done today in F1. So everything started from that point and as a consequence, we had to design a smaller rear wing. And since we lost a lot of rear wing down force, we had to put the exhaust on top of the gearbox in order to make a bigger diffuser and regain what we lost with a smaller rear wing.”

Comment of the day

US_Peter says what most of us are thinking about Sakon Yamamoto:

Wow, he really must be bringing a lot of money.
US_Peter

From the forum

What do we make of Ferrari’s latest F1 logo?

Site updates

I hope you all like the changes to the site’s design which went live yesterday. These will be reflected on the forum eventually too but not until after this race weekend.

Happy birthday!

No F1 Fanatic birthdays today. If you want a birthday shout-out tell us when yours is by emailling me, using Twitter or adding to the list here.

On this day in F1

It’s a surprise birthday present for Sakon Yamamoto, who returns to F1 in place of Bruno Senna on the same day he turns 28.

Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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38 comments on “F1 Fanatic round-up 9/7/2010”

  1. Bolt-on rule making?

    At some point, there needs to be a complete review and re-write of the rulebook surely?

    It’s a bit of a Frankenstiens monster at the moment.

    1. It seems like it. In my opinion they are making the safety car rules insanely complex, and it all started with the safety car line, which I still think needs to go.

      I don’t really understand all the complexity. In my mind, isn’t the answer for race control to release the safety car well before the leader reaches the start/finish, and the leader simply falls in line behind the safety car? In the event the leader is too close to the start finish line hold the safety car in for one lap, or have a second safety car parked halfway around the circuit, and they can be on the track at the halfway point waiting for the leader.

      1. And as for the delta times, surely race control could monitor car positions via GPS or something, and monitor drivers speed through the section of the track where the incident is, and if it appears they are driving too fast on the section of the track where the incident is, then penalise them on the spot. It doesn’t matter if they are driving at race pace for the rest of the lap, as long as they are driving safely through the section of the track where the incident is.

      2. the reason the safety car was deployed when it was, is the medical car needed to get to the accident asap, hence there was no need to put someones life in danger waiting for the lead F1 car.

        my thinking is the medical car should not need to be escorted and should stay off the racing line.
        all F1 cars should instantly be brought down to a slower lap speed, with no overtaking when medical car hits the track and safety car should pick up the lead driver.
        the formation that they line up is the same as they restart,
        except for those that did NOT PIT will line up as 1st 2nd 3rd and so on, those that have pitted line up in the order they did pitted behind the NOT PIT cars.

    2. Agree, too complex. Need to be re-wrote it from scratch.

      From the moment there is no any fuel load need, Safety car rule could be:

      1) Pit stops not allowed meanwhile Safety car period.

      2) Allowing drivers to overtake just to reach his race position before safety car was deployed. All drivers should allow overtaking, those who try to make some resistance will be punished with 20 sec stop and go penalty.

      3) Those drivers who eventually were in boxes when safety car period started, should join the race not overtaking any other driver (at the end of the formation line).

      I know, that doesn’t avoid “divine injustice” due to safety car, but what rules avoid it?

      The point (IMHO) is not trying to not affect the race result, that’s mainly impossible. The point are:

      1) Make a simple rules that can warrant safety.

      2) If somebody decide to compromise safety rules to get some advantage/avoid some disadvantage, he will be enough punished.

    3. As Will Buxton wrote about a week ago, the solution should be simpler SC rules with the pit closed after deployment of the SC, but as this is F1 they will come up with making it even more complex.

      And so it is, now we can have even more controversy with the SC!

      1. It can be a lot simpler than that:
        1. Incident happens – teams and cars notified YELLOW FLAG and SAFETY CAR, all the cars slow down and don’t overtake.
        2. SC and Doctor leave the Pits – teams and cars notified SAFETY CAR and DOCTORS CAR LEAVING PITS, which allows the cars to judge work out where they will meet.
        3. SC cruises to pick up pack, Doctor races to incident – teams and cars notified SAFETY CAR AT FIRST CORNER (then SECOND CORNER, THIRD CORNER etc till the pack catches up) and DOCTORS CAR ON TRACK CAUTION REQUIRED
        Its simple, Race Control actually control the race and the SC and the Doctor since they have all the technology and know where everybody is. The people who don’t know where everybody else is are the drivers, who get penalised for it at the moment!

      2. Closing the pit lane in a safety car period is just plain stupid.

        It doesn’t promote safety and it ruins the race for every driver who needs to make a pitstop.

        It’s a lose-lose situation.

  2. I bet Senna is a bit ticked off.. I’d be pretty upset!

    1. God, if Senna can’t be sucessful in F1 I hope he finds a decent series, LMP1 or something, grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr, WHY!

      1. Grosjean is showing some serious skills in GT1.. maybe he can go there. At least it’s got excellent online video coverage.

  3. That new Ferrari logo is definitely a Marlboro packet of some description.

  4. Well, I imagine there’s a very simple way to avoid the safety car procedures: don’t crash.

    1. Sounds good, it’s simple, understandable and very easy to police.

      “Every driver crashing due to a action/failure to act while on track/in the pitlane or anywhere else involved in a GP meeting will be punished with disqualification from the championship standings”

  5. Comment of the day! Thanks Keith! Seriously though, I can’t wait to hear their lame excuse for sacking Bruno…

  6. I think they should have the old safety car rule back to avoid more trouble.

    1. Yeah because there was no complaining about the old safety car rule. Apart from every time the safety car was deployed of course …

      Geez

  7. Great headline from the Independent:

    Webber’s warning: British duo are on collision course

    He’s certainly the reigning expert on them :)

    1. Who collided Webber??

      1. He has had collisions with Vettel and Kovalainen (with the latter being his fault).

  8. Another race, another rule change.

  9. Seriously FIA? You can’t learn from other forms of racing? Closing the pits is the only way to make it fair and stop Luca and Fernando’s incessant arm waving.

    They’re about the dang dumbest bunch of smart people I’ve ever seen.

    1. Magnificent Geoffrey
      9th July 2010, 7:50

      Exactly. It wasn’t practical before because of the fuel situation, but now that there’s no refuelling, that’s no longer a problem.

  10. I think fairest solution would be that pits would be closed for the drivers between pit entry and race leader. If the pits had been closed like a rule was in 2008-09 we could have seen Nico Rosberg winning the Valencia race and that would have been unfair result.

    1. Easier to say – close the pitlane until the SC pics up the lead driver.

      1. That just takes all the strategy out of it. Not a good idea.

  11. A pretty good interview with Niki Lauda about his views of Schumacher, sums it up pretty good: http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns22405.html

  12. Has anyone read the Thursday Press Conference on the F1.com website. An intersting start to the talk with all four drivers deflecting questions about teammates.

    Well worth a read I think.

    1. Reading it now, it’s quite long :)

  13. I had a great time reading the Thursday press conference. these guys (Webber, Alonso, Hamilton, Button) should really go into stand up comedia!

    http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/85083

    look at this in the start (about team mate relationships)

    Q. And the relationship with your team-mate?
    MW: Sensational, amazing.
    Q. We have heard this before.
    MW: Yeah, it’s a broken record.
    Q. Fernando?
    Fernando ALONSO: Very good as always.
    Q. As always?
    FA: Yes.
    Q. You have always had a good relationship with your team-mate?
    FA: Yes.
    Q. Working relationship or…?
    FA: Both.
    Q. Lewis, would like to comment?
    Lewis HAMILTON: About what?
    Q. Team-mates. Previous team-mates even.
    LH: I have had great team-mates and great relationships.

    later they try it on Alonso again:

    Q. (Jon McEvoy – The Daily Mail) Fernando, you drove with Lewis for a year. What’s your reading of the way the British boys get on?
    FA: Very good, I think.
    Q. (Jon McEvoy – The Daily Mail) A bit better than in your day?
    FA: Similar.

    also nice comment from Lewis about the Scalectrix practise LH: He lapped me, almost twice. I crashed quite a lot.

    Really making a nice show of it here, not just droning up team speak ;-)

  14. This safety car rule change essentially changes it like the safety car had come out right in front of Vettel.

    So what this does is NOT help Alonso and Massa, but in turn it would also ruin Vettel and Hamilton’s race and give them an extra 20 seconds or so to make it to the pits. While the rest makes their stop and hurries their way back to the SC.

    If this rule had been in effect in Valencia the top 5 would have been Kobayashi, Button, Barrichello, Kubica and Buemi. Vettel, Hamilton, Alonso and Massa would have been somewhere behind that lot.

    So instead of ruining the race for 2 drivers they now ruin the race for 4 driver.

    How on earth is that better than what we had now?

    1. To be honest, If Koby won, I don’t think anyone would be upset…

      But in reality, you are absolutely correct, this seems to be a continuation of the “band aid” policy they have with the rules.

      This also, from a personal perspective, just doesn’t seem natural. The rules where not the problem last race. it was again, the implementation of them. If Lewis had just been given a penalty quicker, the argument would be “was it too harsh?” instead of this, almost crisis.

  15. UneedAFinn2Win
    9th July 2010, 13:32

    This means nothing to English speaking fans but here in Finland, this weekend marks the 350:th(!!) consecutive GP one of our broadcasters, journalist Erkki Mustakari. He’s been a supporting voice for all the GP:s I remember watching, and shows no sign of slowing down.

    Keith, how far off are you from that figure… :)

    I’m sure he wouldn’t mind tweets in any language http://twitter.com/f1tiimi

  16. In all these changes, rows etc about the safety car everybody seems to have forgotten the reason it was introduced. That was so that in a seriously dangerous situation which would previously have resulted in the race being stopped, the race could continue and hence not mess up TV schedules.

    That typically would have been once or twice per season…… some how we have got to routinely having the safety car out once or twice per race…… with it coming out for incidents which could easily have been covered by waved yellows…. Given that whenever the SC comes out it messes up some ones race surely the FIA, FOTA and the GPDA should go back and think when is a safety car really necessary….. certainly before the introduction of the SC an incident like Webbers, with the driver immediately out of the car and the crashed car well away from the track would not have resulted in the race being stopped….. so was a SC really necessary?

  17. It seems this was a pretty tough negotiation strategy from HRT to get more from having Senna in the car, look at joe Sawards commentary ( http://joesaward.wordpress.com/2010/07/09/hrt-gets-round-to-explanations/ ).

    But maybe it was sort of planned, we did hear that Yamamoto would drive a race when he was signed on as a test driver for a lot of money at the start of the year. I don’t see Senna fuming about it, so he might have had to agree to give the team some more money flowing in.

  18. Like the new look page Keith, but still miss the shortcuts to the forum.

    1. Jarred Walmsley
      10th July 2010, 9:41

      Look at the top of the page

  19. Hi there,

    Can anyone tell me what the pit lane garage line up is for the Abu Dhabi F1 Grand Prix? Is Force India Pit 6?

    Thanks,
    Andie

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