F1 Fanatic round-up: 9/9/2010
The FIA says it will publish a full explanation for the Ferrari decision today, which of course will be on the site when it becomes available. Here’s today’s round-up:
Links
Ferrari accuse McLaren of secret team orders (Daily Express)
“Ferrari have spent a lot of time since Germany briefing against other teams, claiming McLaren told Lewis Hamilton in one race that the “cat was out of the house” to get him to pass team-mate Heikki Kovalainen.”
Comment of the day
The World Motor Sport Council’s decision yesterday not to punish Ferrari any further for using team orders in the German Grand Prix leaves us in an odd situation for the rest of the season, as John H explains:
It’s a dangerous precedent. So you can have team orders but it will cost you the measly sum of $100K. Any other team that does it now this season will have to get exactly the same punishment or it makes even more of a mockery of the council.
John H
From the forum
The funny F1 videos thread has been running for over a month and is still going strong.
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday to Mark Hitchcock and Prashanth Bhat!
On this day in F1
Ayrton Senna won the Italian Grand Prix for the first time in his career on this day 20 years ago.
The McLaren driver led home championship rival Alain Prost’s Ferrari, with their team mates Gerhard Berger (McLaren) and Nigel Mansell (Ferrari) behind them.
But the race is most famous for Derek Warwick’s violent crash at the start where he rolled his Lotus at the Parabolica:
Jameson said on 9th September 2010, 6:22
I’m unhappy with the results, but I have found light of the situation in recent weeks by shouting at slow drivers in front of me “Fernando is faster than you!” Alas, none let me by…
US_Peter (@us_peter) said on 9th September 2010, 7:26
Hah! That’s a nice tactic, I’ll have to try it and see if I can get it to work.
bosyber said on 9th September 2010, 7:53
I will try it while on a bicycle, I think – at least then they can hear me!
ddk said on 9th September 2010, 6:43
here is an idea: if a team finishes a race with both cars on adjoining positions then the second driver gets the same points as the one who finished in front of him. This could cut the whole team orders thing
BasCB said on 9th September 2010, 10:48
Do it the other way around and it would work even more!
BBT said on 9th September 2010, 8:17
If I was Williams (my favourite team) or one of the middle ranking teams, I would nominate a second driver put half a race worth’s of fuel (or less) in the car get to the front (or try), order them to back the pack up.
A well timed pit stop by the number one car, retire number 2 and you end up with a nicely enhanced result or podium not based on pace and racing but team orders.
One car in the top three would be better than two cars say 8 and 10.
Might not work but is would be fun watching a team trying it.
DGR-F1 said on 9th September 2010, 8:27
Well, and how long will it take for the Sporting Body to get together to even start thinking about this? All this means now is that we, the fans (especially Ferrari fans) can no longer know whether a pass between ‘team-mates’ was a legitimate move or was an orchestrated one. And more to the point, the FIA won’t know either, and apparently won’t care.
If we are going to see the eventual end of the ban, doesn’t it rather put an end to any point of pretending there is equality within the teams? They will decide a No1 and a No2 and that will be that. So we can have the introduction of a third car for the bigger teams (and a rookie driver who will have to keep his peace) and we will be able to predict the finishing order of most of the races. Won’t that be fun?
As for Ferrari’s little rant about McLaren, it doesn’t go anywhere, since if Ferrari have not been penalised, nobody else can be, not even retrospectively.
Rob said on 9th September 2010, 9:11
I am just fed up of the whole thing, and am glad it is (hopefully) over. This whole situation has just harmed the reputation of the FIA, as they have showed themselves incapable or unwilling to devise a rule about team orders that is enforceable.
My thought is that either the FIA changed the rule as a sop to the fans after 2002 with no intention of ever using it or taking action against any teams (trusting that no team would be stupid enough to make it as blatant again), in which case they are nothing more than a body concerned with protecting their own interests pretending to care about spectators, or the rule was changed without anyone considering how it would be enforced if a team had the outlandish idea of using code rather than saying over the radio “Here are your team orders, let your team mate pass you. Those were your team orders.”, in which case they are a joke and should be ashamed to call themselves professionals.
I am hoping that in the end the whole affair has no bearing on the champioship, and unless Ferrari pull something out of the bag at Monza I can’t see them overaking Red Bull or Alonso beating Webber and Hamilton.
BasCB said on 9th September 2010, 10:46
This picture send to Joe Saward by a commenter shows how a lot of us think of the matter. http://joesaward.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/screen-shot-2010-09-09-at-04-30-37.png?w=500&h=271
I do not think it really is about the FIA supporting Ferrari, just the council members not wanting to punish this and a general lobby to freely use TO from F1 insiders.
US_Peter (@us_peter) said on 9th September 2010, 19:48
Awesome picture.
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine) said on 9th September 2010, 10:13
As you can imagine we’re getting a large volume of comments at the moment. We’ve also got some kind of problem with the comment filter which is preventing some legitimate comments from being posted. Working on it.
cheers said on 9th September 2010, 10:54
See how closely Alesi followed Berger. It was a better Formula then.
Prashanth said on 9th September 2010, 13:22
Thank you Ned Flanders for ur wishes
Eric said on 9th September 2010, 13:32
team orders, $50,000 per driver.
taking out a competitor, drive through.
you just might see some ugly racing near the end of the season, if the title is very close, its cheep enough, compared to the gains/rewards money wise.
i would hate to see F1 go down this road but they have only them selves to blame “FIA” if it happens.
alexf1man said on 9th September 2010, 15:13
I think I have a potential COTD attached below. Although it is my opinion, I am sure many people share my view of things:
Formula 1
Ends up
Racing all over the globe
Raking in the money for Bernie, but
Always making me ask, are
Ratings so important, and am
I prepared to watch a sport where one team in particular gets away with cheating?
Do they really think cheating is still an
Enjoyable part of the
Sport (if it ever was in the first place)?
Ever only one answer to this: NO!
Racing is in the team’s blood, and with the championships,
Victories have come in big and small levels of success, but not without controversy, or an
Entertaining argument, e.g. in Belgium 1998, when
A certain Michael Schumacher tried to win the race,
Before driving into the back of DC, who was about to go a lap down.
Into this new(ish) era of the FIA, with the same old stories:
Great racing ruined by
Ghastly decisions made by a select few,
Eager to manipulate the
Result of a championship, just go back to 2007 with McLaren. They lost all their
Points after allegedly copying Ferrari’s car designs, no thanks to one of McLaren’s Chief
Engineers Mike Coughlan, who obviously left the team to avoid further
Negative press. He used to work for
Arrows before they became defunct in the summer of 2002. Only
Last autumn we found out about the
Team orders scandal (or in this case race fixing) in Singapore 2008. Do
You still want to watch a sport that stabs itself in the back with inconsistent decisions?
Ads21 (@ads21) said on 9th September 2010, 16:49
http://www.jamesallenonf1.com/2010/09/alonso-mistakes-ive-made-a-few/
Alonso being quite honest about his season.
Ads21 (@ads21) said on 9th September 2010, 17:08
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2010/09/courageous_fia_does_the_right.html
oh and this, Andrew Benson being a beacon of common sense.
Bartholomew said on 9th September 2010, 17:27
“cat was out of the house”
LOL Mclaren is always smarter than Ferrari.
Next time we´ll hear over the radio “the double pepperoni one please” and suddenly one of the two Ferrari drivers lets the other one go through