Brawn “comfortable with our current position”

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Ross Brawn says he’s “comfortable” with Mercedes’ position despite their apparent lack of pace in testing.

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Ross Brawn Q&A (Mercedes)

“Our intention was always to launch the car in a fairly basic specification to allow more time to focus on the upgrade package. This inevitably means that we look further off the pace than people might expect. Knowing all of the facts, I am comfortable with our current position and the developments that we have to come.”

Sir Jackie Stewart: want more overtaking in F1? Make circuits punish drivers for their mistakes (The Daily Telegraph)

[Fernando] Alonso ran wide at the Yas Marina track on four separate occasions as he tried to best the Renault. And yet incredibly the car behind him, driven by Mark Webber, was still not able to pass. The run-off area was so well manicured and without obstacles that Alonso was effectively able to make fairly big mistakes and still maintain his position. That is plainly wrong.”

Williams stays in the driving seat despite shares sell-off (The Daily Mail)

“Adam Parr, who became chairman of Williams last year, said: ‘There’s no chance of Frank slowing down. His name’s above the door, he’s the team principal, the team’s inspiration.'”

Q & A: Key on Sauber’s progress (Autosport)

“In Barcelona, we found that sectors one and two were reasonable and sector three was a weak point. We haven’t 100 per cent nailed the slow stuff yet, but some of that we think is balance and also because the high-speed sections are reasonable we were eating the tyres fairly quickly if we nailed it on the first lap. From what we can see, we need to work on the low-speed. We’re not too bad, but not 100 per cent.”

Headhunters’ hunt for heads is on (FT)

“Mr Ecclestone and the top F1 team bosses and drivers, who had initially accepted their invites, ended up as no-shows as the F1 boss claimed Mr Bower had broken a condition of not writing about his family. However, Mr Ecclestone could not stop Max Mosley, now retired from the sport, from turning up.”

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Comment of the day

Now that the Bahrain Grand Prix has been cancelled some of the teams feel sufficiently emboldened to say what they should have said to begin with. I’m with PeriSoft on this one:

Of course, it’s easy to say now.
PeriSoft

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Happy birthday!

Three birthdays today – best wishes to Verstappen, Hedgey and Kolon!

On this day in F1

Jackie Stewart won the Tasman series race in Sandown Park on this day 45 years ago.

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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109 comments on “Brawn “comfortable with our current position””

  1. Thats a comment I thought I’d never hear from the mouth of Jackie Stewart.

    1. I know!
      What does he want, the tracks to be safe or the racks to punish every mistake?

        1. A balance between both. Maybe a strip of grass or gravel a couple of metres wide around the edge of the circuit. Then have Tarmac run offs but not too big and with good safe barriers

          1. I completely agree. I’ve been saying for a while there really ought to be something that punishes offs. I don’t find racing in parking lots particularly exciting…

          2. You can’t compromise safety, but drivers need a reason to hold back on the more difficult corners and allow other drivers to take on the risk and either close the gap or attempt a pass.

            Similar to the debate about corner cutting, my suggestion would be a GPS system that recongises when a car leaves the track.

            Run a two or three strike system followed a drive though penalty. Drivers might not attack every corner without hesitation if it could potentially result in an overall loss of 20-25 seconds?

            Thinking back to some of last year’s races, some drivers could have easily hit three strikes over the full race distance.

          3. One thought I had was some sort of gravel only an inch or two deep, over concrete or tarmac that’s slightly recessed. That would punish drivers who had an off, but still be relatively safe if a car rolled on it. It might even allow drivers to get back on track in a situation like Hamilton beaching himself in China, as there would be less gravel to sink into.

          4. I’ve thought about that in the past too. I came to the conclusion that they should put a meter or so of some kind of low friction material along the edges of the track before the runoff. No idea what that material could be though tbh! I just think it seems like a better idea than gravel or grass as a solid material could sit flush with the road. Problem is, what is low friction when in contact with a hot tyre?

            Haha, or maybe they could put heating elements around the track so if you over them it damages the tyres!

          5. Call me old fashioned, but I’d like to see some real grass on the tracks. Gravel is good for accident hot spots, but it’s the one throw back for me, seeing bits of dirt and grass fly everywhere when there’s an off. As long as it’s safe of course. Tiny fake grass strips at Valencia do nothing for me.

          6. Best thing is sand, completely safe but very hard to get out.

          7. As much as we would want it we wont go back to grass and gravel, so my solution is more appropriate for this Mario kart age.

            Magnetic field – pit lane speed limiter!

            I think the fact that Jackie is raising this issue says a lot!

          8. I am with Steward (and you guys/girls here) on this.
            Gettin on the runoff should mean losing out. At least slowing the car down, probably ruin the tyres a bit so making mistakes is punished a bit more.

          9. As much as we would want it we wont go back to grass and gravel, so my solution is more appropriate for this Mario kart age.

            Maybe they should race with road cars on the track? :P

      1. You don’t have to make the tracks unsafe in order to punish a driver for making a mistake. Some sort of surface that effectively trashed a car’s tyres would do the job, and be just as safe. They have such a surface at in the red zones at very outer edge of Paul Riccard High Tech Test Track runoff areas.

        1. I am all for seeing punishment for offs! But to make punishing safe maybe harder than you think!

          For example some of you were suggesting a strip of different material that makes you lose traction/grip or destroys your tires before the run off area. These ideas seem good at first glance and are some of the things I have thought about in the past, however if you think about it a bit more you realise that this wouldn’t really work, especially from a safety point of view, as if a driver only goes slightly wide and only puts one or two wheels onto the slippery surface then they are going to go straight into a spin as one side of the car has more traction. Yes spinning is a good punshiment as it makes you lose time, but it could also mean you spin back onto the track into the path of another car and cause an accident (or possibly into a wall at potentially high speed).

          My solution? Not too sure, but I am leaning towards what Jay said. In Formula 2005 for PS2 if you cut corners the game reduces your rev limit for a certain amount of time depending on how bad a cut it was. I don’t see why this couldn’t be implemented, or a three strike drive through system as Jay suggested.

          My favourite qualifying to watch is Monaco. To see the drivers push the cars to the very limit and come within millimeters of touching the wall or even just stroking it excites me no end and distinguishes the men from the boys. I even like the race for this reason and don’t mind that there is not much overtaking as the sheer skill and focus the driver must need to do this for over 70 laps is more than amazing enough to keep me interested and my heart pounding! However we all know Monaco would never pass the current track safety standards so this can’t really be implemented everywhere, and plus it would make some circuits slower. I have often wondered how much faster Monaco would be if it had a couple of meters of run off area around the outside like most other tracks? If it did I am sure it would lose the reason that makes me like it so much though! (Sorry to go off topic slightly in that last paragraph)

          1. I totally agree about Monaco. Whenever people moan about it being boring for lack of overtaking I have to wonder if they wouldn’t be better off watching NASCAR. Watching the best drivers fly around Monaco, almost as if they’re feeling the barriers with their whiskers like a cat, is about as exciting as motorsport gets.

          2. An automatic rev-limiter doesn’t even work in a video game, so it definiely shouldn’t be in real F1.

      2. Jackie’s not saying tracks should be less safe to punish errors, or implying that it should be less difficult to crash. He’s saying they should be less forgiving with regards to the amount of time a driver loses for leaving the road. Replace a huge tarmac run-off with a huge gravel trap, nobody’s going to hit the wall but mistakes will cost a lot more time and maybe even a DNF. Tracks like Abu Dhabi are basically a huge car park with the outline of a circuit painted on- leaving the track often saves time.

    2. I was reading an article on the Austin circuit in the February issue of F1 Racing, and Tavo Hellmund was saying that their version of Istanbul’s Turn 8 will be faster, but with terrible camber and going downhill, and that if he had his way, there would be a wall on the outside and no room for margin, but that can’t be done. The same article says that Tilke GmbH also employs a full-time soil expert and chemical engineer, who formulates the exact composition of the tarmac and can pretty much make the surface as grippy as a fresh set of soft tyres, or as slippery as a frozen pond. Would it really be so difficult to mix up some tarmac for the run-off that is either a) very, very slippery, b) with carve your tyres to ribbons, or c) both?

      1. Tavo Hellmund really talks the talk. So did Simon Gilett (remember him?!). Marking out the layout and clearing a few bushes is all well and good, but I’ll remain sceptical until they start laying the track

        1. But he sure seems to be going the right way. I really like following those pictures in Austin to see when they start the real work.

      2. Interesting things mentioned there. I think the problem is with this “big business” with other companies the best interests of the sport are not being served.

        Its the same situation with Bridgestone. Do you produce a product whichs contributes beneficially to the sport, or do you produce an impeccable product which serves a good image for that specific company?

      3. One thing is the customer demanding more variability (and Bernie allowing for that as well) the other is a bit of competition in the circuit building.

        Steward has a fair point, about all Tilke tracks being more of the same. It is only starting to change for the last couple of tracks.

    3. Jesus, thats surpirising. That said, ideally you would have a couple of metres of grass on all but the most critically dangerous corners before the tarmac, so you punish small errors, but at the same time the large errors result in a race ending but safe and survivable incident, at the worst.

    4. Gaining a place because some one is off the track is not what I call an overtake.

      1. True but if a driver is less tempted to go off the track because it will slow him down or damage his car a bit then he may go round the corner slower and allow the car behind tO catch up and possibly overtake properly

      2. No, its properly punishing a mistake. This isnt little league.

  2. I agree with Sir Jackie that today’s driver can run wide and maybe even gain time. If the FIA and track owners say that they need Tarmac run off areas for safety, then have a gravel trap at the start of a run off area to punish the driver and then have the Tarmac to prevent crashes. I know that maybe a few corner in f1 will need Tarmac run offs due to lack of space between track and barriers, but most corners don’t even need them.

    1. you beated me…! :P

    2. The main problem with gravel traps is the potential for the front wing to dig into the gravel, and have the car flip over. Simply put, Gravel is great, but due to potential safety concerns, it has to be employed when the car can not be travelling at high speed.

      1. That’s why I like the idea of just an inch or two of gravel or sand in a shallow concrete or tarmac trough. It would provide a surface that would punish the drivers for an off, but wouldn’t be deep enough for any part of the car to dig in.

        1. Ah I see, like, just to screw with the drivers tyres. I kinda like that idea.

    3. I think gravel run-offs are safer than tarmac because it slows cars down, and it also punishes them.

      1. Gravel traps don’t always slow cars down, at high speed, the cars tend to just skip over them.

  3. About that FT article: turning up where???? I need to know now you mentioned it.

    1. I’d say the article is referring to the launch of No Angel, the biography of Ecclestone that was launched this week. It appears he was unhappy with the way the book detailed elements of his private life – namely his family – that he had asked remain private.

      1. i can imagine how bernie felt. He is looking like a nobody, and his ex like a nut case.
        Don’t worry bernie, the f1 fans still have respect for you, but i can imagine in the paddock you would have that feeling when people stop talking as they see you coming.

        1. f1 fans still have respect for you

          Which ones would that be?! And I don’t really see Bernie being red-faced around the paddock – or anywhere. The guy’s pretty shameless, which is exactly why the majority of fans – as far as I can tell – rather wish he’d go away.

    2. It is a short writeups column. The one for F1 interest is about the book presentation.

      Another nice quote from Brower:

      In his speech, Mr Bower recalled the time when he met Lakshmi Mittal at the Monaco Grand Prix with Mr Ecclestone, and the steel tycoon asked Mr Bower to promise never to write about him. He refused to make such an undertaking, “just as I never made any undertaking about [Mr Ecclestone’s] family”, he told gathered friends.

  4. I have an extremely random question, which I believe entered my mind when someone suggested t’other day that F1 circuits should cross national borders: Which F1 circuits are located nearest to a foreign country/ border?

    Off the top of my head Monaco springs to mind, as it’s right next to both France and Italy. Montreal too is practically in America, and Singapore I believe is very near Malaysia and even Indonesia. A historical example would be Avus which was in the West Berlin enclave surrounded by East Germany

    Obviously distance can be illusory too- North Korea is geographically close to Yeongam and Suzuka, but politically it may as well be on the other side of the world. Same goes for Afghanistan/ Pakistan and the new Indian circuit

    Off the top of my head Monaco springs to mind, as it’s right next to both France and Italy. Montreal too is practically in America, and Singapore I believe is very near Malaysia and even Indonesia. A historical example would be Avus which was in the West Berlin enclave surrounded by East Germany

    Obviously distance can be illusory too- North Korea is geographically close to Yeongam and Suzuka, but politically it may as well be on the other side of the world. Same goes for Afghanistan/ Pakistan and the new Indian circuit

    1. I can’t think of any. Did you perpously type half of it twice or is there a site error?

      1. No it was a very stupid copy/ paste error!

    2. AVUS wasn’t just close to the border – it had to be shortened after the post-WWII partition of Germany because a portion of the circuit fell in the Soviet-controlled eastern side.

      1. I’d heard that before too, but according to Wikipedia it’s a myth- the pre war circuit was never more than a mile from the location of the wall

    3. The new Sochi circuit is around 20km from the Russia/Georgia border.

      1. Would have to be a pretty long track then!

    4. the Korean circuit is 0.5km from the sea! and the European GP is in Spain!

    5. ForzaLaScuderia (@)
      27th February 2011, 3:35

      Actually Montreal is not close to America at all. From Montreal to Windsor/Detroit which is the nearest border crossing is a 10 hour drive.

      1. What are you talking about? Montreal is about 34 miles from the border to Upstate New York. Maybe 10 hours on foot.

        1. I see what happened here, flintstone car. Hence the driving/on foot confusion.

    6. ForzaLaScuderia (@)
      27th February 2011, 3:36

      Actually Montreal is not close to America at all. From Montreal to Windsor/Detroit which is the nearest border crossing is a 10 hour drive. You have to go through Ottawa and Toronto on the way.

      1. ForzaLaScuderia (@)
        27th February 2011, 3:39

        Apologies for the double post.

        1. Montreal is 50km north of the US border and nearest border crossing.

      2. It’s 84 km from the Ontario border, which for some Quebecois is another country!

        1. how come? different language?

          1. Partly – it would take more than a post here to get into it, but basically there is something distinctly different between Québec and the rest of Canada, especially everything else going west. But it’s not strictly a language thing; if you ask most people in Québec to describe English Canada (especially Ontario) you’re most likely to hear: straight, square, boring, conservative… .

          2. A lot of them think they should be independent before realising they’re heavily subsidised.

    7. Spa Francorchamps is 30km (18miles) from German border.

    8. Which F1 circuits are located nearest to a foreign country/ border?

      and make the drivers pay a toll and show their passports too, should be a good laugh.

    9. Spa is not that far from Luxembourg and Germany. Still it would have to be over 50 km long to get there.

    10. I think you can’t beat the San Marino Grand Prix, which was held in Imola, actually 100km outside of the San Marino Republic.

  5. I’ve said it too many times. What was wrong with grass and gravel?

    it’s a safety thing, because cars stop quicker on tarmac? fair enough. But why not having like 5 meters of grass alongside the track and THEN tarmac for safety reasons.

    then, if a driver goes off, it’ll be a costly mistake.

    1. Yeah, that would be a nice compromise. Although I suppose grass itself can cause problems, as Pedro Diniz showed when he rolled his Sauber at that crazy race at the Nurburgring 99, and his rollcage dug right into the grass. According to Jaques Villeneuve he would’ve broken his neck had he been wearing a HANS device, as is mandatory now

      1. …especially with the bladed roll hoops that Lotus and Force India are running this year, and Mercedes ran last year.

        1. yes but if it was fake grass layers, it wouldn’t be deep at all.

      2. I’m pretty sure Diniz’s rollbar failed rather than dug in. Though it could have dug in and failed at the same time. As this link shows

        1. Wow, it’s weird seeing a car without an airbox! Perhaps it did just smash, or maybe it broke because it got stuck in the ground. Either way, I hope the crash tests on the rollbar have improved since then…

          1. Just wondering though. If Diniz had landed like that on tarmac… would he still be around today?

    2. I think the FIA does it so that that the cars have the best chance of staying on all 4 wheels.

      Crashes where a car goes into the gravel, tyres dig in and it rolls seem to be a thing of the past.

      Its interesting as they can’t really downgrade on safety now. When the next fatality occurs (and in reality it will happen one day) it is very important that it is known to all that the FIA has eliminated all potential hazards.

    3. Or how about some kind of “obstacle” like small plastic bollards that stop the drivers from coming straight back onto the track if they outbrake themselves into slow corner.

      Instead of just running wide and slinging back around onto the track, they have to do a slower zig-zag between the bollards before getting back onto the track. If they don’t and go over the bollards – bingo! broken front wing

      If someone does have some kind of failure and ploughs straight over them it doesn’t really matter

  6. Wondering if they could put sensors in the run off areas and get then to automatically slow the offending car down.

  7. Lets have some sharp stuff at some runoff area so when drivers goes out there his tyres are destroy.

    1. or more realistically we could have the abrasive run offs found at the Paul Ricard circuit.

  8. Yeah i agree with Jackie, Alonso’s desperate moves on Petrov wern’t even punished, he just carried on, and even sometimes gained time – running wide at the final couple of corners was actually an advantage! crazy.

    But at the same time, the slightest error and you pay style like Monaco is what makes it epic, theres nothing like it.

    Maybe a middle ground is an astro turf runoff area? slow you down without a massive accident, or just good old gravel.

    1. You could argue the fact that the run off area gave Alonso more incentive to pass as if he failed he wouldn’t crash into a wall and retire.

      However, we saw in Abu Dhabi that even when the championship is on the line people still don’t try and make the overtaking moves. It must just be too hard.

      1. oh he was trying lol, just the track is appalling and designed by a dim wit. the one corner u might be able to overtake the track pinches before the corner. making overtaking near impossible.

        and petrov for once was driving pretty well.

  9. Whats up with the Mobile version being available on my Computer. The mobile version looks strange on a tv, all stretched out and such. Is it for testing stuff?

    1. I’ve had the same problem with James Allen website… I think it’s a wordpress plugin issue with wp-mobile theme.. ( think that’s the name )

      1. I’ve had that a number of times on Allen’s site, in fact, just today. I’ve never had it happen on F1F though.

  10. In regards to the updates, with a pretty standard screen resolution and text size, I’m getting the header bar wrapping so the Donation button is just below F1 Video. Resizing my browser window has no effect on it either. To get it back up on the proper bar I have to shrink my text to a micro size.

  11. Hi, Keith.

    Could you turn this in a post too?

    Book reveals Alonso tried to sabotage Hamilton’s car

    A new book reveals how the spiteful Spaniard actually asked the pair’s McLaren team boss Ron Dennis to sabotage Hamilton’s car to ensure it ran out of fuel.

    And it confirms Alonso also tried to ‘blackmail’ Dennis into making him their No. 1 driver as he and Hamilton bitterly fought each other for the Formula One world title.

    The shocking claims come in Tom Bowers’ just-published biography “No Angel: The Secret Life of Bernie Ecclestone.”

    The book reveals Alonso gave his boss an ultimatum just hours ahead of the 2007 Hungarian Grand Prix.

    It says he warned Dennis he would hand over incriminating emails to the sport’s governing body the FIA if he was not given preferential treatment over his rival.

    LINK: http://thestar.com.my/sports/story.asp?file=/2011/2/27/sports/8150485&sec=sports

      1. But that’s a pretty juicy part of the book to leave out!

        1. Everyone already knows that Alonso tried to use his knowledge of the emails to get preferential treatment from McLaren.

          1. but not that he tried to sabotage Hamilton’s car. I”d say that’s a pretty big rumour.

        2. I have my doubts about an article that starts off by blatantly calling a driver “spiteful”.

  12. My suggestion is to ask the driver to do a lap 10% slower than his fastest lap or maybe a drive through penalty…safety shouldn’t be compromised to enable more overtaking.

  13. Why not those polystyrene (well they look like it to me!) boards you see at the Rettifilo in Monza, where the drivers have to snake around them? you could make a “tunnel” on the exit of the course that they have to navigate and lose a second in. On a side note, it annoys me that they’re allowed to go wide on the exit of Ascari, they keep saying it’s not an advantage, then why do the cars do it?

    1. On a side note, it annoys me that they’re allowed to go wide on the exit of Ascari, they keep saying it’s not an advantage, then why do the cars do it?

      Lol, exactly. Their times get thrown in the bin now when they do it so it doesn’t really matter what excuses they make :P

  14. Stewart’s comment is an indictment on the current F1 fascination with parking lot style racing circuits.

    A driver need not suffer car damage if he has an off circuit moment, however he must be sufficently delayed b suc an excursion. It becomes even more ridiculous when such a driver even makes up time as Kimi showed us several times in China.

    Be that as it may, what is more heart wrenching is to hav e such a new and modern circuit to be designed in such a way as that it is all but impossible to go past a driver who is travelling over a second slower.
    Petrov wasn’t a second slower than Alonso, but the backmarkers quite often had to come to a stand still in order to be lapped and these are cars several seconds per lap slower than the leading cars.

    A poor choice of corner combinations and high speed sections were mated together. Even the very long straight has a miserable sector leading up to it thus making it all pointless.

  15. Paul Ricard has some kind of system on the runoff areas which destroys the tyres quite badly so driver has to pit as a result. Maybe something similar could be introduced to other circuits as well.

    1. Ironically Paul Ricard is owned by Bernie. I’m not for it, it gives them the excuse to basically make a huge carpark of tarmac, paint some lines and call it a race track.

  16. I really do hope that Mercedes are up there this year, would be great to see another contender.

    And I agree with Jackie Stewart, I don’t want endless gravel traps, they potentially ruin races where it needn’t have happened but a bit more grass of slightly rougher ground would suffice.

  17. For Verstappen, van harte gefeliciteerd met je verjaardag, and of course the both of Hedgey and Kolon have a great birthday as well.

    1. Dankjewel! Thanks for the shout out, Keith and congratulations to Hedgey & Kolon as well!

  18. I really don’t understand why people are calling for destructive runoffs.

    If anything, Alonso being able to keep Webber behind simply demonstrates how ridiculously difficult it is to overtake on that track.

    At least Alonso could take a shot at Petrov even though it was doomed to fail. Put destructive runoff around the track and he wouldn’t even have been able to do that.

    If there needs to be some change in the tracks then it’s to add overtaking opportunities. The drivers never called for grooved tyres, huge front wings or flappy rear wings, but they did call for better circuit design. Wy is nothing done with that? Well apparently India did listen, but besides that one none ever did.

    1. Patrickl, if there had of been destructive runoff Alonso still would have taken a chance, he had to, he had to try and finish 4th to win the championship. The difference would have been when he messed up he would have been penalised for the mistake, rather than given more “free shots” at passing Petrov, and because he would have been punished the car behind him would have had a chance to pass. That is what motor racing should be about.

      1. Motor racing should be about racing. Not about putting cars on such a narrow track that they simply cannot even attempt a proper pass.

        Alonso takes risks where he can. Not where he can’t. he simply would NOT have atempted a pass if it would ended his race.

        Why do you think Webber didn’t even try overtaking Alonso? He would have crashed and ended his race.

        1. It won’t need to be narrow to be punishing. If Abu Dhabi had a proper layout and with punishing run offs it would have been fun. A bad layout with easy run offs weren’t very fun. If you combine a good layout and easy run offs, the fastest cars would pass the others too easy and it wouldn’t be fun at all. The most exciting overtakes are always when a driver puts it all on the line to make the pass. Do or die style. Had it been “do or wait another corners and you will get a chance more” style it wouldn’t be very exciting.

        2. Racing is about taking risks in hoping to achieve some sort of reward.

          Runoff areas do not exist to assist in overtaking. The purpose of runoff areas are to allow a driver that goes off the circuit (i.e the “narrow track” which isn’t actually that narrow given that it’s 12 metres or 4 traffic lanes wide), to stop safely without destroying the car, or killing themselves. Runoff areas do not exist to give you free shots at passing a rookie pay driver every lap, and that is what Alonso was doing.

  19. i dont get it.

    People are always unhappy with things. The ’10-season was far one of the best und exciting season, that i’ve ever seen.

    The run in Abu Dhabi was a Thriller. I was getting more and more nervous to the end. The fight between Alo & Pet was really cool and impressive. It was a great show to all fans of Renault and Ferrari – and of course the people, who wanted Vet to become Champion. It took so many rounds until the great show was over.
    Now imagine how this feeling would have been destroyed, if Alonso crashed into a wall or had to stop ? The whole thrilling situation would be over – the run on p4 would be impossbile for him and the excitement would have been over.
    In my opinion the whole constellation and the conditions of the circuit were perfect, because everyone could push to the limit: Alo fighting for every tenth and meter to catch Pet, and Pet defending his position in every corner until he could run off on the straights …and so on. Every mistake made the gap between both longer or shorter – and thats the kind of “racingfever” that always was present to formula1 and which we all like!

    The question is what do F1-Fans really want ??!

    Do we want an outrageous number of overtakings per every race ? Or do we prefer exciting fightings, wheel-to-wheel and huntings like Alonso did in the last race.

    I would prefer the last option. Only overtaking is no fun, this is no nascar, this is formula1.

    1. The question is what do F1-Fans really want ??!

      They want less poorly designed tracks of the Abu Dhabi, Singapore, Bahrain and Valencia moulds.

    2. Now imagine how this feeling would have been destroyed, if Alonso crashed into a wall or had to stop ? The whole thrilling situation would be over – the run on p4 would be impossbile for him and the excitement would have been over.

      Only if you were only interested in Alonso being champion and nothing else. Everyone else would be waiting to see if Vettel would retire again in that Red Bull, which would have changed everything. In fact, it would have made Hamilton the unlikely champion.

    3. The question is what do F1-Fans really want ??!

      You only have to read the comments of F1 websites to see that F1 fans are never happy and are often complaining no matter what. We are a glass half empty bunch. We rarely say something positive.

      An interview with a driver is met with comments of “but you’re crap, so why bother?”

      A new car is launched: “That livery is awful, that design is going to be slow, how do they not know this? Martin Whitmarsh should be sacked. Lewis should leave this team that’s supported him for nearly 15 years”

      A rookie gets a drive on the grid: “But he’s crap, what has he shown? He’s just bringing in money. They should have signed some semi-retired guy who has all but given up on the sport”

      A driver gets out-qualified by his team-mate by 0.05 of a second: “He’s so crap, why does that team keep him? He gets murdered by his team-mate every race lolz”

      etc etc etc :D

      I quite like reading it though. It does make me chuckle. :D

      1. :-) That sounds about right. Seriously though, I definitely feel that the glass is more than half full. Last season was incredibly exciting, with the most drivers still in reach of the title going into the final round in the history of the sport. There’s always room for improvement in F1 though. In this case I do think Sir Jackie is correct. To be able to make as many mistakes as Alonso did in Abu Dhabi and not lose any time is a bit absurd. When he made a mistake in Spa a couple months earlier it ended his race. Hamilton nearly crashed out of the lead in that race as well, and certainly lost precious seconds that could have cost him the lead if he hadn’t had the benefit of such a large gap to Webber. That’s how circuits should be. Gravel runoffs > tarmac runoffs.

        1. I think the comments Sir Jackie Stewart made addresses one half of the situation.

          Sure, if Alonso had been punished more for his mistakes, it would have given Webber more chance to pass.

          However this fix would not give Alonso any better chance at overtaking Petrov, so it doesn’t encourage overtaking, just punishes mistakes.

          As long as the person leading just drives to block, fixing the edge of the course will help the car 2 back from the moving road block, not the car directly behind.

  20. Last year Brawn was also confident about Mercedes performance before first race…

  21. All can be done by GPS devices in the cars. If you put the wheels off the track your aceleration should drop a few % so you would loose time for your mistake. This is easy to do nowadays in a world full of electronics.

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