Raikkonen blames Bottas but stewards take no action on “speculative” move

2017 Azerbaijan Grand Prix

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Kimi Raikkonen blamed Valtteri Bottas for the first-lap collision between the pair in Azerbaijan but the stewards took no action over the incident.

The Ferrari driver suggested his rival caused the accident by releasing his brakes as they went side-by-side into turn two.

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“Today many things happened that were out of our hands and unfortunately we paid a big price,” said Raikkonen.

“After the start, at the second corner, I got hit by Bottas. I don’t know what he was doing, he braked very early but probably he noticed that and let the brakes off, went too fast and hit me. Because of that the rear end of my car hit the wall and I had a massive damage.”

However the stewards ruled Raikkonen’s passing attempt was “speculative” and did not blame either driver for the collision.

“The stewards examined video evidence and considered that car seven [Raikkonen] was making a speculative pass on the outside of car 77 [Bottas] in turn two and that car 77 hit the kerb and was pushed wide into car seven,” they noted. “The stewards determined that no driver was wholly or predominately to blame for the collision.”

The Finnish pair have had several run-ins over the past few seasons. They tangled at Sochi in 2015, which cost Bottas a podium finish, and again in Mexico the same year.

Bottas was also involved in a collision which ended Raikkonen’s race in Spain this year. On that occasion Bottas admitted he had braked “too early”.

2017 Azerbaijan Grand Prix

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    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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    70 comments on “Raikkonen blames Bottas but stewards take no action on “speculative” move”

    1. I guess like DC said unfortunately it seems like Valtteri and Kimi are magnetically attracted to each other.

      1. Kimi seems to attract all kinds of troubles lately, which is weird because he is one of the most cautious drivers during starts / first laps.

        1. How did he “attract” Bottas reckless driving?

          1. by “making a speculative pass” ;)

      2. When Tufins go to race
        A turn has not enough space

        1. When @f1-liners tries this on every report
          There will be times where he comes up horribly short ;-)

          1. @bamboo he ho, bamboo he ha
            Porque mi chistes, yo las prefiero escribir así
            ;)

            1. Calidad no cantidad

              xox

    2. Probably fair.

      Bottas lost a bit of control by bouncing over that kerb, and Raikkonen’s cheeky little outside attempt was always going to be narrow, even if Bottas had complete control.

      1. Bottas lost control because he didn’t wanna give up when he should have. Raikkonen was already ahead. Bottas forces things too much sometimes, especially at the start, and other drivers have to avoid him instead.

        1. I agree. Kimi was very unlucky here, and Valtteri was very clumbsy (not his first time either).

          They were going slower through this sequence than under the following laps because they were just coming off the first lap. The view from Seb’s cockpit shows that Kimi left more than a car’s width beside the kerb, and took a very wide outside line through the corner, and that he was ahead before corner entry.

          Kimi was right – Bottas braked too early and then let the brakes off in an ill-conceived attempt to keep his position.

          1. How did Bottas brake too early? Surely if he had braked later then the collision would have been even worse?

            As for releasing the brakes… this is partly true as anyone that knows physics or race craft understands that any braking force reduces the potential turning force and the opposite is also true so when you apply turning force it reduces the potential braking force. So Bottas has to make a choice, does he carry on braking and not attempt to turn or does he attempt to make the turn but release the brakes? Personally I think attempting to make the turn was the most likely way to avoid a collision while continuing to brake would have guaranteed a collision.

            The other major issue is that brakes do not work when the car is in the air (Neither does the steering).

            Also surely kimi could also have slowed down more for the corner and allowed Bottas the space to make the turn?

      2. Raikkonen’s cheeky little outside attempt was always going to be narrow

        What are you talking about? Kimi was ahead, on the racing line, and gave plenty of space. They crashed only because Bottas, in a desperate attempt to keep fighting for the position, chose to go into the corner with more speed than the situation allowed, and bounced off the curb.

        1. No, they were both level when they approached the braking zone. Kimi braked later so moved ahead, However it was too late for bottas to be able to take the corner by that point unless kimi also slowed down by the same amount. Kimi was then going too fast to be able to take a wide line through the corner so he was not able to give Bottas the space he needed. Bottas had no real choice but to try to make the corner but he was squeezed to the curb.

          If Kimi had braked at the same time as bottas then they would both have made it through unscathed.

          It was entirely a racing incident.

          1. Lol, like bottas much? you don’t make much sense here, firstly being ahead under the racing rules in terms of corner rights is always defined at the turn in point, not when they start to brake. Kimi was ahead as he braked later, true, but how does that impact bottas’s ability to make the corner? Kimi left enough space on the inside, thats all he needed to do, and kimi made the corner safely. it’s bottas’s responsibility to also make the corner safely without creating contact, this he failed to do, and IMHO he deserved a 5 or 10s time penalty. driving over the kerb, or wanting to stay ahead are not mitigating factors…

    3. What does a speculative pass means anyway?
      They right, from footage you can see Bottas hit the kerb which pushed his car towards Kimi’s

      1. Michael Brown (@)
        26th June 2017, 22:07

        @caci99 When a driver attempts an overtake with the mindset, “I don’t know if this is going to work. Let’s see…”

        1. @mbr-9 thank you for the explanation ;)
          By definition then, does it mean that judging a move speculative is subjective and speculative in itself :)? I mean, to the stewards it looks speculative but to Kimi it was a firmly pass.

    4. Well Bottas has to slow down a bit at the first lap. It is the second time he bounces off a kerb and hits Kimi, last time at Barcelona he even destroyed Verstappen’s race. And in this case, I feel that Kimi left more than enough space for both of them to take that corner safely.

    5. it is misleading that Vettel is a menace having scored the most penalty points yet Bottas and his clumsy starts count as racing incidents yet he is ruining other people’s races! Verstappen did the same last year but at least this year bad karma got him and even if 4 DNFs from 4 races wasn’t enough Ricciardo won! Hakkinen, Raikkonen, Kovalainen are all very likable even Rosberg. Bottas just isn’t, not good enough to be exciting not bad enough to get the boot from Merc. Average.

      1. nelson piquet
        26th June 2017, 21:33

        kovalainen was the epitome of average. at least bottas won a race without the leader retiring

    6. This is the kind of dumb stuff the stewards do race after race, Bottas is terrible on the first lap and also what does a speculative pass mean, Bottas had no real line into the corner thus decided to climb over the kerb which threw him into Kimi regardless thats a slam dunk penalty even the Ocon one as well!

      1. Kimi had no real line into the corner either, They were both level with each other into the braking zone. Kimi left his braking late which then gave him no chance of taking a wide turn. This then left bottas with nowhere to go. Bottas did’t choose to hit the kerb, he had no choice! If kimi had been ahead before the braking zone then I would agree that it was the fault of bottas, however this was not the case.

    7. Shaun Robinson (@)
      26th June 2017, 13:34

      I blame Bottas for this one. Obvious that once he was on the inside he would have hit the kerb. Then it’s obvious that once you hit the kerb you are going to go airborne and go wide. Knowing this, Bottas should have broke earlier to avoid contact. Otherwise you’re pretty much saying “If you try to overtake around the outside, the driver on the inside can hit you and it’s legal”

      Seen this type of incident loads and still shocks me that its deemed OK, even though these professional drivers know that they will go wide after hitting the kerb.

      1. Bottas was inside in Canada too actually. He’s just been awkward at the starts for some reason lately. Even when he’s not crashing into someone outright, he’s forcing people into avoiding him and stuff like that. I don’t like that kind of racing at all personally.

    8. Irrespective of this incident between Bottas and Raikkonen, the real farse is the rule that allows lapped cars to unload themselves under the safety car.

      Raikkonen’s race unfolded because he tried to continue.
      Bottas’ race was effectively over, so he could basically gamble on anything.

      I remember Mark Webber had similar fortune at the Nurburgring a few years back (can’t remember exactly). That annoyed me too.

      It’s unfair on the midfield and back markers. They look to jump on days like Sunday when the leaders hit trouble. Fine if the leaders can recover, well done to them, but not if they are gifted a lap as Bottas was.

      1. @eurobrun But the same rule applies for backmarkers too – they can also unlap themselves in same manner, making it possible for minnow teams to score points if chaos ensues in the later stage of the race.

        1. Well, they are not really going anywhere, are they? They are there because they are slow in any case. It won’t make a difference even if they catch up with the ones ahead. They’ll just fall behind again.

    9. Without the contact combined with what unfolded later, and Raikkonen could well have won that race. Easily.
      The stewards keep ruling Bottas blameless (because its the first lap?!) and the result is Ferrari losing valuable championship points to Mercedes.
      Raikkonen’s move looked ”speculative” only because Bottas braked too early and it was Bottas who was predominantly to blame

      1. I agree. Vettel got points for doing something just as braindead as Bottas. Bottas has done it three times this year already.

        Raikkonen’s move was absolutely fair, and he gave him a lot of space.

    10. Michael (@freelittlebirds)
      26th June 2017, 17:14

      It’s a good thing that Kimi accepted full responsibility, at least according to DC.

      That was the funniest joke ever told during a podium :-)

    11. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
      26th June 2017, 18:54

      I do get mixed up with the amount of people complaining about Bottas. Does anyone remember Bahrain last year? He braked later and it resulted in a crash. He tried bracking earlier and it just happens to be that he had contact twice this year. The rules did state this year that if one individual was clearly responsible for an accident on the first lap, they would get given a penalty. This didn’t happen in Spain or here.

      In Spain, I don’t think Bottas is any more to blame than either of the others. Yes, he braked early (which is his fault), but both the others attempted to pull alongside (which was their choice). Bottas ran out of Space and it resulted in contact for all 3 of them. All were blameless. Fully understand why it was a racing incident.

      Here in Baku, Bottas had to react to the fact that Kimi was on the outside. He went just a little tighter than necessary which unfortunately resulted in him bouncing and under steering into Kimi. He could have gone a bit further to the right but it really did seem surprising how much that kerb affected the car. It was a little bit of a risk when Kimi went around the outside but he won’t have expected this to happen. But it was clear Bottas suffered the most from this as he instantly fell to the back. This may be why they decided not to give any penalty. Kimi suffered some damage, but the damage from Bottas’s incident wasn’t what cost him the race as his pace was still pretty good even with the bit of damage he had. Bottas made the mistake and paid the consequences. But he made a stunning recovery which I don’t think anyone should deny even if he was helped by the safety car a little.

      1. Helped a little? Try: his entire recovery was because of the safety car, plus the Force Indias taking out themselves and Raikkonen, Vettel receiving a penalty, and Hamilton having to pit for headrest.

        Without that he’d be 7th or even 8th.

        1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
          27th June 2017, 9:43

          It was to do with the safety car. You sort of can say this: It was 100% because of the safety car that he got to where he was. But it was 100% his driving that got the rest of the overtakes done if you exclude the retirements. This was the bit that many people thought was impressive. OK he wouldn’t have done this well if it wasn’t for the safety car, but as so many people voted him as one of the drivers of the day elsewhere, I would still say he made a very impressive recovery even if his start was messy.

    12. How many times do we have to suffer through the same thing : bad officiating.
      It is the bane of sport everywhere and is very noticeable and affects so many races in F1.
      The sport needs to get better stewards , install better rules and generally stop wasting the gift that the present band of officials and administrators have been given.
      Of course the Raikonnen incident was Bottas’s fault and Bottas, again, ruined Raikonnen’s race . Its the scene we see repeatedly in F1 ,a driver messes up and ruins another drivers race but, nothing is done about it or a driver double moves or creates a very dangerous situation and nothing is said or done but , at other times a driver barely does a thing and what he does seems fine but, a penalty is assessed.
      Officiating in F1 is prejudiced ( as in Mercedes can do no wrong ,neither can Verstappen and in general British drivers are favored while German drivers are held to a higher standard. It destroys the balance that all sport requires.
      Don’t for a minute say that its the nature of auto racing and stewards simply can’t properly regulate an auto race,BULL.
      Look at Indycar and how well and how quickly its stewards act and always ( or very close to always ) get it right . the same is true in WEC. The stewards seem to actually watch the race and make consistent and sensible rulings . the opposite of F1.
      So , did Raikonnen get treated unfairly,? Of course . Will it happen again ? Of course . Should he follow Alonso to Indycar ? Of Course but, only if he wants what most of us want : a race determined by the quality of the drive and not what team you drive for or who the F1 powers favor at the time ( like Mercedes or Verstappen.)
      Perhaps not only Alonso and Raikonnen should come to Indycar but, a few other F1 drivers as well. The money is not as good but, the competition is and it is also fair .

      1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
        26th June 2017, 19:46

        @rikdi

        I don’t understand your problem with what Bottas has done. The first occasion just wasn’t his fault as I explain in the post above. This time, he suffered much more than Kimi. So that was his penalty. What is your problem? Bottas did not ruin Raikonnen’s race. He just made it a little worse. Then Kimi hit debris that wasn’t anything to do with Bottas later on. Bottas payed his own penalty by falling right to the back. That could well be why he didn’t get a penalty as he’d already given himself one. He just made a brillient recovery.

        1. @thegianthogweed Does it really matter who suffered more? If a footballer tackled another from behind and injured himself, would the referee say hold on he suffered more so no need for the red card?

          A penalty is a penalty because in my opinion Mercedes got extra constructors points they potentially don’t deserve. Look at it this way: had Bottas not hit Kimi, Kimi probably wouldn’t have been behind the FI and he probably won the race.

          1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
            26th June 2017, 20:50

            But in F1, not football, it has often been the case that if who causes an incident suffered like Bottas did with a puncture, they often don’t get penalties as they’ve already given themselves one. That is why I think it is quite clear a penalty wasn’t needed. I think that was a good reason not to give him one. I think the fact that how well he recovered from that puncture showed he did deserve the position he got and yes, Kimi was unlucky. There have been loads of gentle contacts on the first lap that drivers didn’t get penalties for in the past, and plenty of them have been fair, and I think this one is fair too. We can’t actually blame Bottas for Kimi having to retire later on at all. It wasn’t a major crash at all and it didn’t result in any penalties. Bottas paid the consequences at the start but recovered very well.

            1. It wasn’t a minor crash – it took Bottas well and truly out of the race. The only reason he recovered was because of multiple safety cars, and multiple drivers losing out in front of him later on.

              Drivers are supposed to be more cautious than normal during the first few corners. Bottas clearly wasn’t.

            2. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
              27th June 2017, 8:46

              I agree is had quite a big impact on Bottas, but if it was that bigger problem, they would have given him a penalty. But as I keep saying, I gave himself a penalty. He partly recoverd down to retirements and the safety car, but he also did a very good drive later on and plenty of good overtakes. If the stewards really think he was far more at fault than Raikonnen and he needed more of a penalty than a puncture, they would have given him one. The rules did state this year that if one driver is clearly at fault for an incident in the first lap, they would get given a penalty. This either explains that Raikonnen was slightly at fault too which that do seem to be saying or that Battas gave himself his own penalty which clearly happened.

    13. Bahrain last year he hit Hamilton. This year though what a job he is doing. F1 billiards in Spain perfectly taking 2 rivals out but stuck round to later help his teammate as the guys he would have raced he had taken care of. Canada down the inside of Vettel out of control with brakes locked up leaving Vettel no where to go and getting clipped by Max, he nearly pulled his Spain trick again. Sunday just straight drove into Raikkonen, Rosberg was penalised for this last year. He is like Teflon though always gets away with it. The year Raikkonen hit him in Russia Raikkonen was penalised, he did the same to Raikkonen in Mexico and got away with it. Merc have a hell of a number 2. As long as he doesnt hit Hamilton again

      1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
        26th June 2017, 22:02

        He gets away with it because the stewards have way more evidence than we do and they can see what happened in many more ways. Mexico in 2015 was so obviously Kimi’s fault. Bahrain last year was Bottas’s fault but I got COTD when I mentioned that I thought that was one of the most harsh penalties that year and many others agreed.

        He just wasn’t at fault in Spain this year. Read my comment further up. The other drivers pretty much played an equal part and since Bottas got away with it, if he was to blame, there is no chance he would have got away without a penalty. It was a racing incident. Verstappen and Kimi risked coming along side (which was their choice) and Bottas ran out of space. All were blameless. No penalty was perfectly fair.

        This race, Bottas gave himself his own penalty. He cost Kimi a couple of places to start with but gave himself a puncture and fell well over a lap behind. At the time, that was more than enough of a penalty that he gave himself. That will probably be why they didn’t investigate it further. He may have been lucky that the safety car came out later but there is no doubt that he made a good recovery. Just because he has a good car capable of getting back right to the top shouldn’t mean he should get another penalty. It just happens to be that he’s in pretty much the best car. But the fact he was a lap down won’t have helped. He will have had a challenge getting back up again. That is also like a penalty as he is responsible for having to need to do this. He performed brilliantly here and got a deserved podium and it isn’t just me that thinks this. Many may disagree but on other forums, far more people say Bottas deserves that podium than those who don’t.

        There was absolutely nothing wrong with what Bottas did in Canada. Hamilton locked up and nearly crashed into a Ferrari in Russia in the first corner. He kept it under control. Nothing was wrong with that. Bottas locked up but didn’t go wide at all. You are completely making things up about Vettel having nowhere to go. That is nothing related to Bottas. Bottas has the right to be on track. He didn’t go wide or anything.

        Bottas isn’t getting penalties because he has hardly done anything wrong. The 2 things that were clearly his fault, (Bahrain and here) he either did get a penalty, or paid for the consequences. Other drivers in the past have sometimes made a total mess of things like hitting other drivers and have lost loads of positions because of this but sill manage to recover. Just because they manage to get points, does that mean they should get a penalty as they have already given themselves one? F1 has been like this for ages. If a driver does something a little clumsy like Bottas did and Bottas didn’t suffer any more than Kimi, it would be then the he would deserve a very harsh penalty. I think the reason why he didn’t get one is so obvious.

        If the driver they hit doesn’t suffer that much and they suffer much more like Bottas did, I don’t see why it needs investigating any further. It was nothing serious and Bottas lost out. But he recovered very well. And because of this, people seem to be wanting him to get a penalty. If he hadn’t had a good recovery, people probably won’t have been bothered about the fact he didn’t get anything.

        1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
          26th June 2017, 22:14

          Just to add, I think what the stewards have said makes it even more clear why they left it as it was.

          “The stewards examined video evidence and considered that car seven [Raikkonen] was making a speculative pass on the outside of car 77”

          Just as mentioned above in the article.

          I also did think Raikonnen was making a bit of a risky move as he didn’t leave that much space and as the word “speculative” does mean risky, they clearly think what Raikonnen had attempted was possibly a little too risky. This reason and the rest I have explained I think sums it up totally as to why Bottas shouldn’t have got a penalty.

          1. He left more than a car’s width of space to the Kerb. It was way more space than the initial camera view would indicate.

          2. “Speculative pass”? The only thing speculative was the stewards ruling… “Speculative pass” is not defined in any rulebook, as far as I know. Just stewards making it up to cover their decisions.

    14. How can the ‘unlapping’ rule be fair?
      It was introduced so that back markers didn’t get in the way of the leaders, Bottas got a free ride from the back of the grid despite causing one of the yellows himself, how can that be right?
      I think if there is no one in the way of the top ten i.e. the point scoring positions, lapped cars should stay lapped and the race can get on its way sooner.

    15. Bottas doesn’t know where to position himself and when to brake in his first laps with Mercedes so far. Has he always been like this in Williams too? Last race people were blaming Verstappen on the incident with Vettel or blaming Vettel himself or calling it a race incident, but Bottas was also his usual awkward self there on the inside as well. He really needs to get over whatever this problem of his is in first laps.

    16. Michael Brown (@)
      26th June 2017, 22:10

      You know what else was a speculative move? Hülkenberg on Hamilton, Brazil 2012.

    17. The problem is unprofessional stewarding. This was Bottas’ fault, he ran into another car that was on-track under proper control. There was plenty of room for Bottas’ car, but he had lost control and ran right into the Ferrari. 100% Bottas fault, which by the definition of the current interpretation is a slam dunk penalty.

      Talking of stewarding, ask yourself what would have happened if the Ham-Vet incident was reversed? Do you think Lewis would have been let off with a mild slap on the wrist? No, I don’t think so either.

      F1 is getting like Rugby Union, how often have you heard Eddie Jones saying they played first half to gauge the way the ref was running the game?

      1. GtisBetter (@)
        27th June 2017, 17:49

        Only it wasn’t bottas his fault. It was what is called a racing incident. Almost all contact can be avoided it people just brake early and play nice. But this is a sport, so we have to agree that people are willing to fight each other on the track. That also means that both Kimi and bottas did what was right and it turned into a collision. Both could avoided it, but they weren’t doing anything bad. Just squeezing two cars, where only one fit.

    18. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
      26th June 2017, 22:24

      It really is surprising how many people are thinking this isn’t enough. As they are stating, they clearly think Raikonnen played a little part in it too. They have far more evidence than wee will ever see and while I sometimes think they make stupid decisions, I think this one is fair. But we always should accept that they will be able to prove and find out what happened in many more ways than we ever will. If drivers suffer damage and fall right to the back after they have done something wrong, they often don’t get penalties as they’ve just given themselves one. This is what Bottas did. Bottas just managed to have a mix of luck and skill to get right back up to 2nd, which to me was deserved.

      Afterall, a lot of people think Bottas was one of the best drivers of the day on other forums. He got 18% of the votes on planetf1. The 3rd highest. The next highest rated driver after Bottas is Alonso with 8% of the votes.

    19. Bottas keeps escaping once more. We’ll see how far this goes. Kimi was in front and this guy bounces off the kerbs and crashes into another car causing lasting damage to the opponent’s car. Still nothing from the stewards.

      But as I mentioned in my other comment, if I am to accept Vettel’s verdict from the stewards, I have to accept this one as well. Can’t pick and choose.

      1. I disagree with that last sentence @evered7, let me point out your mistake in comparing these incidents.

        With this incident, they more or less judged that it was a racing accident, just using different words. They do not say that Bottas was blameless, but they also don’t say he is to bear the full brunt of the accident (whatever a speculative pass is supposed to be). In the end, we have seen boatloads of accidents in the first few corners get different judgement than ones where there were just the two cars going at it. And it is true that Bottas got himself the worst part of it since it dropped him 2 laps back.
        The thing we discuss is their judgement of the accident and who was to blame to what degree. I think this was “just one of those things”, i.e. a racing accident where no driver needs to be penalized. You might disagree and think Bottas was fully to blame.

        With Vettel, there is no ambiguity in the Stewards’ judgement of what happened “Car no. 5 steered into car no. 44”. How much clearer can you get. Vettel intentionally drove steered his car into Hamilton’s car. Behind the SC.

        The discussion is about whether the penalty they then handed for the dangerous driving fit the offence. We can disagree and argue about that. But their ruling does not leave room for doubt on what happened (no, coming up with facts like: “maybe he did not steer” does not count, that is alternative facts) or who was to blame.

        1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
          27th June 2017, 9:38

          @bascb
          I agree there, Bottas was mainly to blame and he paid for the consequences. He just managed to recover. Just because he did doesn’t mean he should get more of a penalty.

          1. exactly.

          2. The amount of self impact should not enter the question. If a rule is broken, there should be a penalty.
            And when a penalty is given, it should stick, not this double jeopardy stuff like for Kvyat. Two wrongs do not make right.

            1. And this is exactly why there are Stewards to decide on the merits of every incident individually @lassel, because it does not make sense to give a standard penalty without thinking.

              Remember, we had this a few years back where boatloads of drivers were penalized for having a wheel off the track while overtaking etc. It ended up completely messing with the race needlessly. A penalty is needed to correct things and to signal wrongdoing.

              I am sure that Bottas knew full well that he had ruined a good race for himself by not giving up the position and staying on the inside once he finally got back towards the pits at a snakes pace. Now if things had gone differently and Kimi would have had to limp to the pits, while Bottas was able to continue on without too much issues, I think we could well have seen a penalty of some sort for him. But penalizing him on top of that would just make sure that we get to live in a nanny state where drivers won’t be able to defend on track.

            2. @bascb then there shouldn’t be a rule of it is not applied equally.
              As soon as you put subjective rulings that cannot be effectively be appealed in effect, you open the door for rulings based on opinions, not facts.
              That is why we see some drivers getting away with stuff time and again that others are immediately penalised for.

            3. well, it’s exactly the same as in the “real world” @lassel. There are laws (the rules) and when you get prosecuted (i.e. someone noticed you might have infringed, and there was enough evidence hinting that might well be the case to get investigated) you present the evidence you see, the prosecution presents the evidence they have and a judge (or a panel of judges, or a jury, depending on where you are and at what level) a. depends whether you did infringe that rule and b. what punishment is applicable, taking in account the specifics of the case.

              Yes, some things are almost automatical (driving to fast in the pitlane, there is a pretty exact table for the hight of the penalty (regardless of why it happened), for example) and some things are by defenition less clear cut and need a judge or steward to weigh the facts and hand out an appropriate penalty.

              And yes, I think we can all agree that F1 stewarding is far from perfect. But they did improve over the last few years already, so let’s hope the recent innovations – giving stewards a system to easily check/reference similar cases from the past, for example – help improve it even more.

            4. @bascb Improve? Your infallible stewards can’t even give the correct penalty when it is explicitly set in the rules (Kvyat, Canada: article 36.8 explicitly states 38.3(d) (10s Stop’n’Go)), how can their decisions be trusted? They seem more based on opinions and second guessing than anything else …
              Of the 9 penalties the stewards can impose, 7 can not even be appealed. This makes the stewards more or less judge, jury and executioner, a system which all democratic societies have abolished as it gives very poor legal certainty.

            5. The stewards are very far from “infallible” @lassel. And yeah, it was a pretty bad example in Canada with Kvyat.

              On the other hand, I think that case nicely shows why fixed penalties are a trap. I think the initial verdict and penalty the Stewards agreed on was fitting. It only got an affront as soon as someone pointed out to them that they had handed out a penalty that does not fit the rules and they had to “correct” that. In my view it would have been better NOT to have that fixed penalty in the rules, so that the original verdict would have been final.

              I agree that it is often annoying that penalties cannot be appealed after the race. Then again, to avoid endless limbo in the results, I accept why this is. A judge and a jury are part of the same job. In many systems there is no Jury (in my opinion those are the better ones, but that is a different debate), and the execution is handed to Whiting (and the teams themselves).
              As we saw in the Kvyat case, there IS some kind of appeals system in place, be it probably informal. We often see rival teams pointing things out to the stewards/whiting.

        2. @bascb Bottas misjudges the space he has, bumps into a kerb, lands on the car in front, damages it permanently.

          Sainz did a similar mistake when judging Grosjean’s position and caused him to go into a spin and crash into Massa. If Bottas had spun there taking a few others out, maybe it would have been different? Also the fact that he caused trouble for himself shouldn’t come into picture. It was his fault that made him lose places. But that is not punishment itself. If so, then Sainz retiring should have been punishment enough. This is the inconsistency I don’t get.

          Also if the stewards found Vettel guilty, they applied whatever penalty they deemed fit similar to not giving any to Bottas. So when we accept one, we can’t question the other was my point. I am not going to the wordings here at all. Just the verdict.

          1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
            27th June 2017, 16:07

            Sainz’s move was clearly far more dangerous. These 2 incidents are just not comparable. Sainz misjudged his distance to Grosjean twice, forcing him onto the grass, then cansing himself to loose control and take out Massa as well as damaging Grosjean and nearly taking out Alonso. Bottas’s incident was nothing like this and it only resulted in a bit of damage to Raikonnen and much worse damage to himself. The stwerads also said that Kimi’s move was “speculative” Which if you look up the meaning of the word means involving a high risk of loss. Which is what they think Kimi did. And they have much more evidence of this that we will get to see. If Bottas didn’t suffer as much as he did, or Kimi hadn’t done what they considered as an overly risky move, they probably will have punished Bottas. Is I keep saying, the rules have stated this year that if there is clearly one driver to blame for a first lap collision, A penalty will be given. Sainz was clearly to blame in Canada. They have given their verdict that Raikonnen played a part in this too. But Bottas was the one who suffered much more. I think Bottas was more to blame but there explanation as to why they didn’t give out a penalty seems perfectly reasonable. It really does seem to be people on this site much more than elsewhere that thinks he deserved a penalty. Just accept that the stewards can see more than us and have much more proof to back up their decisions.

          2. Thank you @thegianthogweed for pointing out the differences between these cases.

    20. Our butcher is driving better than the thick head.

    21. Kimi was already in front. Bottas should have gave enough room and go into the corner slower.

    22. Stop, just please stop with this “the stewards said..” or ” no penalty was given so the move must have been OK”.
      You saw the race you make your own decision and in case you have not been paying attention the weak link in most sports are the officials and from my point of view F1 stewards are among the worst of the worst.
      Don’t ,however , single out F1 because the only sport that has truly done anything to correct its officiating mishaps is Tennis. At most tournaments anyway they use electronic line calling based on computer enhancement of multiple camera views of the ball. It is great.
      MLB has a similar system available to help the TV viewers . Its called “pitch track ” and it shows ( again using computer enhancement of multiple camera views )where the ball past through the strike zone but, the major leagues refuse to use this system to replace the home plate umpire. Foolish but, emblematic of the silly things that sports do and how little value they place on getting the call right . Please note ,as alluded to above, F1 may be the worst of all.
      There is so much at stake and so much money on the line but , for officials the circuit uses a rotating system of ex-drivers who may or may not be impartial ( and it seems like they rarely are ) may or may not be too old and may or may not have ever had the ability to understand or apply the rules but, because they : one, have some level of name recognition and :two . are available that Sunday , are named to be the one who makes difficult and very telling determinations affecting drivers, teams and those associated or invested in both.
      Note ,also that there do appear to be patterns in the stewards rulings like: the British driver should be given the benefit of the doubt whenever possible ,the German driver should be presumed to be at fault whenever possible and some teams rarely if ever do wrong ( and by ” some teams” I mean Mercedes ) .
      So, trust your eyes , use common sense and know that if you are relying on the decision of an F1 steward -you are probably wrong .

    23. Well, its kinda like The Highlander, there can only be one, Finn that is. LOL!
      That coming from a fellow Finn……what a race for Bottas, pure Finnish Sisu, never give up.

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