F1

Stewards waving blue flags for Sutil

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  • #132857
    Aish Heydrich
    Participant

    Don’t know if somebody started this topic anywhere, but it was a massive indignity towards a great spirited fighting Sutil out to prove himself. It was shameless on Race Control’s part and I hope FI appeals against that. It must have been very distracting for him as it continued for a good number of laps till Hamilton passed him towards lap 50.

    #228845
    Fer no.65
    Participant

    Doubt it was confusing for him… I mean, he knew he was on the lead lap.

    #228846
    RagingInferno
    Participant

    This has happened quite a few times for a variety of drivers, usually midfielders who were out of position. I don’t think there’s much FI can complain about since it’s unlikely it affected Sutil at all, given that he knew he was battling with the people around him for position.

    #228847
    JamieFranklinF1
    Participant

    Maybe with all the technical glitches that were going on throughout the weekend, something happened, which made things more difficult for the marshalls? If that’s the case, then they were probably just making an educated guess, and it’s better that they wave them, and have them ignored due to the driver in question knowing that they don’t apply to him, than a driver getting in the way, and the marshalls being too cautious because they’re unsure.

    #228848
    Aish Heydrich
    Participant

    @JamieFranklinF1: You are probably right with the tech glitches. But glitches or no glitches, anybody can understand the position of the drivers if they’re watching it on TV or following orders through their phones from a guy who is watching it on TV. At least a TV feed won’t be glitched out.
    With all the tech geniuses around the paddock, no one could fix a glitch in a day.

    #228849
    Kingshark
    Participant

    I think that they should just ban blue flags all together. Backmarkers should be allowed to race the top guys, whether they are a lap down or not. In fact, without blue flags you’re likely to get to see twice as many passes in a race.

    #228850
    RagingInferno
    Participant

    @kingshark It’s nice in theory, but we would likely see far more incidents like Vettel and Karthikeyan’s incident at Malaysia last year happening. I can’t imagine ANY of the top teams supporting this idea either.

    #228852
    Slr
    Participant

    without blue flags you’re likely to get to see twice as many passes in a race.

    I’d rather sprinklers used during races. Having lapped cars racing the front runners would be going too far in Formula One’s aim to improve the wheel-to-wheel racing.

    #228853
    Kingshark
    Participant

    @slr

    I’d rather sprinklers used during races.

    That would cost and waste too much water though. Have any of us the slightest clue just how much water is needed to make a 6.0 km long, 20 meter wide circuit properly wet? A lot.

    #228854
    Matthijs
    Participant

    @kingshark: nice theory, but why would backmarkers race the top guys anyway? It’s not like they’re fighting for position, so there is no gain, only loss (of time or bodyparts perhaps). Better to make way and loose as little time as possible, since the backmarker is racing his own race with fellow backmarkers.

    #228855
    Slr
    Participant

    That would cost and waste too much water though. Have any of us the slightest clue just how much water is needed to make a 6.0 km long, 20 meter wide circuit properly wet? A lot.

    I didn’t actually support Bernie’s idea of using sprinklers, I just said what I said to emphasise how much I would not want to see blue flags done away with.

    #228856
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    @matthijs
    Perhaps the backmarkers shouldn’t race the leaders, but at least they should be allowed to stay in the middle of the track if they want to.

    @kingshark may had been thinking of
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDZEPxNRJjg

    #228857
    Jack Lenox
    Participant

    I agree with @kingshark. I really don’t get the blue flag rule. @matthijs says they’re not racing for position, but they are. They’re all in the same race and sometimes we’re talking about a driver who isn’t normally a backmarker like Hamilton in Hockenheim last year. You should be able to try to unlap yourself if you can and therefore you should be able to fight with the front runners. If the front runners are so good, surely they can get round lapped backmarkers anyway? Why do they need the backmarkers to effectively pull over and get out of their way?

    Also I think it’s unfair on the backmarkers when they are having their own race with other slower drivers because they can accidentally concede too much and have another backmarker overtake along with the faster car. And this does happen quite a lot.

    It’s a race, every driver should have the right to drive as fast as they are able to, to the very end.

    #228858
    Jack Lenox
    Participant

    As an addendum to that point, discarding the blue flag rule would surely prevent seasons like 2011 where Vettel seemingly increased his lead by about a second a lap at almost every race. At least once he reached the backmarkers he’d have to start fighting again rather than just getting further and further ahead.

    #228859
    tmekt
    Participant

    @jacklenox

    Lapped cars are allowed to unlap themselves, that’s what Hamilton momentarily did in Hockenheim and he wasn’t penalized. The thing is that the reason they were lapped in the first place was because they were slower than the leaders so it’s usually not even remotely possible to them to try unlapping themselves (with exceptions of course but that’s very rare).

    The blue flag rule is there to prevent the cars that are being lapped from meddling in the top battle which they aren’t part of and it usually doesn’t cost them awful lot of time to let the lapping cars pass if they do it smartly. If a Caterham had an effect on the race winner you can only imagine what kind of moan-fest would follow (like it did in Austin last year when Karthikeyan partly blocked Vettel which assisted Hamilton in his passing maneuver).

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