F1 Fanatic

Well you have two extremes though; in Canada anyone who was in DRS range of someone else would be far ahead of the other before the braking zone. Spain wasn’t super effective, but we did see a lot of DRS overtakes. Also, you’re forgetting that Lewis was alongside Vettel 2 or 3 times in those last 15 laps; so I wouldn’t class that as “no attempted overtakes”

Your argument was “he can’t hold off a car with DRS” but in Canada, nobody could.

Also, in Spain, Hamilton’s McLaren was clearly much faster in racing trim. He was catching Vettel by 1.5 to 2 seconds a lap in that last stint leading to their 15 laps of constantly being 0.5-0.7 apart. Vettel wasn’t even able to pull away in Sector 1 with the massive turn 3, and could only pull 1 tenth out in sector 2 with Turn 9; where Hamilton should have been compromised by the dirty air in both sectors

what’s the point of holding off a much quicker car with DRS? You’re defenseless anyway, so why trying to hold off?

The rain is another story. Never forget the constant G-forces, the concentration where he needs to go through every lap with a dry circuit (if you can read my topic about the drivers body to know what it really is to drive an F1 car for the human body). If the circuit is wet and there’s only 1 dry line, it’s verry VERRY easy to lose control over the car. Seb was a bit driving in the wet at the last lap, therefore he lost it all. Also, don’t forget that he was leading the race from the 1st lap untill the lap before the last lap. Tyres were also going off verry quickly as you all know that tyrecontrol is nessecairy in Canada

There are so many factors which any team needs to get right for a race. Car needs to be fast and DRS and KERS need to work, setup needs to be the right 1, driver needs to be fit, the feeling of the driver needs to be good, the tyres need to be good,…

Don’t know who said this but remember this quote: “The car may be the fastest on the grid, BUT somebody has to drive it over the line in one piece.”

Exactly. Seeing Monaco and Spain reminded me of Imola 05 and 06 actually; though nowhere as dramatic.

As I said; his defensive driving is not very visible, but he has a way of beautifully reading the car behind and controlling their exits

@matt90, in comparison to imola 05 and 06? he didn’t even raced in 05, so it could only be at 06 where he was TEST driver for williams. Maybe you mean schumacher instead of Vettel.

You’ve got a point about monaco, but like I said before, somebody needs to pull it over the line…

Oh no no no. It was nowhere near Imola 05/06. I just said it reminded me of these Imola races

Yes I suppose it was similar in having such a long and close finish. I didn’t really mean your point though, I just meant to anybody considering Spain a truly great defensive drive, they need to look back to other ones. The great thing about Imola was that although both drivers defended brilliantly you still had a real sense that the other could still finally pass any time. Whereas, in Spain, after Hamilton sort of had a first go he couldn’t get as close again, and you got the impression that no matter how good a run he got out of the last turn he would be relying on Vettel making a pretty big error to get close in turn 1. Vettel drove well, certainly though.

In many ways it doesn’t help that I don’t particularly like him, so it’s hard to prevent my bias from coming through. But it’s hard to fault him this year, and some of his races and poles have been great. I just don’t want to heap praise on him until I’ve seen him in a slower car and I have to, lol. I definitely have to rank him among the 3 best drivers now though. It’s like how you grudgingly have to accept how brilliant Schumacher was.

@mads but yeah, its so easy to overtake at Monaco. Even when your tyres are shot, it is fairly easy to defend by sticking it on the inside.