i was only able to watch about half of it... michael is really something, falling off the pace a bit in the middle, but then catching up again... What's wrong with michael's car, why does his second stint always suck so much?
i was going in and out of sleep during the race. it started at 5am local time. lucky i was awake for alonso's and schumi's second pit stops. every other time my eyes were open it was boring.
Lap times are so delicate that all those drivers are struggling to squeeze every and each tenth out of the car, and sometimes a race is decided upon one tenth of a second. You don't need everybody huddling together and scratching each other for position for a race to be exciting, at this level of racing the competition happens everywhere and one single delay could ruin your race. If you could follow for the entire race onboard with one driver, say Montoya, it would be very interesting to see how the race unfolded.
A good race overall, I enjoy the tussles of the midfield between RB/JPM/JV/RS/GF as well as the race at the very front. The way Michael Schumacher put on blindingly fast times after Alonso's second pit stop was just awesome.
At one stage during his second stint, MS suddenly lost about 2 seconds to Alonso, he explained afterwards that he went a bit wide at turn 11, and people hardly noticed that. It is that fast.
It's annoying to see that Schumacher could have gone much faster than Alonso while behind him, and not even trying to go for the pass. Boring, boring, boring. It feels like a sort of "can't be arsed to go for it" attitude (although it wasn't even needed). Good race though.. I suppose.
The thing is you got to put yourself in the drivers shoes. What is the point in risking it when you know you got the car under you, you know you've got more fuel and you know if you try to battle the car your going to use more of your tyres and fuel.
A Grand Prix is more endurance than the likes of the quick sprint races in the likes of the BTCC etc.
@RevMonkey
The drop off at the second stint seems more strategic to me. The dirty air effect would make Schumacher use his tyres more and the team probaly knew he was staying out longer. They probaly dropped the revs and maintain the car, not much point blitzing away and working your car harder than you need to. A wins a win if it's by 1 lap or 1 second. Thats one thing I don't understand with Kimi, although I admire his fighting spirit is why he pushes the car so hard. Examples of this were last year when he would finish miles up the road and still be lapping hotlaps right to the end of the race when he really didn't need to push the car that hard.
Boy your deluded. Below I quote MS in the press conference---
Michael Schumacher: "It was no surprise that it was difficult because we were driving pretty competitively and as quick as we could. It’s a bit more difficult behind when you’re driving in the slipstream and the wind conditions today made it a bit tricky in certain areas. "
"I always thought we could do it at the first pit-stop, but then I pushed a bit too high at turn six and almost lost it and that was probably the reason that I had to spend more time behind until the last pit-stop, which was interesting because it was varying quite a bit in certain parts of the race where Fernando sometimes seemed a bit slower and then sometimes I seemed to be a bit slower and then I was picking it up again and he had a pit-stop where he was pushing very hard, but we could match his sort of pace."
"I had two occasions, honestly. One was when Fernando went into the pits and I pushed, naturally, pretty hard and I got a bad tail wind in one corner which almost took me off the circuit and then during the race, probably lap 24, I went wide in turn 11, I think, which was quite tricky, and I lost quite a bit of ground. But then, at that stage, Fernando was strong in the middle sector of the second stint, I was pretty strong and then we were pretty equal before the pit stops. "
This race is head to head, even steven, just like in Bahrain. Difference is though, this time MS wins. No one's sandbagging, it's all about fractions, and watching people competing at this level gives me total satisfaction.
I are know that, look here
I can still express my boredom, despite it being the nature of the type of racing. In fact, I'm also displeased with anything that results in turning down revs or otherwise saving the engine for another day. Engine & tire rules suck, as does the 1st part of the last section of quali, not to mention the mannequin crap the drivers are these days, no offence to good driver but I'd rather see them drive than curb every flipping aggression.
Back to the days when passes were made, to the extent that even illegal blocking was not unheard of!
And I'm not deluded, you're deluded thinking I'm deluded. My opinion is based on what I want to see while I'm perfectly aware that the top drivers are putting everything in it thoughout. Immediately after Alonso had pitted for the 2nd time Schumacher went much much faster for several laps, and if it weren't for the sodding aero rubbish that makes passing near enough impossible on a track where there supposedly are opportunities for it not only had he probably gone faster earlier, but he'd have caught up earlier and had more reason to pass.
Couldn't agree more! Engine rule sucks, and I want slicks back. Burning fuel in the first part of Q3 is kinda stupid really, and it seems they will change it very soon.
"Back to the days when passes were made, to the extent that even illegal blocking was not unheard of!"---post of the day
But by the comment "Schumacher went much much faster for several laps", I think you are still to an extent, deluded. Check them out---lap times around FA's second pit stop:
Not 0.1 per sector, but approx 0.5 per lap. look at the difference in Schumacher's laptimes before and after Alonso pits. From 1:32.5/4x straight to 1:32.0/1x, I think that over 3 laps is a relatively significant improvement.
The difference was 1.2 sec wasn't it? Including the third lap at the same speed 3x0.5 sec = 1.5 sec, that's more than the gap alone, and the pitstop at this point was simply bonus added on to the gap after passing Alonso in the pits.
But of course you could be right and the flying pink elephants could be trying to tell me something
I thought it was a cracking race. Even gave up two hours of Aero and IC Engines revision to watch it, with my F1 diet of ginger beer and fruit pastelles (don't ask why, it's tradition).
i prefer prosts suggestion on how to make it more interesting which was allow tyre changes but not allow fuel stops. means the cars start heavy and there is a compramise on setups, do you setup to be ideal with weight or when light or a compramise in between. do you drive hard at start and hammer brakes or save them till the cars lighter ?
basically it would mean that at the race neared the finish the car in front may be relatively slow copmpared to a chasing car. in the early 80s when tyres also usually weren't changed in a race, it was common for some cars to be up to 3 secs a lap faster than the leader at end of race, which lead to some fairly tense closing laps
you make a good point, but i really rather that they drive the balls of their cars even if they don't need to, simply just so that they can one-up the other man.
one thing that i hate (love to hate) about f1 is that everything is so gentlemanly. instead of actually duking it out, they'll subtley stub the other driver in the back with strategy. it's almost like they're apologetic to make a passing move, and all the f1 drivers are pussies about it too when they do get passed. deal with it. it's racing. i do understand that it is difficult with the aero turbulance and whatnot, but you just don't see the kind of balls racing of dijon 1979 anymore. F1 seems to be quite the intellectual's motorsport. it's like A Beautiful Mind as opposed to the Gladiator.
There are enough gladiatorial series out there now, ETCC DTM etc all have handicap system which always ensures a level playing field,however for people like me who is still fond of the idea that the quickest driver and quickest car should win, F1 is the stuff.
