Quote from Hyperactive :

Not really, Alonso went over S/F before him, prolly some tech fault or shifting error

I really hope that is the case. But in some races the timing line is off set from the start line. He could of thought that he crossed that ...

pretty intresting race but poor Räikkönen and Kubica,the scaryest crash was Timo Glocks...
But still,Hamilton 1-st,Heidfield 2-nd and Rosberg 3-rd

Anyway, hooray for no TC. Nice to see some on-track passing for once.

Nice to see Lewis and Nico congratulate each other

Man, I've done Kimi's braking on the grass spin SO MANY TIMES in LFS.

Nico and Lewis congratulating was great. Funny how quiet Lewis got when Dennis entered.

Well, wasn't that an interesting race. Massa flashed his spectacular driving skills already in t1! The other Massa incident.. I couldn't see from the angles whether it was Coulthard's fault or Massa's. From one angle it looks as if they're side by side at corner entrance and Coulthard turns in; from another angle a bit like a dive from Massa. Shame on Nakajima for ruining Kubica's race That bump where Glock got air and Kubica went wide in during quali should definitely be flattened out a bit.

Pity Raikkonen had such a poor race, but what a strange move on Kovalainen; and, what a strange move by Kovalainen after his brilliant pass on Alonso.

All in all it looks like a very exciting season

Quote from DeadWolfBones :

Man, I've done Kimi's braking on the grass spin SO MANY TIMES in LFS.

me tooo, i hate when that happens

Massa's spin on the first lap might have been caused by the new ecu. So far what I've read, the ecu has a launch mode which, when enabled, stays on for 90 seconds after which it automatically disables itself. Maybe it disabled itself when Massa was coming out from T1 and caused that abrupt power peak? If it was Massa's own fault it was really bad driving, losing it in T1 like that

Hamilton drove well, but ultimately the other guys handed him his advantage by making lots of really dumb mistakes. It was fun to watch, but I hope they get it together for the next race. These guys are supposed to be the very best in the world.

Numpty award goes to Heikki, for hitting the pit lane limiter after passing Alonso...

The lower teams will be killing themselves that they didn't finish as everyone who finished got points.

Bourdais is going to be a very strong with vettel in the STR, Red bull was just unlucky and Ferrari just had a Shameful GP(2005 agian?)

Quote from Hyperactive :

Massa's spin on the first lap might have been caused by the new ecu. So far what I've read, the ecu has a launch mode which, when enabled, stays on for 90 seconds after which it automatically disables itself. Maybe it disabled itself when Massa was coming out from T1 and caused that abrupt power peak? If it was Massa's own fault it was really bad driving, losing it in T1 like that

The teams can put several custom engine maps onto the ECU. You could make an engine map that retards the engine in a manner that would simulate launch control. To stop this the FIA has made it so that the engine map can be changed for 90 seconds after the car starts moving. So you could still use such a map, but you would be stuck with it for 90 seconds, basically a full lap.

I think Massa's spin was caused by his right foot!

Damnn

Quote from LongJohnSilver :

The teams can put several custom engine maps onto the ECU. You could make an engine map that retards the engine in a manner that would simulate launch control. To stop this the FIA has made it so that the engine map can be changed for 90 seconds after the car starts moving. So you could still use such a map, but you would be stuck with it for 90 seconds, basically a full lap.

I think Massa's spin was caused by his right foot!

It isn't said anywhere the car needs to be stopped to change the mapping. Being smart, if possible, you would try to time it for it to be switched off into first corner .

Think I'm going to make a personal list of top 3, worst 3 per race this year.

Stars:
Hamilton for being untouchable
Bourdais for being faster than Kovalainen and Alonso at the end
Alonso for being aggressive and exiting

Noobs:
Raikkonen for making two disgracefully silly mistakes
Massa for forgetting that he has no TC in T1
Nakajima for hitting Kubica

Quote from J.B. :

Think I'm going to make a personal list of top 3, worst 3 per race this year.

Stars:
Hamilton
Bourdais
Alonso

Noobs:
Raikkonen
Massa
Nakajima

Not sure why you think Nakajima should be in that list ? quick edit after your edit, meh, hard to say without getting a proper look at it..

For me i'd have to say Piquet was the worst driver in the field, i'd even go as far as to say taking this weekends performance as a whole, he looks positively out of his depth

Quote from Hyperactive :

It isn't said anywhere the car needs to be stopped to change the mapping. Being smart, if possible, you would try to time it for it to be switched off into first corner .

A source:

Quote from Autosport :

The move to impose a 90-second lockout on engine mapping changes at the start of a race will be enough to prevent teams trying to simulate launch control.

Quote from Autosport :

However, amid some early suspicions that teams were experimenting with ways to simulate launch control, the FIA has imposed the 90-second lockout - forcing teams to stick to the same engine mapping setting for effectively the first lap of the race.

Quote from Mazz4200 :

Not sure why you think Nakajima should be in that list ?

For me i'd have to say Piquet was the worst driver in the field, i'd even go as far as to say taking this weekends performance as a whole, he looks positively out of his depth

I added the reason in my post. Piquet only got away because I'm only judging the race and I didn't see what happened to him. If I were judging the whole weekend he would be the worst by far.

Quote from DeadWolfBones :

Man, I've done Kimi's braking on the grass spin SO MANY TIMES in LFS.

Yeah, that was my first thought too when I saw this accident

The race was good, it was good to see many teams being able to fight, I'm very glad to see BMW and Williams at such a good form already at the beginning of the season. The race was a shame for the whole Ferrari including its pilots. I've always knew that Massa is a poor driver when it comes to racing, but lol, today it was more obvious than ever before. Kimi was quite fast and competitive, however these huge mistakes would not have left him any chances on fighting for points if not the SC.

It's also a shame for Barichello who just missed such a good opportunity to score many points with HONDA and I'm also very sad about the Sebastian, damn it was his debut and only ~5 laps left his FERRARI engine surrendered while he was 4th...

All in all, it was a good start of a new season, it was also quite weird to see such a small number of cars crossing the finish line .

Great success

Hamilton - didn't make mistakes
Hiekki - Good drive overall, safety cars costed him
Bourdais - Shame about the engine failiure.
Kubica - drove the wheels off it for the first part of the race.

Epic fail

Kimi - mistakes aplenty.

Quote from LongJohnSilver :

A source:

You're right then

---

To kimi's defence, you must say that his first laps were quite nice, 7 positions up in one lap . Some how it just took an eternity to get pass Barrichello...

yeah outstanding race, really Ferrari should be ashamed, such silly mistakes.
Mclaren again proven that we are the best And Hamilton should thank Kovalainen for such great defending, he blocked Raikonnen like 2 times, if he didnt who knows, maybe there would be a slight change in final results.
Over all, Honda improved, Williams improved and ofcourse Toro Rosso, top job from them this weekend, amazing.

btw Rubens will probably get a DQ for leaving the pit lane under the red light.
but well at least he shows that the car is capable of scoring points

Quote from Hyperactive :

To kimi's defence, you must say that his first laps were quite nice, 7 positions up in one lap . Some how it just took an eternity to get pass Barrichello...

No doubt being helped by 5 cars binning it, Massa spinning it and Piquet being utterly pathetic..innit

Admittedly, he was damn quick when he had a clear track, but, as someone else said, this seasons gonna be won by the guy who makes the fewest mistakes.

So it's still anyones guess who'll come out as Champion.

All in all, it's shaping up to be a great season, one of the best for years.