Blueflame just check the numbers I gave. They are 100% correct and I stand by them. Mclaren learned from their mistake with Alonso and got Hamilton a second driver who was given completely different tactics. Kovalainen even said in few of the interviews that it'd be nice to once start with a light fuel setup.
You are right that I don't like Hamilton's character (I prefer Button a lot more) but I've NEVER questioned his speed. All I'm saying is that Kovalainen was about as fast in qualifying as Hamilton was in 2008. Statistics from that season support that statement. Check it if you don't believe me, you can find the qualifying times from Formula 1's official website.
Kovalainen's race pace was off (as I've already mentioned but you don't seem to read) which was as much his as the fuel setups fault since he suffered a lot from his tactics. He was slower in races than Hamilton but in no way did Hamilton make Kovalainen look like a fool. That was Mclaren, and Mclaren only.
2009, that is another story and is mainly focused on Kovalainen losing his confidence in himself and the team.
The reason why Button found home at Mclaren is as much about his speed as his character. Hamilton is arrogant and annoying while everyone likes Button as everything in him is what you'd expect from a British driver. Class, style, humility(at least compared to some other F1 drivers), consistency with tires and of course, speed. He's not as fast as Hamilton but easier to work with.
It's actually funny that here everyone who dislikes a driver seems to believe that driver is almost nothing and deserves nothing. Vettel, Räikkönen, Schumacher. I'm betting you don't dislike Kovalainen but you rather never cared about him or followed him which is why you don't know he always had large fuel load and was actually about as fast as Hamilton in Q2's in 2008 (Q2 times are easy to check through F1 webpage if you don't believe me).
It's the same if you ask about Heidfeld from me, I have no recollection of his driving, only some generic comments about how he was supposed to be the next top driver but lost his chance to go to Mclaren as Kimi was a better driver. That actually tells nothing about the guy but still shows some bias as I already have a way I think I should feel about the guy. Same with you and Kovalainen. At times the feelings are right and at times wrong, you just need to either dig to the facts or have someone to explain them to you (assuming you can admit to yourself that you actually don't remember much)
Just to clear some things, Kovalainen was, if I remember correctly, once or twice in 2008 with the same fuel strategy as Hamilton. And those times he was ahead of Hamilton in the qualifying. At the time it was actually quite often calculated how much fuel was needed per lap and how much that weighted and how much that weight affected the lap times. No doubt you can remember this. Kovalainen lost to Hamilton in almost every qualifying because his car was around 0.5 seconds slower. His race pace is a completely different story but it is undeniable that Kovalainen wouldn't have won a lot more qualifyings. In Q2 Kovalainen was at least 0.1s faster than Hamilton 5 times, there were 6 races where their Q2 time was within 0.1s and Hamilton was at least 0.1s faster in 7 races. Kovalainen was very even in qualifying with Hamilton in Q2. In media it was often calculated that had Kovalainen had as much fuel as Hamilton he would've been faster in I think about 50% of the qualis. Kovalainen's tactics were shit and they never worked that was Mclaren's fault not his and his image suffered a lot because nobody looks at facts but only your positions in the grid and in the finish line. He lost his confidence and ended up with horrible 2009 season and losing his job. Also Hamilton had in at least half of the races newer parts than Kovalainen because for some reason they only had time or materials to make just one of the upgrades for the race. You know this as well as I do. I'm not saying Kovalainen was better than Hamilton as a driver but he was a lot better than any of you give him credit and I think he applies rather well to the context I used him in my previous post.
True, but in Germany more than 2 seconds off the pace in qualifying (in both Q2 and Q3). It still remains a fact that Räikkönen won at Spa with a car that had received no modifications since the dawn of time and at the moment if I remember right the car was supposed to be over a second slower than the rest as they had implemented new parts and Ferrari had not 1.5 seconds may have been slightly too much. Remember that Turkey was 2 months before Spa. And it's not about Spa either as he was 3rd in Monza and 4th in Suzuka with the same car that was 0.5 seconds off the pace in Turkey and two seconds off the pace in Germany.
Why there are so many Kimi fans is probably explainable by his attitude. He doesn't care about anything else than driving and almost never made mistakes due to pressure (Iceman). Besides who wouldn't like his comments in the last race?
The team was distracting him so he said what he thought. There's no act in anything he does. You either like it or don't but you can't deny his skill.Also to note at that time 4th or 5th best team meant something completely different than it means now as the gaps between teams was huge. This year both Sauber and Mercedes could be classified as capable of winning cars (even though technically Sauber hasn't won a race). Sauber in 2001 was nowhere near that.
You are correct that Kimi has never been the fastest qualifying driver. The reason he's so great is his race pace. Another thing is that to me it seemed in 2008 and start of 2009 like Ferrari actually did everything like Massa wanted. Once Massa was injured Kimi won with acar that hadn't received any upgrades in months and was supposed to be 1.5 seconds slower than the top teams.
Also try to understand that Kimim ade mistakes in the beginning of season simply because he hadn't driven a car like this in 2 years and it took time to get him comfortable with the car. There is a reason why almost every single driver fail after having a year or two break from driving F1.
I would also like to note that Grosjean is actually a really fast driver in terms of qualifying speed. He's just not as good driver in the races. Kovalainen kicked Hamilton's ass in qualis and Mclaren had to put him to lousy pit strategies to keep him behind Hamilton, still no one sees Hamilton as slow driver. There are countless examples like this you don't use as they affected to some drivers whose personalities you like.
It's just ridiculous to say that a driver didn't earn a championship they won or to say that they should've won some other time. F1 is a team sport and the best team (you need to have a good team behind you) usually wins. There are exceptions of course when a driver actually won the championship with a worse car than his rivals but so what? The drivers who won the championship in certain year deserved and earned the victory 100%.
And to add it's hilarious to see how you judge a car simply by who was driving it. Alonso's Renault was a piece of shit but Vettel's Red Bull is way better than the others. Next I think some of you will tell us that 2009 Räikkönen drove with the best car in the grid simply because the person hates Räikkönen and refuses to believe he's fast. YOU DON'T KNOW, there is no possible way for you to know which car was the best except for some very rare seasons because a car designed for one track can be horrible in another and the factors influencing how the race weekend goes has too many variables for you. Also the power differences change during the season so there's no absolutely best car.
And to add it's hilarious to see how you judge a car simply by who was driving it. Alonso's Renault was a piece of shit but Vettel's Red Bull is way better than the others. Next I think some of you will tell us that 2009 Räikkönen drove with the best car in the grid simply because the person hates Räikkönen and refuses to believe he's fast. YOU DON'T KNOW, there is no possible way for you to know which car was the best except for some very rare seasons because a car designed for one track can be horrible in another and the factors influencing how the race weekend goes has too many variables for you. Also the power differences change during the season so there's no absolutely best car.
It was for both forcing DiResta to grass and taking Grosjean out. (had it only been one infraction I think he would've only gotten DT)
I think your whole discussion about Vetter being great if he succeeds to overtake everyone in this track is ridiculous. First of all, this race is one of the hardest tracks to attempt an overtake, second overtaking is actually more about the car than the drivers because of DRS. Red Bull car has never had a good speed in straights compared to other teams which makes overtaking extremely hard. Remember last race? Kimi was 0.5-1 second behind Massa the entire race but couldn't do anything in straights because Massa's ferrari had 10km/h higher top speed.
Of course there are different measures to greatness but in my eyes overtaking is only a fraction of being great nowadays. Vettel is without a doubt with Hamilton (I personally believe Vettel is faster than Hamilton) the fastest driver in qualifying - when you need them to drive a perfect lap, they usually do.
Alonso is not that good in qualifying pace and has to overtake more (he's good at doing that though) but that's because he doesn't have the raw speed Hamilton and Vettel do. In race it's about consistence with speed and saving tires which Alonso probably does best of the three but if he starts from behind the two it's very hard for him to pass.
I don't know if you see my point but I'd rather be fastest in quali and keep my position during the race (that's what every driver wants) than be forced to start from behind and be forced to overtake a lot.
BTW, I've seen amazing passes from Vettel (against Alonso in Monza for example) that proves he's capable of overtaking. His car isn't designed to overtake but to win, that's why it's harder for them to overtake if needed. It's not about the driver it's about the car.
Also Red Bull are making changes to the car after (probably to gain better overtaking ability for it) which in my mind can be used against Vettel if he manages to overtake (assuming Red Bull can make the car very good in possible overtaking areas of the track)
With DRS implemented you actually don't need to even know how to overtake properly but in some tracks just press a button and if your car is faster you're past the opponent. How is overtaking ability from a driver important or a measure of greatness if you don't need it? Racing is about winning and winning only.
Of course there are different measures to greatness but in my eyes overtaking is only a fraction of being great nowadays. Vettel is without a doubt with Hamilton (I personally believe Vettel is faster than Hamilton) the fastest driver in qualifying - when you need them to drive a perfect lap, they usually do.
Alonso is not that good in qualifying pace and has to overtake more (he's good at doing that though) but that's because he doesn't have the raw speed Hamilton and Vettel do. In race it's about consistence with speed and saving tires which Alonso probably does best of the three but if he starts from behind the two it's very hard for him to pass.
I don't know if you see my point but I'd rather be fastest in quali and keep my position during the race (that's what every driver wants) than be forced to start from behind and be forced to overtake a lot.
BTW, I've seen amazing passes from Vettel (against Alonso in Monza for example) that proves he's capable of overtaking. His car isn't designed to overtake but to win, that's why it's harder for them to overtake if needed. It's not about the driver it's about the car.
Also Red Bull are making changes to the car after (probably to gain better overtaking ability for it) which in my mind can be used against Vettel if he manages to overtake (assuming Red Bull can make the car very good in possible overtaking areas of the track)
With DRS implemented you actually don't need to even know how to overtake properly but in some tracks just press a button and if your car is faster you're past the opponent. How is overtaking ability from a driver important or a measure of greatness if you don't need it? Racing is about winning and winning only.
I understood your point but unless you are saying Blueflame is correct (which I thought you did since you said he has a valid point) you bring nothing to the original argument.
Your point is valid, to a certain extent, but it doesn't change the fact that BlueFlame was wrong. And that 250% is simple math to show you how great this ''cultural difference'' of yours in basic human behavior would need to be for BlueFlame to be correct. If you have a problem with math or 250 is just too big number for you I'm sorry but I fail to see how numbers and facts bring anything else than credibility to this argument that has way too much personal opinions instead of facts.
First of all we are looking at differences in different Countries. Not totally different cultures since the countries compared were European. Yes, every country has it's own cultural quirks but that's it. The difference between countries in self perceivement can't be so huge that it would cause anything BlueFlame has suggested. Yes there are people who are racist and don't admit it but can you honestly say that for example because of social norms in Italy there would be at least twice as much people than Belgium lying in this quiz? The argument was that Italy was by far the most racist country in Europe which according to the survey is practically impossible.
For Italy to be even in top 3 in racism, they'd have to have more than 10 percentage units of the population more people who are racist but don't admit it than any of the top three countries. For Italy to surpass Belgium the difference would have to be 25 percentage units of population. So if there is 10% of Belgium people who lied, there'd have to be more than 35% Italian people who lied. 250% more. Sounds likely?
It's not that you don't have a valid point in theoretical aspect when you want to be 100% accurate but in this argument the odds of Italy being more racist than the other European countries are non-existent.
Of course some racist people may think that they are racist but what does it matter? We can assume that the percentage of racists who claim not to be ones is equal in every nation or at least very close to being equal.
On the other side you have a study that is relatively sound and on Blueflame's side you have nothing, just a troll trying to agitate.
If you haven't yet noticed, Blueflame is the troll of this forum with no valuable insights in any discussion. Not to mention that arguing with him is pointless since he honestly doesn't seem understand even simple arguments. Just ignore him.
Remember people: ''Don't feed the troll''
You do realize that being a good ''development driver'' doesn't have the same effect to the car than it had in late 90's? Nowdays driver feedback is a lot less important since you have all the possible telemetry you can imagine.
A driver has a voice in what parts feel good and in what direction they want the car to be developed. That's it. The biggest effect from a driver is seen in the first race of the year. (now compare schumacher's mercedes, 2009 Brawn and 2009 Merc)
Your Brawn example is so flawed that even you can see it but I'll still go over it. THEY HAD NO MONEY!
I agree that most of the good/bad development driver talk is crap but your explanations are completely wrong. Also having an experienced driver to tell you how the car should be is a lot more effective than having a new, inexperienced driver coming and telling you how the car should be.
That pretty much translates racing incident to common English.
I'm going to call the crash between Hamilton and Maldonado a pure racing incident. The thing is that first Hamilton pushed Maldonado out and then he gave some room that Maldonado thought Hamilton was giving him because he was entitled to room on the track. Just when Maldonado had got to the track Hamilton turned in and Maldonado couldn't react (partially because he was in the air after going over a curb). Had Hamilton either left room or shut the door completely this wouldn't have happened and had Maldonado let go (which he wasn't actually forced to) the acciden't wouldn't have happened either.
All ''what if's'' about walls being in the corner can be forgotten as there were no walls and had Hamilton pushed Maldonado to this imaginary wall, he'd be given huge penalties as they were side by side when he forced Maldonado out of the track. Also note that last year Vettel overtook Alonso in Monza having only 2 wheels on the track - I don't remember anyone yelling that it was cheating or wrong to race when you are pushed off the track.
The whole incident was stupid and pointless since had Maldonado given up he still would've passed Hamilton the next lap as Hamilton's tyres were completely dead. Neither of them would've benefitted from succeeding in the reckless attempt to pass or in at least as reckless defending.
Alonso drove a great race when comparing to his qualifying performance but the race performance is hardly even in his top 20 races. He benefited from Hamilton slowing the group down in the beginning and especially from the safety car - not to mention Vettel's and Grosjean's car failures. He wasn't faster than the others, just had some luck with how things played out. We've seen that Ferrari's fast so it's not like his car is slower than the others'. His overtakes showed why he's a world champion and one of the best drivers, if not the best, at the moment but that's it. Vettel reigned supreme the entire race until his car blew up and no one here is saying how great Vettel was. The guy pulled a perfect lap in the quali and owned every one else right until the car stopped working.
Very interesting race, corgratz to Alonso. I'm hoping a Lotus will still win a race this season even though this seemed like the best place to score a victory for them.
All ''what if's'' about walls being in the corner can be forgotten as there were no walls and had Hamilton pushed Maldonado to this imaginary wall, he'd be given huge penalties as they were side by side when he forced Maldonado out of the track. Also note that last year Vettel overtook Alonso in Monza having only 2 wheels on the track - I don't remember anyone yelling that it was cheating or wrong to race when you are pushed off the track.
The whole incident was stupid and pointless since had Maldonado given up he still would've passed Hamilton the next lap as Hamilton's tyres were completely dead. Neither of them would've benefitted from succeeding in the reckless attempt to pass or in at least as reckless defending.
Alonso drove a great race when comparing to his qualifying performance but the race performance is hardly even in his top 20 races. He benefited from Hamilton slowing the group down in the beginning and especially from the safety car - not to mention Vettel's and Grosjean's car failures. He wasn't faster than the others, just had some luck with how things played out. We've seen that Ferrari's fast so it's not like his car is slower than the others'. His overtakes showed why he's a world champion and one of the best drivers, if not the best, at the moment but that's it. Vettel reigned supreme the entire race until his car blew up and no one here is saying how great Vettel was. The guy pulled a perfect lap in the quali and owned every one else right until the car stopped working.
Very interesting race, corgratz to Alonso. I'm hoping a Lotus will still win a race this season even though this seemed like the best place to score a victory for them.
Sorry, guess I'm just bored. I'll put him in ignore list and end this nonsense
You didn't read what I said? IF they make up stories, they go out of business. They tell mostly about the negative stories but what they tell are fairly truthful. Most of it is truth and rest is somewhat true but distorted because of political or other reasons - but they don't lie to you, why would they, it's not worth the risk.
Tell me any case in which a piece of news was a lie told to attract readers.(something you can prove please, not something you find trouble believing)
Give me any example of something that is more credible way of receiving information than the news. Oh, and because 9/11 was published in news as well that must mean they are wrong and it never happened. I also doubt that there were any protests or changes in power in India or that Greece is in huge debt.
I suppose that next you'll claim there is no dictatorship, oppression or poverty in North Korea because that can be found in the news as well...dumbass
I don't know where you get your ''local news'', but my local news are 99% accurate about everything and the major news companies are fairly reliable as well. They do like to tell about catastrophes, oppression, and such but they don't make things up 'cause if they do and someone (rival, maybe) catches them, they're done.
Like...What?
Let me ask you something, were you in Bahrain?
You're claiming there was no security there (a hint, most of them would've been outside of the track to prevent any non-authorized access since the average people can't buy tickets)
You are comparing people who are being oppressed continuously to kids in London - have you no aspect of reality? Half of Bahraini Citizens are Suffering from Poverty and Poor Living Conditions. This is because of the governments actions. Bahrain is extremely rich, but the top elite only seek to oppress the lower people (If you'd get ten cents a day and didn't have a proper home I'd think you might protest as well when seeing the amounts of money they government throws at other things.
And the Force India case, how on earth can you say nothing happened? (source?) Did you see nothing happened or are you juset being an ****. Force India wasn't attacked, no one claimed they were - Hings said: "We were not the target. We just happened upon an incident that was ahead of us, a disruption in the road. Nobody was hurt from our team. We were not targeted directly by Molotov cocktails."
If one out of 12 teams gets few molotov coctails thrown at them by accident when travelling to the track (not that long journey) imagine the circumstances in the country. If few people were killed at your city, what is the chance you'd be there when it happens? The odds are minimal but that doesn't mean it didn't happen. In Bahrain, the odds seems to be quite high even though teams spend most of their time around the track (which was heavily guarded btw.) and the teams were never a target. People are protesting the government, why would they want to attack F1 teams?
I don't know if you are being ignorant or just plain stupid but please just think before you post. You sound like a 10-year old who doesn't seem to know what poverty or oppression means and think every place is just as happy as your safe home
DRS system nailed? Do you know how close you need to be to overtake someone in F1? I'll give you a hint, it's not one second. I can remember some basic rules from pre-DRS era that it was somewhere 0.3-0.4 seconds difference depending on the track that even allowed you to try to overtake. With DRS I'd guess it's somewhere in the 0.4 range at the moment. This means that the 0.4-1.0 difference is only giving an unfair advantage to the driver behind because they are just getting a free boost to their cars.
Also the fact that overtakes happen in other places than in DRS zones as well just tells you that DRS is useless because people can overtake without it in worse places. Imagine if we didn't have the DRS, We'd still see the most overtakes in the current DRS zones because they are the generally in the best places overtake.
DRS also becomes useless if there are many drivers because in the middle of the ''train'' everyone has DRS and it's of no use to them (other than keeping up with the ones in front)
Besides, betting stuck behind the slower cars was previously one very important factor in strategies and made the races interesting. Now nobody cares about where they end up because they can use DRS
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v ... vHh4gg&feature=relmfu
This is the Alonso sand Rosberg incident and it is nothing like Schumi-Barrichello.
Just watch where Alonso's nose is. At any point is Alonso's front wing even at the same level as Rosberg's rear tyres. Alonso is fully behind and chooses to go out like Hamilton did.
Had there been a wall nothing would've happened because Rosberg would not have hit Alonso due to the fact that Alonso was behind
I really can't figure out how you can think two completely different cases are exactly alike. Schumacher's move on Barrichello was too late and Barrichello was already almost alongside. In this case Alonso was nowhere near being alongside so why are we even discussing about this?
http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/99102
''The stewards looked into the matter and decided that because Rosberg had moved to the right to defend his position in a 'constant and continuous straight line manner' and because Hamilton was not alongside Rosberg as he began that move that the German did nothing wrong.''
''Rosberg was cleared for his incident with Alonso for the same reasons.''
''The stewards looked into the matter and decided that because Rosberg had moved to the right to defend his position in a 'constant and continuous straight line manner' and because Hamilton was not alongside Rosberg as he began that move that the German did nothing wrong.''
''Rosberg was cleared for his incident with Alonso for the same reasons.''
Oh, I didn't know that. Unless you can find a finnish proxy I suppose we'll just have to wait 'till someone posts a video in youtube.
This season is looking fairly interesting so far. Did anyone else notice that the top 3 drivers in the driver's championship are within 5 points and top 7 are within 19 points (Räikkönen is 7th!). Anything can happen amongst those top 7 drivers.
The first move Rosberg did to Hamilton was 100% clean. He chose a line to the far right and was ahead of Hamilton during the complete move. Hamilton was behind until he jumped to the sand and somehow passed Rosberg from there - a brilliant move from him btw.
It's the same as if I was driving the far right all along and you for no apparent reason jumped off the track from the right side. Your call, you pay if it doesn't work out and you gain if it works out but you were not forced to go outside thus it's not my responsibility.
Just watch a replay and you'll see. http://www.mtv3.fi/urheilu/f1/ ... i-hamiltonin-ulos-radalta (the upper one of the videos)
True, but F1 is supposed to be the pinnacle of motorsport and at the moment the tires provied by Pirelli are (my opinion) not at that level. I don't even remember Pirelli addressing the problems with the marbles which is probably the most frustrating thing since I have no idea if they are trying to fix the tires or even if they have an idea that the marbles are a problem.
FGED GREDG RDFGDR GSFDG