I think it's a maturity thing with Hamilton. He hasn't had much time to experience what it's like to be at the back of the grid, even those few races in 2009 his car wasn't nearly as bad as he implied (and he had the advantage of KERS). Drivers like Alonso, Button and Webber know what it's like to drive in the slowest cars, in midfield cars and competitive cars. They have the experience and Lewis doesn't.
The stewards have said it was a racing incident, Webber has said it was a racing incident. The contact with Button, the stewards have decided it was a racing incident, Button/Hamilton both said it was a racing incident. Button has even spoke out defending Hamilton http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/formula_one/13755503.stm Some people just want to be negative all the time, get over it. OK some of Hamilton's passes are aggressive and should be punished, but not all are. Now if he so much as goes within an inch of another driver everyone jumps on the bandwagon and starts slating him.
I think the Hamilton/Button incident has certainly displaced the view that their good relationship is not genuine.
Could you imagine the furore it would've cause if cars 3 & 4 had been replaced with 1 & 2 respectively?
An excellent contribution fevriul, if I may say so. And welcome to the forum. This post sums up the incident nicely and also validates the need for the Stewards to study the data before handing out penalties. It also validates them being involved, just as modern football needs referees and assistants. (When the game was invented, referees didn't exist). It is clear that the Stewards have taken proper account of the data and that it was a 'racing incident' - i.e. one in which neither driver is considered more responsible for it. This should be the end of recriminations and we should all move forward. And yes, Niki Lauda, that includes you mate!
Jenson Button defends McLaren team-mate Lewis Hamilton This may have been posted already but there we go. Come on, Mclaren 1,2 in Valencia. They can do it
Well, this is a newspaper so we can expect them to have twisted Lauda's words, and I have a lot of respect for Lauda because he was a great driver. Apparently he's had a dig at Schumacher as well according to the Mail on Sunday. So for that reason I would expect none of this to be true. The incident was a racing incident, that's all I have to say. The FIA and the stewards are stopping drivers from making risky moves, which is the whole point of overtaking. It's much more exciting when drivers clip each other when trying to overtake and end up drifting round the entire corner only to carry as normal, like the Senna/Mansell era .If they get it wrong and don't affect the other driver, why should they be punished?
I agree with most of that except that the FIA are stopping drivers from making risky moves. Nobody was penalised for the Hamilton/Button or Alonso/Button incidents. To me that encourages overtaking attempts, at least in those kinds of circumstances. Whether Hamilton would have been punished for his incident with Webber will remain unknown because the stewards abandoned the investigation when Hamilton went out, which surely indicates that the worst they thought it might have deserved is a drive through (which they can convert to a 20-second time penalty).
well fevril, you are entitled to your opinion, but the whole watching world saw that hamilton hadn't got passed and because of the slippery conditions, that he misjudged, he hit Webber, in the back, not the place someone in front on the inside could possibly hit. He is a poor decision maker, if he wasn't he wouldn't crash so much.
Good point, but what gets me is that they say they are 'investigating incidents' for no apparent reason. It's just time wasting, and diverts their attention to the events that actually matter. And their consistency is dreadful. What happened about how di Resta was taken out? And his penalty was unnecessary anyway. Heidfeld got away unharmed, and di Resta had his punishment by having to pit in, and they still gave him a penalty. He did extremely well to get to where he did though after his penalty......
Yes, absolutely. Worse, by opening an investigation they're automatically creating a controversy (which is, of course, the objective - there's no such thing as bad publicity). Hamilton was the subject of four investigations yesterday. Two were dropped and the others exonerated him. I know they need to show that they're taking incidents seriously but surely some of yesterday's incidents could have been resolved by private discussion rather than announcing that they're holding an official stewards' investigation? If they made no comment on such incidents then there'd be no controversy.
David Coulthard yet again comes to Lewis' defence (no insult intended) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/mo...-Lauda-is-wrong-to-say-he-is-a-liability.html I honestly can’t remember ever witnessing anything quite like we saw on Sunday. It was utterly surreal. Probably the toughest race I’ve ever participated in and I was only talking on the BBC. But Lewis is box office and when you have someone of the stature of Niki Lauda, a triple world champion, saying that he could “kill someone” with his driving, then I can understand why it’s a story. The first thing I want to stress is that Niki raced in an era when deaths were commonplace. Niki himself was read his last rites after a horrific crash at the Nürburgring in 1976. So if anyone is qualified to comment in the way he did then it is him. What I would say, however, is that the world moves on. When Niki was racing in the 1970s, drivers would frequently give each other a full car’s width when racing so as to minimise the possibility of a potentially fatal incident. Drivers these days are giving each other a cigarette paper’s width. Accidents will happen. With that in mind, let’s look at the incidents on Sunday to try to establish whether Lewis was in any way ‘reckless’. And bear in mind, too, that I am basing my judgements on the world feed which we get up in the commentary booth, not on the multiple camera angles and replays available to the stewards. Lewis’s first collision was with Mark Webber’s Red Bull almost immediately after the safety car came in at the end of lap four. He took a bit of a gamble going up the inside, slid ever so slightly going over the kerb and out-braked himself. Mark, who had generously given him room, at this point came back onto the apex, as he was entitled to do, and their cars touched. If anything I would veer towards blaming Lewis, simply because — as is the case on any road — it is more the responsibility of the chasing car to make a safe overtaking manoeuvre as he has the better field of vision. But the stewards called it a ‘racing incident’ and I’m happy with that decision. Next up was Lewis’s attempted pass on Michael Schumacher at the hairpin, when he ran wide and was overtaken by Jenson. In my view Michael was at fault for this one. The rules are clear; you pick a line when approaching the braking zone and stay on it. Michael chose his but then moved fractionally to the left, forcing Lewis wider than he would have liked. Lastly, and most controversially, the collision with Jenson on lap eight. Again, on the same basis as before, I would veer towards blaming Lewis as the chasing car. If you don’t get your front wheels right up alongside the other driver’s cockpit, with his limited field of vision through the ‘letterbox’ of his helmet, there is always a fair chance he won’t see you. The wing mirrors do not angle out sideways so there is a substantial blind spot. When conditions are as they were on Sunday, the risk of not being seen is redoubled. To cut a long story short: Lewis had the run on Jenson, was entitled to try the move, but didn’t get up alongside him enough hence should have backed off. The stewards, with their replays and camera angles, felt it was a ‘racing incident’. And who am I to argue? I don’t profess to know what is on Lewis’s mind or why he is getting into so many scrapes. It is the subject for a whole different column. I see he has been linked again with Red Bull. Maybe a move away from McLaren is something he needs after literally growing up there over the last decade — a bit like when the kids finally move out — and drop the emotional baggage (both good and bad) which inevitably grows in every relationship. Who knows? I hasten to add I have no inside knowledge here but he does seem a bit distracted at present, certainly in contrast to his main rivals. But do I think Lewis is a liability to other drivers? Not for one minute. This could also be a reason why Vettel doesn't overtake much, he knows he's got a 50-50 chance getting a drivethrough and will actually lose places. When he loses a place he adapts his strategy and trys to outlast them on the same tyres. Vettel's not scared of overtaking, but getting punished as much as Lewis.
What on the race track? If Hamilton sees a gap he goes for it, whereas most drivers wait for the space of a bus before they make a move. By doing that, they, and the driver they are overtaking remain on the track to carry on racing.
Welcome to the forum Inertia. It says you joined in Feb so your not a full newbie, good to have you posting
