The above supports my belief that it was Rosberg's first trip across the chicane - not his second - which really affected the result of the race. When Rosberg took his first trip across the chicane, Hamilton was still busy fighting Massa, and both were at least 4 seconds behind Rosberg - an extremely comfortable cushion - as a result of Magnussen's brief yet spirited defence of his position. The result of Rosberg's lock-up was that that gap got immediately cut in half, which was critical when Hamilton then found his way past Massa shortly afterwards. It was critical because it allowed Hamilton to start putting pressure on Rosberg, a tenth here, a couple of tenths here. Rosberg, from an extremely comfortable position, had ended up putting himself under pressure. And you could tell - his call over the radio was frantic: "Don't tell me the gap!" I don't think Hamilton would have managed to get within DRS range before the pitstop even if he hadn't hit traffic, or made an error, and lost half a second to Rosberg. (If you watch the official timings, the gap suddenly went from 1.1 seconds to 1.7 - no idea why, but probably Ericsson's fault) But the net result was that Rosberg could now see his team-mate in his mirrors, inexorably getting closer, for half of his first stint. And the more immediate result was that, when their pitstops were done, Hamilton was still within two seconds of Rosberg - and, once his tyres were up to temperature, he was gaining again, and could realistically think about overtaking Rosberg - a luxury he had not had before. The second trip across the chicane, for me, simply gave Hamilton an easy opportunity to get past Rosberg - something which, to be perfectly honest, looked likely to happen anyway given their respective pace. But the first mistake Rosberg made showed that he may not be as comfortable in the current pressure as he has tried to seem - and that will make Hamilton very happy indeed.
Someone claims to have translated the Italian conversation before the podiums. Note: I cannot vouch for this translation, but thought it worth posting here: At least he admits he was lucky before!
I've assumed that if it was anything noteworthy then it would have been flagged up by now :s You peaked my interest and found several random sources saying much the same Referring to Lewis. But he says "He had a big f**ing luck". How the f** is it possible?" The Mercedes guy says "You need luck in life. You had it as well" and Nico responds "I've had(luck) as well, but damn" Than he goes to Massa and says "I didn't think you were so far behind" and Massa says "Me neither, but when I noticed you guys going even further I decided to save the car To end on a happier tone, Ricciardo squeezing through, please log in to view this image
I dunno guys. Both of his recent penalties have been quite harsh. I want racing to be encouraged, not penalized. He could be even more dangerous if he's doing too much thinking during a move rather than using his instinct. I think even Bottas is unsure if it was really punishable. It's not like he's Maldonadoing his way through Let's just have a look at this piece of vintage F1 footage and imagine how many penalties would be applied today. (ignore the slight speed up of the video) [video=youtube;I-JBDGWZsMY]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-JBDGWZsMY[/video] Watching Magnussen pull what I feel is a completely legitimate move and then being penalized for it just leaves a sour taste in my mouth. It means we'll not be blessed with this kind of dog fight ever again. That makes me incredibly sad.
I know there's the safety aspect to take in to consideration, I know it's different times... But if you can't defend and you can't muscle by anymore, what's the point? And that's a genuine question. I just don't know if there is any point in watching racing if a driver has to yeild or a driver can't force his opponent to get out of a corner. To me it's just not motor racing. I know I'm getting old and slowly turning in to a bit of a dinosaur, but there has to be some spectacle to it. Otherwise it's just cars going around in a very controlled environment.
I certainly think Magnussen is generally getting harshly treated, it is starting to feel like whenever there's any doubt, he gets a penalty anyway. There are other drivers who are doing similar and indeed worse every race who get nothing! Was his move really any worse than some of Buttons defence against Perez, for example? Hamilton has done much "worse" ( i say "worse" because even then i see it as fair) against Rosberg this season, no penalties there. Alonso has made a career out of that kind of defence. It is hard but fair racing. Going back to Germany, when he was penalised for the Massa accident (which i still say was a racing incident, arguably more Massas fault if anything given KMag was left nowhere to go), if that was an incident worthy of a penalty, Rosbergs on Hamilton at Belgium 100% was too, but that gets seen as a racing incident. And penalty points... he has 4, in what way has he been worse than Gutierrez (who has 0) and several dopey crashes (some penalised, he has 7 penalties, 4 in race) to his name? As for moving under breaking, quite a few do it, Massa is guilty for it, Alonso, Perez, Vettel, Rosberg and Hamilton have all done it more than once this season.
It's exactly the question that people should be asking. I genuinely fear for the sport. When Fernando Alonso comes out and says this has been a tough year for the sport because the cars are heavy, slow, and quiet, we should stand and take notice. He has the most to gain in this environment as Ferrari *should* be suited to an engine formula. Yet he cannot stand it. With penalties for drivers fighting for position and in a world of DRS amd other overtake buttons, the driver is becoming less relevant. There is a wonderful quote in the Senna movie regarding his thoughts on active suspension, and the great man said it takes away the driver from a Drivers Championship. Something needs to be done to prevent what is essentially a corporate takeover of the sport. It is no longer ran for the benefit of motorsport or competition, it is done to make money for itself and for big companies and their roadcars. I find it hard to watch most weekends now. It may be some years before F1 gets its noise back too, given the amount of $$$ invested in these power units.
I'm still going to maintain... Magnussen broke the rules. Going round the outside at turn 1 was precisely how he got past Bottas in the first place. His nose was behind at both braking point and apex - he didn't have a right to the racing line. With a bit more experience, he'd probably have played the long game, and tried cutting back from deep and having a run at Bottas into the chicane. Was it marginal? Yes. I have seen worse moves escape punishment, a problem I attribute to inconsistent stewards. Do I think he's been unfairly treated? Perhaps - I already said I think Massa was mostly to blame for their crash in Germany and Magnussen getting punished was ridiculous. I can't comment on Belgium because it was never made clear which incident they were investigating. Was it worthy of a drive-through? No. I'm glad we have the five-second penalties for minor infractions now, and I'm glad he still got a well-deserved point. I want Magnussen to come good. I think in terms of raw pace he's a top driver, and he deserves to have a shot at a WDC. I certainly don't think he's arrogant on the same level as Maldonado or clumsy on the same level as early Grosjean. I think he just needs to be aware that he's not in GP2 any more. Hamilton took a while himself to let cooler heads prevail, and even then we had the string of Massa crashes in 2011. And Magnussen has been unlucky to end up involved in crashes every time he's found himself in a good position. But Perez , the same Perez who got punished for his crash earlier this year, Perez who was barely a step up above Grosjean and Maldonado a couple of years ago, managed to have a perfectly legitimate, and very entertaining, dogfight with Button. We had several moves in Hungary between Hamilton and Rosberg that were barely questioned. We had Ricciardo's "feint" in the braking zone and his outrageously late braking - both of which, I'd add, were a good thing. In fact, I'd say this season has been a greatt season for out and out racing, especially since the peeling back of the regulations surrounding racing incidents, which I really hope sticks. The topic comes up every couple of months but no, I don't think F1 is becoming sanitised. Mostly because many of the things people complain about - pay drivers, sponsorship, inconsistent stewards - have been around since before I was born. I don't want it to become a procession but I don't think we're in as much danger as people would have you believe.
I thought the Mag penalty was harsh although I dont like the very late defence into a braking zone at 225 MPH and then a squeeze back to the racing line - I do think it was pushing his luck as he did this a number of times. What I dont understand is if he recieved a penalty for the incident with Bottas then I struggle to understand why the Perez/Button battle was not even investigated - for me either Button forced Perez off or Perez gained an adavantage by leaving the track and then having the inside line for the next corner. As always there seems to be a lack of consistency with these things which makes me think that the Bottas incident was probably the final straw in number of boarder line defensive moves - as percieved by the stewards.
Oh I don't think it's a "the sky is falling" type situation right now, but what we have is a young hard racer seemingly have the hard part squeezed out of him for really no valid reason. Stewards should be stepping in for clearly idiotic or dangerous driving that really crosses the line imo. Mostly they have let racing happen, which I'm grateful for. But I'm not sure why some incidents are even referred to the steward when other "head up your arse" moves go totally unnoticed.
please log in to view this image Disappointed they didn't rename Ascari after the Canamasas incident this weekend. "La variante opzionale Ascari" was the best suggestion I've seen, and "Curva di Playstation" wasn't far behind.
well I watched the video you put up, but didn't see someone make any ridiculously late defences, neither did I see them make a defence that pushed the other driver off the track, both drivers left space, so I fail to see why you're comparing them, Magnussen made a late defence which ended with him purposefully driving straight across the 2nd part of the chicane with his inside wheels over the line and, unsurprisingly, hit the person challenging him. Clumsy and overly aggressive, I'm pretty sure you would be screaming at the PS if someone did something similar online.
Yep agreed. Some drivers hit others all the way through the race and get unpunished because it was a great comeback... It depends on whether the driver has a huge fanbase or not really mate. Nothing else.
I wasn't comparing them, I was merely saying that if we squeeze the racing out of drivers by punishing hard racing, displays that will likely never be seen again. There's about 3 or 4 potential penalties in there these days and people would be debating it for weeks rather than just soaking up the spectacle that they just witnessed. Once upon a time, the senior drivers would put the newcomers in their place with some hard moves of their own. But even that would be frowned upon now. It's now controlled from a box, but sometimes inconsistently because of changing stewards. I saw Magnussen's move as a hard racing move (though the kerb didn't help him out) that we could have easily seen Senna or Schumacher pull in the past. Yes I know they got their fair share of hand slapping too, but it's drivers like that who make the sport the spectacle it should be. I know you and many others don't agree (nor do I ecpect you to), it's just my point of view. I'd have been happy to see Bottas come back and stick a similar move on Magnussen.
The Villenueve/Arnoux fight was not proper racing, it was banger racing. If you allowed that to continue then someone would get very badly hurt. It is a legendary few laps, but very extreme. No one wants to 'stop' racing, buy young Mag has been making his McLaren a bit wider than is allowed. You can get away with every so often, but two races on the trot he has overflexed his muscles defending a position. The penalties he got were for forcing other drivers off the track, not holding his racing line or defending going into a corner. No problem with his robust defense, but there is a line. If the Bottas (ITA) and Alonso (BEL) incidents were in isolation, then I'm not sure if he would have got a penalty, but I imagine there was some totting up going on in the stewards office concerning some of the other moves he was making, some of which were borderline, but on their own not worthy of any penalty, but maybe a quiet word in the office afterwards about general driving standards and what is and isn't acceptable. Ron Dennis has come out to say he hopes Mag does not change his style, neither do I, I like the fact he actually puts up a fight, but there are still limits which he can't cross too many times.
