I dont dispute any of your points and I cant prove either way what the hypathetical outcome could/would have been - its a matter of opinion/perception. However, my underlying point is that RB were never going to put Vettel in the position of having to pass Webber. There is the obvious argument that as a team they could make that decission (and why not?), but if they wanted to give Webber a fair shot then putting him behind 2 cars on track wasnt the way to do it. Vettle completed 23 laps on his hard tyres against the 14 laps Webber did in the same stint which seemed awfully short considering Webber was already 3 laps shorter on his first stint. Grosjean did 24 laps as did others and DiR managed 27 in his final stint. Webber had only completed 17 Laps prior to his final stint and his race pace at the time was ok and he had a 15 sec lead with 11 laps to go (This would have been shorter had they streched the previous stint of 14 laps). The question for me is "IF" Vettel had been out of the race would they have pitted Webber or would they have left him out with track position, a 15 second lead and with a futher 20 odd seconds back to the next car requiring him to complete 28 laps? I dont know the answer and it would probably have been a tall order, but the fact remains that the 2nd stint was unneccessarily short (even for a 3 stop) and effectively removed the option of reducing his hypathetical final stint from 28 laps to circa 23-25 laps with track position and less fuel - hardly an out off this world thought. Anyway, just my thoughts. "Webber left the pits on a set of hard tyres with 42 laps remaining. He would have needed to do two stints averaging 21 laps each to make it to the end of the race. Vettel was able to manage a 23-lap stint on hards which indicates Webber could have handled this, even taking into account how he was punishing his tyres more severely than Vettel. Whether he could have done so and been quick enough to pressurise Grosjean is a matter of conjecture." "Least Surprising: Vettel's win, very much enhanced by getting the obvious strategy and making it work. I've read (and heard) some interesting verdicts on Webber's three stopper. To be frank, I was surprised how early his first stop was – and then even more surprised by his short second stint, although it's possible he took more out of those tyres over the course of the weekend. During the race, his only fresh tyres were his last set of Options. Even so, I still have a raised eyebrow at what actually happened."
I've got a delightful comment on my rep "Neg rep for being a...", which has a little grey 'neutral' next to it, and is from someone heavily in the red on rep, so I presume it is indeed neg rep from someone without rep to give/take.
Interesting stat, if we were still on a 10-points for a win system, Vettel would have already won the championship: please log in to view this image
What the hell has happened to Mercedes!? Anyone who thinks the change in tyres hasn't helped Red Bull just need to look at that chart! McLaren 6 points
According to Dhel it's nothing to do with the tyres, it's RBR's invisible and undetectable TC system.
Why has Alonso got 0 points in Canada and Kimi has 6? Surely it's the other way and the title wouldnt have been won.
McLaren need to sort it out and scrore more points or it could be their worst season since '67. Shocking.
I'm suspicious tbh, their DRS seemed very negligable, I'm deciding whether to put some money on them for WDC/WCC next year.
I think you are misinterpreting me Miggs. They tyre change was a big impact but the secret smart traction control..illegal or legal... Had the biggest effect. Just wait until other teams bring the same technology and you will see Mr Horner running up and down Jumping up and down shouting illegal to FIA
http://www1.skysports.com/f1/news/22058/8973076/reflecting-on-suzuka "Reflecting after the race few felt that in reality he would have had significantly greater speed or tyre life to steal the victory. Privately, Mark was less sure about the three stopper being necessary than the press releases suggest." (Brundle)
Webber heavily handicapped in Japan TJ13 has come to learn that Mark Webber was in fact significantly handicapped for the Japanese GP weekend – and this time it was neither by design or intention from the team. Following the inferno and fire truck debacle in Korea, Mark’s chassis was impossible to refurbish before the he had to be back on track just a few days later. Factor’s such as time, logistics and merely that we are in the twilight of this year’s racing season prevented Red Bull from providing their Aussie driver with a new chassis. Red Bull did confirm that the chassis Mark would use was heavier than the one Sebastian would be using for the Japanese weekend. What wasn’t revealed was how much heavier the old chassis weighed in at. TJ13 believes it was at just over 22kg heavier than the one Vettel was using and the reasons for this are simple. Firstly it was an older iteration of design from earlier this year. Then, when a chassis gets damaged throughout the year, running repairs are done that usually render the chassis ‘not optimum’ and heavier. A chassis may be repaired a number of times a year and this process each time adds weight which in turn can affect rigidity slightly which also alters the handling characteristics. In Suzuka,this year, the cost in lap time for every extra 10kg of fuel was estimated by analysts to be around 0.4 seconds per lap. This just gives a little more context to the quality of the drive the outgoing Red Bull Australian driver delivered on his way to an excellent 2nd place finish.
Wow thanks Forza, I presumed he had a brand new lighter chassis not a heavy old referb. Kudos to mark for getting that to a pole position too!
