The Official German GP Thread 2014 *******Spoilers*****

[BritishRacinGrin]

Hungrymc said:

But you're missing the point that he was in too hot and was trying to give room to Kimi, the mistake was getting there in the first place. Once there, he had to try and minimise the damage by treading a very fine line of steering input and releasing the brakes while not running deeper or wider and thus having a certain accident. What he did was stray slightly the wrong side of that very fine line.

Do you not think I knew already, I watched it too

Hungrymc said:

As for grip circles, do you really think the Hamilton doesn't understand the issues of braking or accelerating while asking the tyres to deliver lateral force? Are you serious? Do you throw the same accusation every time someone loses the back under power?

'do you really think that you know better than Lewis Hamilton? are you serious???'

I love it when people come out with stuff like this. I am not allowed to criticise in any way because I am not an F1 driver. The fact is it was a mistake, it resulted in a collision, and it was clumsy. It is not often that we see F1 drivers applying steering lock while the front tyres are locked solid because it is going to be fractionally harder to unlock the wheels if they aren't pointing in a straight line.

[longblackcoat]

BritishRacinGrin said:

I love it when people come out with stuff like this. I am not allowed to criticise in any way because I am not an F1 driver. The fact is it was a mistake, it resulted in a collision, and it was clumsy. It is not often that we see F1 drivers applying steering lock while the front tyres are locked solid because it is going to be fractionally harder to unlock the wheels if they aren't pointing in a straight line.

I love it when people say "the fact is" and then come out with opinions, rather than facts.

[BritishRacinGrin]

Which of the following statements do you believe are not factual?

• it was a mistake
• it resulted in a collision
• it was clumsy

[Sexual Chocolate]

Its funny isn't it, how many sports people at the top of their game get lucky, a lot. I think it was Lee Travino that once said "The more I practice, the luckier I get."

Anyway, what a great race with some superb overtaking moves by most all the top drivers and some great battles all the way through the race. Would have been interesting if the SC was deployed when Sutil span his car. Who knows, maybe Lewis could have caught and overtaken Nico.

[VolvoT5]

longblackcoat said:

BritishRacinGrin said:

I love it when people come out with stuff like this. I am not allowed to criticise in any way because I am not an F1 driver. The fact is it was a mistake, it resulted in a collision, and it was clumsy. It is not often that we see F1 drivers applying steering lock while the front tyres are locked solid because it is going to be fractionally harder to unlock the wheels if they aren't pointing in a straight line.

I love it when people say "the fact is" and then come out with opinions, rather than facts.

So you don't agree it is a 'fact' that it was a mistake resulting in a collision? You think he actually intended to collide with the other car then? Seems like an odd strategy to me.

[IainT]

Vaud said:

Indeed.

I'm impartial these days. No favourite driver, no tribalism. I am delighted to watch Alonso extract 100% from a dog of a car, I love to see Lewis put a bit too much front wing at risk, I love the Williams revival, Marussia points from the back, etc.

The last incident though was a bit odd, but I think it was badly managed rather than conspiracy. The marshalls running across the circuit should be replaced, following instructions or initiative...

I'm not impartial - I like Hamilton and want to see him win. I see the SC decision as odd (not putting it out) but I think it's simply a poor decision not some conspiracy.

I think Hamilton would have passed Bottas if we had the SC after a few laps before the super-softs lost the edge and probably got close to Nico but not with enough tyre-life left to make a pass.

In the grand scheme of things it'd have made 3 points difference which might be significant come the end of season but I suspect not.

[matt3001]

Some pictures I took whilst sitting at T1 which show the Massa crash develop.

Edited by matt3001 on Tuesday 22 July 11:33

[zac510]

IainT said:

I'm not impartial - I like Hamilton and want to see him win. I see the SC decision as odd (not putting it out) but I think it's simply a poor decision not some conspiracy.

It must be pretty difficult decision to make; if you put out the safety car then it's called a conspiracy to bunch up the field and contrive the finish, if you don't put out the safety car then it's a conspiracy to preserve the German driver's lead!

[P-Jay]

zac510 said:

IainT said:

I'm not impartial - I like Hamilton and want to see him win. I see the SC decision as odd (not putting it out) but I think it's simply a poor decision not some conspiracy.

It must be pretty difficult decision to make; if you put out the safety car then it's called a conspiracy to bunch up the field and contrive the finish, if you don't put out the safety car then it's a conspiracy to preserve the German driver's lead!

I'd like to think Charlie is above all that and just "calls it as he sees it" but I don't think he's above being lead for the good of show - for instance his recent ruling on FRIC - most, if not all teams use it, have done for a while - but as Mercedes was seen to be the best system banning it bunched the grid again.

[sandman77]

matt3001 said:

Some pictures I took whilst sitting at T1 which show the Massa crash develop.

Edited by matt3001 on Tuesday 22 July 11:33

Great pictures. Thanks for sharing. What camera were you using?

[matt3001]

Thanks.

Canon 600D and a 55-250 kit lens

[rdjohn]

Sorry if this has been mentioned elsewhere in the previous 30 pages.

I keep having a feeling that Merc. played a very bad strategy with Lewis after the collision with JB, but all the comment here seems to be about the SC call by Charlie.

I think Lewis queried if he should come in for a new nose at the 2nd stop. Merc left him out and eventually opted for 3 stops. SKY reckoned that he would loose an extra 12 seconds for the new nose. Whereas the 3rd pit stop cost him more like 23s.

I appreciate the irony of 20/20 hindsight, but did anyone else think Merc goofed, at the time? I appreciate that they have the data and strategists, but it still seems to have been a bad decision.

[Mikey G]

I think his strategy was compromised from the bump from then on, tyre wear may have increased due to a little more understeer. If he pit earlier for a nose he would still have had to go 3 stops anyway as the super softs he would have had to put on would not have lasted the 26 lap stint even with a new nose.

[toppstuff]

sandman77 said:

matt3001 said:

Some pictures I took whilst sitting at T1 which show the Massa crash develop.

Edited by matt3001 on Tuesday 22 July 11:33

Great pictures. Thanks for sharing. What camera were you using?

I read that Massa is still blaming Magnussen for the incident.

He really is a daft plum. It was at worst a racing incident ( which was the stewards view ) but I think that if any blame is to be apportioned it is to Massa.

He's turning into Captain Calamity.

[London424]

rdjohn said:

Sorry if this has been mentioned elsewhere in the previous 30 pages.

I keep having a feeling that Merc. played a very bad strategy with Lewis after the collision with JB, but all the comment here seems to be about the SC call by Charlie.

I think Lewis queried if he should come in for a new nose at the 2nd stop. Merc left him out and eventually opted for 3 stops. SKY reckoned that he would loose an extra 12 seconds for the new nose. Whereas the 3rd pit stop cost him more like 23s.

I appreciate the irony of 20/20 hindsight, but did anyone else think Merc goofed, at the time? I appreciate that they have the data and strategists, but it still seems to have been a bad decision.

Not at all...the way I saw it was that it was too early to pit when the accident happened, but, the damaged wing meant the Softs didn't last as long as hoped.

So, pitting and changing to the Super Soft AND a new wing would add on 12 seconds when they would have to run two lots of Super Soft to finish the race anyway.

The only thing they got 'wrong' was the guess/hope/decision around the safety car, but even then you could argue they did the correct thing anyway as if the safety car came out and they didn't pit they still needed to make another stop within a few laps and Hamilton would likely have been right at/near the back with no hope of coming in the top 3.

[IainT]

London424 said:

but even then you could argue they did the correct thing anyway as if the safety car came out and they didn't pit they still needed to make another stop within a few laps and Hamilton would likely have been right at/near the back with no hope of coming in the top 3.

I hadn't really appreciated that point - you're spot on. Under those circumstances they had no option but to pit.

[Dave_newcastle]

London424 said:

....and they didn't pit they still needed to make another stop within a few laps and Hamilton would likely have been right at/near the back with no hope of coming in the top 3.

Good point - if they had pitted under a safety car they would have lost out to everyone who had tyres to last to the end of the race. So it was a good call to pull him in asap and before a safety car was called. They knew they had a chance of passing Bottas if the safety car wasn't called (the pass wasn't to be) and if the safety car had been called he would have been on new tyres and closer in terms of track distance to both Bottas and Rosberg, both who were on older tyres. Perhaps pitting when they did was a gamble of a near certain second for a significant upside chance of first?

[Scuffers]

ash73 said:

Dave_newcastle said:

Perhaps pitting when they did was a gamble of a near certain second for a significant upside chance of first?

It wasn't a gamble at all; no safety car was an outlier. But I think it was the right result overall, Lewis didn't deserve a victory after banging wheels with Jenson and Kimi, imho.

How would people react if Massa or Maldonado had locked up like that...?

the difference is that he did not take anybody out.

Jenson was in part, his own fault (he should have seen it coming and either shut the door or not turned in), and kimi was just as much into the move as lewis was.

it's called racing, you don't wait for the written invite...

[Dave_newcastle]

ash73 said:

It wasn't a gamble at all; no safety car was an outlier.

I agree with you - I was wrong to use the word gamble. I think that the LH team had no choice but to pit then because there was a chance that the safety car would be called out.

To not have pitted in the circumstance they found themselves in would have been the mistake. My reasoning:

If Lewis had stayed out with the aim of equalise the time on his last two set of tyres (and finishing second) and then the safety car had been deployed he would have been knackered.

He would then have had to pit under the safety car (or after it had been recalled) and rejoined and finished further down the field than even 3rd. Because every car that had tyres to last the race would have remained out on track behind the safety car and thereafter to the end of the race and Lewis would have had to pass as many of those as he could in the laps remaining.

All he could possibly lose out by pitting when he did was 3rd v 2nd and even then he had a chance to recover second as we saw.

The possible gain of pitting when he did was a possible first and avoiding the potential minor points placing or worst.

[THX]

Just as well everyone contributing to this thread are proven st hot racing drivers, capable of navigating a Formula 1 car through 60 laps whilst managing the tyres and fighting through traffic...

Otherwise you'd think it full of gobstes.