Your Reject of the Race - Abu Dhabi!

[Salamander]

Trulli takes it for me. Starts the weekend by continuing to shoot his mouth off about the Sutil incident from Brazil, which was just pure idiocy. Winds up behind his rookie teammate during the race, who started 6 positions behind him. IIRC, he was about 3 or 4 seconds behind with a few laps to go, and then winds up finishing 6 seconds behind. I wouldn't count him out of F1 just yet, but I certainly won't be surprised if he doesn't return.

[Jack O Malley]

I doubt Life or Scuderia Italia drivers ever entered the Ferrari pit by mistake.

I'm laughing quite loud

Algersuari & Renault, for already said reasons.

[Yannick]

So the race on the over-hyped new Yas Marina Circuit is run, and the big question is if it has lived up to the hype.
I would say: not quite, because when it is more interesting for the TV camera to gaze into the sundown or to show the retired Whamilton talking to one of the resident Sheiks than what's actually happening on track, something must be wrong.
Still, there were several good battles going on during the race - even the rare occasion of one in the top positions leading towards the finish line. Tilke and his bureau are lucky to get away without the award this time, after all the borefest locations they have provided us with in the meantime, especially Valencia and Shanghai. But maybe Bernie wants it that way because, as cynics would say, when there is too much action on track, there is no timeframe to screen a commercial break.

But now, let's focus on other contestants for the award:
On the same island as the track, there is the Ferrari World theme park being built. Ferrari themselves, though, were pretty anonymous in this race. Not as anonymous as Renault, though, where Alonso seemed not properly motivated after yesterday's qualifying performance, or lack thereof.
The two points in the race when the Ferraris appeared on screen were when the team switched Raikkonen to a one-stopper and when Fisi got his penalty for pitlane speeding. All of that allows us now to see Luca Badoer's performances in a different light. Clearly, Ferrari was not where they wanted to be this season, and this one was probably one of their worst finishes ever. The same can be said for Renault, who finished worse, making them the prime candidates for the award.

It's become pretty obvious that these teams have halted development of their 2009 car long ago. Still, both of them have somehow managed to get the upper hands over Force 1ndia at Abu Dhabi again, but why? Sutil told German TV RTL that he had trouble getting the tyres up to temperature during the 1st stint. Then he came in early and they switched him to a two stopper, whereafter everything was fine (end quote). But was it really? You could clearly see he was disappointed.

Alguersuari's troubles of recognizing his own pitbox as the sun was going down were a bit of hilariousness at a time when this race needed a breather not to get boring, so even though it's basically a reject-worthy move, I would not hand the award to him. Hopefully, they update the two Red Bull teams' color schemes somewhat for next year, so they won't have this problem again and there will be more variety when looking at the cars in general.

The above mentioned Trulli got beaten here by his rookie teammate Kobayashi, even though it was only his 2nd race. Kudos to Kobayashi-san. If that will help Trulli's contract negotiations is another matter. But together with his press conference performance, it surely is a bid for the award - but a weaker one than the publicocrap about how great the circuit would be, which it clearly wasn't, because it is not an exceptional track, just an OK one. Both Toyota drivers showed up in P3 for a while, which should free them from getting the award.

That leaves us with Williams, who lost one spot in the Constructors to BMW Sauber thanks to not being able to fight for points - and with McLaren who could have scored a podium - if not two - were it not for all the technical problems they had.
At least, Hamilton showed the car's potential before the 1st stops and had a good battle with Vettel for sector times - and Kovalainen made at least one good overtaking move as well that was cut in one visible and one invisible half by the cameraman.

Hence, it is now time to say "Servus" to BMW Sauber, whose sporting branch Sauber have clearly shown today that they don't have a bid at the award this time around. But will it help them that they have overtaken Williams in the WCC to get onto the grid for next year? Probably not. The big question is where will the Sauber fans go to next? Le Mans?

It will be interesting to see who goes away with the award, so now it's over to you Enoch and Jamie of F1 Rejects dot com to decide and report on the awards ceremony.

Thank you for all the podcasts, reports and this forum environment that you have created this season.

[watka]

I doubt Life or Scuderia Italia drivers ever entered the Ferrari pit by mistake.

Life never had that problem, Ferrari never had to compete in pre-qualifying!

Other than Alguersuari, no-one did anything amazingly stupid, but some people were just plainly slow when their futures depended on it. Namely Renault (8th in the championship is shocking, Kubica doesn't know what he's getting himself into) but more so Trulli and Nakajima.

My vote goes to Nakajima because he may as well have gone all out with a radical strategy to steal some points (that was the only way Williams would ever hold off BMW in the constructors), but he was completely anonymous once again. Not only does he make quite a few mistakes, but the pace he showed earlier in his F1 career seemed to completely desert (no pun intended) him this season. He'll end up at Team Goh in Le Mans, or racing for Toyota in JGTC next season.

[shinji]

Abu Dhabi circuit - Another disneyworld track, much lust, enough competition.

?

I thought the track was good... as it seems you also did...

Please explain.

[Dj_bereta]

Abu Dhabi circuit - Another disneyworld track, much lust, enough competition.

?

I thought the track was good... as it seems you also did...

Please explain.

yes, its a good track, but generated a boring race.

I think that track show great races for GP2, F-3s etc, but for F-1 is boring.

[Frentzen127]

I think that track show great races for GP2, F-3s etc, but for F-1 is boring.

That, unfortunately, doesn't speak very highly of F1's current state of affairs.
Could it be then, that it may not be Valencia's, Shanghai's, Singapore's or Abu Dhabi's track layouts faults but instead the cars inherent flaws that produce bad racing?
More to the point, how can you argue against that, when other racing series do just fine on those same tracks?
2010 looks just boring for me.

[thehemogoblin]

Alguersuari- The wrong pit stall, then toasting your gearbox? Brilliant.

Ferrari/Raikkonen- Totally boned the pony on their chance to get past McLaren/Hamilton after the brake failure. All it would have taken was 7th position.

[noisebox]

Alguersuari - Sure, the Red Bull and STR pit crews are very similar, but it's not the first time there are similar pit crews in the pit lane. I doubt Life or Scuderia Italia drivers ever entered the Ferrari pit by mistake.

I do remember Michael Schumacher accidently walking into the Toyota pit after his car broke down a few years ago, so it can happen to the best of them!

[DonTirri]

(or as I like to call him, Waaaaahmilton) race to lose.

It should be WHAMilton, like WHAMbulance.

No. he's Liewis Whinelton. it rhymes even when spoken. (Dubbed him that between Australia and Malaysia)

[rffp]

Jaime Alguersuari - does he need a map for the pitlane?

[CarlosFerreira]

I'm going to risk my neck here, and suggest we should all cut Alguersuari some slack.

- It was dark. The floodlights in Abu-Dhabi give a notoriously different effect than Singapore's "brighter than day" stuff.
- Red Bull and Toro Rosso are next to each other.
- The crews dress similarly.
- Vettel was coming in seconds after Alguersuari. That means both lollipop men are out to call in their respective drivers.
- Both lollipop men are dressed alike, wearing the same helmets.
- The guy is sitting in an F1 cars, wearing a helmet - which means he probably sees as much as I would out of a postbox.

Yes, he was silly to make that mistake.It might even grant him rejectdom for this race - but I feel it's not THAT stupid a mistake, that's all.

[thehemogoblin]

I'm going to risk my neck here, and suggest we should all cut Alguersuari some slack.

- It was dark. The floodlights in Abu-Dhabi give a notoriously different effect than Singapore's "brighter than day" stuff.
- Red Bull and Toro Rosso are next to each other.
- The crews dress similarly.
- Vettel was coming in seconds after Alguersuari. That means both lollipop men are out to call in their respective drivers.
- Both lollipop men are dressed alike, wearing the same helmets.
- The guy is sitting in an F1 cars, wearing a helmet - which means he probably sees as much as I would out of a postbox.

Yes, he was silly to make that mistake.It might even grant him rejectdom for this race - but I feel it's not THAT stupid a mistake, that's all.

I said "and" in mine. I feel like blowing up a gearbox is often on the driver.

[CarlosFerreira]

I said "and" in mine. I feel like blowing up a gearbox is often on the driver.

No worries, I wasn't arguing. I half hope he gets it, for humorous reasons (and because Buemi made mincemeat out of him all weekend). I was just wondering if there wasn't some reason for such hideous mistake.

[fjackdaw]

- Vettel was coming in seconds after Alguersuari. That means both lollipop men are out to call in their respective drivers.

Even more slack to be cut - the Toro Rosso crew weren't out. He was expecting to see them, but saw the Red Bull team instead.

[CarlosFerreira]

- Vettel was coming in seconds after Alguersuari. That means both lollipop men are out to call in their respective drivers.

Even more slack to be cut - the Toro Rosso crew weren't out. He was expecting to see them, but saw the Red Bull team instead.

Serious? And we're wondering how he fluked that...

[lostpin]

The thing with Alguersuari was hilarious, but still not enough for the award. Trulli seems far more deserving when he was fairly beaten by his rookie team-mate, Ferrari for losing their 3rd place for a point, etc, etc...

[Warren Hughes]

I would like to make a mention for ROTR for Jonathan Legard's pronunciation of Abu Dhabi. I never want to hear the word 'abbadabby' again, in any context

[Captain Hammer]

I would like to make a mention for ROTR for Jonathan Legard's pronunciation of Abu Dhabi. I never want to hear the word 'abbadabby' again, in any context

I agree - there was so much more that he could have done with it!

Abu Dhabi, Abba Dabby, Adu Bhadi, Apu's Dairy ...

[Cynon]

(or as I like to call him, Waaaaahmilton) race to lose.

It should be WHAMilton, like WHAMbulance.

No. he's Liewis Whinelton. it rhymes even when spoken. (Dubbed him that between Australia and Malaysia)

No, Waaahmilton. Here's his waaahmbulance.

But I'll give Team Waaahmilton, also known as McLaren Reject of the Race for ... well...

"Lewis, you have to stop racing now."

....

[Winterspring]

Toro Rosso: Well in that Buemi did score a point but what they did to Jamie was pretty stupid.

Renault: Poor Quali, poor race.

[TomWazzleshaw]

Jaime Alguersuari: Pitted in the wrong stall, ate a gearbox and got utterly thrashed by Buemi for the 2nd race weekend in a row.

Renault: Did they even race?

BMW Bigwigs: This race showed just how stupid they are in pulling out. Heidfeld finished BOTR in 5th and Kubica was in contention for points for most of the race before spinning whilst battling Buemi

[Phoenix]

-Renault: both Alonso and Grosjean had little to do with their cars, and they delivered little as expected.
-Jaime Alguersuari: he had constant problems with his car, and to top it there was that silly pit incident (did the Toro Rosso mechanics even know that he was going to pit?)

[bigslydoc]

Joint award for Renault and BMW.
Renault showing why they would be little missed as a team (more as an engine builder).
BMW showing why they will be greatly missed!