Your Reject of the Race - Japan!

[watka]

I haven't seen the race yet (long day), but the FIA have given Petrov their ROTR for his antiques at the start.

Antiques!!! I think you mean antics.

[Captain Hammer]

Jaime Alguersuari - while the seaparate Petrov/Hulkenberg and Massa/Liuzzi incidents were somewhat avoidable, Alguersuari bashing Koabayshi for no reason at all is surely Rejectful.

[mario]

Even if it was a suspension failure, why would he be driving fast enough to break it on the formation lap? He should have been dawdling around at about 50 miles per hour for that lap. It's not like it was to warm the tires or anything.

On the other hand, it is called an installation lap for a reason. It's not just getting to the grid, it's a mini-shakedown - you're supposed to stress the car a bit in case something's not right with it. At that point there's still a chance it can be corrected when you get to the grid (or pull it into the pits if it's something big like only having 3 gears). At the absolute least you need to open full throttle for a bit and get up to top gear, also stress the brakes a little, make sure the hydraulics are sound, that sort of thing.
There's also the matter of trying to feel out grip levels on full tanks ready for the start - especially given the amount of rain the track had seen since the last time they;d been running heavy.

If he dropped it himself, he's a tit, but there's plenty of reasons for not just cruising all the way round at sub-safety car pace.

Oh yeah, reject - Massa - I'm just about ready to give Petrov the benefit of the doubt on the grounds of rookie foolishness, but Massa's got no excuse after this long.

There are a number of checks that the drivers have to do before going to the grid, and they have to push the cars a bit to make sure that they are working correctly - heat cycling the brakes so they do not glaze over if they are too cool, getting the tyres up to temperature, engine modes, clutch and differential settings - all of which entail driving the lap at close to the sorts of speeds that you would do in the race. It also acts as a useful yardstick for the driver - giving him a better idea of track conditions, where his braking points are on higher fuel etc.
Realistically, if the part failed at close, but not full, racing speed, chances are that even if he had gone more slowly on the installation lap, it would have failed on his first flying lap, so overall it would probably have made no difference if he had gone slower. Besides, we have seen parts fail at much lower speeds - Kubica ended up missing a wheel due to a wheel nut failing at safety car speeds.

1. That bloke who ran across the pit lane when Kovalainen was barreling down it, almost causing a Kyalami 1977 in the pit lane (It didn't even look like he even saw him coming)

But with his svelte figure he was obviously confident that he could make it to the other side. Or perhaps it was Max looking for some new thrills.

Brundle summed it up well when he saw that - "There goes a man who is tired of living". In fact, I really do wonder what the hell that marshall (I think it was a marshall) was doing - asides from not looking, which is asking for trouble, I'm not even sure that he was supposed to be up on the pit wall, or what he was trying to do.

[RA107]

Nominations:
Lucas di Grassi - did well in Q but threw it away by crashing on his lap to the grid (can't remeber this happening before)
Force India - double retirment and losing thier grip on 6th place in the WCC
Vitaly Petrov - silly crash with Hulkenberg before reaching the start line!
Jaime Alguersuari - stupid Capelli-esque wheel banging with Kobayshi when position was lost. It cost him a point in the end.
Wheelnuts - Third time Mercedes have been affected by this and Kubica apparently could have lost all 4 tyres!

But my ROTR is:
Felipe Massa: All over the place in Q and unable to get Q3 in the second best car. Then a slow start off the line and a Senna-Prost 1990-esque collison with Liuzzi which was like the master of disater in 2002/4. Only Kubica/Petrov has a larger points difference between teammates.

[Nessafox]

and Kubica apparently could have lost all 4 tyres!

i would defenitly want to see that happening with yamamoto or so especially 4 tyres at exactly the same moment 'whiiii i'm flying!!! wait... what....?'

[Captain Hammer]

Kubica apparently could have lost all 4 tyres!

Petrov, too. It’s probably for the better that he retired when he did. Renault have apparently identified the problem with Kubica’s car as being a lack of torque in the pneumatic air guns that attached the wheels. The end result was that the wheel nuts were not tight enough, resulting in the wheels coming free when under load – like at the hairpin or 130R. It’s the same problem that did Alonso in at the Hungarian Grand Prix last year. It’s likely that Petrov’s wheel(s) would have come off at some point.

[F1000X]

Adrian Newey for looking like he got maced after being sprayed in the face with champagne.

Lucas Di Grassi for making even Sakon Yamamoto look skilled.

DNFelipe Massa for pretending he was Ayrton Senna and Liuzzi was Prost.

[CarlosFerreira]

I haven't seen the race yet (long day), but the FIA have given Petrov their ROTR for his antiques at the start.

Antiques!!! I think you mean antics.

I did! Thanks.

[Tealy]

BBC sound technicians for fixing the sound problems - the race was so much better with the radio commentary.

Seconded.

After it changed back I had a quick look to see if you could switch the commentary via the red button (I believe you normally can but thanks to the commonwealth games it wasn't there). I think Ill watch the next race with the radio commentary as the combination of Croft and Davidson was much stronger than Legard and Brundle, which says a lot about how poor Legard is.

[Aerospeed]

Vitaly Petrov - Clumsy start gets him penalized for next race
Kamui Kobayashi - Sorry, but I think even the hometown crowd didn't approve of his erratic driving

[ZsoltForever]

Kamui Kobayashi - Sorry, but I think even the hometown crowd didn't approve of his erratic driving

This post gets my ROTR.

[CarlosFerreira]

What the heck was Alguersuari doing? When Kobayashi passed him for the second time, he just kept coming back at him, trying to knock him off track! Unsportsmanlike.

Also, flying wheels.

[RAK]

Lucas di Grassi: His presence wasn't exactly missed, but that was one hell of an embarrassing move, and he destroyed his chassis while he was at it.

[Debaser]

Kamui Kobayashi - Sorry, but I think even the hometown crowd didn't approve of his erratic driving

Get your papaya and pomegranate shield ready - How dare you moan about the one driver who does any overtaking!!!

[ADx_Wales]

Kamui Kobayashi - Sorry, but I think even the hometown crowd didn't approve of his erratic driving

This post gets my ROTR.

Fixed

[dr-baker]

Nominations:
Lucas di Grassi - did well in Q but threw it away by crashing on his lap to the grid (can't remeber this happening before).

Schumacher crashed into Albers in China going to the grid in 2005 or 2006.

[Myrvold]

And that was in a much more stupid way...

[fjackdaw]

Kamui Kobayashi - Sorry, but I think even the hometown crowd didn't approve of his erratic driving

Get your papaya and pomegranate shield ready - How dare you moan about the one driver who does any overtaking!!!

And what evidence is there that they disapproved of it?

[DonTirri]

Kamui Kobayashi - Sorry, but I think even the hometown crowd didn't approve of his erratic driving

Erratic. ERRATIC?!?!?!?

The guy provided the only goddamn entertainment in the race and you call him erratic?

I'm calling it here.. TROLL!

[Phoenix]

Kamui Kobayashi - Sorry, but I think even the hometown crowd didn't approve of his erratic driving

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahah!













Not funny, sorry.

[Bob]

Kamui Kobayashi - Sorry, but I think even the hometown crowd didn't approve of his erratic driving

Erratic? It was the Alguersaurus that did the erratic driving.

Kamui pulled off some brilliant overtakes, the most of anyone in the race I believe. He is something that is lacking in today's F1, a driver with balls.

My vote goes to Felipe Massa, a stupid lunge down the inside that ended in disaster, for someone who was very nearly champion two years ago it was shameful.

[Ed24]

4 candidates:

Massa: Over-reacted to Rosberg moving in his sight line. Should have had the experience to back off. Can't be much motivation for him left in 2010.
Petrov: Silly error, and the cumulative factor of his multiple crashes throughout the year deserves consideration. This might be the last chance to give him a RotR as well
Di Grassi: Apparently the car didn't break after all, so an embarrassing mistake.

but for me, the winner is:

Bits falling off cars: Ruined an interesting race between Kubica/Webber and Rosberg/Schumacher. Its just lucky the wheels didn't bounce towards the track.