2010 German Grand Prix - Discussion

[TomWazzleshaw]

What I find amazing though is that almost no mud is being thrown at Force India for being pathetic.

Everybody here loves The Force. Rejectful behaviour like theirs yesterday just makes us all love them more.

I must admit I did find their rejectful performance funny (Especially the first pitstop and Sutil's half spin into the gravel) but it cost me some major points in the FSport Fantasy F1 Competition which is why I'm so sour about it now.

[Row Man Gross-Gene]

Fantastic user name!!! How I'd like to hear that name ring out in a podcast again!

As Enoch might say: Indeed!

[shinji]

If the message had been "Felipe, since Fernando's ahead of you in the Championship, would you move over for him so he can win the race please?', and afterwards Ferrari had been completely honest and open with what had happened, I wonder what the situation would be. Is honesty a complete no-go area?

[FullMetalJack]

What I find amazing though is that almost no mud is being thrown at Force India for being pathetic.

Everybody here loves The Force. Rejectful behaviour like theirs yesterday just makes us all love them more.

Yup, hopefully their rejectful behaviour continues and its not a one-off. Mainly so Williams can take 6th place in the constructors championship.

[CarlosFerreira]

If the message had been "Felipe, since Fernando's ahead of you in the Championship, would you move over for him so he can win the race please?', and afterwards Ferrari had been completely honest and open with what had happened, I wonder what the situation would be. Is honesty a complete no-go area?

Then, they'd be in clear infringement of article whotsitsname.

[shinji]

If the message had been "Felipe, since Fernando's ahead of you in the Championship, would you move over for him so he can win the race please?', and afterwards Ferrari had been completely honest and open with what had happened, I wonder what the situation would be. Is honesty a complete no-go area?

Then, they'd be in clear infringement of article whotsitsname.

So lying wins. Huzzah!

[CarlosFerreira]

If the message had been "Felipe, since Fernando's ahead of you in the Championship, would you move over for him so he can win the race please?', and afterwards Ferrari had been completely honest and open with what had happened, I wonder what the situation would be. Is honesty a complete no-go area?

Then, they'd be in clear infringement of article whotsitsname.

So lying wins. Huzzah!

Sadly, unnecessary regulation makes The Truth something to be avoided at all costs.

[ADx_Wales]

If anything I said about the result of the German GP made people question my attitude in the forums, thats because I am genuinely upset, not only by the actual occurrence, not only by the way it was executed and not only by the lack of punishment given to the same team who do this time and time again, you cannot throw in times where its happened before "when it was allowed" and thus cancel out the condemnation of a team that have got out of this scot free, all that they will get penalized with is more fines, and its Ferrari, owned by FIAT, who still have enough money to buy their own country, the "fine" will have no effect and the result still stands. It makes me sick.

Also, it DID have an effect on the overall result, did nobody realize that Sebastien Vettel was chopping the gap down to Alonso, who should NOT have been allowed to pass Massa, and we would have seen a brilliant battle for third, and going back to what I said on the last podcast I will mention no more of what could and SHOULD have been.

In the BBC F1 Forum which (unless you're clever) is only available in the UK, David Coultard was defending team orders ([sarcasm]wonder why[/sarcasm]) and saying F1 "Is a Team sport"...

...WHOAH THERE!!! Does that mean every single driver in the F1 rejects can be removed? Were they not in it for themselves?? What about all those things that Fangio, Senna and Schumacher won in the past, oh what were they called again???....oh that's right, DRIVERS CHAMPIONSHIPS!!! Do you know what one of them is Mr Coulthard?!?!...............................................Thought not.

Rant over, for now, It will probably errupt once again when Ferrari and more importantly Fernando Veruca Salt Alonso gets what he wants.

[theshoo]

I don't post often as I'm an F1 novice, only having followed it steadily for 3 years ( I've watched every practice, qualifying and race during that period). I leave the comments to the Pros on this forum. However, my feeling is the blame falls to Massa. Yes he a great guy. I too would like to be his friend. But he works for Ferrari. He has a great house because of Ferrari. He drives that great looking Ferrari through the streets of his hometown because of Ferrari. Financially he is set for life, the likes of which many of us will never see because of Ferrari. So the least he could do is not just pull over to the side of the track and let Alonso pass. He could give it a go, make it look good and yet take one for team. The first "coded" message he received from Rob Smedley was essentially that he was leading Alonso by 2+ seconds and now was the time to increase that lead so they wouldn't have to send him another "coded" message to let Alonso pass. He had his chance and failed. Fernando caught him and rather than making a show of the overtaking he choose to be a baby, embarrass the team and cost them a fine. A small fine in terms of Ferrari, but money forfeited none the less. They stuck with the guy after the spring-in-the-head incident and he repaid them by throwing a hissy-fit.

[F1000X]

In some way, they deserve a penalty for doing it so poorly. A money penalty I could agree with. A disqualification would make me stop watching Formula One altogether.

NO IT WOULDN"T

[thehemogoblin]

I don't think Ferrari should be forced to give up their positions this time, but I do think they need a far harsher monetary penalty. Like, $10m or so. Enough for them to actually feel the dent in their wallet.

[coops]

Great picture but it actually reminds me of the (equally appropriate) Captain Rochefort.

[coops]

Martin Brundle - http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsp ... 856345.stm

[CarlosFerreira]

Martin Brundle - http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsp ... 856345.stm

Autosport, Maurice Hamilton, Martin Brundle - all of them seem to agree. I know nothing about the law, but the idea that you can create a difficult-to-police-and-enforce regulation and expect people to abide sounds flawed on retrospect.

[Tealy]

I don't post often as I'm an F1 novice, only having followed it steadily for 3 years ( I've watched every practice, qualifying and race during that period). I leave the comments to the Pros on this forum. However, my feeling is the blame falls to Massa. Yes he a great guy. I too would like to be his friend. But he works for Ferrari. He has a great house because of Ferrari. He drives that great looking Ferrari through the streets of his hometown because of Ferrari. Financially he is set for life, the likes of which many of us will never see because of Ferrari. So the least he could do is not just pull over to the side of the track and let Alonso pass. He could give it a go, make it look good and yet take one for team. The first "coded" message he received from Rob Smedley was essentially that he was leading Alonso by 2+ seconds and now was the time to increase that lead so they wouldn't have to send him another "coded" message to let Alonso pass. He had his chance and failed. Fernando caught him and rather than making a show of the overtaking he choose to be a baby, embarrass the team and cost them a fine. A small fine in terms of Ferrari, but money forfeited none the less. They stuck with the guy after the spring-in-the-head incident and he repaid them by throwing a hissy-fit.

It's a fair point that at the end of the day. If Massa could have kept a 4-5 second gap to Alonso there is no way this would have happened. I feel sorry for Massa but much like Webber he struggled to contain his frustration when the best thing to do would have been to accept the situation and move on.

I've let everyone have their say before coming to my own conclusion, mainly because I really was unsure what to think about it all. As a fan I hate to see team orders and I also hate to see Ferrari effectively get away with breaking the rules. However as it has been said the rule is unenforcable and even if it was where do you stop. Do you punish a team for asking drivers not to take each other out? Or for turning their engines down to make it to the end of the race?

Much like in Monaco it is the rule which has let us down on this occasion and hopefully this incident will open our eyes to improving the rules of the sport once more.

[Debaser]

Ferrari should have settled this at the pitstops by leaving Massa out so that Alonso on new tyres could get ahead by the time Massa pitted. Also if Alonso hadn't messed up when he could have overtaken Massa behind those backmarkers, we'd have none of this now. Coulda, woulda, shoulda...

[watka]

I don't post often as I'm an F1 novice, only having followed it steadily for 3 years ( I've watched every practice, qualifying and race during that period). I leave the comments to the Pros on this forum. However, my feeling is the blame falls to Massa. Yes he a great guy. I too would like to be his friend. But he works for Ferrari. He has a great house because of Ferrari. He drives that great looking Ferrari through the streets of his hometown because of Ferrari. Financially he is set for life, the likes of which many of us will never see because of Ferrari. So the least he could do is not just pull over to the side of the track and let Alonso pass. He could give it a go, make it look good and yet take one for team. The first "coded" message he received from Rob Smedley was essentially that he was leading Alonso by 2+ seconds and now was the time to increase that lead so they wouldn't have to send him another "coded" message to let Alonso pass. He had his chance and failed. Fernando caught him and rather than making a show of the overtaking he choose to be a baby, embarrass the team and cost them a fine. A small fine in terms of Ferrari, but money forfeited none the less. They stuck with the guy after the spring-in-the-head incident and he repaid them by throwing a hissy-fit.

Hi there, and please feel free to post more often (as long as you stay clear of kostas and Captain Hammer, you'll be alright )

Whilst Massa is part of the team, and it made every sense from a championship perspective for him to move aside, I think it is important to reminder that these commands from above are not easy to handle in the heat of the moment. If you've been racing your hardest for a good 40 laps, risking injury at high speed, your first thoughts will not be "do I need to let my team mate past". I'm sure Massa loves the Ferrari lifestyle, but I doubt you could name a single driver (except Raikkonen!) who has gone to Ferrari for money reasons over a love of racing. And a love of racing means they want to win. It is far easier to say "I will give up my place for my team mate" off the track than it is to practice that on the track.

[Ed24]

Ferrari should have settled this at the pitstops by leaving Massa out so that Alonso on new tyres could get ahead by the time Massa pitted. Also if Alonso hadn't messed up when he could have overtaken Massa behind those backmarkers, we'd have none of this now. Coulda, woulda, shoulda...

But then Vettel would have got past.

They did try this to a lesser extent though (and my view is shared by Christian Horner) by bringing in Alonso before Massa, which wouldn't normally be done when Massa has track position.

[DemocalypseNow]

Ferrari should have settled this at the pitstops by leaving Massa out so that Alonso on new tyres could get ahead by the time Massa pitted. Also if Alonso hadn't messed up when he could have overtaken Massa behind those backmarkers, we'd have none of this now. Coulda, woulda, shoulda...

This is exactly what Red Bull did in Canada to make sure Vettel would be ahead of Webber once the pitstop cycle was finished. And nobody seemed to latch onto the fact they'd orchestrated the drivers positions there, so what would have changed here? The whole fiasco would have been avoided.

[F1000X]

I can't stand team orders. I can't argue with the fact that they are sensible from a manufacturer's standpoint, but I hate that they interfere with racing. That said, I make a distinction between asking drivers to hold station (which I believe is reasonable in some situations) and asking one driver to pull over and hand the victory to his teammate, who he may otherwise have beaten outright. The latter is classless and despicable and only defensible if you subscribe to machiavellian "ends justify the means" logic. I do not.

Instructing teammates to hold station, particularly when they are chasing the leaders makes sense for both of them, simply because it allows them to save fuel, tires, and keeps them from straying from the optimum line in an effort to impede one another. When the two are in the lead, it is a different story.

I find it so disappointing, and frankly, embarrassing that Formula 1s most successful and most prestigious team is also the team that has the least scruples about using underhanded tactics. This is why I cannot have any respect for Ferrari, or the drivers they appease and protect.

I wonder if Massa regrets extending his contract after this.

[FullMetalJack]

It would have been funny if Rob Smedley said on the radio, Felipe Baby, since Fernando's ahead of you in the Championship, would you move over for him so he can win the race please.

[coops]

It would have been funny if Rob Smedley said on the radio, Felipe Baby, since Fernando's ahead of you in the Championship, would you move over for him so he can win the race please.

It always comes across as though its Alonso thats the baby.