F1 Silly Season 2009!

[MattR]

That's nifty.

[skimonkey30]

thats cool

[skimonkey30]

I cant believe its a race weekend!!

[sperry]

Originally Posted by skimonkey30

I cant believe its a race weekend!!

I'm totally fired up! I watched practice live last night... I find it hilarious that the new rules are supposed to give the cars 1/2 the downforce over last season... but because the F1 engineers are so good, this year's car has 17% more downforce than last year, so that plus the slick tires makes them more than 0.5s faster around Albert Park.

And then there's the whole rear diffuser debacle... I get the feeling that the 3 teams w/ the "illegal" diffusers are going to dominate the race, then get DQ'd a day or two before Malaysia after some BS appeals crap.

[MattR]

I just watched practice...I'm starting to think these cars will race really well. I am puzzled as to how the three D:fuser teams managed to put one over on everyone else...I know the engineers for those squads were not involved in the initial design, but you think everyone else would have reacted by now. Should be a most interesting race.

[sperry]

Originally Posted by MattR

I just watched practice...I'm starting to think these cars will race really well. I am puzzled as to how the three D:fuser teams managed to put one over on everyone else...I know the engineers for those squads were not involved in the initial design, but you think everyone else would have reacted by now. Should be a most interesting race.

Yeah, you would have thought all the big teams would have brought both diffusers... but then again, even w/ the better diffuser they may have been slower, in which case, the appeal of the rule is their best chance, and you can't exactly appeal the rule if you've got the diffuser on your own car.

Also... nice picks Matt... we picked the exact same lineup! With a minute before the deadline, I almost swapped ALO out for NAK, but decided I should keep the more experienced driver even if he's in a slower car.

[van]

Wow!

[Dean]

So, are any of the teams actually using KERS? They talked about it, but I didn't here them say which if any teams are actually using it... Did I miss something?

I found one site saying it was Ferrari's, McLaren, Renault and one BMW, Heidfeld's...

They are talking about the weight factor, but aren't all the cars running the minimum weight with ballast positioned as needed?

[Nick Koan]

They occasionally showed the graphic for using KERS. It was the battery graphic on the RPM graphic. It showed the charge and flashed yellow when it was being used. I think Brawn and Renault were using it as well, but I'm not quite sure.

What's interesting, is that it seems most drivers were using the KERS to help come off corners to long straights. I don't think they showed any driver using it to pass.

Regardless, they were saying that the KERS is heavy, but it also puts the weight at a very specific spot (by the engine). Ballast, on the other hand, can be put anywhere in the car to maximize weight balance.

[Dean]

Should have waited until I saw more of the race. They just explained the new graphic for it... And discussed the weight location, etc...

[Nick Koan]

edited for spoiling

[Libila]

That was quite an opener!

Without spoiling too much, I'm impressed with Brawns debut as well as Hamilton's driving.

What are everyone's thoughts on KERS? Personally, I don't see it lasting more than a season. It really does take away from the essence of F1 although it is a neat strategic weapon.

[sperry]

Ugh... once again F1 gets bitten by not having well defined penalties and procedures and qualified event stewards that are all on the same page with implementing them.

Trulli got shafted.

Toyota faces an uphill battle to appeal its lost Melbourne podium, but the Japanese team does have a valid case to argue.

Jarno Trulli's third place and champagne celebrations became twelfth on the official classification, after stewards ruled he illegally overtook Lewis Hamilton behind the Safety Car.

The Italian had been running third when the Safety Car came out late in the race, but he dropped behind the McLaren driver in an off-track moment.

"Trulli took back the place under the Safety Car," said McLaren team boss Martin Whitmarsh at the time of the investigation.

The stewards of the meeting agreed, promoting Hamilton to third, but Trulli insisted that he only passed the Briton because he had "suddenly slowed down and pulled over to the side of the road."

"I thought he had a problem," the 34-year-old said, "so I overtook him as there was nothing else I could do."

The rules permit overtaking under the Safety Car in such circumstances.


The problem for Toyota is the inadmissibility of appeals for post-race 25-second penalties, because if the incident had occurred earlier in the race, the penalty would have taken the form of a drive-through, which is not subject to appeal.

Toyota snuck in its appeal through a loophole, by lodging it not with the stewards of the meeting, but with the local clerk of the course.

The team has two days to formalise its appeal in writing.

If it allows the procedure, the Court of Appeal would be faced with a difficult decision. Hamilton has been quoted by Speed TV as admitting that - after passing Trulli following the Toyota's off - he was then "told (by McLaren) to let him back past."

Hamilton presumably then pulled over and slowed, which would seem to corroborate Trulli's explanation that he only passed the Briton because "there was nothing else I could do."

http://en.f1-live.com/f1/en/headline...30160152.shtml

[Dean]

OMG... [RANT]

I do not claim to understand the FIA or how they run events, but they need to get their $%^& together!

Changing results after the podium ceremony for anything other than a post race inspection failure just makes them look like morons.

There has to be consistency! If that means having a standard set of stewards that go officiate every race, so be it. Maybe they have that, but it doesn't appear that way.

It is the officials responsibility to reset the order before restarting or concluding a race. If there was something still to be resolved after the checker, bring all cars to the pit lane until it is resolved and then roll the podium cars to "victory lane". Passing under a local yellow is one thing, a safety issue, and the driver's responsibility. Determining positions/running order behind the Safety Car is the Race officials! You can't penalize a driver for being in the wrong position unless he has refused to comply with your direction as to where he should be IMHO.

Back to a general rant at the FIA, they need to get control of "The World Feed". The production quality is all over the place depending on the race. I don't know how to fix it, but it needs to be taken care of. Australia was not bad, but it was not great either. I realize the speed guys can only talk about what the world feed has provided and don't blame them, but the feed itself is sad. Their ability to cover incidents or significant events and/or replay them in a timely manner is pitiful at times.[/rant]

Otherwise, it was a pretty interesting race. I wish I could get interested enough to participate in the Fantasy "team", but stuff like this just annoys me.

The mandatory two different tire rule still boggles my mind as well...

[sperry]

All the stuff like the two tire rule, the addition of KERS, the moveable front wing, etc are all attempts to make the cars go different speeds at different times in their race strategy.

So even if everyone is still finishing the race distance in the same overall time, some teams will be faster than others on track because they opted for the soft tires in the 1st stint rather than the 3rd, or one driver that uses KERS for passing vs. one that uses it only on the longest straight, vs. one car w/o KERS at all that's faster in all the corners because they've got better weight distribution.

It's sort of a silly way to manufacture on-track speed disparity (and therefor passing, even if it's not "real" passing), but it did seem to result in make the race more interesting than the time trial parade it was in the Michael Shumacher era. It's especially silly, when the last two seasons have been fantastic without all these changes... hell, last season's championship came down to a pass in the last corner of the last race of the season!

But it's all especially ridiculous when after the race, they just go and move the standings around anyway. Jackie Stewart is dead on when he rants and raves about the league needing a fixed stewarding crew that stewards every event... and it needs to be made up of an FIA rep, a couple of ex-drivers, and a local track rep. The ex-drivers are the guys that know how to dole out fair punishment for incidents because they've all been there... they can tell who was at fault, and they can tell immediately. This post race time penalty BS ruins the credibility of the sport.

[van]

Lewis Hamilton Loses Third Place In Australian GP After Lying To Race Officials

[Dean]

Here is the video that F1 pulled... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZgIk-RjiI7w
Trulli clearly way out in the grass.

It is still the stewards fault for not resolving this before the podium. Where is the in-car video? Don't all the cars have video? Why should they have to rely on what driver's say? They just look incompetent.

Let me guess, the world feed can't afford enough hard disk space to store all the camera footage and TIVO just what they broadcast in real time... No wonder it takes them 5 minutes to replay incidents at turn 1 on the opening lap, they are looking for the remote.

I am not going to judge what Hamilton did or did not say when. The visual record should be the determining factor.

Interesting how my two gripes come together.

[Nick Koan]

Now the FIA is saying that further action may be taken against Hamilton, which of course has the more sensational rumormills (like crash.net) saying that he's likely to be excluded from the championship this year.

http://en.f1-live.com/f1/en/headline...02145024.shtml
http://www.crash.net/formula+one/new...exclusion.html

Now, that's a bit far I think. Even if they feel he lied, this penalty should be enough and a stern warning not to do it again, or risk losing all points for the season.

[sperry]

Originally Posted by Nick Koan

Now the FIA is saying that further action may be taken against Hamilton, which of course has the more sensational rumormills (like crash.net) saying that he's likely to be excluded from the championship this year.

http://en.f1-live.com/f1/en/headline...02145024.shtml
http://www.crash.net/formula+one/new...exclusion.html

Now, that's a bit far I think. Even if they feel he lied, this penalty should be enough and a stern warning not to do it again, or risk losing all points for the season.

What a joke.

First, the driver's testimony shouldn't have jack shit to do with the stewards'/FIA's decisions. They expect the teams to say things that would lose them championship points? I know I wouldn't trust their testimony anymore than I could throw an MP4-24. The FIA's investigation and resulting decision should be based entirely on observed facts... not on testimony from anyone that has anything to gain or lose based on the resulting decision. Otherwise you have to create an environment of fear to scare folks into telling the truth (which is exactly what the FIA is doing w/ threats of exclusion from the championship, and their big penalties, etc).

Second, this should have never happened because the stewards should have sorted it all out before pulling the SC in at the damn race!

I can't believe that NASCAR is so far ahead in this aspect. They have consistent rules for handling full course yellows and pace cars, and when they go green, there's no more discussion... the field is set, and it's set correctly 99.9% of the time. And even in that 0.1% of the time when they screw it up, it's up to the driver to make the pass to correct the situation... which may be unfair, but at least it's consistent and not up for further review a week after the damn race. With all the video cameras, GPS data, track loops, and track officials all over the place, there is NO excuse for getting this wrong. The stewards are flat out incompetent.

[skimonkey30]

here we go again this time "liegate"

http://en.f1-live.com/f1/en/headline...07182222.shtml

[sperry]

Race bans possible for McLaren

It is possible McLaren will be banned from a number of races should the World Motor Sport Council take a dim view of the 'lie-gate' scandal at the April 29th meeting.

Bernie Ecclestone told the Express newspaper that the serious charge of lying to stewards and bringing the sport into disrepute is worsened by McLaren's recent trouble over espionage.

"It is never good for anyone if you are back in court quickly for something similar," the F1 Chief Executive said.

The FIA body has essentially unlimited powers: from race bans, total exclusion from the championship, to draconian financial penalties, like the $100m fine levied against McLaren in 2007 for spying.


Ecclestone admitted that McLaren figures lying to the stewards to have Jarno Trulli penalised amounted to 'fraud'.

"There are many options open if the charge sticks and it would be a terrible thing if any team were banned from races. But it could happen," he said.

In 2005, BAR Honda was banned for two races for fielding a trick fuel tank.

http://en.f1-live.com/f1/en/headline...08172645.shtml

If the FIA decides to ban McLaren for any of the races, when they're already just barely able to put enough teams on grid to meet the 20 car minimum, they're idiots. In fact, they're already idiots for asking a team questions about their race strategy and expecting truthful answers. I can't blame McLaren at all for lying... they're trying to win a championship, and I don't remember seeing "telling the truth" as one of the technical regulations for F1.

The FIA never should have questioned McLaren. They should have just looked at the facts, including the radio transmissions where McLaren told Hamilton to let Trulli by, and then corrected the stewards' mistake that penalized Trulli. Hamilton should have placed 4th. And all this drama should have never happened.

This just reeks of the FIA making an example out of McLaren just to show FOTA who's boss in F1.

[Nick Koan]

Win it or bin it!

Renault R28 crashed during Dubai Roadshow
Handheld Cam from above the pits:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hiBvVCx-Yng

Highest Quality version I've found. Looks to be from the grandstands (fF to about 1:22 in):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJpURLp4wYI

Handheld cam from the pitlane wall (with an oh-shiiiii.. moment)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etWeu9_N9bg

[Dean]

The benefits of treaded tires and <18000 RPM engines comes to mind...

[MikeK]

Interesting article on the McLaren factory.

I had no idea how much goes on at the actual factory during race weekend.

[skimonkey30]

uh silly season 2010?

http://en.f1-live.com/f1/en/headline...30140202.shtml

no tyre warmers or re-fueling.....wtf