2017 Formula One Azerbaijan Grand Prix

[jamie donovan]

normal day of Vettel throwing his toys out of the pram.
Vettel screwed up and is not willing to take the blame, then ramming a car side on?
Any other driver would have been black flagged for that action

 

[ears]

normal day of Vettel throwing his toys out of the pram.
Vettel screwed up and is not willing to take the blame, then ramming a car side on?
Any other driver would have been black flagged for that action

It was petulant and embarrassing for him and the sport, and maybe if he'd damaged the other car the punishment might have been more - I'm sure they took into account that it was at safety car speeds.

Other drivers who could have won that race but didn't would have been cursing their bad luck - their race was affected by things they had little control over - Raikkonen, Verstappen, Massa, Hamilton.

Vettel only has himself to blame. And today, now the red mist is clearing, he must be deeply regretting his actions. If for no other reason than it cost him a lot of points.

 

[samcar304]

This is a very interesting situation... I don't feel Vettel may have intentionally done it. He might have misjudged the distance between the cars. Don't forget they are wider this year. But you still can't see past the fact he went out of his way to pull alongside Hamilton to gesticulate. On one hand i can't see Vettel being stupid enough to put his car in jeopardy by causing contact with another, possibly putting him out the race. And then one the other hand I don't see why he had to react the way he did with the Media. Its the same with football. A player will get sent off/make a bad challenge and the player and their manager will defend themselves after the match to the public and media. However the next week or following a FA investigation they will more or less change their mind, apologise for their actions and move on. This is what Vettel needs to. He should go away cool off and come Austria apologise publicly for his actions and to Hamilton. Whether Hamilton wants to be the bigger man and accept the apology is up to him.

 

[ears]

This is a very interesting situation... I don't feel Vettel may have intentionally done it. He might have misjudged the distance between the cars. Don't forget they are wider this year. But you still can't see past the fact he went out of his way to pull alongside Hamilton to gesticulate. On one hand i can't see Vettel being stupid enough to put his car in jeopardy by causing contact with another, possibly putting him out the race. And then one the other hand I don't see why he had to react the way he did with the Media. Its the same with football. A player will get sent off/make a bad challenge and the player and their manager will defend themselves after the match to the public and media. However the next week or following a FA investigation they will more or less change their mind, apologise for their actions and move on. This is what Vettel needs to. He should go away cool off and come Austria apologise publicly for his actions and to Hamilton. Whether Hamilton wants to be the bigger man and accept the apology is up to him.

Agree.

There's a good opinion piece up on the BBC website about it now.

And some analysis at the bottom from Allan McNish who, I think, gets it spot on

"It was a bit of a misunderstanding.

"It was actually a bit of a comedy in a way. It was a sideswipe, whether by intentional or by accident, we don't know.

"Hamilton is trying to win his fourth world title, to match Vettel's four. Vettel is trying to pull away and win a fifth.

"All these comments are mind games, building up the pressure. Lewis Hamilton was playing mind games on the circuit, too. When it came to the next safety car restart, they were in the same position and guess what? He went even slower.

"To me it is all part of the love and war of a world championship in F1."

Full article
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1/40404462

 

[samcar304]

Agree.

There's a good opinion piece up on the BBC website about it now.

And some analysis at the bottom from Allan McNish who, I think, gets it spot on



Full article
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1/40404462

Completely agree, I rank the words from a Racing driver turned pundit more highly than a journalist. Not to say the journalist can't be right, but I feel the experience from being in situations like that themselves provides a better insight. That's why people like Martin Brundle, Allan McNish and Damon Hill are pivotal to F1 broadcasting by giving their unbiased and educated opinions. People like Tom Clarkson, Andrew Benson and David Croft have been shown to show some form of Bias in the past and that's why I take most of their articles/opinions with a grain of salt.

 

[samcar304]

Strange double post, My apologies. (if possible could a moderator delete this please. Thank you)

 

[jamie donovan]

I agree. i hadn't taken into account that it was really at safety car speed (maybe even slower)
so it wasn't dangerous, but to be fair, Vettel did have both hands off the wheel as he was along side, it looked like as he took his hands out of the car he knocked the wheel with one hand, most probably didn't want to make contact just wanted to let Hamilton see that he was pissed.

 

[RWLemonade]

Ill be honest, i still think its a boring track, however it was a good race... what spoiled it was Vettle throwing his dummy out of the pram... i tell you why...

2nd restart, LH goes round the corner at constant slow speed, not touching his brakes to build gap to the safety car (hes entitled to) then SV comes along up his arse LH as he wants a good run at LH, not relising the speed difference and nudges LH.

SV gets upset thinking he got braked checked by LH, which infact he did not... then what makes it worse SV drives along LH waving and pointing like a gorilla not relising that he lost control of the car and nudges LH, basically he and they messed up both of there races.

And then in the aftermath, SV wont admit i actually lost my temper and got it wrong, and then you see LH saying hes a nutter and i want to move on to the next round...

Can you see the difference...one is uptight and irate and the other is calm and understands the situation..

Im a big MS and LH fan, i do like SV but to be honest he does not show himself in good light...

Remember when SV was at RBR no one challenged him, the car was in a league of its own.. now LH and MS had and have challenges from there teammates and other drivers when winning there championship, do not forget LH beat NR twice to the championship and the last one was just bad luck for LH...

SV has won 4 championships with one team, now LH and MS have won championships with 2 different teams... who is a better driver, who is better to be patient and understand people and technology to extract the most....

OK rant over, thats my 2 cents.. Congrats to Ricardo, Bottas and Stroll... very lucky result for all 3...

 

[ears]

ILH and MS had and have challenges from there teammates and other drivers when winning there championship

I can't think of anyone with the initials MS whose team mates were allowed to challenge them for a title. Even a race. Even a pole position, fastest lap, practice session, probably even the lunch queue!

 

[ears]

Mika Salo? But he didn't challenge for any titles.

 

[RWLemonade]

I can't think of anyone with the initials MS whose team mates were allowed to challenge them for a title. Even a race. Even a pole position, fastest lap, practice session, probably even the lunch queue!

MS has a spert of Mass and Rubens that actually raced him in a few races, both Ferraris were very fast, just like LH and NR....

I remember at RBR there i think in the middle of the season, 2007 to 2009 cant remember exactly when but Mark Webber had the measure of Sebastian Vettle... Only a few races though and then it swung in Vettle favour, now what we dont know were they given same hardware, did Vettle get more preferential treatment then Webber...

Why is that ? Helmet Marko is a wanker, he rather favour junior team members as he is a control freak, Always controlling them... At least the other teams let there drivers race each other upto a point.

 

[paracletus]

Apparently there may be further action taken for the appalling behaviour; it would be the correct decision to demonstrate that it is unacceptable to commit road-rage on the racetrack or anywhere else.
I would suggest a one-race ban, or at least a 10-place grid penalty for the next GP, plus fine SV his race fee for baku.
It's a sackable offence, wouldn't be surprised if this is his last year with ferrari.

 

[Akra]

Apparently there may be further action taken for the appalling behaviour; it would be the correct decision to demonstrate that it is unacceptable to commit road-rage on the racetrack or anywhere else.
I would suggest a one-race ban, or at least a 10-place grid penalty for the next GP, plus fine SV his race fee for baku.
It's a sackable offence, wouldn't be surprised if this is his last year with ferrari.

Things which are sack-able offences in the real world, don't tend to be at high end sporting events. Some of the comments Alonso has made would be considered sackable by many companies, but they'll never sack him (thankfully, because he's hilarious). Schumacher got his entire championship year wiped out for driving into a car in a much more significant way, so suggesting they'll sack their current championship leader is clutching at straws a bit.

 

[Neilski]

When I watched the (side-on) collision for the first time, I immediately assumed it was an accident. Apparently Seb hasn't claimed it was accidental though, so who knows. It was feeble for sure. (Btw, I like neither of them.)
Was very pleased that Daniel won the race, and yeah also got a good laugh listening to Fernando!
As one or two others have already mentioned, both Senna and Schumacher were outrageously unsporting whenever it served them, so that has badly tarnished their incredible achievements for me. Lewis and Seb are not yet that low!

 

[samcar304]

Apparently there may be further action taken for the appalling behaviour; it would be the correct decision to demonstrate that it is unacceptable to commit road-rage on the racetrack or anywhere else.
I would suggest a one-race ban, or at least a 10-place grid penalty for the next GP, plus fine SV his race fee for baku.
It's a sackable offence, wouldn't be surprised if this is his last year with ferrari.

At most I think Vettel will receive a hefty fine. Giving the only other driver who has a shot of winning the championship a race ban would be very bad for viewership. Basically handing the championship to Hamilton.

 

[samcar304]

The whole argument for Vettel finishing ahead of Hamilton and it not being justice is ridiculous. Vettel was given a 10 second time penalty for dangerous driving. He came in and he served it. Now if the Mercedes mechanics had done their job and put the headrest in properly then we would not have the injustice debate. Hamilton would have won and Vettel finished 4th/5th. So it was more Mercedes' own doing that cost Lewis finishing above Seb.

 

[ears]

The whole argument for Vettel finishing ahead of Hamilton and it not being justice is ridiculous. Vettel was given a 10 second time penalty for dangerous driving. He came in and he served it. Now if the Mercedes mechanics had done their job and put the headrest in properly then we would not have the injustice debate. Hamilton would have won and Vettel finished 4th/5th. So it was more Mercedes' own doing that cost Lewis finishing above Seb.

I totally agree, but Hamilton will be thinking 'oh well, bad luck but we only dropped 2 points' while Vettel will be thinking 'I wish I hadn't done that'.

But on the subject of luck, if there was one driver who, in my opinion, was most deserving of a lucky break, it was Ricciardo. Monaco, Barcelona, there've probably been others where he really was hard done by.

So when the chips fell, when others had bad luck, or contributed to their own downfall, nobody was more deserving to be the guy who picked up the pieces and took the win.

 

[MoerasGrizzly]

Regardless of whether Hamilton was originally at fault (the BBC say no), Vettel should have been disciplined severely for swiping the Mercedes. An F1 car is extremely strong when coping with expected loads and forces, but a deliberate glancing blow from another car might weaken the suspension in a manner that is not immediately obvious. Both drivers would shortly thereafter attain speeds of 200 mph - a failure at that velocity could well be catastrophic.

A proper punishment for Vettel would have been a black flag and then a ban during which time he could thank his lucky stars that Hamilton finished safely.

He almost didn't though, remember the headrest failure?

 

[ears]

He almost didn't though, remember the headrest failure?

Nah there was a red flag between the contact and the headrest failure. Hamilton got out of the car and the headset was replaced when he got back in..Nice conspiracy theory, but unconnected I should think. Just absent minded engineer thinking about something else - maybe the contact - when fitting it.

 

[MoerasGrizzly]

Nah there was a red flag between the contact and the headrest failure. Hamilton got out of the car and the headset was replaced when he got back in..Nice conspiracy theory, but unconnected I should think. Just absent minded engineer thinking about something else - maybe the contact - when fitting it.

Ah, I misremembered that one then.