333pg333

I have to agree Mike. He was zig zagging to escape, not block/cover.

MPD47

Meh, I'll be honest, I was half asleep when I watched it and I don't like LH anyway, always complaining/yada yada. So I am biased against him.

A.Wayne

That is correct !

Interesting point and i guess that's why he was warned instead of being penalized. LH moves were defensive to prevent a draft , the rules state you cannot make that many defensive moves.........thin line .....

multi21

Everyone drove a great race, from the veterans, who are expected to drive well, to the rookies and newer drivers who continue to impress.

Rosberg, Kubica, Sutil, Petrov, and others.... what a great bunch of new talent and that is not even mentioning the names like Vettel or Hamilton that we take for granted, but are still quite young.

I think Ferrari has masked their engine problems better than Red Bull, but still has major issues of reliability. Alonso, who drove a fantastic race considering the circumstances, will be on his 4th engine in as many races. Massa had a cooling issue in Bahrian too. With a total of 19 races this season, I fear grid penalties by the time we get to the races with hard WOT long stretches like Spa and Monza.

With the exception of the 1st race, this is shaping up to be a very entertaining season!

A.Wayne

What a great bunch of Kids racing in F1 today , fantastic racers from front to back , there is a lot of talent up and down the grid, nothing from Vettel , but i do believe many of them would have looked the same in that RB chassis.


Sad to see what Senna is racing Why would his family allow him to drive such poor machinery , risking his safety, family reputation and money , sad , really , really, sad situation to put that kid in, He need's a manager ..

Flying Finn

It is a thin line with that "defensive move" but in this kind of case where the car behind could've just drive straight and not to move from one side to the other, it's acceptable (at least i think so).
There's a little gray area but you really can't prevent that.

He ain't like his uncle was though (hah, who is?) and is only in F1 in the 1st place because of his last name.

A.Wayne

OK...
Are you saying Senna is slower than Kobyashi ? Luizzi ? et, al ....

M758

That is totally false. Alsono's gear problem was on downshifting and braking. It was perfect on accel. So he could get out of the corners just fine. However his braking was compromised. That is what Button repassed him when Alonso tried the outside. The box was going into neutral on the downshifts so he was losing engine braking. Not in traffic he could manage that, but the car was not strong enough under brakes to pull off a pass. Personally I think Alonso pushed too hard trying to pass Button knowing he had a problem with the box. That pushing caused the motor to pop.

Not ready so say Alonso was "stupid" in pushing that had, but I have a feeling that had he settled in and not tried so hard to pass the motor might have made the distance. So points lost despite the strong effort to drive around the issue.

M758

In racing you are commonly allowed 1 clearly "defenisive" move. Sometimes you can "get away" with two moves if you disguise one.

However weaving on the straight weather to break a draft to out right block is not going to win you any favor with race officials. The FIA was right to take notice. Now maybe you argue he was trying to break a draft vs block. Ok fine that is where the warning comes in. Give him the benefit of not actually bocking and tell him no more. Seems like it worked as I saw not more weaving from him or any other drivers.

BTW...
I think Rosberg had the drive of the race. Strong qualy spot and then just did his thing. It may have been "boring", but he finished well. For a younger driver weekends like this build confidence which will payoff later in the season.

A.Wayne

Joe ... !

Alonso had to get by to save his championship points lead , he was almost 2 seconds a lap faster than button when he caught him , he did not push the engine unnecessarly , the damn thing blewup, it's racing , it happens ..................



Ferrari admits reliability concerns

By Jonathan Noble Monday, April 5th 2010, 07:54 GMT

Ferrari has admitted that it is 'worried' about its reliability in the wake of more engine problems at the Malaysian Grand Prix.

Fernando Alonso lost valuable points when his engine blew-up just a few laps from the end of the Sepang event. And with customer team Sauber having also hit trouble, Ferrari knows it needs to get to the bottom of the problem as quickly as possible.

The events in Sepang were also not the first time that Ferrari has faced engine concerns this season - with the power units on Alonso and Felipe Massa's cars having had to be changed between qualifying and the race in Bahrain.

Team principal Stefano Domenicali reckoned the first three races showed that the F10 had speed, but also that Ferrari needs to get on top of both reliability and the errors that messed up its qualifying performance in Malaysia.



.

ltc

Sort of like when a Ferrari engine blew up with 17 laps left to go at Suzuka one year.

A.Wayne

No that was payback for 2 yrs without one mechanical failure of any kind .....

MJSpeed

Alonso had no clutch from the start! It's amazing that not only it lasted as long as it did but that he was going as fast as he was. Not to mention the pitstop. How the hell do you do that without a clutch.

As far as him not losing time; that's just ludicris. A split second hesitation from the engine coming off of the corner is amplified at the end of the of the following straight. Next time you're on the track, throw it into neutral at the apex, then put it in the correct gear and see your laptimes. And if you don't think that time is lost while braking and downshifting, then I guess we can discuss that seperately.

As for him pushing, don't forget his race engineer telling him to catch/pass Button. Obviously the Ferrari brain trust felt that the equipment would hold up to the punishment, they were wrong by 1.5 laps. He was following his race engineer's orders. At the end of the day, this only cost him two points.

M758

based on the hearing the car in the braking zones and accels it became clear to me his problem was on downchanges.

There was a problem in the gearbox tha cause it to foul up when downshifting. I could not tell if it happen at certain gear interval (ie from 3rd to 2nd) or any time he was downshifting. What was clear was that at times the box seemed to go into neutral when going down through the gears. On conrner exit accell he seemed to do just fine and box never missed a beat. So probably something in the controller.

So I do give him credit for runing damage car strong. However when he stayed with Button on the way in to a coner he had normal accel on the way out of the corner. His weak spot was the way in. I am sure was fooling around with brake bias doing all he could to compenstate for poor braking and in clean running you can take different lines and try to carry speed and general have a better shot of driving around a probelm. However when racing comes down to out braking a guy from 180 mph missing a gear on the way down hurts really bad.

Now as for driving it too hard looking back it seems obvious to me that he was pushing it hard and maybe had he taken it easier in the brake zones and not challenged he could have held position to get more points than he did. Seems to me like he was trying too hard to for 1 more point only to have it cost him the points he had.

Now if the Ferrari team was pushing him then clear he was on not doing it on his own. However it still does not change the fact that maybe it was the wrong plan. It should have been very clear that barring major error Alonso was not going to pass Button. Alonso's car was too weak under braking. Sorry to say but it was just that way.

Like I said earlier I am not ready to call it a "stupid" idea as you always need to race. Certainly had he been able to pass and have the car last it would have been a great idea. However he failed at both the pass and the finish. So at some point you do need to ask was it worth it. Could the car have made it a few laps more had Alonso just held position rather than attacking?

Flying Finn

Well, that's basically impossible to tell but since he's having hard time beating Chandhok... Liuzzi I don't rate much but Koby seems to impress me almost every time he drives, fast and has guts.
Besides, I didn't compare him to any of these, I said he ain't Ayrton.
Or are you saying Bruno is not slower than Ayrton was when he started in F1 with a piece of **** car?
(I know you aren't...)