2012 F1 - Malaysia

[TeaLeaf]

Well, what a Grand Prix and who would have predicted the eventual outcome?

Drive of the day
(and gamble of the day) was Perez & Sauber.    Brilliant result for this young driver, HOWEVER:

I was seriously ticked off by the message Sauber passed to him with 7-8 laps left: "second place is important to us, we need this position, we need these points, don't throw it away".   Sorry Sauber, but when you're catching a Ferrari at 1.0-1.5 seconds per lap and when your driver gets to within 1.8 seconds of Alonso you then tell him to "not go for the win" it's plain mad.

It also smacks ever so slightly of 'interference'.   Sauber get their engines from, guess who, Ferrari.  Anyone else have a slight uneasiness about that pit transmission to Perez now?   Perez would have won that grand prix and Peter Sauber's tears could have been celebrating a fantastic win:  

I fully believe that Perez was so angry with the message that he just had delivered by his pit wall that he lost concentration during that next lap and ran wide.  I certainly would have reacted in the same way.

Lucky Barsteward of the Day:  
Alonso.  He had no right to be there despite pulling more speed out of the Ferrari than it had.   The others were simply faster, but he got gifted the position by poor pit stops and a safety car.

Unlucky Barstewards:
Jenson & Lewis both got let down by pit stops, unlucky contact, being stuck in your pit slot as other cars passed, safety car timings etc.  Poor results from them despite having the best car on the circuit.

Nostalgia:
Schumacher - I hated him when he drove the first time around, but I am growing to like him in his new more mature version.   Delighted to see him podium in 3rd and a well deserved result.

Consiracy:
Red Bull - need to do some catch up fast.  But, the story for me was the radio messages to Vettel in the final stages of the race.  Recall the scene:
-the pit tell Vettel to retire the car when he is running fine in 11th, no technical reason given.  
-Vettel then starts closing in on 10th (the final World Championship point) so the message then changes to 'Stay out'.  
-But then it becomes clear that Vettel will not catch 10th before the end of the race (and therefore will finish the race with no points), so on the final lap the message changes to "Emergency, stop the car immediately".    

Now this could all of been an honest KERS failure and a message to avoid immediate hazard to the driver.  
Or
It might have been a nod to the fact that a car retired before the end of the race can change its gear box without taking a grid penalty at the next race.  

I'm afraid I think it is the latter.  Vettel did not seem to believe it was a real emergency, he ignored the pit wall orders and finished 11th.  Am I a conspiracy theorist or what?  

Technical:
With the rear cover off the final pieces of the Mercedes wing-stalling system were revealed.  Many articles out there about it, this is but one:
http://scarbsf1.wordpress.com/2012/03/24/mercedes-drs-duct-how-it-links-to-the-front-wing/


All in all, it was a great race to follow and some great driving on display.   Looking forward to China in 3 weeks!

[Tutonic]

It also smacks ever so slightly of 'interference'.   Sauber get their  engines from, guess who, Ferrari.  Anyone else have a slight uneasiness  about that pit transmission to Perez now?   Perez would have won that  grand prix and Peter Sauber's tears could have been celebrating a  fantastic win:  

I'd say that's a bit of a leap - I can see how a team might get nervous, this might be the best position they get all season and they don't want their man binning it into a wall chasing down a good driver like Alonso. It looked to me like he ignored them and continued to chase down Alonso anyway - then he cocked it up. Oops!

If Ferrari stop mucking about and give Alonso a half-decent car he will be seriously hard to beat, because he is some driver. If I were a Ferrari engineer I'd be learning how to rain-dance for the rest of the season.

[Snokio]

I think they retired vettel because of rear brake temps, the puncture sustained caused bodywork damage and airflow was not being directed to the brake, i think they also need to provide evidence of this to retire the car, but not sure

Great race, shame there is a 3 week break now

[T-Bag]

Well, what a Grand Prix and who would have predicted the eventual outcome?

Drive of the day
(and gamble of the day) was Perez & Sauber.    Brilliant result for this young driver, HOWEVER:
...

It also smacks ever so slightly of 'interference'.   Sauber get their engines from, guess who, Ferrari.  Anyone else have a slight uneasiness about that pit transmission to Perez now?   Perez would have won that grand prix and Peter Sauber's tears could have been celebrating a fantastic win.  

Consiracy:
Red Bull - need to do some catch up fast.  But, the story for me was the radio messages to Vettel in the final stages of the race.  Recall the scene:
-the pit tell Vettel to retire the car when he is running fine in 11th, no technical reason given.  
-Vettel then starts closing in on 10th (the final World Championship point) so the message then changes to 'Stay out'.  
-But then it becomes clear that Vettel will not catch 10th before the end of the race (and therefore will finish the race with no points), so on the final lap the message changes to "Emergency, stop the car immediately".    

Now this could all of been an honest KERS failure and a message to avoid immediate hazard to the driver.  
Or
It might have been a nod to the fact that a car retired before the end of the race can change its gear box without taking a grid penalty at the next race.  

I'm afraid I think it is the latter.  Vettel did not seem to believe it was a real emergency, he ignored the pit wall orders and finished 11th.  Am I a conspiracy theorist or what?  

As far a Perez goes, I was aware the engines come from Ferrari but I don't think they have any motivation to avoid challenging them. It's still a Ferrari engine on pole at the end of the day. Points are everything to a team like Sauber and this 2nd place will give them plenty of breathing room from the teams around them for the prize money at the end of the season. It was the right call considering Alonso would never make it easy for someone to pass...a less aggressive driver and I might have called it differently.

As for Vettel, it's clearly a gearbox ploy. "We're not getting points so why bother" attitude is not what this sport needs. Abusing the rules like speeding under the safety car (but getting away with it by not crossing a timing strip by pitting) in Australia and manifesting problems to change parts is what I've come to expect from the team. It's a bit disappointing to see.

[TeaLeaf]

Why do my spidey senses forewarn me of incoming spam?   We're watching......