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All European races start at 8am here

9am here. Meanwhile, Australian GP used to be at midnight from Sat to Sun, what used to be an awesome time. Now it's 3 AM, what is awful.

2am start for me, eastcoast USA and next weekend is a 4am start. I'm fine with that and won't ever complain. If you want to watch the racing, you'll get up. Plus I like the 9am Sunday race starts for the European rounds.

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BTCC Pick Em's Champion 2010
Formula Fun Cup Champion 2013
http://www.the-fastlane.co.uk

Being great is one thing, outclassing is another.

Someone who really outclassed his teammate is Kimi.

Kimis team mate had 2 laps to setup his car with parts they fitted that morning. It is pretty unfair to judge Grosjean on that one.

And yeah I'd say Massa outclassed Alonso this week. He spent the entire weekend ahead of Alonso until that ridiculous strategy call screwed him.

A pretty good race i thought, Kimi did a great job and really did all he had to do the whole race, Alonso gave chase hard all race too.

Pleasing to see a Lotus win their first Australian Grand Prix since 1968 also.

That is luxury. All European races start at midnight for us. Not so good for Monday productivity.

Hehe yeah of all the places to live for F1, NZ wold have to be one of the worst!

What? If anything people complained that the start was so late in Australia, leaving little time for possible delays.

yea, not gona lie to you... it's pretty fucken shit

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"An idea whose time has come cannot be stopped by any army or any government"


3x TBKL rFactor Hillclimb champion

McLaren say it was a Red Bull problem that cost Webber
http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/106136

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Dan Wheldon | 1978 - 2011

I'll agree to disagree.

/fanboy Alonso

So Lotus was giving away these in Melbourne



wants

Pretty genius piece of marketing. I hope they still have them for Silverstone

Also some fun facts:
- Kimi's finished his last 29 races, 26 of them in the points
- Alonso/Massa led a lap for the first time since Germany/Monaco 2012
- Rosberg's not scored a point in 7 races
- Button has now scored 1001 points
- First lap led for Sutil in his 91st race
- 7 different race leaders; second most in history (along with 1973 Canada, 1975 GB, 2008 Canada). Most is 8 (1971 Italy)
- Bianchi's FL just 0.05s slower than Vettel's (thanks to Pirelli really)

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Dan Wheldon | 1978 - 2011

looks like you have been away from the forum for some time

get ready for next week as race starts at 5AM

Japan was ok when it started at 2AM, but now they set to 3AM

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Motorsports trend for 2024: everything is a bad taste joke now

http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/2013/03/17/2 ... pit-stops/

Look at the strategy break down on that page. How is it the "classic undercut", it was nowhere near the optimum time to pit, he took himself out of sync because he was being held up. He hampered the ideal 3 stop strategy to even pit.

A stint of 11 laps on the medium tyres was a compromise to his own strategy. Stopping early is a risk as it means you have to do longer stints later on and nobody was certain about what the tires would do in that situation. You still need to have the pace to not only get ahead during your outlap(s) (as your competitor will likely pit to cover you soon), but you also then need to make sure you can manage your tires and pace to stay ahead later and not risk getting re-overtaken (since your tires will be more worn). Its definitely not as 'obvious' or a sure-fire thing like you are making it seem.

No one bar Alonso and Lewis [who flatspotted his tyres several times when he was battling Alonso] where the only ones to even do a stint of 11 laps or less on the medium tyres

Yes because everything Ted says is gospel? There have been numerous occasions where he's reported something which is incorrect, that was simply his own opinion of things.



In summary: it does not matter that Massa fought hard with Alonso in the first laps of the GP; that he was given priority in the first pit stop; or that he himself has explained that it was indeed Alonso who chose to pit when, in Massa's opinion, it was far too early. Some people are still bent on blaming Ferrari for mistreating Massa. Baffling.

Either way, Massa wasn't able to hold on to the back of Vettel later on. If they were indeed planning on 3-stopping like they did end up doing, it meant that Massa would have his chance to undercut Vettel later on as there'd be another round of stops, but he just wasn't quick enough to even pass Vettel for the final podium place also.



Given they knew the supersoft tyres would not last it was ideal to just get them out of the way as soon as possible rather than do Sutil's strategy. Particularly if you qualify in the top ten. Get them out of the way after a handful of laps and spend the majority of the race on best rubber. The race winner used the same strategy, the only difference is the pace of the cars.

Sutil was so far ahead due to a great start and not losing too much time making his way through the field. Given how little time [FP2 only] they had to test long run pace I doubt they knew which strategy was going to be the best. Hedging their bets and splitting it in midfidl was the best decision all things considered.

Apologies for the long post.

He pitted a couple of laps earlier than others...that is the classic undercut. I mean, it's pretty much the definition of it. Yeah he did it a couple of laps earlier than normal but that was so they could get both Massa and Vettel. All it did was lengthen his 3rd stint a little, and it was still within the lifetime of the tyres.



He, Brundle and Croft all called it at the same time, as did a bunch of us. The strategy they put Massa on was utterly retarded and served NO purpose but to screw him. It didn't benefit him over Vettel, and it REALLY didn't benefit him over Alonso. He spent literally the *entire* weekend ahead of Alonso until that call. Massa was put into a silly no mans land strategy, where neither a 2 stop or 3 stint would be optimal. It was a compromise no matter they did from then on. It not only cost him a position to Alonso, it cost him a podium. And it isn't like we're going to make out that it is a silly idea that Ferrari would directly screw Massa. His gearbox seal knows all about that.



Teams who are going to qualify 9th or 10th at best often use the harder tyre in Q3 for an advantage in the race. It is the same reason why most outside of the top 10 does it too. It isn't about "get them out of the way", because that's silly - you know you have to run them, so why would you run them at the start? All that does is ensure you will have to put very early which will put you back in the pack. A reason outside the top 10 runs the harder option at the start is so that when the time comes to pit, the race is usually more spread out. It also allows them to be more flexible with the stints, which the top 10 often cannot do. Annnnd, it's more important for those at the front to not get stuck in the pack because the time difference lost is rather extreme. Where as if a car that qualifies 12th gets stuck behind one that qualifies 15th in the stops the time lost is minimall. di Restas strategy was retarded. As always.



That doesn't address the problem though. They didn't know how good the long run pace would be, but that makes no difference. It was well documented that the Supersoft tyres could not run much more than 5 laps at pace. The very end of the tyres life was around 10 laps. Other than Sutil, only Mercedes ran more than 10 laps on the supersofts. Not 1 other car attempted it, even the Lotus with it's exceptionally low tyre wear. They gave Sutil 12 laps on the Super Softs, a tyre which only lasted 8 on di Restas car in the same race. That, is such a stupid strategy call it's unreal. But it;s also vintage Force India - have the cars well into the points by two thirds distance, and somehow throw it away. FI Came out better because of the issues Grosjean, Rosberg and McLaren had.

Pretty good photos!

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"An idea whose time has come cannot be stopped by any army or any government"


3x TBKL rFactor Hillclimb champion

Reading through the thread I like how you can't criticise any driver, even ones having not so much bad but anonymous races like Grosjean, without someone leaping to their defense.

I'm gonna say it now: Maldanado had a shit race.
There, defend that

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