Teams use clever trick to escape penalty

A few teams have cleverly used a tactical advantage in order to escape penalty in form of grid position, it has emerged.

After the Chinese GP, Williams discovered a problem with Pastor Maldonado´s gearbox and promptly changed it. That  meant five places down on the grid in Bahrain for the Venezuelan driver, who eventually retired the car. Bruno Senna´s car also encountered some issues, this time the brake pedal felt shaky, and the team decided to retire Senna´s car, by having the Brazilian driver enter the pits and retire the car.

“The loophole in the long-life gearbox rule is that genuine retirements – for whatever reason – are not further penalised on the grid of the next race, even if a gearbox is changed out of sequence,” writes Germany´s Auto Motor und Sport. The tactical retirement was also used for Jenson Button in Bahrain. Having been in the points, Button then hit a problem with what is probably a broken and noisy exhaust that was blowing hot gases onto the tyre, which punctured. Button pitted, but was back a lap later with what the team explained as ‘differential problems’, but Button was now back in 13th place, and had no hopes of scoring points this late in the race.

Button will get a free gearbox change, since he did not complete the race, but the tactical reason is even more clever for McLaren, since they are planning some interesting modifications at the rear of the cars, which requires a whole different gearbox shape.

No team orders at Lotus

Close, but no cigar. Kimi Raikkonen looked like he was ready to kick himself for not winning the Bahrain Grand Prix last weekend, after he finished second in the race, three seconds behind Sebastian Vettel, who took his first win of the season.

Analysing the race, things do tend to look a bit clearer a few days later. And if Lotus had employed team orders a bit earlier in the race, at a time when Romain Grosjean could have been ordered aside to let Kimi pass more easily, the Finn might have won the race. But even though team orders are legal from 2012, Lotus team principal Eric Boullier said that they do not use team orders at all.

“We don’t want to play team orders, so we let them race normally and what happened, happened,” said Boullier.

Kimi Raikkonen said after the race that he was disappointed no to be winning, but the race showed that Lotus has the speed.

“Yeah,” said Raikkonen, “but there are no team orders and we know the rules. “I tried to get past as quickly as I can but it’s not easy with two similar cars.

“It’s always easy to say afterwards ‘if we had done that’ but in the end we were not fast enough to win and we have to take the second,” he added.

 

Did Force India refuse to remove alcohol advertisement?

One of the stories that circulated during the weekend of the Bahrani Grand Prix, was that Force India had chosen to withdraw from the second free practice session, in order to get back to the hotel safely. A reasonable decision, considering four team members were involved in an incident on Wednesday, when leaving the Sakhir International Circuit.

Then during Saturday´s qualifying round, not a single image appeared showing the Force India cars, promptly starting rumours that Bernie Ecclestone had somehow blocked the team from exposure on the TV feed, since he is controlling FOM and thus controlling what goes out to the viewers. But there were a few issues tat kept bothering me. One was that Force India left the circuit on Friday, a full two hours after the second practice session was over, which then made no sense as to why they should not participate in the event in the first place.

One more thing that kept picking at my brain, was that of Bernie Ecclestone actually told the TV crews that not a single image of Force India was allowed to be filmed, then why wasn´t the sponsors reacting? Why didn´t we hear Vijay Mallya respond to this? Well, there might be a very simple explanation.

Bahraini law says that it is not allowed to show advertising for alcohol, and as we know the Force India cars have prominent ads from Whyte & Mackay, Kingfisher beer and Vladivar vodka on their side, all easy to spot. But looking at the others cars, and driver overalls, McLaren had no Johnny Walker ads on their cars, the embroidered patch on the overalls were covered, so now the rumour is, that Force India simply refused to remove the advertisements from the cars, causing Bernie Ecclestone, rightfully, to refuse TV exposure. Not only is it a bad idea to refuse this sort of thing, it is breaking the law.

These rumours are yet to be confirmed, and contacting the team is as useful as having building a sauna in the Gobi desert. However, I still maintain that Bernie Ecclestone would have known some part of this, and therefore his excuses, that he did not know why and no one wants to see some cars drive around in 10th anyway, are still rubbish.

Bahrain – The Day After

Bahrain 2012 delivered one of the most thrilling races I have seen in many years, and I have a feeling that I will be saying this a lot over the season.

This season has shown to me that we should never count a driver out, just because it´s been a few years since they last been in F1. Three drivers are perfect examples, and two of them will receive honourable mentions a bit further down this article.

Michael Schumacher returned in 2010 and didn´t do a fantastic job. Some people thought he came up with one excuse after the other, some said he was burned out and some said they´d rather go watch Nascar. Whatever that is. But the fact is that after three years away from the sport, Schumacher did what any driver does. He started from scratch. He had to learn how to work around a car that wasn´t built for him, he had to work with new rules, yes I know, so did the other drivers as well, but Schumacher has always had this approach. He is a very patient man and knows that it takes some time to get back to winning races. Fast-forward to 2012 and it looks as though Mercedesmight be close to cracking the code. The performance is there, but the tyres are too important, says Schumacher. I still think that once Mercedes can fgure out a way to get the tyres working for them, not the other way around, we´ll start seeing Schuey back on the podium.

This season is also showing us that no one can predict a winner, at least not on account of the first four races. There are still 16 to go, and four different drivers have so far won a race. It´s brilliant for us, but also for the drivers, because it means they get an extra dose of motivation when they see that it is in fact possible to win this year, you can battle for the big points. When Fernando Alonso won in Malaysia, I think everyone was flabbergasted. The car is a finisher, but around 7th place I reckon. To win in a car that is struggling to finsih in the points, is fantastic.

Ok, back to the honourable mentions, because hthere are two more left. And both from the same team. Kimi Raikkonen and Romain Grosjean. Yes, I know that the main reason Grosjean is driving this year after been away for two years, is because he is in Eric Boullier´s driver development programme. Renault, sorry, Lotus had a food selection of drivers who were ready and fast enough to drive for them, and they basically gave Grosjean the keys to the pearly gates, because that kid can drive! He never got the chance when the team was run by Flavio, he was only acting as someone filling a seat, unfortunately, but he has the speed and the maturity needed. He is 8th in the standings, has 23 points and got his first podium in Bahrain. If he didn´t retie in the first two races, he could be in the top 4 now.

Kimi Raikkonen is a strange fellow, isn´t he? he left F1, seemingly because he couldn´t be bothered. At least that´s how it looked at the time. He was fed up with Ferrari, they were tired of him as well, I think, and he went on to other things. Kimi never looked to be interested in a comeback, and if you held a gun to his head asking him about it, he would say “it´s ok to drive in F1…”

Now he is back and boy, is he back! Two years away and he just jumps into a car that he has hardly had any test time in. And he is battling for wins! This is once again a perfect example of why we should never underestimate a driver, just because we haven´t seen him around for some time. Kimi is back? You bet ya!

So, to the awards.

Driver of the Day – Sebastian Vettel:

I am sorry if you thought that I was going to award this one to Kimi Raikkonen. It was very close, but in the end Vettel showed his class again. He made the best start and went to get a nice advantage. His position was only ever compromised when Kimi started to shake things up a bit. It was close, very close. At one point Kimi made a move on Vettel, and they were wheel to wheel, but Kimi had to let him go. It went on like this lap after lap, Kimi falling behind a bit, then suddenly he was right behind Vettel again. It was great racing, and great to see Vettel winning again.

Biggest Oh My Moment – Lotus:

Raikkonen and Grosjean seems to me to be a perfect match. They race each other, respect each other and had brilliant internal battles themselves at one point. Lotus is coming out of nowhere this year, well ok, they are coming from Renault, but that car is seriously fast. Two very fast drivers and I see them winning in the next couple of races.

The Who´s A Good Aussie Award – Mark Webber:

Now Mark webber has been criticised a lot for not being as fast as Vettel, but the Aussie driver thrives when things get tough. He also seems perfectly at ease with the fact, that he will probably not be driving for Red Bull next year. But Webber is taking some very good points this season. Four fourth places in four races, he should have 444 written on his car, if you ask me. It means he is third in the championship, which is completely open, and only fiev points away from Vettel in the lead.

Good Effort Award – Paul di Resta:

Paul di Resta is doing a good job, picking up where he left in 2011. Last year he scored 27 points, impressed a lot of people when he drove to sixth in Singapore, but has already amassed 15 points in just four races and is out-performing Nico Hulkenberg.

Worst Performance – McLaren:

Not the place you want to be, I can tell you that. Three third places for Lewis Hamilton and once again a botched pit stop, earning him a disappointing eighth place in Bahrain. Ok, he is still 2nd, four points up to Vettel, but Jenson Button finished 18th yesterday and 14th in Malaysia. Button could have been leading by now, if things worked perfectly. A sticky wheelnut for Button in China, and yesterday Lewis Hamilton encountered issues with the left rear wheelnut twice. As a result, Hamilton has asked the team to investigate the issues and find a solution. Team principal Martin Whitmarsh explained the problems for Hamilton:

“The first [pit stop] one we had what we call pegging, which is when the drive pegs and the drive holes don’t align which is pretty unfortunate,” said Whitmarsh. “The second one we had a cross-thread which we have seen once before. So pretty disappointing, we lost a lot of time and places for Lewis.”

 

Schuey: The tyres are too important now

Michael Schumacher has said that the tyres are now playing a much to large role in a race, claiming that drivers are not able to drive to their abilities, because they have to consider the tyres first.

It was a test for Pirelli on Sunday, as the Italian tyre manufacturer delivered the tyres for the Bahrain GP for the first time. Pirelli entered F1 in 2011, after Bridgestone pulled out, but the race ni Bahrain last year was cancelled due to the civil uprising taking place. Pirelli brought the soft and the medium tyre to the race, and the majority of the drivers had to pit three times.

“The main thing I feel unhappy about is everyone has to drive well below a driver’s, and in particular, the car’s limits to maintain the tyres,” said Schumacher.

“I just question whether the tyres should play such a big importance, or whether they should last a bit longer, and that you can drive at normal racing car speed and not cruise around like we have a safety car.

“I’m not happy about the situation, let’s see what happens in future. If it was a one-off car issue, you could say it’s up to us to deal with it.

“But basically it is everybody, with maybe one or two exceptions, and if it is 80% of the field that has this problem, then maybe the tyre supplier should think about that.”

Paul Hembery, the director of motorsport for Pirelli, said he was very surprised by the comments from Schumacher, and disappointed even.

“I’m disappointed to hear those comments from someone of Michael’s experience. Others were getting on with the job and getting their tyres to work. His comments during winter testing were that he was very happy with the tyres, and now he seems to have changed his tune.”

 

Alonso angry with Rosberg decision

Fernando Alonso said after the Grand Prix in Bahrain, that he was very angry with the way Mercedes´ Nico Rosberg behaved on the track during the race on Sunday.

Rosberg drew attention to his driving style, not once, but twice during the race. TRack stewards investigated both incidents after the race, which took several hours of deliberating and watching TV footage of the incidents, which saw Rosbrg move to the right of the track on the approach to Rrn 4, as he defended his position.

In both cases, Rosberg was deemed not to have swerved or blocked either Hamilton or Alonso, the ruling for the second incident is:

“1. The driver of car eight commenced his move to the right after the exit from turn three and moved to the right in a constant and continuous straight line manner, not making any sudden movements (as evidenced by telemetry and video evidence) and;
2. At the time he commenced his move, car five was behind him and no part of his car was alongside car eight and;
3. The driver of car eight made the move to the right prior to the driver of car five making the same move and;
4. For more than half of the distance travelled by car eight in moving in a straight line towards the right hand edge of the track, car five remained behind car eight and;
5. Because the delta speed between the two cars was quite significant it was difficult for car eight to detect the exact position of car five in relation to his own car;
6. No part of car five was alongside that of car eight.”

But Fernando Alonso is not at all happy with that decision, and speaking to Associated Press after the race, Alonso said:

“Instead of such a wide run -off area (if) there had been a wall, I’m not sure I’d be here now to talk about it.”

He later went on his official Twitter to write the following:

“I think you are going to have fun in future races!” Alonso wrote. “You can defend position as you want and you can overtake outside the track! Enjoy!”

 

Bernie: There´s no such thing as bad publicity

After a fantastic race at the Sakhir Circuit in Bahrain, in which Sebastian Vettel secured his first win of the season, Bernie Ecclestone has reiterated that the race will stay on the calendar indefinitely.

Bernie Ecclestone was upbeat and happy about the race, saying that there is a solid future for the race and that it´s good because people are talking about it. Last year´s race was cancelled after a bloody and violent crackdown from the government on protesters demanding democratic reforms in the country. And today the fact that the race was held, drew criticism and condemnation form many human rights organisations. As a build up for the race,a mass demonstration with thousands of protesters was held during the weekend, in which at least one protester was killed.

When asked if the events in Bahrain this year would have any impact on the future decision to host the race or the growth of motorsport in the region, Berie Ecclestone said:

“I think it’s good because people talk about things, you know. You know what they say – there is no such thing as bad publicity,” he said. “It’s growing all the time, and other places are interested. I think it will grow here for sure.”

Ecclestone also believes that the race will be on the calendar indefinitely.

“Absolutely. Forever. No problem.”

 

Vettel wins thriller in Bahrain, Lotus on the podium

Putting politics aside for a moment, the 2012 edition of the Bahrain Grand Prix was a thriller of absolutely some of the best driving seen in many years.

Aptly dubbed ‘Bore-rain’ in 2010, the Hermann Tilke-track has never produced interesting races as such, and expectations were that Sebastian Vettel would simply run with the win, leaving everyone standing in the dust. But it was far from a walk-over for the German double world champion, although he made a great start.

Towards the first turn, Vettel managed to keep the field behind him, as Lewis Hamilton and Mark Webber kept their 2nd and 3rd places. Button was passed by a brilliant move by Fernando Alonso, while Nico Rosberg, winner of the last race in China, dropped to tenth. Grosjean managed to get past Rosberg and even tried to have a go at Webber. One lap in and Vettel lead with 1,7 seconds. Down the order we had Schumacher and Maldonado who started way down due to gearbox changes, but they both managed to push ahead. Schumacher did come out the best, as he was soon up to 17th. Raikkonen and Massa also had a very good battle in the beginning, Rosberg battled with Hamilton, pushing him almost off the track. Rosberg later repeated the move, pushing Alonso off the track, and both incidents are being investigated.

Throughout the entire race there were close battles and unpredictable racing. Halfway through, Raikkonen showed that he is back, putting serious pressure on Vettel, and lap by lap the Iceman edged closer to the champion. At one point Kimi almost made it past, but had to concede immediately. He later dropped a little behind Vettel, settling for 2nd. Team mate Romain Grosjean also drove a fantastic race, as he not only managed to secure third from Mark Webber, but kept it and defended it well, as well as catching up to Raikkonen and Vettel at the front.

Webber settled for 5th, ahead of Rosberg, di Resta, Alonso, Hamilton, Massa and Schumacher. The latter secured the final spot in the points, after Button had to stop on lap 54 with a flat tyre. He re-joined in 13, but on the final lap Button started to drive really slowly and finally pitted from 18th, retiring the car.

In the end it was a fantastic performance from Vettel, who wins his first race of the season, ahead of Kimi Raikkonen in second and Romain Grosjean in third. What a great result for Sebastian and well-deserved result for the two Lotus drivers. With four different race winners in the first four races, the 2012 season is as open as it can be.

The championship standings show that Sebastian Vettel leads with 53 points, ahead of Lewis Hamilton 49, Mark Webber 48, Jenson Button 43, Fernando Alonso 43, Nico Rosberg 35, Kimi Raikkonen 34, Romain Grosjean 23, Sergio Perez 22 and Bruno Senna 14.