# Formula 1 2007 Season****SPOILER****



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

By (seemingly) popular demand, we embark on a new season of Formula 1. Bring on the fans.


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## #98 (Nov 26, 2003)

My prediction: MS returns with Spyker and Franka as his chief engineer and wins the WDC.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Is Mika Häkkinen going to be McLaren's other driver in 2007? :dunno: 


:eeps: 


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## Pinecone (Apr 3, 2002)

Are we getting rid of the Turd? I hope I hope.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Who is "we."

If a vote were taken here, he'd be gone in a flash.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Pinecone said:


> Are we getting rid of the Turd? I hope I hope.


I think that his latest "term" ends in 2008. But lets see what sort of poop he can arrange before he finally gets flushed down the toilet.

Anyway, he is such a self centered asshole, that he might just stick around beyond then.

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> Who is "we."
> 
> If a vote were taken here, he'd be gone in a flash.


If a vote was taken anywhere, I would say that he would be done.

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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Patrick said:


> Is Mika H***228;kkinen going to be McLaren's other driver in 2007? :dunno:
> 
> .


The plot is thickening ... :eeps:

More rumors about this today.

Interesting.

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> Is Mika H***228;kkinen going to be McLaren's other driver in 2007?
> 
> Not according to McLaren


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> Patrick said:
> 
> 
> > Is Mika Häkkinen going to be McLaren's other driver in 2007?
> ...


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Pinecone said:


> Are we getting rid of the Turd? I hope I hope.


I'm afraid not. He'll be there for us to rag on. It wouldn't be much fun without him to criticise.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

You talked with Martin Whitmarsh? .[/QUOTE]

Yes, over the weekend.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

McLaren comment on Hakkinen return 

Tuesday, November 14th 2006, 13:36 GMT 


McLaren say they do not currently plan to draft in former champion Mika Hakkinen as Fernando Alonso's Formula One teammate next season, amid speculations that the Finn could make a comeback.

The Mercedes-powered team did confirm, however, that the 38-year-old Finn had recently spent time in their race simulator.

"Mika has been in the simulator, and following his visit to Brazil (last month) wished to understand if he could contribute to our programme," said McLaren chief executive Martin Whitmarsh.

"We currently have no plans to run Mika alongside Alonso next year. The identity of our second driver will be announced in due course."

Hakkinen, world champion with McLaren in 1998 and 1999, retired from Formula One at the end of 2001 and has been racing for Mercedes in the DTM German touring car series.

He was in Brazil as a guest of Mercedes to watch old Ferrari rival Michael Schumacher bow out in the final race of the championship.

The Finn revealed earlier this year he had turned down a chance to drive for Williams last year after that Formula One team approached him in 2004.

Spaniard Alonso, 25, joins McLaren from Renault at the end of the year after becoming the youngest double champion in Formula One history.

His teammate for 2007 has yet to be confirmed, with Kimi Raikkonen departing for Ferrari and McLaren saying only that they expect to make an announcement before the end of the year.

Briton Lewis Hamilton, 21, is a front runner while 35-year-old Pedro de la Rosa hopes to be part of an all-Spanish line-up after moving up from being a test driver to replace Colombian Juan Pablo Montoya as a race stand-in this year.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

That article was from two days ago, and the story about Mika broke last week.

Read Autosport (if you speak German) from today. The story is on the cover.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

That is the cover article on autosport.com


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

The first sentence in the article above states "...do not currently plan to draft....". 

So it's not a blanket renouncement. Rather it is a hedged answer that still leaves the door open.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

All that I have heard at this point is that Mika remains a well paid employee of Mercedes Benz (or is it AMG?).

Like I said, it is interesting.


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## bimmerology (Jul 3, 2006)

i heard that danika patrick is going to williams... hahaha


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

bimmerology said:


> i heard that danika patrick is going to williams... hahaha


She could double as a grid girl to make a little extra money each race. First thing you know, Flavio would be dating her (providing it wasn't considered a conflict of interest, of course.)


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Anyone know why the 2006 F1 thread was taken down? It had some good info in there and some interesting comments that I was looking for to use.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> Anyone know why the 2006 F1 thread was taken down? It had some good info in there and some interesting comments that I was looking for to use.


:dunno:

http://www.bimmerfest.com/forums/showthread.php?t=136124

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> :dunno:
> 
> http://www.bimmerfest.com/forums/showthread.php?t=136124
> 
> .


Thanks. I was looking for the old title.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> Thanks. I was looking for the old title.


I am sure it wasn't for a lack of looking.

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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> I am sure it wasn't for a lack of looking. .


Okay Patrick, so I deserved that. Hey, I was in a hurry.

Thanks for the guiding light.

I wanted to look up our friend Alex's comments from last year.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Häkkinen passed his physical (medical examination) for McLaren. :eeps: 


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Patrick said:


> H***228;kkinen passed his physical (medical examination) for McLaren. :eeps:


Will Mika just end up being another Jacques? Maybe he's better off to stay put in DTM.

Of course, he could go to GP2. The seems to be the popular dumping ground for former F1 drivers now.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Here's a good one.*

Johnnie Walker appoints Hakkinen

Wednesday, November 22nd 2006, 14:56 GMT

Two-time Formula One world champion Mika Hakkinen has been appointed as Responsible Drinking Ambassador for Johnnie Walker's Formula One Sponsorship programme.

The role of the Finn will involve raising awareness on issues of responsible drinking, particularly in relation to driving.

"I am extremely proud to represent such a prestigious company as Diageo in this very important role," said Hakkinen.

"My years on the racetrack have shown the vital role responsibility and control play in motor sport, these principles are just as important for drivers on the road around the world.

"This is a role that I truly believe in."

Hakkinen's appointment builds on the association of Johnnie Walker with the McLaren team, with whom the Finn has been recently linked for a possible return to F1.

Johnnie Walker has sponsored McLaren since the 2005 season.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*PR Spin*

This is one of a number of recent articles from Schumi reflecting on his past. In this, as in the other articles, Schumi gives us his spin of past problems, transgressions, incidents and the like in what I see as an overall PR effort to repair the damage he has done to himself.

Schumacher: I felt for Alonso at Monza

By Jonathan Noble Monday, November 27th 2006, 14:22 GMT

Michael Schumacher has revealed that he felt some sympathy for Fernando Alonso at Monza this year amid all the controversy over the Renault driver's grid penalty.

Alonso was penalised after the race stewards judged that he had blocked Felipe Massa during qualifying. The furore over that decision resulted in Alonso claiming that he no longer felt F1 was a sport.

Looking back at that incident in a lengthy interview with German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung, Schumacher has admitted that the Monza controversy reminded him of how he felt after the 1994 British Grand Prix - when he was banned for two races for ignoring a black flag.

Speaking about his punishment in 1994, Schumacher said: "My perception at the time was: it was all staged and I was made out to be the angry maverick. We had a large lead in the world championship and this penalty was very convenient.

"There they (the FIA) developed a rule compliancy trend against us. The way in which Flavio Briatore went about it certainly did not help. No one is interested because you are swimming against a strong current.

"In hindsight, I have to admit that one later looks at things differently and not only sees one's own side only. Maybe Fernando Alonso will also see it like that in the future."

He added: "When he (Alonso) felt that he was unfairly penalised by the FIA and presumed that there was a conspiracy against him I had a lot of sympathy for him and I could understand his reaction, because I thought back to how I felt in 1994. I also told him that after the race in Monza when we met at the airport in Geneva."

Schumacher maintains that he did not ignore the black flag at Silverstone in 1994, brought out for overtaking Damon Hill on the formation lap.

"I didn't ignore the black flag," said Schumacher when asked about the incident. "I just didn't see it. And I am also not saying that I didn't make a mistake then, only that the FIA was likewise not without fault. And I couldn't understand why I of all people should have been the scapegoat."


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

:eeps: 

Häkkinen will test a McLaren tomorrow or at the latest, Thursday, in Spain.

Interesting.


.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

dwette said:


> Of course, he could go to GP2. The seems to be the popular dumping ground for former F1 drivers now.


Hmm. I cannot think of one former Formula One driver that is racing GP2. Timo Glock? Giorgio Pantani?

But can either of those guys be considered "former" Formula One drivers?

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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Hmm. I cannot think of one former Formula One driver that is racing GP2. Timo Glock? Giorgio Pantani?
> 
> But can either of those guys be considered "former" Formula One drivers?


I never qualified it with "successful," or "regular," but they did have F1 seats in one fashion or another.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Looks like Speed TV is sharing F1 broadcast duties this year with FOX, which will do 4 GPs including Canada and US. 

I wonder if there's any chance FOX will do the USGP in HD. That would be awesome.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

I wonder if they will use real announcers that know something about Formula One. :eeps: 


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

dwette said:


> Looks like Speed TV is sharing F1 broadcast duties this year with FOX, which will do 4 GPs including Canada and US.
> 
> I wonder if there's any chance FOX will do the USGP in HD. That would be awesome.


HD sure would be awesome. I can't wait to see how they do. Do you know who will do commentary? Couldn't do any worse than CBS did.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Dumb question here: if the original feed from a race (lets say in Europe) is not broadcast in HD, how could Speed/Fox then show the program in the US in HD? :dunno: 


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> Do you know who will do commentary? Couldn't do any worse than CBS did.


They should get Edmund Irvine to do it (at least co-commentary). :eeps:

He has a comment about everyone in Formula One.

.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Dumb question here: if the original feed from a race (lets say in Europe) is not broadcast in HD, how could Speed/Fox then show the program in the US in HD? :dunno:
> 
> .


I didn't say that. I said I hope they do the *USGP *in HD. That's the one race they would produce.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

dwette said:


> I didn't say that. I said I hope they do the *USGP *in HD. That's the one race they would produce.


Relax guy!

I didn't accuse you of anything. My question was an honest one - I don't get all of this HDTV stuff that is just now becoming popular here.

.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Patrick said:


> I wonder if they will use real announcers that know something about Formula One. :eeps:


Same commentary team (Varsha, Hobbs, Machett, Windsor). We continue to be subjected to Hobbs making engine noise. _Ynrrrrr

_


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Relax guy!
> 
> I didn't accuse you of anything. My question was an honest one - I don't get all of this HDTV stuff that is just now becoming popular here.
> 
> .


If it's not produced in HD, it can't be turned into HD. It has to be recorded in the first place using high definition video equipment. But FOX already has a lot of experience doing that with Football, Baseball, and NASCAR, all of which are regularly produced in HD and broadcast on FOX.

But Bernie -- greedy bastard that he is -- will likely inhibit production of non-American races in HD until he can find a way to make extra money because of it.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

dwette said:


> But Bernie -- greedy bastard that he is -- will likely inhibit production of non-American races in HD until he can find a way to make extra money because of it.


Cute...but, unfortunately, probably correct.

Patrick, my condolences on HD not being popular in Finland. You don't know what you're missing. After HD, I find it hard to watch anything that's not HD.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> Cute...but, unfortunately, probably correct.
> 
> Patrick, my condolences on HD not being popular in Finland. You don't know what you're missing. After HD, I find it hard to watch anything that's not HD.


HDTV is the thing right now - at least as far as those that sell TV sets are concerned. And I just bought a Sony HDTV today. 

However, we have to wait for those that produce TV programming to catch up and broadcast things in HD format.

I have seen sports while in the US in HD, and I can't wait for it to happen here. It is fantastic!

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Mika, Is he back?*

Q & A with Mika Hakkinen

By Jonathan Noble Wednesday, November 29th 2006, 17:54 GMT

The gossip in the Barcelona paddock during this week's first winter test has only been about one man - Mika Hakkinen.

From early week rumours of a possible test soon, it was finally confirmed just before the double world champion arrived at the Circuit de Catalunya today that he will indeed be running on Thursday.

For the moment, the test is just a one-off, to allow the team to get feedback from a top-line star about just what is right or wrong about the MP4-21. But after autosport.com sat down with Hakkinen on Wednesday afternoon, there is every suggestion that the Flying Finn may be back for more action in the near future.

Hakkinen started off his chat with a little monologue...

Mika Hakkinen: I just wanted to tell you what is going on, but I do not want to say too much about it. I have to drive tomorrow. I am very excited as the last time (I drove an F1 car) it was 2001 when I was driving the car flat out.

I drove at Goodwood this year just for fun, but obviously Goodwood is not the place you have to go fast - it is just entertainment for the fans. Here obviously I can push the car harder, not on the first lap, but I have a full day at least to experience a GP car again.

It is going to be an exciting day. An extremely exciting day. I am looking forward to working with the team and the mechanics. Obviously there are a few faces in the team who are new, but there are some old members in the team as well. It is going to be exciting and fun.

I will say again that it is difficult to say too much more. I have no feeling about it yet. Obviously you guys want to understand if I am coming back to F1 or staying in the DTM&#8230;and at the moment the idea is the DTM. I can say that. F1, at the moment, is a big experience day to understand how the F1 car has changed over the last few years.

It will be a great experience with the electronics and also using Bridgestone tyres again. I used them when I won my championships in 1998 and 1999, so this is all interesting.

Q. When did the decision to test come about?

MH: Well, this process, what is happening at the moment, did not happen too long ago. It has not been going on like one year or half a year, but only a short time. Obviously I was in the simulator at McLaren a couple of times, which was very exciting. It is an interesting machine. Obviously I signed with Johnnie Walker for me to be an ambassador for them - to promote safety on the road and not drink and drive.

Q. So is tomorrow just a promotional event?

MH: No, it is not promotion tomorrow.

Q. What kind of answers are you expecting out of tomorrow? What do you want to know?

MH: Obviously I do have memories, understanding and feelings from when I used to race. I know roughly how it works, how the car is handling, braking, accelerating, cornering and the G-load. So that is going to be one of the big tests for me - are they like what they used to be?

Will it be more difficult or easier? I think the thing for me to answer is, am I quick enough? That is not the purpose of the test though, logically like you have read for the press release.

Q. Who started all the discussion that has resulted in you testing?

MH: The whole idea was done together with not one particular person, but with the whole McLaren team. Let's see what is going to happen. Obviously I have been in the simulator a couple of times, which was interesting. My feedback from many years of F1 will be very valuable info and all this is something good.

My opinion is I should not sit here too much longer. Let's wait and see - and enjoy it. I am excited. It is very positive. I am looking forward to seeing the steering, the pedals, and everything this evening. It is all exciting.

But it is not only fun. You have to take a serious approach for the whole test. You cannot test and joke about it. Okay, let's drive. I have to focus my mind to make a good day tomorrow.

All the valuable information to the team is for the future. I think it is serious. Then they will make every note about it. They will investigate for the comments. It is going to influence the future. It is absolutely serious.

Q. So did all the discussions start about the Brazilian GP time?

MH: Yes, roughly about that time. It was not long ago.

Q. And what is your wife's opinion?

MH: She is very excited about it.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Now we see that the evil Ferrari had a hand in this matter........

Tyres give Renault insight on damper ban 

By Michele Lostia Monday, December 11th 2006, 12:34 GMT 


Renault F1 chief Flavio Briatore has revealed that running on Bridgestone tyres for the first time this month has given his team insight into why Ferrari pushed for the mass damper system to be banned this season.

According to Briatore, rivals Ferrari were unable to make the device work due to the characteristics of the Bridgestone front tyres. This, the Italian claims, has led to chain of events that ended with the FIA banning the system altogether.

Renault began using the mass damper device at the end of the 2005 season, but mid-way through the 2006 season the FIA banned the system, saying it operates as a movable aerodynamic device, which is forbidden by the regulations.

While other teams were reported to have tried the mass damper system as well, Renault were most affected by the ban, with director of engineering Pat Symonds admitting recently that the removal of the device cost his team in terms of lap times and development.

But now Briatore has revealed that winter testing on the Bridgestone tyres has given Renault insight into why rivals Ferrari were unable to work with the device - and he believes this in turn led to the system's ban.

"Now we understand why they banned the mass damper all of a sudden mid-season," Briatore told fans at the Bologna motor show. "This is because it wouldn't work with Ferrari's Bridgestone tyres, as their fronts are too wide."

The FIA has never revealed what information led to the decision to ban the mass dampers, and Briatore initially accused McLaren and Ferrari of pushing for the ban. McLaren boss Ron Dennis, however, has denied it was his team that protested the device.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> The FIA has never revealed what information led to the decision to ban the mass dampers, and Briatore initially accused McLaren and Ferrari of pushing for the ban. McLaren boss Ron Dennis, however, has denied it was his team that protested the device.


I wonder Alex will say when he reads that! :bigpimp:

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> I wonder Alex will say when he reads that! :bigpimp: .


Alex took an oath to reserve commenting on his favorite team and their former driver.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Teams demand equality from Bridgestone 

By Jonathan Noble Wednesday, December 13th 2006, 16:53 GMT 


Formula One teams are demanding Bridgestone treat them all equally from the start of next season, autosport.com has learned, after discovering that the Japanese tyre manufacturer has given a better contract to some teams than to others.

Bridgestone will become the only tyre supplier in Formula One next year, after rival company Michelin withdrew from the sport. Moreover, the Japanese tyre maker will be the sole provider of tyres to F1 as of 2008, when the regulations change to a single, controlled supply of tyres.

But with Bridgestone effectively becoming the sole supplier a year earlier than 2008, many teams had been under the impression that they would all receive the same treatment in 2007 as well.

That view was quashed at last week's F1 team principals' meeting in Monaco, however, when it emerged that Bridgestone was varying the terms of its commercial contracts throughout the grid.

The discussion about the situation became heated when some teams found out they were having to pay for tyres as others confirmed they were receiving their rubber free of charge.

Autosport.com has learned that Bridgestone wants to charge some teams for race and test tyres next year - which could amount up to $5 million (US) over the course of the campaign. Further charges have also been mentioned for extra test tyres from 2008.

With the team bosses agreeing that the situation was not satisfactory, it was decided that Bridgestone would be pressured to give the same deal to every F1 team. Bernie Ecclestone told the team bosses that he would step in to sort out the problem.

"Everyone just wants to be treated the same," one source told autosport.com . "Those teams having to pay for tyres obviously felt very angry when one team said that they had been given a contract for free tyres that lasted for three years."

Bridgestone was not represented in the meeting, and the company has since been at pains to emphasise that it wants to treat all teams as equal as possible.

A spokesman for the company said: "Bridgestone is surprised at reports that certain aspects of tyre supply were discussed at the recent team principals meeting. Details of Bridgestone's contracts with its teams are confidential.

"Bridgestone in 2007, as the single tyre supplier present in F1, will supply tyres according to the rules laid out by the FIA. The rules state that we will make available identical quantities and specifications of tyres for tests and races, which is our intention.

"We aim to be fair and equitable in our tyre supply in F1. Our contracts with teams are compliant with the rules for 2007.

"As the official tyre supplier to the world championship between 2008 and 2010, Bridgestone will also comply with the terms of its tender for that period with the rules laid out by the FIA."

Bridgestone sources have insisted that with the FIA rules stipulating that race and test tyres must be free from 2008, the only charges mentioned are for extra rubber that some outfits have requested for wind tunnel and test-rig work at their factory.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

franka said:


> Teams demand equality from Bridgestone
> 
> By Jonathan Noble Wednesday, December 13th 2006, 16:53 GMT
> 
> ...


Seems pretty sh!tty for a mandated monopoly...they got ya by the crank shaft, so to speak.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Bridgestone will become the only tyre supplier in Formula One next year, after rival company Michelin withdrew from the sport. Moreover, the Japanese tyre maker will be the sole provider of tyres to F1 as of 2008, when the regulations change to a single, controlled supply of tyres.

They make it sound like 'because Michelin withdrew, F1 will have to go on with a single supplier'.

The truth is the FIA mandated one supplier, and everyone knew who that would be, so Michelin withdrew. Why should they continue to put money into the FIA's business when they will get nothing out of it?

Regarding some paying and some not, Bridgestone should have been up front with it all and the FIA should have made sure it was all up front. I can't imagine that the FIA didn't know Bridgestone's intentions all along. I'm sure they did.

Which goes to show that Bridgestone was reaping favors from the FIA from the get go.

It stinks.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

How does ChampCar deal with the tire regs? They also have a sole supplier, and it is Bridgestone.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

dwette said:


> How does ChampCar deal with the tire regs? They also have a sole supplier, and it is Bridgestone.


They have at least two compounds, with the red tires being the softer. All champ teams buy their rubber.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

franka said:


> They have at least two compounds, with the red tires being the softer. All champ teams buy their rubber.


Yeah, I know about the red tires. Actually, there is -- or has been -- some discussion about doing the red tires in F1. Maybe the FIA should just mandate an equal contract for all teams.

Either that, or do a sliding scale for tire payment based on wins...making Ferrari pay the most. Hmmm...I guess that leaves Super Aguri getting rebates.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

I like the sliding scale.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

I just read in the Dec 11th Autoweek that Kimi drove Schumi out of racing. 

The article states that "many on the inside believe Kimi drove Schumi out of F1 before he was ready to go."

I read that somewhere else myself about 3 mos ago. Well I hope it's true, what joy. 

What a joy my man Kimi pushed Schumi not just out of Ferrari but out of Ferrari and right out of F1.

Fans can Rejoice the news. What a joy. Thank you Kimi.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*A very sad note*

Regazzoni killed in a road crash

Friday, December 15th 2006, 16:49 GMT

Former Grand Prix driver Clay Regazzoni was killed in a car crash in Italy today. He was 67 years old.

The Swiss driver is reported to have collided head on with a truck on the A1 Motorway near Parma, while driving a Chrysler Voyager.

Regazzoni, who gave the Williams team their first Grand Prix win in 1979, made his Formula One debut in the 1970 Dutch Grand Prix, as Ferrari handed him the second seat alongside Jacky Ickx.

He made an instant impression, finishing fourth in that race. Just four rounds later, he captured his maiden Grand Prix victory at Monza.

By the end of the 1970 season, Regazzoni had done enough to claim third place overall in the world championship.

Regazzoni stayed at Maranello for two more years, but with competitiveness lacking he made a switch to BRM to join Niki Lauda in 1973.

After a disappointing time there he returned to Ferrari the following year, when he and Lauda were recruited by new team manager Luca di Montezemolo.

Although Lauda was supposedly team leader, Regazzoni pushed him hard and eventually finished second in the world championship behind Emerson Fittipaldi, having taken a win in Germany.

In 1975 he won the Italian Grand Prix, but he would not find the form that he had previously enjoyed and by the end of 1976, despite winning in Long Beach, he was replaced by Carlos Reutemann.

A switch to Ensign and then Shadow was a big step down, but just when his career seemed to be on its way out, he was signed by Frank Williams to be teammate to Alan Jones for 1979.

He repaid that faith by delivering the team's first victory at Silverstone, but it was not enough for him to retain his seat for 1980.

A return to Ensign beckoned, but at Long Beach he suffered a brake failure at the end of the main straight and sustained spinal injuries after hitting a concrete wall.

That crash brought an end to Regazzoni's Formula One career, but he was still determined to carry on with motor sports.

He competed in the Paris-Dakar Rally in the 1980s and used a hand-controlled sportscar in some events. More recently he took part in historic rallies. He also commentated on F1 for Italian TV.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Fade-A-Way*

Schumacher pipped to prestigious award

Monday, December 18th 2006, 12:37 GMT

Michael Schumacher was pipped to Germany's Sportsman of the Year Award by triple Olympic gold medal winner Michael Greis at the weekend.

The prestigious annual Award, which is voted for by Germany's sportswriters, was presented at a gala ceremony in Baden-Baden on Sunday.

Greis, who won three gold medals in the biathlon at the Turin Winter Olympics, collected 3,126 points. This compared with the 1,645 that Schumacher got to take second spot.

Schumacher, who won the award in 1995 and 2004, finished ahead of football World Cup's top scorer Miroslav Klose.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Montezemolo: Raikkonen must win '07 title 

By Michele Lostia Wednesday, December 20th 2006, 17:50 GMT 


Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo says Kimi Raikkonen must seize the opportunity and win the world championship for the Italian team next season.

With rivals Renault having captured the title in the past two years, di Montezemolo believes that Raikkonen must fulfil his potential in 2007 and win his first title, which the Ferrari president believes would have already happened had it not been for poor car reliability at McLaren.

"It must be said that in 2005 Raikkonen would have won the championship with a more reliable car," he was quoted as saying by Gazzetta dello Sport. 

"He broke down five times, and he was always in the lead. So now he must understand this is the time to win the title. 

"(Felipe) Massa goes extremely quickly and maybe he will be faster systematically. I hope they will both go quickly."

He added: "We are ready to get back to winning ways. This way Jean Todt would be able to retire serenely and so would I. 

"Schumacher arrived at the right time and now arrives Raikkonen, also at the right time."

Amid continued questioning about Raikkonen's partying lifestyle, di Montezemolo said he has no concerns about the Finn's approach to the job.

"It happens to everyone to get drunk at times," he said. "(Eddie) Irvine was a bit like that too. It also happened to a guy from Kerpen, no matter how difficult it is to believe it.

"I'm not worried at all about Kimi. He is motivated and he has the right approach with Ferrari."


----------



## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> "It happens to everyone to get drunk at times," he said.




.


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> .


Not me.


----------



## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

I liked the parts better where Kimi's wife caught him in bed with another woman, twice. Is he even married anymore?


----------



## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

The teams should have had a full year or more to homologate their engines. The FIA keeps talking about cutting costs, but they keep doing bone-headed rules changes that escalate costs.


----------



## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Catch the last paragraph from Ralf about Ferarri and big bro Mikey....



Toyota to wait and see on Ralf's future 

By Alan Baldwin Friday, January 12th 2007, 14:22 GMT 


Toyota are happy to wait before opening talks on Ralf Schumacher's future at the Formula One team beyond this year.

"The situation is that we have a three-plus-two-year contract, so we have an option in our favour for two years," Toyota motorsport president John Howett told reporters at the unveiling of the new TF107 car on Friday.

"I think both sides really want to wait until probably we've seen some races and he wants to see if we are good enough to provide a machine and I think then we'll sit down and discuss," added Howett.

"At this stage I think we are both genuinely very relaxed about it."

Now the only Schumacher in Formula One following the retirement of elder brother and seven-time champion Michael, Ralf partners Italian Jarno Trulli in an unchanged line-up at the Cologne-based team.

Trulli, 32, last year agreed a three-year extension to his contract, a move that raised a few eyebrows in Grand Prix circles given the trend towards younger drivers. Schumacher is a year younger.

"We feel that with the current market, and the way its evolving, that it was right at that time to secure Jarno for three years," said Howett. "We believe in him and we think that, given a good car, he can deliver the results."

Schumacher has scored more points than Trulli in his two seasons at Toyota, taking their only podium of 2006, but Trulli delivered their best results to date in 2005 when he finished second twice.

Schumacher, who once spoke of his desire to build a team around himself as Michael did so successfully at Ferrari, said there was no need for either to be pre-eminent.

"Both of us, and we have proved it, are able to win races so there is no priority now. And it is not needed because they are able to fulfil the needs of both drivers. Certainly, each of us hopes to win races."

The German was a winner at Williams while Trulli has one victory from his spell at Renault in 2004. Toyota have yet to win a Grand Prix since their debut in 2002.

Schumacher said the new car, which he has already tried out in a shakedown test, looked promising.

"I must say the impression is very good...What we saw there certainly will look different to some extent in Melbourne but it already works as expected."

Schumacher has never before started a season without his older brother and said he would miss that on a personal level at least.

"It is certainly going to be different," he said.

"I don't think it (the racing) will change," he added. "We always have the opinion that Ferrari is special and that Michael and Ferrari was even more special but I don't know whether that's really true."


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

dwette said:


> And while we're waiting for the season to start, here's Robin Miller's 2007 Wish List.
> 
> And I will add one of my own:
> I do not want to see drivers fist-fighting, unless they take their helmets off first.


Good list, including yours.

Here's my addition:
I don't want to see or hear of Max Mosley (universally known as "The Turd") ever again mentioned in connection with F1.


----------



## Alex Baumann (Dec 19, 2001)

Evil team's car for the 2007 season have been unveiled, in case anyone cares.

http://www.planet-f1.com/News/Story_Page/0,15909,3210_3524_1836574,00.html


----------



## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

And it is beautiful.

:eeps: 


.


----------



## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Alex Baumann said:


> Evil team's car for the 2007 season have been unveiled, in case anyone cares.
> 
> http://www.planet-f1.com/News/Story_Page/0,15909,3210_3524_1836574,00.html


Can't wait to see the battles unfold. Will it be two way, three way, or even four way? Can McLaren return to former glory. Will Williams continue its slide to backmarker territory?

Damn...we (wife and I) will miss the whole season opening weekend and have to settle for seeing it all on the DVR after the fact.


----------



## Clarke (Oct 21, 2002)

Are you sure its not a concept for the Cars sequel?


----------



## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

Hmm...


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Alex Baumann said:


> Evil team's car for the 2007 season have been unveiled, in case anyone cares.
> 
> http://www.planet-f1.com/News/Story_Page/0,15909,3210_3524_1836574,00.html


Right. It looks pretty evil to me. And yes, I care. Looks like they've been very busy on design in the off season.

I'm curious: are they going to run restricted V10s this year or are they just being careful not to get any foreign debris in the side intakes.:bigpimp:


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Bad start for champions of all sorts:

http://www.planet-f1.com/News/Story_Page/0,15909,3210_3213_1849534,00.html

Perhaps there's some hope for BMW this year.


----------



## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*BMWs 1st F1 BMW*

BMW aim to keep momentum with F1.07

By Jonathan Noble Tuesday, January 16th 2007, 08:14 GMT

The BMW Sauber team on Tuesday launched their new challenger for the 2007 season, the F1.07, with the aim of keeping their momentum from last season.

BMW were one of the surprises of the 2006 season, scoring 36 points on their way to fifth place in the standings, and grabbing their first podium finishes since the German car maker took over from the Sauber team.

"It is not just another launch, another car, it is the first car developed by new team," said BMW motorsport boss during the launch at the Valencia circuit. "It really is the first BMW Sauber. It is a very, very special day for us.

"When we started more than a year ago, we established a clear plan. It is straightforward to win points in 2006, to be on the podium with our own strength in 2007 and to win races after that. We stick to that plan.

"We are in the middle of a two-year ramp up phase now, which includes the increased of staff. We have moved from 275 to 400, we will go to 430 eventually, the new factory is under consideration.

"We have turned the wind tunnel from one shift to three shifts, we have taken on a new supercomputer, we have established a test team. We have ramped up operation quite significantly."

Theissen is under no illusions about how hard it will be to break into the top four in 2007.

"The four ahead of us were at least 50 points more, it is quite a big gap," said Theissen. "The good message is every point we gain they lose so the gap closes from both sides, but we want to take the next step with this car."

He admits, however, that BMW want to keep their momentum in 2007.

"It is our expectation. We had a very good season last year, we jumped from P8 to P5 but now we want to take the next step to shorten the gap to the top teams," he added.

The new car will make its track debut at 1pm local time.


----------



## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*More BMW's 1st Car*

Theissen: F1.07 'best car yet'

By Jonathan Noble Tuesday, January 16th 2007, 08:40 GMT

BMW Motorsport boss Mario Theissen says the new F1.07 unveiled at the Valencia circuit on Tuesday is the team's best car yet.

"It is the best car we have ever done, if it is good enough to achieve our targets we will see in the coming days," said Theissen.

"We are looking forward to the first track test and first comparison with our rivals."

The German squad are looking to break into the top four in the championship after finishing in fifth place in the 2006 season, scoring two podium finishes thanks to Nick Heidfeld and Robert Kubica, who remain in the team for 2007.

BMW raced under its own name for the first time last year, having taken over the Sauber team at the end of 2005.

Technical director Willy Rampf says the new F1.07 had met all the goals they set when they started to design it.

"The car is exactly as we wanted it, we are in the process of having the first development steps in plan," explained Rampf. "We set internally our targets with regard to weight, aero efficiency and happy we achieved all our internal targets, and now we see if that is good enough compared to the opposition.

"For the chassis develop we had two main targets, one to increase aero efficiency and to be flexible enough for Bridgestone - a wider range for weight distribution and set-up. On aero, the whole car is basically a new development.

"The complete front wing is a new development, the nose is much shorter compared to F1.06. The chassis is higher, target to get a better airflow under the floor and have an increase in aero efficiency.

"The sidepod and radiator duct inlet area we paid a lot of attention, there are a lot more details compared to F1.06 - that's a result of wind tunnel testing. We also revised the complete cooling system, last year it was a bit marginal, here we increase radiator duct and efficiency.

"At rear end we tried to make the car as narrow as possible and when you see the gearbox and fairing, you will see if it not possible to go much closer to gearbox to be tighter."

For the first time, the car will feature a seamless shift gearbox designed and built by BMW, and the team are confident it will be ready for the first race of the season in Melbourne.

BMW said the second F1.07 chassis is almost complete.

The new car will hit the track for a shakedown this afternoon at the Ricardo Tormo circuit in Valencia.


----------



## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*BMW...Not Exactly a Sterling Start*

Kubica makes debut with F1.07

Thursday, January 18th 2007, 16:51 GMT

The BMW Sauber team continued with their first testing session with the new F1.07 unveiled this week at the Valencia circuit.

The German squad were the only ones in action today, as McLaren left after shaking down their new car yesterday.

Today, Robert Kubica got his first taste of the F1.07, taking over from teammate Nick Heidfeld. The Pole covered just 39 laps, being hindered by teething problems that were time consuming to fix.

Kubica was joined by test driver Sebastien Vettel, who drove the interim F1.06 chassis. Both drivers concentrated on set-up work aimed at understanding how to make best use of the Bridgestone tyres.

Kubica was the quickest of the two with a time of 1:12.310. Vettel's best was 1:13.490 after 88 laps.

The team will wrap up the test tomorrow.


----------



## Alex Baumann (Dec 19, 2001)

Renault reveals R27

http://www.formula1.com/news/5540.html

I didn't like the colors









_Picture source: F1total.com_


----------



## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

I don't think I like the new colors. The old scheme was just so distinctive. The new looks like...I don't know...fruit salad. Will Flav put on clean pants this year?


----------



## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Time for a bump - it has been a month, and Australia is less than a month away.

And I am pissed. I just realized that I have a business meeting in Stockholm from 16-18 March. I will probably miss the race.

:banghead: 


.


----------



## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Patrick said:


> And I am pissed. I just realized that I have a business meeting in Stockholm from 16-18 March. I will probably miss the race.


We'll miss it too, since we'll be on the road returning from the 12 Hours of Sebring.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

dwette said:


> We'll miss it too, since we'll be on the road returning from the 12 Hours of Sebring.


One word: Tivo (or whatever other means you have to record it.)


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> One word: Tivo (or whatever other means you have to record it.)


Time for me to buy a recordable satellite receiver!

.


----------



## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

:yikes:










.


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> :yikes:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


*camouflage car?*


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

berford said:


> One word: Tivo (or whatever other means you have to record it.)


We have the DirecTV HD DVR. All the F1 stuff will be recorded (Practice, Quali, Race, Inside Grand Prix) as well as whatever Sebring stuff Speed channel shows.

Only two more weeks and we're heading out for Sebring. :thumbup::thumbup::thumbup:


----------



## Ajax (Feb 1, 2002)

Patrick said:


> :yikes:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


: puke:

I liked the Test Black much better.


----------



## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> :yikes:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


The Green Team? With a Honda logo?


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

dwette said:


> We have the DirecTV HD DVR. All the F1 stuff will be recorded (Practice, Quali, Race, Inside Grand Prix) as well as whatever Sebring stuff Speed channel shows.
> 
> Only two more weeks and we're heading out for Sebring. :thumbup::thumbup::thumbup:


Have a blast.


----------



## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

dwette said:


> We have the DirecTV HD DVR. All the F1 stuff will be recorded (Practice, Quali, Race, Inside Grand Prix) as well as whatever Sebring stuff Speed channel shows.
> 
> Only two more weeks and we're heading out for Sebring. :thumbup::thumbup::thumbup:


What do you typically do at Sebring? Involved with any teams? Camp on the grass and party? Etc?


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

franka said:


> What do you typically do at Sebring? Involved with any teams? Camp on the grass and party? Etc?


This will be our first time at Sebring. Last year we went to Petit Le Mans (10 hr. race at Road Atlanta), which was our first ALMS race. We got hooked, so we're going to Sebring, and we'll return to Petit Le Mans in October. We're also thinking about the ALMS/ChampCar weekend at Road America in August.

We do not camp out, but stay at a hotel off track (like Holiday Inn Express, nothing fancy). We'll arrive at Sebring Wednesday afternoon in time for the first ALMS practice and stay until Sunday morning. While there is a big party zone there, we are not likely to take part since we don't drink. Our days will mostly be get to the track by 7-8 AM and stay until the track goes cold around 6 PM. Wednesday thru Saturday there is almost constant activity on track with practices, qualifying, and many support races (Speed GT and Touring World Challenge, some open wheel stuff, Panoz, and Porsche GT, etc).

There is a BMW Car Corral (called Bimmerstasse) that we have tickets for. It includes parking, hospitality, and a drawing for the BMW M Performance school. Friday afternoon is the autograph sessions in the paddock. I bought my wife a photo book by the ALMS photographer John Thawley, so our mission will be to get it signed by as many drivers as possible.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

dwette said:


> This will be our first time at Sebring. Last year we went to Petit Le Mans (10 hr. race at Road Atlanta), which was our first ALMS race. We got hooked, so we're going to Sebring, and we'll return to Petit Le Mans in October. We're also thinking about the ALMS/ChampCar weekend at Road America in August.
> 
> 
> > That all sounds terrific, especially if you are with friends that are equally into it. The ALMS cars are excellent examples of racing machinery. I'm jealous. Pit passes and all I bet.
> ...


----------



## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

franka said:


> That all sounds terrific, especially if you are with friends that are equally into it. The ALMS cars are excellent examples of racing machinery. I'm jealous. Pit passes and all I bet.
> 
> I would trade missing the opening F1 race on TV for your Sebring adventure in a second.


My best friend is equally into it, if not more so. She also happens to be my wife. :thumbup:

The pits (but not the hot pits) are always open to all ticket holders for all ALMS races. ALMS races are actually way more fan friendly than F1 races. We'll be at the USGP in June, but F1 treats fans like a nuisance and goes out of its way to keep them out of its way.

I also bought a new DSLR for all the photo opportunities. A Nikon D200 with a 18-200mm VR lens and a Nikon AF-S 300mm f/4 telephoto.


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

News or rumor (that's rumour in some parts of the racing world)--a new face at Ferrari: http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns18076.html


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Also, as we count down to the 2007 season, I'm obviously getting back into the swing of things. Good interview with Robert Kubica: http://www.formula1.com/news/5700.html


----------



## GimpyMcFarlan (Aug 13, 2002)

dwette said:


> We'll be at the USGP in June, but F1 treats fans like a nuisance and goes out of its way to keep them out of its way.


Hopefully you will find the USGP much more fan friendly. For several years Indy has opened the pits up the day before practice begins for a fan "walkabout". This is similar to the Cold Pit setup at ALMS events. It is an excellent time to take upclose pics of the cars and occasionally a drive will come out for pics and autographs. SPEED has had day long recording sessions behind the pits with F1 drivers and other racing celebrities (Andretti clan, Unser clan, etc) that are in front of a live audience. My father and I will be there again and we are looking forward to it!


----------



## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

GimpyMcFarlan said:


> Hopefully you will find the USGP much more fan friendly. For several years Indy has opened the pits up the day before practice begins for a fan "walkabout". This is similar to the Cold Pit setup at ALMS events. It is an excellent time to take upclose pics of the cars and occasionally a drive will come out for pics and autographs. SPEED has had day long recording sessions behind the pits with F1 drivers and other racing celebrities (Andretti clan, Unser clan, etc) that are in front of a live audience. My father and I will be there again and we are looking forward to it!


Sorry, but you need to go to a ALMS race and you may stop making any claim that this is so great. I've been to the USGP for that last 5 years and the pit walkabout is really pretty damn lame, and not worth more than a hour of time. What they call access to the pits, crew, and drivers is pathetic. Fan access to teams and drivers at ALMS goes way beyond F1's attempts at fan friendliness. F1's Thursday is more like, "here's our cheesy pittance to show we're trying to tolerate fans as best we can."

Here's me (with back to camera) with Bill Auberlen and Joey Hand at the #21 PTG M3 discussing left-foot vs. right-foot braking at Petit Le Mans last year. If it were any more fan friendly, they'd give me the car to take out for a spin on the track (but I did get to take 2 parade laps on the track in my own M3 later that day).


----------



## GimpyMcFarlan (Aug 13, 2002)

dwette said:


> Sorry, but you need to go to a ALMS race and you will stop making any claim that this is any good. I've been to the USGP for that last 5 years and the pit walkabout is really pretty damn lame, and not worth more than a hour of time. What they call access to the pits, crew, and drivers is pathetic. Fan access to teams and drivers at ALMS goes way beyond F1's pathetic attempts at fan friendliness. F1's Thursday is more like, "here's our cheesy pittance to show we're trying to tolerate fans as best we can."


I've been going to ALMS and CART races at Mid-Ohio on and off for 20 years. Been there and done that. Is the F1 experience the same as ALMS? Absolutely not, but I've heard from plenty of international visitors that Indy is a much better fan experience than other F1 locations across the globe. At least F1 is trying to get better, even if it is only in baby steps.


----------



## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

GimpyMcFarlan said:


> I've been going to ALMS and CART races at Mid-Ohio on and off for 20 years. Been there and done that. Is the F1 experience the same as ALMS? Absolutely not, but I've heard from plenty of international visitors that Indy is a much better fan experience than other F1 locations across the globe. At least F1 is trying to get better, even if it is only in baby steps.


Don't get me wrong. I love Formula 1 racing. It's a great sport and attending the USGP is an experience my wife and I look forward to every year. We always participate on the Hoosier BMWCCA car corral too. It's a blast and one of our favorite weekends of the year.

But fan friendly it is not. Everything that's done to connect F1 fans with the cars and drivers they come to see is inadequate and lame, and they provide so little time for that kind of contact that it causes crowds to be excessively large to make it worthwhile. I've been to the pit walkabout twice and both times it was a huge disappointment. You couldn't see anything unless you force your way through the crowd to the front. And even then, the barrier is still pretty far from the crew and cars. In ALMS I can just about pick up a wrench and help if I want to. I once went to a 1 hour autograph signing session for Ralf Schumacher. It was a stupid, unmanaged, disorganized mess.


----------



## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

*F1 circus to arrive in Melbourne on Sunday*

The Herald Sun (Melbourne) is reporting that Formula One teams' cars and equipment will arrive in Australia on Sunday, and then be transported by truck during the night (Monday morning) to Albert Park.

Formula One Management has arranged air transportation for all Formula One teams, and this requires 5, Boeing 747 cargo planes, each carrying 110 tons of equipment. The flights leave from London, Munich and Milan, for Melbourne's Avalon Airport.

......

Holy crap, what a logistical nightmare! But that would be a lot of fun to be a part of IMHO.

As a fan, I would be really interested to see what goes into these "fly-away" races in terms of how teams prepare for them, what do they pack, how do they arrange their containers and so on. It must be amazing.

.


----------



## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> The Herald Sun (Melbourne) is reporting that Formula One teams' cars and equipment will arrive in Australia on Sunday, and then be transported by truck during the night (Monday morning) to Albert Park.
> 
> Formula One Management has arranged air transportation for all Formula One teams, and this requires 5, Boeing 747 cargo planes, each carrying 110 tons of equipment. The flights leave from London, Munich and Milan, for Melbourne's Avalon Airport. Holy crap, what a logistical nightmare! But that would be a lot of fun to be a part of IMHO. As a fan, I would be really interested to see what goes into these "fly-away" races in terms of how teams prepare for them, what do they pack, how do they arrange their containers and so on. It must be amazing. END END
> 
> I'd imagine that if the FIA is paying and/or organizing it that each team would be limited to just so many containers and maybe a total weight If the teams themselves are arrainging matters then anything they want goes.


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> The Herald Sun (Melbourne) is reporting that Formula One teams' cars and equipment will arrive in Australia on Sunday, and then be transported by truck during the night (Monday morning) to Albert Park.
> 
> Formula One Management has arranged air transportation for all Formula One teams, and this requires 5, Boeing 747 cargo planes, each carrying 110 tons of equipment. The flights leave from London, Munich and Milan, for Melbourne's Avalon Airport.
> 
> ...


Our Speed channel had a special on the logistics involved in moving the teams around last year. And there was an article last season in Car and Driver, I believe, following the set-up and dismantling of the BMW-Sauber team's stuff. It is indeed very interesting...and expensive.

Re. franka's comment, I don't believe the organizing bodies have anything to do with it.


----------



## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Finally, it is worth watching the Friday sessions!

I will be up at 04:00 tomorrow morning to watch qualifying ...  


.


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

See here for a summary of 2007 season changes: http://www.formula1.com/news/5738.html
_Nota bene,_ whatever Max touches turns to sh!t. That's the way it works with turds.


----------



## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

I propose that we have separate threads for each GP. We had much better discussions back when we had old format.


----------



## LoneStarM3 (May 12, 2005)

Pinecone said:


> Are we getting rid of the Turd? I hope I hope.


I confess FNG ignorance.

Who is "The Turd?"


----------



## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

F1Crazy said:


> I propose that we have separate threads for each GP. We had much better discussions back when we had old format.


You will get my no vote on that....:thumbdwn:


----------



## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

LoneStarM3 said:


> I confess FNG ignorance.
> 
> Who is "The Turd?"


Max, the F1 president I believe, is the appropriately named Turd.

What is FNG? I know NFG.


----------



## cenotaph (Dec 19, 2001)

LoneStarM3 said:


> I confess FNG ignorance.
> 
> Who is "The Turd?"


:eeps: Uh oh.


----------



## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> What is FNG?


F*cking New Guy.

.


----------



## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

F1Crazy said:


> I propose that we have separate threads for each GP. We had much better discussions back when we had old format.


I can't remember that far back ... 

I admit that someone new may get lost in the "season spoiler" thread, but I actually like this. I just wish that there would be a bit more activity, opinions, and so on.

I mean, I wish that Baumann would forgive me for all of the nasty things that I said about Spoonface, and come back here. 

.


----------



## Bruce (Dec 24, 2001)

F1Crazy said:


> I propose that we have separate threads for each GP. We had much better discussions back when we had old format.


Agreed. Nothing saying you can't start a new thread each round.


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> I can't remember that far back ...
> 
> I admit that someone new may get lost in the "season spoiler" thread, but I actually like this. I just wish that there would be a bit more activity, opinions, and so on.
> 
> ...


I think last year was fine with the single thread...besides, it's easier to get people continually involved and simpler to maintain a running dialog. As I recall, when they were all separated, it was somewhat difficult to determine which thread was current, and everyone had to find a new thread every other week.


----------



## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

berford said:


> I think last year was fine with the single thread...besides, it's easier to get people continually involved and simpler to maintain a running dialog. As I recall, when they were all separated, it was somewhat difficult to determine which thread was current, and everyone had to find a new thread every other week.


It seems to me that there is less activity in current format. It's Friday GP weekend yet Australian GP was hardly mentioned, in the past in a separate thread we'd have at least few posts by now.


----------



## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> I can't remember that far back ...
> 
> I admit that someone new may get lost in the "season spoiler" thread, but I actually like this. I just wish that there would be a bit more activity, opinions, and so on.
> 
> ...


Forget him. He plays dirty. I can't say what, for fear of "official" reprisal. Leave it at that.


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

franka said:


> Forget him. He plays dirty. I can't say what, for fear of "official" reprisal. Leave it at that.


I don't believe your opinion of Alex is very widely held. As for myself, I believe he's a critical asset.


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

F1Crazy said:


> It seems to me that there is less activity in current format. It's Friday GP weekend yet Australian GP was hardly mentioned, in the past in a separate thread we'd have at least few posts by now.


I don't think there's ever been much talk of Friday practices...for good reason, since engine conservation became so important. Fun begins on Saturday, IMHO.


----------



## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

berford said:


> I don't think there's ever been much talk of Friday practices...for good reason, since engine conservation became so important. Fun begins on Saturday, IMHO.


the sessions are longer now and mandatory


----------



## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

berford said:


> I don't believe your opinion of Alex is very widely held. As for myself, I believe he's a critical asset.


that's fine


----------



## Test_Engineer (Sep 11, 2004)

LOL @ RB not making it into Q2! Looks like Honda wasted $300Million on this new car.


----------



## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

Test_Engineer said:


> LOL @ RB not making it into Q2! Looks like Honda wasted $300Million on this new car.


Like the Speed guys said, they could always buy the faster cars back from Super Aguri. :rofl: :rofl: Go Sato!


----------



## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> Forget him. He plays dirty. I can't say what, for fear of "official" reprisal. Leave it at that.


:tsk:

.


----------



## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> I don't think there's ever been much talk of Friday practices...for good reason, since engine conservation became so important. Fun begins on Saturday, IMHO.


All that has changed now that Friday is "test day", there is no restriction on tyre use and teams can use a different engine (without penalty) on Saturday for qualifying.

I watched 90 minutes of the second Friday session, and it was excellent.

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

armaq said:


> Like the Speed guys said, they could always buy the faster cars back from Super Aguri. :rofl: :rofl: Go Sato!


Sato was happier than Kimi after qualifying! LMAO!

.


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## AzNMpower32 (Oct 23, 2005)

franka said:


> They are meeting their stated yearly objectives. They are very new to running an F1 team. They may surprise this year with a better than expected result.


True. I believe their 4th place finish in the first two races were already slightly better than expected............and like others said, its only their 2nd season. There's always room for improvement.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

It looks like things are back to "normal" after today's first free practice, with the Red cars in front by a country mile. Yes, it is only practice, and the first session.

I have taken the afternoon off, and I plan to open a lager and watch the second free practice starting in 20 minutes. :bigpimp: 


.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> It looks like things are back to "normal" after today's first free practice, with the Red cars in front by a country mile. Yes, it is only practice, and the first session.
> 
> I have taken the afternoon off, and I plan to open a lager and watch the second free practice starting in 20 minutes. :bigpimp: .


Patrick, thanks for the heads up on that. I would have missed it otherwise.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

No problem.

I forgot to mention it earlier, but I bought a Formula One package from the TV station here that broadcasts the races. And I love it!

I get everything live, all weekend long, plus a bunch of behind the scenes interviews, scoops, 1 hour pre- and post- qualifying & race studio. Keke Rosberg, Mika Salo and JJ Lehto do a bunch of the commentary as well.

I even cancelled a business trip to Amsterdam that was scheduled for this weekend, so that I could lounge at home and watch the procession. 

And I am still cheering for McLaren!

.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Patrick said:


> It looks like things are back to "normal" after today's first free practice, with the Red cars in front by a country mile. Yes, it is only practice, and the first session.


Friday times don't mean anything. The teams aren't out to set fastest laps. They're checking out setups and tires.


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

dwette said:


> Friday times don't mean anything. The teams aren't out to set fastest laps. They're checking out setups and tires.


Well, the last minutes of the second session are pretty good indication of who's who as they all tend to run in qualifying trim. Even if there is some sandbagging you can check individual sector times to see how things stack up.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

dwette said:


> Friday times don't mean anything. The teams aren't out to set fastest laps. They're checking out setups and tires.


I guess that you missed the part where I said, *"Yes, it is only practice, and the first session."*

:dunno:

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

I think that Toyota should quit their F1 project, pay Sir Frank Williams one billion dollars, and let the Williams team represent the marque.

And Honda should just quit, period.


.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Patrick said:


> I guess that you missed the part where I said, *"Yes, it is only practice, and the first session."*


I didn't miss it. So why emphasize times then? Sometimes they do reflect how the teams are doing, but often they don't. How many times have we seen cars running at the top in practice, only to choke miserably in quali? I don't pay a whole lot of attention to practice times. I'm usually more interested in whether teams are making setup changes, having problems, etc. If any practice times are meaningful to me, they're the ones from the last practice session before quali.

Sadly, I have to work and can't sit down to watch it all unfold.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Kimi and Massa seem to think practice is telling*

Raikkonen predicts close battle in Bahrain

By Jonathan Noble and Pablo Elizalde Friday, April 13th 2007, 15:04 GMT

Finn Kimi Raikkonen expects a tight battle between Ferrari and McLaren at this weekend's Bahrain Grand Prix.

The Ferrari driver, who lost the lead of the championship to McLaren rival Fernando Alonso in Malaysia last Sunday, dominated today's practice sessions in Bahrain, although he was just 0.013 seconds ahead of Alonso's teammate Lewis Hamilton in the afternoon.

"I think it is going to be very close fight between both of the teams, and BMW looks quite fast," Raikkonen told reporters after practice.

"But it is too early to say what the others teams did. So we will see tomorrow."

Raikkonen, using a new engine this weekend, was pleased with his day's work despite some handling problems with his car.

"It was okay in the end, I think," he said. "It was quite difficult in the middle of the day with the handling of the car, but we improved it with some more laps and I was pretty happy in the end."

Teammate Felipe Massa was also happy with his day's work after posting the fourth fastest time.

"I am pretty happy with the handling of the car, which has allowed me to be very consistent in terms of performance over long runs," said Massa.

"We have a good point from which to work over the rest of the weekend. In particular, we have to work on improving our performance on the first lap on new tyres. It all looks very close, but we have everything we need to do well in qualifying and in the race."


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Watch out for BMW*

Watch out for BMW, warns Hamilton

By Jonathan Noble and Pablo Elizalde Friday, April 13th 2007, 15:32 GMT

McLaren's Lewis Hamilton has warned not to rule out the BMW Sauber team at this weekend's Bahrain Grand Prix.

The German squad have shone thanks to their race pace since the start of the season, and they are currently in third place in the constructors' championship.

BMW were one of the most impressive teams during testing in Bahrain last month, and although Hamilton expects McLaren and Ferrari to fight for victory, the Briton has warned not to write BMW off.

"I think it is going to be pretty similar to what we have had in the last couple of races," Hamilton told reporters after practice.

"There will be the two Ferraris and the two McLarens, and I think some of the other teams have got a bit of work to do to get close to us.

"BMW are extremely quick as well though. We definitely have to look out of them, as they have a lot of potential. But let's wait until final practice tomorrow. We don't know what fuel people were running today."

BMW drivers Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld were third and seventh fastest respectively in today's practice.

Hamilton, looking for a third consecutive podium finish, believes McLaren are closer to Ferrari this weekend.

"I think generally Ferrari seem to be very consistent on long runs, but today the gap seems to be a lot less than in the test. So that is positive on one side, but we also need to keep pushing as well," he said.

"I feel quite optimistic for tomorrow and I think we have definitely got the pace for one lap and we are more consistent over one lap."

The Briton, however, reckons Ferrari remain the team to beat, despite McLaren's one-two at the Malaysian Grand Prix last weekend.

"We have definitely been working extremely hard to improve the car but I don't believe in three weeks we have closed the gap completely to Ferrari," Hamilton added.

"We have definitely made some steps forward, but they seem to be just as quick as they have always been. So the gap has got closer, but I still think they are the quickest car out there and we have got a lot of work to do to close the gap."


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

A lot of information from a lowly practice.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Great qualifying results...this order of start could reflect the seasonal fininsh in constructors championship, IMO.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

berford said:


> Great qualifying results...this order of start could reflect the seasonal fininsh in constructors championship, IMO.


I think the top four qualifiers reflect the top four finishers for the season (if Massa doesn't keep choking and make way for Heidfeld into the top 4), but I doubt Massa will win and doubt Alonso will do as badly as 4th. I do think Hamilton will finish in the top three for the championship, and he will eclipse Massa as the better driver very quickly during this season (if he hasn't already). Louis is the real deal and has injected some serious, good energy into the sport.

I would not be surprised to see the season finish this way: Alonso, Hamilton, Kimi, Heidfeld.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

dwette said:


> I think the top four qualifiers reflect the top four finishers for the season (if Massa doesn't keep choking and make way for Heidfeld into the top 4), but I doubt Massa will win and doubt Alonso will do as badly as 4th. I do think Hamilton will finish in the top three for the championship, and he will eclipse Massa as the better driver very quickly during this season (if he hasn't already). Louis is the real deal and has injected some serious, good energy into the sport.
> 
> I would not be surprised to see the season finish this way: Alonso, Hamilton, Kimi, Heidfeld.


I wasn't predicting the driver championship, just constructors.


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## AzNMpower32 (Oct 23, 2005)

And so the results are out for Bahrain:

1. Massa
2. Hamilton
3. Raikkonen
4. Heidfeld
5. Alonso

A bit surprised to see #4 ahead of #5.


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

AzNMpower32 said:


> A bit surprised to see #4 ahead of #5.


Certainly not to McLaren's surprise, just read franka's post earlier. They saw it coming.

Heidfeld is right up there with the big boys. Both last week's and today's P4 were no joke.


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

dwette said:


> It's a good point, but you don't always have to be faster to hold someone off, if you are free of mistakes. Alonso held off Schumi like that in the final stint of Imola back in 05. He was slower than Schumi because of tire wear, but ran without making mistakes and held him long enough to take the win.


Defending a position for the last couple of laps and holding someone off for the entire race are 2 different things. Acutally, in Heidfeld's case, holding off is the wrong word. Not much defending for him to do, he simply drove his race and kept Massa behind him.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

armaq said:


> Certainly not to McLaren's surprise, just read franka's post earlier. They saw it coming.
> 
> Heidfeld is right up there with the big boys. Both last week's and today's P4 were no joke.


No joke, indeed. I finally watched the race yesterday, and I have to say, putting a move on Alonso was terrific. And the rest of his race was pretty much error free. I loved the look on Mario's face after the overtaking.:thumbup:


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Someone to talk about instead of Schumi.*

McLaren: Hamilton can be the greatest

By Alan Baldwin Wednesday, April 18th 2007, 08:42 GMT

British rookie Lewis Hamilton could become the greatest driver Formula One has ever seen, according to McLaren chief executive Martin Whitmarsh.

"Why not?," he told Wednesday's Guardian newspaper, after the Briton's third podium finish in three races at the weekend. "It's obviously too early to analyse but if the trend continues there is no reason why he could not be the greatest driver ever."

Whitmarsh, who has worked at McLaren with the likes of Brazilian Ayrton Senna and France's quadruple champion Alain Prost, said he had "a pretty clear picture of what gives the top guys that crucial edge over the simply good or average drivers.

"And I think it is pretty clear that Lewis ticks all the necessary boxes."

Hamilton, 22, came second and beat his double world champion teammate Fernando Alonso in Sunday's Bahrain Grand Prix after finishing runner-up to the Spaniard the previous weekend in Malaysia. He had been third in the Australian season opener.

His phenomenal start to the season, admittedly in one of the best cars on the starting grid, made him the first Formula One driver in the 57-year history of the world championship to finish his first three races on the podium.

It also left him, with Alonso and Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen, in a three-way tie at the top of the championship with 22 points.

Formula One greats Jackie Stewart and Stirling Moss acclaimed the youngster's performance and attitude after Melbourne and the accolades have continued to flow in as Hamilton surpasses all expectations.

"Within the next three years, Lewis Hamilton will certainly be in contention and could easily win the world championship," Stewart told the Sun newspaper.

"It's not inconceivable it could be done this year...he's been able to accomplish more in a shorter time than any driver I've ever seen."

Team boss Frank Williams, whose cars took Hamilton's compatriots Damon Hill and Nigel Mansell to the world title, joined the chorus of admiration after the weekend.

"I thought after we got rid of Michael (Schumacher), now we've got a chance again," he said. "But then another superhuman turns up.

"Michael was many things, but he was also a very, very simple human. Hamilton is a different character I think, but purely in terms of calibre or quality of skill, what I'm seeing so early in this man's career is remarkable."

Hamilton entered Formula One after winning last year's GP2 title and has been nurtured carefully by McLaren for the past decade.

He has made no mistakes so far, although team bosses admit errors are inevitable in one so young and inexperienced.

"I think he's at the point where he's got enough brownie points in his pocket to afford to lose some without getting heavy criticism," team boss Ron Dennis told reporters in Bahrain at the weekend.

"We've tried to keep the pedestal low, because inevitably he will fall, or step off it," he continued. "That's the time, because inevitably they all make mistakes, when he will get some criticism.

"But for the moment he can't do anything wrong, can he?"


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

A very good early season summary at PlanetF1: http://www.planet-f1.com/story/0,18954,3265_2066478,00.html

Worth a read.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*More Floor Controversy*

Is this about McLaren sticking it to Ferrari? Besides the usual sticking it to them? Could this be why McLaren is closing on Ferrari?

FIA in fresh clampdown on movable floors

By Jonathan Noble Tuesday, April 24th 2007, 11:14 GMT

Motor racing's governing body has instigated a further clampdown on movable floors in Formula One, autosport.com can reveal, amid fears that some teams are still trying to exploit the regulations.

The FIA revised its testing procedures on floors after the season-opening Australian Grand Prix following a clarification request from McLaren.

The Woking team asked if they could use a spring device utilised by other teams to help resist the forces experienced during floor tests. The spring would be calibrated to pass FIA tests in the pitlane but allow the floor to flex up at speed on the track, thus potentially increasing straightline speed and improving handling on the entry to corners.

Article 3.17.4 of Formula One's technical regulations states that no bodywork, such as the floor, can deflect more than 5mm vertically when exposed to a 500 Newton load upward.

That McLaren request was obviously declined, which was almost certainly the ultimate intention of the letter, and the FIA reacted by forcing teams to remove any devices attached to the floors while the tests were conducted.

The revised procedure forced a majority of teams to make revisions to their floors - primarily to stiffen them up for the tests.

It had been thought that the new tests had brought an end to the focus on movable floors, but sources have revealed to autosport.com that concerns remain that some teams are still trying to flex their floors.

Following detailed examination of car floors by the FIA at the Malaysian and Bahrain Grands Prix, the governing body is still not convinced teams are all operating within the regulations, so it has now radically toughened up its tests.

From the Spanish Grand Prix, the loads tests on the floors will be quadrupled from the current 500 Newtons up to 2000 Newtons - with the teams still having to remove any stay that is fitted between the bodywork and chassis.

Furthermore, the FIA will check the bodywork on the reference plane is flat and rigid with the skid block removed - with particular attention paid to those areas where the car sits on the weighing platform.

The FIA appears to be sceptical of arguments put forward by some teams that spring type devices are important for preventing damage to the floors when they hit kerbs.

FIA technical delegate Charlie Whiting has now written to all the teams to inform them of the new tests and his concerns about the situation.

In the letter, a copy of which has been seen by autosport.com, Whiting wrote: "Following detailed examination of the cars during the Malaysian and Bahrain Grands Prix it has become evident that some teams are attempting to gain an aerodynamic advantage by designing bodywork which is flexible and/or not flat.

"Explanations for this seem to centre around the need to ensure the front of the chassis or reference plane isn't badly damaged when it makes contact with the ground, however, whilst we acknowledge these arguments may have some validity, such designs quite clearly contravene Article 3.15 of the 2007 F1 Technical Regulations.

"If you want to avoid damage you must ensure your cars do not make contact with the ground as regularly as they appear to."

Article 3.15 of the technical regulations effectively outlaws movable aerodynamic devices.

It is not clear yet just how much work teams will need to undertake to pass the new tests.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

franka said:


> Is this about McLaren sticking it to Ferrari? Besides the usual sticking it to them? Could this be why McLaren is closing on Ferrari?...
> 
> .


Looks like a never ending controversy. Creates a little fun, anyway.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Go Kimi, Time to Kick some Ass*

Raikkonen full of confidence after test

By Jonathan Noble Tuesday, May 1st 2007, 14:32 GMT

A bullish Kimi Raikkonen has warned Ferrari's rivals that he and the Italian team are in much better shape for the rest of the season after making a set-up breakthrough in testing at Barcelona this week.

Despite crashing in the rain on Tuesday afternoon, Raikkonen has dominated the testing times so far this week and he believes modifications to the F2007 have increased its overall speed and made him much more confident with its handling.

"We've learned a lot," said Raikkonen after returning to the pits following his small off at Turn 3, where he just kissed the tyre barriers without suffering any major damage.

"You never know what the others are doing, but for the race we are more confident. The car feels very good here, so let's wait and see what happens."

Raikkonen is most happy with his own personal confidence in the car, having faced a stronger than expected challenge from teammate Felipe Massa in the first three races of the year.

"I found a better set-up for myself and the car seems to be handling the way I want now," said Raikkonen. "I think we are in a much stronger position now.

"(The championship) started three races ago, but the points are very close and nothing has been lost so far. It is important to have good races now. We have a good package, I have got a better setup and I am much happier than in the first three races. I think it is good."

Raikkonen confessed that he had not been happy with certain characteristics of the car in the first races of the campaign, and knew that only proper testing would help him overcome the issues.

"The car was good and getting better, but it was never quite right," he said. "I was not happy after qualifying in Melbourne and the same in Malaysia. We knew the problem but we could not do anything between the races. But finally we found something, which is definitely better for me."

Raikkonen believes the improvements should help keep the team ahead of McLaren at the Spanish Grand Prix - although he is unsure exactly how much of an advantage they currently have.

"I think we have improved a lot since the last race, and we understand the car more. That is the main thing. Sure we want to win the race and we will see what we can do, but I am now much happier going into the race than the last couple of events

"We have found something which is definitely much better for me. I think we can use the full potential of the car now."


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Sounds Good to Me*

Raikkonen certain of improved one-lap pace

By Jonathan Noble Monday, May 7th 2007, 13:34 GMT

Kimi Raikkonen believes Ferrari's qualifying pace will be much improved at this weekend's Spanish Grand Prix, claiming that the F2007 has been lacking on its single lap pace so far this year.

Although Raikkonen and teammate Felipe Massa have started on pole at all three races so far, both drivers believe that the car is not as strong as it should be in getting performance from its tyres for that one quick lap.

And with the team encouraged by last week's test at Barcelona, with major car upgrades evaluated for the first time, Raikkonen is optimistic that their race strategies will no longer need to be compromised through fear of not getting to the front of the field.

"As I already said over the last weeks, we have to improve the performance in qualifying," Raikkonen told Ferrari's official website.

"It was not really easy for me to get all the potential out of the car on a single lap, because we never managed to prepare it at the best.

"Now I'm really happy about the steps forward: although it's really difficult to overtake another car, even when it's slower, it makes things a lot easier when you want to win, when you can start from the front."

He added: "We were able to improve the F2007 considerably, because the new components work really well and the car is now much closer to my style of driving. I'm much more optimistic now: we can attack the best way possible, as my friend Markku Alen (Finnish rally driver) usually says.

"It's true that you never know how competitive you really are compared to the other teams during the test sessions; obviously for that we have to wait for the qualifying and the race; but the lap times give us some hints."

With teams having spent the last four weeks working on major development steps for the Spanish Grand Prix, many believe that this weekend's race will provide the clearest indication yet of just how strong each team will be for the rest of the year.

Raikkonen said: "We come to Spain to win; and we'll do the best to accomplish this goal. It is a hard-fought championship and it is always important to gain as many points as possible.

"The best part of the season is yet to start: summer is coming and we race in Europe."


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

*Formula 1 budgets and sponsorship*

So, awhile back, we had the Turd telling us that rules changes were being made in name of SAFETY. When that idea flopped, he told us that the latest rule changes (changing the engine formula, engine longevity, i.e., two races per engine, one tyre supplier, etc.) were being introduced in the name of reducing budgets, cost savings for smaller teams, and so on.

He even suggested limiting the budgets of each team to a maximum of 100 million US Dollars (74 million Euros) per season - a sort of "salary cap" on how much teams could spend. Thus, it would be possible for new, privateer teams like David Richards' Prodrive to "compete" against the likes of FIAT and Daimler-Chrysler.

Right.

For the 2007 season, the budgets of all teams together, has risen by 300 million Euro (408 million US Dollars) when compared to the 2006 season. 6% of this increase is due to a change in the way that TV money is distributed to all teams (some get more, some get less than 2006), and another 6% from the car makers involved in Formula 1. Clearly, the banning of cigarette sponsorship has not hurt team budgets.

What will the Turd come up with next? :dunno:

Here is a look at the team budgets for 2007, in millions of EUROS (multiply X 1.35 to get the total in US Dollars):

1. McLaren = 379.31 (up 14% from last year)
2. Honda = 323.77 (#1 in 2006 with a 320.2 million EUR budget)
3. Ferrari = 308.65 (#5 in 2006)
4. Toyota = 302.08 
5. BMW = 298.77 
6. Renault = 240.54 (#6 as well in 2006, won both championships)
7. Red Bull = 218.23 
8. Williams = 148.35 
9. Super Aguri = 70.38
10. Toro Rosso = 69.47 
11. Spyker = 55.35

The total is roughly 2.4 billion EUROS.

In terms of single sponsors in Formula 1, here is a look at the top 11, and their sponsorship amounts in millions of EUROS:

1. Honda = 323.08 (includes "sponsorship" of Super Aguri)
2. Toyota = 211.54
3. Red Bull = 186.92
4. Mercedes-Benz = 184.62
5. BMW = 169.23
6. Marlboro = 153.85 (interesting because cigarette advertizing is banned in Formula 1)
7. Renault = 100.00
8. Bridgestone = 80.62
9. VodaFone = 58.08
10. IMG = 41.54
11. Petronas = 32.31

Comments on any of this? Aside from the obvious fact that Toyota and Honda are spending silly money to no end!

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

BTW, in case you are unfamiliar with The Turd, this is what we are talking about:










The man is clearly unwell, but there is another thread about that somewhere else.

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

They've been knee-jerking for at least as long as I've been watching, which is around 30 years.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> BTW, in case you are unfamiliar with The Turd, this is what we are talking about:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Isn't Schumi a turd too, but with a little t ?


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> BTW, in case you are unfamiliar with The Turd, this is what we are talking about***********:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Lest it be unfound: http://www.bimmerfest.com/forums/showthread.php?t=131132&highlight=turd

"Unwell" is actually a rather kind characterization.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Max's designation as a *turd *started here and took on a life of its own: http://www.bimmerfest.com/forums/showthread.php?p=1238855&highlight=turd#post1238855


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

dwette said:


> Max's designation as a *turd *started here and took on a life of its own: http://www.bimmerfest.com/forums/showthread.php?p=1238855&highlight=turd#post1238855


I didn't intend to deprive you of the credit. Patrick nicely punctuated your point.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Any comments about the spending gone wild vs the FIA's unrelenting intentions to reduce costs at all costs?

BTW, that total (2.4 billion EUR) would be enough to pay for the salaries of all NHL team's players for 2.5 seasons ... Just thought that I would toss that out there.  


.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> I didn't intend to deprive you of the credit. Patrick nicely punctuated your point.


FWIW, Max The Turd was put up for auction on ebay.co.uk a few years back. The auction was advertized as "a turd for auction", no reserve, no buy it now price either. Bidding was lackluster.

.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

berford said:


> Patrick nicely punctuated your point.


Yes he did. That's why I said it took on a life of it's own. 

We celebrate Max's Turdness.

WTF is that stench?...


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Considering how he has constantly tried to mess around with Formula 1 and WRC, I wonder if actually anyone likes The Turd? :dunno: 

Considering The Turd's failed political aspirations due that little Nazi "thing" with his father, I suspect that this is The Turd's way of playing politics on a big stage. Thus, someone (his own interests) must be benefiting in some way from his ridiculous games. But who, and what are they getting? :dunno: 

Any thoughts on that?


.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Maybe all this should be in the other thread! :rofl: 


.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Any comments about the spending gone wild vs the FIA's unrelenting intentions to reduce costs at all costs?
> 
> BTW, that total (2.4 billion EUR) would be enough to pay for the salaries of all NHL team's players for 2.5 seasons ... Just thought that I would toss that out there.
> 
> .


Well, the simplest response is: FIA "thinking" is flawed with respect to their methodogy for initiating cost saving. Given their fearless leader, is it any surprise that they can't do much of anything right. And they have no teeth (or haven't used them, anyway.)

Of course, with the right, gutsy leadership it's entirely possible that they could reduce costs, but to what end? In my opinion, whatever they might do would run counter to the public's enjoyment and interest in the sport.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Considering how he has constantly tried to mess around with Formula 1 and WRC, I wonder if actually anyone likes The Turd? :dunno:
> 
> Considering The Turd's failed political aspirations due that little Nazi "thing" with his father, I suspect that this is The Turd's way of playing politics on a big stage. Thus, someone (his own interests) must be benefiting in some way from his ridiculous games. But who, and what are they getting? :dunno:
> 
> ...


I think it's quite enough feed for Max's ego to be in the public eye...or maybe having his eye on the grid girls is his way of getting his jollies. Then, of course, he gets a salary, travel expense, and rubs elbows with the rich, famous and probably infamous. Turds have a way of attracting the infamous.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Cost cutting is a joke. Aero mods for passing too.

CART cars with tunnels have minimal problems running in the wake and passing. But tunnels were axed (by Maxed?) as a cost cutting item. What was the claim, too much wind tunnel time for the small guys as I recall.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Kimi finally gets a win...and 4th and 5th for Robert and Nick ain't too bad. Woohoo to BMW Sauber. Oh and young Lewis on the podium again.


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## AzNMpower32 (Oct 23, 2005)

Glad to hear Kimi got a win, and both BMW Sauber drivers did well. Honestly, it's probably just me but I don't get the hype over Hamilton. Yes yes I know the reasoning, but it's a bit overdone IMO.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

AzNMpower32 said:


> Glad to hear Kimi got a win, and both BMW Sauber drivers did well. Honestly, it's probably just me but I don't get the hype over Hamilton. Yes yes I know the reasoning, but it's a bit overdone IMO.


I agree with you. I think its about the extremely low probablity of such rare events, like McLaren with a fast and dependable car, a very young rookie that many said was being pushed too fast to be in F1, etc all coming together. Like the perfect storm senario.

A lot of the racing press is British and they are all goo goo.

I think it was Alain Prost, or someone of his time and stature, that said they watched Lewis and Alonso through a particularily tough corner and said that where Alonso was man-handling the car Lewis was just gently guiding it thru.

If that's true Lewis is a rare talent.


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

I understand how one can get tired hearing about Hamilton all the time but he is a real deal, no doubt about it. Lewis has a huge talent, I'd even say that he's the most talented driver in the field today. What worked for him is the fact that he didn't have much experience with previous F1 cars and especially tires. This is where Alonso is having trouble, he was used to Michelin tires that he helped develop. Running Bridgestones this year he has to change his driving style and car setup significantly to stay competitive. We have similar situation with MotoGP where young gun Casey Stoner can quickly adapt to different tires and Rossi is trying to get the tires he likes from Michelin instead of adapting.









BTW, Kimi's back!!! :freakdanc


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Ditto for Kimi


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Honda is stealing BMW staff.*

Honda confirm more tech staff members

By Alan Baldwin Monday, July 2nd 2007, 12:03 GMT

The Honda Racing team have confirmed they have signed former Williams and BMW employees in an effort to rejoin Formula One's top teams in 2008 after a dismal season so far.

Following the announcement that they had signed Frenchman Loic Bigois, chief designer with the now-defunct Ligier, Prost and Minardi teams, over the weekend, team boss Nick Fry has confirmed the recruitment of two more men from rival teams.

"Prior to Loic being announced we also hired another French guy, Francois Martinet, from Williams and we've hired John Owen from BMW and one of the young McLaren aerodynamicists," Fry told Reuters.

"So it's a concerted effort to improve our skills in that area because aerodynamics these days is 80 percent of the performance and we simply weren't strong enough in that area."

Honda scored their first point of the season in Magny-Cours last Sunday, thanks to Jenson Button finishing in eighth place.


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

I don't remember when I saw that much overtaking at Magny Cours or at any other track for that matter. Alonso was the star of the race and it just shows that you CAN pass in F1 but most drivers rely on their strategy to gain positions :tsk: 


Alonso drove as good as Schumi did in his last race in Brasil yet no one noticed?


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Sour Grapes from Ron Dennis*

Dennis: McLaren flattered Ferrari

By Mark Glendenning and Jonathan Noble Monday, July 2nd 2007, 09:34 GMT

McLaren boss Ron Dennis believes his team made Ferrari look better than they actually were in the French Grand Prix after seeing the Maranello outfit return to form with a one-two finish.

Dennis claims his team were on the back foot for most of the Magny-Cours weekend, having been concerned about engine performance, being unable to find a good balance in Friday practice and then seeing Fernando Alonso suffer an unexpected gearbox problem in qualifying.

Those factors resulted in McLaren under-delivering - which allowed Ferrari to have a fairly straightforward run to victory.

"We flattered them [Ferrari] this weekend," said Dennis. "They did a good job, and probably improved the car a little bit. But we made them look a lot better than they were. Hopefully, we will demonstrate that at Silverstone."

But Dennis was far from disheartened by the result, especially because it was Kimi Raikkonen and not McLaren's closest title challenger Felipe Massa who took the win.

"Overall, it was damage limitation from beginning to end," he explained. "Obviously we're delighted that Kimi won over Massa. It means he is only a couple of points closer to Lewis, and didn't close the gap that much, even on Fernando.

"If this is going to be our worst race then we'll be comfortable with that. And if we hadn't had such good races before, we wouldn't be where we are in the world championship. So we've got to put it down to the fact you can't win every race, and this is one we didn't win.

"But we've won here previously, and there is no reason that we can't win at Silverstone. You know, as history has shown, when you have got a good lead in the world championship, you have got to be pragmatic about your races.

"Lewis did a really solid job at finishing third. It's his eighth podium position, and there is no luck that gives you that sort of result. For me, I loved Fernando's fight; I think he was fighting from beginning to end, and he got the most out of a difficult situation. And that's motor racing."

Dennis believes McLaren did the right thing in keeping Hamilton on a three-stop strategy, even though it killed off any chances of the Briton challenging either Ferrari driver for position.

"Lewis didn't make a good start. He was able to hang on; there was no problem with pace, but it was going to be impossible to overtake.

"We then started to evaluate everything that could go wrong, or everything that was likely to cause us to lose third place, and then we switched him to a strategy to guarantee third place, and that was really what that was all about."

Dennis also said that he was baffled by Alonso's gearbox problem in qualifying, which was caused by the failure of a part that the team had used without issues for three years.

"The gearbox problem was difficult to accommodate, to say the least," he explained. "It was such a one-off. This is a component that we've used for three years and we're somewhat mystified.

"It's probably a batch problem, which we were able to eliminate with help from the factory. So we were comfortable that it wasn't going to be an issue in the race."


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

F1Crazy said:


> I don't remember when I saw that much overtaking at Magny Cours or at any other track for that matter. Alonso was the star of the race and it just shows that you CAN pass in F1 but most drivers rely on their strategy to gain
> Alonso drove as good as Schumi did in his last race in Brasil yet no one noticed?


Passing back markers and mid-pack cars is one thing but passing when you have only a half second is not so easy.


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

franka said:


> Passing back markers and mid-pack cars is one thing but passing when you have only a half second is not so easy.


That's what makes his moves on Fisi and Heidfeld even more impressive.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

F1Crazy:freakdanc[/QUOTE said:


> What's the point or message of the bananas?


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

franka said:


> What's the point or message of the bananas?


Happy about Kimi's win


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

F1Crazy said:


> Happy about Kimi's win


Same here! But the only part of the race that I caught was at exactly the moment that he got the checkered flag! I got stuck on the beach ... :eeps:

And, I will be flying back to Finland during the race at Silverstone on Sunday. Bummer.

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Long but Good, Inside Magny-Cours Strategy*

Damage Limitation

Ferrari's 1-2 result in the French Grand Prix last weekend was seemingly bad news for championship leaders McLaren. The truth is, it could have been much worse. Adam Cooper analyses Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton's race and hears from the team chiefs how the events unfolded

By Adam Cooper 
autosport.com contributing writer

A Ferrari comeback in Magny-Cours was nicely timed in terms of the world championship, and while points leader Lewis Hamilton didn't lose too much ground to his Italian rivals, the competition is closer than it was before. And with the top four drivers now on two wins each, there's a nice symmetry about the results as we reach the halfway mark of the season.

Ferrari won in France fair and square, and the fact that Kimi Raikkonen was able to jump Felipe Massa at the second round of pitstops shows that it's not only at McLaren where an intense intra-team rivalry is gathering steam. But the Maranello team were certainly helped by a below-par weekend for McLaren, where the management readily admit that they didn't quite get things right this time.

So what went wrong for McLaren, and what did the team do to try to recover?

A disrupted weekend for McLaren

The first signs of trouble came on Friday, when Hamilton stopped on the circuit early in the morning session with an electronic problem. The car was returned to the pits by the marshals and he eventually put in some laps later in the session, but the programme was disrupted. Quick times from Ferrari piled on the pressure.

On Saturday morning, it was Fernando Alonso's turn to experience trouble. Again it was a minor glitch with a brake sensor, but it kept the reigning world champion in the pits until the very end and meant he lost priceless track time in a session that's vital in terms of preparing for qualifying.

However, overnight changes had found performance, and Hamilton was quickest, albeit by just 0.063 seconds, over Massa. It was close and extremely hard to call, and the first stages of qualifying didn't help anyone get a clear picture.

In Q1 Lewis was ahead of Kimi by 0.068 seconds, and in Q2 he edged Felipe by 0.027 seconds. Both of those sessions in theory provide the perfect guide to the ultimate pace of the cars; convinced that Hamilton had proved the silver car had the pace, McLaren decided to go for it and attempt to lock out the front row by running both drivers as light as they dared in qualifying.

Once again the team demonstrated that they are giving both drivers a fair shake by handing them identical fuel loads - enough to take them just 16 laps into the race. The team could only hope that the Ferraris didn't choose to run quite as light, and thus securing the front row would be a little easier.

Kimi Raikkonen, Felipe Massa, and Lewis Hamilton line up at the end of pitlane © LAT 
As ever, the two leading teams sent their cars down to the pitlane at the earliest possible opportunity, and all four were sat with the engines idling for what seemed like an age. Interested observers at Spyker noted that Alonso's car appeared to clunk into gear exceptionally early, and one can only guess whether or not that had a bearing - no pun intended - on what happened next.

In fact after driving out of the pits Alonso soon realised that he has a problem, and he was straight back in. It was a rare ceramic bearing failure, something that had failed only once before in three years of use. The bottom line was that Fernando could take no further part in the session, and was thus doomed to start 10th with the fuel that was still in the car - a load that was only ever going to work if he was at the very front.

In the event, things didn't work out for Hamilton either. He admitted to making a mistake, and the result was Massa got ahead to the tune of 0.070 seconds. This was another good effort by the Brazilian, and only when the race unfolded did we discover that he was fuelled to go to lap 19, and was thus carrying three more laps of fuel.

We've tended to take the fuel burning phase a bit for granted lately, but this was quite a significant one and it showed that there is a sound reason why the top guys seem so keen to sit at the end of the pitlane with their engines cooking.

Having got to the front of the queue, Raikkonen ran 13 laps, compared to the 12 of Massa and Hamilton, and thus earned himself an extra lap in the race. He would stop as late as lap 22, which meant he was a couple of laps heavier than his teammate in qualifying.

Intriguingly, Alonso was ahead of Hamilton in the pitlane queue, and as soon as the Spaniard hit trouble, the Briton's engineer got on the radio and told him he had to try and earn another lap, something he just failed to do.

"It was very, very tight to try and get that extra lap," McLaren CEO Martin Whitmarsh said afterwards. "We had Fernando in front, so he would have been in the best place to do it, and we were reconciled with Lewis to not getting that extra lap. Obviously when we had the problem with Fernando we had the opportunity to push with Lewis and try and get the extra lap, but it was too tight.

"I think we had about an eight-second margin to go out there, do the fuel burn, do the pitstops, and do two runs. Kimi was the only one who was able to do it [earn 13 laps] by pushing along at the front. We did at the last one with Lewis by pushing harder at the outset."

When it all shook out, Massa was on pole ahead of Hamilton and Raikkonen. There was quite a big margin to the Finn, but he knew he had extra fuel, and Alonso was down in tenth and no threat.

Hamilton's race: all over at the start

All was not yet lost for Hamilton. He still had a chance of beating Massa into Turn 1, although that's not easy from the inside spot at Magny-Cours, but he could always have a go into the hairpin. The threat from Raikkonen was tempered by the knowledge that he had endured some pretty dire first laps lately.

Kimi Raikkonen overtakes Lewis Hamilton at the start of the French Grand Prix © LAT 
However, Hamilton had a poor time trying to get away from the dirty side of the grid, a problem that also afflicted BMW's Robert Kubica, immediately behind. Normally by that stage of the weekend there would have been some rubber down on the dodgy side after two GP2 races, two Euro F3 races, and the Porsche Supercup, but rain in the morning had put paid to that. And a bad start from Hamilton coincided with Raikkonen finally getting it right.

So now Lewis was down in third with what the team knew was the lightest load of the three - it really was the worst case scenario. When he came in for his first pitstop on lap 16, the option existed for a longer second stint and a two-stopper, but fearful of dropping him into traffic, the team decided to go short and keep him on a three-stop schedule.

It was a strategy that raised a few eyebrows up and down the pitlane, but McLaren's theory was that beating the Ferraris was no longer and option, and the three-stopper was the best way to consolidate third.

"Sometimes you've got to be pragmatic, take the points, and move on to the next race," said Ron Dennis. "That's what it was, pragmatism. That's why we switched Lewis's strategy, it was a way to keep him out of trouble, keep him out of traffic. It wasn't designed to give him a shot at second; it was designed to make sure he came third."

There was also the issue of tyres. Nobody was very keen to get on to the softer option tyre, but they all knew they had to at some stage. A three-stop strategy would mean that Hamilton only has to use the less-favoured tyre in that short final stint.

Hamilton had one especially exciting moment when he came out of the pits just behind Kubica. Informed he was racing the Pole for position, the Briton immediately fought back and pulled off a great passing move of the type we've been waiting for him to demonstrate since the start of the season.

Funnily enough, he didn't have to do it, since Kubica was due to stop a few laps later, and thus Hamilton would have got his place back and stayed ahead after his own third stop by dint of some quick lappery. But Hamilton is not the sort of man to play a percentage game - he saw a rival, and his instinct was to pass him come what may.

However, getting ahead at that stage did make his life easier and put third place beyond reasonable doubt. Crucially, it also allowed him to back off on the engine in the closing stages.

"Lewis was going to beat Kubica because he had more fuel," said Whitmarsh. "But nonetheless it was great to see it, it was a fantastic overtaking, and it allowed us to take it easier on the engine.

"We haven't had a single failure this year, it's been absolutely fantastic. But Indianapolis and this weekend are very hard on the engines, so we were quite keen to preserve our engines at the end of the race.

"So Kimi" - Whitmarsh meant Hamilton, of course - "doing that meant that he wasn't held up for probably five laps behind Kubica, it was a good thing to do, and it was great for the fans. Whatever had happened at that juncture of the race, we had them covered."

Fernando Alonso dices with Nick Heidfeld in the hairpin © LAT 
By the end of the race, Lewis was 29 seconds down on the Ferraris, allowing for some backing off to save his equipment. It would be fascinating to know if McLaren have since done the sums and worked out where he would have been on two stops.

Alonso's race: could do better

All things being equal you'd expect a double world champion in the championship-leading car to make sensible progress from 10th place, but of course Alonso's race was completely compromised by the fact that he was committed to stopping on lap 16, way ahead of the cars immediately in front of him on the grid.

At least being a little lighter might have given him some advantage off the line and in the ducking and diving of the first lap. He also had another joker to play - by not running in Q3, he had a couple of new sets of the option tyre left, when everyone else had used theirs up. The team decided to start him on one of those sets and thus get the compulsory stint out of the way.

This had two advantages: the tyre was known to be less favourable and would thus be used in the shortest stint of the race, and at a point where Fernando was almost certain to be stuck behind people. Secondly, a new soft tyre might give him a little edge over everyone else (on new mediums) at the start and in the course of the first lap.

"We started on options," said Whitmarsh, "because with the best will in the world he was going to be in some traffic, and we felt that was the right time. You were then going to have the ability to make a long last stint, and we knew we had some primes to enable him to do that. We were able to get the option bit out of the way - it was probably a less consistent race tyre."

In the end, the only places Alonso gained on the first lap were those vacated by Heikki Kovalainen and Jarno Trulli when they tangled, which meant he finished the first lap in eighth.

Over the course of the remaining 69 laps, the only driver he managed to successfully demote was Williams's Nico Rosberg - a clear sign of just how difficult was the job he had, having been stuck with the light fuel load. It's worth noting that Jenson Button also managed to usurp Rosberg, and he did it with a Honda from 13th on the grid.

And yet along the way Alonso pulled off some brilliant passes, including one on BMW's Nick Heidfeld that was as good as any we've seen in a while. The problem was of course that he spent so much of the race in traffic.

'" had not fantastic luck all through the weekend," Alonso later commented, "and in the race I think I pushed hard, but I knew it was extremely difficult because when the pitstop time arrived, I knew that it was very easy that I was behind them again. And in fact it was that case."

And it was an attempt to beat that traffic that the team did something at the first stop that surprised many onlookers.

A McLaren mechanic waits for a pitstop © LAT 
As discussed, Lewis and Fernando both came in on lap 16 (in the end the gap on the road between them made it logistically possible) because that's what was decided before qualifying - but no one expected them both to come in again just 19 laps later, on lap 37, when logic suggested that Fernando would have benefited from a much longer second stint.

In fact the fear was that he would drop into even worse traffic if he hung around too long taking on extra fuel.

"At the first stop we fuelled quite light," said Whitmarsh, "because at that point we were concerned that Fernando would have fallen behind the train of cars that was being led by Barrichello.

"I think if you look at that stop, he came out 2 or 3 seconds in hand. If we'd tried to put more fuel on, he was in danger of falling behind that, and that would have been very detrimental to his performance, so that was the right call.

"Subsequently we could have three stopped or two stopped. We certainly didn't succeed in getting Fernando into clear air for long enough during the race, but we were trying to thread our way through."

Lap 16 together, lap 37 together... The paths of the McLaren drivers then diverged. Lewis carried on with his three-stop schedule, but at that lap 37 stop Fernando was filled for a hefty 33-lap run to the finish (coincidentally the longest opening stint by anyone in the field was also 33 laps, by Rubens Barrichello).

Alonso was able to go for his long closing stint because he had already done his bit on those unloved soft option tyres, while most of his rivals had still to use them, and didn't want to do too many laps on them.

The Spaniard was ninth when he came out of the pits after that stop, and over those remaining 33 he laps gained just two more places - when Button and Rosberg made their second and final stops.

There were to be no more dramatic passes. Alonso's tyres were past their best at the end, and he could do little about Renault's Giancarlo Fisichella up ahead. "I did 33 laps, with a lot of fuel in the first 10 laps, so I damaged them a little bit, and I was not able to be too aggressive in the last couple of laps when I was fighting with Fisichella," he said.

Clearly there was speed in the car - he set a better fastest lap than teammate Hamilton, one that was a huge 0.6 seconds quicker than the best by fourth place finisher Robert Kubica, so the fact that the eventual outcome was a humble seventh gave a graphic demonstration of the value of strategy and track position.

Alonso enjoyed the wheel-to-wheel racing, even if it didn't actually help him much.

Kimi Raikkonen leads Lewis Hamilton early in the race © XPB/LAT 
"I knew that I was light on fuel compared to what they had, so I risked as much as I could because I knew that I must pass Nick on the track and open a gap. Unfortunately it was not enough, and he and Fisichella overtook me. If you qualify with light fuel to be on pole position and you start in 10th, the race becomes very, very difficult."

Overall, it was a case of damage limitation for the team, and the fact that the Ferrari drivers switched places certainly went down well with the Woking boys, since Massa is the more immediate threat in the drivers' championship.

"I think that with Lewis, two or three stops would have got us to the conclusion that we had," said Whitmarsh. "And we knew that during the race. We debated it, and we decided on grounds of conservative safety to run three stops, to minimise the time we were on the option tyre at the end.

"I don't think it would have been an issue either way. I don't think there was a strategy today that was going to make us fast enough to beat the Ferrari, so I don't think we got that wrong.

"With Fernando, we ran a two-stop strategy, but you're trying to second guess other people. It may well be that a three-stop would have given him more time in free air.

"He pulled off three fantastic overtaking manoeuvres, but it is difficult, and you lose a lot of time. If he was in free air he would have been the fourth car today, even from where he started. But we didn't manage to spend enough time to realise that performance.

"I don't think we got the best out of the car. We weren't particularly strong in Barcelona (in the Spanish Grand Prix), and Turn 3 is Barcelona-ish.

"We'd worked hard to develop the car and so had Ferrari. They had a strong package here, and I think we didn't do a good job as a team on Friday to give our drivers the best here. We made reasonable progress on Saturday. We came here to win, and the reality is we were likely to be third and fourth had we got it right.

"You've got to second guess what others are doing. Maybe we could have done it better, but certainly over the course of the weekend we didn't give Fernando the best cards to play in this particular game."

Alonso lost more ground to Hamilton in the championship standing, and as in Montreal, circumstances conspired against him.

"I'm disappointed, no doubt," he rued afterwards. "A championship with two seventh places in the last three races - seventh in Canada and seventh here - is not great in terms of points.

"In Canada I had a safety car in the lap I had to stop; here it was a gearbox in qualifying. One day this will happen to the other guys, and I will take points. That is all I can say now."


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Ground Effects*

I was against the elimination of ground effects when it happened.

You may recall that grnd effects were eliminated as a way to reduce costs, the claim was small teams could not afford the wind tunnel costs. To return to grnd effects will require a complete revamp of each teams approach to areo mngmnt. That's a huge undertaking as the entire areo pkg will have to be redesigned.

Many of the FIAs cost cutting proposals have increased teams expenses rather than reduce them as they jerk from one sweeping reform to another. This is just another example.

If a small or large corporation made the many blunders that the FIA have they would be out of business. The FIA survive only because there is no alternative.

Bring ground effect back, says Michael

By Mark Glendenning Thursday, July 5th 2007, 09:43 GMT

Williams technical director Sam Michael has suggested that a reintroduction of ground effect cars could be the answer to improving the opportunities for overtaking in Formula One.

While current proposals to come up with a new technical package for 2011 are geared primarily towards increasing F1's energy efficiency, its relevance to road cars and its environmental impact, the plans are also seen as an opportunity to improve the sporting element.

According to Michael, the return of ground effect - where a low-pressure area is created below the car, effectively sucking it to the road - is an idea worthy of consideration.

"When you have cars that create loads of downforce, it's pretty difficult to achieve passing," he said. "Going towards categories that have less downforce and power doesn't seem like the solution. Look at F3; it's the most boring racing you can ever watch. Reducing the downforce isn't the solution for F1.

"I do think you can benefit from following the experience F1 had in the 1980s of using ground effect more than we do now. The things that have probably made F1 worse is getting rid of ground effect, and lifting the front wing - it's gone up ****m in the last five years. Both those things made the cars very sensitive to onset flow."

Michael said that any leap in performance that ground effects may bring about could easily be managed by adapting the tyres.

"You need to adjust performance elsewhere, but you can do that with the tyre," he explained. "If the cars get too fast, Bridgestone can change that from one race to the next. It's quite easy - and we should make an advantage from that."

While the idea would undoubtedly be a hard sell to all of the teams, Michael insisted that it could be made viable.

"Every time we've looked at doing that before, we've seen that it costs £2m to make two cars and everyone says they can't be bothered paying for that.

"I don't think it's too risky to go to a ground effect car. The OWG [Overtaking Working Group] proposal does not include adjustable wings."

Ground effect is currently featured in the Champ Car World Series, although its use was severely diminished in F1 when flat undertrays were made mandatory in 1983.


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## AzNMpower32 (Oct 23, 2005)

Raikkonen wins again , with both BMW Sauber drivers doing pretty will. Kubica in 4th and Heidfeld at 6th.

http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/08072007/13/success-raikkonen.html


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Well friends, tables have definitely turned here. There is no doubt that the Ferraris are the fastest. McLaren is now sucking hind tit.

Go Kimi. Get em. Get the McLarens and put Massa back to 2nd on the team.

This is why Ferrari grabbed Kimi. Kimi has finally figued out the tires and the car and the car has gotten faster too. If Ferrari keep their speed advantage Kimi will win the championship. And it will be well deserved.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

In Dallas they showed the F1 race delayed on Fox, and at the same time as the ALMs race on CBS.

The stations do that on purpose for ratings but it screws the fan. Sure you can tape one and watch the other but it shouldn't be that way. 

The stations demonstrate that don't give a flying f**k for their viewers at the same time they play these games to get viewers and ratings. At least the ALMs was live so this time its Fox and F1 that is sticking it to us

I'd stick it up their's if I could.

Have a nice day.


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## AzNMpower32 (Oct 23, 2005)

Yea, Fox showed the Silverstone GP delayed also. I was watching it at 2.30pm EST..........even though I'd known the results since this morning.

Hearing the F1 motors and SMG gearboxes is just epic though, just brilliant. And watching them carve up the corners at those speeds! :thumbup:. The gearbox shifts make me want to drive the next best thing, a BMW M5. :bawling:


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

You could see the speed diff between the cars and the top 3 were flying. Not all tracks have the cameras set-up where you can see the speed they are traveling.

I just hope Ferrari can stay ahead in the speed game and bring up their reliablity to perfect. If they break I pray it is Massa, like the stall today that the team says was the car's fault. I wonder if it was or not.

Interesting that Hamilton dropped so far back after starting from the all critical pole. And that so many others took points away from him. And that Massa qualified behind Kimi. I bet Massa's head is about to explode. He can't stand Kimi beating him.

Like I said earlier I think Kimi is coming to grips with the car and the Bridgestones. At least I hope so. If that is what happening then he should keep improving over the next few races. And if that happens it could put him up front in the points. Lots of ifs.

I'm waiting for stuff to start happening to Hamilton. It has to. Kimi staying right on his ass and pressuring him, may have caused Hamilton's false start in the 1st pit stop. Hamilton was rattled and keyed off the wrong guy. Stuff has to start happening to him. No one goes so long w/o stuff catching up.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> I got it now. Thanks for the help.


Apologies if my English is too good. :eeps:



.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Apologies if my English is too good. :eeps:
> 
> 
> 
> .


:rofl::thumbup:


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick;
To be honest said:


> "....to harm the sport." implied that you did not approve.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> "....to harm the sport." implied that you did not approve.


IMHO, The Turd is ruining Formula 1 (he is the harm to this sport) - I think that I have made that clear.

And my post was pure sarcasm. That is difficult to get though on the Intraweb (sarcasm, I mean). We need a sarcasm smiley.

I do think that a lot of crap will go on between now and the end of the season, and (gasp) I think that McLaren is going to get severely penalized for this spy scandal mess. The Turd wants to do politics on the highest level; this will be all about politics.

All the better for the sport. There are now more people watching because of all of this, and I am sure that Spoonface is pissed that it isn't him getting all of the attention. :rofl:

It is all about HIM.

I kid ... :bigpimp:

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

If FIA comes down hard on the McLarens then, as it stands now, Kimi would officially be the King that he is already to his adoring fans.

King Kimi...I like that


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> IMHO, The Turd is ruining Formula 1 (he is the harm to this sport) - I think that I have made that clear.
> 
> .


He's not only The Turd but the personification of what it comes out of. Look in Webster's under Turd and they show a picture or Max with the legend "see also, A**hole."


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

The FIA is a French organization. That says it all.

Lots of behind the scene politics and no one taking responsiblity. Just like the French govt.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

http://www.motorsportmumblings.com/viewtopic.php?t=372&sid=d3dafd1b090fe78aaa95c8c7ec129b96

Other people also hate him. :rofl:

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Kimi drove a great race along with Lewis and Alonso. If he could have gotten around Lewis he would have been able to pull away.

What happened to Massa? Kimi is ahead in points so watch for some tricks from Massa.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Massa's backbone has been snapped. He knows it.

But the #2 seat at McLaren will be open for him in 2008! :brent:


.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Patrick said:


> So, how long do we have to wait until Briatore announces that Alonso is coming back to Renault to drive with Kovalainen next season? :dunno:
> 
> .


Well, it only took one day for this to get cleared up: McLaren will let Alonso go at the end of the season (reported in The Times).

Wow.

.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Well, it only took one day for this to get cleared up: McLaren will let Alonso go at the end of the season (reported in The Times).
> 
> Wow.
> 
> .


Grandprix.com starts off their report in this way:

"The Times newspaper in London is reporting that "well-placed sources" say that Ron Dennis has informed Fernando Alonso that he can leave the team at the end of the year if he wants to do that. This does not seem very likely."

They go on to say that both drivers are under several year contracts. Could be very messy if McLaren chooses to make it so.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

There is nothing new here that wasn't out a day or two ago. Its all speculation at this point. Dennis has said he will let him go if he wants but we know if will be a cold day in hell before that actually happens.


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

They are all just threatening each other, all mind games. 

Alonso can't possibly go back to Renault, now a second-tier team that he DUMPED. I can see him driving a red car, but not until Ferrari get rid of both Raikkonen and Massa. BMW? They do need a superstar driver, and McLaren might be interested in Hamilton's Polish pal, but RD could demand a large amount of $$$ for breaking Alonso's contract to make the trade difficult for BMW. 

What Alonso wants is more WDC titles, if he's smart like he seems to be, he won't wear anything other than silver, red or white.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

armaq said:


> They are all just threatening each other, all mind games.
> 
> Alonso can't possibly go back to Renault, now a second-tier team that he DUMPED. I can see him driving a red car, but not until Ferrari get rid of both Raikkonen and Massa. BMW? They do need a superstar driver, and McLaren might be interested in Hamilton's Polish pal, but RD could demand a large amount of $$$ for breaking Alonso's contract to make the trade difficult for BMW.
> 
> What Alonso wants is more WDC titles, if he's smart like he seems to be, he won't wear anything other than silver, red or white.


I'm not sure he's that smart. Seems pretty emotional to me both on and off the track, especially given his recent behavior. No doubt he has a lot of talent, but he also gets flustered and has mental lapses from time to time. To me that translates into his needing to be "handled," which task Dennis isn't up to. His best move would be to go back to playing in Briatore's sandbox.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

berford; Seems pretty emotional to me both on and off the track said:


> This sounds a lot like Schumi.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

franka said:


> berford; Seems pretty emotional to me both on and off the track said:
> 
> 
> > This sounds a lot like Schumi.
> ...


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Manager denies Alonso free to leave

By Pablo Elizalde Wednesday, August 8th 2007, 10:04 GMT

Fernando Alonso's manager has denied the Spaniard has been given the green light to leave McLaren at the end of the season.

On Tuesday, The Times quoted a source close to McLaren as saying that team boss Ron Dennis had told Alonso that he was free to leave the British squad at the end of 2007.

"My understanding is that he's been told he can go because they're so fed up with him. Ron is just very pissed off with both of them [Alonso and Lewis Hamilton]," the source told the newspaper.

Alonso's contract with McLaren runs out at the end of 2009, but speculation has been rife about his future following last Saturday's incident with teammate Lewis Hamilton, when the Briton disobeyed orders from the team to allow the Spaniard to pass in order to have an extra lap in qualifying.

Alonso was later penalised for holding up Hamilton, losing his pole position and having to start from sixth place. The Spaniard finished the race in fourth while Hamilton won to stretch his lead in the championship.

Hamilton said after the Hungarian Grand Prix that Alonso had not talked to him since then.

The two-time champion told Spanish TV right after qualifying that the mood was sombre at McLaren because it was him and not Hamilton who had grabbed pole position.

Spain's best-selling newspaper Marca on Monday wrote Alonso had given McLaren an ultimatum, and that the world champion was already looking for a way out of his contract.

Marca also wrote Alonso's manager had already met with Renault team boss Flavio Briatore.

On Tuesday, almost every Spanish newspaper reported about The Times' article, but Alonso's manager Luis Garcia Abad said he had talked to Dennis and the Briton had denied the story.

"I talked to Dennis this morning (Tuesday) and he told me what has been published it's not true. His intention is that the contract is fulfilled," Garcia Abad told El Pais newspaper.

Garcia Abad also downplayed reports about Alonso's exit at the end of the season, saying there aren't many options available if the world champion wants to keep on winning.

"To us, it's not a matter of money," he added. "If it were for the money, we would be in another team. We are in McLaren to win races and the third title. That's our goal. And in these moments there aren't that many options: just McLaren and Ferrari."


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Rumors, rumors. Don't believe what you hear from anonymous sources...they're often no better than no source at all.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Hamilton and Alonso are just acting like a bunch of babies. Between that and Stepneygate, the season is starting to loose the excitement it had.

I'm headed to Road America tomorrow for ALMS. More racers, fewer whiners. If they don't like each other they trade a little paint when the officials aren't looking (and sometimes when they are).


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

dwette said:


> Hamilton and Alonso are just acting like a bunch of babies. Between that and Stepneygate, the season is starting to loose the excitement it had.
> 
> I'm headed to Road America tomorrow for ALMS. More racers, fewer whiners. If they don't like each other they trade a little paint when the officials aren't looking (and sometimes when they are).


Agreed


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## Pinecone (Apr 3, 2002)

franka said:


> Kimi drove a great race along with Lewis and Alonso. If he could have gotten around Lewis he would have been able to pull away.


I don't agree. I was watching live timing, and every time Kimi got close (about 0.7 seconds) Lewis would rip off a fast lap and the interval would go back to just over 1 second.

Very Schumi like, just drive fast enough to win.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Autosport has a long and in depth article on the Lewis and Frenando fiasco. I can post it here if anyone would like to read it. It is very detailed and clear and has some new twists.

After reading it I clearly support what Fernado did. Let me know.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Alonso: Waaaa...Ron he looked at me...waaaaa
Hamilton: Waaaa.....Ron he looked at me first...waaaa
Alonso: Waaaaa...I need my diaper changed...waaaaa
Hamilton: Waaaa...no me first...waaaaa


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Lets hear it. I love the drama. And I am bored. :bigpimp:


.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Its Long, but Interesting*

Stuck in a Moment You Can't Get Out Of

The Hungarian Grand Prix was one of the most difficult weekends for McLaren CEO Ron Dennis and his team in recent history. What really happened at the third qualifying session at the Hungaroring on Saturday? Why did the stewards choose to penalise Fernando Alonso but not Lewis Hamilton? and what are the implications for all involved? Adam Cooper brings the full story of McLaren's undoing at Hungary

By Adam Cooper 
autosport.com contributing writer

Like everyone else, I could barely believe what was happening when Fernando Alonso sat in the Hungaroring pits at the end of third qualifying. The clock was ticking, and it was blindingly obvious when Alonso finally pulled away that Lewis Hamilton would not make it round to start his final lap.

From my vantage point in the media centre, I watched in disbelief as Alonso just made it across the line, and Hamilton didn't. It was extraordinary, and there seemed to be no explanation other than either a major mistake by the team, or - the one that proved to be correct - a spectacularly unsubtle piece of gamesmanship by the Spaniard.

At the time, of course, we had no way of knowing that the world champion was in fact responding to an earlier flouting of team instructions by Hamilton, and that indeed internally Lewis was regarded as the villain of the piece. Over the next few hours the story escalated, and so did the pressures inside the McLaren camp.

A lot of people seemed to have misunderstood the reason that a penalty was imposed on Alonso, and within McLaren there is obviously a feeling that this was a 'domestic dispute' that did not need any outside interference.

But the bottom line is simple. It is the duty of the FIA to ensure that the spectators in the grandstand and watching at home on TV see a fair contest with an outcome they can believe in - this not is the Tour de France. The penalty handed out to Michael Schumacher in Monaco last year showed that chief steward Tony Scott Andrews is not to be messed with in such circumstances.

The truth is that Alonso denied his main championship rival a chance to compete fairly for pole position. The fact that they happen to be teammates - and indeed this particular and unprecedented form of impeding could only involve two teammates - was irrelevant.

What if Alonso and Hamilton collide on the last lap in Brazil when the title is up for grabs? Should the fact that they are teammates cause the FIA to forgo any investigation and dismiss it as an internal team squabble?

This was a calculated professional foul undertaken in response to an earlier indiscretion by Hamilton. But while Lewis's move flouted team instructions and massively raised the stakes in their intra-team fight, it was not one that directly affected the outcome of the competition.

It's a hugely complex story, and one that is hard to grasp firmly, because the principal players have not yet given us the full, unadulterated truth on why things happened as they did.

But with the benefit of hindsight and additional investigation since, the events of the infamous Q3 session in Hungary can be unraveled and analysed.

Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso at the head of the pitlane queue in qualifying © LAT 
Qualifying

Hamilton's behaviour at the start of the session was as hard to comprehend as that of Alonso later on, and after the session McLaren CEO Ron Dennis was quick to point out what his man had done wrong.

It all started because of the anomaly at certain tracks that allows one but not both drivers to complete an extra lap in qualifying - a quirk of lap times, track length, and so on.

The driver accorded this privilege can complete one extra lap of fuel-burning before he gets to the stage of proper qualifying runs at the end of the session. As a result, he has a lap less of fuel in the car on his hot laps, which in Hungary equated to 2.3kgs - or a useful 0.05 seconds.

Since the Monaco dramas, Dennis and the team have done their best to give the two guys a level playing field, to the extent that on a number of occasions they have started Q3 with identical fuel loads.

However, of late there has been a bit more flexibility in strategy, and once an ideal fuel load has been decided upon, if a driver and his engineer fancy taking a punt and going two laps heavier or whatever, they can. What they cannot do is dip below the agreed figure.

In Hungary, Hamilton was indeed two laps heavier at the start of Q3. Because Lewis had enjoyed the advantage on home ground at Silverstone (this was not an issue at the Nurburgring), it was Fernando's turn to be favoured by going quickly at the start of the fuel-burning session.

Thus, he would effectively lose the aforementioned 2.3kgs before he started his hot laps, and therefore be even better off relative to Hamilton in weight terms.

There was another major twist, in that the tyre choice was not clear-cut. In theory the supersoft option tyre was the obvious choice, but there was a risk that it would go off before the end of the lap.

Since Alonso's style punishes the fronts more, he chose to go for the prime soft tyre for the laps that counted. Hamilton took the more obvious route of the supersoft. So as well as the marginal weight difference, the two men were going to be on different tyres come the end of the session.

McLaren's plans went awry at the start. Hamilton won the race to get down to the end of the pitlane and await the start of the session. The reason he got out first is that after being refuelled following Q2, the cars leave the McLaren pit once their engines have cooled to a certain temperature. The team know that once they have reached that level the driver will be able to sit at the pit exit with the engine safely running for three or four minutes.

"What determines when the car goes down is the engine temperature," said Ron Dennis. "Because we know how long we can hold the car stationary. So we can't send it until it comes down to that temperature. The engineers send it against a temperature value, and that's when they went down, out of sequence."

Hamilton agreed to let Alonso past at Turn 1, or at Turn 2 if that didn't work. Any scenario of course also involved keeping Kimi Raikkonen behind at all times, so that the Ferrari man could not interfere with the way McLaren wanted to run the session.

Fernando Alonso © LAT 
But Lewis went off at quite a pace and did not give Fernando the option to pass. Alonso stayed with him initially, but the anticipated wave-by didn't happen, and after a few corners he began to question what Lewis was doing - the man on the other end of the radio, chief engineer Steve Hallam, did his best to placate him.

Hamilton in turn was asked by engineer Richard Hopkins to move over as planned. Indeed he asked several times, but apparently there was no response. He was then told that it was an order direct from Ron Dennis, and finally Ron himself got on the radio - as he has done during several moments of crisis this year, notably in Monaco and Indianapolis - and asked Lewis to do what had been agreed.

There is no question that this was a major, major flouting of team protocol by Hamilton, and one for which he had no proper explanation.

By this stage Alonso was getting frantic and was seriously distracted in the cockpit, and trying to keep Raikkonen behind made life even more complicated. In an attempt to calm him down, he was even told that Hamilton had ignored a direct order from Ron - in other words, Fernando was reassured that he was not being stitched up by the team in some way.

Eventually it was clear that the pass was not going to happen, and after a lap Alonso slowed and prepared to switch to a different approach. When he came in for his first stop he was held in an attempt to guarantee a clear track. Indeed he was held for a full 40 seconds, which seemed like an age.

There was no need to rush off. Once it was clear he was unable to get his extra lap in, Fernando had some time to spare. Indeed, using it up would also help to guarantee that his final lap would come as close to the end of the session as possible.

However, in the confusion there was an extra delay because the usual order of 'blankets off' had not come from the pit wall. As the TV pictures showed, the tyres went on with blankets still attached and there was some panic as the front right got caught up. An extra time of five seconds was lost - ironically this unforeseen delay actually helped to get Alonso out on to a clearer track than he would otherwise have experienced.

All of this added to the tension both in the cockpit of car No. 1, and in the pits. Fernando did a lap of 1:20.133, enough to put him on pole by a significant margin, but then on his first set of new tyres Hamilton bettered that with a 1:19.781.

Then came the crucial final stop, which was preceded by some more confusion in the camp.

Alonso had one set of brand new prime tyres left, but at the last minute the team discovered a problem with the pressures. That meant a late switch to a back-up set, which had been scrubbed on an installation lap but were still in reasonable condition.

On top of everything else that was going on, this came as a surprise to Alonso, who had been expecting the new tyres. He queried the team's decision, and perhaps his mood was not helped by seeing a spanking new set of options being unwrapped for Hamilton, as planned.

Lewis Hamilton waits for Fernando Alonso to leave the pit box © Reuters 
Meanwhile there was the matter of the now infamous countdown. The team wanted to get Fernando into clean air and have him complete his final lap as late as possible, with the maximum amount of rubber down on the track. The man responsible for relaying the countdown was not Hallam, but Mark Slade, who usually takes over some communication duties while in the pits.

In the course of Fernando's stop, Hamilton had pulled in behind him, and everyone in the team knew that whatever countdown Alonso might have benefited from, they still had to get Hamilton out as well. It was going to be tight, but there was time.

The countdown ended, and the lollipop came up. And that was the definitive signal for Fernando to leave - it has to be, for safety reasons, because it tells the driver that there are no cars coming down the pitlane. It makes no sense at all for the lollipop to go up, a countdown process carry on, and allow the driver to just head off.

So there is no question that the lollipop did mean 'go', and Alonso was indeed told by Slade to go. It was Alonso's decision to sit there.

Whatever the truth, the curious thing is that everyone in the team seemed to be absolutely paralysed and apparently unable to do anything to encourage or force him to leave. After a full 10 seconds, he finally headed off.

It was my initial assumption that his steering wheel display showed a countdown to the end of the session, and that he was savvy enough to know that at 1:38 or thereabouts he could still safely go, and that Hamilton would not be able to make it.

Some cars do have such a dash readout, but the McLaren does not, and thus the drivers rely on information from their engineers. In other words, Alonso took a huge risk when he sat there as the seconds ticked away. Indeed on his out-lap he asked the team how he was doing, and had to be told to hurry up.

He made it by 0.6 seconds, even less than was reported at the time, but Hamilton was at least 4 seconds adrift. In other words, had Lewis not been stopped for the unplanned 10 seconds, he would not only have been safe, his timing would have been perfect as he would have completed his lap at the last possible moment.

Despite all the confusion, the distractions and the fact that he was not on the optimum set of tyres, Fernando kept his head and put in what was in effect a blinding lap to take pole.

Meanwhile Hamilton made his feelings known after crossing the line, saying "Don't you ever do that to me again," to which Dennis apparently replied, "Don't you ever ****ing talk to us like that again."

I choose those words carefully because it was initially reported that Lewis had started the swearing (see later), whereas it now seems that in fact it was Ron who raised the language stakes.

In addition, Hamilton is thought to have added something to the above statement that implied that he would be off to pastures new if it did happen again.

Fabrizio Borra and Ron Dennis in parc ferme © LAT 
What happened next...

You didn't have to be a genius to work out that something strange was going on at McLaren. The TV cameras caught Dennis throwing off his headset and going over to Fernando's physio, Fabrizio Borra, who also doubles as the Spaniard's pit signaller.

Ron insisted later that his intention was merely to have some back-up in parc ferme in order to help ensure that Hamilton and Alonso didn't do or say something they might regret. Borra was surprised to be collared in this way, and have his headphones removed by the team boss, which is why the situation looked so odd. Watching on TV his wife was so worried that she rang his mobile to see if he had lost his job...

The rest of the world leaped to the conclusion that Borra was in some way part of a plot, possibly giving Fernando hand signals to let him know when he ought to get a move on. A great story, but something of a red herring for which there was little support in terms of evidence.

"I took Fabrizio with me because I am only one person," Dennis said. "I didn't know what level of temperature the drivers were going to be when they came out of the cars, and I wanted Fabrizio to keep Fernando calm, and I was keeping Lewis calm.

"What we didn't want is things said in the heat of the moment that we would subsequently regret. We were both trying to calm both drivers down. Listen, as upset as both of the drivers were, they didn't say things that increased the pressure. They didn't increase the pressure, and basically, we tried to calm it all down."

Ron duly took Borra down to the scrutineering bay, where the drivers are weighed straight after qualifying. Dennis wandered in and was pictured clambering over the weighbridge as Alonso apparently ignored him. It is utterly against the rules for any team member to be in the FIA garage in those circumstances, and indeed the McLaren boss could have faced censure for his trespassing.

In the end there wasn't any fight, or any harsh words in the style of the Alonso/Massa confrontation in Germany, or at least none that the TV cameras saw. Ron's other motivation for being there was possibly to get the stories straight.

Both drivers were about to head straight into the live TV unilateral interviews, and thereafter into the FIA press conference, where they would get an unfettered grilling. Whether Dennis actually made contact was not clear from the TV pictures, but he and the team were now completely unable to have an influence on what was about to be said.

Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso in the press conference © LAT 
Hamilton has made it clear on more than one occasion this year that he is not afraid to speak his mind, and he's also highly adept at getting his message across in as subtle a way as possible, given the circumstances. As after the Monaco GP, his view was one of surprise about what had unfolded, and that he was looking forward to what the team had to say.

His comments included: "Not really much to say, you saw what happened"; "I think you should ask the team that"; - that sort of thing. But asked by how much he missed starting his last lap, he left us in no doubt: "I would think by the same amount of time that I was held up in the pit stop."

When Fernando was asked why he waited so long, Lewis interjected: "Your guess is as good as mine..."

Now it was becoming really interesting. When asked directly about his earlier "No. 2 driver" comment in Monaco, Lewis was even more forthright.

"I really don't understand why I was held back, so I guess you should ask the team, and I definitely will do when I go back and do the debrief. So I can't really comment on that. I think the team have been extremely fair since Monaco, so I can't really put that on them. They work extremely hard and I've got so much belief in the team that I wouldn't believe they would do that."

There was more than a little hint there that he already understood that this was an Alonso and not a team decision, but moments later he appeared to have changed his tune: "No, as Fernando said, he was told to stop and wait. His wheels were on, his blankets were off, and he was told to wait. I imagine that I probably lost half-a-minute, I would say, from my in-lap coming in to waiting behind Fernando. At least 30 seconds, so it definitely needs a good explanation."

As for the Spaniard, he escaped lightly as he was never really put on the spot about those crucial last 10 seconds, and was able to fudge the issue.

"I think you can ask the team this question," he said. "You know I am always monitoring the pitstop by the radio and they do the calculations. They find the gaps and I just drive the car."

He added: "Every qualifying we stop and we wait, sometimes ten seconds, sometimes five, sometimes 45, as with the first stop today."

Crucially, at this stage no outsiders knew that Hamilton had disobeyed team orders at the start of the session, and thus appeared to be an innocent victim. Interestingly, Alonso chose not to enlighten us.

Even while this press conference was going on, another dimension was added to the story when word first spread around the paddock of the radio conversation between Hamilton and Dennis, complete with (extra?) F-words. What on earth was going on?

Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton © LAT 
The mystery deepens

All of the above had given the media a clear indication that something was up. There had been no opportunity for all concerned to concoct and agree on a controversy-free part line. So now Ron Dennis had to implement some kind of damage limitation. What else could he do?

Both drivers had made it clear that we should ask the team, and fortunately, we soon had a chance to learn more.

At every race McLaren holds their own 'Meet the Team' media briefing in the Brand Centre, with both drivers joined by Dennis and Mercedes motorsport director Norbert Haug. The usual format is the drivers answer questions first, and then disappear, leaving us to talk to the management.

On this occasion, Dennis had little option but to take the bull by the horns and begin with his own account of what had happened. He had spent at least some time with the drivers by now, and it was clear that one of them was particularly unhappy - Hamilton was not present.

Clearly, Ron couldn't say anything that would directly contradict what had been said in the press conference, or anything that might suggest there was improper behaviour that might provide ammunition for the stewards. He had to go along with the countdown story that Fernando had set in motion, however vaguely, at the press conference.

However, he began by informing us that things had gone wrong at the start of the session, and made it clear that Lewis was in trouble.

"In this instance, it was Fernando's time to get the advantage of the longer fuel burn," Dennis said. "The arrangement was, OK, we're down at the end of the pitlane, we reverse positions in the first lap. That didn't occur as arranged. That was somewhat disappointing and caused some tensions on the pitwall. We were, from that moment on, out of sequence because the cars were in the wrong place on the circuit and that unfolded into the pitstops.

"It complicated the situation into the result, which was Lewis not getting his final timed lap. So this really started from that position, and from our drivers not swapping position to get the right fuel burn in order to arrive at the point where we cut the end result to the end.

"Now, as you have often asked the question, and let me make it a very honest answer: it is extremely difficult to deal with two such competitive drivers. There are definite pressures within the team. We make no secret of it.

"They are both very competitive, and they both want to win, and we are trying our very hardest to balance those pressures. Today we were part of a process where it didn't work, and the end result is more pressure on the team. But what you hear is the exact truth of what happened, and we will manage it inside the team through the balance of the season.

"Obviously Lewis feels more uncomfortable with the situation than Fernando. That's life, that's the way it is, and if he feels too hot to talk about it then that's the way it is.

Lewis Hamilton, Norbert Haug, and Fernando Alonso in the McLaren press conference © LAT 
"But what I've done is, I have given you an exact understanding of what took place today. And it's just pressure, competitiveness, and that's the way it is. We've just got to get on and deal with it, but we're not hiding from it."

It was an astonishing speech, not least because Ron admitted that Lewis was not present because he was so pissed off. And his admission of the pressures involved in juggling the drivers was pretty honest too.

What we still hadn't got was a proper explanation of what happened during those critical 10 seconds. When someone asked Fernando directly why he had not responded to the lollipop, Dennis butted in and answered for him: 'Being counted down by the engineer."

"They do the same thing in every stop," added Fernando. "In the eleven races we did, sometimes we stop 10 seconds, sometimes 20, sometimes 45 like the first one, depending on the traffic and everything."

Dennis was then told by a team member that he was required to visit the stewards, and he left Alonso and Haug on their own. But not long after he'd gone Hamilton suddenly appeared - and told us that he'd got caught up with the start of the GP2 race, and had forgotten that he was supposed to be meeting the press...

Lewis made it clear that normal procedure is that a driver goes when the lollipop moves: "I was surprised, because I was in gear, I was ready to go, and just as I was coming up to him the lollipop went up. The tyre blankets were off, everyone was away from him, and I just put it into neutral and just waited."

He also poured water on the suggestion that waiting for gaps was commonplace.

"You're out as soon as possible to go and do your lap, you don't wait for traffic. You're in the pitlane, and they tell you slow down for a couple of seconds so that a Williams can go past, and then you're out. They don't tell you to wait."

The two drivers continued to push their own versions of events, and with referee Ron elsewhere, it was as if the gloves were off. This was amazing, electric stuff, and sitting between the two drivers, Haug had not said a word.

But it was all getting too much for McLaren F1 CEO Martin Whitmarsh, who had been watching from a balcony above. He suddenly appeared downstairs and effectively commandeered the microphone: "Unfortunately Ron's had to go to the stewards at the moment, and I think it's best we wrap this up.

"I'm sure that Ron will want to talk to you later, but I think at the moment we need to talk amongst the team. I'm sorry but we're going to call it to a stop now, and we'll reconvene later."

Lewis Hamilton heads to race control © Reuters 
The drivers disappeared, and when Dennis returned he seemed almost surprised to find that the conference had finished without him. He also seemed in a relatively upbeat mood, as if convinced that what he had told the officials had convinced them that nothing underhand had taken place.

Keen to give us more information, he explained the role of the FIA GPS system, that tracks all the cars, in the countdown story.

"When the engineer is controlling the car, when the car goes out, we have a GPS system. Every car is displayed on the GPS system, so we see where every car is. The standard procedure is you don't want to send your car out in traffic. He's looking at the GPS and he's looking at the gap.

"He then says there's 15 seconds to the gap. So you hold the car, the gap is coming round, and you do a countdown: 15, 14, 13 and so on. The guy is looking at this thing because that's what determines when the car is released. That's why you see the car. That's why you see the car stationary, because the countdown is going on to the gap."

The obvious question was, why didn't Fernando react to the lollipop?

"The lollipop is out of sequence, and it was definitely not right. The reason the car didn't move is because of the countdown to the gap. The lollipop man is basically seeing Lewis, the car behind him, the engineer is looking at the GPS system. That's where we got it... We didn't do a good job."

He refused to place any blame on Fernando: "This whole thing started from the beginning of practice with two competitive drivers and it didn't work out the way we'd planned it. But don't make a bigger issue of it than there is. The stewards understand the situation, they want to listen to the tapes, and they'll hear everything that we said."

One thing seemed blindingly obvious about the whole countdown story. Surely Alonso's guys could not be completely oblivious to the need to get Hamilton out - and why couldn't anyone else in the team override the countdown and tell the Spaniard to get moving?

I asked Ron why he hadn't done it himself. "If I knew," he began. "But I didn't understand what was going on. Once the guy is on the button saying x, x, x, that blocks the channel. I hear the countdown, but once he puts the finger on the button, he blocks the channel.

"It wasn't great, and it was difficult to handle then and now. There was nothing sinister to it."

The first pitstop for Fernando Alonso © LAT 
The official reaction

Dennis may have seemed bullish about the stewards' reaction to his initial interview, but he was to be disappointed. An official bulletin came out requesting his presence along with that of both drivers and any other relevant personnel at 6:30 pm. Normally in a dispute that involves two drivers there would be separate interviews, but instead the whole gang went in together. It was to be a lengthy discussion, and Hamilton didn't hold back when describing his feeling that an injustice had been done.

The stewards had access to two crucial bits of evidence. First, they had the recordings of the FIA GPS system, which allowed them to replay the critical phases of qualifying and see exactly where the cars were on the track - the same screen that the McLaren engineers viewed when searching for a gap. This sort of evidence did not exist until this season.

Secondly, they had access to radio transmissions - but crucially, not all of them. The teams are only obliged to open the radio link to the FIA while their cars are on track. When they come into the pits, they can maintain radio silence. Apparently, only two teams take that censorship option - and guess what, it's not Spyker and Super Aguri...

In other words, no one at the FIA had heard or had a record of any conversations that happened when the cars were stationary, including any countdowns. They were, however, able to hear the on-track chat, including the by-now legendary exchange between Hamilton and Dennis.

It is standard practice for top teams to record all radio traffic in case it needs to be reviewed for any reason, but McLaren did not volunteer any 'private' pitlane conversation recordings. That seems strange, as a recording of the countdown in particular would have been useful evidence if it showed things had happened as Alonso claimed to the media. In fact, the stewards did not specifically demand to hear any such recordings.

However, a strange thing happened in the meeting with the stewards. In contrast to what we had been told less than two hours earlier, the crucial 10 seconds was not explained away to the stewards as part of the countdown.

Instead, the focus moved to the matter of tyres - something that had not been mentioned at all by Ron or Fernando in earlier media discussions, other than the drivers referring in very general terms to their preference for the prime or option.

As discussed earlier, Alonso was surprised to be given scrubbed tyres for his last run. He now claimed that the 10 seconds were spent in a discussion on whether he had been given the right tyres. When asked by the stewards whether this chat could not have gone on during the previous 20 seconds countdown he said that he couldn't speak to the team because the engineer was talking to him.

However, it's my understanding that, as you might expect, a McLaren driver can talk back in such circumstances. Indeed, as outlined earlier, the tyre discussion did take place before the lollipop went up. If that was the case, then Fernando was not being entirely straight with the stewards.

Ron Dennis speaks to the media on the grid © LAT 
Interestingly, the stewards chose not to focus entirely on those critical 10 seconds, but also took an extensive look at the wait at the first stop, and the initial 20 seconds wait at the second. They found that there were some inconsistencies in McLaren's story about looking for gaps, and armed with the GPS recordings, they were able to pinpoint these - not least the fact that when Fernando went out at the end, there were only four cars on the track, and they were not an issue.

Much emphasis was placed on the on-track radio conversations related to the last stop, and especially what Hamilton was told as he was coming in. There was a definite suspicion that, irrespective of anything Alonso might have done of his own volition, there was something strange about the 'official' 20 seconds countdown, even though it was not that but the extra 10 seconds that specifically caused Hamilton to miss his final lap.

The core of the decision that eventually emerged was as follows:

The team were asked to explain why having indicated to Hamilton that he must stop at his pit on the next lap, they then informed Alonso whilst he was still on the track that when he also pitted on the next lap he would be held for 20 seconds.

The team stated that they frequently give estimates as to duration of pit stop to their drivers before they pit and that the reason the car was in fact held for 20 seconds was that it was being counted down prior to release at a beneficial time regard being given to other cars on the track.

Alonso was asked why he waited for some 10 seconds before leaving the pits after being given the signal to leave. His response was that he was enquiring as to whether the correct set of tyres had been fitted to his car. When asked why this conversation did not take place during the 20 second period when his car sat stationary all work on it having been completed, it was stated that it was not possible to communicate by radio because of the countdown being given to him.

Reference to the circuit map shows that at the time Alonso was told he would be held for 20 seconds there were but 4 cars on the circuit, his own and those of Fisichella, Hamilton and Raikkonen. All but Raikkonen entered the pits such that there can have been no necessity to keep Alonso in the pits for 20 seconds waiting for a convenient gap in traffic in which to leave.

The explanation given by Alonso as to why at the expiration of the 20 second period he remained in his pit stop position for a further 10 seconds is not accepted. The Stewards find that he unnecessarily impeded another driver, Hamilton, and as a result he will be penalised by a loss of 5 grid positions.

The explanation given by the team as to why they kept Alonso stationary for 20 seconds after completion of his tyre change and therefore delayed Hamilton's own pit stop is not accepted.

Alonso's five-place penalty reflected the current standard penalty for unintentional impeding of another driver, and was exactly the same as that given to Giancarlo Fisichella for not letting Sakon Yamamoto past. As such, you could argue that Fernando got away pretty lightly.

The stewards' decision on the media centre notice board at the Hungaroring © LAT 
Any grid penalty is black and white and cannot be challenged. That was not the case for the sentence handed down on the team, namely the loss of constructors' points.

Many were surprised that the team were penalised when it seemed that Alonso had acted independently; but, as noted, the whole sequence surrounding the 20 seconds countdown had aroused the suspicion of the stewards, especially some inconsistencies in the team's stories. In essence, the stewards felt that they had not been told a coherent, truthful story, and they were not impressed by that.

An extra disappointment among the many setbacks that McLaren faced was a decree from the FIA that if the team won, no constructor representative would be allowed on to the podium. This was something that came up and was clarified on Sunday.

Apparently, it was connected with the fact that McLaren gave notice of its intent to appeal, which put the result into some kind of limbo - not least because lost appeals can lead to bigger penalties. Had there been no appeal, the team would have been able to pick up the trophy (even if not the points). Cynics might view the unusual development as some kind of attempt to wind up Dennis by his old sparring partner Max Mosley, although having been on the Nurburgring podium, he would probably have sent someone else this time.

What does it all mean?

Either way, it was the team penalty that clearly most troubled Dennis, and his official response on Sunday morning drew attention to the stewards' interest in those 20 seconds and the whole way that the team ran their qualifying session. He insisted that it was no business of the stewards, and he does have a point.

When the going gets tough, Dennis does have an endearing habit of focusing on the detail of something where he knows he is right.

What he didn't do was give any further explanation of the mysterious 10 seconds and Fernando's behaviour, and as far as I heard, he never acknowledged either before or after the race any specific wrongdoing on the part of the Spaniard. He did teeter towards it when asked on the grid before the start, however.

"It is extremely challenging to convince drivers that we've got equal equipment and that we operate to the best of our ability, not favouring one or the other," he said.

"Yesterday was very, very challenging. There is no real innocent party in some aspects of the team. But from the perception of did we do anything that was not consistent with our efforts to be equal and even-handed? Most certainly not."

So was he admitting there was some guilt in the camp? Well, not exactly.

Ron Dennis, Norbert Haug, Fernando Alonso, and Lewis Hamilton in happier times © LAT 
"Clearly when things don't go as you planned, there is a reason. I don't think guilt is the right word, I think if plans that we'd put in place were properly executed then we'd have both cars on the front row of the grid, comfortably, and we would not be faced with a loss of constructors' points."

Dennis is pushing ahead with the appeal against the latter penalty, and basically that means he has to set out to prove that there was nothing untoward in what went on as far as the team were concerned.

I am inclined to believe his insistence that there was nothing wrong in the team's behaviour. And nothing gets Ron more riled than suggestions of impropriety that are unjustified, especially if he feels that the accusers - in this case the stewards - have not properly understood the procedures and thought processes involved.

Having said that, a cynic might conclude that his insistence on equal treatment, and the fact that clearly Hamilton had disobeyed orders, plants the suspicion that the team or some members of it may have tried to implement a 'correction', much like the one that saw Mika Hakkinen and David Coulthard exchange places in Melbourne in 1998. Whether anyone expected Alonso to actually go quicker and steal pole is another question...

Exactly what Alonso was thinking is still open to debate, but it might not be as clear-cut as it first seemed. His motivation could well have been not to prevent Hamilton from completing his last lap, but just leave things so tight that the Briton would have to push so hard on his out-lap in order to beat the clock that his supersoft tyres would lose their edge, and be useless on the lap that counted. The fact that he only just made it himself does lend weight to that theory.

To say that the triangular relationship between Alonso and Hamilton and Dennis is strained would be something of an understatement. There is no question that Lewis has massively compromised his standing in the team, because there is no rational explanation for what he did at the start of the session - it was a massive breach of team protocol.

As for Alonso, the bottom line is that however much he had been provoked by Hamilton breaking ranks, he left Dennis hung out to dry, forced to defend the double world champion on the 10 seconds countdown issue to the bitter end.

In the heated circumstances, the last thing the McLaren boss wanted to do was antagonise his double world champion even more. But he won't have liked being put into that position, especially at a time when he has made it crystal clear how important integrity and team values are to him.

"The drivers understand the obligations that we have in the team," he reflected just minutes before the start. "And they are expected to follow those obligations.

"Like everything in life there is one thing that is agreed and properly documented, but things don't always go according to those commitments, and in the end inevitably there's a lot of pressures, in F1, those final closing moments of that particular qualifying had higher levels of pressure than we've experienced before."

I can't see that the pressure will be relieved any time soon...


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Yes, long. Very long.


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## Salvator (Oct 14, 2003)

So... race coming up this weekend, right? Anyone have any news of interest? :dunno:


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Salvator said:


> So... race coming up this weekend, right? Anyone have any news of interest? :dunno:


Yes.

Räikkönen will win this race.

.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Yes.
> 
> Räikkönen will win this race.
> 
> .


Don't you mean, Kimi will be leading the race until he blows up his engine?


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Salvator said:


> So... race coming up this weekend, right? Anyone have any news of interest? :dunno:


The F1 world has been pretty quiet since Hungary. Perhaps everyone is just waiting to see what happens in the Silver Arrow's spying and points award cases. (Haven't heard of any gag orders, but they seemed to be gagged up anyway.)

Latest news (good news, I believe) is that both Nick and Robert are driving BMVs next year.

More news: I pick up my new ride today.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

RaceTripper said:


> Don't you mean, Kimi will be leading the race until he blows up his engine?


He isn't driving a Chrysler anymore.

.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> He isn't driving a Chrysler anymore.
> 
> .


Perhaps he wishes he were--


PosTeamPoints1McLaren-Mercedes 138 (additional 15 points under protest)2Ferrari1193BMW71
*******>
********>
:bigpimp:


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> Perhaps he wishes he were--


I would like to suggest that perhaps McLaren wishes that Kimi was Hamilton's teammate (and still with the team). He doesn't give a rat's ass what is teammate is up to.

.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> I would like to suggest that perhaps McLaren wishes that Kimi was Hamilton's teammate (and still with the team). He doesn't give a rat's ass what is teammate is up to.
> 
> .


Very likely true.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

What's up with the Toyos besting the Bimmers by a mile in 2nd Friday practice? Perhaps they learnt [sic] something in NASCAR to help them out.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> What's up with the Toyos besting the Bimmers by a mile in 2nd Friday practice? Perhaps they learnt [sic] something in NASCAR to help them out.


LOL.

It seemed like everyone was doing longer stints with more fuel in the 2nd free practice. And perhaps BMW had some other program compared to the Toyota cars. It will be interesting to see what happens in this morning's practice (starts in 25 minutes).

I think that BMW will be up there in qualifying later today.

BTW, the track temperature reached +54C in yesterday's second session. 

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

BTW, WRT cars being assisted by corner workers out of the gravel traps and back on to the track: this will no longer be allowed as per Hamilton in Germany, even if the race is red flagged.

Also, Hamilton was able to keep his engine running (and not over-heating) because McLaren has some program that allows the engine to idle on 4 cylinders for up to four minutes without doing any damage to the engine.

Those guys think of everything!


.


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

berford said:


> What's up with the Toyos besting the Bimmers by a mile in 2nd Friday practice? Perhaps they learnt [sic] something in NASCAR to help them out.


I love practice champs, especially my boy Ralf! :rofl:

Seriously, you didn't think BMW dropped the ball to end in 10th. Kubica said they concentrated on long runs to compare the two compounds and it's what they usually do on Fridays. Some of the setup work was compromised because of the red flag situation but they got it right at the end, 5th and 6th on the grid is where they are right now.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

F1Crazy said:


> I love practice champs, especially my boy Ralf! :rofl:
> 
> Seriously, you didn't think BMW dropped the ball to end in 10th. Kubica said they concentrated on long runs to compare the two compounds and it's what they usually do on Fridays. Some of the setup work was compromised because of the red flag situation but they got it right at the end, 5th and 6th on the grid is where they are right now.


Yeah, I know practices are just that. I think they wanted to give Ralfie a little confidence boost. teehee.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

:tsk:

Both Barrichello and Button's engines have been changed for today's race. Oh Honda ...

I think that not only will the Super Aguris finish ahead of the Hondas, but that the Williams Toyotas will spank Ralf and Fisi. Wow.


.


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## AzNMpower32 (Oct 23, 2005)

*Turkey GP results*

1. Massa
2. Raikkonen
3. Alonso
4. Heidfeld
5. Hamilton.

I predicted #1 and #2 correctly . Oh, and another great job from Heidfeld :clap: . Too bad about Hamilton's tire issue. Oh well


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

:yawn:


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Kimi was apparently trying to prove something to someone by driving the fastest lap of the race with only two laps to go until the checkered flag...


.


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## Pinecone (Apr 3, 2002)

He did the same thing at the last race, but did it the last lap. In both cases taking about the hat trick (pole, win, fast lap) from the winner.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

:snooze: :snooze: Is it over yet? :yawn:


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Pinecone said:


> He did the same thing at the last race, but did it the last lap. In both cases taking about the hat trick (pole, win, fast lap) from the winner.


I think (my opinion) that he did it this time in response to Ferrari team orders - they were told with 10 laps to go that the current 1-2 order should be the final finishing order. I suspect that Kimi wanted to say that he would have raced Massa for the victory if the team would have let him, thus the fastest lap.

He also claimed that he was bored just driving behind Massa, and going for the fastest lap gave him something to do. :rofl:

.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> I think (my opinion) that he did it this time in response to Ferrari team orders - they were told with 10 laps to go that the current 1-2 order should be the final finishing order. I suspect that Kimi wanted to say that he would have raced Massa for the victory if the team would have let him, thus the fastest lap.
> 
> He also claimed that he was bored just driving behind Massa, and going for the fastest lap gave him something to do. :rofl:
> 
> .


Team orders? What team orders??? They follow the rules soooooo well.:tsk::bigpimp:


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> Team orders? What team orders??? They follow the rules soooooo well.:tsk::bigpimp:


LOL!

It sounds like Bernie is also getting fed up with this "not racing to the flag" stuff. He mentioned that the driver's championship could be won by the driver with the most victories, not points.

With four drivers having three wins each, that could be fun with five races left! :bigpimp:

.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

AzNMpower32 said:


> .... Too bad about Hamilton's tire issue. Oh well


He handled it perfectly (and got a little lucky, too.) Showed a lot of maturity for one so young. He could have torn up the front end completely...but didn't.

I haven't seen a particular analysis yet, but I couldn't figure how Robert faded back so much. Anyone know?


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> LOL!
> 
> It sounds like Bernie is also getting fed up with this "not racing to the flag" stuff. He mentioned that the driver's championship could be won by the driver with the most victories, not points.
> 
> ...


So you could, theoretically, end a season in a 17 way tie. How weird would that be?


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> So you could, theoretically, end a season in a 17 way tie. How weird would that be?


:rofl:

Yeah, and then flip for the championship...

.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Patrick said:


> :rofl:
> 
> Yeah, and then flip for the championship...
> 
> .


Use process of elimination...playing matches of "chicken"


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

berford said:


> but I couldn't figure how Robert faded back so much. Anyone know?


Bad pit strategy which was the result of running light in the 1st stint. It was inevatible.


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

armaq said:


> Bad pit strategy which was the result of running light in the 1st stint. It was inevatible.


Exactly, he was the only one that did Medium-Hard-Medium and it was obvious that BMW couldn't deliver the times that they wanted on softer compound to take advantage of short first stint. Nick did Hard-Hard-Medium and drove longer stints and it payed off. Kovalainen and Rosberg did the same and moved in front of Kubica. Ferrari was the only team that could run softer compound successfully.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

F1Crazy said:


> Exactly, he was the only one that did Medium-Hard-Medium and it was obvious that BMW couldn't deliver the times that they wanted on softer compound to take advantage of short first stint. Nick did Hard-Hard-Medium and drove longer stints and it payed off. Kovalainen and Rosberg did the same and moved in front of Kubica. Ferrari was the only team that could run softer compound successfully.


Thanks. When I'm home during a Euro GP, is generally watch it in bed with the wife sleeping at my side and the TV on mute. So if the commentators comment on things like that, I don't hear it. I generally rewatch with the sound on, but haven't done so this time.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> Thanks. When I'm home during a Euro GP, is generally watch it in bed with the wife sleeping at my side and the TV on mute. So if the commentators comment on things like that, I don't hear it. I generally rewatch with the sound on, but haven't done so this time.


You probably could have just fallen asleep during this race. :eeps:

:bigpimp:

.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> You probably could have just fallen asleep during this race. :eeps:
> 
> :bigpimp:
> 
> .


Unlike many others, I never find F1 boring. I guess that's just me.


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## SteveT (Dec 22, 2001)

berford said:


> Unlike many others, I never find F1 boring. I guess that's just me.


I'm never bored by F1. You aren't alone.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

I don't usually find F1 races boring, and Turkey is one of my favorite tracks, but this race did bore me. I guess it wasn't my month for open-wheel racing. I went to Road America and thought the ChampCar race was really dull & even left 20 minutes before it was over. Hungary was marred by the McLaren boys being such big babies -- it was hard to root for either of them.

But my two favorite races are coming up: Monza and Spa.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> Max asked for a review. That's the new evidence. This is all old news.


Uh, hello franka? Read the link I posted.

Did you hear (yesterday) that the FIA cancelled the original hearing with the International Court of Appeals and sent the issue *BACK* to the World Motor Sports Commission??? This is based on NEW evidence and it is quite a development.

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> Uh, hello franka? Read the link I posted.
> 
> Did you hear (yesterday) that the FIA cancelled the original hearing with the International Court of Appeals and sent the issue *BACK* to the World Motor Sports Commission??? This is based on NEW evidence and it is quite a development.
> .


My Autosport subscription covers "the news" quite well. Thank you.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> My Autosport subscription covers "the news" quite well. Thank you.


Well, read the "news" then instead of these silly $50,000 gearbox fine stories!

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

The full decision by the stewards 

Thursday, September 6th 2007, 17:14 GMT 


The stewards having received a report from the Race Director regarding the use a the Hungarian Grand Prix by Vodafone McLaren Mercedes (McLaren) of what they refer to as "lightweight gearbox" requested the presence today of Paddy Lowe (Engineering Director of McLaren) and David Ryan (Team Manager) and such other personnel as they considered appropriate to explain the position. 

The facts as ascertained are that late in the afternoon of Thursday 2nd August Paddy Lowe disclosed to the Race Director as list of changes made to their vehicle, one of which was referred to as a "lightweight gearbox". 

The matter was referred to the FIA F1 Technical Delegate for his consideration but a meeting between the parties did not take place until immediately prior to qualifying on Saturday 4th August. 

Changes to both cars were shown to the Technical Delegate who marked the list produced by McLaren as confirmation that the changes had been brought to his attention. His action did not constitute approval to the changes and this fact is recognised by McLaren. 

The Technical Delegate asked whether the changes to the gearbox had been subjected to a further crash test. He was advised that the changes were only to the gearbox and were not significant. The Technical Delegate asked that he be given details of the changes before the next race. 

Both team cars took part in qualifying and the race using the lightweight gearboxes.

When further information was received on the evening of Friday of 17th August which detailed the tests carried out by McLaren on their lightweight gearboxes the FIA requested details of actual differences between the original gearbox and the lightweight version. 

This information was finally received on the evening of Tuesday 21st August. It was the view of the FIA that the changes had been made to the original gearbox (which together with the original rear impact structure had been subjected to impact tests) were "significant". 

2007 Formula One Technical Regulations Article 16/1/2 states that "any significant modification introduced into any of the structures tested shall require that part to pass a further test."

The FIA accordingly requested McLaren to carry out further tests as required by Article 16.1.1 in the presence of the FIA technical delegate. 

Because of time constraints McLaren used the original (not the lightweight) gearboxes for the Turkish Grand Prix. The relevant tests were carried out and completed satisfactorily on Thursday 30th august. 

The view of McLaren is that the modifications made to their original gearbox which resulted in that which is termed the lightweight gearbox were not significant within the meaning of Article 16.1.2 such as to require the component to be re-tested. They base this view upon what they regard as the excessive weight and strength of the original gearbox (which was designed to meet a greater crash test requirement than that which applies in 2007) and upon the results of their own computer modelling. 

The view of the FIA is that the percentage in weight reduction (which it is accepted does not necessarily correlate to a reduction in strength) was of sufficient magnitude as to be regarded as "significant" therefore requiring an impact test before use. 

Whilst the term "significant" contained within Article 16.1.2 is subjective and open to interpretation (as indicated by the different views adopted by McLaren and the FIA), what is beyond doubt is that by delaying the supply of information to the FIA (which could have been supplied on completion of the modification to the gearboxes during the week commencing Monday 16th July), McLaren deprived the FIA of the opportunity to consider the changes made and require impact testing to be carried out before use. 

Had such information been imparted in due time the tests could have been satisfactorily completed prior to the Hungarian Grand Prix such that their use would have been without criticism. 

Clearly the requirement to submit information which may result in a request of impact testing is important in the FIA's endeavours to ensure the continued safety of competitors. The Stewards feel that disclosure should be made in circumstances such as this and accordingly censure McLaren for choosing to rely on the results of their own computer modelling and denying the FIA the opportunity of requiring the results of an actual impact test before using the component concerned. 

McLaren are accordingly ordered to pay a fine of US$50,000 (FIA International Sporting Code Article 155).

The view of the Stewards is that the components having been satisfactorily tested indicate that the cars complied with the technical configuration required when they raced in Hungary. Nothing in this decision is to be taken as condoning the practice of retrospective impact testing resulting in the use of untested components but in the particular circumstances of this case no further sanction will be applied.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Correction: McLaren spends more than $50,000 on champagne per race for their hospitality "tents".


.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> Well, read the "news" then instead of these silly $50,000 gearbox fine stories!.


This "silly story" is good fill in news until the hearing is convened. Until then its all speculation and panting.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

berford said:


> Not that $50k is more than a sniffle to McLaren, but it seens every time they turn around they are getting hit with some additional issue. Makes one wonder if there's a conspiracy within FIA to "get" the team one way or another. Oh, and *who *would that benefit.:yikes:


Yes. Seems McLaren is asking for trouble when they should be squeaky clean before The hearing.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Ferrari say truth will out in spy hearing 

By Jonathan Noble Thursday, September 6th 2007, 15:48 GMT 


Ferrari say they are confident the "truth will come out" after the FIA said it had found new evidence in the espionage case involving the Italian squad and McLaren.

The governing body announced on Wednesday that it had reconvened its World Motor Sport Council for a hearing in Paris on September 13 to consider the development.

The Italian squad responded to the announcement on Thursday, saying they will attend the new hearing.

"Ferrari notes the FIA's decision to call an extraordinary meeting of the World Motor Sport Council to examine new evidence that has emerged with regards to the accusation that Vodafone McLaren Mercedes has violated article 151c of the International Sporting Code," said Ferrari in a statement.

"Ferrari will be present at the Council meeting on the 13th September in Paris and wishes to reaffirm its own strong wish that all the elements in this case are brought to light. Ferrari is confident that the truth will out."

The Monza paddock has been full of intrigue about the nature of the new evidence that has led to the calling of the FIA hearing, with world champion Fernando Alonso not commenting on Thursday at suggestions that he has been involved in providing new evidence.

Paddock sources have suggested that the matter revolves around an email exchange between Alonso and McLaren test driver Pedro de la Rosa about setting up of this year's car.

Autosport.com understands that the FIA became aware of new evidence last week and wrote to all F1 teams, as well as Alonso, de la Rosa and Hamilton, on Friday to make it clear that it was their duty to provide the FIA with any information regarding that matter.

It is also believed that the letter to the drivers promised them an 'amnesty' from any punishment if they fully cooperated with the ongoing investigation.

How much involvement Alonso had in the matter is unclear, and the FIA has refused to confirm or deny the nature of the new evidence, or the letters.

"We can make no comment at all," said a spokesman.

Alonso himself also kept quiet when McLaren prevented him from answering questions about the matter during a pre-Italian Grand Prix media briefing at Monza on Thursday.

What is known is that the new evidence gathered by the FIA has not come from the two men at the centre of the controversy - Mike Coughlan and Nigel Stepney.

Italian newspaper La Repubblica quoted on Thursday from a letter that Stepney had sent to the FIA confirming he had met with Coughlan to discuss technical data.

Neither Coughlan nor Stepney are scheduled to appear at the FIA hearing on September 13.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> Ferrari say truth will out in spy hearing
> 
> By Jonathan Noble Thursday, September 6th 2007, 15:48 GMT
> 
> ...


This "silly story" is good fill in news until the hearing is convened. Until then its all speculation and panting.

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Just for you Patrick.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Update on spying situation:
http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2007/9/6723.html

And, oh, by the way, there's something going on at Monza this weekend.

*Friday Practice Session 1* POSDRIVERNATIONALITYENTRANTTIME1.Kimi RaikkonenFinlandFerrari1:22.4462.Felipe MassaBrazilFerrari1:22.5903.Lewis HamiltonBritainMcLaren-Mercedes1:22.6184.Fernando AlonsoSpainMcLaren-Mercedes1:22.8405.Nico RosbergWilliams-Toyota1:23.472 6.Jenson ButtonBritainHonda1:23.6687.Giancarlo FisichellaItalyRenault1:23.6718.Robert KubicaPolandBMW1:23.7039.Nick HeidfeldBMW1:23.886 10.Jarno TrulliItalyToyota1:23.96511.Heikki KovalainenFinlandRenault1:24.07612.Rubens BarrichelloBrazilHonda1:24.56413.Takuma SatoJapanSuper Aguri-Honda1:24.58714.Mark WebberAustraliaRed Bull-Renault1:24.59515.Ralf SchumacherToyota1:24.660 16.Alexander WurzAustriaWilliams-Toyota1:24.68917.Anthony DavidsonBritainSuper Aguri-Honda1:24.69418.David CoulthardBritainRed Bull-Renault1:24.81019.Adrian SutilSpyker-Ferrari1:25.130 20.Sebastian VettelToro Rosso-Ferrari1:25.439 21.Sakon YamamotoJapanSpyker-Ferrari1:25.44822.Vitantonio LiuzziItalyToro Rosso-Ferrari1:25.762
*******>
<TD class=wsw-tsnat*****many[/TD]
<TD class=wsw-tsnat*****many[/TD]
<TD class=wsw-tsnat*****many[/TD]
<TD class=wsw-tsnat*****many[/TD]
<TD class=wsw-tsnat*****many[/TD]
********>


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Full letter from Mosley to McLaren drivers 

Friday, September 7th 2007, 12:03 GMT 


Dear Mr De La Rosa

As you will be aware, the FIA has recently investigated whether, how and to what extent McLaren was in possession of confidential Ferrari technical information. The FIA has subsequently been made aware of an allegation that one or more McLaren drivers may be in possession, or that such drivers have recently been in possession, of written evidence relevant to this investigation.

In the interests of the sport and the Championship it is important that the FIA as the regulator establishes unequivocally and rapidly whether or not this allegation has any basis in fact.

The FIA therefore formally requests that you produce copies of any relevant documents which may be in your possession or power of procurement and which may be relevant to this case. For these purposes "documents" includes all written materials such as emails, letters, electronic communications, text messages, notes, memoranda, drawings, diagrams, data, or other material, stored in any physical, "hard copy" or electronic form.

In particular (though without limiting the generality of this request), the FIA wishes to receive copies of any electronic communications (howsoever conveyed or stored) which may be relevant to this case and which make reference to Ferrari, Nigel Stepney or any technical or other information coming from or connected with either Ferrari or Mr Stepney. 

In the event that you are aware of the existence or previous existence of any document falling within the above description but are not in a position to produce it, please describe the content of the document in question, the circumstances under which it came to your knowledge and the reasons why you are unable to produce it. 

In the event that you are unsure as to whether any document falls within the above description, kindly submit it (or a description of it) and the FIA will assist in making a determination. You will appreciate that there is a duty on all competitors and Super Licence holders to ensure the fairness and legitimacy of the Formula One World Championship. 

It is therefore imperative that if you do have any such information, you make it available to us without delay. I can confirm, given the importance of this issue, that any information you may make available in response to this letter will not result in any proceedings against you under the International Sporting Code or the Formula One regulations. However, in the event that it later comes to light that you have withheld any potentially relevant information, serious consequences could follow.

We are sending identical letters to Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton. We look forward to hearing from you at your earliest convenience. Thank you very much for your co-operation.

Yours sincerely

Max Mosley


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

I believe its a fact of F1 life that teams try to find out as much information about their competitors as possible and I'm sure that many ppl leak info for a variety of reasons. This has been a part of F1 for as long as F1 has existed.

It would be a shame to see McLaren banned, especially for 2007 and 2008, on the basis of some emails about set-up.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Friday Practice Session 2 POSDRIVERNATIONALITYENTRANTTIME1.Fernando AlonsoSpainMcLaren-Mercedes1:22.3862.Lewis HamiltonBritainMcLaren-Mercedes1:23.2093.Giancarlo FisichellaItalyRenault1:23.5844.Robert KubicaPolandBMW1:23.5995.Nico RosbergWilliams-Toyota1:23.679 6.Felipe MassaBrazilFerrari1:23.7227.Nick HeidfeldBMW1:23.821 8.Kimi RaikkonenFinlandFerrari1:23.8339.Heikki KovalainenFinlandRenault1:23.84810.Alexander WurzAustriaWilliams-Toyota1:23.881
*******>
<TD class=wsw-tsnat*****many[/TD]
<TD class=wsw-tsnat*****many[/TD]
********>
*That's better.*


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*No Comment says Ron D*

McLaren 'no comment' on spy developments

By Pablo Elizalde Friday, September 7th 2007, 13:54 GMT

McLaren will not comment on the latest developments in the spy saga surrounding their team.

The Woking-based outfit issued a statement on Friday following growing speculation about the nature of new evidence that had been discovered by the FIA.

And although the focus is now on an email exchange between drivers Pedro de la Rosa and Fernando Alonso, McLaren want to wait until the September 13 before speaking about the matter.

McLaren said in a statement that they intended to make "a strong set of submissions" at the hearing in Paris next week but could not comment further for legal reasons.

"We understand that information has again been leaked into the media," McLaren said in a statement referring to the stories emerging from the paddock yesterday, "and consequently there is a desire for us to address the issues that relate to the meeting of the World Motorsport Council on Thursday 13th September 2007 where we intend to make a strong set of submissions.

"However our lawyers have advised us that as the case will be heard by the World Motor Sport Council on Thursday of next week that this is the appropriate forum for the matter to be discussed, and that the team and our drivers should make no further comment.

"We kindly ask the media to understand this position."


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick...Certainly the Sept 13th meeting is the big event but that doesn't make the gearbox issue any smaller nor does it make the world stand still until the 13th. 

Many things, including a race, will occur before the 13th and those events/issues/occurances will carry the same weight as they would if there were no 13th meeting.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

franka said:


> ... but that doesn't make the gearbox issue any smaller...


The gearbox problem is a gnat in a swarm of wasps. I really don't think many people care about it anymore.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Holy crap, what a wreck. :yikes:

Brake failure? I hope that Räikkönen is Ok for qualifying.


.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick I hope that Räikkönen is Ok for qualifying. .[/QUOTE said:


> Starting from 5th is not a good sign. Maybe it was the backup car or maybe it was Kimi.
> 
> So what was the problem in that accident? Certainly not a driver error so suddenly.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Alonso denies trying to harm team 

By Jonathan Noble and Michele Lostia Saturday, September 8th 2007, 08:57 GMT 


World champion Fernando Alonso has angrily hit back at suggestions the information he has supplied to the FIA about McLaren's spy saga was a deliberate attempt by him to damage the team.

The Spaniard has endured a fractious relationship with his McLaren team in recent weeks, and the fact that he was involved in providing new evidence to the FIA over the spying matter prompted wild rumours in some sections of the media that he could have done it as a way of helping ease his way out of the team.

But Alonso has hit back at those suggestions, thinking it would be 'stupid' of him to try and damage the team in such a way.

"I've been unfairly treated by the papers," he was quoted as saying by Gazzetta dello Sport. "I did not accuse the team, I just replied to the FIA with honesty and professionalism.

"It's stupid to think that I might have replied to the FIA in order to damage the team, as I would do nothing but damaging myself. You must not forget I'm fighting for the championship.

"The FIA sent that letter to all the drivers, asking if we had anything on this matter. It was our duty to reply, by sending what we had. There was no other choice. I hope everyone understands that.

"Effects on the championship? We've lived with this story for two months and we've seen that there have never been repercussions on the race track."

The focus of the new evidence surrounds an email exchange between Alonso and test driver Pedro de la Rosa about Ferrari set-up data obtained by chief designer Mike Coughlan.

All de la Rosa has said was: "I'd love to speak, but I can't, at least until September 13th (when the FIA hearing is)."

McLaren are maintaining their silence about the matter until the hearing next Thursday, although parts of Coughlan's legal documentation that have been lodged at the High Court have been obtained by The Guardian today.

In them, Coughlan is adamant that none of the information he had obtained from Stepney was used in improving the McLaren car.

Coughlan denied he had: "reviewed the Ferrari documents in their entirety or in any way which enabled any proper appreciation or assessment in engineering terms of their contents".

He said he only looked at the documents: "on only two or so intermittent occasions".

There are suggestions, however, that the FIA has been provided with information from Italian authorities, courtesy of the Polizia Postale e delle Comunicazioni, suggesting that there were 'hundreds' of telephone and SMS contacts between Coughlan and Stepney that go beyond what has so far been acknowledged - and may even include conversations on grand prix weekends and tests.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Raikkonen: crash didn't affect qualifying 

By Mark Glendenning and Jonathan Noble Saturday, September 8th 2007, 13:44 GMT 


Kimi Raikkonen thinks that his failure to secure a place on the front two rows of the grid for the Italian Grand Prix was not a direct result of his morning practice crash.

The Finn crashed heavily at the Ascari Chicane in morning practice, forcing him to switch cars prior to qualifying even though the team were able to use his regular engine.

And although he was pipped to fourth place on the grid by Nick Heidfeld, Raikkonen thinks that the accident did not influence his speed in the afternoon.

"For sure it didn't help, but I don't think it hurt us too much," said Raikkonen. "We'll see tomorrow in the race how we do. Of course we could have done better in qualifying, and in the whole day so far, but I think we are still in a good position for the race."

Raikkonen has blamed the morning's accident on the rear tyres locking under braking. Moments before the crash he was seen adjusting the brake balance in the cockpit.

"I just locked the rear brakes, and unfortunately it turned right and not left," he said. "Once it turned right I could not do anything, so I just waited until it stopped. Once you are on the grass there is not much you can do."


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Hmm, not bad for Nick, but since BMW is almost always the first team to head in for fuel and tyres, it could be a light fuel load.

Otherwise, unless there is a wreck in Turn 1, I strongly suspect that both McLarens will drive away. It should be fun to see them fight it out - just as they did in the free practice this morning when Hamilton almost drove Alonso Diaz off the track!

Spoonface has gained some weight! Anyone notice? He was also out last night with Mika Salo, having a few tonics. At least according to Salo. :eeps:

BTW, the Finnish TV guys mentioned a silly story told by Rubens. Apparently, after the miserable race in Hungary, Rubens' mobile phone rang. He answered it, and it was none other than Spoonface himself calling. Rubens asked him what was up, and Schumacher replied that he was sitting on his sofa, smoking a cigar and having a drink, and wondering what the hell you (Rubens) were doing out there. Barrichello finished the race in last place, 2 laps behind Hamilton.

:bigpimp:


.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> Starting from 5th is not a good sign. Maybe it was the backup car or maybe it was Kimi.
> 
> So what was the problem in that accident? Certainly not a driver error so suddenly.


Probably a combination of the T car, and whatever was going through Räikkönen's head. Crashing like that at 320km/h looks horrifying. 

It was either a brake problem (maybe not warm enough front brakes), or something related to what Kimi said - that he hit a bump, and the next thing he knew, the car went hard right under braking.

I am waiting for the evening sports news in hope that there is more info.

BTW, Massa looked pretty pissed off in the post-qualifying interview. Or perhaps shocked and awed is a better term for it.

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> Starting from 5th is not a good sign. Maybe it was the backup car or maybe it was Kimi.
> 
> So what was the problem in that accident? Certainly not a driver error so suddenly.


Probably a combination of the T car, and whatever was going through Räikkönen's head. Crashing like that at 320km/h looks horrifying. 

It was either a brake problem (maybe not warm enough front brakes), or something related to what Kimi said - that he hit a bump, and the next thing he knew, the car went hard right under braking.

I am waiting for the evening sports news in hope that there is more info.

BTW, Massa looked pretty pissed off in the post-qualifying interview. Or perhaps shocked and awed is a better term for it.

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

So... if Ron Dennis quits before next Thursday, McLaren will not be punished harshly in the spy case. Wow. It's a witch hunt! It reminds me of what happened to Tom Walkinshaw. :yikes:

And... Renault's negotiations with Alonso have progressed so far that Flavio will not announce the 2008 Renault driver line up until after next Thursday's hearing. 

If... McLaren gets shut out of the 2007 season by the FIA, Briatore is ready to have Alonso drive for Renault already in Spa, next weekend. :eeps:

Strange days have found us.


.


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## WAM (Jan 30, 2002)

Wow, what a performance by McLaren,especially Alonso. I am rooting for him to win his third championship. However, the Turd seems to want Ferrari to win it!

Bit of a shock to see Ferrari at least half a second behind McLaren, at least in P2, P3 and Q2. Q3 is a similar gap, but even then, I doubt Massa is trying anything radical in terms of fuel strategy. Not sure about Kimi in Q3, whether it was a qualifying mistake or high fuel.

As for Kimi's P3 crash, what bump?? From the onboard shots, the wheels appear to be stable until he just veers off.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

I think its strange that no one has gone on to speculate that if McLaren is booted from the 2007 championship, or even heavily penalized by deducting points, then the championship falls to Ferrari with either Massa or Kimi as champion.

Certainly Ferrari, Massa and Kimi must be thinking this and both drivers focusing more on beating their teammate than the two McLarens.

It should bring the possiblity of the championship home to both of them in a very strong manner.

The strange thing is that all the sports writers, that are willing to make a story out of anything, have not speculated on this real possiblity happening. 

Or at least not yet.


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## WAM (Jan 30, 2002)

Well, my reference in the post above about the turd wanting Ferrari to win it, was exactly that. Max Mosley is also known as the turd.

I think Ferrari are well aware in that McLaren are possibly going to get penalized heavily, and it is looking quite likely that Massa may clinch the championship.

Personally, I think that is a flawed method of winning, and if Ferrari technology was instrumental in getting McLaren where they are now, why is McLaren blowing them away in Monza, so far?


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

This morning's GP2 and Porsche Super Cup races were perhaps more exciting than that.

At least the Italian Police didn't impound the McLaren cars before the race as rumored to be the case.

Ron Dennis was visibly upset after the race and unusually once again, his wife was in the paddock (for the second race in a row for that matter). Is he going to quit? :dunno:

Anyway, the WDC is down to Alonso and Hamilton. My money is on Alonso.

I can't wait for Spa! :thumbup:


.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

What's up with Kimi? Too much Finlandia last night. We used to all the pass by Hamilton as Kimi getting snookered. Or was Kimi just snockered. Whatever. If Kimi's so good, how could he get embarassed so badly? Pathetic.


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

Don't know if you watched the post-race interview, but Kimi said his neck was hurting (fromt the accident) and he had problems keeping his head up going into T1. When Hamilton pulled along side Kimi, Kimi was getting annoyed by his old neck and wasn't checking the mirrors at all.

And yes, it seems we are witnessing Ron Dennis' last few GPs.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Hamilton's car was faster and he had fresh tyres.


.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

franka said:


> I think its strange that no one has gone on to speculate that if McLaren is booted from the 2007 championship, or even heavily penalized by deducting points, then the championship falls to Ferrari with either Massa or Kimi as champion.


Does it? The McLaren drivers were told they wouldn't be punished if they cooperated handing over evidence. So that might be interpreted to mean McLaren could be excluded, loosing their point in the constructor championship, but with the drivers retaining their points for the driver's championship (unless they are found culpable). I'm not assuming the driver's battle will change if it goes badly for McLaren.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

WAM said:


> Well, my reference in the post above about the turd wanting Ferrari to win it, was exactly that. Max Mosley is also known as the turd.?


Only Max is The Turd. Jean is The Toad.

Call him "Jack the Toad"


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

berford said:


> What's up with Kimi? Too much Finlandia last night. We used to all the pass by Hamilton as Kimi getting snookered. Or was Kimi just snockered. Whatever. If Kimi's so good, how could he get embarassed so badly? Pathetic.


Kimi was not surprised by Hamilton, you could see that in some of the replays. Kimi made several defending moves but would be silly to take them both out defending the position. Plus we learned later of his neck problem.

If Ham didn't get him there it would be somewhere else so what's the point of fighting for it? The McLarens were just faster.

I've said before that the McLarens are running the FSD tech in their shocks and FSD allows the shocks to work both in low speed and high speed situations and no doubt gives the McLarens an advantage over the curbs, as we could all see in the race. Same in Monaco.

No other F1 team is running FSD. Is it just a coincidence that the FSDs are on the winning car? I think not. That alone does not make McLaren's fastest but it helps, a lot.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Ron has Thoughts about Italian Authorities*

McLaren suspect Italian authorities' timing

By Jonathan Noble Sunday, September 9th 2007, 10:08 GMT

McLaren have accused the Italian authorities of trying to disrupt their preparations for the Italian Grand Prix in the wake of the team being informed they are under investigation over Formula One's spy controversy.

Team boss Ron Dennis is one of seven people under investigation, and on Saturday he received from the prosecutor in Modena an "avviso di garanzia" - a legal notification notifying a person he is suspected of a crime and is being investigated.

The documents do not necessarily mean that charges will be forthcoming, however, and McLaren think the timing of the move by the Italian authorities was deliberate.

A statement issued by the team on Sunday said: "McLaren did receive some contact from the Italian authorities yesterday but were not charged with anything.

"We strongly suspect that the nature and timing of this wholly unnecessary contact, just before the start of qualifying, was to disrupt our preparation for this important session and Thursday's World Motor Sport Council hearing.

"McLaren are completely confident that were any proceedings of this type ever to be brought, we would be completely exonerated."

McLaren's criticisms of the timing of the Italian actions before qualifying has added further confusion to the sequence of events yesterday, with Dennis claiming in his regular press briefing late on Saturday afternoon that he was not aware of any contact with the Italian police.

When asked what he could say about rumours that the team were about to be served by a writ he said: "Nothing. Nothing has happened yet. If it happens, it happens. But it hasn't happened yet."

When asked to clarify whether or not the team had received documents from the Italian police he responded: "That's the same question! Nothing has happened so far. Maybe it is going to happen, but it hasn't happened."

McLaren face a fresh hearing of the FIA World Motor Sport Council on Thursday to discuss new evidence relating to the spy saga.

This revolves around an email exchange between test driver Pedro de la Rosa and world champion Fernando Alonso that allegedly discusses Ferrari set-up secrets.

The FIA has also confirmed to autosport.com that it has received further new evidence from the Italian authorities relating to telephone and SMS conversations between McLaren chief designer Mike Coughlan and former Ferrari engineer Nigel Stepney.

As revealed yesterday, it is understood that there are logs of hundreds of contacts between Coughlan and Stepney - some of which came on race weekends and which go beyond what has already been acknowledged.

An FIA spokesman said: "I can confirm that we have received new information from the Italian authorities."

The FIA has also made it clear that it did not contact McLaren sponsor Vodafone to help in its investigation into McLaren, as has been suggested in the Sunday Times newspaper today.

The spokesman added: "Vodafone may have been contacted by the Italian authorities, but they were not contacted by the


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

RaceTripper said:


> Does it? The McLaren drivers were told they wouldn't be punished if they cooperated handing over evidence. So that might be interpreted to mean McLaren could be excluded, loosing their point in the constructor championship, but with the drivers retaining their points for the driver's championship (unless they are found culpable). I'm not assuming the driver's battle will change if it goes badly for McLaren.


That's an interesting point.

McLaren is booted from the championship but the drivers keep their points and one of them is proclaimed the champion even though he has no recognized team or vehicle.

Interesting, but I have trouble envisioning how that would work.


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## Pinecone (Apr 3, 2002)

It will work just like the one race where McLaren was prevented from getting Championship points. They are still a recognized team, and the drivers got their points, just not team points and no constructors trophy for the race.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Pinecone said:


> It will work just like the one race where McLaren was prevented from getting Championship points. They are still a recognized team, and the drivers got their points, just not team points and no constructors trophy for the race.


That was a penalty that was dreamed up at that time and McLaren was as you say a "recognized" team.

The term I heard was possible 'disqualification' for 2007 and 2008. In my book disqualification means the cars are not approved and McLaren is not recognized. And if no car no driver points.

The cars will be "disqualified" if its ruled that McLaren benefitted. Not the drivers, but no cars no driver points.

If as you say it works that McLaren drivers get points for 2007 then it would work for 2008 too. Meaning McLaren would be allowed a team and two cars in 2008 just no constructor's points. I don't think it will work that way.

Disqualification is the operative term here I believe.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Disqualified? Excluded? Which is it, and what does it mean as far as the regulations go. 

I think one has to look at the actual charges against McLaren, and look at what the regulations says about punishment if they are found guilty. That's the way to tell.

Surely there is a way to punish a team severely without punishing the drivers.


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

Patrick said:


> :yikes:
> 
> And Alonso hasn't spoken to Dennis since Hungary...
> 
> Spanish newspapers reported today that Alonso has language in his contract (as do all drivers) that allows him out, if the team does something that somehow ruins/hurts his reputation. Their conclusion was that he will be free after this season.


If you link all the rumors with Alonso's recent activities: no pitwall salute at Monza, not thanking the team in post-race interview, not showing up at the hearing in Paris and so on, there's a pretty clear storyline.


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## bjf123 (Oct 6, 2005)

Here's the 14 page document detailing the FIA's decision. Assuming it's an accurate statement of when really happened. McLaren sure looks guilty.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

armaq said:


> If you link all the rumors with Alonso's recent activities: no pitwall salute at Monza, not thanking the team in post-race interview, not showing up at the hearing in Paris and so on, there's a pretty clear storyline.


I have not been impressed by Alonso's behavior this year. He's really come across a spoiled cry-baby, and it's looking like he's much worse than that, if even half the rumors are true.

I like Hamilton and look forward to BMW becoming a real contender. I'll never like Ferrari as long as Jean Toad is there.


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

cenotaph said:


> Really? I admittedly don't follow F1 that closely, but most of the stories I've heard/read about Dennis paint him as a scheming, conniving, manipulative bastard.


He's a control freak no doubt, but also a good old racer at heart. Every F1 boss is "scheming", "conniving" or "manipulative", they need to be in this sport. It comes down to what they try to accomplish and how far would they go. RD is as straight-up as an F1 boss can be. I don't know where you read those stories, I've never heard/read anyone calling him a bastard.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

RaceTripper said:


> I'll never like Ferrari as long as Jean Toad is there.


You may not have to wait long to start liking Ferrari. :eeps:

"Rumors" are that there are also internal problems within Ferrari (upstairs, with the boss of FIAT and the boss of Ferrari), and that Ross Brawn may be coming back to replace Todt next year.

Apparently, this has to do with them trying to figure out who the #1 driver is - Kimi, or Massa. di Montezemolo's boy is Kimi, and Todt's favorite is Massa.

And BTW, Brawn was also at the hearing in Paris yesterday.

.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Patrick said:


> And BTW, Brawn was also at the hearing in Paris yesterday.


Yeah, I noticed that too, and wondered about its significance.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

bjf123 said:


> Actually, I think that's the case in Finland. Traffic fines are based on your income / net worth. If a factory worker and a CEO get stopped for the same speeding violation, the CEO will pay much more as a fine.


This is true. It is possible for someone to get a +$500,000 USD speeding ticket here.

Nuts.

.


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## cenotaph (Dec 19, 2001)

armaq said:


> I don't know where you read those stories, I've never heard/read anyone calling him a bastard.


I don't think anyone every actually called him a bastard. That was more my interpretation. One story that sticks out I read in C&D (I think) about 5 years ago, and comes from an F1 driver that had Dennis as a mechanic. The driver was leading a race when he ran out of fuel on the last lap. As the team gathered around the car, the driver claimed that he caught Dennis trying to surreptitiously make adjustments to the car before anyone else could look at it. It was later found that the engine had been set to run rich in the morning because of the air temperature, and not adjusted for the warmer conditions during the race. This caused more fuel than normal to be used.

Now, admittedly, this is likely a biased story, but along with some of the other F1 coverage I was reading at the time it gave me the impression that Dennis wasn't exactly a stand up kind of guy. I'm not really trying to change anyones opinion. It's just that your comment was the complete opposite of what I had read about him.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

I think that the GP2 sprint race this morning was more fun than the Formula 1 race. :dunno:


.


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

Patrick said:


> I think that the GP2 sprint race this morning was more fun than the Formula 1 race. :dunno:
> 
> .


As far as F1 races go this one wasn't bad at all. Lot's of passing, especially in the early stages.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

cenotaph said:


> Really? I admittedly don't follow F1 that closely, but most of the stories I've heard/read about Dennis paint him as a scheming, conniving, manipulative bastard.


You don't know that for a fact. You are just trashing someone.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

F1Crazy said:


> As far as F1 races go this one wasn't bad at all. Lot's of passing, especially in the early stages.


True, not bad. But no real racing at the front, aside from the first 800m after the start.

Bummer for Kovalainen - the 1 stop strategy did not work. He was lucky to get P8.

As for Räikkönen's donuts, he claims that he momentarily "lost control" of the car, but admitted that he has always wanted to do that in a Formula 1 car. 

Was Coulthard's DNF again caused by hydraulic/transmission failure? :dunno:

That pissed me off as I was hoping that DC and Rosberg would get good results. And not bad from Nico!

.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

F1Crazy said:


> As far as F1 races go this one wasn't bad at all. Lot's of passing, especially in the early stages.


I liked the coverage of Kubica's performance. The man was on fire. Too bad he didn't have quite enough to get in the points. A good race nevertheless.


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## cenotaph (Dec 19, 2001)

franka said:


> You don't know that for a fact. You are just trashing someone.


What I do know, and what I said, is that of the stories I've read about Dennis, most of them gave me the impression that he isn't exactly a stand up guy. I was honestly curious why some one had an opinion of him that was so different from mine. So far, no one has posted anything to change my mind.

If you're going to complain that what I said is trashing him, then you need to complain when some one calls Mosley, or Todt, or anyone involved in F1, names, because I doubt that anyone here has met any of them in person for more than a few minutes. Our opinions of all of these people are based completely on what some one else has said. And remember, how some one associated with a race team acts around the public and press can be very different from how they act within the team. Sponsors tend to hold a dim view of public behavior that paints them in a bad light.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

cenotaph said:


> What I do know, and what I said, is that of the stories I've read about Dennis, most of them gave me the impression that he isn't exactly a stand up guy. I was honestly curious why some one had an opinion of him that was so different from mine. So far, no one has posted anything to change my mind.
> 
> If you're going to complain that what I said is trashing him, then you need to complain when some one calls Mosley, or Todt, or anyone involved in F1, names, because I doubt that anyone here has met any of them in person for more than a few minutes. Our opinions of all of these people are based completely on what some one else has said. And remember, how some one associated with a race team acts around the public and press can be very different from how they act within the team. Sponsors tend to hold a dim view of public behavior that paints them in a bad light.


Some of us here have been following F1 for over 20 years, some 30 years. That is a lot different than someone that admits they know little or nothing about the sport and its players and is just passing on some negative gossip about a man that has devoted his life to building an honest team and a major firm. I do not know Ron personally but the vast amount I hear about him leaves me with the impression he trys to right by his ppl and honor his word.

And yes there is at least one post before mine supporting Ron, so your claim of none is not correct.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Hungary appeal set to go ahead 

By Jonathan Noble Monday, September 17th 2007, 14:53 GMT 


McLaren's appeal against losing their constructors' championship points at the Hungarian Grand Prix appears to be going ahead this week, even though the team have been thrown out of the constructors' title chase.

The Woking-based outfit were docked the 15 points they would have scored at the Hungaroring after the race stewards believed they had not acted in the best interests of competition with the way they conducted the controversial qualifying session.

And although McLaren said at the weekend they were unsure about whether or not to press ahead with the Hungary appeal in light of their penalty for the spy affair, the FIA announced on Monday that the session was currently still scheduled to take place in Paris on Wednesday.

A statement issued by the sport's governing body, which detailed media accreditation processes, said: "At the qualifying session of the 2007 Hungarian Grand Prix, the Panel of the Stewards of the meeting found that one of the Vodafone McLaren Mercedes ("McLaren") drivers had obstructed another in the pit lane.

"A penalty was imposed preventing McLaren from scoring points in the Constructors' Championship at that meeting. McLaren have lodged an appeal against the decision of the Stewards to the FIA International Court of Appeal.

"This appeal will be heard on Wednesday 19 September 2007.

"In the interests of transparency the hearing will be open to members of the press."

McLaren have not confirmed they are pressing ahead with the appeal, however, but they have also not informed the FIA that they wish to stop it.

Although appealing the Hungary verdict appears at first glance to be futile if the team are already out of the constructors' championship, the matter is quite complicated.

The $100 million (USD) fine handed down to the team will take into account the earnings the team would have got for their finishing position in the constructors' championship based on the points scored up to and including Monza.

The more points the team have, the better chance they have of staying ahead of Ferrari's finaly tally and therefore getting more money taken off their fine.

Team boss Ron Dennis said at the weekend: "The thing that we have to balance up is that if we accept that moving forward into an appeal on the findings of the World Council on Thursday, then the appeal process next week is relatively pointless," he said.

"But the financial settlement is structured in two parts...I am really looking at this moment, to try and identify those things that we feel comfortable about in order to achieve closure. If we can achieve closure, at this moment, that is my recommendation to the board and shareholders


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

I'm glad they're going forward with this issue, if for no other reason than to get the rules straight. Obviously for them, though, there are bigger issues.


----------



## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

What is the story with Mclaren having a dossier on Renault that they will submit to the FIA?


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> What is the story with Mclaren having a dossier on Renault that they will submit to the FIA?


Renault had some CDs that show details of this season's McLaren car - they came with a former McLaren engineer that now works for Renault. Renault even admitted using the information when designing their 2007 car. No big deal.

.


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## BMW Power (Jul 25, 2007)

Patrick said:


> Renault had some CDs that show details of this season's McLaren car - they came with a former McLaren engineer that now works for Renault. Renault even admitted using the information when designing their 2007 car. No big deal.
> 
> .


I guess Renault didn't do a very good job, judging by the relative performance of McLaren vs Renault.


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

franka said:


> Maybe Dennis made promises to Alonso before he came to the team like he would be #1 thinking that his rookie would not be leading.
> 
> Now that Lewis is leading ol RD may have gone back on his word.


Kinda unlikely for RD to do that, but who knows. I think what happened was, and it's pure speculation, that Alonso was acting to be a good boy and RD bought it. Note that at that time he only had one title under his belt. By the time he arrived at McLaren as a double-world champ, his ego had ballooned to new highs and he had no interest in hiding it. The fact that Hamilton (whom Alonso didn't know would be his teammate) has been doing extremely well also added fuel to all of this.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

armaq said:


> EXACTTLY! You took the words right out of my mouth.
> 
> He's the anti-RD type. Also, I think the red team do actually need a character like Alonso. They are going nowhere with their current driver pairing. Would Kimi want to come back?


Kimi is making the bank driving for Ferrari now, he isn't going anywhere for the next two seasons. Regardless of who his teammate is. He would probably enjoy having either Spoonface or Alonso as teammates.

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

F1Crazy said:


> There is definitely personality crisis within Ferrari team. They have no clue how to treat their drivers now that Schumi is gone. I mean Kimi of course ad not Michael's b!tch Felipe.
> I agree with Patrick, Alonso would be a much better fit for Ferrari.


I would argue that the problem (if there really is one) in Ferrari is between Todt and di Montezemol.

Kimi may have a dull, outward personality, but one driver is faster than the other. 

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> Kimi has stated several times that he is very happy and comfortable at big RED.
> 
> It could be a lie but reading it in the context of a full interview in an F1 rag it seemed genuine.


Thye guy is actually SMILING and making jokes when interviewed on Finnish TV. Even his parents say that he is happier than ever.

I believe it, but then again, I am just a dumb American tourist stuck in northeastern Europe. :bigpimp:

.


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

How about Alonso and Kimi? Good idea?

http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns19670.html


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

armaq said:


> How about Alonso and Kimi? Good idea?
> 
> http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns19670.html


That would be awesome! :rofl:

And then get Ross Brawn to be the team boss.

So, in the spirit of pure speculation, who would drive with Hamilton at McLaren? :dunno:

Nico? :eeps:

.


----------



## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

Patrick said:


> That would be awesome! :rofl:
> 
> And then get Ross Brawn to be the team boss.
> 
> ...


This probably would never happen, but I'd like to see an all-Brit lineup at McLaren: Button and Hamilton. I want to see just how good JB is. Is JB confirmed at Honda for 08?

Don't think Williams would let Nico go, especially to McLaren.


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## Salvator (Oct 14, 2003)

Patrick said:


> That would be awesome! :rofl:


It seems logical to me... Alonso has the "passion" that the Italians love, to counterbalance the "ice" of Kimi... I think many driver's consider driving for Ferrari as being a "pinnacle" move... Explaining Kimi's "happiness" there... I think Alonso has been gunning for a red car all along... and realized that he could cement his relationship with Ferrari by selling out McLaren (via the emails)... I would not be surprised at all by this line-up... :dunno:


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

armaq said:


> This probably would never happen, but I'd like to see an all-Brit lineup at McLaren: Button and Hamilton. I want to see just how good JB is. Is JB confirmed at Honda for 08?
> 
> Don't think Williams would let Nico go, especially to McLaren.


Button and Barrichello are both confirmed for 2008. I have no idea why, however.

At least if Button would drive for McLaren, he would be cheap! As compared to now, when for some reason, he is one of the top four paid drivers.

And I am convinced that Nico will end up at McLaren. Keke is tight with the Dennis family, he actually likes Ronny, and Mercedes wants a German driver in a McLaren (another reason why Nico drives for Germany and not Finland).

.


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

Patrick said:


> And I am convinced that Nico will end up at McLaren. Keke is tight with the Dennis family, he actually likes Ronny, and Mercedes wants a German driver in a McLaren (another reason why Nico drives for Germany and not Finland).
> 
> .


That does make a lot of sense. However, I read an article on Nico in which Frank Williams basically said if they ever wanted to win a race again, they must hold on to Nico. Which is quite true, but you never know. I always thought he'd drive for BMW one day.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

armaq said:


> That does make a lot of sense. However, I read an article on Nico in which Frank Williams basically said if they ever wanted to win a race again, they must hold on to Nico. Which is quite true, but you never know. I always thought he'd drive for BMW one day.


I do not think that Nico would leave after this year, and he does have a contract for next years. It would outstanding if he could get a win (this year) in a Williams. It would break up this endless cycle of McLaren or Ferrari winning everything.

Hmm. BMW. Why not?

Keke ended his career with McLaren (albeit, not how he liked) and he regularly speaks positively about the team. He was Häkkinen's manager and spent a lot of time with McLaren during that time, so to me at least, Nico driving for McLaren just seems almost expected - at some point.

.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

As quoted in Grandprix.com:

"*McLaren's statement in full:*

McLAREN TO FOCUS ON FUTURE - 21 September 2007

McLaren Racing has notified the FIA of its intention not to appeal the verdict of the World Motor Sport Council, as announced on 13th September 2007.

Having now had time to study the judgement of the World Motor Sport Council with its lawyers and shareholders, McLaren thinks it is in the best interests of the sport, and its goal of winning races and world championships, not to appeal.

It is clear from the full judgement that the World Motor Sport Council concluded that the charge that a McLaren employee had "unauthorised possession of documents and confidential information" was proven.

Despite the existence of no evidence that the information was applied, tested or shared with the engineering team (which it was not), this possession constitutes a breach of the Code. To our regret and embarrassment, the content of the previously unknown emails demonstrated possession not being limited to a single person, albeit unsanctioned in any way by the team. For this breach of Article 151c, a very heavy penalty has been imposed on the team.

The major principle of the issue for McLaren is: this information was not used to gain advantage on its cars.

Moving forwards, and in consultation with our shareholders, we will now review and further strengthen our internal compliance structures and processes.

Ron Dennis said: "We believe the time has come to put this huge distraction behind us. McLaren wants to win races and world championships. We are fortunate to have, and continue to receive, unwavering support from our employees, sponsor partners and Formula One fans across the world - all of whom are equally keen that we totally focus on winning this year's drivers' championship and the remaining three races of the season.""

Very professional...unlike The Turd.


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

> _There have been suggestions in recent days that the negotiations and may even have included the sale of Fernando Alonso's McLaren contract to Ferrari - in exchange for a sizeable sum of money. This would rid McLaren of the Alonso problem, provide funding to pay the fine (and to acquire another driver) and give Ferrari a stronger driver line-up in the future_


http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns19675.html


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Kimi AND Alonso at Ferrari. That could go badly. They'll need to stock extra diapers for Fernando.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

RaceTripper said:


> Kimi AND Alonso at Ferrari. That could go badly. They'll need to stock extra diapers for Fernando.


:rofl:

Personally, I would love it. And then bring on MSchumacher as Räikkönen's teammate in 2009.

Let them all fall down together!

.


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## Pinecone (Apr 3, 2002)

What I wonder is why nothing was done to any drivers when the "new evidence" was that Pedro and Alonso HAD the data and planned on using it.

In fact, it looks like McLaren is taking the fall for certain individuals who overstepped the bounds.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick
Let them all fall down together! .[/QUOTE said:


> I'm missing what all fall down together means.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Pinecone said:


> What I wonder is why nothing was done to any drivers when the "new evidence" was that Pedro and Alonso HAD the data and planned on using it.
> 
> In fact, it looks like McLaren is taking the fall for certain individuals who overstepped the bounds.


The Turd gave them all immunity in return for cooperation.


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

berford said:


> The Turd gave them all immunity in return for selling out their own team.


Corrected.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> The Turd gave them all immunity in return for cooperation.


Oddly enough, The Turd didn't find out about the drivers' involvement until after Alonso threatened Dennis, and then Dennis informed The Turd/FIA.

I do agree with Terry that it is a strange situation. Perhaps Alonso and de la Rosa should cough up the 32 million Euros since they helped sink their own ship.

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

What do you mean, Ralf would be a great fit wit dem good roundy-round boys


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

RaceTripper said:


> Maybe he can join Cora in the Mini series she was racing in?
> 
> :dunno:


Good point.

Or he could just go away and ask his big brother for money when times get tight.

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> What do you mean, Ralf would be a great fit wit dem good roundy-round boys


Turning left that many times during a race has never been a good thing for Formula 1 drivers.

Ralf is a has been.

.


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## mrbelk (Dec 5, 2003)

Does anyone besides me find it completely ridiculous that Kubica was hit with a drive-through penalty on what was very clearly a racing incident between he and Hamilton?

-MrB


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## GimpyMcFarlan (Aug 13, 2002)

mrbelk said:


> Does anyone besides me find it completely ridiculous that Kubica was hit with a drive-through penalty on what was very clearly a racing incident between he and Hamilton?


I didnt realize K received a drive thru penalty for that contact. From the video replay I saw K's kowabunga move inside looked overly optimistic to me. (considering the conditions of the track) However Hamilton was obviously way out on the edge of the track too. Who was closer to the racing line in that corner? :dunno:


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

mrbelk said:


> Does anyone besides me find it completely ridiculous that Kubica was hit with a drive-through penalty on what was very clearly a racing incident between he and Hamilton?
> 
> -MrB


I agree with you 100%. He was the only driver hit with a penalty, Vettel didn't get punished for Alonso incident :dunno: I guess he dared to race Hamilton and that was his mistake :tsk:


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## mrbelk (Dec 5, 2003)

F1Crazy said:


> I agree with you 100%. He was the only driver hit with a penalty, Vettel didn't get punished for Alonso incident :dunno: I guess he dared to race Hamilton and that was his mistake :tsk:


Exactly. Kubica said in his post-race comments that he was definitely the faster of the two drivers, and that Hamilton was way outside and kind of dove to the inside to "close the door." Hamilton is the golden boy and woe be he that challenges that.

Do you mean Webber, and not Alonso? Didn't know that Vettel got tangled up with Alonso. Vettel did get hit with a 10 spot penatly in China for his ramming move on Webber, but Hamilton said that Webber was following _really_ closely under the 2nd safety car, so I don't think that Webbo was completely blameless in that incident.

-MrB


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

GimpyMcFarlan said:


> I didnt realize K received a drive thru penalty for that contact. From the video replay I saw K's kowabunga move inside looked overly optimistic to me. (considering the conditions of the track) However Hamilton was obviously way out on the edge of the track too. Who was closer to the racing line in that corner? :dunno:


The move wasn't really that optimistic, Hamilton was slower at the time, probably few seconds a lap and he opened the door on numerous occasions. LH admitted that he didn't see Kubica. Robert understeered a bit and that combined with Lewis taking his different line caused the contact, typical racing incident. Penalty was ridiculous and probably cost Kubica a chance for podium.


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

mrbelk said:


> Exactly. Kubica said in his post-race comments that he was definitely the faster of the two drivers, and that Hamilton was way outside and kind of dove to the inside to "close the door." Hamilton is the golden boy and woe be he that challenges that.
> 
> Do you mean Webber, and not Alonso? Didn't know that Vettel got tangled up with Alonso. Vettel did get hit with a 10 spot penatly in China for his ramming move on Webber, but Hamilton said that Webber was following _really_ closely under the 2nd safety car, so I don't think that Webbo was completely blameless in that incident.
> 
> -MrB


After Alonso's pitstop he was hit by Vettel from behind and you could clearly see that McLaren sustained some damage. This was much more deserving a drive-through than Kubica's move.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

No comments about the Ferrari team orders? :dunno:




.


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## bjf123 (Oct 6, 2005)

What team orders? Felipe was going to run out of gas! :angel:


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## BLT (Jan 30, 2006)

bjf123 said:


> What team orders? Felipe was going to run out of gas! :angel:


No, he "felt" a vibration and needed new tires.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

:rofl:

Oh well. If only Hamilton would have run out of fuel...

I missed watching the race live, and had to wait until Sunday night to see the replay. However, I had at least 25 text messages from friends that watched it live. Comments like, "best race in years!", "this race has everything - really, everything!", "best race for Finland since Keke was driving!" and so on. It was difficult to not check the web (or here) until after the race was over.

Rain like that, really messes up a Grand Prix! Great stuff.


.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

BLT said:


> No, he "felt" a vibration and needed new tires.


Conspiracy.

Do you really think that was planned?


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Ferrari: Hamilton title would be tainted 

Tuesday, October 2nd 2007, 08:22 GMT 


Lewis Hamilton will have to thank Ferrari if he wins the Formula One title in China this weekend, according to the Italian team's president Luca di Montezemolo.

"I still think that in the spying affair it was a big mistake not to disqualify the McLaren drivers as well," the Gazzetta dello Sport web site quoted him as saying after Sunday's Japanese Grand Prix.

"It means that if Hamilton wins the championship, he will also win it thanks to Ferrari because there is a lot of Ferrari in his car."

McLaren were fined $100 million and stripped of all their constructors' points by the governing International Automobile Federation (FIA) last month for having Ferrari technical information in their possession.

However, the drivers escaped sanctions because the FIA said they had been granted an amnesty in exchange for providing evidence.

Hamilton, 22, can become the first rookie to win the championship as well as the youngest world champion if he wins this Sunday's penultimate race of the season in Shanghai.

The Briton leads teammate and double world champion Fernando Alonso by 12 points after the Spaniard crashed in Fuji.

Ferrari have won the constructors' championship.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

F1Crazy said:


> I agree with you 100%. He was the only driver hit with a penalty, Vettel didn't get punished for Alonso incident :dunno: I guess he dared to race Hamilton and that was his mistake :tsk:


How do you spell "prima donna." Shades of Spoonface.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

franka said:


> Ferrari: Hamilton title would be tainted
> 
> Tuesday, October 2nd 2007, 08:22 GMT
> 
> ...


Pure BS.

Quoth Mario, "I would want no part of it." Now there's class.


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## e46Christian (Feb 27, 2003)

franka said:


> Ferrari: Hamilton title would be tainted
> 
> Tuesday, October 2nd 2007, 08:22 GMT
> 
> ...


That's rich coming from an admitted cheater like di Montezemolo. I agree with Mr. Hobbs from Speed - the only thing that benefited McLaren was finding out how badly Ferrari was cheating with the movable floors.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

e46Christian said:


> That's rich coming from an admitted cheater like di Montezemolo. I agree with Mr. Hobbs from Speed - the only thing that benefited McLaren was finding out how badly Ferrari was cheating with the movable floors.


+1


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Damn, this is difficult for me! :eeps:


.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Damn, this is difficult for me! :eeps:
> 
> .


What?


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

The FIA admitted that they screwed Ferrari on the wet tires. If it weren't for that then Kimi would have taken 1st place and the championship would be looking different.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> What?


Holy crap, is my understanding and use of the English language suddenly cryptic? uch:

Ok, you - berford - if anyone, knows about my disgust for the tricks and cheating by FIAT all these years. At the same time, I have been a long-time McLaren fan due to our (Finnish) history with the team. Now that Kimi is driving a red car, and some strange stuff has been happening with McLaren, I have a hard time having an opinion.

I am stuck between being a Räikkönen fan, and a McLaren fan. I don't like the crap that surrounds Ferrari, but I like cheering for Kimi. I don't like the crap that surrounds Hamilton and Alonso (don't like either driver), but I want to cheer for McLaren.

I am screwed either way!

PS: franka, be gentle with me. I am a bit sensative after being personally attacked in the OT forum earlier today. 

:rofl:

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> The FIA admitted that they screwed Ferrari on the wet tires. If it weren't for that then Kimi would have taken 1st place and the championship would be looking different.


Yep. Oh well...

BTW, the FIA has now announced that the race stewards must send out race orders by hand now (printed). No more e-mail messages to all of the teams. What a relief.

Lovely that the FIA figured out that one several hours after the race was over.

Imagine if they (whoever "runs" that series) gave out race info to NASCAR teams by e-mail! Would they send pictures or text - assuming that the team bosses can actually read? :rofl:

Sorry. Couldn't help myself. :angel:

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> Yep. Oh well...
> 
> BTW, the FIA has now announced that the race stewards must send out race orders by hand now (printed). No more e-mail messages to all of the teams. What a relief.
> 
> ...


A ten million Euro fine against the FIA and payable to Ferrari seems in order here.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> A ten million Euro fine against the FIA and payable to Ferrari seems in order here.


That's probably quite accurate!

The fact that Liuzzi's P8 and 1 point result were nullified, costs Toro Rosso a million Euros.

.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Holy crap, is my understanding and use of the English language suddenly cryptic? uch:
> 
> Ok, you - berford - if anyone, knows about my disgust for the tricks and cheating by FIAT all these years. At the same time, I have been a long-time McLaren fan due to our (Finnish) history with the team. Now that Kimi is driving a red car, and some strange stuff has been happening with McLaren, I have a hard time having an opinion.
> 
> ...


On the horns of a dilemma. I understand your predicament. It's always good to have a driver you like on a team you respect. If not, then you got problems.

Personnally, I've seen so much favortism for Ferrari over the years and so much in the way of dirty tricks on the part of the team (principals and drivers alike), that I don't think I could chear for them under any circumstances (perhaps if they delivered a car to my driveway, gratis:dunno. Also, personally, I like both BMV drivers and respect the team. Plus they're doing reasonably well and improving. I'm happy.

One more reason, in my opinion, to dislike Ferrari is the way they obtained the championship this year--and have no regrets about it. I think the evidence of data use was very scant and based primarily on suppositions that de la Rosa and Alonso were lying. They had the opportunity, for certain, to use the information they had, but I don't believe they did (or if they did, it was minimal use at best and gave them no advantage at all--other than the ability to determine (with FIA assistance) that Ferrari had an illegal design that was FIA approved (at least tacitly). Read "more favortism."

I know this falls into the realm of conspiracy theory, but I wouldn't be surprised if Stepney's actions were secretly approved by Ferrari so they could claim the championship through devious means if the season went badly. Just a thought that's been lurking in the back of my mind.  Alex, you're entitled to have a sh!t fit over that.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Yep. Oh well...
> 
> BTW, the FIA has now announced that the race stewards must send out race orders by hand now (printed). No more e-mail messages to all of the teams. What a relief.
> 
> ...


The procedure was appoved somewhere near the beginning of the year. What did FIA do wrong? Now they've just tightened up the procedures--which should have been done before.

Pictures!!! Your get three:rofl::rofl::rofl: for that.:thumbup:


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Like I said earlier, its like cocaine possesion. If you are caught holding that's it.


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

franka said:


> Like I said earlier, its like cocaine possesion. If you are caught holding that's it.


Your comparison is weak.


----------



## Salvator (Oct 14, 2003)

franka said:


> The FIA admitted that they screwed Ferrari on the wet tires. If it weren't for that then Kimi would have taken 1st place and the championship would be looking different.


I must have missed something... last I heard, every other team had the right tires on... only Ferrari did not... How is this the FIAs fault? :dunno:


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

The FIA emailed them late. The FIA themselves admitted the mistake. Thats how its their fault.


----------



## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

franka said:


> The FIA emailed them late. The FIA themselves admitted the mistake. Thats how its their fault.


Here's the text of the FIA press release:

*"TYRE CHOICE AT THE JAPANESE GRAND PRIX*
30.09.2007
 
A communication from the Stewards requiring all competitors to fit extreme wet-weather tyres for safety reasons was sent to all teams by email at 12:35 hrs local time today. Save for Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro, all competitors have confirmed that they received the email at 12:37 hrs. 
It is understood that Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro did not receive the email at the same time as other competitors. As a result, Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro was the only team which did not start on extreme wet-weather tyres.
The 2007 Formula One Sporting Regulations (Art. 15.1) state that in exceptional circumstances Stewards or Race Director may give instructions to Competitors by means of special circulars in accordance with the Code and these circulars will be distributed to all competitors who must acknowledge receipt.
At a meeting of the Formula One Sporting Working Group held in Monaco on 7th December 2006, all teams agreed to an electronic distribution system to ensure that all competitors received communications simultaneously, with no time advantage for a team by virtue of their location in the pit lane. This system has been used throughout the current championship year.
To avoid any recurrence of today's problem the agreed method of using electronic communications will continue to be used but in future will be backed up by the traditional method of written communication."

*It doesn't say they e-mailed late--only that the Marlboro team didn't confirm receipt.*









 
*******>*******>
********>********>


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## Salvator (Oct 14, 2003)

franka said:


> The FIA emailed them late. The FIA themselves admitted the mistake. Thats how its their fault.





berford said:


> Here's the text of the FIA press release:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I'm going to have to go with Berford... Either they didn't see it in a timely fashion, or they chose to play Russian Roulette, figuring that having inters on, once things cleared out they would have an advantage... unfortunately for them, their gamble did not pay off... Seems to me, SOMEONE from Ferrari would have noticed that EVERYONE else was on full wets... Had even one other team, no matter which one, gotten this wrong as well, I'd have more sympathy... but methinks they got caught short and are now trying to point a finger at someone else... Hmmm... typical... :eeps:

: popcorn:


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

I will have to find where I read the FIA admitted the problem.


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

Ferrari CHOSE to start the race on inters. The FIA email could have saved the red team's race, but mysteriously the only team that chose to use inters didn't get the memo. 

Let's say they really didn't get the email. I find it very hard to believe that nobody on the entire red team knew that every other team was starting on wets, and nobody was smart enough to ask "hey guys why are they all on wets?" However I'm not surprised that now they've blown it, they are blaming someone else for ruining their race. Classic Ferrari style.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

I saw an interview with Jean Todt on Monday about this issue.

He said that Ferrari did not get the e-mail on time, and that they would have had full wets on at the start, if the order would have been received.

Also, he admitted that anyway, their gamble to start with intermediate tires was a mistake (regardless of the late e-mail from race stewards). Ferrari had weather information that suggested several laps into the race, the rain would ease up. In the end, the opposite happened.

Ferrari succeeded with a similar risky strategy at the Malaysian Grand Prix in 2001. MSchumacher started the wet race on pole with intermediate rubber, while the rest of the field was running full wets. The rain ceased, a dry line appeared on the track, and MSchumacher went on to win the race by 20+ seconds.


.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Well, here is a better take on the 2001 race (from wikipedia):

Four laps into the race rain began to fall. The rain soon became a monsoon with many cars spinning off the track. The two Ferraris ran wild at the same corner and rejoined the race just ahead of the safety car, preventing themselves from being lapped. This allowed them to slowly follow the pack around the track on their Bridgestone intermediates which were less than suitable to the conditions. The heavy rain caused unexpected orders, allowing even Giancarlo Fisichella and more surpisingly, Jos Verstappen with the poor Arrows to take the lead. Verstappen was highly fastest on the track, and produced some really brilliant maneuvers. However as the track began to dry, the intermediates began more suitable. If it hadn't stopped raining, Verstappen could have even won the race with Arrows. The two Ferraris were able to gain many places. The result was a Ferrari 1-2. This was one of the most exciting races ever in Formula 1.


The article in Finnish wasn't as clear about when the rain started.


.


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## Pinecone (Apr 3, 2002)

And anyone who believes that ALL the teams don't lie, cheat, steal and do WHATEVER they can to get an edge is smoking something.

This is a high dollar cut throat BUSINESS.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

More bad news for Alonso.

He will have to race the T-car in China, as his race car is so badly damaged, that they have no time to get it fixed by tomorrow.

It sounds like McLaren is also in a hurry to get a new T-car built in Woking, and sent to Shanghai.

Talk about an expensive, logistical nightmare! :yikes:


.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> There was better film than that.


I searched YouTube, and that is all that I got.

The Ralf Schumacher + Alonso crash in the tunnel has a bit better footage.

.


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

"Q. (Carlos Miquel – Diario AS) For Robert. Did you believe you would have had the same penalty if you had touched with another driver?

Robert Kubica: This is a difficult question which I would prefer not to answer. I think this season we have had many contacts between the drivers and nothing happens. We have also had one contact between two drivers which are sitting next to me (he's talking about Alonso and vettel), and nothing happens, so this is my answer."

I think it would be very bad for Hamilton's career if he was treated with any favoritism, be it the stewards, media or Turd and Bernie. This would only diminish his achievements, sort of like what happened with Schumi.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> I searched YouTube, and that is all that I got.
> 
> The Ralf Schumacher + Alonso crash in the tunnel has a bit better footage.
> 
> .


Next time you're in Chicago, drop by and we'll watch the whole race on tape--if I still have a VRC then.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

berford said:


> No, this is getting bad. Hamilton would have to be stupid to intentionally cause an accident that he himself could be involved in (and taken out)--especially when he was the race leader. He's not at all stupid.


Take a look at the tape and then comment. At the min he caused the accident.

He pulled way to the side and the driver's involved said it looked his car died and he had pulled off to the side of the track.

Look at the tape.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

F1Crazy said:


> "Q. (Carlos Miquel - Diario AS) For Robert. Did you believe you would have had the same penalty if you had touched with another driver?
> 
> Robert Kubica: This is a difficult question which I would prefer not to answer. I think this season we have had many contacts between the drivers and nothing happens. We have also had one contact between two drivers which are sitting next to me (he's talking about Alonso and vettel), and nothing happens, so this is my answer."
> 
> I think it would be very bad for Hamilton's career if he was treated with any favoritism, be it the stewards, media or Turd and Bernie. This would only diminish his achievements, sort of like what happened with Schumi.


True, he does seem to be the 'New Schumi" in that regard, as I've suggested here on a few occasions.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Autosport has a copy of the tape in the above story but it would not copy over to my post, from Autosport.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

franka said:


> Take a look at the tape and then comment. At the min he caused the accident.
> 
> He pulled way to the side and the driver's involved said it looked his car died and he had pulled off to the side of the track.
> 
> Look at the tape.


The key is *intent*, Frank. I don't see intent and one would have to get inside his head to know.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> Next time you're in Chicago, drop by and we'll watch the whole race on tape--if I still have a VRC then.


Sounds great! We can rant about Spoonface and The Turd while you try to remember how to use a VCR! :rofl:

.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Sounds great! We can rant about Spoonface and The Turd while you try to remember how to use a VCR! :rofl:
> 
> .


:thumbup: and :thumbup:


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> The key is *intent*, Frank. I don't see intent and one would have to get inside his head to know.


Well, did Vettel _*intend*_ to crash into Webber? Still, his penalty is a 10 position drop on the grid for Shanghai.

Anyway, I would just like to see the clip!

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> Well, did Vettel _*intend*_ to crash into Webber? Still, his penalty is a 10 position drop on the grid for Shanghai.
> 
> Anyway, I would just like to see the clip! .


+1


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

This is excerpts from the press conference about the crashes and faults. Some of it may not flow completely correct because I edited big chunks of it out. The whole thing was 4 to 5 times longer than what is here.


Thursday's press conference - China 

Thursday, October 4th 2007, 11:23 GMT 


Participating: Fernando Alonso (McLaren Mercedes), Robert Kubica (BMW Sauber), Kimi Raikkonen (Ferrari), Sebastian Vettel (Toro Rosso) Mark Webber (Red Bull).

Q. Mark, Sebastian and Fernando, would you just talk a little bit about the problems following behind the guy who is actually controlling the field when it's under the safety car?

Mark Webber: It's pretty easy when the safety car lights are on because a) you can see everything, if you're the next guy behind the silver Mercedes and you just have to try to keep a sensible rhythm behind it and obviously in the first safety car (period) and clearly in the second safety car (period) there was not a sensible rhythm. 

I'm all up for not a great rhythm when the lights are off, because we're preparing for a re-start when the lights are off and there were a few times when I believe Jenson was being backed up by Nick. I think sometimes Jenson passed Nick nearly and I passed Jenson sometimes because the pace was yo-yoing around massively. 

We know what pace the safety car can do and I accept a little bit that maybe you get a bit bored in that situation because we did a lot of laps and sometimes you get ready to go. It definitely contributed to Sebastian hitting me up the back that we were confused at what the other car was doing because he was doing what he wasn't doing what you are supposed to do (behind the safety car). Clearly.


Sebastian Vettel: I think, as Mark said, it's never easy when the rhythm is just not there. The safety car driver is pushing as hard as he can and for us, that is not the highest speed.

Obviously the very first part of the race was done behind the safety car; we had a couple of laps and it was always quite close sometimes, and I remember I sometimes had to pass Mark and Mark was beside Jenson and so on, so it always got quite tight and in the second safety car (period) I was in third position, I only had two cars to observe, so the job was a bit easier, you might say, and I can only repeat what I said after the race: just exiting turn 13, all of a sudden I saw... as a human being you react to movement, I would say, and all of a sudden I saw Lewis pulling far to the right and slowing down a lot. 

I was wondering what happened to him, I already thought he's retiring, there's no more power. That's what it looked like for me because he was going so slowly, and yeah, by the time I looked back in front of me I was already in Mark's rear, so for sure, I apologise again. Obviously I did not plan to destroy both of our races in the end.

Fernando Alonso: Nothing to add. I think I agree with the two versions.

Q. But do you feel there wasn't a natural rhythm also, that it wasn't being done correctly?

FA: It's difficult to know what the car in front of you needs to do but for sure, I didn't see the race on TV but hearing the comments of them, they seem to overtake the car in front a couple of times and some unnecessary manoeuvres, to overtake and to avoid cars in front of you. I also overtook Lewis two or three times, so it seems that we all agree.
SV: In the end it was my fault for crashing into Mark's car, so I'm not here to blame anybody but I think it's clear that the rhythm was not there. In the end we are all sitting in the same boat. It's raining, there is a safety car for a long time and it's quite complicated to keep the temperatures in the brakes and avoid glazing them. 

But at that point I was just distracted, you could say. I was looking to the right and I was sure he (Hamilton) was retiring, there was no power anymore and yeah, all I can say is that by the time I looked back I was already in Mark's rear end so… It's not to blame anybody but for sure the reason was the rhythm was not there.

MW: I think he did a **** job behind the safety car. He did a **** job and that's it. He spoke in the drivers' briefing about how good a job he was going to do and then he did the job the opposite way, so we know for next time, it's no problem.
MW: It was difficult. Looking for a window it is hard for us to get an idea of how intense the rain is when we are in the car. All we know is that the visibility was very very poor. I was particularly worried that when we went back to racing if someone lost their car on the straight we would have a very big crash because, guys, you just can't see anything. 

Once we got going I think that the conditions for the first few laps were raceable, it wasn't too bad, but having said that the field where I was, was quite spread out and it's always more difficult if you have cars close together. But I think the Safety Car was running out of fuel and had to come in anyway.

SV: I think it was the right choice because it is us drivers on the circuit and to be honest even under the Safety Car, going down the main straight, I didn't see anything and really **** my pants. It was just about guessing. We exited the last corner, I saw the other cars and suddenly there was just all this spray. 

As Robert said, twice I saw him right next to me and I was like (gasp), what is he doing there! On the restart I was thinking before it was no problem to go flat out in a straight line but in the end you saw nothing. I was looking to the right and seeing the wall and the advertisements and then when that stopped I was looking at the left and waited for the boards – 200, 150, 100 – then somewhere started to brake and when the spray came down I saw the incident at the first corner with Jenson, Nick and Mark. 

Q. (Mark Surer – Premiere Television) Robert, you got a Drive Through because you hit Hamilton by trying to overtake him. Was that okay in your view?

RK: In my view it was not okay because from the drivers' point of view I had not hit him on purpose and we had seen many contacts between two drivers and nothing happened. I get a Drive Through and we lost less than six seconds and I didn't gain any position. Unfortunately it destroyed my race. It was an FIA decision of the stewards and that's how it went. 

We had no time to ask for the decision to be changed. Normally if the accident happens the decision is taken after the race, for example with Nick and Ralf in Nurburgring, but this time it was different. I think that the last time it happened that a driver got a Drive Through penalty for contact was many years ago. 
KR: No.

Q. (Carlos Miquel – Diario AS) For Robert. Did you believe you would have had the same penalty if you had touched with another driver?

RK: This is a difficult question which I would prefer not to answer. I think this season we have had many contacts between the drivers and nothing happens. We have also had one contact between two drivers which are sitting next to me, and nothing happens, so this is my answer.

Q (Dan Knutson – National Speed Sport News) Fernando, you said this has been a very difficult season for you. How much are you looking forward to Monday after Brazil?

FA: A lot! I am looking forward, no doubts.


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## GimpyMcFarlan (Aug 13, 2002)

franka said:


> Article 40.10 of the F1 Sporting Regulations states: "The safety car shall be used at least until the leader is behind it and all remaining cars are lined up behind him. Once behind the safety car, the race leader must keep within 5 car lengths of it."


Right...  I don't think any lead driver has followed this rule. Everyone drops back once the lights go out and make false starts to throw off the guy in 2nd place.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

True some make false starts when the race is truely starting but the back and forth before the actual start is to keep the brakes and tires warm. 

So they accelerate hard but only for a short distance, up to the next car since the rule says you are not to pass the one ahead, then brake hard. 

And they do this continuously until the race starts. Back and forth aways attempting to stay out of the way of the guy behind you and to not run past or over (we hope) the guy in front of you. 

Its squirt and brake hard, squit brake, etc.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

*This could get really interesting!*

The weather forecast for Sunday afternoon is hard RAIN and very strong WIND.

The edge of a typhoon is supposed to smack Shanghai. 

:bigpimp:

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Now even Hamilton thinks that he is going to get penalized.

The Finnish media reported that the stewards are looking at giving him a 25 second penalty for the Japanese Grand Prix, which would drop Hamilton to P4. Strange days have found us.

I haven't figured out what this would do to the driver's standings, but obviously Räikkönen would be closer.

That makes this weekend's race a bit more interesting.


.


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## Pinecone (Apr 3, 2002)

It would drop him 5 points to 102. And would give Kimi 2 extra points making it a very close race between the three for the last two races (Hamiton 102, Alonso 95, Kimi 92). As it stands now, Hamilton only has to score 4 points (in the last two races) to top Kimi (Kimi would have to pretty much win both to have any chance) and if Hamilton beats Alonso or scores no further back than 1 point, he beats Alonso. So without any penalties, a P5 or higher with Alonso behind gives the Championship to Hamilton. A P5 with Alonso P4 also gives Hamiton the Championship.

Strange that some people be dropped qualifying positions and others get race time penalties. FIA and the Turd make NO sense. Shades of NASCAR, do what is needed to make it more interesting, not what is right.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

It even made CNN:

http://edition.cnn.com/2007/SPORT/10/04/hamilton.inquiry/index.html

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Pinecone said:


> Strange that some people be dropped qualifying positions and others get race time penalties. FIA and the Turd make NO sense. Shades of NASCAR, do what is needed to make it more interesting, not what is right.


Thanks for clearing up the points situation, Terry. It does make a bigger difference than I thought, and probably helps Alonso more than Räikkönen.

I wonder if this will change the stewards rulling on Vettel? Assuming that Hamilton is found to be responsible. :dunno:

.


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## armaq (Apr 18, 2003)

I watched practice on Speed and heard some interesting comments.

According to Peter Windsor, Anthony Hamilton said that he believes his son would get some kind of penalty, one way or another. 

Also according to Windsor, Timo Glock will be Jarno Trulli's new teammate.


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## bjf123 (Oct 6, 2005)

franka said:


> What an awful statement to come from the head of F1. It makes me believe that he would fix races if he could. Maybe he does fix penalties.
> 
> Maybe that is why LH got away with a penalty for causing an accident. Max would have to penialize LH or drop the other penalty. What a nice way to keep LH where he "rightfully" belongs.


I agree completely. While I'd hate to think BE's desire for Lewis to be world champion had any impact on the decision to not penalize Hamilton, it does make you wonder.


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

BMW need to get their act together, another hydraulic failure cost them first win. Last week strange FIA decision cost them a podium but this week they can only blame themselves, they are back where they started the season. I sure hope next year's car is not only faster but more reliable.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Go Kimi. What a good race

Maybe Max can figure out a way to take the official last lap back to just before ol Lewis f**ked up. 

And do it retroactively. After all LH is "deserving".


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## E36FewInNumber (May 19, 2007)

I can't believe Hamilton spun out. I'm surprised he wasn't very angry when get got out of the car, because I would of been. although it makes it that much more interesting in Brazil.


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## RaceTripper (Apr 12, 2002)

Hey all...I'm gonna sign off from this thread. But I may keep my eye out for a 2008 thread if someone creates it. See ya next season.


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## Salvator (Oct 14, 2003)

RaceTripper said:


> Hey all...I'm gonna sign off from this thread. But I may keep my eye out for a 2008 thread if someone creates it. See ya next season.


Do you walk out on movies before the end, too? :dunno:


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Go Kimi, Go Kimi, Go Kimi*

Ferrari: Raikkonen at Schumacher's level

By Pablo Elizalde Monday, October 8th 2007, 09:49 GMT

Kimi Raikkonen has been as strong as Michael Schumacher in the second part of the 2007 season, according to Ferrari's head of track activities Luca Baldisserri.

Despite winning the first race of the season in Australia, Raikkonen failed to dominate teammate Felipe Massa in the early part of the year following his switch from McLaren.

Since the French Grand Prix in July, however, the Finn has been the top scorer, including four victories in nine races, and he is still with a distant chance of taking the title in Brazil despite two retirements.

Baldisserri reckons now that Raikkonen has adapted to the team and the tyres, the Finn has been at Michael Schumacher's level.

"Michael is a seven times world champion and we've been working together for 10 years, and at the end, with the relationship with Michael it was enough to look into his eyes to understand where there was a problem, to understand what he was meaning when he was speaking about the car," Baldisserri said.

"Generally with Kimi, we were struggling a bit at the beginning because he had some trouble to adapt his driving style to our car, to learn all our systems and to learn the Bridgestone tyres but I have to say that from mid-season to the race that he did today he can be at the same level as Michael.

"A driver that can do a race like today, such difficult conditions, without making a mistake is a great driver."

Raikkonen is seven points behind championship leader Lewis Hamilton and will need to win the Brazilian Grand Prix, with Hamilton in sixth and Fernando Alonso in third, to take the title.

Raikkonen kept his championship hopes alive by winning the Chinese Grand Prix, from which Hamilton retired after a driving error.

Ferrari's sporting director Stefano Domenicali said it is no miracle that the Finn will be able to fight for the title in the final race.

"No, I don't think it is a miracle, first of all, because if you look, we have won eight races out of 16, so fifty per cent of that, we have done great results," said Domenicali.

"But it's not a miracle. We always said that we never give up, it's not just a way of saying it, it's just what we feel and once again, I want to stress the point that the team is very close together, we know that from the outside, after one race, big pressure but that's part of the game."


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## e46Christian (Feb 27, 2003)

franka said:


> Go Kimi. What a good race
> 
> Maybe Max can figure out a way to take the official last lap back to just before ol Lewis f**ked up.
> 
> And do it retroactively. After all LH is "deserving".


Give me a break. If you think the Turd isn't rooting for Ferrari, I have oceanfront property to sell in Montana.

Did Bernie make an inappropriate comment? Yes. I hate that little weasel, but he's right, though. Raikkonen has as much personality as nail clippings and Alonso is a whiny b!tch who puts personal glory ahead of the team.

Is it obvious that I absolutely despise the Red "team"?


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

RaceTripper said:


> Hey all...I'm gonna sign off from this thread. But I may keep my eye out for a 2008 thread if someone creates it. See ya next season.


I hope that it wasn't something that franka said. 

:angel:

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> I hope that it wasn't something that franka said..


If it was something I said, pls let me know what it was, so I can use it again on some others here. :thumbup:


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Go Kimi Go*



franka said:


> Ferrari: Raikkonen at Schumacher's level .
> 
> "Generally with Kimi, we were struggling a bit at the beginning because he had some trouble to adapt his driving style to our car, to learn all our systems and to learn the Bridgestone tyres but I have to say that from mid-season to the race that he did today he can be at the same level as Michael.
> 
> ...


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> If it was let me know what it was so I can use on some others here. :thumbup:


Well, I would like more people in here giving their thoughts and insight. I even asked Alex to come back. :yikes: :rofl:

Maybe he will rejoin us for the 2008 Spoiler, which, IMHO, berford may start on Monday, 22 October! 

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

*Other headlines...*

Wurz has retired and won't drive in Brazil. :yikes:

No news on who will replace him now and next season.

Massa will help Räikkönen if there is the possibility for Kimi to win the championship.

Toyota wants Alonso next year, and is willing to pay.

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick; I even asked Alex to come back. :yikes: :rofl:QUOTE said:


> Yikes :tsk:


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick;
Massa will help Räikkönen if there is the possibility for Kimi to win the championship. /QUOTE said:


> Personally I would not trust him to do so. I think it kills Massa to be beat by Kimi, especially after the beginning of the season when Massa was hot s**t and Kimi was struggling.
> 
> Did you see his face talking in the post race interview? It was killing him to sit there next to the Kimi with him being 3rd.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> Yikes :tsk:


Yep! :thumbup:

He may have a different opinion about things, but he knows Formula 1, and I think that I was wrong for being part of chasing him away.

My Spoonface rants were part of a normal Finnish insecurity complex about Germans. :rofl:

We are still pissed that they burned down Lapland while retreating from everyone in 1944. :eeps:

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> Personally I would not trust him to do so. I think it kills Massa to be beat by Kimi, especially after the beginning of the season when Massa was hot s**t and Kimi was struggling.
> 
> Did you see his face talking in the post race interview? It was killing him to sit there next to the Kimi with him being 3rd.


Massa's spine snapped after the French Grand Prix. Sorry, but he is a pretender, i.e., Barrichello #2.



.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> Massa's spine snapped after the French Grand Prix. Sorry, but he is a pretender, i.e., Barrichello #2.
> .


He'll never leave Ferrari until he's dumped. Then who will be his replacement?


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> He'll never leave Ferrari until he's dumped. Then who will be his replacement?


Vettel.

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Its 11 days and 3 hours until the Brazilian GP. 

Statistically the winner here has not been the one leading the championship but the one in 2nd place.


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## WAM (Jan 30, 2002)

Holy moly, what a race! I can't believe Hamilton made another bonehead move, all he had to do was sit back in fourth place and clinch the championship.

I was rooting for Alonso anyway, but after the Ferrari's got into 1-2, it was pretty much over, unless something happened to one of the Ferrari's.

Great move by Kubica to take positions from the Rosberg-Heidfeld fight.

In the meantime, the Turd continues to turn the screws into McLaren.

http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2007/10/7015.html

FIA President Max Mosley has said Formula One racing's governing body will rigorously examine next season's McLaren to ensure it does not contain intellectual property obtained from Ferrari.

McLaren were stripped of their 2007 constructors' points and fined $100 million earlier this season after being found guilty of benefiting from possession of confidential Ferrari data. Although no proof of its use was found in the design of the team's current car, Mosley wants to provide reassurance that it does not feature in next season's either.

"We want to play fair with McLaren, but want to give the other teams and the public the guarantee that the new McLaren is not built upon Ferrari information," said Mosley. "We are now facing the situation of going through the '08 McLaren with a fine-tooth comb. And we are not speaking about a single component but of the incorporation of intellectual property and ideas in order to solve technical problems."

Mosley described the case as still "wide open and very difficult", but said he hoped it can be closed at a meeting of the FIA's World Motor Sport Council on December 7.

Asked to hypothesize on what might happen if the new McLaren were found to contain Ferrari material, Mosley added: "As penalty I could imagine sending McLaren into the '08 season with a minus of championship points as is used in soccer - or exclude the team for the whole season."


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## woody underwood (Feb 9, 2004)

A. Williams needs money and probably has a bit of grudge against BMW.
B. Looked to me like Rosberg was trying to take Kubica out.
C. How much did Ron Dennis offer Frank to do that?
D. If Rosberg had taken him out and then parked the car...Hamilton would have won the championship.
E. Think about it...


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## Wingboot (Jan 8, 2002)

Wow....just wow. How can you not like F1? So what if they don't rub fenders on every lap it's just awesome.


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## E36FewInNumber (May 19, 2007)

YAA KIMI!! I'm glad for kimi.

but it is soo unfortunate for lewis, i kinda feel bad for him with the tires during china, and then the tranny issue. he has a lot of potential and I'm sure he'll be a great force next year. as for Alonso i kinda wanted him to win but am still glad kimi won. can't wait till next year.


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## ///M3lissa (Jun 23, 2005)

What a great race :thumbup:


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

*Lewis can still be crowned a World Champion!*

Both BMW and Williams had fuel temperatures in their cars more than 10C lower than ambient temperatures and in violation of technical regulations. If the cars are excluded from the race then Hamilton moves up to 4th place and wins WDC. :yikes:


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## E36FewInNumber (May 19, 2007)

> The BMW Sauber and Williams teams have escaped penalty after being investigated by Brazilian Grand Prix stewards over fuel irregularities on their cars at the end of Sunday's Interlagos race.


looks like kimi is still champ.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Go Kimi. It is unbelievable. Perfect. Kimi deserved the title. Too bad for Massa that he had to give up the win. But then if Kimi hadn't got screwed in qualifying he may have been on pole anyway.

I'm glad Lewis did not win it. He screwed himself like a rookie. Bonehead mistakes alright. Like the announcer said there is a reason rookies don't win championships. 

I would have liked to see Alonso take 2nd and Lewis 3th.

Screw Eccelstone, the A.S.S. He can eat his words all off season. I hope someone keeps reminding him.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Hold on*

McLaren appeal casts doubt over title

By Jonathan Noble and Biranit Goren Monday, October 22nd 2007, 00:47 GMT

McLaren Mercedes have notified the FIA of their intention to appeal the race stewards' decision not to penalise BMW Sauber and Williams.

The Brazilian Grand Prix stewards have confirmed the race results, deciding not to take action against BMW Sauber and Williams despite a report from the FIA technical delegate that stated temperatures of fuel samples taken from both cars of each team were outside the regulations.

McLaren's decision to appeal leaves the results of the drivers' world championship in a state of uncertainty.

If the FIA's International Court of Appeal overturns the stewards' decision and, more crucially, disqualifies the Williams and BMW Sauber drivers, then McLaren's Lewis Hamilton will be elevated to fourth - giving him enough points to beat Kimi Raikkonen to the world championship title.

The ICA would still need to accept McLaren's appeal, though, and in that case a date will be set for the hearing.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*This was published before the appeal*

Stewards: temperature issues too unclear

By Jonathan Noble Monday, October 22nd 2007, 00:07 GMT

BMW Sauber and Williams were not punished for the fuel temperature discrepancy at the Brazilian Grand Prix because the FIA stewards could not prove that their petrol was outside the permitted limit.

A statement issued by the stewards at Interlagos on Sunday night said that they could not say for certain that the fuel in the cars was below the 10-degree maximum limit allowed in the regulations.

The stewards said that there was a discrepancy between the Formula One Management temperature of 37 degrees and that provided by the FIA and team-contracted meteorologists Meteo France, which was a few degrees cooler.

Furthermore, they made it clear that they did not have certain data in their possession that would have helped prove the teams were in breach of the regulations.

In particular, their statement said they lacked: "a precise reading of the temperature of 'fuel on board the car' which shows fuel at more than 10 degrees centigrade below ambient temperature"; and "a regulation stating in clear terms that for the purposes of Article [6.5.5] the definitive ambient temperature shall be indicated on the FOM timing monitors alone."

The statement added: "In view of the matters referred to above, the stewards consider that not withstanding the presumptions referred to above there must be sufficient doubt as to both the temperature of the fuel actually 'on board the car' and also as to the true ambient temperature as to render it inappropriate to impose a penalty."


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

I doubt the appeal will succeed. I hope not.

Other articles say Ron D looked stunned at the end of the race. Ron's misplaced confidence in a rookie is to blame. He put his money and his mounth on Lewis when he should have been backing Alonso.

We'll never know but I'd be willing to bet that McLaren would have the title wrapped up by now if Ron did do what whatshisface said and made Alonso number one on the team. Lewis would have accepted it w/o complaint I'm sure.

Ron has Ron to blame for loosing the title. I used to be a big McLaren fan but dropped them at the end of last year when once again they had lost too many races due to tech problems, glitches. After this year I'm especially glad he didn't win. Year after year Ron compalined about thier tech problems but year after year they had them and wasted Kimi's talent driving for them.

He was too cocky with and about Lewis. And Lewis had a great season but also showed us he is a rookie after all.

Did you hear what Kimi said about how much he enjoys the Ferrari team compared to last year? That Kimi is having the most fun at Ferrari after many years in F1? Of course, he's away from Ron D.

Kimi's the fastest man in F1. Others come close but can not drive to the edge that Kimi can.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*I do too*

Note 5th paragraph from the bottom, same point I made earlier about Ron D. McLaren deserve to loose.

Separartely, I wonder how long before Ron D is hospitalized.

Alonso hopes appeal is unsuccessful

By Pablo Elizalde and Matt Beer Monday, October 22nd 2007, 09:20 GMT

Fernando Alonso believes it would be bad for Formula One if Lewis Hamilton was handed the world championship title via a court of appeal ruling.

The outcome of the 2007 championship remains in doubt after McLaren informed the FIA that they would appeal against the race stewards' decision not to penalise Williams' Nico Rosberg and the BMWs in Brazil.

The three drivers finished ahead of Hamilton in fourth, fifth and sixth, but were the subject of a post-race investigation over the temperatures of fuel samples taken from their cars. The officials decided it could not be proved that the fuel had been below the temperature permitted under the regulations and that no action should therefore be taken.

But if McLaren's appeal is successful and the three drivers are penalised, Hamilton could gain enough points to take the world title away from Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen.

Alonso reckons such a situation could have dire consequences for F1's reputation.

"It would be a joke, and we've had too many already," he told Spanish radio station Cadena Ser. "If something like that happened, it would end up burying the sport."

The former champion could only finish a distant third in the Brazilian Grand Prix, and ended the season third in the standings.

He reiterated his belief that McLaren could have been more supportive of his title bid.

"It doesn't seem like the season has been managed very well," Alonso said.

"The result speaks for itself. McLaren lost the championship probably because of some of the decisions they took, especially in the second half of the season. It's no secret that they haven't helped me a lot.

"What my team boss stated in China, saying that they weren't racing against Raikkonen but against me, was a declaration of intent. So McLaren did their part in losing the title, but also Ferrari did a better job than the rest.

"In the last races both my hands and feet have been tied. I didn't have any power. I had to do it all the way they said and that made it harder to close the gap."

But despite his continued criticisms of the team, Alonso denied that he had resolved to leave McLaren, and played down suggestions that he was set for a return to former team Renault.

"I know there are rumours, but I haven't talked to any other team and that's the reality," he insisted.

"If I don't stay at McLaren, I can't say Renault is my first option."


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Dennis: Alonso future to be decided soon 

By Jonathan Noble Monday, October 22nd 2007, 10:18 GMT 


McLaren boss Ron Dennis has said he expects the future of Fernando Alonso at his team to be resolved within a fortnight.

Alonso has had a troubled relationship with Dennis this season, and there has been continued speculation that the Spaniard will not see out his original three-year deal with the team.

Dennis has stated for several months that the matter would only be sorted out after the season has finished, and he has now a put a timescale on a resolution being found.

"The issue of the drivers is an issue that we have continuously told you we will address after the end of the season," he told reporters at Interlagos. "And it will be addressed over the course of the next two weeks."

Dennis again blamed the growth of the Internet for increasing tensions between Alonso and the team, as he admitted that McLaren had struggled to cope with the demands of modern media through 2007.

"I have said so often, the Internet has been the bane of our lives," he said. "This is an uncontrolled, unedited, source of information that is fed into the media.

"Of course, I am not critical at all of the media. It just makes it so hard because everything is so instantaneous. You are just spending too much time trying to correct the inaccuracies that come into the system. That puts pressures on the team.

"But we will not in any shape or form say that this pressure has had anything to do with the fact that we had this problem (Hamilton's gearbox problem) today.

"I think the team has resisted the pressure very well during the season, and I would not put any of our on-circuit problems in testing or racing against that."


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*This article is just too good to not post it.*

Spanish press blames McLaren for title loss

By Pablo Elizalde Monday, October 22nd 2007, 12:50 GMT

Spain's top newspapers on Monday were unanimous in blaming the McLaren team for their failure to win the drivers' championship this season, while also celebrating the fact that it wasn't Lewis Hamilton who took the title.

"The biggest embarrassment of the century," was the cover of best-selling newspaper Marca, which also ran a poll on its website asking if McLaren boss Ron Dennis should step down.

"Sweet defeat," said AS on its cover, featuring a picture of Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen spraying champagne on the podium in Brazil. It added: "McLaren gifted the title to Raikkonen."

"The Ferrari family gave McLaren, that pretence of a team that was in reality a pack of egos united only by some stickers, a true lesson," commented El Pais.

El Mundo wrote: "With just one winning horse, McLaren would have both titles in the pocket. But his (Hamilton's) glint caused a revolution for Ron Dennis and his consultants. They got excited about the dream of a rookie champion.

"Dennis dressed himself in the policy of equality. And with it he has gone until the end. The result could not have been more equal. Pure equality: 109 points each, with the particularity that his Italian neighbours took the glory by a single point."

ABC added: "Raikkonen flew over McLaren's wreck."


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*The crap that comes out of McLaren these days.*

McLaren 'had no choice' but to appeal

By Jonathan Noble Monday, October 22nd 2007, 14:52 GMT

McLaren think they had no choice but to appeal the stewards' decisions on the 'cool fuel' issue at the Brazilian Grand Prix, because they believe they would have faced a barrage of criticism if they had stood back and not acted.

The Woking-based team wasted little time in notifying the FIA of their intention to appeal after the race stewards decided not to punish BMW Sauber and Williams for using fuel that was outside the temperature limits laid out in the regulations.

McLaren F1 CEO Martin Whitmarsh said on Monday that his team do not know why the teams involved did not face any punishment for breaching the rules.

"We were surprised at and don't really understand the stewards' decision," he said.

"Therefore, we feel that if we hadn't lodged our intention to appeal we would surely have been criticised by fans and Formula One insiders alike for not supporting our drivers' best interest."

Should the BMW Saubers of Nick Heidfeld and Robert Kubica, plus the Williams of Nico Rosberg, be excluded from the Interlagos result then it could move Lewis Hamilton up into a position that would hand him the world championship.

Whitmarsh has made it clear, however, that McLaren's motivation in planning an appeal is not aimed to attacking Ferrari.

"I want to stress that our quarrel, if you can call it that, is not with Ferrari or with Kimi Raikkonen," he said.

"No, on the contrary, Kimi won the race fair and square and Ferrari did a good job to finish first and second.

"Our argument is with the stewards' decision in relation to the cars of Rosberg, Kubica and Heidfeld. Hence our decision to lodge our intention to appeal."


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Just an afterthought: Does anyone doubt that Massa could have one in Brazil?


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> Just an afterthought: Does anyone doubt that Massa could have one in Brazil?


Or that Räikkönen could have *won* in Japan?

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

No


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Alonso has already started to rip McLaren apart. And it only took a day.

His comment about the McLaren protest: "If it went through, it would be the scandal and a complete joke. If that happens, it would be the end of this sport (Formula 1)."

I am just waiting to hear what he says next. Once he isn't boiling over anymore.

Where is the popcorn?


.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Berford: how long do you want to wait until starting the 2008 ** SPOILER ** thread? :dunno:

I suspect that some "stuff" related to 2008 will unfold quite soon.


.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

berford said:


> :rofl:
> 
> BTW, how's the civil action against Stepney going?


I haven't heard much about it. Would you care to inform us?


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

berford said:


> :rofl:
> 
> BTW, how's the civil action against Stepney (um, that would be the Ferrari employee) going?


So does one idiot make the team walk in shame? No of course not. So what's your point?


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

franka said:


> So does one idiot make the team walk in shame? No of course not. So what's your point?


Here's the latest news I've seen:

On 4 October 2007,in a complete twist to the 2007 Formula One espionage controversy Nigel Stepney issued a statement claiming that he had received key information about McLaren's set-up , [pit] stopping, weight distribution and other aspects of various parts of their car when he was still a Ferrari's employee and said that Ferrari had gotten off lightly.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Again what's the point?


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

franka said:


> Again what's the point?


Read what Nigel said. In short, Stepneygate was a two-way street. But sanctions were handed down to only one party. FIA was only interested in hurting McLaren though both teams (if you can count the employees as teams) were involved in information-sharing. I doubt either team benefitted appreciably from the other in a technological sense. But in the end Ferrari certainly benefitted greatly from penalties imposed. To wit: 

Official score: Ferrari 204; McLaren 0.
Sum of team driver points: McLaren 218, Ferrari 204.


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## F1Crazy (Dec 11, 2002)

berford said:


> Just an afterthought: Does anyone doubt that Massa could have one in Brazil?


Why do you think his contract extension was announced before the race? He had no choice but to play the game. He was almost crying at press conference :rofl:


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

berford said:


> Read what Nigel said. In short, Stepneygate was a two-way street. But sanctions were handed down to only one party. FIA was only interested in hurting McLaren though both teams (if you can count the employees as teams) were involved in information-sharing. I doubt either team benefitted appreciably from the other in a technological sense. But in the end Ferrari certainly benefitted greatly from penalties imposed. To wit:
> 
> Official score: Ferrari 204; McLaren 0.
> Sum of team driver points: McLaren 218, Ferrari 204.


I'm sorry and maybe dense but I don't get what it is you are driving at.

So what that Stepney and the others screwed up. It was 1 or 2 or more individual's action and was not team sanctioned either way.

Regarding the sum of the points it shows that Ferrari was not as reliable as McLaren and that McLaren, even with more driver points was still not able to win the championship. That sum of points, which is an interesting fact, speaks more negatively about McLaren than Ferrari.

Please tell me what side it is that you are fighting on.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

*Oops...*



Plaz said:


> Any final word on what was going on with Hamilton's car? Was it the clutch?


It wasn't a transmission software problem after all. Or at least not one caused by MicroSoft. :eeps:

Rather, Hamilton pushed the wrong button in the cockpit. which dropped the transmission into neutral. This button is only in use before the start, and when accidentally pushed while driving, it forced Hamilton to have to restart the transmission operating system. This cost him 30 seconds.



.


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## Plaz (Dec 19, 2001)

Patrick said:


> It wasn't a transmission software problem after all. Or at least not one caused by MicroSoft. :eeps:
> 
> Rather, Hamilton pushed the wrong button in the cockpit. which dropped the transmission into neutral. This button is only in use before the start, and when accidentally pushed while driving, it forced Hamilton to have to restart the transmission operating system. This cost him 30 seconds.


DOH! :tsk:


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Montezemolo: team cost Alonso the title 

By Michele Lostia and Matt Beer Tuesday, October 23rd 2007, 09:45 GMT 


Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo has praised Fernando Alonso's response to losing the world championship and suggested that Alonso only missed out on the title because McLaren mishandled their drivers.

The inter-team relationship at McLaren was one of the dominant storylines of the 2007 season, with Alonso outspoken in his demands for greater support from the squad.

The McLaren drivers ultimately ended the year tied on 109 points, as Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen snatched the title by a single point with his victory in Brazil.

"Alonso is a real champion, in every sense, an extraordinary driver. I've really appreciated his sportsmanship," di Montezemolo was quoted as saying by Gazzetta dello Sport.

"He lost the championship by a point and I don't think it was his fault, rather it was a consequence of his team's bad internal management.

"By congratulating Raikkonen already during the press conference, Alonso demonstrated to be a champion off the track too. It was a gesture we greatly appreciated."

Alonso offered further praise for Raikkonen in an interview with Italian radio station RAI yesterday.

"He is an extraordinary guy - a very, very nice personality even though you don't see it," the Spaniard said. 

"The moments I have with him behind the podium and in the press conference, he always laughs and plays pranks, things you don't see when you then watch him on TV.

"So I think he is a really good person, very focused in the races. He loves F1, he is a really great driver. He fought in 2003 and 2005, now he's managed to win the title, I'm very happy."

Di Montezemolo was also critical of Lewis Hamilton's driving in Brazil, although he added that the British rookie's overall achievements in his debut year were praiseworthy.

"Hamilton made an error driven by youth and nervousness. Had he stayed behind Alonso, instead of trying to attack him, he would be champion now. He did something rash," said the Ferrari president.

"But it must be acknowledged that he's had an extraordinary season: so young and in his rookie season in F1 he was in the title fight until the last second. That's why he deserves respect and congratulations.

"But I must also recognise that during the season he did not always hold an exemplary behaviour. I didn't like, for example, the move on Raikkonen in qualifying in Interlagos."

There was a brief controversy at the end of qualifying in Brazil after Raikkonen encountered Hamilton while on his final flying lap. Hamilton, who was on an out-lap, apologised to Raikkonen and no action was taken.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

F1Crazy said:


> Why do you think his contract extension was announced before the race? He had no choice but to play the game. He was almost crying at press conference :rofl:


I believe I made that point before the race.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Twice now Hamilton said he doesn't want to win by those 2 cars being disqualified. He said it would be cruel to Kimi. That he wants to win the right way on the track.

So if true then why isn't Dennis withdrawing the appeal? Because he has investors and its business. Its no longer a sport.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

McLaren deny Hamilton caused gearbox error 

By Biranit Goren and Steve Cooper Tuesday, October 23rd 2007, 14:38 GMT 


McLaren have rejected suggestions that Lewis Hamilton's gearbox failure in the Brazilian Grand Prix was due to him pressing the wrong button on his steering wheel.

Hamilton was seen slowing down almost to a halt on lap eight of Sunday's race, dropping from sixth to 18th place, but was then able to regain speed.

The incident sparked rumours suggesting the 22-year-old pushed the wrong button on his steering wheel, which in turn left his car in neutral until he was given instructions over the radio how to reset the system.

Compounding these rumours was a report in Montreal's newspaper La Presse, which quotes Hamilton directly as saying he indeed pushed the wrong button.

However, a source close to the Hamilton family has described the report as "absolute rubbish", telling autosport.com that Hamilton has not spoken to the Canadian newspaper or said anything as such to anyone.

A McLaren spokesperson also denied the report and said the failure was not down to human error.

"We can confirm that the temporary gear shifting problem Lewis suffered on lap eight of the Brazilian Grand Prix was due to a default in the gearbox that selected neutral for a period of time," she said.

"It was not as a result of Lewis pressing an incorrect button on his steering wheel."

McLaren F1 CEO Martin Whitmarsh also ruled out driver error and said the likely reason is hydraulic valve failure.

"It was a gearbox problem, and it went into forced-neutral and changing down seemed to rectify it - it might be mechanical, but we doubt it," he told Autosport magazine.

"If it was something mechanical, they usually don't fix themselves. It could be electronics software - but there's no evidence in the analysis to support that. Could be a sensor - but again, there's no evidence in the data recordings.

"So it would appear that the barrels that change gear went out of control - and out of control of the driver - and that's probably hydraulic.

"That could be either a very small Moog servo control valves that were interfered with by a tiny piece of debris or they are sensitive to magnetic interference - something generated a magnetic field which caused the valve to misbehave."

This week's Autosport magazine


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

franka said:


> McLaren deny Hamilton caused gearbox error
> 
> By Biranit Goren and Steve Cooper Tuesday, October 23rd 2007, 14:38 GMT
> 
> "That could be either a very small Moog servo control valves that were interfered with by a tiny piece of debris or they are sensitive to magnetic interference - something generated a magnetic field which caused the valve to misbehave."


Magnetic field. Now there is a good conspiracy theory.

Ferrari sent out a strong magnetic field directed at Lewis's car.

:yikes:


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*I had to post this one.*

Hamilton meets his fiercest rival yet

By Jonathan Noble and Biranit Goren Saturday, October 20th 2007, 21:32 GMT

Lewis Hamilton faced fierce opposition at Interlagos on Saturday, but his rival was not one of the Formula One drivers but rather a French journalist who took the Briton to task in the official FIA post qualifying press conference.

L'Equipe writer Anne Giuntini was clearly unhappy with how Hamilton had let Kimi Raikkonen past in qualifying for the Brazilian Grand Prix.

Wasting little time to put her point of view across on the eve of what could be Hamilton's maiden championship, Giuntini suggested that the British driver had not been fair in his dealings with the Ferrari driver.

"For everybody, it is evident that twice you disturbed Kimi. Is everything good to become a world champion?" she asked.

Hamilton responded: "To be honest there is no reason for me to do anything to Kimi because if anything he can win..."

"You never showed him clearly that you could give him the track free?" Giuntini continued, as the two locked in a heated exchange.

"What do you want me to do? Put the indicator on?" Hamilton replied.

"You know exactly..." She said.

"I did the best job I could to get out of the way," Hamilton insisted. "And I did apologise to him if I did get in his way."

"Is that what you call the best job?" Giuntini continued.

"Yes," Hamilton responded.

Giuntini: "As a sportsman?"

Hamilton: "Yes. How are you at your job? Are you the best at your job? You never made mistakes....no?"

Giuntini: "Sometimes..."

Hamilton: "Oh, really..."

Other journalists managed to stir the press conference on to other topics, until one made the mistake of mentioning Giuntini's run-in with Hamilton, labelling it a "ridiculous exchange". The Frenchwoman saw this as her cue to pick up where she earlier left off.

"Let us continue the ridiculous exchange," she turned to Hamilton. "Do you think you can do everything you want and then you just apologise - is that the way it works in Formula One?"

"I'm not going to answer that," Hamilton finally snapped. "I just don't want to talk to you, to be honest."

Giuntini, who is married to Renault's head of engine track operations Denis Chevrier, was later seen in the paddock being berated by a rather angry McLaren boss Ron Dennis as well as Hamilton's father Anthony.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

I saw that interview on TV. :rofl:

She was so animal! 


.


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## dinanm3atl (Sep 26, 2007)

I don't even know what she is referring too... but I missed the last minute of qualifying because of SPEED running on NASCAR truck coverage!!!!

What a GREAT season!!!


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

franka said:


> ...
> 1. ... McLaren, even with more driver points was still not able to win the championship.
> 2. That sum of points, which is an interesting fact, speaks more negatively about McLaren than Ferrari.
> 
> 3. Please tell me what side it is that you are fighting on.


Per above:
1. It's sort of difficult to win when your points are taken away.
2. I don't understand that at all.:dunno:
3. I think McLaren got screwed by The Turd. Is that clear enough?


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> 3. I think McLaren got screwed by The Turd. Is that clear enough?


Funny. I think that they got off lightly. The fine was silly, but they should have been tossed - team and drivers - from the championship.

Just my opinion.

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> Funny. I think that they got off lightly. The fine was silly, but they should have been tossed - team and drivers - from the championship.
> 
> Just my opinion. .


+1 :thumbdwn:


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

berford said:


> Per above:
> 
> 2. I don't understand that at all.:dunno:
> 3. I think McLaren got screwed by The Turd. Is that clear enough?


2) McLaren had more points than Ferrari but it didn't do them any good. If they had a clear one and two on the team they would probably have won the championship. Just like Ferrari had done for years to help Schumi win. And like Ferrari did to put Massa 2nd so Kimi could take the points.

3) McLaren screwed themselves. :rofl:

I wonder if Lewis will be proclaimed #1 next year, assuming Alonso is gone ?


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

McLaren is pushing ahead with their appeal. They claim it is too important to let go they say. They claim its not aimed at the teams involved.

All this after Hamilton has said 2x that he doesn't want the championship that way.

McLaren is inner conflicted.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

I have read from numerous sources - including the Finnish representative to the FIA court of appeals - that there is no way that what happens on 10 November will change the results of the championship.

And there is even a precedent for fuel manipulation in Formula 1. However, in this case (Brazil) there is no hard EVIDENCE. If some would magically appear, at worst, both BMW drivers and Rosberg might lose their points from Sunday's race, but not their race positions, i.e., Hamilton is still P7. This has happened before.

Anyway.


.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Funny. I think that they got off lightly. The fine was silly, but they should have been tossed - team and drivers - from the championship.
> 
> Just my opinion.
> 
> .


And I respect your opinion. When I read through the transcript, I find little to no evidence that McLaren used or benefitted from having Ferrari IC. If you look closely, the foundation for the FIA findings (and, consequently, their penalties) is almost entirely their supposition that de la Rosa is lying.

Here are my notes on the 13 September Decision. I know it will take some work, but if you're up to it, follow along...and rebut my conclusions if you like.

3.10 Call de la Rosa a liar without cause.
3.12 IBID
3.17 IBID
at 6.1, FIA presumes how McLaren should manage its employees. Rather presumptuous to say the least.
at 8.5 FIA says that it is entitled to penalize a team for meer 
possession of confidential information of another team. But it did not do so earlier even though it was admitted by McLaren that they possessed Ferrari information. Why would that be different at a later date.
8.9, 8.10 and 8.11 Op sit
at 9.2, the penalty of $100.000.000 is to be paid by Dec. 13, 2007
Do they really mean what they say in 9.5? Strange.

When all is said and done, Coughlin should have turned Stepney over to FIA and been done with it. Where would that have gone? I'll hazard a guess: nowhere.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Possesion, like cocaine, is the crime.

All these teams are stealing and using info. Have been for years.

When an engineer or designer or driver goes to another team he doesn't empty his brain of everything he knows.

A fair amount of what goes into a design is copied from others routinely.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

berfordWhen all is said and done said:


> I'll bet some persons would be sued and it would be an issue with the FIA but maybe not so big.
> 
> Ferrari forced the FIAs hand at a time when they were slipping behind McLaren in the points. That probably had a major influence on Ferrari to push for max sanctions.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

franka said:


> Possesion, like cocaine, is the crime.
> 
> All these teams are stealing and using info. Have been for years.
> 
> ...


FIA didn't find possession to be such a big problem in the early round, so the cocaine analogy falls short. McLaren admitted possession and were not sanctioned.

Fast forward to round two. FIA only considered possession as an afterthought in the second round. Their big problem (and the only reason they reopened the issue) was "use." At best it was presumed use, yet they imposed heavy sanctions.

Thus I have a lot of sympathy for McLaren. If they had gone to appeal and gotten a fair hearing, I think the ruling could have been overturned. But, of course, they were worried about driver points sactions as well, so they didn't appeal.

I'm not particularly a fan of McLaren, Dennis, Alonso or Hamilton. I just think they suffered the wrath of Ferrari's FIA machine [sic]. And that's unfair and shameful.

My opinion.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*My Man Kimi*

Raikkonen: Brazil lap 1 clinched the title

By Biranit Goren Wednesday, October 24th 2007, 03:52 GMT

Kimi Raikkonen believes the first lap of the Brazilian Grand Prix was the most decisive moment in the 2007 world championship - and the reason why he was able to win the title against all hopes.

The Ferrari driver clinched the championship by a single point on Sunday after points leader Lewis Hamilton finished only seventh. And the the normally cool and collected Finn made no attempt to hide his emotions this time.

"I am so happy it almost hurts! This is like a dream come true," he told Ferrari's official website after returning to Europe on Tuesday. "This is something I wanted to reach since I've been a child.

"I've always said that the aim of my career is to become world champion. I came very close a couple of times and in the end everything turned out fine.

"The last race was really emotional; it was a great race and I think that I've never experienced such emotions in the cockpit.

"Everything worked perfectly fine. It was like a birthday present from heaven!" Raikkonen, who celebrated his 28th birthday last week, added.

Looking back at his unprecedented title win from third in the standings, Raikkonen said the Chinese Grand Prix two weeks ago was the turning point for his campaign.

"We left Japan and were 17 points behind, without the possibility to fight back," he said. "I think I can say that not more than ten people outside of the team would have bet on us. But we didn't give up. In a certain sense we believe in miracles.

"China was our joker: we won and the driver on the top of the standings didn't take any points. That gave us some hope, but there weren't many chances for us left."

Reflecting on the season finale at Interlagos, where Raikkonen was third on the grid but up to second by the first corner and behind teammate Felipe Massa, the Finn said he could have potentially overtaken the Brazilian at the start but chose not to.

"Maybe I had the best start of the season and maybe I could have passed also Felipe at the first corner, but I had a plan and it didn't involve a fight with my teammate," Raikkonen said.

"I could see in my mirrors that Hamilton was next to [Fernando] Alonso in Turn 3 and that he had a problem. I realized that we had the chance we had hoped for: this first lap seemed to be decisive for the whole championship.

"We could have had more pace and I want to thank Felipe again for his support: he did what he could do, just like a perfect teammate.

"As a team we couldn't do more than a double-win, but when I had crossed the line the most important thing to know was what Hamilton had done.

"I asked for information over the radio but there was just silence for a couple of seconds: finally Chris told me that he came in seventh and my heart nearly went into flames due to happiness! This is it: now we're world champions!"

Raikkonen also paid tribute to his Ferrari team, lavishing the Italians with compliments.

"It is fantastic being a part of the greatest team of all times," he said. "This year I really enjoyed Formula One more than ever before. I dreamt about winning the title with Ferrari and I bet that this is every driver's dream.

"This team never stops: they work at the max and never give up. We had some difficult moments, but we always managed to come back. And this shows the quality of the people working there. Thanks again!

"Now I go to the Finali Mondiali at Mugello (this weekend), to celebrate with all of Ferrari: it's my first time there and it's the perfect moment to get there.

"And then it's time for a holiday, the first as world champion."


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Allegedly the FIA has frozen engine development for 10 years starting in 2008.

That's some crazy sh*t


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

franka said:


> Allegedly the FIA has frozen engine development for 10 years starting in 2008.
> 
> That's some crazy sh*t


That would be no surprise. The leadership is allegedly crazy.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> FIA didn't find possession to be such a big problem in the early round, so the cocaine analogy falls short. McLaren admitted possession and were not sanctioned.
> 
> Fast forward to round two. FIA only considered possession as an afterthought in the second round. Their big problem (and the only reason they reopened the issue) was "use." At best it was presumed use, yet they imposed heavy sanctions.


Do you recall that it was Ron Dennis that informed the FIA about the new evidence? Do you remember Alonso's role in that?

My guess (mine) is that what McLaren admitted to (via Alonso and de la Rosa) was just the tip of the ice berg.

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> That would be no surprise. The leadership is allegedly crazy.


There is no way that all of the teams will agree to that. Never.

And what happens when a new team comes to Formula 1 in the year 2013? Do they get FIA supplied engines?

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> Do you recall that it was Ron Dennis that informed the FIA about the new evidence? Do you remember Alonso's role in that?
> 
> My guess (mine) is that what McLaren admitted to (via Alonso and de la Rosa) was just the tip of the ice berg. .


So are you also saying that McLaren were faster this year due to Ferrari data?

And that Ferrari was so furious because they knew that?

That would fit why McLaren dropped the issue instead of appeal.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Worth a read: http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns19813.html
Spot on, as they say.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> So are you also saying that McLaren were faster this year due to Ferrari data?
> 
> And that Ferrari was so furious because they knew that?
> 
> That would fit why McLaren dropped the issue instead of appeal.


Yes, that is why I think that the drivers should have been tossed from the WC. Taking away the team points is fine, but it didn't make any sense that the drivers still had a chance to actually win the world championship. What McLaren knew from Ferrari directly benefitted both drivers.

Ferrari is still furious about it.

And the FIA will be watching what McLaren does with their 2008 car - it has to be approved by the FIA in December (as I recall). They could still get banned for 2008.

If McLaren would have appealed, there was a chance that even more evidence could have been presented. They already sank their own ship, why make it worse?

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> Allegedly the FIA has frozen engine development for 10 years starting in 2008.
> 
> That's some crazy sh*t


Ok, now this was just reported here. :tsk:

I still don't see how this will fly with the teams. This is the same FIA that wants all teams to have the same aero packages, the same tyres, the same everything.

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Well it has always been that Ferrari appear to catch some breaks.

It is a good arguement for proffesional, traveling stewards. Same at each race.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick said:


> Ok, now this was just reported here. :tsk:
> .


Obviously I missed it then. Would you please post the number of the post so I can go back and read?


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> Worth a read: http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns19813.html
> Spot on, as they say.


Demon Hell! An original member of the drivers club that hates Spoonface! :rofl:

He is British, of course he wants Hamilton to win.

Hamilton had little to no pressure all year, aside from the competition with Alonso. When it came time to get it done, he failed. Twice.

.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> Obviously I missed it then. Would you please post the number of the post so I can go back and read?


Sorry. I meant here, where I am sitting, i.e., Finland.

This motor development (or lack of) was just reported up here in the Finnish press.

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Patrick;
Hamilton had little to no pressure all year said:


> Rookie mistakes from a rookie.
> 
> His star sure has fallen from last 2 races.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Spyker is "Force India" next year


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

franka said:


> Spyker is "Force India" next year


I just read that.



What do they want to be forced to do? :rofl:

It sounds like the FIA World Motorsports Council has had a busy day in Paris... :snooze:

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

*Frozen Out*

This freeze is draconian. No exceptions at all, like now were some development can be made to the head above the valve.

This is absolute and will ruin the sport that I used to enjoy. I find it hard to believe that this will not get changed even over 2 years.

Those with lesser engines have no chance to catch up other than buying a top 3 engine. Ferrari, BMW, Mercedes

We know this is not what BMW had in mind when they entered. They planned to develop a winner over a number of years and are on track getting better every year. They wanted F1as a show place for their engines and tech development.

Engine development frozen for ten years

By Matt Beer Wednesday, October 24th 2007, 13:03 GMT

The FIA has announced that the current restrictions on engine development will be tightened to a blanket freeze on all changes for ten years from 2008.

The decision was taken at a meeting of the World Motor Sport Council in Paris today.

"There will be a total freeze on engine development for a period of 10 years, starting from 2008," said an FIA statement.

"A change can be made after five years but only with the unanimous agreement of all stakeholders and following a further two-year notice period.

"Total freeze means that there will be no exceptions for development of certain parts of the engine, as is the case under the current regulations."

The extension to the engine freeze comes just days after the manufacturers involved in Formula One submitted a proposed engine rules package for 2010 to 2013 that was intended to help reduce costs and promote more environmentally-friendly technology.

The original engine development freeze was introduced for the start of the 2007 season and was expected to remain in place only until a more radical overhaul of the engine regulations was carried out.


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## Salvator (Oct 14, 2003)

franka said:


> Spyker is "Force India" next year


Do you think mixing vindaloo spices into the fuel will be considered an illegal additive? :dunno:

( I keed, I keed!  )


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Salvator said:


> Do you think mixing vindaloo spices into the fuel will be considered an illegal additive? :dunno: ( I keed, I keed!  )


I won't touch that one, not even with a ten footer.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Yes, that is why I think that the drivers should have been tossed from the WC. Taking away the team points is fine, but it didn't make any sense that the drivers still had a chance to actually win the world championship. What McLaren knew from Ferrari directly benefitted both drivers.
> 
> Ferrari is still furious about it.
> 
> ...


You seem to be privy to information that has not been made public, to my knowledge anyway. What is that?

BTW, did FIA ever post a readable transcript of the September proceedings? The first posting was corrupted, and I never went back to look for a repost after the first two days.


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## Galun (Aug 14, 2002)

berford said:


> Official score: Ferrari 204; McLaren 0.
> Sum of team driver points: McLaren 218, Ferrari 204.


Ferrari would have won in constructor points anyways. McLaren drivers scored 15 driver points in Hungary but the team was not allowed to win constructor points and that could not be blamed on Ferrari. So even without the spygate penalty it would have been Ferrari 204 McLaren 203.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Galun said:


> Ferrari would have won in constructor points anyways. McLaren drivers scored 15 driver points in Hungary but the team was not allowed to win constructor points and that could not be blamed on Ferrari. So even without the spygate penalty it would have been Ferrari 204 McLaren 203.


Just another stupid penalty imposed on McLaren which, you'll recall, they didn't contest because they were stripped of all their other points anyway.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

berford said:


> Just another stupid penalty imposed on McLaren which, you'll recall, they didn't contest because they were stripped of all their other points anyway.


What would you have done if you were the FIA?


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## Galun (Aug 14, 2002)

berford said:


> Just another stupid penalty imposed on McLaren which, you'll recall, they didn't contest because they were stripped of all their other points anyway.


I thought they were penalized because they were caught lying to the mightly FIA or something along those lines.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

berford said:


> Just another stupid penalty imposed on McLaren which, you'll recall, they didn't contest because they were stripped of all their other points anyway.


Do you recall the incident between Alonso and Hamilton in Hungary that lead to their constructor points being docked? Do you remember why they chose not to appeal?

Stupid penalty? Are you trying to re-write history? :dunno:

.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

franka said:


> What would you have done if you were the FIA?


As you'll recall, they dropped Alonso 5 grid positions for what I would call a "blocking" penalty. The extent of the penalty is, of course, judgmental. I would have dropped him another 5 positions. He should have known from having been on the side of the blocking incident at Monaco in 2006 that interference is dealt with harshly. Notwithstanding the other things that went on at Hungary, the team did not interfere in any way with any other team--they just shot themselves in the foot. Consequently, I would have ended with driver sanctions. In my opinion, they didn't end there because they wanted to keep the constructor's championship close.


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## berford (Sep 10, 2002)

Patrick said:


> Do you recall the incident between Alonso and Hamilton in Hungary that lead to their constructor points being docked? Do you remember why they chose not to appeal?
> 
> Stupid penalty? Are you trying to re-write history? :dunno:
> 
> .


I remember it all. Per above comments, it was team infighting that affected no other team, except to the extent that Alonso's having been moved back in the grid was a positive contribution to others.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

*Ecclestone bitter that Räikkönen won*

As reported in the Daily Mirror.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/motorsport/2007/10/25/f1-boss-blasts-mclaren-89520-20005386/



.


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## Salvator (Oct 14, 2003)

Patrick said:


> As reported in the Daily Mirror.
> 
> http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/motorsport/2007/10/25/f1-boss-blasts-mclaren-89520-20005386/
> 
> ...


If I was Ron Dennis, I think I'd just walk up to Bernie and deck him, then immediately announce my retirement... "Analyze this, Bernie!" - Pow, right in the kisser! :rofl:


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

Poor, poor Bernie, even he couldn't "fix" it.

I hope his head explodes.


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## Galun (Aug 14, 2002)

berford said:


> Notwithstanding the other things that went on at Hungary, the team did not interfere in any way with any other team--they just shot themselves in the foot.


Again I thought the penalty on constructor points was due to McLaren's behavior to the FIA. They tried to explain that they held Alonso for 20 seconds with a legimate reason like traffic management or something, but at the time there were only 4 cars on the track. Any rational person would have deduced that Alonso held up Hamilton on purpose. I think an earlier article someone posted in this thread even stated that the stories among Dennis, Alonso, and Hamilton were all different at first, and then after a few hours their stories converge.

The stewards would have none of it and I think the penalty on the team was due to McLaren trying to treat the stewards and FIA for fools. It's not unlike in a court of law where someone was caught lying and cheating and show no remorse, and the judge hand down a bigger penalty. Just my opinion.


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## Patrick (Dec 23, 2001)

Galun said:


> Again I thought the penalty on constructor points was due to McLaren's behavior to the FIA. They tried to explain that they held Alonso for 20 seconds with a legimate reason like traffic management or something, but at the time there were only 4 cars on the track. *Any rational person would have deduced that Alonso held up Hamilton on purpose.* I think an earlier article someone posted in this thread even stated that the stories among Dennis, Alonso, and Hamilton were all different at first, and then after a few hours their stories converge.
> 
> The stewards would have none of it and I think the penalty on the team was due to McLaren trying to treat the stewards and FIA for fools. It's not unlike in a court of law where someone was caught lying and cheating and show no remorse, and the judge hand down a bigger penalty. Just my opinion.


Spot on.

But lets re-write what happened after the fact to support who we support. And then, lets believe it because we think that it's true.

.


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## franka (Jan 23, 2006)

I feel the FIA should stay out of the team's problems. It had nothing to do with anyone else or any other team.

The FIA's excuse to get involved was BS.


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