yea right. Massa scored nil in the 1st 2 races, and yet he was the WDC leading coming into this race.
Massa wasn't happy with his car from day one. i can't help but think if anything was wrong with the car. it's like each time he turns, he just spins.
Thats all there is to say really. Lewis did a 'Schumacher' today. Despite a tiny little off at (I believe) Abbey, he drove a perfect race in really difficult conditions. And his start is the best I have seen since Renault and their launch-controls. Today, Ferrari had a big fat off day. I'll hand this one to the Massa-haters. There is really no point to defend Massa other then saying ho obviously was given an awful car today. Drivers have said before that their car was undriveable, but this one was litteraly undriveable. I had some hope for Kimi in the early stages of the race. He closed the gap to Hamilton quite easily. I was somewhat surprised to didn't swithed the tires at the first stop and it looked like the had to pay and had to pay heavy for it. It was clear from the first outlap after the first stop. Even in that lap alone, Lewis took about four seconds. Kimi did, however, did a good job at damage-limitation, taking the car home in fifth. It seemed his car was quite good in fairly dry conditions. Not much lost in the championship yet, but I hope we will remember this as Ferrari's worst 2008-race by far (well along with Melbourne).
Of course there was something wrong with his car. The problem was behind the steering wheel. No reason to drive the curbs as hard as he did, when he just isn't any better in these conditions.
Personally I'd prefer to see Ferrari and one of its drivers bring the title home a few races ahead if possible. Nice and calm. But maybe I'm just boring
A very nice and IMHO fair assessment of the race. You can't argue with the fact that Lewis was some 68 seconds ahead of the next best car and had one little off compared to the majority of the field spinning. Lewis seems to have many haters on this board, to be honest I have never read of so many armchair experts on one forum and I just wonder how the posts would be if he were in a Ferrari? I of course like Ferrari or I wouldn't be reading these boards but give the guy a break. He is a 23 year old living the dream and so what if he says something we don't all agree with or makes a stupid mistake, we all do it, but just not on an international stage. Today he drove a perfect race and I still feel that had Kimi had his tyres changed at the first stop he still couldn't have kept pace. Lewis has been likened to MS with his car control in the rain and as such should be applauded. Sorry if this is long winded and I reckon there will be a few replys telling me I am talking bollocks but if a driver has driven well then I feel he/she should be given the plaudits for such rather than abuse.
Its hillarious how you and cosmic kid jump all over Massa when he has a bad race. His car was never the same since Friday when he spun in Balonso's oil slick. Even the ITV commentators said that his car was spinning with hardly any throttle. Where were the 2 of you when Massa was doing well in the last 5 races and Kimi was banging the dog? Yep just 2 boys with nothing to do but throw in one liners bashing Massa when the door opens 1 inch.....Que Ted.
I don't understand your point. All I said was that Massa's rep as a dismal wet weather driver was reinforced today. How is that not the case?
All I know is that Massa is still one of the championship leaders, despite all his mistakes this year. I believe we should all consider that.
Given the three-way tie for first at the mid-point of the season, I'd say that its a pretty clear indication of the general mediocrity of the three drivers. Too many mistakes and rampant inconsistency by both Ferrari and McLaren. Just not seeing the utter domination by a driver/team like MS and FA just a few short years ago. Its ironic that RB finishes third with Ross Brawn calling the shots. And LH is still one lucky SOB, coming within a few inches of taking himself and his team mate out...
What do you expect from a "Ferrari" chat forum, Mercedes/McLaren lovers? I'll bet if you went to a Mercedes forum the haters would be in reverse, eh?
Great post. I am not a Hamilton fan (simply because he drives for Mclaren) but I never doubted him as a great F1 driver.
Just got done watching the stupid tape-delay on Fox. Congrats to Lewis on the home race win. It's a shame they decided to keep Kimi's used tires. What the hell happened with Massa? He's got some 'splainin to do.
Franco , as I'am aware you dont bash LH, much, but I have to say the one reason I will stick the knife in is because Massa fans are the biggest ones slaggling LH off, so what do you expect. Normally I wouldn't.
Well Massa sucks in the rain I think that's obvious. He doesn't need to be sacked, but he can't afford anymore crap performances like the one he had today. Congrats to Rubens for getting the Honda onto the podium that was impressive. Were there any drivers today that weren't in the grass at least once during the race?
Thanks a lot Ferrari for ruining Kimi's chances due to a bad gamble on tires. A change to full wets during his stop could have been enough to sail past Hamilton and build up a huge lead, enough to pit for inters later and still be P1. Even Barrichello was topping the front runners by 13 SECONDS at one point due to full wets. Dismal performance by Massa although the car was far from perfect. His Highness Mr. Hamilton seems to be proving himself to be a Rain Master as his teammmate struggled badly, so I'll give credit where credit is due.
Something seems to have gone seriously amiss with the broadcast schedule. I tuned into Fox for the British Grand Prix, but instead, I got a bunch of F1 cars at the "Thousand Lakes" Rallye. NOW we see why Donnington Park got a foot in the door. If "Massa sucks in the wet", then so does the entire F1 field -- Everybody - including Hamilton - went roundabouts on the track. With the standing water out there, everybody should have gone for full wets. Rubens blew off everybody on wets and wound up on the podium. Jensen spun off, despite full wets. Inters were the wrong tire -- and everyone made that mistake. Alonso and the red cars compounded that mistake with trying to double stint the inters. (When will these guys start looking up, instead of reading the FIA's weather forecast?) Massa's performance at Monaco pretty much disproves the "bad in the wet" mantra. Where Massa is hurting is being weak on the ability to control a disaster in progress. Others spin and get right back on track. Massa spins and goes to the back. Or to the gravel. But the team didn't help a bit, here. Of course this driver that "needs to be sacked" is in a dead heat for lead in the WDC, despite the team's botching several of his races.
The problem is, it starts getting hard to justify, on his 5th spin. If there was a problem with his car fair enough, if not, his skill in the wet needs addressing pronto.
FERRARI'S PROBLEMS BEGAN FRIDAY - NOT RACE DAY For those spouting off about Massa need to keep this in mind (also read who had fastest lap of the day Friday): Here's the F1 regs and perhaps with the accident (a big shunt to the rear of the car) on Friday, Ferrari might have thought about this and have given Massa a better car than the rebuild and ensuing problems: 28) SPARE CARS, ENGINES AND GEARBOXES 28.1 Each competitor may have no more than two cars available for use at any one time during an Event. Any partially assembled survival cell will be deemed to be a car in this context if it is fitted with an engine, any front suspension external to the survival cell, bodywork, radiators, oil tanks external to the survival cell or heat exchangers. 28.2 Any driver who decides to use another car following the qualifying practice session, or whose car has a change of survival cell, must start the race from the pit lane following the procedures detailed in Article 38.3. Under these circumstances no restrictions on fuel load will be applied. 28.3 No change of car is permitted after the start of the race. Friday Practice . . .Hirohide Hamashima - Director of Bridgestone Motorsport Tyre Development, said: "The wind at Silverstone made conditions difficult for teams and drivers to judge handling and set-up. From all of today's data it seems that the medium tyre is the quicker over a lap, offering more grip, however we did not see sufficient long runs on this tyre to judge how durable it will be over a race stint. In contrast to the general trend, today's fastest lap was set by Massa using the hard compound, when teams were trying a lot of different fuel loads, also the morning session was interrupted. Silverstone is a very abrasive circuit and tyre management of wear and degradation will be very important, so I expect to see teams running longer stints on the medium compound in tomorrow's morning practice session." Stats of the Day Total amount of laps completed by all drivers: 956 laps Average number of laps per driver: 48 laps Most laps by a driver: 70 - Rosberg (AT&T Williams) Fastest lap: 1min 19.575 secs - Massa (FP1) Compounds used: Hard / Medium and this from Ferrari . . . A rather niggly Friday for Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro. This morning there was Felipe Massa's accident, when he lost control of the car under braking going into turn 7, because of oil dropped on the racing line by Alonso's car. It ended with Massa's car in the barriers and while fortunately the driver was uninjured, the car suffered heavy damage. Thanks to the work of the team, Felipe's car was repaired and the Brazilian managed to get out on track in the second session. Kimi had no particular problems but, especially in the afternoon, he was unable to get the car well balanced. "First and foremost I want to praise our mechanics, who did an extraordinary job in repairing Felipe's car," commented the Team Principal of the Gestione Sportiva, Stefano Domenicali. "Given the amount of damage and the short time available they were really great. On the technical front, it was not a totally satisfactory day. Of course, we lost some time with Felipe, who despite everything said he was reasonably happy with the handling of his car, while the same could not be said for Kimi, especially in the second session. Now we must study the data very carefully to be sure we make the right choices for the rest of the weekend, keeping in mind the weather, given that rain is forecast for the next two days." Felipe Massa: "It was a big crash, but that's part of the game and I have had much worse accidents in my career. I didn't see any flags and I had approached the corner in the usual way and then I totally lost control of the car under braking. I tried to slow down, but the impact was still pretty violent. The most important thing is that we were able to fix the car and in the end we didn't lose that much time as it wasn't planned for me to do many laps in the morning. I want to thank all the lads for the work they did: they were fantastic and they didn't stop for a moment right up to the very end of the second session. We came to Silverstone with a good starting point after the tests we did here last week and I think we are going in the right direction. I am pleased with the balance of the car and its performance on both types of tyre we have here from Bridgestone." Luca Baldisserri: "We struggled a bit today. This morning we had Felipe going off the track which did serious damage to his car. Fortunately, thanks to an exceptional job from the team, we managed to put the car back together and get the driver out on track with an hour remaining of the second session. Kimi was unable to find the best set-up on his car, so we can expect a bit of work now to be as well prepared as possible for tomorrow. From what we saw today, and from the data we gathered last week, we have a significant amount of information to study to be ready for qualifying and for the race, while keeping in mind the fact the weather could be bad." . . . . . . Carol
