Sebastien Bourdais has been given a five-place grid penalty for impeding Nick Heidfeld during qualifying for the Hungarian Grand Prix. The German driver complained that Bourdais had slowed him down during his final run in Q1, when the Frenchman was right in front near the end of the lap. As a result of the incident, Heidfeld failed to make it to Q2 for the first time this year. The stewards decided to give Bourdais a five-position grid penalty, meaning the Toro Rosso driver will start from the back of the grid. The stewards also investigated an incident between Williams' Kazuki Nakajima and Renault's Fernando Alonso, but no action was taken.
They should have given Heidfeld the 5 place penalty and any other driver that whines about being held up. Bunch of wussies, back when qualifying mean't something, you just got on with it.
Well it sucks to have someone on your racing line while you're on a flyer, and you have to slow down or get off line to get around them. The lap has then gone to crap, and you have to try it again. The problem is, if there is no time left, you have a crap lap, thanks to the person who held you up. It's really no fun, and I can fully understand them getting pissed at it.
+1 Bourdais was just starting his flying lap so where should he have gone? Heidfeld was just frustrated with his own performance and should be mad at himself, not at Bourdais.
Blame Heidfelds strategist / pit boss - they should have factored in - which the very nearly did correctly - other cars that may have gotten in the way in Nicks flyer, or Bourdais counterpart who didn't tell him to get a shifty on as someone was coming up behind him fast Anyway, if Heidfeld shaved that silly beard off, that's gotta be worth a couple of tenths
Back in the day.... we always looked for gaps in traffic and would release the car acordingly, sometimes just as a quick car came around in order to get a 'tow' or some driver motivation. Luckily most drivers had the 'red mist shield' on and would not deliberately slow to spoil our lap. Of course back then drivers would have no problem "discussing" things with each other after the session. (And you thought Danica invented the pit stalk....) Ah, those were the days, cars were beautiful to see (mostly), anyone with a bag of wedge could build himself one and a driver could go from F3 to the bigtime (or not). No (or few) motorhomes, camaraderie et al.....
+2 . A ridiculous penalty. The team and Sein put themselves in a hole, a pathetic effort for the third best team in F1. Qualifying isn't everything but it is a portent. Nick's search for scapegoats will continue as his speed fades, a great shame as he seems to be one of the nicer people in F1.
From the onboard, it didn't really look like Nick had been blocked. I think Nick missed that SeaBass was starting a hot lap, so it may have looked odd from Nick's viewpoint -- (slow when being run down, then speeds up at the start line). From the onboard tv view, this seems like a bad call. But by my numbers 14th + 5 spots is still only 19th ---- so if the purpose was to avoid Sutil having to start dead last, this might not do it.
+1 If they're going to have knock out qualifying with all the cars on the circuit at the same time then they should realize they're not always going to have a clear empty track with no cars on it! Last time I checked the steering wheel turns both directions so you can go around someone who is going slower, if it messes up your perfect lap, tough cookies that's what happens when everyone else is going for a fast lap at the same time.
I did not see the situation that caused the penalty. I don't think any of you were at the track either at that exact location to see what truly happened. The reason for the rule is to avoid potential disaster of a car at speed ramming another car on its cool down lap. Also to give a driver a chance at an unobstructed fast lap. Its either this or single car qualifying which is really boring. I prefer the current F1 method and support these penalties, right or wrong, you just can't have it both ways. The stewards made the call, so I am thinking it was legitimate. Someday, when it happens to your favorite driver, you will complain about the rule not being effective. Bourdais probably deserved the penalty.
i actually missed the incident. but i did see the part where Nick was waving his hand on the main straight to SeaBass. not gonna help him in his bed to secure his seat next year.
The world feed showed the onboard from Nick's car. It might have missed a block at an earlier point on track, but just before Nick was doing his hand waving, just before the start/finish, there was a decent gap to Bourdais.
