F1 Feature - Time for the FIA to make an example of Vettel? They made him do a written apology to Whiting for the **** OFF outburst and made him promise no more outbursts. So now he is kind of muzzled , he uses another method to express his anger.Todt and the rest will not be at all impressed. I think they should come down hard on this kind of behaviour,next time it might have different consequences.
This isn't a high school. They handed him the penalty. Some feel it was too soft, others feel it was harsh. It's done, he's got the points on his license time to move on... What F1 needs now is not a bunch of PC politics, it needs a good title fight.
Time for the FIA to make an example of Hamilton??? Pick an incident he was not penalized for ok? The horse is dead - so move on!
How many more threads do we need about this subject? It looks like the Hamilton fan club decided to take "revenge" for the in their opinion unfair treatment of Lewis here over the last years. Complain about the "hate against Lewis" all the time but doing not a bit better against Vettel now... Enjoy your five minutes, who knows what is next...
It's actually the world's press who do these articles,including Auto Motor Und Sport,Italians/Spanish /French etc etc perhaps you want to censor them too? If you chose not to read them fine ,others might choose differently.
OK...just one question: would you post all this if the roles of Hamilton and Vettel would be reversed? I doubt...
I think I must have watched a different race! Yes it was a stupid thing to do but they were hardly moving and there was no danger or damage. There is nothing to suggest he would do this sort of thing at speed (er, unless we think about what he did to Webber, which went unpunished). Let's all move on, he's been punished and lost a potential win. It was a stupid race on a stupid track that can only have passed FIA safety reviews due to huge bribes! Pete
In my point of view the two drivers should have been penalized, not just Vettel. The two faults must have been sanctioned. We all know that Hamilton has a kind of crown in the FIA and is never sanctioned. Hamilton really seems to me to be a malicious sportsman with very perverse intentions, always trying provocative moves against their rivals, seeking to get them out of their minds, as he did the previous years with Rosberg. My advice to Vettel is to assume that Hamilton will try to play with his head and try to provoke him always. He must be intelligent and do not get into his game. It is expected that in case of having a Safety Car again, with Hamilton in the first position and Vettel second will try again braking and deceleration maneuvers, I think that Vettel should try to point the edges of the front wing to the center of the rear tires in order to cause a puncture in the Mercedes tires, in the case of Hamilton producing these malicious braking and deceleration maneuvers.
Probably no need for me to post ..you guys would already be out of the blocks like Usain Bolt, running with the baton Watching the race live (did you ?) i thought Lewis had brake tested Vettel and posted that opinion at that time. The facts provided by the stewards changed my mind.
The problem is that many drivers had done dirty tricks without penalty and that Charlie Whiting has screwed it up so many times that any punishment would lack legitimacy. Did Vettel deserve a harsher penalty or not? Harsher compared with what? I´d black flagged Vettel and put 10 seconds to Hamilton, but that didn´t happen. I´d already assumed that deserving has nothing to do with F1. Time to move on.
The stewards opinion of anything is usually wrong, and usually biased for 'the show'. Let's remember, the stewards failed to notice a **** off massive crane lifting elton back on the track in his mclaren once, in a flagrant example of assistance to return to the track, an outright regulatory no no. For anyone that could try to argue 'unsafe position, better to be back on track', the crane didn't lift the other three cars back on track, including the one that went off before elton, and therefore should have been, if it were legal, the first in line for the crane. The stewards suggesting thee wasn't a brake check are deluded, watch the footage, its very clear that slowing down occurred, and given the safety car was a long way away, it wasn't necessary to slow down immediately on the corner exit like that, no one in racing acts that way, except old cheating-ton, who has been warned over his driving plenty of times under the safety car, but rarely sanctioned ala the 'is it because I is black' comment aimed at stewards in Monaco to avoid a penalty there
Leave this thread open. It's hilarious to watch the polarised views of the Pro and Anti Ham fanatics. The best comedy of all time. No value add though. As for Vettel - he was given his punishment. Case closed. Move on. Giving him further penalties would be completely unwise and would open the sport up to clear accusations of manipulation. It's hard enough to please the fanatics as it is.
Sebastian Vettel: FIA could take further action over Lewis Hamilton collision - BBC Sport I think they will have to take some more action,after the warning in Mexico with Whiting. Nil points for Baku should get his attention.
As a newcomer to F1 (literally just started watching this year because frankly I felt like a bad Ferrari owner having no interest in the sport and wanted to give it a go), if they end up banning Vettel for that incident, I'm done and am quitting my recent trend of watching F1. Should he have done what he did? No. But it is the heat of the moment, and it wasn't that serious in my opinion (speed was low, tire to tire and not even clear that he made contact on purpose). A ban would in essence be likely to give Mercedes the constructor title and Hamilton the WDC, and would be a huge overreaction I think at best, and at worst indicate that the thing is rigged in favor of Mercedes. Either way, it would leave a very sour taste in my mouth, one that, given my lack of any real history with F1, would make me leave the sport. I realize I am probably in the minority on this and am in a unique position given how recently I have started watching, but the whole situation - both the initial action and the talking heads and various after math - stinks to high heaven.
If they alter their decision it will seriously undermine F1 as a sport. Track stewards are like referees, it's on them to make decisions during the actual event. If the penalty is deemed wrong post-event, the blame lays with the incompetent stewarding team, who should receive better training. Now, if they actually change race/championship results because of whining from some of the involved parties and - gasp - members of the specialized media, then it's a clear message that F1 is steadfastly heading towards being reality television, rather than a proper sport. If the governing body needs to correct any official decision days after the event, it only proves how incompetent the stewards are at the actual race. Worse, it sets a very iffy precedent, effectively putting them in the position of clowns making suggestions, rather than 'referees' with the authority to enforce rules. Who is going to respect race stewards when they know anything can be argued later? Very quickly it will become a case of who can cry most, and louder. (Hamilton currently beats the rest of the grid & paddock on this one by a country mile...) IF this is truly a PR issue, and IF the FIA are *so* worried about repercussions with road safety and the little children, they should make Vettel do some public anti road rage campaigns, and fine him if he doesn't. There, that gets the whole politically correct spectacle BS out of the way, and appeases politicians and lawyers by reinforcing their manufactured responsibility to advocate for a safer world through an inherently unsafe sporting activity. It also gets a guy in a red suit clowning around in front of reporters, satiating their desire to be pandered to by a key member of a sports organization whose only job is to win races. Referees/stewards need to get things right when they happen, it's their responsibility to lay out punishment on site, during the event, and it is the sportsmen's responsibility to accept that, whether they like it or not. If the decision turns out to be wrong, it's on the backs of the stewards who did a crap job. Better luck next time. Luck plays its part in winning or losing championships. Crappy ref calls are part of the game. Any serious sport takes that for granted. Let the fans and reporters whine and/or gloat about it. It makes the whole thing more exciting - and real.
Interesting article from Joe Saward's blog entitled "Crime and Punishment" At the end, he quotes F1 photographer Darren Heath: Ferrari really are a horrible team right now, he wrote. Dismissive of interest, completely devoid of any grace, charm or humility, they exude an aggressive arrogance that is bitter in its mien and wholly unpleasant to experience. Read here: https://joesaward.wordpress.com/
Wow. Adds credence to those who think 'F1 could survive without Ferrari'. If anything close to true, not a happy picture for the fanboys. (I'm a pragmatist...sorry if you are offended.)
I read that and posted exactly the same comment I posted above, on his website... it is "awaiting moderation"... Saward has some good insights but the man is very very very UK biased. I actually laughed out loud when I read his "I am european" line. The other day, by the way, he was writing about how he thinks it is an F1 team's job to talk to the media, lest the sponsors be upset. Utter nonsense. Some reporters get their panties in a twist when they get no attention from top teams. This happens to affect British ones significantly more. Ironically, although I believe the team should act any way it wants to toward the media, I do think he has a point that not talking to the media won't favor Ferrari's position. Tis the political world we live in...