2015 FORMULA 1 JAPANESE GRAND PRIX: RACE *** SPOILERS ***

Maurizio sees reduced gap even on this kind of track

Maurizio Arrivabene: “You’re never completely happy when you don’t win the race, but I think this result should not be compared with what we had achieved in Singapore one week ago. We’d rather compare this track to Silverstone, because it has similar characteristics. And if we look back at the British Grand Prix, at the gap that we had there to our main rivals, we can see that today we have been closer. And this means that there has been a major development in all areas, starting from our power unit. As for the strategy, we were in doubt as to shortcut the Mercedes or pit after them; but there were not many data available from practice, due to the rain on Friday, so making certain choices would have meant a huge risk for the life of the tires.”

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SF Sunday Press Release in full.
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Mercedes is upset because they didn't feature on the TV. Boo ****ing hoo.


They make it so easy to make themselves deeply unlikeable. Their drivers, one of them thinks he's a rapper and is constantly confused about what he should portray, instead of being himself. The other one is as bland as they come and still gets pushed around. For some reason they have Lauda in there, presumably to make up wrong statements and try and be in the picture still. Even their team principal is factually a robot.

When they don't win a race it's ''CRISIS CONTROL''. And now when they win a race they get pissy because the camera's weren't on them to watch their uber alles domination. Nothing happened with them, so no reason to keep the camera on them. Battle for 9 to 11th all race was far more exciting.

 

JENSON!

Yup, my thoughts too.

oh, and it's JENSON!!!!

More action in the midfield than up front. Considering their lack of power and ERS deployment issues, I was excited to see Alonso defend against faster cars, even when those other cars had DRS enabled. Ultimately, there was only so much he could do with the McHonda car.


In other somewhat related news, did anyone else catch the MotoGP Aragon race? That Pedrosa v. Rossi battle was EPIC!!!!!!!!!

 

Ron is absolutely right, you cannot encourage more teams into the sport, and more investment from those already in it performing badly, if they can't test and make improvements that make a difference. For once, Ron is bang on.

Bring back testing, by the time Ferrari or anyone else is ready to beat merc regularly, it will have been 50 races of dominance........ That equates to three and a half seasons under the old race numbers per season, hence why we are all sick of F1 at the moment, boring boring boring, the occasional concession to a Ferrari win Isnt enough as we knew this years championship results in Australia LAST year

 

And when I say fifty races, I'm counting the first half of next season too, the winter will only catch the mercs, they will develop on and maintain the advantage and Ferrari will have to catch the last few tenths on track next year

 

Maurizio always looks like he's smelt something horrible under his nose!

 

...Alonso was probably in the neighborwoods....

 

TFHB alert



--Nico Rosberg was down on power for Japanese GP F1 start--

Nico Rosberg was down on power for Japanese GP F1 start - F1 news - AUTOSPORT.com

 

Saw that this morning. Seems mb is having some issues with their new engines.

 

Fair enough....that explains it. Oh well.

 

Yea, that was great. I was sure Rossi was just stalking Pedrosa to force an error, but the Honda power on the straight and Pedrosa's cojones made the difference.

Was happy to see Iannone in 4th - having a decent year.

 

pissed that Rossi finished third but it was an awesome battle-far more exciting than F1's japan snooze fest.

 

Actually Hamilton does that every time because he's self-conscious about how his hair looks immediately after he comes out of the helmet, so he's really avoiding the camera while he tries to fluff it back up.

 

They should absolutely be allowed to test a lot more, though perhaps not unlimited testing, which favors wealthy teams. It's absurd to ban testing in what is supposed to be the pinnacle of motorsport.

 

+1

I fully understand they don't want a return to unlimited testing using multiple dedicated test teams, but running for 2 or 3 days after select races would see minimal increase in costs and the tracks already nicely rubbered in etc. Cost a bunch of hotel rooms etc for a few more nights, which unless you're Fauxtus right now, is a drop in the ocean to these guys.

Cheers,
Ian

 

"Fair" would be letting the tail end teams/struggling teams, like those consistently outside the top 7 - 8 finishers at every race get some limited testing throughout the year.

Top two teams in championship could get 1 or 2 days outside race weekends, 3rd - 4th 3 or 4 extra days, 5th - 7-th maybe 5 extra test sessions, etc..

When performance improves, one unused test day goes away, etc.

I dunno I'm not in charge.

 

That's ok cause the guys in charge don't know either...

 

It's Bernie who convinced the teams to give up the test days and accept more races instead.

Bernie argued his case, saying that could sell races, collect and redistribute more money, but he could not sell the test sessions that cost just as much to the teams, according to him.

But the effects of lack of testing are now deeply felt; mostly when you change formula.
That, and the silly token system is what is damaging F1. It's very difficult to challenge Mercedes, when you are restricted to develop and test.

IMO, there are too many GPs,

 

+1

The token system is fine...later. Should have given them free range to play with their engines and get it right, then 2017 orso, introduce a token system.

 

+1...I wonder if the system in place was an enticement to keep Mercedes? Recall that a) they were debating whether or not to stay prior to creating their works team and b) Bernie was intricately involved in Hamilton moving to Merc. While we applaud LH for having the foresight to jump to Merc, there's also the belief dangling in my mind that he was privy to information that would make it advantageous to jump to the Silver Arrows.

It's my opinion that Bernie may have bent over a little too far backwards to keep an (important) manufacturer involved in F1. I think they were given assurances they would be ahead of the field for a little run and have one of the premier drivers on their team.

Now, it's time to take my TFH back off. Thanks for humoring me.

 

Your scenario is not unreasonable at all.....

 

This is what happened when they changed to the previous V8 in '06. The first year teams were allowed to make any changes they liked.

It's not too late to make this change, although I doubt it will happen.

 

We know from the start of the '14 season that it was indeed Merc's threatened position to leave if they didn't get the hybrid system they wanted.

There are plenty of stories about Merc also having a far deeper and earlier engagement with the FiA on the new engine spec giving them a huge head start. That is consistent with what we know about Merc seeking to have secret/extra testing over and above the other teams (ie tire test in Spain).

 

There are plenty of them!
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