2011 Australian Grand Prix

[prisonermonkeys]

I've been to Bathurst before. The experience was horrible. We tried to get a spot up near Sulman Park because it's the best section of track, but all the Holden fans kicked us out because it was apparently "their" spot. But even if we'd have been able to stay, I don't think we would have wanted to. It wasn't yet 11am on the Friday before race day - we were just passing through, but planned to be there - and there were dozens of people off their faces. This was before the police started enforcing booze laws, but honestly, Bathurst was a horrible place to be at that time.

 

[Cap'n Jack]

I've been to Bathurst before. The experience was horrible. We tried to get a spot up near Sulman Park because it's the best section of track, but all the Holden fans kicked us out because it was apparently "their" spot. But even if we'd have been able to stay, I don't think we would have wanted to. It wasn't yet 11am on the Friday before race day - we were just passing through, but planned to be there - and there were dozens of people off their faces. This was before the police started enforcing booze laws, but honestly, Bathurst was a horrible place to be at that time.

I actually had a completely different experience at Bathurst. Although I only went on the Sunday of the 2004 race (I believe this was before the alcohol laws), I found it to be a very family friendly atmosphere up there. I spent most the race sitting at and around Sulman and McPhillamy where there were a quite a few dads and mums with their younger kids.

But I have to disagree with replacing Albert Park with a Mt. Panorama rip-off. The circuit owners would no doubt want the V8's to visit and something about the series running around an imitation of their mecca would surely be considered sacrilegious by the V8 gods!

 

[F1 fan]

Anyways I just want to warn people from England and Ireland. On Saturday night, or Sunday morning, the clocks go forward one hour so I think you will hav to set your alarm to 5AM. I'm not entirely sure though.

I guess the Scottish and the Welsh are on different time zones then? Or do they just not matter to you?

 

[Lee]

In all seriousness?

I hope Ricciardo doesn't make it. That might sound like a horrible thing to say, but I'm honestly sick an tired of hearing about him - helped in no small part by those bloody idiots we know as the Channel Ten commentators - and he isn't even in the sport yet. Everybody talks about him like he's the golden child of the next generation, simply because he set a lap time good enough to qualify for third in the race that had just happened, ignoring the fact that the circuit had considerably more rubber laid down from testing and an entire Grand Prix meeting than it did when those qualifying times were set.

In the current crop of young up-and-comers, he's right up there in terms of talent and pace. Sure everyone over-hyped the Abu Dhabi test, I agree with your remarks about that. However, his career up to now has been very much F1 driver standard, winning the British F3 Championship at the first time of asking, coming second (by two points) in his debut season in the World Series by Renault..

The chap's got something, deffinately. More so than Buemi (Who has never won a junior series) and Alguersuari (6th in his debut WSR season).

I guess the Scottish and the Welsh are on different time zones then? Or do they just not matter to you?

Don't let Daan see this..

 

[aarror]

If you can't be bothered thinking, then you shouldn't bother posting.

If you take away the steep drops around Mount Panorama such as building an identical track on "safer" land, it takes away half of the spectacle of such a track. This is the point lukecfc is making.

While Bathurst is an awesome track, F1 can never race there and creating an identical track would be extremely expensive and quite pointless. Albert Park is a fine track - why fix something that isn't broke? If F1 has to leave Melbourne, I'd much prefer to see Adelaide make a come back.

Unfortunately, They're looking for a permanent track, not a street circuit, which sucks because seeing an F1 car rip through turn 8 would be awesome!

 

[Rossticles]

I found it to be horrible. Read through it again, and ask yourself the following question: how does this affect Tonio Liuzzi?

He was only mentioned at Renault, a team he had a chance at, Force India, his previous team, and his current team HRT. I don't see that as focusing on him any more than any other driver. Every article is going to have bias. You disagreeing with that bias doesn't mean it's wrong or it's a bad article. Also there are always going to be opinions and statements that are out there like the ones about Sutil and STR. As far as the bottom teams go it isn't easy to come up with anything to write about them. Whatever.

I'd post a link to the preview quotes they would probably be seen as stupid as well.

 

[lukecfc]

If you can't be bothered reading, then you shouldn't bother posting.

Ok sorry about that, I didn't actually mean I didn't read it, it's just a term I loosely use to say somethings pretty long. Basically what I was saying is that the spectacle of seeing F1 on Bathurst will not be the same as seeing seeing it on a similar circuit somewhere else. eg. F1 on my local racetrack (which is pretty crap) would be pretty impressive, and not just because I'd watch it live, but watching it on a replica circuit somewhere 200 km away wouldn't be the same.

Also, if your going to lose the scenery and change the track, albeit slightly, I don't think it'll be the same as Mt. Panorama. Scenery is the wrong word here though (although conrod straight does look brilliant), its more like the feel, the novelty of the circuit. They might be able to get the shape right, but they definitely wont be able to get those in.

 

[happycorey]

Excited to start my first full season of F1. Only caught the last half in 2010. Hoping Seb comes out strong and Shumi proves himself as well.

 

[IceMan PJN]

Excited to start my first full season of F1. Only caught the last half in 2010. Hoping Seb comes out strong and Shumi proves himself as well.

Ahah. So, 2010 was your first F1 season? This explains why you're backing Vettel. Granted, he's a talented driver, but having the right car helps. Had Vettel been driving a Lotus or Torro Rosso last season, you probably wouldn't be backing Vettel going into 2011. I'm a Hamilton fan, and I started following F1 in 2008, when he happened to win the WDC. Had I started in 2009 I'd probably have ended up a Button fan. There's actually a lot of talent on the grid, to varying degrees, but they don't all have a championship-winning car.

Where a driver really has a chance to shine relative to the next guy is when he's in a matching car. Hamilton was 2008 WDC, and Button 2009, but starting in 2010 they were in matching cars so you get a better sense of which one's actually more talented as a driver. In 2010 Hamilton outperformed Button in almost every possible way, although Button still did well, and the only reason Button came so close in the points is that Hamilton had a string of rotten luck for a handful of consecutive races. Heck, had Hamilton enjoyed Button's good fortune, he'd probably have won his second championship last season.

 

[Rossticles]

Ahah. So, 2010 was your first F1 season? This explains why you're backing Vettel. Granted, he's a talented driver, but having the right car helps. Had Vettel been driving a Lotus or Torro Rosso last season, you probably wouldn't be backing Vettel going into 2011. I'm a Hamilton fan, and I started following F1 in 2008, when he happened to win the WDC. Had I started in 2009 I'd probably have ended up a Button fan. There's actually a lot of talent on the grid, to varying degrees, but they don't all have a championship-winning car.

Every driver on the grid could win the championship with the right car. I don't get what you're trying to say here. Hamilton won because he had one of the best cars on the grid and got lucky in Brazil. Vettel won because he had the best car on the grid and got lucky in Abu Dhabi.

~ 24hrs to FP1

 

[happycorey]

Well it was more of a forming an opinion over which driver I liked most, and who you want to root for. I love Schumi, because he is one of the greats, but I just don't think that he would be MY favorite driver that I could follow for quite some time. I love Ferrari, but I didn't really like any of their drivers at the moment. Overall, Vettel is about as young as I am, and I like Red Bull Racing as a team. So it was my choice to back the driver, even though he almost lost the championship, he was still going to be my favorite driver.

If I had even followed back in 08, he could have still been my favorite since he drove well that season and brought RBR their first win, and in 09 he did pretty good also. It's just who I liked most, and his talent is great as well.

 

[Ardius]

Ahah. So, 2010 was your first F1 season? This explains why you're backing Vettel. Granted, he's a talented driver, but having the right car helps. Had Vettel been driving a Lotus or Torro Rosso last season, you probably wouldn't be backing Vettel going into 2011. I'm a Hamilton fan, and I started following F1 in 2008, when he happened to win the WDC. Had I started in 2009 I'd probably have ended up a Button fan. There's actually a lot of talent on the grid, to varying degrees, but they don't all have a championship-winning car.

Where a driver really has a chance to shine relative to the next guy is when he's in a matching car. Hamilton was 2008 WDC, and Button 2009, but starting in 2010 they were in matching cars so you get a better sense of which one's actually more talented as a driver. In 2010 Hamilton outperformed Button in almost every possible way, although Button still did well, and the only reason Button came so close in the points is that Hamilton had a string of rotten luck for a handful of consecutive races. Heck, had Hamilton enjoyed Button's good fortune, he'd probably have won his second championship last season.

So Vettel hasn't shone against Bourdais, Liuzzi or Webber? "Had he been driving a Lotus or a Toro Rosso" - Monza 2008. Vettel has shone in the past in less than great cars, believe it or not, he had fans from way back since 2007.

Hamilton didn't exactly outperform Button in "every possible way"...he still seems fairly weak at thinking his way through races, still making race-ending dives. It certainly wasn't "bad luck" at Melbourne or Monza. Granted, Button clearly isn't as fast as Hamilton and struggles a lot with cars he doesn't like but held his own against Lewis much more than people gave him credit for before and after 2010.
Hamilton would have won last year with more luck? Same could be said for all 5 contenders last year except Button who really needs to sort out his qualifying performances. All of them suffered bad luck.

Its kind of amusing to assume someone is a Vettel fan simply because he was champion that year - 2010 was one of the most undecided championships ever. Vettel really didn't win it in commanding style like many do. Personally I feel Red Bull didn't make good enough use of the car they had, Vettel, Webber and the team's strategies and unreliability really made a meal of that season. I'd imagine 2010 made more Kubica, Button and Kobayashi fans than any other driver.
I've been a Button fan ever since his debut in 2000. Surely by your logic I should be a Schumacher fan (1994 is the earliest season I can remember watching), but I'm not.

 

[F1 fan]

Ahah. So, 2010 was your first F1 season? This explains why you're backing Vettel. Granted, he's a talented driver, but having the right car helps. Had Vettel been driving a Lotus or Torro Rosso last season, you probably wouldn't be backing Vettel going into 2011. I'm a Hamilton fan, and I started following F1 in 2008, when he happened to win the WDC. Had I started in 2009 I'd probably have ended up a Button fan. There's actually a lot of talent on the grid, to varying degrees, but they don't all have a championship-winning car.

Where a driver really has a chance to shine relative to the next guy is when he's in a matching car. Hamilton was 2008 WDC, and Button 2009, but starting in 2010 they were in matching cars so you get a better sense of which one's actually more talented as a driver. In 2010 Hamilton outperformed Button in almost every possible way, although Button still did well, and the only reason Button came so close in the points is that Hamilton had a string of rotten luck for a handful of consecutive races. Heck, had Hamilton enjoyed Button's good fortune, he'd probably have won his second championship last season.

That is a ridiculous quote. Not everyone chooses to support someone because they won the championship in the first season they watched.

FYI, I'm a Vettel fan, but I've been watching f1 since 1991. Quite frankly, the fact that you assume that someone supports Vettel purely because they only started watching in his first championship season is idiotic.

When i started watching f1 in 91, my attention span was quite short (being 4 years old), but I started supporting Schumi at some point in 1992.

 

[Rossticles]

Its kind of amusing to assume someone is a Vettel fan simply because he was champion that year - 2010 was one of the most undecided championships ever. Vettel really didn't win it in commanding style like many do. Personally I feel Red Bull didn't make good enough use of the car they had, Vettel, Webber and the team's strategies and unreliability really made a meal of that season. I'd imagine 2010 made more Kubica, Button and Kobayashi fans than any other driver.
I've been a Button fan ever since his debut in 2000. Surely by your logic I should be a Schumacher fan (1994 is the earliest season I can remember watching), but I'm not.

I became a Raikkonen fan when I first started watching F1 during the 2002 season. The 2007 season was a good one. Ha. I started to pay attention to Vettel starting at the aforementioned 2008 race at Monza when he won from pole in STR which used to be the terrible Minardi team. When Raikkonen left Ferrari my attention shifted heavily toward Vettel and Kubica, who also had brought a struggling team some points. I guess my point is that M. Schumacher was at the height of his popularity winning 5 championships in a row when I started watching and I can't stand him.

 

[niky]

Would be interesting to dig up threads and find out when we started the Sebastian Vettel fan club here... I'm pretty sure it was during that Scuderia Torro Rosso season when he had his first win. I think I was one of the first dozen members.

So... where are my Kobayashi-club mates at?

 

[astrosdude91]

I'm a Red Bull and Vettel fan by chance. At the beginning of last year. I randomly picked a team to be a root for. I had no knowledge of any previous F1 seasons, but I liked Red Bull energy drink. So I went with them. I probably would've done the same thing in 2006 or something when they were still a mediocre team.

 

[Northstar]

I started following F1 lightly in '07, Hamilton was also debuting in F1 that year so I just went with him as my favorite, plus, I've always liked McLaren. Everyone has different reason's as to why they pick certain drivers/teams as their favorite, it's not worth arguing over.

----------------------------

Australia will be interesting, hopefully I won't repeat last year and doze through 3/4 of it.

 

[Rossticles]

I started following F1 lightly in '07, Hamilton was also debuting in F1 that year so I just went with him as my favorite, plus, I've always liked McLaren. Everyone has different reason's as to why they pick certain drivers/teams as their favorite, it's not worth arguing over.

----------------------------

Australia will be interesting, hopefully I won't repeat last year and doze through 3/4 of it.

I always enter these race weekends (Malaysia, China, Japan) thinking "Oh it looks like I'm going to stay up late the whole weekend." It never happens. I end up setting my alarm and then turning it off when it goes off at 2am thinking what the hell my alarm is going off for.

 

[Terronium-12]

I officially started watching in '09, but can slightly remember watching the occasional race as far back as '06 or '07 (I did say slightly, didn't I? ) but when I started watching it properly I didn't really cheer for anyone despite knowing practically everyone that was in a seat at the time; it wasn't until mid-season where i genuinely wanted Barrichello to snag the WDC because he's one of the racers I pay attention to but needless to say when Button to the WDC home I was almost as pleased.

Enter 2010:

Everything was common place now. I'm familiar with everyone on the field, even more so than I was beforehand, and pretty much from the green light I wanted Webber to win (and the same can be said of this season as well), so the logic being that you're likely to relate of the then champion is dim at best.

Did I mention I wanted Webber to get the title this season?

 

[astrosdude91]

I'm the same way, T. I watched an occasional race during '06 or '07 when they would show it on Fox. I had no idea who any of the drivers were, but I remember thinking "how the hell are they going so fast?"

 

[F1 fan]

Australia will be interesting, hopefully I won't repeat last year and doze through 3/4 of it.

Ouch... Have done that once or twice, but only when the race was boring. Australia 2010 was anything but boring. Looking forward to the f1 finally starting.

 

[Terronium-12]

I'm the same way, T. I watched an occasional race during '06 or '07 when they would show it on Fox. I had no idea who any of the drivers were, but I remember thinking "how the hell are they going so fast?"

One of the first things I thought were "These things are 🤬 loud!"

 

[prisonermonkeys]

I've been a dedicated fan of Formula 1 for quite a while now, but it wasn't until the middle of 2008 that I got to watch races regularly, and 2009 was the first season I got to see in full, which was lucky for me because I've been a Jenson Button fan since 2000. I really started paying attention to the sport then, and I wanted to find a driver whose career I could follow from start to finish. As Button was a rookie in 2000, I started supporting him.

 

[TheFlyingKiwi]

I always loved f1 but never followed it until last year. Now im an avid fan however I cant watch many races due to time zones but can't wait for the Aussie gp where I can watch live the Ferraris take a one two win.

 

[lmanion]

I have followed it since I was really little I think I was 6 or 7 when Senna died and I can still remember the news reports of his death. I have always been a Mclaren fan but I also like Williams as well. My problem atm is that the only driver I really dont mind in the 2 teams is Button, Webber is now my number one driver and I have followed him since the news of him being given a drive in the Minardi.

 

[astrosdude91]

I should just start a thread for people to share how and when they got into F1, so we can stop cluttering up this one.

 

[J-PaP]

Was really cold and wet today especially during v8's qualifying. I'd wear gumboots tomorrow if I had a pair.

Didn't get to see too much racing today as I spent it doing the pit walk and going to see all the different displays around the track.

Got to briefly meet kovaleinen and trulli and get them to sign my hat. Kovaleinen was really friendly.

the Formula 5000 cars are amazing! Though they struggle to stay on the track. There were 3 or 4 red flags during their qualifying session.

Look forward to hearing the noise of F1 tomorrow.

 

[Cap'n Jack]

the Formula 5000 cars are amazing! Though they struggle to stay on the track. There were 3 or 4 red flags during their qualifying session.

I love watching those cars go, they're just an absolutely awesome sight... not to mention the sound! I would love it if they brought some of the cars of the Tasman Series out for a little race too.

 

[J-PaP]

I love watching those cars go, they're just an absolutely awesome sight... not to mention the sound! I would love it if they brought some of the cars of the Tasman Series out for a little race too.

I believe they had a few of them in the historic demonstration. Nothing racing though. They sound amazing. I'm not sure of the model but there was this one that stood out from the others that was mostly blue up front and completely bare in the rear. Clearly longer than the others as well. Guy was giving it down the straight and could drown out the other formula 5000 cars thats how loud it was.

 

[Grayfox]

Why is lotus racing this year?

In my view their too slow and are a hazard.