2013 Formula One Spanish Grand Prix

[Centura]

I'm happy I learned my lesson last year and stopped "cheering" for Mercedes. They sound surprised (seriously?) that their car is still eating the tyres more than anyone else.

 

[F1 fan]

Just like the GP2 race this morning, which was a disgrace.

Speaking of which, I'm amazed that Cecotto hasn't been given a penalty. That move on Canamasas was ridiculous.

 

[zippy_the_cat]

Quick reactions after watching the BBC recording:

1). Another supreme drive from Alonso with Raikkonen and Massa nearly matching him for quality. Fernando's first lap was textbook stuff and Kimi was firm and decisive in dealing with Vettel.

2). Hamilton got badly shown up by Rosberg, and for the first time gave his new co-workers at Mercedes a taste of the bad-Lewis nonsense that in the end I doubt folks at McLaren are missing. Lewis stuffed his own race with the lock-up just after the start and it was all downhill for that set of tires and everything else after that. Ross Brawn made it very clear afterwards that he thought Hamilton had under-performed ("Nico did an excellent job managing the tyres to make just three stops and his level of performance showed what our car is currently capable of on tracks like this"), so the honeymoon is clearly ending.

3). Red Bull as a group did some good damage-mitigation today. They were a bit lucky that Grosjean's suspension broke, but what they could control, they did.

4). Ricciardo didn't hurt his case for a promotion in 2014 and Di Resta despite scoring good points didn't help his own. For both, luck played a part in blunting the impact of what they accomplished -- Vergne having to retire through no fault of his own took away Ricciardo's measuring stick, and Di Resta was very unlucky that the backmarkers happened to be ideally placed to give Rosberg the benefit of DRS.

5). Pirelli's now talking about a compound change for Siilverstone. It's not a testament to Horner's political skills that still it's only one team pressing for a revert to 2012 spec -- Brawn should be riding that train too and up to now hasn't been.

 

[LMSCorvetteGT2]

Perhaps they're already developing next year's car? I know it's only early days into this season yet, but with the huge development budget Mercedes will have they could definitely hit the ground running with the new specification next year.

As said by others suspension set up seems to be the issue, also Mercedes and Ferrari are both currently working on their 2014 cars side by side with progression of their current 2013 cars. They have been doing this since last year, hence the influx of engineers hired by both Merc GP and Ferrari (bring back Rory Byrne to do the 2014 car). Also it would be stupid and a waste for them to squander this car after 5 races when Lewis is 4th WDC and still has a very real chance of climbing up further up.

Anyways, it's a bit of common knowledge that the Ferrari and Mercedes are both working on 2014 cars right now. They have two team engineer groups doing this.

You have to be good on tyres to do what Ferrari did. Like I said also they could also do a 3 stop, but as it is more risky and you can make 4 stop work then it is better to go for 4 stop.

If that were the case, then Ferrari would have taken the 3 stops, it isn't more risky. It comes down to being a matter of if their car can allow them to do it or not. From the graining on the tires during the race and the situation Massa dealt with via delamination, I'd say four is the best they could muster. Having the best car helped them maximize what they could and that is why they won today, not because of some great tire control that you say the Ferrari has when they have said they aren't amazing at them. Pat Fry says they and several teams need to get a better understanding of tires, and that as been an issue at Ferrari for the past couple year (hence hiring a Tire Engineer), yet no where near as bad as Merc GP.

“We’re not going the pace of the car, we’re going the pace of the tyres”

Think he put it best ^

 

[Wardez]

Yeah, Ferrari actually pushed for most of the race while other teams kept on the same program of conservation. Will Buxton lays it all really, really, nicely in his latest blogpost.

I think you all should read it, since it talks about how the teams really aren't forced into babying their tires but opt for it since going for less stops has always been the case in F1, in this era or any.
He calls this race a game changer in the sense that other teams are now going to be looking at exposing their necks and going flat out at the sacrifice of maybe one more stop, which really isn't too bad if you really look at things.

He mentions also how RBR had considered four stopping but kept it conservative in the plan. Once they realized what Ferrari was going for, they realized they could've done the same and probably gotten much closer to Alonso. The Formula the way it is now made Alonso's win possible, but it didn't grant him it whatsoever. They had to work hard for this win and I'm proud of the way they did, so much. Just looking at the stat's for Catalunya and how starting from pole used to pretty much be an automatic win and seeing this really puts a smile on my face. Great time to be a fan, don't listen to the whiners, they're grasping at straws and sharpening ridiculous ideals.

I love how dynamic F1 is these days. The teams and organizers are really shaking up the Formula and we're getting highly entertaining strategies, risky moves, and dramatics we would've never seen had everything stayed static. I look back at the V10 era, and realize just how boring it really was for that long time. People are so unreasonable trying to make excuses for why it was great racing when it's really only a matter of nostalgia.

Here's Will Buxton's piece:
http://willthef1journo.wordpress.com/2013/05/12/the-game-changer/

 

[prisonermonkeys]

According to someone on another forum, it's something to do with their suspension set-up. They've sacrificed tyre durability for better hot lap pace.

Honestly, I doubt that. They knew the tyres would be sensitive at the start of this year, since Pirelli promised more of the same with their tyres several months ago. There's no way Pirelli would sacrifice their tyre durability for the sake of one-lap pace, because the tyre degradation is so extreme that their tyres would not last no matter how much one-lap pace they managed to get.

 

[Sureboss]

What a horrific race, makes the championship slightly more interesting for the next few races, but that's it.

 

[Pezzarinho17]

It wasn't the best race, I've never really been a fan of Catalunya. It isn't helped by conducting a majority of the pre-season testing either.

I'm struggling to understand some of the criticism of Pirelli. They have accepted that 4 or 5 stops in a race is too many, and they need to get on top of the punctures they have suffered in the last 2 races. But the degredation is a very good factor for the sport. It wasn't as important when we had refuelling as that played the role of mixing up strategy. With fuel now set though, the teams and drivers need something to allow for different strategies. Martin Brundle put it best during the race commentary:

"We used to spend a majority of the weekend arranging the grid from the fastest to the slowest, give them tyres to run to the end and were then surprised every week to see them finish in the exact same order."

A lot of criticism has also been aimed at the DRS around some of this years circuits, China especially comes to mind where it was far too powerful. In Spain however, it is placed in both positions following very fast corners where the aerodynamics are being relied upon. The DRS allows the car behind to recover some of the time lost in this corner, but not actually close up into the braking zone. Most of the passes were due to different tyre performances at that point affecting the acceleration of the previous corner or braking into the next.

Yet again (though FAR too early this year!) I'm already backing someone other than a McLaren driver to beat Fernando Alonso. He is an amazing talent for sure, watched in utter admiration as he made Hamilton and Raikkonen look like F1 novices at the start yesterday, but I still can't stand him or Ferrari. After all he has gone through though, I would like to see Massa in the hunt for the title.

Now looking at Raikkonen and Lotus to keep the momentum. Raikkonen has been the most consistent driver so far, and although being better on the tyres didn't work today for the outright win, it should see him repeat Australia again this season. I just hope Pirelli don't change that for Red Bull.

Please McLaren, please fight for at least 1 win this year? That or move to 2014 early.

 

[Lion-Face]

I think you all should read it, since it talks about how the teams really aren't forced into babying their tires but opt for it since going for less stops has always been the case in F1, in this era or any.

Ferrari's pace was 1:28 ~ 1:30 for 90% of the race. Pole Position was 1:21. That sounds like babying to me. The pace of the cars is 10 seconds quicker than the race pace of the tires....

 

[HKS racer]

Best race of the season so far in my opinion, Alonso and Massa on the podium and no Red Bull! Who says you can't race on the new tires? Hope Ferrari keeps it up, screw tire conservation, attack, attack attack 👍

Good point on the tyres. Now every engineer, every driver they are all crying, instead of question themselves why Ferrari is flying and why they are not able to do the same. The tyres are the same.

 

[Hun200kmh]

Just a few random notes:

1 - DOTD - Alonso and Kimi "ex aequo".



2 - Best move - Alonso, that double overtake in lap 1 was jaw.dropping stuff



3 - Greatest unexpected achievement - Kimi's last stint. Quoting a disbelief I totally shared ...

Kimi. 20 laps on the hard tyre. Good luck with that!

4 - Greatest comeback - Webber, after a dismal start. 12th in the first lap, 5th at the end. More impressive than that is that he finished the race less than 10 seconds behind Vettel (2nd at the end of lap 1, 4th in the end). Amazing drive.



5 - Nice things to say about ...

Massa - Not stellar, as it would have been if he had caught Kimi, but well done to get a podium finish.

Perez - Solid drive, I have high hopes for this guy., just hoping McLaren don't ruin him.

Gutierrez - I may have been to hard on this guy. Still unconvinced but he sure did surprise me yesterday. On my watch list.​

6 - Underwhelming performances by -

Mercedes

Vettel

Hamilton
​

7 - Funny stuff

Mclaren issuing team orders to keep Perez behind Button. especially when we consider this and this and countless other similar links.

 

[Rich S]

Those must be the new Codemasters F1 2013 regulations. I remember the last time I played online with that game, when I downloaded the TT world record and saw what looked like a silver colored beach plane flying overhead, then I realized it was not a plane but the TT WR holder.

 

[xStretch-]

I'm sorry but that is a ridiculous statement, whichever way you look at it he's 4th in the championship driving a car notorious for munching it's tyres.

You know I am right, he chews up his tyres, it's not all down to the car. I think their problem is setup mainly. To much camber is the most obvious issue but I think they are doing something wrong. To have a car beast in Q and be crap in the race is down to the way they set the car up.

 

[Hun200kmh]

Joe Saward on the tyre issue. He sides with Pirelli.

http://joesaward.wordpress.com/2013/05/13/choices/

 

[albteman015]

Yeah, Ferrari actually pushed for most of the race while other teams kept on the same program of conservation. Will Buxton lays it all really, really, nicely in his latest blogpost.

I think you all should read it, since it talks about how the teams really aren't forced into babying their tires but opt for it since going for less stops has always been the case in F1, in this era or any.
He calls this race a game changer in the sense that other teams are now going to be looking at exposing their necks and going flat out at the sacrifice of maybe one more stop, which really isn't too bad if you really look at things.

He mentions also how RBR had considered four stopping but kept it conservative in the plan. Once they realized what Ferrari was going for, they realized they could've done the same and probably gotten much closer to Alonso. The Formula the way it is now made Alonso's win possible, but it didn't grant him it whatsoever. They had to work hard for this win and I'm proud of the way they did, so much. Just looking at the stat's for Catalunya and how starting from pole used to pretty much be an automatic win and seeing this really puts a smile on my face. Great time to be a fan, don't listen to the whiners, they're grasping at straws and sharpening ridiculous ideals.

I love how dynamic F1 is these days. The teams and organizers are really shaking up the Formula and we're getting highly entertaining strategies, risky moves, and dramatics we would've never seen had everything stayed static. I look back at the V10 era, and realize just how boring it really was for that long time. People are so unreasonable trying to make excuses for why it was great racing when it's really only a matter of nostalgia.

Here's Will Buxton's piece:
http://willthef1journo.wordpress.com/2013/05/12/the-game-changer/

I have to agree with this. The only issues with the tires right now are the delamination and punctures. That is a fault of Pirelli and needs to be taken care of quickly. Like Buxton mentioned in the blog, the teams calling for a change are the ones currently not succeeding. Pirelli came to F1 in 2011 and that year, Red Bull ran away with the championship. There were quite a few races with three and four stops also. Tires weren't degrading as badly but the cars were also slower. I'm sure that all of you here know, the quicker the lap times, the faster these tires degrade.

If we look at the Spanish GP results from those years. You can see see that the cars have gotten faster. This is also a good track to show this since they test here. The information is on F1.com if you guys don't believe me.

2011 fastest qualifying lap was: 1:20.981
2011 fastest race lap was: 1:26.727

2013 fastest qualifying lap: 1:20.718
2013 fastest race lap: 1:26.217

Yes the differences are quite small but the tires this year are also worse than they were in 2011 and in 2012. Not to mention that DRS is not allowed to be used all the time anymore. So how come the lap times stayed relatively close if not better than previous years? The answer is the cars have gotten faster. Keep in mind that even during qualifying, tires have been dropping off by the end of the lap this year so the times would theoretically be even better.

Ferrari was having trouble in 2011 with getting heat into the tires especially on the harder compounds. The other teams had no such problems. Was this Pirelli's fault? No! It was Ferrari's for not making a car good enough to fit the formula for that year. Red Bull got it right and they rightfully dominated in 2011. They deserved that tittle because they designed the best car to fit those rules. Red Bull and a lot of other teams are now having trouble with the current compounds and want a change. I'm pretty positive the teams knew that the current Pirelli's were going to be worse than in previous years. So why did they not design their cars accordingly? It's not like the teams have absolutely no idea about how these tires work. If they didn't, Mercedes wouldn't have changed the camber on the rear wheels for Barcelona. The problems seemed to be pointed towards the suspension and how the tires are loaded in the corners. Remember when Red Bull were warned in Belgium about having having too much camber and how that was risky due to higher tire wear? Lotus seems to be doing fine. Last year they were the same too. Ferrari had decent race pace last year also. I don't think that is a coincidence. Mercedes has been struggling one way or another since their return and last year, their race pace was slower than qualifying just like this year.

My point is that the teams that got it right are doing great while everyone else is complaining. Mind you this is F1 and experienced viewers should know the politics that come along with the sport. The teams complaining are only doing so in hope of the advantage others have could be taken away. It happens every :censored:ing year for 🤬's sake. It happened with the flexing front wings, exhaust blown diffusers, the F-Duct thing Mclaren came up with, double diffusers etc. etc. etc.

The teams that win get hated on. Instead of bettering themselves, the competition likes to play the blame game. It's always been like that.

Before the high tire degradation, we had refueling. Oh, what a fabulous time that was . A Toyota would qualify in the top 5 and hold up everyone behind them because they were a slower car and had to conserve fuel until they hit the pit lane after a very short stint. They would then lose all of the positions gained on saturday and "race" in their usual position. Almost all of the overtaking happened in the pits apart from the one pass on track during the race that was shown in slow motion 300 during highlights. And most of those passes were due to weird pit stop rotations where a slower car would be in front of a faster one. Races were more like parades back then. Now, the same people complaining about the action back then are complaining about what is going on now. My, what a circus this sport is.

 

[SkengD]

Hamilton has been known to be hard on his tires but he has had races before where he has done better than the so called tire savers out there so I dont think its all his fault .

Its more a mercedes chassis issue than a driver issue , I just dont understand how they cant figure out how to solve that issue . They seem to have the worst tire wear on the grid.

Im sure it would be common sense to have a car that qualifies 10th and can at least move forward rather than have a car that qualifies on pole just to lose 10 spots

Also what is this I hear about the f1 cars being slower than the gp2 cars ? ( lap times in yesterdays race im talking )

 

[zippy_the_cat]

Also what is this I hear about the f1 cars being slower than the gp2 cars ? ( lap times in yesterdays race im talking )

That was a claim from Button but folks here and in other forums have noted there was no real difference in qualy and race times at Barca this year as compared to last. Button was just talking out his butt in McLaren's ongoing search for excuses.

 

[Centura]

6 - Underwhelming performances by -

Mercedes

Vettel

Hamilton
​

I think the performance of Vettel looks underwhelming is because they switched his strategy more than half way in to the race.

He was driving to the pace of a three stop for more than half the race and then they switched to a four stop.

Webber was stuck in traffic and they changed him to a four stop after only eight laps.

 

[Seismica]

7 - Funny stuff

Mclaren issuing team orders to keep Perez behind Button. especially when we consider this and this and countless other similar links.

Team orders or not, Button had a fantastic race considering his dysmal qualifying performance and race start. Like Webber, he had an awful start and made his way back through the field to finish ahead of where he qualified.

Button was on the same strategy as his teammate Perez, and was able to get ahead. I think if Perez could have passed him, he would have done it. There was a call on the radio to save tyres, but we never saw on camera whether Perez was actually close enough to pass when he had the DRS (Despite the higher number of overtakes than is normal at this circuit, the DRS wasn't actually that effective unless the leading car made a mistake out of the chicane). He also finished higher than he did last year (in terms of both position and time relative to the lead car), in a car which was much less competitive.

In contrast, Perez had a poor race. Despite the poor fortune of Grosjean, the poor performance of both Mercedes cars and his good start which put him ahead of Webber (Though cancelled out by Massa overtaking him), Perez wasn't able to gain any positions. A poor 3rd stint cost him dearly, allowing Di Resta and Button to jump him in the final pit stop phase. I believe this is attributed mainly to the fact he used an extra set of tyres in Q3. All things considered though, I believe he had a very mediocre race. His performance in Bahrain was much more promising.

I think the performance of Vettel looks underwhelming is because they switched his strategy more than half way in to the race.

He was driving to the pace of a three stop for more than half the race and then they switched to a four stop.

Webber was stuck in traffic and they changed him to a four stop after only eight laps.

Red Bull were simply outmatched by Ferrari and Lotus today in race pace. They suffered similar problems as Mercedes, though not quite to the same extent. As somebody else mentioned, they were lucky Grosjean retired, or they would have had both their cars finish a place lower. By Vettel's usual standards, it was poor. But he was certainly the best of the rest. Ferrari and Lotus were in a class of their own today.

 

[Anathema]

Actually was getting back into this because of how well Kimi (and Lotus) are doing, and while I'm not a fan of Alonso... That lap 1 dual overtake was very nicely done, and a good win for him and Ferrari, along with Massa's performance.

 

[SkengD]

Actually perez and button were on diff strategies perez 4 stopped button 3 , i think

 

[Seismica]

Actually perez and button were on diff strategies perez 4 stopped button 3 , i think

I stand corrected 👍. The graphs I was using over at F1 Fanatic only seemed to show 3 pit stops for each driver, as they were showing current position, and time behind the leader. What I thought was his 3rd stint was actually his 3rd and 4th stints. Di Resta was on a 4 stop aswell though, and still managed to jump him. I don't know if it's the pace of the Force India (Sutil had a bad pistop early on which skewed his result) or just a poor couple of stints for Perez. I think it's perhaps a combination of both.

EDIT:

To add to this, here in an interesting chart I found:

It shows that Perez had 3 fresh sets of hard tyres, the same as Button. Perez was 10 seconds ahead approximately at the first round of pit stops, so he had the flexibility in strategy. Whether it was poor strategy judgement, or simply poor driving performance, he performed worse than Button over the course of the race. It's also interesting to see how many stints Di Resta did on used tyres, which should have put him at a disadvantage.

I'm not bashing Perez. I once remember describing him as "As good as Alonso" (Alonso, whom I consider to be the best driver in F1 in all respects). But his performance in Spain was worse than Button's. I don't see how it could be interpreted differently. I really do hope that Mclaren sort out their car issues soon, I want to see what Perez can do in a true pace setting car.

 

[BHRxRacer]

Let me get this straight. 3 weeks ago Rosberg goes backwards and everyone blames him. Now that Hamilton's luck had run out and finally experienced what Rosberg and Schumacher have been suffering with for years, everyone's finally blaming Mercedes? Nobody cared this much before. I'm quite surprised half the posts in this thread are about Mercedes this time. Where was all this talk before? Nothing has changed, especially from 2012.

Anyway, it was still sad to hear Hamilton's radio message. He sounded like he was going to cry. I genuinely feel sorry for him. "I can't drive slower than this". Wow. Do we have an English word that's the opposite of racing?

Horrible race to watch by the way. Can't remember the last time I watched a race so boring. Maybe Monaco last year. No real stand-out performances really. Many drivers drove a perfect race, but ended no where because of the tyres. No "driver of the day" from me today. Vettel, Alonso, Kimi, Rosberg and many others performed at 110% and couldn't have finished the race a second faster.

Can you link me to an article where he clearly imply that Lewis is n°1 ? On a major autosport website ?

In more than one TV interview (Sky+BBC) his only defense was, and I quote:
"There were no talks of favouritism in the negotiations - pause - from Lewis' side".

I don't think you need a degree in discrete mathematics to translate that.

Have they put Hamiltons used tyres on Rosbergs car by any chance?

I was thinking about that, I even tried to pause the recording to see the logo they spray on the tyres to identify them. I don't know if you guys have seen it before, but as soon as Pirelli hand tyres to Mercedes the mechanics spray-paint the drivers' logos on the sides.

Alonso 10/10

Raikkonen 10/10

Massa 10/10

Everyone else. Try harder.

Please. "Everyone else" was already doing 10/10.

That being said, is anyone else looking forward to a Mercedes front-row lockout, and then a 78-lap 22-car procession at Monaco? I'd find that hilarious.

We kind of saw that last year didn't we? Didn't half the grid finish within like 10 seconds or something?

That's Mercedes' fault, not Pirelli's. Everyone else seems to handle the tyre situation just fine compared to them.

Relatively better, but does it matter? Horner was right. Everyone's being punished for making faster cars. God forbid doing that in Formula 1 ffs..

I'm sorry but that is a ridiculous statement, whichever way you look at it he's 4th in the championship driving a car notorious for munching it's tyres.

There's no "whichever way you may look at it". He was a bit lucky. Watch him drop to 6th, 7th or maybe 8th by the end of the season. Rosberg's only behind because of the DNFs. He's going to drop too, I don't know where he is in the standings at the moment but I doubt either Mercedes drivers will finish the season above 6th.

Glad for Massa ,why was Fernando that much faster though than him ?

Penalty + different setup affected his tyre wear + he spent more time in dirty air

I honestly believe Massa would've been trailing Alonso this race had everything gone right for him.

Perhaps they're already developing next year's car?

Have they been developing the 2014 car for 4 years?

5). Pirelli's now talking about a compound change for Siilverstone. It's not a testament to Horner's political skills that still it's only one team pressing for a revert to 2012 spec -- Brawn should be riding that train too and up to now hasn't been.

Why should he? 2012 spec tyres aren't going to change a damn thing. It has been the same story with Mercedes for years. Maybe if they could press for getting Bridgestone back, he'd actually do anything. Maybe then Michael Schumacher would come out of retirement again and show those jealous old ****s that he still had/has it.

**** Pirelli. You get an exciting race here and there but it's too artificial. I might as well start watching racing cartoons/films.

 

[zippy_the_cat]

**** Pirelli. You get an exciting race here and there but it's too artificial. I might as well start watching racing cartoons/films.

Paul Hembery lays down the gauntlet in Autosport this evening:

"I know some of you would like us to do a one stop race where tyres are not a factor, and you can go back to processional racing where the qualifying position is the end position, if that is what you want in racing."

"We don't understand why you [the media] are all so excited. It is a bit bizarre - unless you all want us to give tyres to Red Bull to help them win the championship, which appears to be the case."

James Allen, meanwhile, presents some interesting data that shows how differently Ferrari and Alonso were using their tires as compared to the Merc drivers.

David Coulthard on the BBC's site manages to avoid taking a firm position but says several things of interest:

"I drove Jim Clark's 1963 Lotus 25 recently. That is an iconic car that took an iconic driver to his first world title, but there is no way on earth he would have been able to push flat out throughout a race. He'd have wrecked the gearbox or the brakes would have run out or something. There were so many compromises that we're just not aware of nowadays."

"Different teams are having different problems - for example, Red Bull's limitation in Spain was the left front tyre; Mercedes' was the left rear. That is down to how the car runs in yaw in the corner, which depends on what camber change it has and what suspension geometries the team running. And those decisions are usually based on getting the right airflow to the right places."

The implication of this last comment by DC is that the tires are trumping aero, which up through 2011 was dominant. And without the tires, aero trumps setup. Mechanical reliability being what it is, the tires are also the only factor that's really bringing genuine uncertainty into the engineers' and drivers' reckoning.

And I fully agree with Hembery. Bring back the Bridgestone formula, and it's very possible Vettel/Red Bull would win 19 out of 19 races. Anyone here down for that?

My own view is that a quali-determined result isn't a race; it's a time trial. So I'm happy for there to be something that makes it a thinking game for the drivers.

 

[Seismica]

**** Pirelli. You get an exciting race here and there but it's too artificial. I might as well start watching racing cartoons/films.

The debate with Pirelli is interesting. People had the same arguments about the tyres at the start of 2011, that they were too fragile. I believe their brief was to produce tyres that created races similar to Canada 2010, but at every circuit. They succeeded.

Pirelli developed the tyres to the point where 2-3 stop races became the norm (With 4 stops at more demanding circuits). However, as the teams developed their cars to utilise the tyres more effectively, some teams found that they could actually finish the race in a shorter time by conserving the tyres and going for fewer stops, with many drivers moving to two or even one stop strategies on a regular basis. This prompted Pirelli to reduce the durability of the tyres to compensate, as the races became processional once again with very little variation in race strategy. In 2011, no teams wanted to use the hard tyre in the races, they were forced to by the rules. The result of the changes can be seen in the 2013 tyres.

Now the teams are complaining that their drivers can't push the car to it's limits. But it was their tyre conservationist strategies which prompted this action by Pirelli. The second Pirelli introduces more durable tyres to allow the drivers to push, you will get a handful of drivers opting instead to conserve those tyres and run one-stop strategies. Until the tyres can do more than half of a race distance flat out, tyre management will always play a role.

Simply put, Pirelli can't win no matter what they do.

 

[niky]

Basically: +1

Maybe there was an issue with the teams getting the tires late, but all racing involves conservation of some sort. If we could go back to the bad old days where you didn't need fuel left in the tank for testing and engines and gearboxes didn't need to last several races, we could have qualifying laps a second or two faster than we do now, and perhaps race pace reflective of this.

It's the same old game. Different players. I'd rather this than watch twenty cars sit on Jarno Trulli's tail-pipe for half a race.

 

[zippy_the_cat]

It's the same old game. Different players. I'd rather this than watch twenty cars sit on Jarno Trulli's tail-pipe for half a race.

Well, in less than two weeks we'll probably be watching 21 sit on Nico Rosberg's.

 

[niky]

Well, in less than two weeks we'll probably be watching 21 sit on Nico Rosberg's.

That's if the Merc can actually keep them there. On a tire-eating course like Monaco, I doubt he'd be able to hold them for more than a few laps.

 

[SkengD]

Rosberg did well at Monaco last season but that was last season

 

[Pezzarinho17]

That's if the Merc can actually keep them there. On a tire-eating course like Monaco, I doubt he'd be able to hold them for more than a few laps.

Monaco is kind on tyres, hence they always take the softest compounds. There are no fast and sustained corners that punish the tyres. Also, you can be so much slower than everyone else but so long as they are first to pit then they will not be passed all day, driven half well defensively.

I'm glad Pirelli have come out and said this, I really don't want to see processions and enjoy the current flavour of F1. Qualifying is where the cars are pushed over a lap, the race is where the car is raced over 305km. The outright laptimes are coming down in qualifying despite reducing the use of DRS, and the tyres are providing the necessary challenge in management over the race distance.

What the teams are failing to speak of is the teams of people employed to sit in rooms for the race and monitor a huge range of temperatures, pressures, and other readings. This has come with the vast improvement in the reliability of the cars, as management of the other car systems are no longer as critical as they used to be. No one used to complain to the FIA if their engine couldn't make it to half race distance, they made the necessary changes to stop it and monitored it closely. Maybe these teams who are complaining ought to spend their time more wisely and try to crack the same setups allowing Lotus and Ferrari to race away at the front.

Also on a side note, even more glad to have Sky. I saw Coulthard's blog on the BBC sport website last night, but looked no further than the title of it. Clear to me that he takes his place at Red Bull more highly than he does his position at the BBC. Just wish he would even attempt to curtail his favouritism of Red Bull when working for the BBC.

EDIT: This article puts into words my thoughts brilliantly. The 66 laps were completed in a very similar amount of time and the difference in strategies covers both arguments against Pirelli.