Grand Prix thread de Monaco 2015 Chat and Predictions

Would certainly be a safe pair of hands and an ideal no.2 to Vettel, so fitting in with Ferrari's usual philosophy of having a patsy to work alongside their no.1.

McLaren never really gave him a chance. The car was poor and you always got the feeling they never really wanted him in the first place but had to do something after Hamilton left.


As for Hulk, still no podium after 80 plus starts. Perez has finished ahead of him in every race this year.

 

yeah, his results against Button weren't terrible, I think it was 14-6 to Button, not great but he didn't get trounced and as you say, it was his first season there and they had an awful car.
Grosjean had one decent season, and he was still easily beaten by Kimi who was so disinterested towards the end he didn't even bother with the last two races.
Hulk beat Perez comfortably last season and he's not being trounced, but with drivers a decade younger he needs to beat Perez soundly again to have a pop at something. The McLaren seat will come up eventually.

 

The only stumbling block of Bottas to Ferrari is he is managed by Toto Wolff, team boss of the enemy... That would be an own goal right?

 

Oh didn't think of it that way to be honest, however Vettel parted ways with Marko maybe Bottas will do the same.

 

Unless his wife gets the Williams seat...

 

http://m.crash.net/f1/news/219274/1/wolff-hamilton-said-staying-out-not-good.html

Toto Wolff claims initially the team told him to stay out and Hamilton thought that was a bad idea and wanted to pit...

 

I thought it was unlike him not to stick the boot into the team for an error. The responsibility is ultimately the pitwall's though, they have access to all the information.

 

Just read something that added to the confusion at Merc. It appears that at most circuits the teams rely on live gps position data but at Monaco due to mountains, tall buildings, and the tunnel the gps position signals are not reliable. There are timing loops embedded in the 'track' every couple of hundred meters.
This difference in method of getting the timing data led to Merc believing they had more time for Lewis to pit than they actually had.
Still an error on Mercs part but sounds like a multitude of things led to the error. As Lewis said 'Win as a Team loose as a Team'.

 

Lewis said bad idea but that was if the other front runners were going to pit...Mercedes knew they weren't pitting Rosberg and vettel was unlikely to pit if Rosberg was going to stay out so Toto doesn't make sense. Rosberg isn't in some other team, he is in Mercedes. So Hamilton saying its a bad idea that was presuming Rosberg and Vettel were going to pit. The question is..did Mercedes know Rosberg wasn't going to pit? I am sure the answer is yes...so why didn't they reply to say Rosberg wasn't going to pit? If Rosberg wasn't going to pit there is no way Vettel would pit or get pass Rosberg so why would there be a need to pit Hamilton? There was no need to rely on all those computers for calculations just needed commonsense. Seems like commonsense isn't as common as it used to be. If there was any need for Hamilton to pit they could have pitting him when he was over 26 seconds in the lead that would have covered any eventually of a safety car wouldn't it? Also when Hamilton saw the pit crew out he thought it was for Rosberg ,,remember the pit crew were out very early,

 

He also overshot is marks in the pits which didn't help.

 

Funny, cos when it's actually the teams fault he says "My team cost ME the race today".

 

......Wood.........Trees......

 

Lewis made the final push in the decision to come in, not Mercedes who actually wanted to stay out initially. They just seemed to buckle under Lewis' opinion and demanded 'leadership skills' on what was going to happen behind him.

He ****ed it up all by himself by questioning the pitwall who already had a plan during the safety car and knowing track position is king they should have stood firm instead of caving into Lewis who right now for the forseeable future needs to be put back in his place that he is a mercedes driver not the stratergist or fortune teller.

So (again) Lewis gets away scott free and Mercedes get to look entirely like twats for protecting his own mess and the media **** storm that he made for them following HIS own choices on what should happen.

 

That's crap...why did they had pit crew out so early..that gave the impression Rosberg was putting. Did they tell Hamilton Rosberg wasn't pitting? I am sure the answer was no so he had the impression Rosberg was pitting and Rosberg wouldn't pit unless Vettel was pitting... So really they should have told him they weren't pitting Rosberg so there would be no need for Hamilton to pit because Vettel would not be able to get by both of them.... Is that so difficult to understand?

 

He wasn't the only one to pit though was he.

 

One thing I haven't read is why was the pit crew out when Lewis saw them on the tv screen and subsequently questioned the call Not to pit? It's almost like that was the trigger for Lewis to ask about pitting (him presumably thinking the crew were ready to pit Nico). So why were the pit crew out?

I thought there was a rule about the pit crew only being in the pit lane a certain amount of time before the cars came in. Something to do with not tricking their opponents to coming in and covering.

 

If Mercedes buckled under pressure from Hamilton on the radio then that says a lot about the authority in the team, I've never really been convinced about the management in Mercedes as it seems both drivers can get away with quite a few things but that's a different matter.

Ultimately though it seems both were at fault in this situation, Hamilton should have stayed out regardless and asked about the situation behind him and the pit wall should have informed him of this plus apply some common sense. I still think Mercedes are largely to blame, they have the all data and they know what's happening in the pit lane, all they had to do was look out of the window behind them. Just move on from it though, both were at fault. End of.

 

If Hamilton asked to pit, then the pitwall should have let him know there wasn't a sufficient gap to retain the lead and that his main rivals weren't pitting. It's not bloody rocket science now is it?

 

There's no way the situation could have been avoided, nope not one.....


Peter Bonnington to Lewis Lewis Hamilton: Safety Car, Safety Car. So we are staying out.

Lewis Hamilton to Peter Bonnington: Are you sure it’s the best thing to stay out? These tyres have lost all their temperature. Everyone’s going to be on options now.

Peter Bonnington to Lewis Hamilton: OK. Copy, copy. Box, box.

 

So Hamilton made the call without him knowing the state of play, and his team didn't challenge him?

Dare I say his reputation for coming down hard on bad calls may have played a part? In that split second decision it's going to prey on your mind that disagreeing and it being the wrong call will result in a major bollocking, whilst Hamilton messing up and losing the lead won't get you blamed as much?