2014 Belgian Grand Prix Discussion Thread

[DemocalypseNow]

Here's some crazy, wild speculation on my part, so feel free to just ignore if it sounds too stupid.

You know, thinking about it some more, I'm getting the impression that Hamilton has never really taken Rosberg as a serious threat to him. His actions and words seem more or less consistent with this mindset. I'm wondering if Rosberg got this same impression from Hamilton at some point or another, which could've led to him feeling he had to 'prove a point' - I highly doubt that Rosberg felt he had to prove a point to himself or the team about his title legitimacy.

I actually have to disagree partially with this.

I think Rosberg has felt the need to put his foot down to send a message to his team. From the day he arrived, Hamilton was hired to be the main driver. He was already a world champion on arrival, and is being paid significantly more (€20m vs €12m if estimates are spot on) to drive for the team. Since the day Lewis arrived, Nico has had to make a point on track that he won't settle for being second in the team. I imagine he'll have taken Malaysia 2013 as an early warning sign.

I'm not really sure if I condone what Rosberg did or not, but I certainly understand it. It's nothing like Senna putting his car in a certain position at Suzuka, where the crash was massive and high-speed, and malicious. I don't think Rosberg started the race with the outright intention of forcing his team-mate into an accident, but when he ended up in a 50/50 situation, he felt the need to make it clear it was already his championship, and Lewis couldn't take it away from him, even if the team was on Hamilton's side in certain way. It was certainly an unpopular thing to do, but given how things started out with this driver combination, I'm not surprised it has ended this way.

Mercedes likely assumed Hamilton would simply use his talent to unquestionably defeat Rosberg on track, and therefore remove any need for controlling the drivers. I still believe Hamilton has more natural talent at the wheel, but his temperament is completely wrong, and a mixture of reliability gremlins, pressure from the media and his own team-mate taking advantage of non-finishes in the championship has gotten to him.

[ADx_Wales]

They have been doing a good job of ignoring the orders so far, but maybe the radio messages are being manipulated to highten the on-track drama, Bahrain for example the call was "put on air" but maybe it was just a red herring, because we got some wonderful stuff after that.

However there is going to have to be a point when it becomes a definite "No more of this", then we're going to lose out.

[ADx_Wales]

I'm going to say that the whole "Why do it on lap 2" thing is a bit overblown. I think Nico knows as well as anyone that sometimes, in a Grand Prix, you get one chance to pass someone in a car as fast as yours, and if you can't do it then, it's over.

...just that old gambit "You can't win the race on lap one (in this case "lap two"), but you can certainly lose it"

[Klon]

Oooooooh, Jocke1, where are you?

I got something for you:

[SgtPepper]

Here's some crazy, wild speculation on my part, so feel free to just ignore if it sounds too stupid.

You know, thinking about it some more, I'm getting the impression that Hamilton has never really taken Rosberg as a serious threat to him. His actions and words seem more or less consistent with this mindset. I'm wondering if Rosberg got this same impression from Hamilton at some point or another, which could've led to him feeling he had to 'prove a point' - I highly doubt that Rosberg felt he had to prove a point to himself or the team about his title legitimacy.

I actually have to disagree partially with this.

I think Rosberg has felt the need to put his foot down to send a message to his team. From the day he arrived, Hamilton was hired to be the main driver. He was already a world champion on arrival, and is being paid significantly more (€20m vs €12m if estimates are spot on) to drive for the team. Since the day Lewis arrived, Nico has had to make a point on track that he won't settle for being second in the team. I imagine he'll have taken Malaysia 2013 as an early warning sign.

I'm not really sure if I condone what Rosberg did or not, but I certainly understand it. It's nothing like Senna putting his car in a certain position at Suzuka, where the crash was massive and high-speed, and malicious. I don't think Rosberg started the race with the outright intention of forcing his team-mate into an accident, but when he ended up in a 50/50 situation, he felt the need to make it clear it was already his championship, and Lewis couldn't take it away from him, even if the team was on Hamilton's side in certain way. It was certainly an unpopular thing to do, but given how things started out with this driver combination, I'm not surprised it has ended this way.

Mercedes likely assumed Hamilton would simply use his talent to unquestionably defeat Rosberg on track, and therefore remove any need for controlling the drivers. I still believe Hamilton has more natural talent at the wheel, but his temperament is completely wrong, and a mixture of reliability gremlins, pressure from the media and his own team-mate taking advantage of non-finishes in the championship has gotten to him.

Salamander's got a point. Rosberg has always remained a little marginalised in regards to teams, the media and general attention - he's generally just been 'there.' This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it's also clear Hamilton is regularly referred to as the fastest on the grid in terms of raw pace (with Alonso generally considered the best all rounder), and also has the benefit of a championship to his name as well. Of course this has then affected the relatively weak minded Hamilton, who has then most likely then expected to simply dominate Rosberg hereon in. Their vast gap in intelligences also probably magnifies this - Hamilton continues to make PR faux-pas, and Rosberg simply goes ahead and plays his own method of winding Hamilton up - i.e not engaging with him. He's obviously aware that Hamilton will consider himself a de facto number one, but that this also magnifies the pressure on Hamilton as well - and one clearly has far greater mental resillience to this pressure than the other.

In regards to the team dynamic, they probably did presume Hamilton would have the better of Rosberg, which when on even footings he generally has, but I've never got a sense that the team was leaning towards either driver. I don't there's much more to the second lap error than Rosberg wanted to get past Hamilton and not really caring for any potentially ruffled feathers, while also not really being the greatest wheel-to-wheel racer (he's not bad, just not great). As far as I can tell, they sided with Hamilton yesterday not because he's their preferred driver, but because the incident was quite clearly Rosberg's error.

Of course it remains to be seen how they would react if Hamilton makes an error, thus compromising the team result.

[johnston21]

...and in all of this Nico still cannot/doesn't refer to Lewis by name (if it matters). Where as Hamilton surely refers to Nico by his given name (I know it's been mentioned before).
"Love the drama!"

[eytl]

Can I just say that I find it mildly amusing how:

* first there's a "clear the air" meeting pre-Spa which, it seems, only stirred up tensions more;
* then there's the collision;
* then there's an argument during a post-race meeting about who was to blame for the collision; and
* now there's an argument over what was said during the post-race meeting about who was to blame for the collision.

And how are we going to resolve this? By having another "clear the air" meeting before Monza.

I tend to tell my kids to go to their room for a while to calm down and take a good long hard look at themselves in the mirror.

[CoopsII]

...and in all of this Nico still cannot/doesn't refer to Lewis by name (if it matters). Where as Hamilton surely refers to Nico by his given name (I know it's been mentioned before).
"Love the drama!"

At the weekend I noticed Hamilton had gone from calling his team-mate 'Nico' to 'Rosberg'. Next stop 'that w*nker in the other car'.

[mrfakeboullier]

If that happens then the championship is effectively over.

Don't despair, both drivers are VERY good at ignoring team orders!

If, and it is a very big if, Team orders are implemented they should either be "Lewis let Nico through" or "Multi whoever is ahead after the final pitstops-the other one." I cannot see Nico being asked to move over for Lewis, as Lewis would sneak ahead by 5 points after the USA

[DanielPT]

If that happens then the championship is effectively over.

Don't despair, both drivers are VERY good at ignoring team orders!

If, and it is a very big if, Team orders are implemented they should either be "Lewis let Nico through" or "Multi whoever is ahead after the final pitstops-the other one." I cannot see Nico being asked to move over for Lewis, as Lewis would sneak ahead by 5 points after the USA

The second suggestion won't work since that leaves many laps for them to crash at will and as we have seen, they only seem to need a couple.
I say that they do multi whoever after the first couple of corners until they crash before that which by they then must go for grid position.

As for the ignoring team orders part, I would implement power shortage penalties through the ECU-pit box communication whenever that happened.

[AustralianStig]

As for the ignoring team orders part, I would implement power shortage penalties through the ECU-pit box communication whenever that happened.

I highly doubt any team would do that - it's too risky penalizing your own car and you risk the team behind you catching up. Stranger things have happened, though.

[DanielPT]

As for the ignoring team orders part, I would implement power shortage penalties through the ECU-pit box communication whenever that happened.

I highly doubt any team would do that - it's too risky penalizing your own car and you risk the team behind you catching up. Stranger things have happened, though.

It is not really that strange. If you think about it, Mercedes already did that throught this season (as Red Bull and others did in the past). Whenever they are in saving mode (tyres, fuel or nursing the car) they do this sort power reduction (through mappings, fuel mixture and so on). So it would work like that with the difference of being enforced by the team. Which might be illegal, mind you.

[DonTirri]

I'd imagine Merc is way beyond team orders. There's NO WAY Nico will let Lewis past because he's in the champinoship lead, and there is NO WAY Lewis will let Nico past, for the same reason. Merc has dug their own grave. Spa was just the appetizer. Worst is yet to come.

And I'll call it now. If by Abu Dhabi we have a situation where The one who scores more points in teh race is the champion... we might see a Suzuka 89 repeat (Personally I'm hoping for Australia 86 repeat with Ricciardo playing the role of Prost)

[Rob Dylan]

I'm just sad I have to wait another two weeks to watch the next episode of this soap The post-race antics from all parties have been so entertaining that it's annoying I have to wait two weeks to get the popcorn out in front of the telly waiting for the inevitable.

Then again it could be a repeat of 2007 where nothing much really happened after Hungary, with the exception of a first lap or two. Let's hope not

[SgtPepper]

As for the ignoring team orders part, I would implement power shortage penalties through the ECU-pit box communication whenever that happened.

I highly doubt any team would do that - it's too risky penalizing your own car and you risk the team behind you catching up. Stranger things have happened, though.

It is not really that strange. If you think about it, Mercedes already did that throught this season (as Red Bull and others did in the past). Whenever they are in saving mode (tyres, fuel or nursing the car) they do this sort power reduction (through mappings, fuel mixture and so on). So it would work like that with the difference of being enforced by the team. Which might be illegal, mind you.

Isn't any sort of pit control of the car settings banned?

I'd imagine Merc is way beyond team orders. There's NO WAY Nico will let Lewis past because he's in the champinoship lead, and there is NO WAY Lewis will let Nico past, for the same reason. Merc has dug their own grave. Spa was just the appetizer. Worst is yet to come.

You've at least got to give Merc credit for letting their driver's race - there has been no apparent strategic, mechanical (although maybe Hamilton might disagree, I would bet he's harder on machinery than Nico), or generally even political leaning towards one driver or the other - obviously well aware a situation like Spa might very easily arise. Despite having a dominant car, it's kept this season incredibly exciting, particularly in context of the last few years. It's not the team bosses' fault that Rosberg is a little clumsier as a racer, and Hamilton has the mentality of a child, though I guess you could also argue they would also be aware of characteristics before the situation as well.

Wasn't there a team that used to say no racing until after the final pit stops?

[LionZoo]

I'd imagine Merc is way beyond team orders. There's NO WAY Nico will let Lewis past because he's in the champinoship lead, and there is NO WAY Lewis will let Nico past, for the same reason. Merc has dug their own grave. Spa was just the appetizer. Worst is yet to come.

And I'll call it now. If by Abu Dhabi we have a situation where The one who scores more points in teh race is the champion... we might see a Suzuka 89 repeat (Personally I'm hoping for Australia 86 repeat with Ricciardo playing the role of Prost)

To be fair, Lewis has already ignored team orders to let Nico past. I just find it hilarious that after ignoring team orders in Hungary, he comes out with a statement in the very next race that he, unlike Nico, always puts the team first.

[ADx_Wales]

(Personally I'm hoping for Australia 86 repeat with Ricciardo playing the role of Prost)

Holy crap, this is a first, I agree with you on this.

[Salamander]

(Personally I'm hoping for Australia 86 repeat with Ricciardo playing the role of Prost)

Holy crap, this is a first, I agree with you on this.

No matter what kind of F1 fan you are, the one thing we can all agree on is that it would be awesome if Ricciardo won the title this year.

[dr-baker]

In my opinion, Bottas winning the title would be most epic, but as he has exactly half the points of Rosberg (220 v. 110), I would have to say that's unlikely. I was undecided between Lewis and Nico earlier in the year, but now Daniel is looking like a better option (despite the fact that I despise Red Bull). Who would have envisaged this situation at the commencement of the year, where this was even an option?

[roblo97]

(Personally I'm hoping for Australia 86 repeat with Ricciardo playing the role of Prost)

Holy crap, this is a first, I agree with you on this.

No matter what kind of F1 fan you are, the one thing we can all agree on is that it would be awesome if Ricciardo won the title this year.

Even my mum who doesn't really like F1 wants Ricciardo to win the title!

[DonTirri]

In my opinion, Bottas winning the title would be most epic, but as he has exactly half the points of Rosberg (220 v. 110), I would have to say that's unlikely. I was undecided between Lewis and Nico earlier in the year, but now Daniel is looking like a better option (despite the fact that I despise Red Bull). Who would have envisaged this situation at the commencement of the year, where this was even an option?

Well yeah, I'D LOVE to see Bottas win it... but I am a realist enough to know he has a snowballs chance in hell of doing it. On the other hand... Keke won the title in a Williams, despite being miles off pace of the top cars... by winning only a single race all season... Yeah.

[Fetzie]

I'd imagine Merc is way beyond team orders. There's NO WAY Nico will let Lewis past because he's in the champinoship lead, and there is NO WAY Lewis will let Nico past, for the same reason. Merc has dug their own grave. Spa was just the appetizer. Worst is yet to come.

And I'll call it now. If by Abu Dhabi we have a situation where The one who scores more points in teh race is the champion... we might see a Suzuka 89 repeat (Personally I'm hoping for Australia 86 repeat with Ricciardo playing the role of Prost)

To be fair, Lewis has already ignored team orders to let Nico past. I just find it hilarious that after ignoring team orders in Hungary, he comes out with a statement in the very next race that he, unlike Nico, always puts the team first.

Except Rosberg was miles behind Hamilton and hardly closing at all. It's one thing to let somebody past that has their nose halfway up your gearbox, letting somebody past that isn't even in DRS range is just silly IMO.

[FullMetalJack]

In my opinion, Bottas winning the title would be most epic, but as he has exactly half the points of Rosberg (220 v. 110), I would have to say that's unlikely. I was undecided between Lewis and Nico earlier in the year, but now Daniel is looking like a better option (despite the fact that I despise Red Bull). Who would have envisaged this situation at the commencement of the year, where this was even an option?

Well yeah, I'D LOVE to see Bottas win it... but I am a realist enough to know he has a snowballs chance in hell of doing it. On the other hand... Keke won the title in a Williams, despite being miles off pace of the top cars... by winning only a single race all season... Yeah.

Everyone and their mother won a race that year though. And he was helped by the fact that Didier Pironi had that career ending crash.

[lgaquino]

As for the ignoring team orders part, I would implement power shortage penalties through the ECU-pit box communication whenever that happened.

I highly doubt any team would do that - it's too risky penalizing your own car and you risk the team behind you catching up. Stranger things have happened, though.

It is not really that strange. If you think about it, Mercedes already did that throught this season (as Red Bull and others did in the past). Whenever they are in saving mode (tyres, fuel or nursing the car) they do this sort power reduction (through mappings, fuel mixture and so on). So it would work like that with the difference of being enforced by the team. Which might be illegal, mind you.

Pit to car controls are in fact inllegal, so I think any action of this sort would have to be done by the driver on the steering wheel. Which makes it more difficult, because the driver would probably know the implications of the change.

...then again there were some occasions where drivers (lewis included) didn't know a specific function/button on the steering wheel

[andrew2209]

I'd imagine Merc is way beyond team orders. There's NO WAY Nico will let Lewis past because he's in the champinoship lead, and there is NO WAY Lewis will let Nico past, for the same reason. Merc has dug their own grave. Spa was just the appetizer. Worst is yet to come.

And I'll call it now. If by Abu Dhabi we have a situation where The one who scores more points in teh race is the champion... we might see a Suzuka 89 repeat (Personally I'm hoping for Australia 86 repeat with Ricciardo playing the role of Prost)

Any situation which results in one driver taking off the other driver to win the title would tarnish F1's reputation. In my opinion, in such a situation, the FIA should call both drivers to a briefing, and tell them that if one hits the other, and it's deemed to be deliberate, then they'll be excluded from the championship.

[dr-baker]

I'd imagine Merc is way beyond team orders. There's NO WAY Nico will let Lewis past because he's in the champinoship lead, and there is NO WAY Lewis will let Nico past, for the same reason. Merc has dug their own grave. Spa was just the appetizer. Worst is yet to come.

And I'll call it now. If by Abu Dhabi we have a situation where The one who scores more points in teh race is the champion... we might see a Suzuka 89 repeat (Personally I'm hoping for Australia 86 repeat with Ricciardo playing the role of Prost)

Any situation which results in one driver taking off the other driver to win the title would tarnish F1's reputation. In my opinion, in such a situation, the FIA should call both drivers to a briefing, and tell them that if one hits the other, and it's deemed to be deliberate, then they'll be excluded from the championship.

After all, there IS precedent for that. Just look at 1997... And I would wholeheartedly support that decision. Although it would then detract from the final round being double-points...

[Rob Dylan]

It puts Rosberg in a safer situation in that scenario, because if the season so far is to be judged, he'll probably have an ok lead going into the final double points farce, making Hamilton the one more likely to make a dangerous move happen.

[Yannick]

I have not been following this season much at all, unlike many years past. However, even to me, this team mate collision does not come unexpected after what's been going on internally at Mercedes GP. They still have some work to do before they get their Constructor's title.

I must also say that Lotterer has made quite an impression.

[eagleash]

In my opinion, Bottas winning the title would be most epic, but as he has exactly half the points of Rosberg (220 v. 110), I would have to say that's unlikely. I was undecided between Lewis and Nico earlier in the year, but now Daniel is looking like a better option (despite the fact that I despise Red Bull). Who would have envisaged this situation at the commencement of the year, where this was even an option?

Well yeah, I'D LOVE to see Bottas win it... but I am a realist enough to know he has a snowballs chance in hell of doing it. On the other hand... Keke won the title in a Williams, despite being miles off pace of the top cars... by winning only a single race all season... Yeah.

Everyone and their mother won a race that year though. And he was helped by the fact that Didier Pironi had that career ending crash.

& the loss of Gilles...

[dr-baker]

In my opinion, Bottas winning the title would be most epic, but as he has exactly half the points of Rosberg (220 v. 110), I would have to say that's unlikely. I was undecided between Lewis and Nico earlier in the year, but now Daniel is looking like a better option (despite the fact that I despise Red Bull). Who would have envisaged this situation at the commencement of the year, where this was even an option?

Well yeah, I'D LOVE to see Bottas win it... but I am a realist enough to know he has a snowballs chance in hell of doing it. On the other hand... Keke won the title in a Williams, despite being miles off pace of the top cars... by winning only a single race all season... Yeah.

Everyone and their mother won a race that year though. And he was helped by the fact that Didier Pironi had that career ending crash.

& the loss of Gilles...

...And the year that I was born...

[mario]

In my opinion, Bottas winning the title would be most epic, but as he has exactly half the points of Rosberg (220 v. 110), I would have to say that's unlikely. I was undecided between Lewis and Nico earlier in the year, but now Daniel is looking like a better option (despite the fact that I despise Red Bull). Who would have envisaged this situation at the commencement of the year, where this was even an option?

Well yeah, I'D LOVE to see Bottas win it... but I am a realist enough to know he has a snowballs chance in hell of doing it. On the other hand... Keke won the title in a Williams, despite being miles off pace of the top cars... by winning only a single race all season... Yeah.

Everyone and their mother won a race that year though. And he was helped by the fact that Didier Pironi had that career ending crash.

& the loss of Gilles...

...And the year that I was born...

It has to be said that, in a number of ways, the 1982 season was a season where Ferrari should have fairly comfortably taken the drivers title if things hadn't gone against them.

Just look at how quickly Tambay racked up points after being chosen as a mid season replacement - he scored almost as many points in the final eight races as Keke did (25 points against 28 for Rosberg), but considering that Tambay was unable to compete in two of those eight races on medical grounds, it suggests Tambay would probably have outscored Keke if he could have driven in all eight races.

Now, I cannot see a situation where both Mercedes drivers are unable to compete in the closing stages of this season, so Bottas would need to consistently beat both Mercedes drivers and both Red Bull drivers on a consistent basis. Realistically, I am not really sure I can see that happening - whilst Williams's car does seem to be fairly competitive, their strongest performances have tended to be fairly circuit specific (high speed circuits and dry, moderately cool ambient conditions), and I don't think that the closing races will necessarily favour them all that much. Williams themselves, after all, have said that they were only really expecting to be in with a chance of winning at two venues this season, which were Spa and Monza - which perhaps suggests that they'll fall back on the medium speed circuits that come up after that.

Out of the chasing pack, probably only Ricciardo is in a position where he could perhaps spring a surprise - although the Renault engine remains a sticking point, on the other hand Red Bull are probably the only team that have a competitive enough chassis to compete with Mercedes at twistier circuits.
Furthermore, he is probably the only driver with enough engines in reserve at the moment to compete - even Mercedes are a little short on engine mileage (part of the reason why Hamilton was so desperate to save his engine in Spa is because much of the powertrain that he was supposed to use in Hungary was written off in that fire, leaving him short of engines for the season), and whilst a number of the Renault and Ferrari powered teams have burned through their allocation quite rapidly - Kvyat and Vettel have already used their full allocation of engines due to mechanical issues - and even some of the Mercedes teams are short of engines, Ricciardo has been lucky that he has had relatively few mechanical issues up to now.

One other strength is that, organisationally, Red Bull are probably the best placed to capitalise on the misfortunes of others. Mercedes might have built a strong car, but a number of their on track misfortunes are down to them mismanaging things off the circuit, both in terms of their drivers (Ross Brawn certainly kept both drivers in place in 2013, and I think his influence is missed at Mercedes) and in terms of strategies, which Mercedes haven't always been sharp at either.

That said, the only way that I can see Ricciardo getting enough points would be either more on track collisions between the two Mercedes drivers, or if both drivers had a similar spate of mechanical issues (which isn't impossible, especially considering that Hamilton had a number of mechanical problems this season which would potentially be common to both cars).

[CoopsII]

Phew, that's that sorted then.

[ADx_Wales]