Aquarius wrote:
Glock's last laps were about as fast as Trulli's one. Trulli also kept his dry tyres, so it can hardly be implied that Glock slowed down on purpose.

Aquarius wrote:
Better have Hamilton than Massa champion, but still, both did many blunders this season, they don't really look like the greatest champions ever.

CrueTrue wrote:
3:40 into the video. Ferrari celebrating until they realize that they didn't win. It's priceless (yes, even for Ferrari fans).

Jaap90 wrote:
Nobody can be an greater champion than Michael Schumacher.

issoisso wrote:
I won't be bothered to look up each season individually, but apart from Schumacher's insane 2004 season, pretty much everyone made the same number of mistakes.

Hakkinen especially had the most immensely superior car F1 has seen since the 1978 Lotus 79, and made a complete mess of it race after race after race.

He even ran off the road into the bushes crying at Monza after he screwed up for the Nth consecutive time...

Aquarius wrote:
Well, I didn't watch much of 1998, 1999 and 2000 and missed much of 2002 and 2003 because of cycling races taking place on Sunday afternoons.
True about Hakkinen after a quick check.

Villeneuve's 1997 Williams was also very superior to anything else, btw.

(...)
I understand that the tyre compounds are a bit harder than they were last year, which was far be less helpful to the Ferrari and its tendency to be more gentle on its rubber.

The FIA instructed the Bridgestone people to take this approach because on this day they didn't want a repeat of the tyre failures already experienced in the past by McLaren.

How ironic that Ferrari should be penalised because of a shortcoming in the McLaren.
(...)

Aquarius wrote:
Tyres have been a pain in the ass this year anyway. As soon as the conditions changed (rain, etc.) we saw "lousy" team mates suddently becoming as good or better than their first driver.
Some drivers really didn't manage to get the tyres on temperature (especially the softer ones) and thus screw their qualifying sessions.
I know Bourdais always complained about the soft tyres, Raikkonen against Massa is an example (I doubt Kimi lacked motivation, once the tyres were on temperature he was the fastest man on track) and Heidfeld is another one, like Webber vs Coulthard.
Agressives styles of driving were clearly favoured by those harder tyres. Not a good thing IMO. I find it better when the riders saving their fuel and tyres the more can attack later in the race because they managed not to destroy the material.

Let's hope slick tyres will change that and be more constant next season. If it's case, suddenly people will go around saying Raikkonen is motivated again, that Bourdais became good (if he's still there), Heidfeld too, whereas Kubica and Massa lost motivation after their good 2008 seasons. *yawn*

At least when there were two tyres manufacturers, they needed to bring softer rubbers to get more performance (and less reliability, thus favouring the ones who didn't destroy their tyres).

Aquarius wrote:
When Vettel tested the Red Bull car in Jerez (last FP during the season), he surprised Red Bull's engineers by explaining them that his main concern in the car setup was to have the tyres working in the right temperature, much before the car balance and the aerodynamical grip related aspects.

Button was usually faster than Barrichello when you check their fastest lap in race, but often behind him in terms of final classification. A lot like Raikkonen vs Massa or Heidfeld vs Kubica. Tyres, tyres, tyres... (yes it's true Raikko is quite agressive with his car, my point was more about tyres than driving styles anyway)

issoisso wrote:
That's the basis of any car setup routine: getting the tyres to operate as close to optimum temperature as possible throughout the entire lap......it's the most basic thing about car setup

only_one wrote:
I would like to see F1 without pit stops, that would make things much more interesting