[asr245]

Great race! No way Ferrari or Sauber would have ended where they did if it hadn't rain. Alonso's masterful driver was expected. Perez's was a pleasant surprise. Peter Sauber was nearly tearful at the end of the race.

Originally Posted by akshay380

And what a crappy commentary on ESPN/SS by Slater(?). Next time I am going to mark his mistakes and send them to ESPN bosses. Please throw him out.

You can say that again!! That guy was always confused between the 2 FIF1 drivers & 2 Williams drivers. Then he didn't know who was overtaking whom if the entire overtaking maneuver wasn't shown. Even I knew those things just by paying attention to the scroll bar at the bottom of the screen!!!

Originally Posted by PAVAN KADAM

What an exciting race

......

RBR's drama was pathetic ""BOX THE CAR..! BOX THE CAR..! pause DRIVE ON..! DRIVE ON ..! pause STOP THE CAR.! STOP THE CAR.! STOP THE CAR.! ITS AN EMERGENCY , ITS AN EMERGENCY..!""

Ha! Ha! That was funny!

Mercedes looks like the Honda from 2004-2006 period. Qualify well & then fall off in the race.

PS: Kimi seems to be getting upto speed quickly. Now only if Lotus can give him a car pushing towards the podium.

[mgh]

The rain put a premium on getting the tyre changes right at the right time.
After two races Sauber are 4th in the constructor's championship, 14 points ahead of Lotus.
Sahara Force India do not look like being a front runner in midfield. If it hadn't been for the penchant of Maldonado to lose points at the drop of a hat, they would have been in 7th far behind Williams.
And, what is wrong with Mercedes? Just one point in two races.

[pganapathy]

Oh my, it looks like we are in for a humdinger of an F1 season, especially for the drivers championship. For the constructors it is not going to be half as close, especially if most teams only have one driver finish in the points per race. Mclaren has been good that way, unlike RBR. They should have been contending but are nowhere close yet.

So looking forward to Lotus getting their car right. Add to that Grosjean converting his practice and qualification pace into race pace and actually finishing, and Lotus is a good contender.

This race shows us how important it is to plan well and actually have a car that can compete in all conditions.

Perez looks like the real deal here. Wonder how he will do in the next race. Here he let his inexperience show by pushing too hard and that one bad overtaking move a few laps from the end cost him. Still an impressive talent though.

[Shivank]

One of the most exciting and unpredictable races in F1 in a long while!

Alonso drove wonderfully today. Now this man deserves a better setup in dry conditions as well. However, Sergio undoubtedly raced like a champ today! Had his car not ran wide on that corner, his pace was fast enough to keep Alonso at bay for the remaining laps.

Narain did a great job too; he took Button down unintentionally, punctured Vettel's tyre unintentionally and finally managed to finish the race, may be, unintentionally.

But the most surprising bit was Hamilton not sulking over his defeat this time. May be it's Button's presence on podium which makes Hamilton sulk.

Originally Posted by PAVAN KADAM

Mercedes seems to be gassing out after all the hype and hoopla since the pre-season testing, Nico Roseberg is fast fading out. Schumi's qualifying was fantastic, He's still good and made some places after his sad start. Sad for him to loose places after Grosjean mad an overenthusiastic move only to go out of the race, Schumi finished in championship points anyways. Michael needs prove his mettle the next race, which i am sure he will be gunning to go.

I don't know if it's sheer bad luck for Schumi or there is something terribly wrong with the Mercedes car at the moment! As the laps stack up, the Merc starts to loose its pace. Did you see how easily Button's Mclaren walk past Schumi? And then Kimi trumped Nico in the same manner. It could have to do with wet conditions, but I was really expecting Schumi to do a lot better today. No doubt Grosjean ruined it for him at the very beginning though!

[PAVAN KADAM]

Originally Posted by Shivank

One of the most exciting and unpredictable races in F1 in a long while!

Alonso drove wonderfully today. Now this man deserves a better setup in dry conditions as well. However, Sergio undoubtedly raced like a champ today! Had his car not ran wide on that corner, his pace was fast enough to keep Alonso at bay for the remaining laps.

Narain did a great job too; he took Button down unintentionally, punctured Vettel's tyre unintentionally and finally managed to finish the race, may be, unintentionally.

But the most surprising bit was Hamilton not sulking over his defeat this time. May be it's Button's presence on podium which makes Hamilton sulk.



I don't know if it's sheer bad luck for Schumi or there is something terribly wrong with the Mercedes car at the moment! As the laps stack up, the Merc starts to loose its pace. Did you see how easily Button's Mclaren walk past Schumi? And then Kimi trumped Nico in the same manner. It could have to do with wet conditions, but I was really expecting Schumi to do a lot better today. No doubt Grosjean ruined it for him at the very beginning though!

As Raikkonen says, ""Need Normal Race Weekend to know where we stand""

As per Schumi is concerned..Its sheer bad luck.

1) Romain Grosjean swerved into him in the first corner causing damage - Result, he lost a good 3rd place to 20th.

2) Add Rain to the whole chaos and the safety car.

But, he did well after that, he finished in 10th. He was better than Nico Roseberg, who was just letting people pass by as if he was Blue Flagged.

Sincerely, Mercedes GP pace has been good only in Qualifying.. Race Pace has been pathetic, they have a very good car, but its not the best.

[VW2010]

Actually the dry slick tyre pace of merc was exceptional from the last tyre change.

The intermediate and wet tyres were the problem. More to do with set up for dry race and not wet race. Its a huge difference in set up.

The car will evolve by fourth race.

Otherwise i wont call this a race won by stratergy except for perez. Similarly cant understand why shumi wasnt pulled in for fully wet immediately after spin off. Lack of judgemwnt

[Hatari]

Great race! Pity that Perez made a mistake. Would have been great to see him challenge Alonso for P1 after his team told him to take it easy.

This is the first season i have seen a team differ so much on quali and race pace as Mercedes have. Quite shocking in fact.

A few people are discounting Red Bull, do not understand why.
They have lost a chunk of time with the banning of the rear diffuser, but they are the 2nd quickest team.

Lewis seemed in a better mood i feel because he finished well ahead of Button.
Will be very interesting to see how he handles being beaten in races by his team mate. If he does not adjust mentally, it could affect him a great deal.

Button has clearly come to terms with Lewis being quicker in Quali than him, knowing the race is to follow.

Also, the Massa situation is hurting Ferrari's constructors chances.
But logically, the team have nothing to lose if they do replace him with a rookie.

Lastly, even though I am a Ferrari supporter, I do not believe they can come up with a magical upgrade this season and suddenly start challenging for race wins. (Would love to be proven wrong though!). It has never happened before, simple because development in F1 is very quick and other teams will improve as well.

[SilentEngine]

Epic race! The way Perez was closing on Alonso was just fantastic.

It's still early days in the season, the points table doesn't reflect the actual pace of the cars, but it's exciting to know that we have lot of cars with potential to come good in a race.

Kimi the 'Niceman' had a special gift to his media friends!

[mgh]

End of two races nine teams and fourteen drivers have points.
Prominent among 'pointless' drivers are Massa, Rosberg, Maldonado and Grosjean.
Among midfield teams, Sauber have started strongly. Sahara Force India are depending on luck for points.

[asr245]

Karthikeyan penalised for contact with Vettel - GPUpdate.net

Why on earth was Karthikeyan penalized for this? It was clearly Vettel's doing IMO and should have been left at a racing incident! Was Kobayashi penalized when Hamilton did something similar at Spa 2011? This was ridiculous

[route666]

Great race and Alonso was sublime, he actually uplifted the whole team and now they will put in 200% to proivde him the best car. Perez did a good job in the difficult conditions.

Mercedes is in a mess they dont have a solid direction, IMHO schumacher is taking the team down with him. He is not the old schumi now, in the past he would have taken a bad car into the podium,but now he is waiting for the car to improve. The competition is tough now. His presence in the team is actually affecting Nico's performance as well and Nico is their future . MS should hang his gloves sooner than later.

And Vettel's metamorphose into an arrogant world champion is complete. His Melbourne press conference was cocky and why would he want to squeeze a HRT??? and whine after that,when actually he was the culprit. True character is out of the bag.Cant take pressure!!!

Kimi did his job and he is happy,Webber as usual chipping in points, Hamilton & Jenson trying to stamp their authority in the team and in a way losing their focus on the ultimate goal.

Next Shanghai Noon..

[lifeat100k]

spirited and surprising drive by alonso.....expected schumi to keep up to his rain master image.....super race overall.....hope next race lotus get on podium!

[Fullrevs]

Originally Posted by asr245

Off-topic again (I thought a new thread was being created)





It's 8 engines per season and 5 races minimum for the gear box.



I think Hockenhiem 2010 confirmed his no. 2 status and he has since lost self belief.

Sergio Perez?? I think you forget a Robert Kubica who if regains fitness is almost a certain to be a Ferrari driver. No way Hamilton's going to be in a Ferrari - RBR is the only other choice he has unless Mercedes can improve it's performance. If no Kubica, then they might flirt with Webber (if he remains competitive) as he too is free for 2013.

Robert Kubica is too big a risk if you ask me. He had nearly severed his limbs during that rally crash. Imagine the amount of rehabilitation required to get him into shape? He has been out for two years now. I think its all over for Kubica and F1. He may make it back with Williams or Sauber or someone. He basically has to restart his career from step 1.

Sergio Perez is from the Ferrari driver Academy. With results like he's had last evening, he is a cinch for the seat. The other fresh candidate is Jules Bianchi.

Webber is doing better than Vettel at the moment, would RBR want to ditch him? If they dont find a star in Ricciardo or Vergne, webber might just stay back at RBR.

Hamilton is less likely a candidate but if he is on the driver market by the end of the season, you can count on a lot of top teams bidding for him. Ferrari really need two good drivers to consistently score points if they ever want to lift the constructors title. N for the teams, it is that trophy that is more valued than the drivers. Its where all the money comes from.

[sgiitk]

The burro (as Alonso is called because of his ears) has done it. God has given what can best be described as 'andhe ke hath bater'. My heart oes out to poor Perez, but then he does not yet have the experience to drive at 20/20 in treacherous conditions fot that long. By all accounts he may replace Massa soon.

Ferrari had a 1-2 (Sauber-Ferrari). What more can they ask for!!

[mgh]

Sahara Force India were the only team with both cars earning points, believe it or nuts.
Nine teams earned points.
Formula 1