Posts by Raymond Anderson4

1:35.774 🙏 .

Huge congrats to Massa. I’m honestly really happy for him.

Kudos to Mass. He’s consistently putting up some seriously impressive lap times... let's push for second place, Philip! 🙂

Haha, I’m calling it now: an easy win for Sebastian Vettel tomorrow... Mark Webber will probably take second.
AS long as there are no retirements.
Jenson Button mentioned that tire degradation is becoming a real headache because of the fresh asphalt on certain sections of the track, which might give the team some trouble down the road...
It seems like this year, whoever grabs pole position usually cruises to the win.

darkmarlin16 said:I'm watching Kimi give an interview right now 🤣

I honestly don't find him funny anymore...
It feels like there's an entire army over at Autosport just worshipping everything he says or does.

He’s also become quite prickly lately... especially during interviews. Look, I get it—he isn't exactly the type who enjoys talking to the press, but he doesn't have to make it so incredibly obvious. It's like he wears his annoyance right on his sleeve.

Take what happened just now. He didn't seem to care at all that the others had to slow down through the turn because he went off track. I'm not saying he needs to sit there and cry about it, but a simple "That was an accident, I didn't mean to, sorry to the guys for the mess" would go a long way.
I really think he should stop trying so hard to push this image that he couldn't care less about anyone else.

fadedwalker18 said:Grid:

3. Kamui Kobayashi
4. Romain Grosjean
5. Sergio Perez

Does this lineup ring a bell for anyone else? 😁

I think you realize what kind of chaos that specific combination could trigger, though I truly hope we don't see it play out😁.
Besides, the Lotus is showing real pace and Romain is driving fast... with a clean start, he could easily fight for a podium.

Gary Smith66 said:I just wanted to point out how ridiculous those stories are about Fernando Alonso winning the championship purely because of "luck."

By that same logic, this supposed "luck" is exactly what supposedly brought Sebastian Vettel right back into the fight during those last two races.

And what about the fact that Alonso benefited from Lewis Hamilton's retirement? 😉
He went from a 37-point lead to a 52-point cushion... and if Hamilton hadn't dropped out, that gap would have almost certainly shrunk to under 30 points.
Plus, who can say for sure that Alonso would have finished ahead of Pastor Maldonado? Given Ferrari's pace at the end of the race and how conservatively he drove just to secure 3rd place, even that wasn't a guarantee.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZ8cnvSFQLo
Video.

In my opinion, there shouldn't be a penalty here.

Since the decision is already final, it means he didn't slow down through turn 16.
Alonso's slow lap was really just a symptom of a car that wasn't up to pace from the very start of the lap. If you look at his second sector over the whole weekend, Fernando didn't actually lose much ground because of Kimi. He was consistently about four or five tenths slower in that second sector regardless. In his final Q3 lap, he was running 5.5 tenths off the pace, so Kimi isn't really the reason for that gap. It's more like one tenth, maybe two if you're being generous...
There's a chance he could have jumped Perez, but beating Grosjean would be a stretch.

Sebastian Vettel received a reprimand, but no penalty.

They sent Lewis out on used tires, which means he’s starting his stint with rubber that already has 4 or 5 laps on it.
Unbelievable.
On top of that, I’m reading reports that they completely missed the mark on his setup 🤣 .

Jenson Button is right behind us, and honestly, if a penalty lands on him, it might actually work in our favor... though I hate to say it because Kamui Kobayashi and Romain Grosjean drove incredibly well today. They really earned their spots out there.

We really need to look at the standard racing line through that corner... if this is the path Fernando Alonso typically takes, we have to factor that into the equation.
Then again, that shouldn't be the deciding factor here. A driver can take a different line than everyone else just to mask unsportsmanlike behavior toward the car ahead of them.

I have my doubts about how much McLaren will actually help Lewis.
It seems pretty obvious to me they’re just setting him up to fail🤣.

I don't know... I'm pretty sure Sebastian Vettel just didn't spot him in time, and by then, there wasn't enough room left to dodge without causing trouble, so he did what he had to do... It's a bit of a tricky situation when you've got the rear end of the car drifting right onto the racing line.

It also makes you wonder when Vettel actually spotted Alonso. If he saw him before turn 130, I really think he should have slowed down and drifted to the right before the chicane just to let Alonso past.
That way, the stewards wouldn't have any grounds to claim he was being a distraction to Alonso, since the driver behind can't predict which line you're taking or how hard you're going to brake...

Picture of the incident currently being reviewed.
Looking at this shot, I don't really think Vettel is at fault here...
https://twitter.com/ESPNF1/status/25...511168/photo/1

Can someone please show me, link me, or even just sketch out what happened with the Alonso-Vettel situation?
I'm talking about the penalty! 😁

Where did this even take place?

-just caught up by reading the previous page. It makes sense now.

stormybadger8 said:I’m pretty sure Romain Grosjean got penalized almost entirely because of Esteban Ocon. I wonder if Mark Webber is in the same boat too...
Kamui Kobayashi likely got hit because of those yellow flags...

Honestly, it wouldn't even surprise me if they penalized everyone who set a fast lap in the Third Quarter, except for Fernando Alonso...☕>
At the end of the day, it feels like the starting grid has very little to do with the actual qualifying results.

I'm not entirely clear on the rule—is a driver required to be slower than their personal best, or just visibly slow?
Missing a tenth or a tenth and a half in the final sector doesn't really feel like "slowing down."
Regardless, whoever earned the penalty deserves it...

Lotus looks absolutely manic in the race simulations... specifically regarding Romain. But given how things are shaking out in the championship, he might actually have to step aside for Kimi Räikkönen for the second race in a row. 🙄

Jason Campbell70 said:There’s been some talk about that new wing from the Singapore GP, specifically regarding those modified lower endplate sections.

Word is, the upper portion of the wing performed just fine in Singapore, but the lower part of the endplates—the bits designed to pull air from the diffuser—didn't quite behave the way the folks at Ferrari expected.

Since they only brought one single version of that new rear wing to Singapore😁, they didn't really have any room to run tests.

We'll see how things pan out, but the car still looks tricky to handle when you're pushing for an aggressive qualifying lap... much like what we saw in Singapore.
As usual, they brought a few different parts along; half work, half don't... and even the ones that do work aren't providing much of a gain per lap.
On the bright side, Fernando Alonso mentioned that tire degradation shouldn't be an issue.

Hmm, it doesn't look like Ferrari is going to be fighting for pole position, though I guess we can't say we're surprised by that.
Do you know if they're running the new rear wing? I read somewhere they might just stick with the one from Daytona.