Grand Prix 2011 Japanese Grand Prix Practice, Qualifying & Race Discussion

The championship is still alive!!!!!!!!!!! Okay that may be a bit over optomistic

Despite another crushing win by Vettel in Singapore, Buttons valiant second place ensures that the championship mathematically remains possible for the experienced Britain, but for him to take his second world title he requires Vettel to not finish in all the remain races and Button to win every race and to be honest there is as much chance of me winning the lottery.

Indeed, Button has had a strong 2011 and this would be more highlighted if it wasnt for the sheer dominance of Vettel who has taken a podium in every race apart from Germany. He has outperformed his beleagured team mate Hamilton who is under severe pressure from the media after another incident, this time with Massa who didn't take kindly to it and made his feelings clear after the race.

But at Ferrari they seem to be going through the motions after a great win at Silverstone, Alonso has strong drives without challenging and Massa is regularly in the middle of the points without ever challenging the podium, surely he'll be on the way out soon as he's not performing at a level that Ferrari require him to be if they want to be serious Constructors Champions in the future.

Big news at Mercedes as Aldo Costa and Geoff Willis have joined the team, with the team struggling (in comparison) since their return to the sport in 2010, these two signings might just get them back at the front in the near future and might convince Schumacher to extend his contract, Singapore aside, Schumacher's performances have been a lot better this season and at the very least he has matched Rosberg and perhaps there is still life in the old dog yet and the podium might not be too far away.

Japan has become famous for title deciders with Prost/Senna being the most memorable with the crashes at the final chicane and turn 1 being some of the most controversial in the sport (particularly the latter after a dispute over the start position). The track is regarded as one of the best driver tracks on the calendar, second only to Spa and returned to the calendar in 2009 after Fuji pulled out of F1 due to financial problems after holding the grand prix in 2007 and 2008 where Hamilton and Alonso won respectively.

No doubt the championship will be won in Suzuka but you never know, stranger things have happened in F1, surely the reliability of the Red Bull can't hold out forever, can we hope?

For Galahads superb circuit write up see here http://cliptheapex.com/pages/suzuka-international-racing-course/
 
Let's be serious here. Jenson did not screw with Lewis. It was the team that put them in that position. Please do not let this get out of hand.

P3 might be good for Hamilton. P2 hadn't been working very well for him anyway. Now about P1.....................
 
Is this new?

Look at the end of that 1st stint in China back in April.

Jenson wasn't born yesterday. He's not fast enough to beat Hamilton on pure pace...so he has to go a number of other routes and not all of them will be straight up.

Let's not be naive.

Why did you only quote half of my sentence. I don't mind you taking a sentence out of a paragraph, but chopping my sentences in half to engineer a new context? Very naughty Ray.
 
Turkey last year?

blooming heck not that one again

Massa was somewhere around in front of him too, though we didn't see him on the video.

The 2 messages on the McLaren site only spoke of the gap to Massa, and Lewis being behind, though there may have been others we missed (i.e. none to Ham are listed).

Pit » HAM: "We've missed the chance, Lewis. We've taken the chequered flag. Box this lap, save the tyres."
41 minutes ago

Pit » BUT: "Let's make the gap to Massa."
43 minutes ago

Pit » BUT: "Lewis is the car behind, Massa is the car in front."
46 minutes ago

Yeah I think we can see that lands the blame on Mclaren. A "make sure you give Lewis enough time to get over the line" message would have been nice. You can't expect Jenson to be setting the car up, managing the gap to Massa, preparign himself for his quick lap and keeping an eye on where his team-mate is on the track and if he'll get his quali lap in without a bit of help from the pit wall.

Even more frustrating is that Webber didn't get held up by Button on his lap so if Mclaren had just given a "Lewis you need to go race speed through the last chicane" he'd have got on his lap.

Red Bull were aware of it - remember the message we heard "40% Kers before the last corner Mark" - that was on that run wasn't it or am I getting mixed up?
 
The face that Lewis had for post race interview....same as Turkey last year...when Button tried to pull a fast one on him.
 
Shall I suggest the following?

Had Hamilton or Jenson been driving a Red Bull and sent out at the front of the pack they would have been on pole.

You can suggest it. But P1, P2, P3, Q2 and the first 9 mins of Q3 suggest McLaren had the measure of the Red Bull.

Let me suggest Button's not in Vettel's league when it comes to ultimate pace. Today confirmed it.

Let me also suggest that it was McLaren's Pole to take today. Button's simply not fast enough...and Hamilton had yet another issue.
 
He's going to be even happier when he finds out what Whitmarsh said about him afterwards. I think that was pretty disgraceful from a team principal personally. I can understand he is as frustrated as anyone with frequent mistakes but that was not on.
 
I thought it was a fair fight between Vettel and Button to be honest, they both had good track position. We were just denied an opportunity to see what Hamilton could have done.

FB you are right he definitely tried to focus it on Button, but when pushed he did say a couple of times that Lewis was told not to back up the pack and let cars past. Which would have been fine to me had they not told him also he needed 4 seconds to the car in front or it would hurt his lap. And that car in front ended up being Button.
 
Red Bull were aware of it - remember the message we heard "40% Kers before the last corner Mark" - that was on that run wasn't it or am I getting mixed up?

Very good point, it's a shame we only saw an onboard and not an overhead shot as it's likely in that circumstance that Webber got a sudden spurt on. Is it normal to use that much KERS at that point in the lap?

Not blaming Mark but it could be that Hamilton didn't think he was backing anyone up and this caught him completely off guard.
 
It was track position that got Vettel pole today. If McLaren had the sense to send Button and Hamilton out first then it could have been either of them backing everyone up and getting the lap in in clean air. Button, Vettel and Lewis all put in brilliant laps when they had the opportunity and Seb might have finished third. The way I look at it was that pole was decided from the pitwall today.

Yes but in terms of pure pace in FP1, FP2, FP3, Q1, Q2 and the first runs of Q3, the MP4-26 was faster than the RB7.

That is an undeniable fact. Everything else is moot.

So when people look back on Suzuka qualifying 2011, they should know that the fastest car wasn't on pole. It wasn't on Pole for one singular reason only:

The faster McLaren driver (as measured by all qualifying sessions in 2010 and 2011 (including Q1, Q2 and the first Q3 runs at Suzuka)) didn't get his second run in.

Period.

PS

The above statement implies that Button isn't the faster McLaren driver over 1 lap qually pace.

The above statement also implies that Button wouldn't have extracted a Pole out of the RBR RB7-Renault either.

Button's simply not fast enough...Simply not 'Vettel Quick'...Simply not 'Hamilton Quick'.
 
blooming heck not that one again

Even more frustrating is that Webber didn't get held up by Button on his lap so if Mclaren had just given a "Lewis you need to go race speed through the last chicane" he'd have got on his lap.
Good point; I thought Webber's lap was spoiled, but he was <0.1s off his previous time, so just slow for his own reasons. His gap to Button was only 3s when they finished.
Crude calculation of the gaps each driver had from the TV footage:
Alonso 8s ahead of Vettel
Vettel crosses with 19s remaining
Massa completes 6s after Vettel
Button completes 7s after Massa
Webber completes 3s after (0.7s longer lap)

All being a bit greedy, but no conspiracies about backing up.
 
You are combatting my point by changing the subject and answering a completely different point which I have not made.

McLaren had the faster car/driver combo today. Red Bull had the fastest pitwall/driver/car combo today.

Tomorrow, I suspect that the driver/car combo advantage swings toward Red Bull in race conditions and anything other than a Vettel win tomorrow will be a result of an error by Red Bull or Vettel.

So just so we are clear, I think the McLaren was at least a match if not faster than the Red Bull today and I think the opposite will be true tomorrow.
 
Who's to say Button wouldn't have pipped Vettel had thier track positions been reversed?

Who is to say that Button would not have gone faster if he was sitting in Vettel's racing car and not the McLaren?

If I were to say these things, or the contrary, I would be speculating.
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