Felipe Massa

Brilliant driver on his day but is he championship material?

In 2008 he proved he was but thats only one occassion, plus that season the Ferrari TBH was a bit quicker and won more races that season. In 2009 he nearly suffered a career ending head-injury and since coming to back to the grid he hasn't really shown that promise he did in 2008.

Don't get me wrong he's a driver i very much like, but i do wonder if he'll be a title challenger again for Ferrari season in season out or if he'll stay at Ferrari much longer?

Whats your thoughts on Massa?

 

[Bill Boddy]

Did you see my list of drivers Ferrari were paying in late '09 in the earlier post? Ferrari have plenty of cash if they want to get rid of Massa. Plenty.

Ferrari bought out Raikkonen but they don't want to buy out Massa. That says it all.

 

[RayInTorontoCanada]

Ferrari bought out Raikkonen but they don't want to buy out Massa. That says it all.

It doesn't say anything (unless you're implying they're happy keeping a driver who doesn't mind being an obedient Number 2.)

There were two other factors working in favour of keeping Massa:

1. It would have been a PR nightmare to ditch Massa given he'd nearly died in one of their cars. Besides, it was an unwritten rule to 'save' an injured Ferrari driver's seat until he got back. So there was tradition too.

2. Brazil, in case you don't know, is now the 8th largest economy on the planet...and it's GROWING. Santander is BIGGER in Brazil than it is in Spain so you might just want to keep an open mind and ask why Massa still continues to be there. FIAT also sell lots of cars in Brazil. It helps.

But don't let a good "That Says It All" story get in the way of facts, Bill!

 

[RasputinLives]

1. It would have been a PR nightmare to ditch Massa given he'd nearly died in one of their cars. Besides, it was an unwritten rule to 'save' an injured Ferrari driver's seat until he got back. So there was tradition too.

Now come on Ray you know full well that Kimi being dropped by Ferrari was well on the cards before Massa picked up his injury mainly because Kimi was out done by Massa for 2008 and most of 2009. Massa at the time of his acciedent was their number one driver so I agree it would have been a PR nightmare to keep Kimi instead of him. Would be like Mercedes chucking out Nico Rosberg but keeping Schumi at the moment.

Don't let your love for Kimi get in the way of the facts Ray.

 

[Slyboogy]

Massa at the time of his acciedent was their number one driver so I agree it would have been a PR nightmare to keep Kimi instead of him

It was a nightmare getting Alonso in...

I liked the Kimi-Massa partnership...

 

[Bill Boddy]

I've always been absolutely gobsmacked by the way Santander were chasing Massa so hard to get him to agree to let them sponsor him in 2008 and 2009. They just wouldn't leave him alone. It's well un-documented.

I also remember when there was a discussion about who was going to be Alonso's partner for the 2012 season that someone stated categorically that Alonso had total control of who his team mate would be. Now though it appears that it's Santander who choose. There's nothing like consistency is there?

 

[Tacitus]

I'll put this up because it's just plain hilarious and stupid.
Look I can spell Massa on my calculator.

 

[EvilWhippet]

It's for videos like that we need a "love" button.

 

[Sarinaide]

"Massa, everyone is faster, repeat, everyone is faster, do you understand?"

 

[Tacitus]

"Massa, everyone is faster, repeat, everyone is faster, do you understand?"

 

[KekeTheKing]

Remember me?

 

[Slyboogy]

One incident out of Hamilton's several, Massa can clearly claim that he has "learned" from it as he got a penalty, I think he feels the same can't be applied to Hamilton who has been caught up in several in one season...

 

[RasputinLives]

blooming heck the cars look so much thinner than now don't they?

 

[KekeTheKing]

blooming heck the cars look so much thinner than now don't they?

It's exaggerated slightly by the dimensions of the video.

 

[teabagyokel]

One incident out of Hamilton's several, Massa can clearly claim that he has "learned" from it as he got a penalty, I think he feels the same can't be applied to Hamilton who has been caught up in several in one season...

He's talking nonsense though isn't he? Hamilton was behind him after the drive through, so he did pay. The reason he finished ahead of Massa was that he was just plain slower. In fact, Ferrari benefited, since Alonso beat him (which wouldn't have happened anyway).

What I don't understand is why, when hit by Webber in Monza he wasn't asking the same questions despite repeated evidence that the Marko/Vettel evaluation of is not quite as inaccurate as we thought!

 

[Slyboogy]

He's talking nonsense though isn't he? Hamilton was behind him after the drive through, so he did pay. The reason he finished ahead of Massa was that he was just plain slower. In fact, Ferrari benefited, since Alonso beat him (which wouldn't have happened anyway).

What I don't understand is why, when hit by Webber in Monza he wasn't asking the same questions despite repeated evidence that the Marko/Vettel evaluation of is not quite as inaccurate as we thought!

Talking nonsense where? I didnt hear him say Hamilton didn't pay and didnt get penalised...was he plain slower though? He was keeping up with Alonso and Webber and kept his tyres intact longer than Alonso in te first stint, then the incident happened, after that he was coming through the field yes Hamilton was faster and hot ahead if him but he was in by far a better car and then he got disadvantaged by the safety car.

I am in no way defending his actions, but the Webber one is different, Webber isn't having repeated incidents with Massa and ruining his race, it's a one off, to Massa and many other drivers on the track Hamilton isn't learning from his mistakes and is getting into incidents repeatedly, this was a innocent mistake from Hamilton, but I can understand Massa's frustration.

I don't get what you mean in the latter half of your post about marko/Vettel evaluation

 

[teabagyokel]

Talking nonsense where? I didnt hear him say Hamilton didn't pay and didnt get penalised...was he plain slower though? He was keeping up with Alonso and Webber and kept his tyres intact longer than Alonso in te first stint, then the incident happened, after that he was coming through the field yes Hamilton was faster and hot ahead if him but he was in by far a better car and then he got disadvantaged by the safety car.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/formula_one/15053045.stm

I think he says the problem was "he doesn't pay". He was slower than Hamilton/McLaren, OK that may not be his fault, but he was passed by Hamilton before the Safety Car, and I don't think he can legitimately claim that Hamilton didn't suffer in comparison and the FIA did not penalise him.

I am in no way defending his actions, but the Webber one is different, Webber isn't having repeated incidents with Massa and ruining his race, it's a one off, to Massa and many other drivers on the track Hamilton isn't learning from his mistakes and is getting into incidents repeatedly, this was a innocent mistake from Hamilton, but I can understand Massa's frustration.

I don't get what you mean in the latter half of your post about marko/Vettel evaluation

I'm just comparing Hamilton to a man who has been in a relatively similar amount of collisions with everyone, but without all the handwringing.

 

[Slyboogy]

I think he means overall, (I can't quite properly due to being on the iPod), and not the race, since to him he keeps repeating incidents a lot this year.

When you said "Marko" I thought you meant "Helmut Marko" yes Webber is one guy who seems to get into several incidents, but this year he's not got into many just that one in Monza? This season.

Maybe to him Webber's learning since one collision in a season must be a record for Webber

 

[teabagyokel]

I think there are some drivers who have been whipped up into a frenzy vis-á-vis Hamilton by the "senior drivers" (i.e. Webber), hence Massa's disrespect and the utter ridiculousness from Sr. Maldonado. Webber and Schumacher have similar numbers of incidents, but that is rarely discussed by the drivers.

I can't help but think he's siphoning off frustration from the fact he hasn't come near beating a Spanish guy in the same car onto Hamilton.

 

[Fenderman]

I truly feel sorry for Massa. My daughter had a crush on him so we really rooted for him in his early career. He seemed to come of age when Schumi was mentoring him from pit-wall but then Hungary 2009 happened. He made a great recovery and all things considered a good comeback to F1. Then the "Fernando is faster than you" moment and he's never been the same since. The occasional flash but he's lost his edge.

He's in one of the top three cars on the grid but in the race he is slow which means that he is a road block. What caught Hamilton out was the difference in pace going into that corner. That was Hamilton's error but it illustrates Massa's lack of pace into and through the corners. Maybe he (and Ferrari) can't get his car set up right for him. However, he has had a long career with the team, so I suspect it's that little bit of doubt, deep in the subconscious, left-over from a horrible memory. I'm not a psychologist but my other suspicion is that anything unsettling in the mind may just affect his thinking and his perspectives as well.

It's a shame. At one time he was looking very good.

 

[RayInTorontoCanada]

I think that Felipe Massa should be more concerned that he is 100 points behind his team mate than trying to organize some sort of vendetta against Lewis Hamilton.

I don't even know if Felipe's going to do what the media and internet world is hyping him up to do.

Right now it's seeming as if it's some internet-led, blogging, media-hyped situation and Massa, as you suggest, ought to be working with his race engineers to concentrate on going as well as he can at Suzuka, a hard circuit to get right when on the limit.

Felipe' doesn't need any other side shows. He's been able to out-qualify Alonso in recent months and his first goal should be to out-qualify Alonso again.

His second goal should be to have as clean a race as possible and finish the Japanese GP as high as possible, hopefully 4th or 5th or somesuch.

The WDC is no longer an issue so there won't be any team orders and Massa should just go out and try and finish the Japanese GP ahead of Alonso.

That should be his one and only focus this week.

My advice to Felipe' would be this:

There'll be life after Ferrari if you can show that you can qualify within 1 or 1-and-a-half tenths of Alonso on average consistently and can race with him (regularly) or even out-race him (from time to time). So, concentrate solely on that!