I Was Just Disobeying Orders
- Thread starter snowy
- Start date
There's team orders and there's race fixing, I think that if Mark had done as you say Harry there may have been an enquiry for deliberately hindering other drivers.
Seb's best opportunity for a better, more guaranteed result in Brazil would have been to keep the car pointing forwards and not hit anyone...
Seb's best opportunity for a better, more guaranteed result in Brazil would have been to keep the car pointing forwards and not hit anyone...
Fenderman
Rooters Reporter
Harry That's possibly the poorest example you could have chosen. Webber left Vettel plenty of room whilst uncharacteristically making a good start for a change. That was the best way to help his team mate in that he didn't cause a massive pile up by faffing about brake testing anyone behind him or weaving about on the off chance that Vettel would make it through unscathed. His duty to the team was to get off the line and into the best position possible and take it ftom there. Vettel made a reasonable start only to hash up his first laps all on his own..
Matechitz has obviously got involved and everyone has to fall in line and tow this 'we don't want to implement team orders again directive' rather than address the root cause that is one driver going for personal glory and undermining the team principal. No doubt the owner is a staunch ally of Vettel and this has given him extra impetus to say what he did that he'd repeat his actions again. Horner's position is best described as lame duck and his molly coddling of Vettel is just painful to watch. It would be interesting to see how Newey views all this.
Quintessentially I think Mateschitz has actually publically been a staunch ally of Webber, although I suppose he wouldn't exactly dislike Vettel due to the success he has brought.
Totally agree with regards to Horner, the guy is spineless and his latest 'it doesn't undermine me, no really, honestly it doesn't' is just another example of how deluded he is.
http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/106655
Totally agree with regards to Horner, the guy is spineless and his latest 'it doesn't undermine me, no really, honestly it doesn't' is just another example of how deluded he is.
http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/106655
Maybe one of the Newey thread but do you think he would quit red bull and take up residence in one of the smaller teams for a low price? He isn't in f1 for the money so why not help out a team like marussia and avoid the squabbles and politics of a bigger team.
Newey certainly didn't look happy at Malaysia but i'm not sure this is enough to make him leave. He does, however, have a history of leaving top teams (Williams to McLaren, McLaren to Red Bull) so I wouldn't be surprised to see him at Mercedes within the next few years. I think Ferrari have already tried numerous time to poach him and he's had none of it.
The only way to avoid the politics would be to have his own team - not beyond the realms of possibility IMO - but that just plays into different politics of the likes of the poison dwarf.
Blog Zbod
Podium Finisher
Strictly speaking, Lotus are not a "smaller" team.
Vettel likely will win WDC #4 this season. Sooner or later, he will weigh his accomplishments against his legacy and set to wondering whether he should take deliberate measures to still the rumblings that he cannot win without the aid of the best car on the circuit. This clearly is something he never can escape so long as he drives an Adrian Newey car, and if his relationship with Horner has soured sufficiently, 2014 might be the season he chooses to move elsewhere.
The press already have Vettel teamed with Raikkonen, but Kimi would "retire" (again) and go back to WRC or NASCAR before he would give up his "bespoke" (near as makes no difference) no-PR job at Lotus and become a sock puppet for Red Bull. Red Bull, OTOH, isn't a drinks company, it's a marketing machine whose principal retail product happens to be a beverage. They sell the Red Bull image, and the drinks can just happens to be the billboard. They could not conscience someone so highly paid as an F1 driver not fully embracing his greater role as a spokesman for the machine.
I see no indication that Vettel's relationship with Horner is that badly broken, but that doesn't mean this incident -- potentially combined with a strong performance this season by Lotus -- can't move him beyond the tipping point and convince him the time is right to move on. And as distasteful as Boullier might find it to sack such a promising young driver as Grosjean (especially since he is a fellow Frenchman), I think he'd find it harder still to turn away the opportunity to hire a driver whose palmares include four consecutive WDCs, and whose driving skills have yet to peak.
Webber lost position to both Massa and Hülkenberg before the first corner. It didn't look such a bad a start because Vettel had an uncharacteristically mediocre one and didn't overtake Webber.
Out of the blocks, judging from that distinct juke to the left, I think Webber's intent was to block Vettel, but that turned out not to be necessary because Vettel appeared to be struggling for grip and so posed no immediate threat. In the meantime, Felipe and Nico already had blown past Webber on the outside, so Mark held his line to limit further damage until Vettel braked for the first corner.
Webber did clip the kerb at corner apex, but by that point he had more the a car's length lead over Vettel. I suppose only Vettel knows whether he was giving ground because his tyres wouldn't hook up or because Webber already had boxed him in and closed the door.
The root cause is a team principal who has spent four seasons financing the appeasement the most truculent #2 driver in F1 with cheques written against the good will of the most successful driver in the sport and the reigning world champion. They've been taking for granted that Vettel would continue to overlook their snipping off bits of his ego to feed to Webber without it affecting his enthusiasm or level of commitment, or his fealty to the team, so it always was just a matter of time until Horner's cheques would begin bouncing. I marvel at Vettel's charity to have covered Horner's overdraughts for as long as he did.
Mateschitz doesn't mind an ambitious driver. Mateschitz wants an ambitious driver. What he doesn't want is a jockey making his prize race horse bit-sore by holding the reins too tightly. Once it's been made bit-sore, a horse only ever responds to the rider's commands with anguish and anger. That's why Red Bull will have no more team orders, to stop Horner making Mateschitz's 3x Grand National winner bit-sore.
Vettel only won his current title by three points, and he had a front row seat for Massa's losing the 2008 WDC by a single point (actually, it was a "rear view" seat, as Hamilton came immediately behind Vettel at Brazil). Say what you will about Vettel, there's no one claiming he is slow to learn, and those lessons were not lost on him. Considering his background (and their history), why in heaven's name should Vettel willingly cede seven WDC points to a #2 driver who lacked either the petrol to engage in a protracted battle for position or the potential to win his own WDC? What I have yet to hear or read anyone else anywhere remark to is that Horner clearly is so confident in Vettel's prospect of winning #4 on the trot that he was willing to throw Webber a bone and gift him the win.
So the most vocal opponent to Team Orders in F1 gets his knickers in a twist because his teammate employs the same strategy he had been advocating:
If there's any blame to be laid at Vettel's feet over this affair, it's for letting the charade linger on for so long. He's shown too little ego, not too much. He should have brought the matter to a head and ended it after he so unequivocally dominated the 2011 season and won his second WDC for this team, at which point it became clear we were entering the Vettel dynasty.
His name might not be the largest adorning Hungry Heidi, but it is his team nonetheless, and will remain so for as long as he can continue earning WDCs.
Alonso was forced to follow Massa home in his first race for Ferrari. He made his displeasure clear, but privately, and subsequently got what he wanted - team orders in his favour.
Vettel now finds himself in a very different position. If he can consistently outpace Webber this should cause little difficulty, but he hasn't always managed to do that; or not with a margin of security. Very interesting times.
Vettel now finds himself in a very different position. If he can consistently outpace Webber this should cause little difficulty, but he hasn't always managed to do that; or not with a margin of security. Very interesting times.
no-FIAt-please Of course I am, thank you for the clarification 
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