Head To Head Jenson Button vs Lewis Hamilton

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Lap chart for Button and Hamilton from Bahrain, for those who are interested.

Button was faster for 21 laps, Hamilton for 35.

2012-bahrain-gp-button-hamilton-lap-times.webp
 
It was absolutely clear to me that over the whole weekend Hamilton was much quicker than Button, Button could not get things to work this weekend. Considering the time lost in the pits, before Button's puncture Hamilton was still only what, 6 seconds behind him? Bad weekend for Jenson. Just such a shame for Hamilton as he clearly was good for 4th or 5th.
 
It may be that this was one of those occasions when drivers needed to put some energy into the tyres to get them 'switched on'.

Or, the track just favours Lewis. In 2010 he outqualified JB by 0.4s on the endurance layout of the circuit.
 
I've been avoiding this thread ;), but seeing as Brogan tagged me! I think what you might be overlooking is that the lines should be going downwards as the fuel burns off. tooncheese hasn't published it yet, but the figures are showing heavy degradation (most obvious in the above charts by the step down when new tyres are fitted).

I think the other factor with these pure laptime charts is that if you are stuck behind someone whose tyres are fading, it will look like yours are too. I think both McLarens spent a lot of the first part of the race vying for position but found more clear air after their final stops.

I looked a lot more at Vettel vs Raikkonen and their data showed a big difference degradation between used and new tyres. Not sure if this is a factor too without checking.
 
Something else from the data. It does look like Jenson did have much lower degradation on his last stint (new Mediums), but what that hides is that this was low deg compared to a few very slow laps at the start of the stint. Fuel adjusted, he was perhaps 1.5-2s/lap off the pace at the start of that last stint compared to his earlier stint from lap 8 also on new mediums.

The benefit of this was that by lap 13 of the last stint, he was half a second faster than on his first try with the tyres. Given that he was on course to do 20 laps in that last stint and his earlier tyres were dead after 13 laps, that was a necessary evil, but it would have worked out for him had other issues not stopped him taking 6th.
 
In the last stint Alonso was consistently keeping about 2.5 secs behind Button with Hamilton keeping consistently about 1.5 secs behind Alonso as I remember from the live timing. At least i think t was at that point of the race, but i might be wrong. Alonso closed on Button and Hamilton closed on Alonso, but once they got within these distances they looked pretty powerless to engineer an overtake.
 
Really looking forward to the Spanish Grand Prix now testing is over, can we have it this weekend instead please? pleaseeeeeee?

Want to see the next chapter of the Ham V But story.
 
So Button 11th is a unexpected twist but that will be interesting to see

The qually record between tham as teammates now stands at

Hamilton 32 > 11 Button

But Buttons strength has always seemes to be race pace not 1 lap speed.
 
Seems that LH has figured out the tyres a lot quicker than JB, Also it seems that JB is missing the EBD much more than LH as he prefers a planted rear, however he was also complaining about understeer a lot. The car seems to have become more of a handful for both drivers
 
I have always thought that Lewis has more flexibility to adapt to the car and/or adapt aspects of the car set up to suit him and thus drive and work around the issues. It's often been the case that if Jenson hasn't got the car set up to his liking his pace is affected. He might be able to work round it in race conditions because that good ol' red mist effect could take him into that zone that bypasses conscious thinking and gives an extra edge. One can only hope so otherwise he is in for a very tough race.
 
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