Head To Head Nico Rosberg vs Lewis Hamilton

[FB]

At the Indian GP Kobayashi is recorded as receiving the following:

Kamui Kobayashi (Sauber) Leaving the track and gaining an advantage, driver was sufficiently ahead so no advantage gained, no further action

Not sure what year but, for me, the relevant bit is about gaining an advantage and Rosberg so obviously did. Having had a scan through the rules the stewards can issue a warning if they think that is appropriate. This is the passage from the regs.

6.1 "Incident" means any occurrence or series of occurrences involving one or more drivers, or any action by any driver, which is reported to the stewards by the race director (or noted by the stewards and subsequently investigated) which :
a) Necessitated the suspension of a race under Article 41.
b) Constituted a breach of these Sporting Regulations or the Code.
c) Caused a false start by one or more cars.
d) Caused a collision.
e) Forced a driver off the track.
f) Illegitimately prevented a legitimate overtaking manoeuvre by a driver.
g) Illegitimately impeded another driver during overtaking.
Unless it was completely clear that a driver was in breach of any of the above, any incidents involving more than one car will normally be investigated after the race.
16.2 a) It shall be at the discretion of the stewards to decide, upon a report or a request by the race director, if a driver or drivers involved in an incident shall be penalised.
b) If an incident is under investigation by the stewards a message informing all teams which driver or drivers are involved will be displayed on the official messaging system.
Provided that such a message is displayed no later than five minutes after the race has finished the driver or drivers concerned may not leave the circuit without the consent of the stewards.
16.3 The stewards may impose any one of the penalties below on any driver involved in an Incident:
a) A five second time penalty. The driver must enter the pit lane, stop at his pit for at least five seconds and then re-join the race. The relevant driver may however elect not to stop, provided he carries out no further pit stop before the end of the race. In such cases five seconds will be added to the elapsed race time of the driver concerned.
b) A drive-through penalty. The driver must enter the pit lane and re-join the race without stopping.
c) A ten second time penalty. The driver must enter the pit lane, stop at his pit for at least ten seconds and then re-join the race.
If either of the three penalties above are imposed during the last three laps, or after the end of a race, Article 16.4b) below will not apply and five seconds will be added to the elapsed race time of the driver concerned in the case of a) above, 20 seconds in the case of b) and 30 seconds in the case of c).
d) A time penalty
e) A reprimand.
If any of the five penalties above are imposed they shall not be subject to appeal.
f) A drop of any number of grid positions at the driver's next Event.
g) Exclusion from the results.
h) Suspension from the driver's next Event.

http://www.formula1.com/inside_f1/rules_and_regulations/sporting_regulations/8683/fia.html

 

[Mephistopheles]

My guess would be the the term gain an advantage can sometime be a subjective one as in this case, Did he gain a place by cutting the chicane? Answer - No. Did he maintain his position by cutting the chicane? Answer - No. Did he gain a time advantage? Answer - Yes. Did that time advantage give him a race advantage? Answer - No, because that time advantage was given back in turns I and 2. If he had done the same thing in qualifying then obviously that lap time would have been deleted.

Punishment for offence - first and final warning...

Did the punishment fit the offence? In my view yes....

But what do I know I just sit in my armchair and watch the race on the telly and so I don't have all the data to make an alternative judgement so therefore have to trust those that do have all the information and more knowledge than I....

 

[RasputinLives]

Not that I want to stir things any more than they are but there has to be something wrong with an F1 world where Grosjean gets a penalty for an awesome overtake on Massa at Hungry for being slightly off the track and Rosberg gets away scott free for basically straight lining a chicane.

Not that I'm advocating penaltys. F1's recent black hat white hat policy recently is getting tiresome at best.

What I'm most glad about this incident is that we didn't hear Lewis shouting for the stewards to give a pen for it even though he had reason to be aggrieved. We hear too much of that from all drivers.

 

[Hamberg]

Rosberg on the subject.

"I went straight, and didn't get an advantage. I did initially, but I slowed down in Turn 1 and 2 as is the norm to do.

"So as long as I didn't gain an advantage [overall], then it is fine. And thankfully that is how they judged it."

"It is worth discussing, because it going to the stewards is a bit strange"

"It is something that we all agreed among ourselves, and especially that the first time you can maybe get a warning, but you cannot do it three times in a row."

 

[KekeTheKing]

Edd Straw made a substantial error in that article Hamberg. He incorrectly states that Lap 25 was Rosberg's second fastest lap of the race when it was actually his fastest, by over two tenths. This is a basic tenet of understanding the advantage gained so that's a bit disconcerting I'd say.

You guys are also ignoring the fact that Hamilton set the fastest lap of the race (at that point) on Lap 24, gained DRS on Lap 25, and then of course lost it on Lap 26, so his time loss there (compared to previous laps) is hardly surprising. It's also completely irrelevant. Nowhere do the rules state that Stewards should take into account the lap times of the opposing driver (before or after the incident) when assessing whether an advantage was gained on a certain lap by another driver.

edit - Rosberg expressing surprise that it was even investigated by the Stewards invalidates his opinion in this case. He's basically saying that every driver is entitled to one "Get out of Jail Free" card to use at every race, regardless of the scenario, no questions asked. That is simply not Grand Prix racing.

 

[RasputinLives]

Mephistopheles there is an easy argument to say he gained and advantage. Basically if there had been a pit of crocodiles there he would have attempted to make the corner and at the very least flat spotted his tyres, been slow enough the Hamilton could have made a move at the next straight or most probably hit the wall.

 

[Hamberg]

I agree RasputinLives and I think there are two things here, drivers with previous seem to feel the brunt of odd decisions.

The second is (no not Massa's a giant crybaby) whether the current way the corner cutting is penalised (if by the person in the lead) is fair. It might not be and there may well be changes after this but the rules and directives are as they are at the moment.

 

[Brogan]

Edit: Can't be fucking bothered.

 

[The Artist.....]

The Artist..... When was that?
And I don't think Rosberg was warned previously, and he did get a warning.

Monza, a few years ago. - Drivers were warned before the race as well...

 

[FB]

I think Nico was a very lucky boy, in many ways, throughout the weekend.

 

[Hamberg]

KekeTheKing ahhh, I thought there was just one activation zone before the incident not on the start finish straight as well. Okay.

Couple of questions...
How many detection zones are there? I thought just the one?
If so Hamilton still would have been able to activate it on the start/finish straight wouldn't he? It's the gap at the detection zone that matters I thought?
What turn did this happen at?

I may be struggling with this because I've got some basics wrong!

 

[Mephistopheles]

There was only one detection zone and that was just after the hairpin, there were two DRS zones I'm not sure what that has got to do with anything though...

 

[Hamberg]

Because I can't see how the incident prevented Hamilton from using DRS, (which would of course be a lasting disadvantage for Hamilton) in subsequent laps if Rosberg gave the time back well before the next detection point.

Plus it would mean Hamilton did use DRS on at least the first part of lap 26. So I think that gap on lap 26 must have formed naturally (or because Hamilton's engineers were banking on a penalty and told him to take it easy, or because Hamilton used his special 'Barcelona Button' on lap 24).

Therefore no lasting advantage. Therefore no penalty over a cutting the chicane warning.

 

[Brogan]

Once again, you spectacularly miss the point that if Rosberg had elected not to take to the run off or had not accelerated through it, he would have been passed by Hamilton before T1.

Therefore a massive, lasting advantage.

 

[Hamberg]

That's your opinion not factual and others believe he wouldn't have, the acceleration opened the gap a lot more but he may have still come out ahead.

 

[F1Yorkshire]

It's all a moot point as Hamilton retired. You could argue that running in front of Rosberg meant his brakes may not have failed but the damage to Hamiltons car had probably already been done by then.

 

[Brogan]

The fact that Rosberg chose to take to the run off and accelerate through it tells me all I need to know, including about Rosberg.

 

[Hamberg]

He certainly knows how to push the boundary of the rules. As have all the previous World Champions.

 

[Chad Stewarthill]

That's rather a large assumption you're making (or at least suggesting) Hamberg when he's less than one win ahead and we''re not even half way through the season.

 

[siffert_fan]

While everyone goes on about how the Merc drivers are allowed to race each other, has anyone answered this question:

If Merc comes up with an improvement to the car, but only has enough of the bits to upgrade one of the cars, do they:

1) Hold off on the improvement until both cars can be improved, keeping circumstances equal for both drivers, or
2) Up grade one of the cars, thereby putting the other driver at a disadvantage. If the latter is true, and I suspect it is, do they alternate which driver gets improvements first, or does the same one always have priority?