Brought to you by TheJudge13 contributor Mattpt55 – the best in Scrutineering, Stewards’ Decisions, and other assorted FIA documents looked at slightly irreverently
There’s the race we see on telly, and then there’s the race behind the scenes. One rarely talked about by reporters but told in part by the official FIA documents. Here is a selection of this weekend’s documents for you to peruse at your leisure. Enjoy. Wonder where all this great stuff came from? Right Here
From the Dept of Clean Up Your Room or You’re Grounded 
Give them a fence and they’ll take a mile
From the Count All the Things Dept 
Some of those numbers are getting pretty close to 5. I’m looking at you Kamui
From the Dept of Dental Affairs 
“Re-nominated”? Can’t we leave the politics out of it and just go racing
Good thing they didn’t replace the whole gearbox
I’m sure there’s a dirty joke in there somewhere
From the Dept of That’s Why He’s Kimi 
Now we know why he threw himself in front of Seb’s car. It was a cry for help.
From the Dept of Hard Work
Guess we know who won’t be at Vijay’s last party before they confiscate his yacht
From the Sat on the Naughty Step Dept
Guess a bigger budget does buy a faster car.
From the Dept of Shiny New Pieces
4+1=?
1+4=? Yep, works out the same either way.
Lots and lots of Grid Penalties
From the Dept of I Don’t Think You Get It Yet
No matter how many times you say it, it doesn’t mean it’s true. And isn’t this F1? Can’t be *that* complicated.
From the Dept of Excessive Hyperbole
Props to Dieter for not giving up. Also for knowing the correct answer. And for serving Horner. All in one question.
From the Dept of At Least He’s Amusing, if not entirely truthful
LOL
From the Dept of We’re Totally Not French Surrender Monkeys
Ok, so we *are* totally surrendering, but we are *not* all French.
From the Dept of I Get It Now
So Haas starts in 2015 unless Customer Cars aren’t approved until 2016. K Then.
From the Dept of Saturday Highlights 
They highlighted it for me. And ouch.
From the Could You Repeat That Dept 
Could you re-explain that again?
From the You Can’t Eat Just One Dept 
How many races are left?
From the Dept of Time to Upgrade Your OS 
I’m sure it’s just a massive coincidence that only Mercedes have the latest software.
From the Got Away with it Dept 
As a teenager he’s lucky he didn’t lose his license.
From the Sat on the Very Naughty Step Dept 
Stewards were wearing their judgey-pants today.
From the increasingly busy Dept of sent to the Principals Office 
Tell that to the guy behind me honking in bumper to bumper traffic.
From the Dept of Is it Getting Warm in Here? 
Well, that will stop exactly no one from arguing about it.
From the Dept of Incredibly Leading Questions
Would have been more believable without the ear to ear grin.
From the Unbelievably Repetitive Question Dept 
Laughing all the way to the banker *Crickets*
From the Man of Few Words Dept 
Maybe *this* is why they don’t call you “Cerebral” .
From the Dept of Third Wheels 
I guess they felt they had to ask him something. Too bad it wasn’t anything interesting.
I really don’t like all the gearbox repairs, it makes a mockery of the set number of gearboxes allowed for the season, plus it’s a poor show that these components can only last FP3 and qually, then are so damaged them need replacing. I said it last time and I’ll say it again now, the FIA need to tighten up on this practice as it gives the wrong impression on sustainability and on how long the gearbox lasts.
Bianchi just got a grid drop for changing a gearbox. I’m left wondering what the difference is.
The replacement components rules appear to be very complicated – can someone please explain the rules simply – see report from Autosport below, especially 2nd para !!!!!
Red Bull has replaced components of the Energy Recovery System on Sebastian Vettel’s car, following the problem that hampered his qualifying session yesterday. Vettel’s MGU-K (kinetic energy recovery unit) and CU-K (kinetic energy control unit) have both been switched for previously used versions.
“Vettel will not take a penalty as a result, so starts fourth for today’s race, but he is forbidden from using either of these components again until the final race of the season.”
It’s interesting to me that the electrical components of the PU seem, at face value, to be less reliable than the mechanical parts. Typically, in a road car, and even in f1 since the advent of electronic fuel injection you don’t often see electronic components go bad. So, are all these Renault and Ferrari replacement electronics upgrades rather than replacements for failed units?