Lauda kicks Rosberg back into line
AMuS Crazy Stats : Belgian Edition
Lauda kicks Rosberg back into line
It was a truly bizarre scene on German TV. Sebastian Vettel had just described his race in a vernacular that he would have been kicked out of a truckers’ joint for, because of foul language. Enter stage left – Niki Lauda, who launched a tirade of his own about how impossible a behaviour it would be to speak about Pirelli like that without having talked to them first.
Err… Earth to Niki? Spa 2014? Ring a bell?
It was obvious that Lauda was covering Pirelli. The reasons for that are easy to speculate about. Mercedes has an interest to implement the conservative 50/30% limits that Pirelli mentioned in their post-race press release, because it prevents daring strategies like Ferrari’s on Sunday. Problems in the Mercedes camp or an unusual strategy are the only way to beat Mercedes. If they help Pirelli implement the tyre limits, they eliminate one of the two ways they can be beaten. If that is the real reason behind Mercedes’ defending of Pirelli remains speculation, but it certainly does not seem to be the case that Mercedes unconditionally trusts the tyres. After Rosberg’s tyre mishap on Friday they changed suspension and camber settings way below the limits of what Pirelli declared safe.
However, one of the more vocal critics of Pirelli’s rather preposterous excuse for Vettel’s tyre blow-up, a theory that was immediately put in doubt by three teams (Ferrari, Force India, Lotus), was Nico Rosberg, himself a victim of a highspeed blow-up on Friday. “Tyres must not explode like that,” Rosberg told Sky Germany. “The next race is Monza, the fastest track of the season. He have to have safer tyres.”
Two days later, Rosberg has made a U-turn and his trust in Pirelli has been “restored”. “I’m sure Pirelli will have checked everything thoroughly and we will have a safe race at Monza.” Rosberg said, no doubt after an attitude adjustment courtesy of Niki Lauda, who made his point clear on Sunday.
“You can’t discriminate a partner like Sebastian has done. If one of my drivers had done that, I’d taken him aside to make it clear that we all work together. We are one team and that includes Pirelli.”
AMuS Crazy Stats : Belgian Edition
Original article: Auto Motor & Sport
German magazine Auto Motor & Sport publishes a number of interesting, funny or sometimes just crazy stats after each race. TJ13 presents the translation.
- In the classic battle England vs Germany, Blighty has has taken the lead again 6:5 in wins. However, the Fatherland’s anthem has been played at every single GP, since every race was won either by a German team or a German driver.
- Lewis Hamilton stood on the podium for the 80th time. Exactly as often as his idol Senna, who managed the feat with only one race less than Lewis. Alonso (97), Prost (106) and Schumacher (155) are the next targets to catch up to.
- Lewis scored the pole position for the sixth time in a row. No other active driver has managed that. The record stands at 8, held by Ayrton Senna (1988 Spanish GP – 1989 US GP). This being his 10th pole of the season, Lewis has already won the pole trophy for this year.
- Mercedes will only need seven more lead laps and they cannot be beaten anymore in that regard by any other team.
- If Lewis wants to equalize the record of 13 wins per season, jointly held by Schumacher (2004) and Vettel (2013), he needs to win 7 of the remaining 8 races.
- Romain Grosjean returned to the podium for the first time after 30 races. Since the US GP 2013 he had never finished better than seventh.
- In Hungary and Spa combined, six different drivers where on the podium. That was the first time that has happened since the return of turbo engines.
- Until Spa Sebastian Vettel was the only non-Mercedes driver, who had run all race laps. Now only Rosberg and Hamilton have run each and evry one of them.
- Since he managed to keep the car on the road, at least one of Sebastian Vettel’s streaks remain intact. Since the infamous clash with Webber in Turkey 2010, he has never crashed out of a race in over 100 GP.
- Due to the deliberate double engine change, McLaren incurred a mammoth combined 105 grid position penalty. That’s definitely a new record.
- In the last 44 races (since Barcelona 2013) only four drivers have won a race. (Rosberg, Vettel, Hamilton, Ricciardo). In 2012, the first seven races saw seven different winners.
- Lewis Hamilton has never won the 12th race of a season. He can change that at Monza.
- Since both Vettel and Alonso didn’t score any points, they are still joint record holders for most career points. Lewis Hamilton is only 65 points behind them. If the current point scheme is applied to historic results though, they all still have 2000 points to find until they come anywhere near Schumacher.
- Three drivers overtook their team mate in the overall standings: Felipe Massa, Sergio Perez and Daniil Kvyat.
- Except for Manor GP, every team has had at least one top-5 finish this year.
Hippo comparing Spa 2014 to this past weekend is like comparing chalk to cheese.
No one knew what caused Seb’s tire failure, that in itself could be classed as a mechanical failure and would need a proper investigation so as to determine what was the reasons behind it. When Nico’s tyre blew on Friday, there was no petulant outburst from him criticising Pirelli.
The cause of his tyre failure could’ve been linked to his constant abuse of the track limits. On the penultimate lap, you saw Seb yet again with all 4 tires of the track a Raidillion then few meters later it went. So maybe that’s where the tire picked up the crucial damage that led to the blow up.
We all can understand Seb’s frustration, but his outburst without first knowing the reasons as to what was the cause of the failure, was very poor on his part.
As for Spa ’14, I hope they give Nico a copy of this years race and highlight how Grosjean of all people overtook at Les Combes
I’m referring to Spa ’14 in the sense that it was Lauda who lambasted Rosberg publically while the cars were still on the track. Criticising Vettel for something he has done himself is hippo-critical 😉
Indeed you’re correct in drawing that parallel, Hippo. I too am still surprised how Lauda and Wolff behaved after Spa ’14. It was shocking leadership. I add to that Monza ’14 and the games. For someone who was an instigator at that time, it is amusing to hear him lambast Vettel – even if I agree that Vettel was out of line given all circumstances.
Slight correction Hippo…
The 2013 Barcelona Grand Prix was won by Alonso followed him by Kimi and Massa, Seb came 4th. The run started with Nico’s win in Monaco of that year.
???
I wrote that Barcelona 2013 was the last race that wasn’t won by VET, HAM, RIC or ROS. What does Vettel’s 4th place have to do with it?
Apologies, haven’t had my morning coffee as yet…😁😁😁
I was under the impression that you never drink coffee.
Does anybody know the reasoning for Honda putting in two engines over the weekend? As an engine used for a race cannot be upgraded can it? So any improvements (what a joke that is by the way, “improvements.” LOL) would result in a new engine being fitted and more penalties surely. Just doesn’t seem to make any sense to me really, if anybody knows do enlighten us!
With the double changes they have four fresh engines in the pool. they can now use any of the four engines without getting another penalty for it.
Oh so it’s for reliability I see. In that case they might as well have just spent the whole weekend putting engines in the car. Waste of time sending them out on track!
On another topic, Ferrari resigning Raikonnen has meant silly season’s an anti-climax and surely spells the end of Jenson Buttons career. No seat at Williams available anymore and Ron can’t justify all those wages compared to Vandoorne/Magnussen with the possibility of another season like this year in 2016 surely.
They did it so as to they’d only be penalised just the once. By doing that, they’ve now got 2 power units that they can use without suffering any further penalties.
I get why they did it, but when you only qualify just off the back row, surely it not worth the effort and they might as well start every weekend with new engine knowing they effectively they will only drop two places.
Who is the last driver to achieve 6 poles in a row in the same season?
Senna: The last six in 1989
Mansell: The first six in 1992
Prost: The first seven in 1993
Häkkinen: Races 8-13 in 1999
Long story short, it was Häkkinen, 16 years ago. Interestingly enough, both Schumacher and Vettel had five, but ran out of season. Montoya and Hill came close once with 5 in a row.
Did Mika not also do it in 98?
Nope, longest was three in a row. Fisichella and Coulthard came in between
Does it matter? Any records Hamilton takes is because he has the best car and the only records worth anything in F1 are the ones Michael Schumacher has.
#Don’tFightTheTruth
#Schufosi
#JeSuisFortis
#BlameRenault
#44
#TeamWTF
#KeepFightingMichael
#BlanchimontBoy
#TJ13
I do like the stat of Lewis’s and Sebs points total compared to Micheal, I have chuckled to myself when the BBC and Sky still try to compare these young upstarts😇 but fail to remind the casual viewer that the points system changed and if you rejig the figures….they are wayyyyyyyyyyyy off
This site converts the various points scoring systems and shows just how far behind Michael Schumacher they are.
http://formula1.markwessel.com/alltime
Interesting data. Would be nice to know the points/race averages. I see Schumi is at 12.63pts/race, while Hamilton is at 12.96pts/race. I doubt Lewis races another 150 GPs to match Schumi, so I don’t think Schumi’s grand total will ever be passed.
Nice roundup Hippo and some bloody cool stats. I do have to question Lauda,it must be an age thing as I do remember him being critical of a team called Ferrari in the 70’s he is turning into a very overly critical grump..and the nearest example I can think of is the two guys in the muppets,you know the ones.Statler & Waldorf
https://c2.staticflickr.com/4/3017/2894181382_c1e9f52f59.jpg
Difference being that Statler and Waldorf were actually funny
Oh I don’t know…did you ever fly lauda air?,.I always laughed when I was stuck in limbo for hours after a aircraft fail,boy did we chuckle😇
You really have to subtract Mercedes to apreciate this season in full. That last stat…
The Red Bullies have been noticably quiet after Spa. Have they blamed Renault for Daniel’s retirement yet? Could the problem have been self inflicted?
Yes, interesting theory. We never heard anything about that or a post-race interview with RIC. Presumably he wasn’t in the mood to grin at the cameras. He definitely had a shot at the podium.
@Hippo said: It was obvious that Lauda was covering Pirelli. The reasons for that are easy to speculate about.
Do Mercedes use Pirelli on their road cars?
Yes
Don’t Ferrari also use Pirelli’s on their road cars? The Pirelli / Ferrari road car association extends to branding on video games, single make Ferrari / Pirelli series around the world and bespoke hyper car high performance tyres. I’m not saying that’s not Lauda’s reason… but it’s equally applicable to Ferrari too, if I’m not mistaken.
I think it’s a matter of Lauda more interested in somehow currying favour with Pirelli motorsport that might somehow translate into some sort of short term political advantage for the F1 team. I don’t think Lauda cares so much about Mercedes’ road car tie ups.
I am speculating here… I don’t quite know what the fuck drives that old bastard to speak, or not.