Formula 1 Grand Prix du Canada 2011

It's a crapshoot. Webber has seemingly lost his "drive", Massa is running out of skill.
My own opinion, of course.

But I doubt RBR would sign Kobayashi. I can't think of an actual reason, but I just don't see it happening. Ferrari would be much more likely.
 
Seismica
No, if you look between lap 4 and 6, Both Renaults dropped 1 or 2 places and Di Resta lost even more, and there is no 'P' in sight at that point. Kobayashi got past both Renaults and Di Resta before the first second safety car, and I want to know how. Oh, he also passed Maldonado, Webber and of course Hamilton. The rest were in the pitstops. It's funny you posted a source that directly contradicted what you said :lol:

He certainly needs a better car, then maybe he won't lose out when the track dries.
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Yes I know. :dunce: I was originally working from memory rather than the chart which I looked at later.

As for passing Webber and Hamilton. Neither should count as passes as Webber was spun around by Hamilton and Hamilton had three wheels on his wagon after his collision with Button and had stopped.

I'll check my recording later to see if it shows Kobayashi getting passed the Renaults.
 
Seismica
Kobayashi got past both Renaults and Di Resta before the first second safety car, and I want to know how.
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Can't remember seeing Kobayashi pass the Renaults, but I do remember seeing Di Resta go off in the background at Turn 8. That surely cost him a position to Kobayashi.

Even though Kobayashi was 2nd for a moment, I don't think it was a great race from him. At the end of the race Kobayashi lost a position to Petrov by losing control of the rear when overtaking a backmarker in turn 1. It also allowed Massa to catch up and luckily pass him right before the line.
 
Kobayashi has finished in the top 10 every race this season, so he has consistency to match his overtaking skills which is not always the case with other aggressive drivers.
 
SaberFire
But I doubt RBR would sign Kobayashi. I can't think of an actual reason, but I just don't see it happening. Ferrari would be much more likely.
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Oh, I disagree completely. Ferrari have a bit of a habit for hiring the quick but safe drivers. Alonso, Barrichello, Massa, Schuey, Kimi, Fisichella, etc etc.

I really can't see them taking a risk on someone damaging their pretty red cars.

In other news, HRT are actually beginning to gather some pace. They've leapfrogged Virgin and appear to have their sights set on Lotus/Toro Rosso. Seriously impressive for a team whose budget wouldn't stretch to a bottle of coke.
 
Danny
Oh, I disagree completely. Ferrari have a bit of a habit for hiring the quick but safe drivers. Alonso, Barrichello, Massa, Schuey, Kimi, Fisichella, etc etc.

I really can't see them taking a risk on someone damaging their pretty red cars.

In other news, HRT are actually beginning to gather some pace. They've leapfrogged Virgin and appear to have their sights set on Lotus/Toro Rosso. Seriously impressive for a team whose budget wouldn't stretch to a bottle of coke.
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You're forgetting that Massa was a total crashaholic pre-Ferrari. At the time, a lot of people thought hiring Massa was a mistake.
 
Danny
Oh, I disagree completely. Ferrari have a bit of a habit for hiring the quick but safe drivers. Alonso, Barrichello, Massa, Schuey, Kimi, Fisichella, etc etc.
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Safe, like when Schumacher punted opponents off the track? Massa was still a rookie in terms of skill when they took him in. He wasn't really that fast nor safe. It doesn't seem like Alonso minds a bit of contact when battling either.
 
Hugo Boss
Can't remember seeing Kobayashi pass the Renaults, but I do remember seeing Di Resta go off in the background at Turn 8. That surely cost him a position to Kobayashi.
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It cost him about ten. I'm surprised Brundle & Coulthard didn't notice him going off. His position on the timers plummeted after that.
 
Force India are, we're told, considering complaints about penalties to both of their drivers.

They claim that Vettel compacted the pack too dramatically under the safety car leading to a 'bunching' collision between Sutil and Rosberg. Rosberg believed he was punctured (not personally of course) and slowed on the straight, Sutil then passed... and later received a penalty for doing so.

I'm not sure of the exact circumstances of the Di Resta complaint but suffice it to say that FI feel pretty hard done by on both counts.
 
Hugo Boss
Can't remember seeing Kobayashi pass the Renaults, but I do remember seeing Di Resta go off in the background at Turn 8. That surely cost him a position to Kobayashi.

Even though Kobayashi was 2nd for a moment, I don't think it was a great race from him. At the end of the race Kobayashi lost a position to Petrov by losing control of the rear when overtaking a backmarker in turn 1. It also allowed Massa to catch up and luckily pass him right before the line.
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To be fair, that also happened to Massa, the backmarkers were not moving off the racing line, so to overtake them, the leaders were having to go onto the wet parts of the track.
I just caught Kobayashi's spin at the edge of the camera, and it was when he was trying to go the inside of D'Ambrosio, causing him to lose the rear on the wet and slide onto the run-off.

I don't really see how Kobayashi could have done a better job than he did really with the equipment he had. Sure he got to 2nd through luck and strategy, but he held onto a top 10 place despite driving a much slower car than those around him.
I'd actually say this was one of his better drives, because in previous races he has made the top 10 with a superior strategy (nearly always 1 or 2-stopping), whereas this time he has actually had to defend the positions for a good amount of laps, being on the same tyres as everyone else. Its similar to what happened at Valencia 2010 - although that time he was running worn hard tyres among the front-runners and actually matching their pace!

The only problem with KK is that he isn't particularly great at qualifying so he's always having to make up positions. But his race pace is easily the best of the midfield as he nearly always makes longer stop strategies work much better than those around him. This is perhaps because the Sauber is good with its tyres but he has been faster than Perez.
 
I think the problem with KK's qualifying (to an extent at least) is that the DRS balance is tougher in non hot-blown cars because of the loss of off-throttle rear downforce - that means that the DRS transition isn't as 'smooth' and drivers lose time.

It's astonishing that we're even talking about KK's Sauber in the same quali context as Ferrari, McLaren and Red Bull :D
 
Is it me or is it strange that the Japanese are the only Asian race that can really put out quality drivers compared to the other Asian nations? You would think that with the large amount of wealth in that area that they would want to find something to do with it. Motorsport seems to be a good bottomless pit to throw your money into. At least it is in the west anyway.
 
Hollidog
Is it me or is it strange that the Japanese are the only Asian race that can really put out quality drivers compared to the other Asian nations? You would think that with the large amount of wealth in that area that they would want to find something to do with it. Motorsport seems to be a good bottomless pit to throw your money into. At least it is in the west anyway.
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I see what you're saying... but it doesn't have anything to do with being Japanese as a race - it's to do with the amount of motorsport in any driver's homeland and the amount of sponsorship opportunity available.
 
Hollidog
Is it me or is it strange that the Japanese are the only Asian race that can really put out quality drivers compared to the other Asian nations? You would think that with the large amount of wealth in that area that they would want to find something to do with it. Motorsport seems to be a good bottomless pit to throw your money into. At least it is in the west anyway.
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Thats because Japan has an enormous automotive industry. With this comes a lot of investment in Motorsport, as many Japanese manufacters have their own racing teams across all formulae. Plus, their huge economy means they can invest in sponsoring various teams and drivers, and 'breed' their own, as their are many more opportunities to compete in motorsport in Japan then their are in places like China or Korea, where automotive development is comparitively small.
 
I think Massa did a pretty good job. In the past couple of races he's been just about matching Alonso in qualifying (Some say 'matching' isn't good enough, but then again Alonso is one of the fastest if not the fastest of this generation) and on race pace he's been pretty good too. Bearing in mind the Red Bull and the Mclaren are a lot faster than the Ferrari during the race, it's no surprise he's always struggling against the likes of Webber, Hamilton and Button. The only race where Ferrari have truly been on the pace is Monaco, and that is where Alonso's talent allows him to outperform the machinery.

I think his seat is safer than Webber's at this current moment in time. Though I do believe Webber has had a lot of bad luck this season, often having to come through the field due to mistakes in qualifying or collisions early in the race. He's probably set more fastest laps than any other driver so far.
 
Hollidog
Is it me or is it strange that the Japanese are the only Asian race that can really put out quality drivers compared to the other Asian nations? You would think that with the large amount of wealth in that area that they would want to find something to do with it. Motorsport seems to be a good bottomless pit to throw your money into. At least it is in the west anyway.
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Strange?
Lets see here:
-Japan has a huge...massive car industry that has been in existance for several decades.
-Japan has several race circuits which have existed for several decades and featured on the world stage for the same amount.
-Japan has several local motorsport series, some of which have a good standing internationally (SuperGT, Formula Nippon).
-Very few other countries in Asia have had wealth for very long. Perhaps you are thinking of Singapore, Malaysia, etc? These countries are relatively new compared to Japan.

Basically motorsport has existed for a very long time in Japan, only coming behind Europe and America in terms of history. The huge car industry in Japan which boomed in the 80s and particularly the 90s and 00s only helped invest more into developing the circuits and motorsport series in general. There has been a Japanese Grand Prix for a long time too, which also helps inspire talent.

Then the prospective talent have plenty of local race series to compete in and prove themselves up to an international level. Series like Formula Nippon and SuperGT are respected enough internationally to tempt European or American teams to consider drivers. Then the expense of moving to Europe is funded by the major manufacturers in Japan which in turn have a big interest in motorsport due to their involvement with local series and also internationally e.g. Honda in F1, Nissan, Toyota and Mazda in Sportscars, Mitsubishi and Subaru in Rally, etc.
Its easy from this point onwards to get to F1 level compared to say a Chinese driver because the Japanese drivers will already have plenty of motorsport experience at a competitive level in what a regarded as tough series. Japanese drivers also tend to have manufacturer backing which helps pay there way all the way to F1. Something even European drivers struggle to find. This is why almost all Japanese drivers are "pay drivers" because its pretty much the norm that drivers are backed by a manufacturer. Its actually almost a loyalty thing too, you rarely see a Toyota-backed driver drive anything other than Toyotas his entire career. Its basically part of Japanese motorsport culture that the car manufacturers run their own driver development programmes.

I think if you stop and think about it for more than 2 seconds, I don't really see how you can think its strange that mainly Japanese drivers have made it to F1 over say Chinese, Malaysian, Korean, Indian, Pakistani, etc etc, when its extremely obvious why.
How many other Asian countries have any motosport history at all? Pretty much zero. Only recently have even China and Korea become a force in car manufacture..let alone race circuits and racing cars. You cannot get to F1 without a proving ground and without money.

I think the real mystery here is why Japan have yet to find their super-talent, the answer is mainly due to their "pay driver" background. I think its fair to say all the Japanese F1 drivers have earned their seats in F1 in part to their car manufacturer-backers. Perhaps Kobayashi is the first ever Japanese F1 driver to have been hired on talent alone because as far as I know Toyota haven't paid much at all to Sauber (though he probably was somewhat of a pay driver). It could be said that perhaps Japanese drivers don't have to work as hard as their European counterparts or perhaps the Japanese series are not as competitive, so the best drivers that get promoted by the manufacturers are not as good quality as the top guys in Europe.
You would have thought though that surely by mathematical chances Japan would have found one magic driver already...I mean compare Japan's success in F1 to Finlands...

Note: There have been several pretty darn good Japanese F1 drivers who didn't really get a completely fair crack or were just unlucky or inconsistent. Ukyo Katayama, Shinji Nakano, Takuma Sato and even "Toro" Takagi and Aguri Suzuki were all decent F1 drivers. So I'm not saying they were all rubbish, just none of them are really world champion or even race-winning material.
 
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I agree - Montreal seemed (only in my opinion) to be Massa's most comfortable drive since Hungary.

Remember the announcement of Hakkinen's death in Adelaide? He came back from that big shunt okay. He got married, had a baby (although not personally). He had another very big shunt at Hockenheim and never seemed to drive to the same limits again.

I see a similar thing in Massa, maybe he's finally get past the nagging doubt in the back of his mind?
 
TenEightyOne
I agree - Montreal seemed (only in my opinion) to be Massa's most comfortable drive since Hungary.

Remember the announcement of Hakkinen's death in Adelaide? He came back from that big shunt okay. He got married, had a baby (although not personally). He had another very big shunt at Hockenheim and never seemed to drive to the same limits again.

I see a similar thing in Massa, maybe he's finally get past the nagging doubt in the back of his mind?
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The worst thing that can hold a driver back is fear.

It may be that, or his body hasn't fully recovered.
 
I know I'm a bit late here, just watched it on the dvr. All I got to say is wow what a race. Weather burdened races have to be my favorite. By far the best race of the season so far:tup:
 
Yeah I just finally finished watching all 5 hours of the race. Definitely the best race I have ever watched. The rain hindered it for the most part but it was an amazing race until the very last lap.
 
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plate88
I know I'm a bit late here, just watched it on the dvr. All I got to say is wow what a race. Weather burdened races have to be my favorite. By far the best race of the season so far:tup:
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ohh just finished watching the race and just have to say was one of my all time favourites. Hope it was just a simple mistake from seb and not a crack as people are saying.
 
I knew that vettel deciding not to pit on the last safety car was going to hurt him. But towards the end it was obvious to everyone that Button was going to pass him.
I was disappointed Schumacher couldn't stick with vettel when the safety car went in as he was catching him beforehand, it might have been due to vettel possibly turning up his engine though.
 
Hollidog
Is it me or is it strange that the Japanese are the only Asian race that can really put out quality drivers compared to the other Asian nations? You would think that with the large amount of wealth in that area that they would want to find something to do with it. Motorsport seems to be a good bottomless pit to throw your money into. At least it is in the west anyway.
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Well Japanese drivers are there because of all the reasons Ardius stated, as for other Asian countries just wait and see. In the next decade I can see China becoming really influential in motorsport, they have the cash and the car companies to advertise. I could easily see a Chinese car manufacture sponsored team with Chinese drivers (like Ho-Pin Tung) at the wheel within the next couple of years.

We have already seen China break into other sports such as Tennis and Snooker where they had no previous history in before.

Also the judgment of quality is open to interpretation. There are many quality Asian drivers who just happen to not be in Formula 1. They race in the Asian GT, Touring Car and Porsche championships. The only problem is open wheel in not big in Asia making the transition hard to F1 if they didn't grow up in Europe.

Oh and just to add, Japan has not been economically stable for quite a while and as a result companies there are not flush with cash to back a Japanese pay driver even if they have great talent. As a result they can't compete with the offerings from drivers of other countries and F1 teams especially the lower end ones need the money.

Robin.
 
Robin.
I could easily see a Chinese car manufacture sponsored team with Chinese drivers (like Ho-Pin Tung) at the wheel within the next couple of years.
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I would not at all be suprised if Hispania were purchased by Chinese investors with Ho-Pin Tung driving for them. HRT are talking big, claiming that they're going after tenth place in the WCC this year. Based on their performance in Canada, they might be able to pull it off - they certainly have a better chance of beating Fernandes than Virgin do. If they do it with a sponsorless car, they're going to be hot property the way Honda were at the end of 2006 (but hopefully better-managed). With China producing two excellent races in 2010 and 2011 - not to mention the ever-increasing crowd numbers in Shanghai - the sport is gathering a lot of momentum.
 

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