Category: Motorsport

No time to try to create a table to include here, so I’ll just post a link to the excellent F1 Fanatic site, showing grid positions, fuel loads, and estimated first (or only) stop.

Very nice site too.  I wish I had the time to make my site that good. 

I’m working on a way to get the race results and championship standings posted to this site within about 10 minutes of the end of the race.  It might not be pretty, but it might be fast.  I won’t be able to do that for tomorrow, I have some technical stuff to work on first.

I hoping that my site will be ‘F1 for busy people’ (written by a busy person); a place to go for all the key information like TV schedules and Championship standings.  Of course, any racing I do myself will also go here if I get round to writing it up.

Enjoy the race!

Drivers’ Championship Standings

Position / Points / Driver / Team
Pos 1 – 10 points – Jenson Button Brawn-Mercedes
Pos 2 – 8 points – Rubens Barrichello Brawn-Mercedes
Pos 3 – 6 points – Jarno Trulli Toyota
Pos 4 – 5 points – Timo Glock  Toyota 5
Pos 5 – 4 points – Fernando Alonso Renault
Pos 6 – 3 points – Nico Rosberg Williams-Toyota
Pos 7 – 2 points – Sebastien Buemi Toro Rosso-Ferrari
Pos 8 – 1 points – Sebastien Bourdais Toro Rosso-Ferrari
Pos 9 – 0 points – Felipe Massa Ferrari
Pos 10 – 0 points – Giancarlo Fisichella Force India-Mercedes
Pos 11 – 0 points – Nick Heidfeld BMW Sauber
Pos 12 – 0 points – Kazuki Nakajima Williams-Toyota
Pos 13 – 0 points – Heikki Kovalainen McLaren-Mercedes
Pos 14 – 0 points – Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari
Pos 15 – 0 points – Mark Webber Red Bull-Renault
Pos 16 – 0 points – Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault
Pos 17-  0 points – Lewis Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes
Pos 18 – 0 points – Nelson Piquet Jr Renault
Pos 19 – 0 points – Adrian Sutil Force India-Mercedes
Pos 20 – 0 points – Robert Kubica BMW Sauber

Constructors’ Championship Standings

Pos 1 – 18 points – Brawn-Mercedes
Pos 2 – 11 points – Toyota
Pos 3 – 4 points – 3 Renault
Pos 4 – 3 points – 4 Williams-Toyota
Pos 5 – 3 points – 5 Toro Rosso-Ferrari
Pos 6 – 0 points – 6 Red Bull-Renault
Pos 7 – 0 points – 7 Ferrari
Pos 8 – 0 points – 8 BMW Sauber
Pos 9 – 0 points – 9 McLaren-Mercedes
Pos 10 – 0 points – 10 Force India-Mercedes

Sat 4th April

Practice 0655-0805 Red Button

Quali 0900-1130 BBC1

Sun 5th April

Race 0900-1200 BBC1

Interactive Forum 1200-1300 Red Button

Highlights 1900-2000 BBC3

Okay, it took me so long to write that last post that the things had moved on before I posted it.  Read more at F1 Fanatic.  I agree with their comments about the Stewards/FIA procedures.

Maybe Trulli should still be penalised; he did pass a car under yellow flags.  I didn’t see the incident in TV, but if he could have stayed behind Hamilton without stopping, then he should have done so.

As I said, I’m an Hamilton fan, and more so a McLaren fan, but I don’t think a DQ is sufficient.  Misleading the Officials is a serious offense.  The penalty should be so harsh that teams don’t even consider it. 

Here starts my rant, move on if your not interested or too busy.

The FIA should have a scale for punishments, such as ‘Misleading Officials by Deceit: DQ for three races where the car finishes the race, commencing with the race where deceit occured.’  This would prevent the teams from starting a race knowing that they would be DQ’d, but not finishing it in order to save their engines.

Further, the rule would have to stipulate whether the penalty applies to both drivers.  In the case where only one driver is involved (Hamilton in this case), only that drive should be DQ’ed, and of course the team suffers from potential loss of points.  However, where a fuel irregularity is involved for example, the penalty must apply to both drivers individually.

These must be carefully thought out. In the above example, if the deceit occurs at the end of the season, a decision has to be made (when the rule is written) as to whether the punishment is retrospectively applied to the last three races of the season, or is carried over to the early races of the following season, with regard to potential team and driver changes.

Another punishment might be ‘Misleading Officials by Error: DQ from the affected race(s)’.  This would be used to put right breaches that took place in the past, but could not be identified at the time.  It’s hard to think of an example right now, but the purpose of this rule is to put right mistakes that had been made, but where a team could not have known at the time of the original decision by the Stewards.

There also needs to be a procedural change in regulations.  Take the diffuser row for example.  The cars were deemed legal to race, but under appeal they may be deemed illegal.  Either they’re legal under the current regulations, or not.  The Officials should have the facilities (and wit) to make a decision at the time.  If they can’t decide whether the cars meet the regulations, then the regulations aren’t specific enough, and the teams must not be punished for that.

There should be no ‘spirit of the rules’ rubbish.  The rules are the rules.  If the cars don’t actually breach the regulations as they’re written, then they’re legal.  If it is then decided that the regulations need to be tightened up, then do so after the fact, but allow the teams reasonable time to make adjustments.  There must be no retrospective penalties when the regulations that aren’t clearly defined.

The FIA must take the stance that the rules are a work in progress.  F1 is a complicated sport, and innovation should be encouraged within the regulations.  If it’s not specifically illegal according to the regulations, then it’s legal until the regulations specifically make it illegal.

Officials are re-examining what happened when Trulli and Hamilton swapped places under the safety car in Malaysia.  They’re meeting later today to make a decision which could see Trulli reinstated to 3rd and Hamilton penalised.

Under the safety car, Trulli slid off onto the grass and Hamilton went past; that’s legal.  Trulli recovered and re-passed Hamilton; that’s illegal.  Trulli was penalised with a 25 seconds penalty which demoted him to 12th (or thereabouts) and Hamilton took 3rd.

However, Trulli says that he passed Hamilton because Hamilton slowed suddenly and veered off the racing line, and Trulli thought he had a mechanical problem and was letting cars pass.  Hamilton said that he was distracted by a message on his steering wheel.  However, Stewards are reviewing radio transmissions which may show that Hamilton thought he had to let Trulli pass again; something he didn’t disclose to Stewards in the initial investigation.

Unfortunately, the BBC TV coverage didn’t show the incident.

I’m no expert, but here’s how I see it:

• Hamilton can’t be penalised for slowing and moving off-line, but can be penalised if he was more than two seconds behind the cat in front.  If he mislead the Officials, then he should be punished severely.
• Trulli should not have passed Hamilton unless Hamilton had slowed so much that Trulli had to stop (it’s against the rules to stop on the track unless you have a car failure).  If Trulli had been forced to pass Hamilton because Hamilton slowed, he could have allowed Hamilton to re-pass and the Stewards would take no action.

I’m a Hamilton fan, but misleading Officials is a serious offense, and disqualification from that race is not enough of a punishment.

The FIA must publish their findings, and the evidence, so the public can be fully confident that the regulations have been correctly applied.  I have long held the view that all punishments should be clearly defined.  In other words, for example, “Continuing to drive for more than three turns when the car is damaged to the point that it cannot realistically be repaired during the race (for example, broken suspension): penalty is disqualification from that race, and 10 points penalty for both driver and constructor.”

Yet again, we’re faced with uncertainty over a race result.  This has got to be solved, it’s bad for the sport, and bad for its commercial interests.

Trulli slid onto the grass under yellow flags, and Hamilton went past him. When Trulli recovered, he then re-passed Hamilton (still under yellows). 

Vettel also received a penalty.

Revised result to follow.

1. Jenson Button
2. Rubens Barrichello
3. Jarno Trulli
4. Lewis Hamilton
5. Timo Glock
6. Fernando Alonso
7. Nico Rosberg
8. Sebastien Buemi
9. Sebastien Bourdais
10. Adrian Sutil
11. Nick Heidfeld
12. Giancarlo Fisichella
13. Mark Webber
14. Sebastian Vettel
15. Robert Kubica
16. Kimi Raikkonen
DNF Felipe Massa
DNF Nelson Piquet Jnr – spun
DNF Kazuki Nakajima – crashed
DNF Heikki Kovalainen – accident damage

Will post Championship standings as soon as I can, but may be a few days (busy).