Monaco Qualifying

[JSR]

Isn't it great to see Ferrari back in amongst the top runners again?

Yet again, another blistering last lap for Button. Where did that come from?

http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2009/5/9393.html

Race fuel suggests that Button is one of the heaviest cars in the top 10 (647.5Kg) with only Barrichello (648Kg) and Alonso (645Kg) heavier than him.

Vettel is incredibly light - 631Kg - the lightest man on the track, a full 10kg lighter than any other car. That doesn't bode well for him in the race. Is he three-stopping?

Should be a fantastic race, though, with Brawn and Ferrari right at the top and the light-weight Vettel ready to to spoil everyone's day.

Can't wait..!

[Ian]

Re: Monaco Qualifying

That was a gobsmacking effort from Jenson, though I can imaging some might accuse him of sandbagging

Poor old Rubens - the nightmare continues, though I still think he has a reasonable chance of winning today.

The weird thing for Rubens is that this season is his second best ever, only being bettered in his penultimate season at Ferrari, and he didn't make it to the top step there until the Italian GP, four races from the end of the season.

Vettel complained that he was slowed by Nakajima on his final run, but despite being massively lighter than the others, his sector times weren't the quickest.

Jenson is two laps heavier than Raikkonen, so even if KERS gives the Finn the advantage at the start, Jenson should be able to reclaim the lead after his first stop. The start will be crucial, not necessarily to get into the lead, but to survive the first corner!

For various reasons over the years I seem to miss getting to see the Monaco GP live - I was on the first day of my honeymoon in 1995 on Monaco GP that year, for example! But today, I can watch it live with no interruptions - I just hope it will be worth it and there won't be a repeat of the gutting disappointment when Hill retired from a commanding lead after his Williams' Renault engine expired.

Ian

Isn't it great to see Ferrari back in amongst the top runners again?

Yet again, another blistering last lap for Button. Where did that come from?

http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2009/5/9393.html

Race fuel suggests that Button is one of the heaviest cars in the top 10 (647.5Kg) with only Barrichello (648Kg) and Alonso (645Kg) heavier than him.

Vettel is incredibly light - 631Kg - the lightest man on the track, a full 10kg lighter than any other car. That doesn't bode well for him in the race. Is he three-stopping?

Should be a fantastic race, though, with Brawn and Ferrari right at the top and the light-weight Vettel ready to to spoil everyone's day.

Can't wait..!

[JSR]

Re: Monaco Qualifying

For various reasons over the years I seem to miss getting to see the Monaco GP live - I was on the first day of my honeymoon in 1995 on Monaco GP that year, for example! But today, I can watch it live with no interruptions - I just hope it will be worth it and there won't be a repeat of the gutting disappointment when Hill retired from a commanding lead after his Williams' Renault engine expired.

I'll probably end up watching it an hour behind (fortunately my DVD/HDD recorder lets me do that). Should be a great race.

Did I read that Hamilton's changed his gearbox so he's now at the back? That could be a crafty move. If there's a pile-up at the first corner, generally only the cars at the front and cars right at the back survive. Lewis may see himself weaving through the debris again like the last race.

They've posted fuel-adjusted times at http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/f1mole/20...monaco-gp.html, showing how superbly Button did. I'm sure there was no sandbagging involved, he just hooked up the perfect lap when it counted. Can anyone deny his driving talent now?

I keep reading replies to other articles in which people saying that Jense is an "average driver in the best car" which I think is a lunatic statement. Did they say the same about Lewis last year?

One of the most hysterical things is that I keep seeing the episode of Top Gear on cable with Jense - in which Clarkson asks "why haven't you won?" That is just so funny!

[peter]

Re: Monaco Qualifying

Super race for jb and loved the run around at the end. Oh and nice to see the red cars back at the sharp end. I did think we were going to see a few more cars off epically on the first lap but no they did well today.

[JSR]

Re: Monaco Qualifying

Excellent win by Button, and well done to the Ferraris for keeping right in there. That's five wins out of six now. Five wins was all it took for Lewis to be World Champion last year. One more win and Button will equal last year's second-place man.

But why no press conference, BBC..? Live Formula One, or a repeat of a soap? I guess the soap wins out, then!

It's no good saying "watch it on the red button" because that's no good if you're not watching it live. I click the red button and it's showing the race - half-way through, so I still don't see the press conference. We get to hear from 12th place man Lewis, but not the podium-3. I keep getting the impression that the BBC see F1 as a burden, not an opportunity.

But still, the race couldn't have been any better for Button. Brawn getting the 1-2, Ferrari getting 3-4, and closest title challenger from another team Vettel crashing out of the race. What an ideal race!

[Ian]

Re: Monaco Qualifying

Excellent win by Button, and well done to the Ferraris for keeping right in there. That's five wins out of six now. Five wins was all it took for Lewis to be World Champion last year. One more win and Button will equal last year's second-place man.

But why no press conference, BBC..? Live Formula One, or a repeat of a soap? I guess the soap wins out, then!

It's no good saying "watch it on the red button" because that's no good if you're not watching it live. I click the red button and it's showing the race - half-way through, so I still don't see the press conference. We get to hear from 12th place man Lewis, but not the podium-3. I keep getting the impression that the BBC see F1 as a burden, not an opportunity.

But still, the race couldn't have been any better for Button. Brawn getting the 1-2, Ferrari getting 3-4, and closest title challenger from another team Vettel crashing out of the race. What an ideal race!

Timing was clearly tight at the end of the coverage and the delay in getting Jenson to the winners' presentations may have wrong-footed the Beeb, but I still say that (despite initial concerns that the BBC wouldn't be as good as ITV's slick coverage) the BBC has done a great job so far. The race intro with Jake 'interviewing' all the past Monaco greats was superb.

Who can stop Jenson now? It seems kind of mean that his 6/6 podiums, and 5/6 wins doesn't place him more than 16 points in the lead? Turkey will be a better circuit for the Red Bulls, but it should suit Brawn as well. maybe this will be Rubens' race? But I reckon only some measure of misfortune will stop Jenson from winning again. Silverstone will give Jenson some extra tenths - though Rubens can be magical around there too.

I just hope that the old Schumacher doesn't soon become an albatross around Jenson's neck. Winning all the time is great for JB fans but it could be a turn off for fans of other teams...

Ferrari do seem to be improving, but once again they got the strategy wrong with the tyres. The Red Bulls were never in contention for a win at Monaco and Vettel's shunt was probably due to inexperience.

It was nice to see the Force Indias running well, shame not to get a point though. I think Toyota and BMW will be much more competitive in Turkey and Silverstone.

The remarkable season continues!

Ian

[JSR]

Re: Monaco Qualifying

Timing was clearly tight at the end of the coverage and the delay in getting Jenson to the winners' presentations may have wrong-footed the Beeb,

What, Jenson having a two-minute jog threw out their whole schedule?

Call me "Mr Pointing Out The Obvious" if you must, but if the BBC know the length of a race is between 1h 45m and 2h then it seems pretty ridiculous to give it a fixed 2h timeslot. If there had been some other live show on after it, it would make some kind of sense because compromises need to be made - but it's a repeat of a soap opera! Why couldn't they have given it a 2h 15m timeslot?

Why can't they show the soap opera repeat on BBC2? Why can't they tell those watching a *repeat* to hit red buttons, go to BBC iplayer, watch it on the website etc? I'm only asking for a couple of hours 20 times a year out of my TV licence. Is that too much to ask?

They have many options, and so curtailing the F1 coverage says to me that they treat it as a commodity, not a programme.

but I still say that (despite initial concerns that the BBC wouldn't be as good as ITV's slick coverage) the BBC has done a great job so far. The race intro with Jake 'interviewing' all the past Monaco greats was superb.

As I watched it late, I didn't see the run-up to the race but I did see the preparation and green screen on the red button on Friday. Why couldn't they have shown the "Jake interviewing on greenscreen" on the red button and give some of the race intro time to the actual race? Instead of having 50m before the race and nothing after, why not a half-hour before and 20m after?

Or perhaps the BBC feel that it's far more important to promote their presenters playing silly games with archive footage than it is to hear from those who drove the cars in the live race? Perhaps we'll have to wait 20 years for some berk presenter of the future to question Button about his race win on a green screen. Is that the point?

Who can stop Jenson now? It seems kind of mean that his 6/6 podiums, and 5/6 wins doesn't place him more than 16 points in the lead? Turkey will be a better circuit for the Red Bulls, but it should suit Brawn as well. maybe this will be Rubens' race? But I reckon only some measure of misfortune will stop Jenson from winning again. Silverstone will give Jenson some extra tenths - though Rubens can be magical around there too.

One more race win will mean that Jenson has done better than Lewis last year when he won the WDC. That's pretty incredible. He's already got more than half the points that Lewis had when he won last year - and that's despite winning with half-points in one race. No one can say that Jenson isn't world champion material any more.

I just hope that the old Schumacher doesn't soon become an albatross around Jenson's neck. Winning all the time is great for JB fans but it could be a turn off for fans of other teams...

That's certainly a danger. I know I got really cheesed off over the last two years with "Lewis mania" that I wouldn't want others to get cheesed off with "Jense mania". Fortunately, though, with the BBC not wanting to show post-race interviews and press conferences, I don't think there's much danger of "Button overload".

Ferrari do seem to be improving, but once again they got the strategy wrong with the tyres. The Red Bulls were never in contention for a win at Monaco and Vettel's shunt was probably due to inexperience.

I'm not sure I'd say they got the strategy wrong. It seems fairly clear that they wanted every advantage to get Raikonnen in front of Button to the first corner - and super soft tyres would have been the only option. Unfortunately, even with that advantage, they still aren't a match for the Brawn. Barrichello just walked around Kimi off the line. The strategy for Kimi and Massa could have worked out, if the cars had a tiny bit more to give.

[Ian]

Re: Monaco Qualifying

I'm not sure I'd say they got the strategy wrong. It seems fairly clear that they wanted every advantage to get Raikonnen in front of Button to the first corner - and super soft tyres would have been the only option. Unfortunately, even with that advantage, they still aren't a match for the Brawn. Barrichello just walked around Kimi off the line. The strategy for Kimi and Massa could have worked out, if the cars had a tiny bit more to give.

I'm pretty certain that the Brawns started on the super softs and the Ferraris (and most of the rest) started on the primes. The super softs didn't last long, but they gave the Brawns an advantage off the start line and for the first ten laps the supersofts were quicker by over a second a lap. The Brawns had to stop earlier but by then the damage was done to Ferrari, who would then have to endure a longer stint with the supersofts later in the race.

Ian

[JSR]

Re: Monaco Qualifying

I'm pretty certain that the Brawns started on the super softs and the Ferraris (and most of the rest) started on the primes. The super softs didn't last long, but they gave the Brawns an advantage off the start line and for the first ten laps the supersofts were quicker by over a second a lap. The Brawns had to stop earlier but by then the damage was done to Ferrari, who would then have to endure a longer stint with the supersofts later in the race.

Ian

Oh my mistake, you're right. So they should have started on the super-softs. Surely they did not think they'd get ahead of the Brawns on the harder tyre. What were they thinking?