[OT][RANT]Formula 1 *Contains Spoilers*

Didn't see it, but 'cutting the final chicane'. Good job those officials don't work at Thruxton lol

It was a fantastic final third to the race, but Lewis committed the cardinal sin and broke rule 1.1a "Thou shalt not pass the red car". Paul Stoddert used to refer to the FIA as Ferrari International Assistance and this season they have been working all out. I still don't get how Kimi was allowed to keep going with a foot of exhaust hanging by the lambda probe, especially when they didn't remove it in the pit stop.

You're wrong, Dan, but it is forgiving because you think Formula 1 is a race, a sport. It isn't : it is showbusiness.

There is no particular bias to Ferrari: there is the need to keep the championship alive, people looking their TV and audiences streaming in. It's big money after all.

So: sorry for Kimi who drove a great race, congrats for Hamilton for "la rage de vaincre"(the mad envy to win) and thumbs up for Bernie, a man who knows how to keep a rollercoaster going.

Oh yeah: is isn't (ham)Burger, but Berger. One of the few pilots I know who had to courage to accept second violin because Senna wouldn't settle for less than first. Showbusiness once again.

Cheers and know for fact: Hamilton will be WC... because he was already robbed from the crown last year, which Raikonen collected he too being robbed of it some years previous.

Bernie's Adigio: "Let there be justice but first let out pockets be stuffed!"

All the best,

Tom De Moor

How did he have a great drive? He spun twice and parked his Ferrari in the wall.

Ferrari International Assistance

HTH ;-)

watching it again on the news he didn't really let him pass after cutting the corner and he shouldn't of past so quickly afterwards. i don't though think he should have been robbed of the 1st place after all the other dude spun so surely the advantage is gone? and 25seconds is a bit much aint it? still F1 is more like WWE wrestling these days.

800 HP in 600 kg car on slicks on a changing track due to rain isn't peanuts but that's Spa for you: it can start to pour down on one side of the track while being dry the opposite side.

BTW: in the earlier stages LH spun too. In a "normal" race that was it for him. Spa however isn't normal, it is Francorchamps: it makes and breaks people and teams. Just ask Tom Walkingshaw.

All the best for LH but even more for KR: come back and live to fight another day. They represent the best drivers in F1 today and by quite a margin.

Tom De Moor

He didn't "cut the final chicane", Raikonnen forced Hamilton off the road rather than have Hamilton overtake him. Hamilton was pushed into the safety lane with no way back onto the track other than to proceed in the safety lane. When he re-entered the track, he slowed to let Raikonnen pass him. They crossed the start line with Raikonnen ahead - further ahead than when they approached the chicane. Hamilton then outbraked Raikonnen after "getting medieval on his ass" which Raikonnen didn't like. It was, unlike Raikonnen's previous dirtnasty a clean pass.

Raikonnen and Hamilton then got mixed up with someone (forget who) making a f*ck up of a corner and Hamilton lost the lead to Raikonnen. Raikonnen then stuffed his car into the wall. Hamilton gained no advantage, Raikonnen threw away his lead.

FIA seem to have joined the KKK. Anyone would think that that the FIA had some relationship to extreme right wing politics. Obviously that can't possibly be the case.

Yes he did.

Utter bollocks.

I'm a Kimi fan, so it was a brilliant bit of rightful judgment by the FIA. Admittedly, if it was M.Schumacher instead of Kimi I'd be fuming.

Everyone who works in the sport says the oposite.

Then how did he get from one side of Kimi to the other? Maybe he has moveable aero and flew?

Everybody who works in what you call "sport" but what is anything but sport, knows that he is part of showbusiness and indeed very fortunate to be there. Some whisper that apart of showbusiness it is also one of the best laundry machines for dirty money.

Showbusiness implies optimizing audiences worldwide. F1 is not a sport, it's marketing: it has but value if worldwide TV-audiences watch who register the advertising.

That's what is happening: the "sport" can't allow a run away championship by McLaren, like it couldn't allow Schumacher in the Benetton-days running away with the crown too early.

However F1 can live with Ferrari dominance because the market value of the brand "Ferrari" is about the same as the brand "F1" and 50 times better known to the general public than the brand "McLaren".

It even comes down to the poetic justice that the robbing of McLaren's Hamilton win is actually beneficial to McLaren.

Tom De Moor

None of which answers my question. Surely to have a great race you need to finish the race? I lot of less experienced drivers in lower budget teams managed to get to the end without hitting the wall.

As cynical as that response was - I fear it's probably very near the truth :-( Where there is that much money involved in anything, there is bound to be corruption I guess - from those making the most money who want even more.

I apologise for the mis-spelling of 'Berger'! That was a terrible error on my part, he was, and probably still is, a brilliant character. His interviews were always funny, and he just comes across as a really nice guy. I remember him in what I think may have been his final season, taking several races off with, IIRC, a sinus infection, then coming back still in quite a bad way, and he'd been getting some stick that season for being too old etc as well. So he came back, and promptly won that first race in a Benetton. It was great. :-)

No, a great race can even be driven without finishing. Some things count in spades: other cars overtaken, fastest laps, etc

So? They come in 1 to 2 minutes after the first or if stated in distance: they still have 5 miles to go when the winner sees the checkered flag.

A lot of less experienced drivers *even in Formula 1* pay to drive, real racers are paid. For the moment there are 2 man head and shoulders above the rest: LH and KR, and that concurrs with the 2 best paid drivers.

In a real raceteam there are no complaints, just some regrets, when you skid out of the race when leading but all teambosses are fuming when you bring the car home in 10-th place with performance left in it.

Tom De Moor

He went off the track at least four times during the race, two of those had no effect on him because of the stupidly huge tarmac run off areas at Spa. One of which wrecked his car. Not exactly what I'd call a great race.

Not quite, 5 out of the top 7 finishers were from second rate teams and were all within 17 seconds of the leader. Unlike KR, they all scored points.

I'm not disagreeing with that, although KR isn't exactly earning his money this season.

just to start this off again

I think vamp would fit in quite well on rec.autos.sport.f1 :-)

How anyone can say Hamil-ton didn't give back the advantage he got, I don't know. It's beyond me. As far as I can tell, only Ferrari team members, Jarno Trulli and fake ferrari fans (Tifauxi) think the penalty was justified. Pat Symonds the Renault tech director has even spoken out and said it's nonsense.

A sad state of affairs

Mike P