2810 replies to this topic

[BradSpeedMan]

freaky2, on 17 October 2012 - 08:15 AM, said:

Yep, Kimi would have never done it by himself xD

hey heeyyyy...be nice, it's his birthday!!!!

[Quiet One]

Rainmaster, on 17 October 2012 - 01:01 AM, said:

Well, there's quite a lot to respond to here, and not all of it strictly relevant to my post. And hey, wait a minute! Andres you just did that thing where you simplified what I said so it seemed ridiculous

Nah. You don't need my help to look that way.

(Damn you, I hate it when you are right! )

Rainmaster, on 17 October 2012 - 01:01 AM, said:

To be clear: I have no issue with team orders in any team and this isn't even actually about the fact that Ferrari's are slightly worse than other teams (Ferrari's have to be, they design slower cars ..); I never said he was hard done by (I mentioned his earnings); I have never disputed Ferrari's irrational support for him (of course, that doesn't mean they don't support Alonso more, to his detriment, but that really isn't the point either); and if it's true like I think that he has been mentally absolutely nowhere for a long time then I don't see any way that could be construed as an argument in his favour(!)

I agree but the Hockenheim argument is usually used to justify his failure. That is where the whole misunderstanding came from, although I already suspected that it was not the point in your case

Rainmaster, on 17 October 2012 - 01:01 AM, said:

I am merely looking at the connection between Ferrari's choices and Massa's form. I cited Hockenheim because I thought that was such a clear example. What's it an example of? Massa's mental destruction (orchestrated by the evil Fernando Alonso and super evil Ferrari team ).

The problem with that argument is that Massa has to be at the same time one of the mentally weakest and mentally strongest drivers of all times. Let's not forget that this weakling has also raced along with Michael and Kimi. There's some fundamental flaw there, a guy that raced along 3 of the top 4 drivers of our generation yet he crumbles over a single radio message without a fight.

Rainmaster, on 17 October 2012 - 01:01 AM, said:

In other words, that Alonso's speed and more importantly to Massa (after being the darling of the team) Ferrari's choice of Alonso over him (after them supporting him over Kimi no less!), had a big impact on him mentally - that's almost such an obvious point I feel stupid saying it. Or do people still believe Massa's head injury was the issue and he only recovered in the first part of 2010, then deteriorated again, then got better again now? Again, this is not in favour of him, it just shows how mentally fragile he was and is. He basically admitted how much his confidence and motivation had been an issue after the Japanese GP. It's all there.

I don't know how much of his 2008 quasi championship he thought it was down to his super skills (IMHO, it was more a case of the tendencies from both Kimi to suddenly fade out and Lewis to make unforced errors). And I think (and here I might be oversimplifying, but can't shake the feeling) that Rob Smedley is actually what/who we are talking about when we talk about Felipe's mentality. Not sure if that has any impact, merely stating my feelings.

Rainmaster, on 17 October 2012 - 01:01 AM, said:

Also, I do not claim to know whether that mental impact was something Massa has/had a certain control of (i.e. has he just been not really trying these past years? Or not trying to improve? His improvement in form during a contract negotiation strongly suggests that) or has he actually been grappling with his driving these last years? Trying to regain some confidence? (IF you think in these black and white ways you could come to different conclusions about Massa, e.g. in the extreme "oh he was so hard done by (a Massa fan)" or "my God! What a terrible guy just collecting a pay cheque and wasting a seat (a Massa hater)"). Actually, being human, it's probably a mixture of both of those issues. Once he lost confidence, he just kept digging himself deeper and deeper and results got worse and worse (in truth, he was probably overdriving trying to match Alonso, if anything).

I agree.

Rainmaster, on 17 October 2012 - 01:01 AM, said:

My only real point therefore would be that whatever Massa is today, good or bad and rightly or wrongly, Ferrari made him that way. They can never ever be critical of his performances, because they are in large part responsible for it. If you knock a "number one" driver down (as he was for them), you cannot complain if he takes a hell of a long time to get back up. I think the truth of this can be seen by the fact that Ferrari haven't criticised Massa, and they've kept supporting him, because they know the reality of the situation on some level In fact, I can't really see another rational reason why they've continually supported him, other than out of sheer guilt

I thought at some point that guilt played a big part as well, but that doesn't make too much sense either. The main issue for me (and that is why I keep bringing it on) is that Massa cost millions. And as much as we tend to think about these guys as the only characters in a (comic) book, I cannot forget that they are all part of big corporations and those usually tend to have little concern for emotional values. At some point it must be hard to defend wasting 20M on a guy because he is nice and he might be hurt because for a semester he thought he was number one (something only he could have believed, he simply is no number one material and never was, that much is clear).  At some point the board of directors or whatever might question the wisdom oon wasting millions and millions as much on a mediocre driver when other guys are delivering the same or better results for a fraction of his cost and most pay drivers were doing a better job and bringing money to their teams on top of that!

Rainmaster, on 17 October 2012 - 01:01 AM, said:

Please refrain from interpreting this post as anti Alonso/Ferrari/Obama/Felix Baumgartner or Pro Alonso/Massa/Kimi/Obama/genocide.

FELIX Baumgartner? Y thought he was ZSOLT Baumgartner! It seemed suspicious that Zsolt would break any speed record, considering  his F1 career...

Oh, and FYI you are as of now blocked on my ICQ! Revenge never tasted so sweet...

[pabloh20]

Quiet One, on 17 October 2012 - 01:42 PM, said:

Oh, and FYI you are as of now blocked on my ICQ! Revenge never tasted so sweet...

ICQ??  ICQ???  Would it not have been more soul destroying if you had banned him from your BBS??  Or even worse, not tell him the password to your Princess DIary with voice activated password??

[Quiet One]

pabloh20, on 17 October 2012 - 03:09 PM, said:

ICQ??  ICQ???  Would it not have been more soul destroying if you had banned him from your BBS??  Or even worse, not tell him the password to your Princess DIary with voice activated password??

Oh, you think you are soooo funny!

Get out of  my MySpace. Now.

And send me back that tamagotchi you stole from me, don't think I didn't notice.

[pabloh20]

Quiet One, on 17 October 2012 - 03:35 PM, said:

Oh, you think you are soooo funny!

Get out of  my MySpace. Now.

And send me back that tamagotchi you stole from me, don't think I didn't notice.

Was that the Barbie tamagotchi ??

[Quiet One]

pabloh20, on 17 October 2012 - 09:27 PM, said:

Was that the Barbie tamagotchi ??

Pfffft!!!! Of course not!!!!!!

(yes...)

[pabloh20]

Quiet One, on 17 October 2012 - 09:29 PM, said:

Pfffft!!!! Of course not!!!!!!

(yes...)

[LabradoRacer]

Apparently, Massa raced with a RBR-copy exhaust in South Korea, which may explain why he was faster than Nando. The latter too will get it now, and it's still a close fight for the WDC.

[Quiet One]

LabradoRacer, on 19 October 2012 - 08:18 PM, said:

Apparently, Massa raced with a RBR-copy exhaust in South Korea, which may explain why he was faster than Nando. The latter too will get it now, and it's still a close fight for the WDC.

Ooooh! So Felipinho gets the new upgrades!!!! They are sabotaging Alonso, I tell ya!!

Whitmarsh must go!!!

[LabradoRacer]

Quiet One, on 19 October 2012 - 09:20 PM, said:

Ooooh! So Felipinho gets the new upgrades!!!! They are sabotaging Alonso, I tell ya!!

Whitmarsh must go!!!

[Massa]

I think it says a ton about Ferrari that they are so under-confident in their own abilities they give the upgrades to the number two on the assumption it will just be a disaster.  I almost like the Scuderia now because they're just bumbling along on legacy making all sorts of cute little gaffes.

[Rainmaster]

Hm, I haven't read this Massa upgrades story anywhere else.

[BradSpeedMan]

Massa, on 20 October 2012 - 01:38 AM, said:

I think it says a ton about Ferrari that they are so under-confident in their own abilities they give the upgrades to the number two on the assumption it will just be a disaster.  I almost like the Scuderia now because they're just bumbling along on legacy making all sorts of cute little gaffes.

It's like they on tip-toe to scared to scupper up Alonso's chances, while still using Massa as a g-pig

[Insider]

Looking at rival strategies and live timing data, I am convinced, as Martin Brundle was that Felipe could have at worst, caught and passed Webber and at best, may have got Vettel in a lather and induced severe tyre destruction or better upon him. We did not know Felipe was running a very rare artifice - a Ferrari upgrade that actually worked! Irrespective of that anomaly, the Scuderia chose to run a face-saving scenario for the blessed St. Fernando Alonso Diaz of Oviedo rather than take points away from Vettel. Clearly, their star driver is greater than the team which is both bizarre and obtuse.

[Rainmaster]

A Google search tells me that this Massa upgrade story came from Yallaf1 (that old reliable news source), and according to its own report, originated in a Spanish newspaper (surely an unbiased news source). I guess the only way a Spanish newspaper could explain Massa being faster than Alonso is that Massa had a better car I suspect this story is nonsense not only because it makes absolutely no sense (the only way Massa would get an upgrade over Alonso is if both of them ran it and Alonso didn't like it but Massa did, highly unlikely for Alonso to make such an error), but also because I haven't read about this anywhere else.

[Rainmaster]

Oh Kimi..

[BradSpeedMan]

Rainmaster, on 20 October 2012 - 03:51 PM, said:

Oh Kimi..

The first time I saw it I thought WTF, maybe because I thought it would be concerning Lotus.....the 2nd time however I got it, great promotion by/for Makia...absolute Classic!!!

[Insider]

Rainmaster, on 20 October 2012 - 03:46 PM, said:

A Google search tells me that this Massa upgrade story came from Yallaf1 (that old reliable news source), and according to its own report, originated in a Spanish newspaper (surely an unbiased news source). I guess the only way a Spanish newspaper could explain Massa being faster than Alonso is that Massa had a better car I suspect this story is nonsense not only because it makes absolutely no sense (the only way Massa would get an upgrade over Alonso is if both of them ran it and Alonso didn't like it but Massa did, highly unlikely for Alonso to make such an error), but also because I haven't read about this anywhere else.

You are probably right. Either way, they had their chance to close the gap and didn't take it.

[BradSpeedMan]

well, back to the good old days!!!!


http://www.totalf1.c...t_private_test/

[AleHop]

Massa's is an X-file. Remember that story about Smedley telling him that he had to maintain/open a gap with Alonso before the "Alonso is faster than you" sentence at Hockenheim? A few minutes earlier Alonso said " hey guys, this is ridiculous" and there was a moment Massa was driving like mad when Alonso nearly alongside him and both of them could have finished the race right there. Ferrari have been protecting a less than mediocre driver for more than TWO years. Why? Now after a decent race rumours say it was because some experimental parts in his car, it could be because of the lack of proper on track tests that Ferrari have to do that? Is Massa delivering again when he knows it is contract tine?

Ok, you have already commented on all that.

/* BREAK */

Vettel, is he going to leave the best team of the decade for the Ferrari glory? Past glory I mean. Is he going to leave a comfortable position alongside Webber for a gloves off battle with Alonso? Is he going to say bye-bye to a WDC/WCC producing machine for an adventurous life? No. No. No.

/* BREAK /*

Does RBR/Mateschitz respect the budget cap? Why Newey didn't success at McLaren? What happens when you're full of good ideas but you can't test them all because of the budget cap, wind tunnel time restriction, etc.? Then you go to a new team where they don't care about money, budget and time restrictions. At least their wind tunnel works fine of course but there's more than just Newey. Money, resources a plenty, the best technicians.... Remember when Ferrari could test their new pieces at home in the backyard, they had a great driver and a great group of people together? Very soon they dominated the sport and a lot of rules changed to stop such dominance, remember? Mateschitz came to F1 as a hobby a passion and a business as a promotion for the drinks.

[Ikyrotz]

Rumors from Italy say Alonso got furious with Ferrari during the Indian GP weekend due to some comments by Pat Fry (which apparently implied that Alonso had not been perfect during the quali), and threatened to reveal on twitter how they have not made any kind of progress with certain parts since the Spanish GP. Apparently it took Domenicali until 1am in the morning to calm him down and stop him from tweeting something like that. Allegedly all had started already on Thursday when Alonso allegedly complained about "lots of talk, not much progress". Dunno if these rumors are credible, but they do come from Italy, so who knows.


http://www.lastampa....e0L/pagina.html

[BradSpeedMan]

Ikyrotz, on 29 October 2012 - 08:40 PM, said:

Rumors from Italy say Alonso got furious with Ferrari during the Indian GP weekend due to some comments by Pat Fry (which apparently implied that Alonso had not been perfect during the quali), and threatened to reveal on twitter how they have not made any kind of progress with certain parts since the Spanish GP. Apparently it took Domenicali until 1am in the morning to calm him down and stop him from tweeting something like that. Allegedly all had started already on Thursday when Alonso allegedly complained about "lots of talk, not much progress". Dunno if these rumors are credible, but they do come from Italy, so who knows.


http://www.lastampa....e0L/pagina.html

hhehehehehehehehehehehehehe, oh excuse me, but I would'nt be suprise if it was true

[Caesar]

Ikyrotz, on 29 October 2012 - 08:40 PM, said:

Rumors from Italy say Alonso got furious with Ferrari during the Indian GP weekend due to some comments by Pat Fry (which apparently implied that Alonso had not been perfect during the quali), and threatened to reveal on twitter how they have not made any kind of progress with certain parts since the Spanish GP. Apparently it took Domenicali until 1am in the morning to calm him down and stop him from tweeting something like that. Allegedly all had started already on Thursday when Alonso allegedly complained about "lots of talk, not much progress". Dunno if these rumors are credible, but they do come from Italy, so who knows.



http://www.lastampa....e0L/pagina.html

Dispute was actually  about pasta sauce that Alonso wasn't pleased with.
Alonso threatened to leave Ferrari if they don't fix damn ' red thing ' (tomato sauce)!
Apparently since june cook ( or was it fry ) can't make it taste good for Fernando!
He threatened to tweet it and hold his finger on  ' submit ' button of his mobile
phone till 1,00 am, while negotiator from Indian SWAT team calmed him down.

Edited by Caesar, 30 October 2012 - 07:47 AM.

[BradSpeedMan]

Caesar, on 30 October 2012 - 07:44 AM, said:

Dispute was actually  about pasta sauce that Alonso wasn't pleased with.
Alonso threatened to leave Ferrari if they don't fix damn ' red thing ' (tomato sauce)!
Apparently since june cook ( or was it fry ) can't make it taste good for Fernando!
He threatened to tweet it and hold his finger on  ' submit ' button of his mobile
phone till 1,00 am, while negotiator from Indian SWAT team calmed him down.

sounds like a similiar dispute he had with Ron Dennis at Mclaren '07, only Ferrari here did'nt fall for it here, which is probably the best thing they ever did since he arrived there....

[Quiet One]

Yeah, right. Makes for a funny story for YallaF1, though.

[Rainmaster]

I doubt that's true but it's obvious his calm and happy demeanour is (understandably) beginning to wane because of Ferrari's lack of progress. After Suzuka he said something like he'd had the same car for x many races or something like this. If things don't improve I wouldn't be surprised if some toys left the pram, these things happen.

[brambilla]

For those following the Beebs Murray\Benson "Greatest F1 Drivers" listing - Clark at #3 :

http://www.bbc.co.uk...rmula1/20124557

I've always considered myself a rabid Senna fan (The '94 Benetton had illegal aids !) , but even I've gotta say that what Fangio and Clark did goes beyond Sennas achievements. At this rate, I expect they'll probably rate Senna higher than Fangio too, pity.

[pabloh20]

Rainmaster, on 30 October 2012 - 02:04 PM, said:

I doubt that's true but it's obvious his calm and happy demeanour is (understandably) beginning to wane because of Ferrari's lack of progress. After Suzuka he said something like he'd had the same car for x many races or something like this. If things don't improve I wouldn't be surprised if some toys left the pram, these things happen.

Sometimes the dummy has to leave the pram, there is more than one way to skin a cat after all and sometimes it helps to have a good dummy throw .  However, and this is not just aimed at Alonso, it's usually better if the pram is indoors when the dummy leaves it

[Massa]

He should be upset.  Domenicali should be upset.  That entire team should be upset.  They were given so many free passes thanks to the FIA regulating Red Bull, McLaren hitting a bad stretch, and Alonso delivering results no one expected.  No one ever took that to mean "fix the problems and kick everyone while they're down" and instead just fumbled around on a cushion that went from insurmountable to over in a few hundred feet at Suzuka.  I still believe that never getting rid of Massa sets a bad example and makes the wrong statement to the entire staff.  You don't have to have a dramatic, ugly, and classless firing of the guy, but you had to do something to say "Ferrari, as a team, are better than this."  If they weren't better than Massa's performance this year, how can they say they are better than failed upgrades race after race?  And in that case, how can they expect to get better upgrades?

I realize it's more complicated than that.  Still, I have a hard time seeing a team that can win WDCs or WCCs with Alonso in their car as one that's operating effectively.  I know Red Bull and Vettel are incredible, they're winning because they're great, not because other teams are deficient, but this year just shows that Ferrari and Alonso could have had a lot more from their relationship.

brambilla, on 30 October 2012 - 03:46 PM, said:

For those following the Beebs Murray\Benson "Greatest F1 Drivers" listing - Clark at #3 :

http://www.bbc.co.uk...rmula1/20124557

I've always considered myself a rabid Senna fan (The '94 Benetton had illegal aids !) , but even I've gotta say that what Fangio and Clark did goes beyond Sennas achievements. At this rate, I expect they'll probably rate Senna higher than Fangio too, pity.

I always find lists like this difficult.  There are very few people who have observed every driver from 1950-2012 race live and don't have some sort of bias to a particular era (they were real men in the 60s) or person (Senna was a god) or team (all the best drove for Ferrari) or accomplishment (I won't even consider anyone who didn't win Monaco) or statistic (Schumacher has 91 wins so he's the best).  It's also hard to figure out what winning a race in 1955 meant and what winning in 2005 meant etc etc etc.  Who were people racing against, what were the cars like, what were the conditions like, did it take more to get in a car when the chance of dying was much higher, does it take more now that the field is more even, all that stuff.  You think long enough and you get to a point where it's unfair to say anything about anyone.

[Quiet One]

Massa, on 30 October 2012 - 07:49 PM, said:

He should be upset.  Domenicali should be upset.  That entire team should be upset.  They were given so many free passes thanks to the FIA regulating Red Bull, McLaren hitting a bad stretch, and Alonso delivering results no one expected.  No one ever took that to mean "fix the problems and kick everyone while they're down" and instead just fumbled around on a cushion that went from insurmountable to over in a few hundred feet at Suzuka.  I still believe that never getting rid of Massa sets a bad example and makes the wrong statement to the entire staff.  You don't have to have a dramatic, ugly, and classless firing of the guy, but you had to do something to say "Ferrari, as a team, are better than this."  If they weren't better than Massa's performance this year, how can they say they are better than failed upgrades race after race?  And in that case, how can they expect to get better upgrades?

I realize it's more complicated than that.  Still, I have a hard time seeing a team that can win WDCs or WCCs with Alonso in their car as one that's operating effectively.  I know Red Bull and Vettel are incredible, they're winning because they're great, not because other teams are deficient, but this year just shows that Ferrari and Alonso could have had a lot more from their relationship.

Indeed. In these last races, everybody will be scrutinizing every word Alonso says and turn and twist them until they fit the "he is just a big crybaby" image. That bit of news reek of falsehood as a whole (how do people know what he wrote if he never tweeted it? Either he shown that to half the team, or SD talked, and that would make even less sense as he was the guy trying to cover the 'story', right? It is absurd as it is told. Either there are big chumks of the story amiss or it is just a plain lie). But let's assume for those who will still stubbornly think that this is not just true, but the 'natural' thing Alonso does.

He has every right to be mad. Geez, in a year were 90% of humanity (I define humanity as 'people who watched at least one F1 race, or has received the meme with the 'f1' computer key as a joke) admitted Alonso's efforts and prowess to be up there, to watch his hopes of a WDC disappear because the car disadvantage which has been there all year has not only not disappeared when RBR finally played the Newey card, but worsened because that was the time Ferrari found that (yet again) they screwed up with the wind tunnel would be frustrating for anyone. Alonso has dragged the team on and on, and so far no one in the team said otherwise. He has been under enormous pressure all year, yet kept pushing and smiling all the time. Can't the guy let out some steam without being called a crybaby?

To add insult to injury, this year there's not a single F1 personality you can name as a standard to measure Alonso's 'crybabyness' as all of them made asses of themselves all year. Who would you want to show as an opposite of Alonso the moaner? Vettel ("Cucumber" "Do something anything!")? Kimi ("My steering wheel!!! My steering wheel!!"), Button ("No grip! No grip!!!!"), Lewis ("Guys, we should retire" Twittergate)? Unless you are a fan of Bernd Rosenmeyer, I don't think any other character in the paddock has any moral grounds to compare Alonso's attitude even if he decided to tweet Stefano Domenicali's impersonation of Flavio, thong and all.

Cut the guy some slack. Shut up and enjoy the best driver of this generation. Nobody (until this post ) decided to convert all those idiotic moments from other drivers into proof of them being failures. So don't even try

Massa, on 30 October 2012 - 07:49 PM, said:

I always find lists like this difficult.  There are very few people who have observed every driver from 1950-2012 race live and don't have some sort of bias to a particular era (they were real men in the 60s) or person (Senna was a god) or team (all the best drove for Ferrari) or accomplishment (I won't even consider anyone who didn't win Monaco) or statistic (Schumacher has 91 wins so he's the best).  It's also hard to figure out what winning a race in 1955 meant and what winning in 2005 meant etc etc etc.  Who were people racing against, what were the cars like, what were the conditions like, did it take more to get in a car when the chance of dying was much higher, does it take more now that the field is more even, all that stuff.  You think long enough and you get to a point where it's unfair to say anything about anyone.

I agree. However, with their logical differences, most lists tend to choose more or less the same drivers even if in different order (you'd rarely find Andrea de Cesaris in those lists, and you rarely find Senna missing for example.) That being said, BBC's one is particularly idiotic in that sense and much vilified, with reason
Murray has to go!! ('Their' Murray, not 'ours' wherever he might be!)