105 replies to this topic

[Jean-Pierre]

SV should have had the mandatory 20 sec penalty...

[BradSpeedMan]

Rainmaster, on 30 November 2012 - 03:47 PM, said:

Lastly, the above being the case (and seems by far the most likely option) I don't see Alonso as being involved. If Ferrari didn't need a clarification as I suspect, then the move was just a political game and although Alonso is not adverse to the odd mind game and attempt to undermine Vettel's title/ability, he wouldn't have anything to gain here.

"The 31-year-old Alonso, who was world champion in 2005 and 2006, is believed to be pushing Ferrari to make an official protest to the FIA." Where does this come from??? U think Andrew Benson is sucking fingers here?

[JHS18]

Jean-Pierre, on 30 November 2012 - 03:58 PM, said:

SV should have had the mandatory 20 sec penalty...

For what exactly? Being Sebastian Vettel?

[Rainmaster]

BradSpeedMan, on 30 November 2012 - 04:02 PM, said:

"The 31-year-old Alonso, who was world champion in 2005 and 2006, is believed to be pushing Ferrari to make an official protest to the FIA." Where does this come from??? U think Andrew Benson is sucking fingers here?

I don't rate Andrew Benson that highly, to be honest, and I am wary of that sort of journalism. Alonso is "believed" to be pushing for a protest? Believed by who is the big mystery there. Believed by Andrew Benson, perhaps? The media are supposed to report a story with some reference to sources, when you say something like that, you are not so much reporting a story as creating it. Very sloppy and nowhere near enough for me to believe Alonso was pushing for a protest.  Especially considering I don't believe Ferrari were ever close to considering one, because it's ludicrous to think they didn't know the facts here anyway, as per my last post on this.

The point is, Brad, that had Benson done the same amount of investigation into this at the time as say, plenty of people on the YouTube comments, the F1Fanatic site or even myself, he would know that a protest was never on the cards. I can only believe that Ferrari had also done the same amount of investigation themselves as people on the internet had (that's if they even needed to investigate), and that means that Alonso would never have been pushing for a protest because he would have been told there was no case, within say, an hour at most of Ferrari becoming aware of the building controversy. You can think of Alonso as political or a schemer and maybe he is, but he is not an idiot and is unlikely to push for a protest that he knows has absolutely no chance of succeeding. He has nothing to gain from that.

Ferrari sent the letter to needle Red Bull and undermine them, or, alternatively if we are being extremely generous and ignoring history, to prompt the FIA to "clarify" the matter for their fans (but obviously, if there was no political element here then Ferrari could quite easily have done that themselves, and it would have been more persuasive for those fans who had apparently contacted them).

It's equally true to say, that had there actually been a genuine case here or at least something which needed arguing, then I wouldn't blame Alonso for trying to push such a protest forward. But further still, in that scenario I don't think Ferrari would need to be pushed towards a protest, they would do it anyway.

Edited by Rainmaster, 30 November 2012 - 05:09 PM.

[AleHop]

BradSpeedMan, on 30 November 2012 - 01:47 PM, said:

So they are quite happy to dismiss the yellow flag calim (see #17) when the race are over an all, but when there is a conspiracy theory which fans get excited about they quickly turn the other cheek

Ferrari accepted there weren't any yellow flags after the race when Vettel overtook Kobayashi, that was the Sky Sport "conspiracy theory".

Soon after that, a video appeared on YouTube that showed something NEW: Vettel passing Vergne under yellow flags. They asked for clarification on that and I'm sure Alonso agreed 100% and pushed for clarification until we all realised there was a green flag on that marshals post.

TBH I don't care what people say about Alonso. They said worse things about Senna but it's getting closer more and more every season.

Rainmaster, on 30 November 2012 - 03:51 PM, said:

I think he had a toothache problem.

I thought that was solved and as summer is getting to Argentina I supposed he was on holidays or something.

[AleHop]

BradSpeedMan, on 30 November 2012 - 04:02 PM, said:

"The 31-year-old Alonso, who was world champion in 2005 and 2006, is believed to be pushing Ferrari to make an official protest to the FIA." Where does this come from??? U think Andrew Benson is sucking fingers here?

The first place I heard/read that Alonso was pushing for clarification was the Spanish media. I'm sure he  was just repeating that.

There were people claiming that the green flag Vettel saw at that post was just for those coming out of the pits and the video below makes you think that's the case.



So I think it's true some fans wanted an official clarification even if Ferrari knew that wasn't true.

[LabradoRacer]

Glad that the matter's settled.

I don't understand why people are upset over Alonso's "protest". Even if had pushed for a protest, what's wrong with it?

[JHS18]

When there's clearly a green flag, and there was never anything to this, it just comes across as being a rather sore loser.

[Massa]

LabradoRacer, on 30 November 2012 - 08:48 PM, said:

Glad that the matter's settled.

I don't understand why people are upset over Alonso's "protest". Even if had pushed for a protest, what's wrong with it?

Yeah, I agree.  If there was confusion (and there was), there's nothing wrong for Alonso and/or Ferrari to have wanted a response from the FIA about it.  No one wants to be screwed out of a championship, and fortunately they weren't, but I think it's completely fair for them to want an explanation amidst all the confusion to make sure that  everyone was okay.  I'm sure we'd go through the same things if the roles were reversed.

AleHop, on 30 November 2012 - 07:34 PM, said:

The first place I heard/read that Alonso was pushing for clarification was the Spanish media. I'm sure he  was just repeating that.

There were people claiming that the green flag Vettel saw at that post was just for those coming out of the pits and the video below makes you think that's the case.



So I think it's true some fans wanted an official clarification even if Ferrari knew that wasn't true.

Don't they only wave a blue flag at pit exit?  I've never heard of a green flag for cars leaving the pit lane.  Maybe I'm missing something (as always).

[The Shadow]

BradSpeedMan, on 30 November 2012 - 01:50 PM, said:

Why seek clarification after they dismiss the claim 2 days earlier!!!! I smell a rat, and I think it's Alonso....(he's now turn from mongrel to a rat I swear is true)

How's turbokick doing these days, Brad?

[Jean-Pierre]

JHS18, on 30 November 2012 - 04:12 PM, said:

For what exactly? Being Sebastian Vettel?

I did not know you disliked him so much! I'll admit he is not a likable fellow.

But you are right, no 20 sec penalty because next year all driver will be alowed to pass under yellow, and the authorities decided to apply this new rule early.

[AleHop]

Massa, on 30 November 2012 - 09:06 PM, said:

Don't they only wave a blue flag at pit exit?  I've never heard of a green flag for cars leaving the pit lane.  Maybe I'm missing something (as always).

For cars exiting the pits, on that video a group of marshals show a blue flag at the pit exit and show what "seems to be" a green one at the marshals post.

Their argument was that both the green and blur flags only affects the cars exiting the pits and is showed if the track is green beyond the pit-lane finish line where the green panel on the other video was showed.

I don't know if I explained it right in English. It's a bit complex but with all the controversy I got a bit confused too. The thing is that the video isn't from the race so probably the procedure is different during the race.

As for the controversy on Ferrari/Alonso I doubt there would have been any problem if that had happened in Australia.

[Rainmaster]

Massa, on 30 November 2012 - 09:06 PM, said:

Yeah, I agree.  If there was confusion (and there was), there's nothing wrong for Alonso and/or Ferrari to have wanted a response from the FIA about it. No one wants to be screwed out of a championship, and fortunately they weren't, but I think it's completely fair for them to want an explanation amidst all the confusion to make sure that  everyone was okay.  I'm sure we'd go through the same things if the roles were reversed.



Don't they only wave a blue flag at pit exit?  I've never heard of a green flag for cars leaving the pit lane.  Maybe I'm missing something (as always).

There was confusion, but it was the fans who were confused, not Ferrari or Alonso. Indeed, many fans were not even confused for that long, as they analysed the video and the rules very quickly. I don't think Ferrari were ever confused as they could quite easily have the same or better information available to them and reach the same conclusion, even more quickly. It took the F1Fanatic site 1 hour at most to resolve the question of whether the pass was legal or not - on just the 5th post after the video was posted (http://www.f1fanatic...m=15#post-80878).

I don't believe an organisation like Ferrari would send a letter to the FIA about an incident on the track, on the whim of hearing about a video on YouTube, without first doing an internal investigation into that incident to see whether there was a case or any uncertainty. In this case, the incident was so simple to reach a conclusion on, you'd have to think they were either incredibly lazy and never even looked into it, or woefully incompetent, to genuinely need clarification. That leaves only a political element to sending such a letter. Their only defence to that is to say "we were aware that some of our fans were confused, so we decided to prompt the FIA for a response to address that". In that case, their response to the FIA's "verdict" (not that the FIA had to do any work at all here) would not be worded so carefully as to never actually mention that the pass was completely legal, thereby allowing the possibility in people like Jean Pierre's minds that actually, the pass was illegal, undermining Red Bull/Vettel.

Sorry, Formula 1 is too technical, political, and Ferrari is too shrewd, to write this off as a mere curiosity on Ferrari's part.

[Rainmaster]

I've posted way too much in this thread

But I wonder if the guy who posted that YouTube video knew he would generate so much controversy and discussion. He did do well.

[BradSpeedMan]

http://www.planetf1....inion-Losing-It

Take particular interest to the last sentence 2nd paragraph. Heard or read it from A Benson yes...no?

[Rainmaster]

It's an opinion, alright.