F1 2015

In reply to Coldsnap:

RE- Hamilton's Ego- IMHO, he's figured out how to use it to his advantage, and not alienate people around him.

AKA confidence. Or if you don't like him- arrogance.

Keith Tanner wrote: Big props to Mercedes for the manufacturer championship. There's no question they deserve it.

Did they win it? Does that mean kimi got a penalty?

I thought then finishing order meant they didn't win it yet.

wvumtnbkr wrote:

Keith Tanner wrote: Big props to Mercedes for the manufacturer championship. There's no question they deserve it.

Did they win it? Does that mean kimi got a penalty? I thought then finishing order meant they didn't win it yet.

Kimi was given a 30s penalty which dropped him to 8th, which gave Merc the exact number of points advantage (3) they needed.

I've never been a big Hamilton fan, probably because he enjoys comparing himself with Senna too much, but he has shown in the past two seasons he has the ability to figure out situations and improve his performance. In 2014 qualifying was Nico's strong suit and the races were usually close, but in 2015 it's all Hamilton. I don't know if Niki Lauda has had any influence at all on Hamilton, but I believe that could be the case.

I've been a Hamilton fan since he came within a race or two of winning the championship in his rookie season. Frankly, if I were searching for a driver to follow based on personality, I'd probably be disappointed at some point...though it is hard to find something not to like about Ricciardo.

BTW, did anyone else have their DVR set to record the race and end up with the NASTYCAR 500 instead? Talk about adding insult to injury!!

Haha. Yeah Basil. I started up my recording last night and it was nascar. So I thought. Ok Fast Forward. Bam. More nascar. Oh well. Looks like It was a pretty poorly run race overall with a lot of issues.

ncjay wrote: I've never been a big Hamilton fan, probably because he enjoys comparing himself with Senna too much, but he has shown in the past two seasons he has the ability to figure out situations and improve his performance. In 2014 qualifying was Nico's strong suit and the races were usually close, but in 2015 it's all Hamilton. I don't know if Niki Lauda has had any influence at all on Hamilton, but I believe that could be the case.

I don't really remember Hamilton comparing himself to Senna, at least not in the sense of "look at me, I'm as good as Senna was". It's always come across more as "Senna is my hero and I'm getting to do the same kinds of things he did, this is awesome".

The interviewers and other journalists are often making that comparison explicitly, yes. Given that he's equalled Senna in wins, in almost the same number of races, looks all-but-certain to equal him this year in number of championships, and is 4 years younger than Senna was when he died, I think some comparisons are reasonable to make here.

Basil Exposition wrote: I've been a Hamilton fan since he came within a race or two of winning the championship in his rookie season. Frankly, if I were searching for a driver to follow based on personality, I'd probably be disappointed at some point...though it is hard to find something not to like about Ricciardo. BTW, did anyone else have their DVR set to record the race and end up with the NASTYCAR 500 instead? Talk about adding insult to injury!!

don't understand the problem … the race was on when it was scheduled … 6:30a on NBCSN … the replay was scheduled for noon … but that WAS preempted by the Charlotte race … but the original broadcast was on when they said it would be

What place did Putin take? After all he scored 7 points in hockey against NHL stars.

Basil Exposition wrote: Frankly, if I were searching for a driver to follow based on personality, I'd probably be disappointed at some point...though it is hard to find something not to like about Ricciardo.

Ditto, the guy seems like a lot of us would be. Just happy to be racing F1 and having fun. Just ran across is selfie video from Sochi. Had to share:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUs2-4jnv5M

-Rob

codrus wrote: It's always come across more as "Senna is my hero and I'm getting to do the same kinds of things he did, this is awesome".

Yeah, he strikes me as an F1 superfan who is lucky enough to drive a championship car.

I think Hamilton is just a kid that grew up in a whirlwind. He realized like Miley Cyrus that his life was hyper constricted even if he was doing stuff he loved to do. But as Miley can go crazy and do what she wants, regardless of how odd, he is caught in a world where just spraying champagne like decades of other race winners gets him into a viral backlash online. Or wanting to be quiet and think about what just happened is a bad thing.

I have always been unhappy with Vettel, never because of his driving but because he says things that just feel wrong. Like once at some award show he made a joke implying that all that bad Nazi stuff was just Germans being too obsessive about efficiency. Which made no sense in english or was a terrible joke. Then like this past weekend trying to joke about Hamilton in the press post race conference about Hamilton expecting girls at his hotel room was just distasteful. Seb - just keep the joke about yourself not others' sexual desires.

Vettel has proved he is as good as Alonso so far at Ferrari and Hamilton has a car that he can finally use to dominate. I wonder if he would be dominant if Vettel or Alonso or even Perez ( I rank him highly since McLaren, but must admit ot forgetting about him now and then) was next to Hamilton instead of Rosberg.

bentwrench wrote: Would Hamilton have sealed the deal if Nico had not been screwed?

Not sure, like at Spielberg he seemed to honestly not be able to take the fight to Rosberg. But before the safety car he seemed to be holding on to that DRS gap. So maybe he had the pace.

Then after the safety car Nico was already in trouble so who knows.

I think he would have given Nico a good fight and it would all depend on which of them flinched.

Noticed in the final finishing order both McLarens in the top 10 before Alonso's penalty dropped him to 11th. Is that the first time this year both Mclarens finished in the top 10? If so, there should be a small party in Woking. Compared to the beginning of the season, they've made big progress, even if the claims they're still 30 mph off the pace are true.

I wonder if Hamilton is trying to figure a way to be in line for a Ferrari seat. His comments this year seem to hint at it.

McLaren I think got both cars in the points at Monaco.

Straight out of my memory, I don't think Alonso made 5 laps at Monaco before pulling off. He finished dead last. Honda can't fix their big problems until the season ends. Personally, I think that's a bit dumb. Top level race series in the world, but you can't fix your car. 2015 is pretty much over for me, so I'm already hoping Ferrari can gain just enough on Mercedes to battle it out next year and make Hamilton work harder. If Honda gets their problems solved, it could get pretty wild in 2016. If you could delete the Mercedes cars from the races, it would be an awesome season. Seems like the battle for 3rd on back is the best I've seen in years.

In reply to ncjay:

Suppose that you are correct. I thought they did have one double points finish before Russia.

Anyone going to the USA GP?

Me, already started my trip towards austin this week. Piggybacking off my girlfriends uncle VIP skybox at the start straight. cannot wait .

Cool. Enjoy. Get out of the VIP box as much as you can if you really want to see the racing because unfortunately its the worse place to actually watch the racing unless you want to watch it on the TV.

I'll be the MVR guy for the turn 9-11 sector. Hopefully the rain stays away. COTA has been cursed with bad weather for all of the event this year. PWC was really cold then it started to rain. MotoGP was very rainy. WEC/Tudor was really hot. Initial forecast says clear for Sunday so we will see.

My weekend starts thursday at 2:00 PM and I'll be out there non stop pretty much till sunday night.

Yea, last year was my first F1 race and I wasn't really sure what to do. We had skybox and turn 12 bleacher seats. About half way through the race, majority of the people were just watching the race on the TV inside (owner of barett jackson watched most the race with me outside, cool guy). I was getting tired of the start line view / first turn view. So walked to the turn 12 realized that took me about 20% of the race time to get over there. Got there and found watching them slow down to turn 12 was about as engaging as watching them pass through the start line. At least I could see the pits and turn one at the start line. Either way, had a blast and hope we get some good racing this week.

Oh and this year I'm definitely staying until they kick us out. As we left after the race and it took us like 4 hours to get home from a normally 40 minute ride.

Turns 9 and 15 are the best views on the track although they may have ruined a lot of the views from 9 with the Elton John Stage. I hope not. I'll see once I get there but from my understanding they are putting the stage on the top of Coyote hill there.

With the VIP box, don't you get access to the team "tents" and such? I agree the view isn't that great, but to be able to walk around behind the building and see all the teams and drivers walking around would be worth it to me.

-Rob

Just a few pictures I got from last year. Not bad from a cell phone

Should be fun. If nothing else it's interesting to see and learn from all of the international marshals that come in for the event.

I try to always get all around the track on Saturday to see where I would like to sit next year. Even in practice you can get the feel for the passing zones.

The end of the start straight at Indy for the f1 races was ok. As passes happened into T1 and mistakes made in turns2&3.

Have fun!