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The 2017 F1 Thread

Tony Lockhart said:
Sorry, I disagree. That sort of behaviour always attracts attention, whether it includes a Brit or not.
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I guess we'll never know. I was just supposing that, had the 10 second stop and go resulted in a win for Hamilton and a loss of points for Vettel plus the three points on his racing licence, the FIA would have considered that to have been punishment enough for the German.

Who knows?

I still don't watch it these days but did see the fit of pique on the news. It did seem puerile but again I would guess we would need an engineer to determine how dangerous the potential stresses it could have caused would have been.
 
It's not really about the danger caused directly, it's about the precedent you set if you allow F1 drivers (who are the top of the sport) to lose their rag so much that they deliberately crash into another car.

In the same way that Materazzi was not seriously injured when headbutted by Zindane, but Zidane was still sent-off.
 
Absolutely agree Patrick. I just wonder whether Hamilton winning and Vettel finishing fifth would have been deemed punishment enough?

The stewards DID punish the German, in a manner that SHOULD have proved to be costly. The fact that it didn't turn out that way in the end was due to an odd set of circumstances that the stewards could not have known about when having their deliberations.
 
Regardless of the severity of it an interesting point here is should the punishment be relative to any other driver. If Vet had not hit Ham then he almost certainly would have won with Ham in 5th still so he was definitely punished and quite severely by most normal measures. Did it make it less severe because of Ham having the headrest issue and should that matter to the punishment. Surely the incident should be judged on its own circumstances?
 
Whilst I agree that the punishment didn't appear to fit the crime, Vettel was punished in accordance with the rules during the race. One of the options open to the reviewers during the race was to allow the incident to be reviewed after the race but they decided not to do that.
 
cutting42 said:
Surely the incident should be judged on its own circumstances?
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I agree, and in any other sport that kind of offence would be punished by disqualification.

It makes no difference what happened to Hamilton, but as it happened, the stewards long deliberation meant that Hamilton had to pit first (to fix the headrest) and Vettel gained an advantage when Hamilton came out in traffic and Vettel was able to run a couple of laps in free-air.

It also seemed to me that Perez, who was 1 lap down, was not shown blue flags and also held Hamilton up.
 
How much of a prospect is there of Vettel being penalised further? Another couple of seconds would swap his and Lewis's position in that race, same if applied as a grid-penalty next time. It is an interesting one, not sure what I think about it really. As a spectator it is good having them both closely matched and hungry with some friction, i.e. I rather like it as is!
 
Tony L said:
How much of a prospect is there of Vettel being penalised further? Another couple of seconds would swap his and Lewis's position in that race, same if applied as a grid-penalty next time. It is an interesting one, not sure what I think about it really. As a spectator it is good having them both closely matched and hungry with some friction, i.e. I rather like it as is!
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It is not likely that the Baku race result will change, more likely a penalty in the future.
In smaller formulae there are precedents for similar (but worse and at race speed) road rage incidents. One driver was banned for a year, another for 5 years.
 
For someone like Vettel or Hamilton who stands a damn good chance of getting pole a grid penalty would be the harshest I guess.
 
Personally, I'm not that keen on punishments from one race being carried over into another. I think every race should be an event in itself and the WC on top of that.

I think all these grid and engine/gearbox penalties spoil all that.

So my view is, that if the FIA feel they need to do something else, they just remove the points from Vettel for the Baku race.
 
I tend to agree with you Patrick, in terms of trying to keep the penalty to that particular race. I guess where it becomes difficult is where the driver does something, is unable to finish the race and therefore nulling the points for that race has no effect. Perhaps they should have a system where they deduct championship points regardless of whether they were earned in that race or not.

In this instance I think they should leave the stewards to decide on that race, which they have already done, and if the FIA want to take it further then it just boils down to fines etc.
 
Ramming his car up the back of Hamilton's was a mistake, an error of judgement based on something he expected to happen (Hamilton accelerating) that didn't happen.

That's just a 'racing accident' and it happens to everyone eventually, no matter how skilled and experienced.

What followed was unforgivable, petulant, bullying and potentially hazardous to himself and other drivers.

I think he has been punished enough now. (Although i'd wish Ferrari might 'dock' his wages for being a knob and risking losing their valuable points.)
 
I think we should draw a line under this subject and move on he got his punishment. To go after the event after is making it a farce.

Onwards and upwards to Austria.

Martin
 
martin dawson said:
I think we should draw a line under this subject and move on he got his punishment. To go after the event after is making it a farce.

Onwards and upwards to Austria.

Martin
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Are you happy with that as a precident? Pity it involves these two so the driver preference could be taken out of it.

Seb surprised me with this. As an offence, I think the punishment is totally inadequate. Anyone doing similar will feel a sense of injustice if they are more seriously sanctioned and that can't be right.
 
What it needs is for Vettel to be contrite, admit he was wrong for the 2nd collision and say the 1st one was a misunderstanding. If he doesn't demonstrate he sees his behaviour for the 2nd collision as unacceptable then he must be further sanctioned.
 
clivem2 said:
If he doesn't demonstrate he sees his behaviour for the 2nd collision as unacceptable then he must be further sanctioned.
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I can't remember the first time I heard the expression that to apologise is a sign of weakness, but i didn't agree with it then, and I don't to this day.

However, it seems to be an unwritten rule for all those in the public spotlight to never apologise for anything, whether that be sports people, politicians or anyone else. I fail to be able to take anyone seriously, or with respect if they can't acknowledge when they've made an error. (I'm not directing this at Vettel in particular)
 
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