Convenient/Ferrari lap times (merged)

[alesi95]

Schumacher on a three stop strategy Rubens a two.
Schuey held up by Trulli Rubens close at hand.
Schuey with a problem Rubens closing.
Schuey under pressure Rubens's tyres inexplicitly disapear!
Schuey wins Rubens second
Ross Brawn struggles for excuses team orders still banned.

It's all rather convenient isn't it. Is there something sinister at Ferrari?

[Damon]

Come on, it's Ferrari, there's always something sinister going on... *runs like the wind!*

[NiceGuyEddie]

Hm... Rubens never seemed to be able to challenge Michael. Ordering a second driver not to overtake is one thing, ordering him not to get even near the number one driver is something else. It turns out to be ridiculously easy to see something sinister every time Schumacher happens to win a GP.

[Adam43]

Well the two stops was perhaps more a hedge the bets, as discussed here: http://tentenths.com/forum/showthrea...threadid=54038

Otherwise, no not really. So the wrong Ferrari didn't win for some, hey ho, this one wasn't a fix IMHO. Michael is just better and quicker.

Rubens needs to go a lot quicker for us to see what Ferrari will do when they are close (and they cando what they want for me).

[F1Pete]

Not sure if this has been discussed already...but here goes.

During the Spanish GP, MS's times slowed down to save the car due to the exhaust problem (supposedly). The funny thing about that was....Rubens car also slowed down at exactly the same time. When MS later sped up...Rubens sped up.

What's up with this??? Is this a contract stipulation where RB is not allowed to drive faster than MS?? Anyway, Brundle and Allen mentioned this (questioning the lap times between the two Ferrari's) during the race and I am just wondering if anyone has any insight.

[ElScOrChO]

It could be that, or it could be that the team told Michael to slow down to protect the car. They also told Rubens to slow in precaution. Maybe after more analysis of the telemetry, they found that it was safe to drive a bit faster and then both drivers started to run faster at the same time.

[Gt_R]

I've come across this article and quoted one paragraph.

From thescuderia.net "A quick scan of some various F1 forums shows that the anti-Ferrari fans are feeling a little sheepish now, perhaps a little bit more bitter, but they are not lost their ability to stab at Ferrari. Yes you will have guessed that Barrichello’s 2nd stop and the claims he slowed down when MS had a problem are pretty big issues to some people. Well sadly they are in the wrong. The fact is MS had his problem long before ITV told us about it, and when ITV did tell us about it the pace of the Ferrari’s was down, but not because of the problem, because they were lapping backmarkers. Barrichello’s pitstop, I admit looked suspiciously poor, but watching it again clearly shows the tyres are on the car before the re-fuelling is finished, so he lost no time at all in his stop on Ferrari’s part, he was slow away from the stop but that was nothing to do with Ferrari. But I imagine these basic facts will go straight over the heads of the anti’s."

Not taking a stab at the anti-Ferrari camp..but the paragraph just gives a more possible senario than the conspiracy theories

[fog_shadow]

not to mention that 2 cars retired and there were yellow flags being waved on certain sections of the track.

[climb]

The main problem is, when the fundamental topics about a race are killed by an undisputed walkover, people are forced to find the strangest particulars to secure some discussion.

[Gt_R]

And that "problem" is magnified when Ferrari won

But no offence F1P.

We don't even need to talk about "contract stipulations", its common sense really...a team that have secured one-two would not risk their drivers to risk ruining everything while uncertain about the conditions of the car. Say, MS was told to slow down as Ferrari tries to evaluate the problem and MS trying to conserve...then RB decides to charge and challenge..and MS refuses to give away the lead and push...hence forcing the car into retirement..? What's the point?

Instead, applaud the ability of Ferrari and MS to put in a good race despite the problem. Applaud Ferrari taking 2 different strategies and making it work.

[ASCII Man]

I'm as anti-ferrari/Mr Schu as a person can get, but even i wasn't able to find anything wrong with the slowing down or with Rubens' second stop, except ofcourse for his slowwww getaway, and believe me i tried very hard!

[climb]

No doubt about it ASCII

[DriverT]

I think its just anti-Ferrari conspiracy theorists clutching at straws.

[jetsetter]

I must admit to being a little suspicious when the tyre mix up happened to Rubens, it just seems a little strange that it never seems to happen to Schumacher.

[cos]

http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns12861.html

[krt917]

Originally posted by Gt_R
I've come across this article and quoted one paragraph.

From thescuderia.net "A quick scan of some various F1 forums shows that the anti-Ferrari fans are feeling a little sheepish now, perhaps a little bit more bitter, but they are not lost their ability to stab at Ferrari. Yes you will have guessed that Barrichello’s 2nd stop and the claims he slowed down when MS had a problem are pretty big issues to some people. Well sadly they are in the wrong. The fact is MS had his problem long before ITV told us about it, and when ITV did tell us about it the pace of the Ferrari’s was down, but not because of the problem, because they were lapping backmarkers."

I must admit that that was my reading of what happened too, especially after Michael revealed he'd had the problem for a long time. And broken exhausts don't usually affect performance that much, even if Schuey cut his revs a bit.

The pit-stop was a bit strange, but it was only a couple of seconds slower than Michael's last one and the gap went up by more than that. Schuey had it won by then anyway.

As Adam and NiceGuy have said, Michael was just quicker.