GP2 Silverstone 2011

[skells22]

Next weekend the GP2 cars hit the home of British motorsport and as we now know there is a new start line that can be used.

We also know that Grosjean has a ten grid pen for this race so whatever his qualfying pace is he will have to go back ten spots.

I am very angry with British Eurosport as there is tennis (davis cup) and that has made me mad! I

[jondownunder]

It seems par for the course now that Eurosport don't show race 1 other than in a crudely butchered highlights package. Sadly this time they won't even have a live sprint race due to live rowing(!) and a World Superbike support race (Superstock), frankly far less important to bike racing than GP2 is to car racing.

I sometimes wish the BBC took the coverage they had an option on as Eurosport clearly can't commit to showing motorsport properly, be it GP2, FR 3.5 or ILMC etc. Then again, the BBC seem to have limited capacity on the red button where it was originally rumoured that F1 supports would all be shown, so it might have been the same story there.

Two more full races to seek out torrents for then!

[ECW Dan Selby]

Ridiculous How's GP2 considered so unimportant?! I don't get it.

I would have thought with the whole 'Hamilton used to be in this!!' mania, it could do ok. Besides, it's the path to F1!!

Anyone know where to watch this on streaming?

Selby

[jondownunder]

I'll be away this weekend, but if there are streams around someone usually posts the link on the current race thread at TBK Light.

It really does seem ridiculous that it's 2011 and watching a series second only to F1 is so difficult. Eurosport have no excuse not to show a full race replay if they can't commit to it live. There's no point watching their joke highlights as a massive chunk of the race is always cut out with no explanation why the running order is suddenly different after a commercial break.

[nobster]

If you guys are able to watch RTL7 from holland on sattelite then at least you can watch the sprint race live.

[Mekola]

BTW, Italiaracing just glanced that there will be a non-championship race at Abu Dhabi alongside F1. Demise of GP2 Asia? Why don't they include that race into the 2011 schedule?

[bella]

because i'd imagine it's pretty expensive to do, and the cost to do gp2 vs fr3.5 is already pretty huge. by making it non-championship they save adding the cost onto the main series. i suppose there's potential for locally sourced cash bonuses and that sort of thing too.

[p-matt]

Italia Racing had been reporting for a while that the Asia Series would be discontinued. They said that they wanted to add more rounds on to the Main Series championship. I would imagine this would be Bahrain and Abu Dhabi next year.

[tux1234]

If anyone has a stream for race 1/2 please can you post a link/send it in a pm.

[tux1234]

Found this. http://www.soccertvlive.net/watch/72...---race-1.html

Its Italian but better than nothing. Just rained really hard so the race will start behind the safety car.

[rustyfan]

And FIAs crusade against wet weather racing continues, with another SC start in the wet. Such a pity. If they are hell bent on taking away part of the racing why not do it NASCAR-style and postpone until it's dry?

[tux1234]

Exactly, there is nothing wrong with the track as it is now, it was alot wetter for F1 practice yesterday and they still managed to drive without spining off the track left, right and centre.

[skells22]

Palmer has picked up a 30 sec pen therefore goes down to 20th place after causing a tanlge with Gutierrez.

[ghinzani]

Lead battle, lap 16, simply stunning.

[bella]

it's good to see bianchi back to his best. is this the start of a title charge?

[kurski]

Romain Grosjean cemented his place at the top of the GP2 standings with a dominant victory in race two at Silverstone.

[chunterer]

Not sure i'd call it dominant as he had to do some work for the win!

Clos, it could be argued, gifted it to him to an extent, Van der Garde flattered to deceive again I thought? The final piece of the jigsaw is missing with him nowadays, the promise of his 3.5 days seem long distant.

Disappointed with Parente, really thought he would be challenging in both races, but the battle yesterday between Bianchi and Vietoris, with Ericssons amazing charge put me in mond of the series a few years back when that sort of action happened almost every race!!

Once again though, the two races highlighted that there is a glaring lack of depth this season, with perhaps only 4-5 potentially top line drivers, a similar number of half decent guys and a load of rentadrivers and average journeymen on the grid.

[formula_fan]

Grosjean seems to always leave it quite late and then charge up the order. He seems to have mastered the tyres very well. Good weekend from Ericsson, I was pleased to see him start making better progress.

Originally Posted by chunterer

Once again though, the two races highlighted that there is a glaring lack of depth this season, with perhaps only 4-5 potentially top line drivers, a similar number of half decent guys and a load of rentadrivers and average journeymen on the grid.

I'm surprised by this comment, I would say this is the most competitive field ever for GP2 probably, especially in terms of depth.

[bella]

in defence of chunty's comment, i think there's quite a few drivers, perhaps more than usual who are maybe on their last chances in gp2 or are just there because dad needs them out from under his feet at home. there's the usual one or two who have just got the timing and teams wrong, and need a bit more time in something similar to get some tracktime in. and then there's the genuine talents you get excited about.

[pauln]

I think that's a little harsh on van de Garde. He didn't seem to be doing to badly in free practice until he visited the tyre wall at Vale at the end of the session, which was unfortunate but these things happen.

It was a good effort by the team to get the car out for qualifying at all after that, but obviously compromised given his grid slot. After that he was playing catch-up for the rest of the weekend

[chunterer]

Originally Posted by formula_fan

I'm surprised by this comment, I would say this is the most competitive field ever for GP2 probably, especially in terms of depth.

Can you honestly really say that, compared to previous seasons?

The evidence from the entry list strongly suggests it's the poorest in terms of depth since the series began.

In previous seasons only really the last half dozen or so drivers would be considered as journeymen, but this year it's practically half the grid.

[formula_fan]

Journeymen aren't necessarily poor drivers though, I think they add a lot of depth to the series to be honest. Drivers like Fillipi, Clos and Parente you will probably be considering as journeymen but they are all quick and highly rated so I don't think you can discount the series for having them.

There are undoubtedly a couple of drivers who probably don't belong there but that has been the same every year.

[chunterer]

Originally Posted by formula_fan

Journeymen aren't necessarily poor drivers though, I think they add a lot of depth to the series to be honest. Drivers like Fillipi, Clos and Parente you will probably be considering as journeymen but they are all quick and highly rated so I don't think you can discount the series for having them.

There are undoubtedly a couple of drivers who probably don't belong there but that has been the same every year.

Yes there will always be journeymen and a lot of them aren't poor, but if they've been around a long time and not gone anywhere it's not that great for the next superstars to be up against them as it only looks bad on them if they get beaten?

I wouldn't quite call Clos a journeyman, but I wouldn't call him a potential great either, and Parente unfortunately only falls into that bracket thanks to not having the right funds to have a proper crack or whatever, I don't know. GP2 has never really worked out for him but i've always thought of him as a front runner?

But when you could list the likes of the Ceccon, Razia, Palmer, Leal, Leimer, Cecotto, Filippi, Arabadzhiev, Varhaug, Herck, Gonzalez, Mirocha, and quite possibly a few others who are considered good but perhaps aren't that quick after all then that's an awful lot of seats!

The budgetary requirements are silly and that's had a major part to play in all this and it would be interesting to see just how many more decent guys would be on the grid if the costs were lower (hence why a fair few are in WSR perhaps...)