German GP

[sebbe]

Tp, what Ron Dennis said was that MP4-21's suspension system works in a way that acts like the mass damper system.

“And of course there’s this mass damper issue which is impacting on some other cars’ performance.
“We have a suspension system that’s quite sophisticated and achieves most of what the mass damper concept is.
“But at the end of the day it’s motor racing and you’re trying to get a more competitive car and that’s what we believe we’ve done.”
http://www.itv-f1.com/News_Article.aspx?PO_ID=36839

By the way, in that article Ron says that low fuel strategy for the classification was somehow, em... "orchested":
Asked how little fuel Raikkonen’s car had on board for yesterday’s pole run, Dennis replied: “It will be very apparent shortly.
“I mean, we were pretty aggressive.

According to what "the Kimster" said during post-race press conference they have some fuel pump issues while refueling for the Q3 and he went out with less fuel than planned (something like that happened to Renault during this season, I believe).

Anyway, intentionally or not, Kimi's result was the best they could've hoped for. 21's pace isn't there yet to win a race.

Go ahead Kimi! I'll miss you next year!
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[DaveKillens]

Renault seem to be suffering from different problems. Obviously, the Michelins have not closed the gap with Bridgestone. Also, this removal of the mass damper seems to have upset the balance of the car. Big question... are Ferrari still running theirs? I suspect so......... what do they have to lose, and would they expect a ruling against them post-race? Hardly likely. We shall see when mass dampers are allowed in Hungary, and Renault have them fitted again.
Driver of the day.. Massa. He flew all day as Shu's wingman, could have easily challenged for the win but chose to stay with the team next year and be a good little boy. Shu fans rant and rave at how he walks on water, but if Massa had been turned loose, he would have won convincingly. The old man may appear young and all that crap, but he should retire. Shu won only because of his tires, car, and the fact Massa chose to let him win.
Today was not a test of drivers, it was definitely an equipment race. Wait until Michelin have a better tire, the Renaults are again competitive (I figure Turkey), and we shall see how Shu handles the pressure.

[wazojugs]

Rear tyres were blistering but I didn't see any closeups

Fernando had severe tyre blistering and lost a lot of time in the first stint, Fisi had the same in the second - when we stopped him as early as possible in order to change the tyres and stop him losing position to Trulli.

Ted Kravites was round the back with an itv camera man. the blisters were quite deep and wide.

[Sodder]

Wait until Michelin have a better tire

I don't think they will this year. What do they have to gain. They already have their 100 wins in F1 and there moving out next year. I believe Flavio saw the writing on the walls and decided to cover it up with the crappy tires (uggh, bad joke about displaying the tires, oh well...). He knows that Michelin has already packed it in and he is trying to anger them into producing a better tire. Makes since to me at least.


And would somebody, ANYBODY give Mark Webber some luck. Poor guy.

[RacingManiac]

Shu fans rant and rave at how he walks on water, but if Massa had been turned loose, he would have won convincingly. The old man may appear young and all that crap, but he should retire. Shu won only because of his tires, car, and the fact Massa chose to let him win.

Should they actually needed to push what makes you think Massa would've been faster? He wasn't faster in quali when you can't really "fake" the position given where they needed to end up, and in today's race was much like Indy where Ferrari was running at 8/10th most of the day and that was enough to win.

Not taking credit away from Massa, but you are not looking at this fairly....

[Tom]

I agree with DaveKillens, Massa had the beating of Michael and they both knew it. Take the first pitstop, Massa was so much faster than Michael going at his own pace than Michael at his. I can't explain it but it was clear to me, and I know some other people here, that Michael would not have won today had they been racing.

[manchild]

I agree with Dave about Massa. He was much faster during whole race - enough to give him a headache and even overtake if he was free to do that.

[Tp]

Difficult to say when both drivers weren't exactly pushing during the whole duration of the grand prix - So it's pretty infantile to say one was faster then the other.

Tp, what Ron Dennis said was that MP4-21's suspension system works in a way that acts like the mass damper system.

Yeah that's exactly what I meant - I kinda it worded wrong though

[RacingManiac]

Interesting news....Midland cars were DQed for Flexi-wing infringement, as they failed the static load test in the post race inspection......

I guess its not a game all the team is capable of playing well.....

[allan]

personally i don't blame michelin, imean, what about the hondas, as well as the mclarens(especially kimi)
i think the problem is with the renaults, their same classic mistake, "POOR DEVELOPMENT"......
manchild, don't get me wrong, but what is wrong with u?? i mean i expected a better excuse from u for ferrari's win,

If only Fisichella was capable to be 2nd as many times this season as Massa than neither Alonso or Renault would be so much in trouble as they are now.

if u don't want to admit michael's good performance, then come up with a better excuse
by the way, i think massa had 2 second places this season while fisi had a win and a second place...

[DaveKillens]

For the teams, especially the tire manufacturers, the turning point of the season (so far) was the USGP, where Ferrari suddenly got their feet under them, and have dominated since then. Massa, since then has been running excellent. Give that young man a good car, and suddenlt he looks very good. At the USGP Massa jumped into the lead, and set the early pace. But he later obediently fell into place behind Michael, and ever since has been his faithful wingman.
The win today by Ferrari was textbook, with basically no mistakes, great tires, and just waiting for the others to stumble. Kimi had trouble in the pits, who knows what may have happened if the darn right rear wasn't such a pain. Jenson finally got a decent race under his belt, something he hasn't seen in months. Ralf proved two things today. That the Toyota is steadily improving, and that Ralf isn't worth all that money. He was quick most of the race, but he also screwed up big a few times. Major mate with the pooch. And Trulli started 20th, finished 7th, just 26.5 seconds behind Michael. Watch out for Toyota, they now look very good.
Basically, Renault, Michelin and Fernando has their butts chewed off big time, their worse showing in a long time. But don't count them out.

[saam]

I think we have all been in the busines long enough not to count out the renaluts, but i have to say, its not looking to bright

Well done RED EXPRESS stopping at all stations, even to pick up the (still racing) renaults.....

[wazojugs]

from another site:

The Suspicious Stink of F1
Opinion: It's difficult to concentrate on Winners and Losers when there's such a strong smell of suspicion coming from the FIA's technical delegate.

It's a bit like sitting down to watch a film you've been looking forward to and finding that a piggery has moved next door. Charlie Whiting's move to ban the Renault damping system so pivotal to their set-up makes me mega suspicious - and trying to focus on the German GP has been hard given such a rank smell.

The fact is that Renault will have shown their damping system to him before they put it on the car; it has reportedly been on the car since Brazil 2005, and only now - with the F1 Championship delicately poised - does he decide to ban it. It raises huge questions over either his competency or raises the possibility of connivance within the FIA.

If the system was illegal then it should have been banned straight away. If it was illegal and he failed to spot it for nine months then clearly he is not up to the job.

Whiting's ban was undermined by the fact that the FIA's own race stewards could see nothing wrong with the Renault system.

The timing is very suspicious, coming so soon after the French GP when Fernando Alonso snatched an unlikely second place. Perhaps something needed to be done to put a bigger gap between Schumacher and Alonso if Schumi is to win the 2006 Championship.

Exactly the same thing happened in 2003 when after the Hungarian GP it looked like the 2003 season was getting away from the Scuderia. All of a sudden Max Mosley was announcing that there was a problem with the shoulder of the Michelin tyre and the tyre rules were tightened up to benefit Bridgestone. Embarrassingly for the FIA, Mosley said they hadn't been influenced by anybody and then subsequently Ross Brawn admitted that they had told the FIA about it and that Max had flown down to Maranello the next day.

That stank too.

Tom Rubython. the maverick publisher of F1 Business magazine is not slow to point out that Ross Brawn and Charlie Whiting have been drinking buddies in the past. He has also been very vocal pointing out the unwise nature of such a relationship given the fact that Whiting is the keeper of all the teams' F1 secrets. He knows the technology on all the cars and (no pun intended) needs to be whiter than white..

Maybe it is just coincidental that it came now and we are being overly critical. Only complete transparency will rid us of our doubts. What the FIA need to do now is print a full report. We need to know:
a) Why did Whiting ban the system now?
b) Was he prompted by another team - and if so, who?

It's unlikely Whiting will step down. He is one of Bernie Ecclestone's coterie of former Brabham personnel such as Herbie Blash who he likes to keep around him at races.

Our opinion is this: keep him as race director, for which he is very competent, and appoint a new technical delegate who does not fraternise with any team. And print a full report into the circumstances surrounding this highly controversial move.

[Principessa]

Hi everyone,

Tomba and I returned from Hockenheim yesterdayevening. It was amazing! Only too bad that the Renaults really seemed to have problems to find their pace. It was horrible race for them. For the rest, it was fun to watch live

We have some great pictures and we'll try to put some online later

[emburmak]

It was a great win by ferrari. Please to all those conspiracy thoerists--give it a break!!