2019 Canadian Grand Prix - Montreal June 7-9

[hollus]

As for the rest of your analysis, I better believe ex- or current F1 drivers. But thank you!

As for ex/current F1 drivers, 1) Are they all saying that Vettel safely rejoined the track (not whether he had any choice in how he rejoined, but whether it was a safe situation)? And 2) Do they have access to the telemetry and camera angles that the stewards had?

Ahem... two and a half seasons here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emanuele_ ... ne_results

[Just_a_fan]

Another ex-driver who sees it differently:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1/48583803

By the letter of the law, Vettel was guilty.

He either crowded another driver off the circuit - Hamilton into the wall on the exit of Turn Four, to the point where the Mercedes driver had to anchor on the brakes to avoid a collision.

Or, as his defence said, his natural momentum took him across the full width of the circuit. But in that case he is guilty of rejoining the circuit in an unsafe manner, as he was not in full control of his car, to the extent that he ran Hamilton off the road in an unsafe manner.

One of these scenarios has to be correct.

If he was forced to run all the way into Hamilton, that's not safe. If he wasn't, then he deliberately did it, and that's not fair and deserves a penalty.

You can't have it both ways, and you need to have it both ways to avoid the penalty here.

An interesting admission about the move too [my highlight]

It's a move I can completely understand. I - and most former drivers - would have done the same. It's a defensive instinct to try and hold your position in a moment of panic.

But the fact that others would have done the same doesn't make it acceptable.

And a thought I hadn't had about Vettel's post race silliness. Again my highlight.

Where Vettel ended up being genius was with his diversion tactics after the race - the pantomime smoke and mirrors of the tantrum, the meltdown, and then the eventual cheek of switching the final position markers with Hamilton in parc ferme.

It endeared him to the crowd, most of whom were Ferrari fans in Canada, and were disappointed the penalty had decided the outcome of the race. Everybody was.

But Vettel's actions ensured the talking point was the penalty, rather than the reason for it - the error from Vettel.

[nevill3]

Vettel also received 2 penalty points on his licence taking him to 7 in total now........

[hollus]

This whole story is also another consequence of the "small" 5-second penalties. The drivers are slowly training themselves into the fact that if in doubt, it is worth pushing the rules. If it works, great. Sometimes it works even with the 5 second penalty. And it not, 5 seconds is not much. In this case, by not trying, Vettel would have dropped to 2nd. After trying (if he tried) and getting the 5 seconds... he dropped to 2nd.
It is worth it to test the rules´ limits as long as those penalties are only 5 seconds!

[erudite450]

Vettel should ignore the podium.

he cant, rules!

He can do it though, and then he should be punished for bringing F1 into disrepute.

This is all happening because FIA didn't BLACK FLAG Vettel back in Baku when he crashed into Hamilton on purpose behind the safety car.
Vettel has fostered/festered a bad mentality since then.
WTF was Vettel doing pushing his car like that btw?

You forgot Mexico 2016, where he consistently swore at the late Charlie Whiting but got away it.

[NathanOlder]

If you think that the space Hamilton left was enough, then it's you who needs to go back and watch the Monaco race again. It's visible there was not enough space, but on top of that the line Hamilton forced Ric into was slippery because it was wet, as you've mentioned already. Ric even slided a bit.

To sum it up: Hamilton made a mistake, Ric kept his racing line, but was not only cut by Hamilton, but also forced to the wet side of the track (making him slide) and not given enough space too.

Yea... this surely was a completely different kind of incident and Hamilton was doing everything right, as ever. Just because.

So now you want Hamilton penalised for pushing someone on to the wet part of the track ? boo hoo hoo

Lewis left just enough space, Ric backed out of it as he was on the wet patch and it looked like the door was about to shut but it didnt actually shut.

Even if Hamilton left enough space afterwards, the action happened before. He rejoined the track and forced Ricciardo, who was on his racing line, to brake. Otherwise he would have crashed into him.

No No No! in 2016 Hamilton went off, came back on, was slower than Ric, and left space both sides. What you are now asking is fo Hamilton to actually move out of the way!

In 2019 Vettel went off, came back on, when the car behind has a large portion along side (Lewis had his front axle level with sebs rear Axel and Lewis still had track to his right) he then fed Lewis in to the wall and Sebs righ hand wheels where on the white line!

In Monaco the equivalent would have been Hamilton going right to the point where he touched the barrier. That didnt happen, Lewis left a cars width plus a few extra inches to his right, and massive space to his left.

[NathanOlder]

Michael Schmidt: "All drivers I've asked after the race confirmed Vettel's words: To safely drive back on the track, Vettel needed to choose that line."

All ex-drivers, current drivers (they know the best what Vettel was going through behind the wheel) and even the Sky F1 coverage do have the same opinion. Who don't? Peter Windsor, and obviously the Mercedes team including a part of their fans (not even all of them).

even if, he still he gained an advantage (and he could have braked and re-entered safely, there was lots of free grass to the left) and it was very dangerous and it was clearly blocking with a massive speed differntial (even if necessary to enter "safely"...)...
( I already saw HAM comitted to the overtake on the live feed onboard, only to HAM's reaction this wasn't a nasty crash).

Bold part: As did Hamilton in Monaco 2016 by doing an unsafe re-entry and forcing Ricciardo to slam on the brakes in tricky conitions (wet).

Hamilton left room for a car each side of his! You are unable to see this why ?

[Mattchu]

Vettel made a mistake, that part of the track is not really a great overtaking spot so he probably didn`t have to brake so late/hard. The cars ahead which were about to be lapped probably caused a small loss of downforce but surely this should have been taken into account.
This has ended up being one of them compund issues whereby a driver feels like he`s been wronged even though he was the one who made the mistake.
There`s only one surefire way to avoid this type of penalty...don`t make the mistake in the first place and put yourself in that position.

Easier said than done though!

I personally thought it was a good spectacle, it`s a shame this "incident" has overshadowed a pretty good weekend. Roll on France

[erudite450]

Vettel made a mistake on the spur of the moment, while Hamilton made a great split second decision (basically read him like a book) to jam on the brakes and avoid disaster there. That's what separates the very goods from the greats.

The greats anticipate, react and capitalise, as Mansell did with Senna at Hungary in 89. Hamilton didn't manage to do it.

Yeah, you're saying Lewis should've anticipated Vettel coming back to the right to cover the racing line and go left instead, and that's what I thought initially as well. But you're overlooking the fact that Vettel was STARING IN HIS MIRROR the whole time while coming back onto the track to see what Hamilton was doing. Had Ham gone to the left in anticipation, Vettel wouldn't have gone right and Ham would've made a fool of himself, because then there would absolutely be no reason to penalize Vettel since he didn't go immediately back onto the racing line when rejoining

You're a legend mate!

[NathanOlder]

What we should really be talking about is Ferrari being sneaky by not telling Lec that Vet had a penalty. That's really shafting your one driver in favor of the other.

Yeah, but thats Ferrari all over

[Just_a_fan]

Can you imagine Vettel's reaction if they had told Leclerc and he'd taken second place off Vettel?

[Mattchu]

BOOM!

[Bill]

I just want to know why Lewis was not penalized in Barcelona 2016 for running into Rosberg if entering a track unsafely is thing

[izzy]

This whole story is also another consequence of the "small" 5-second penalties. The drivers are slowly training themselves into the fact that if in doubt, it is worth pushing the rules. If it works, great. Sometimes it works even with the 5 second penalty. And it not, 5 seconds is not much. In this case, by not trying, Vettel would have dropped to 2nd. After trying (if he tried) and getting the 5 seconds... he dropped to 2nd.
It is worth it to test the rules´ limits as long as those penalties are only 5 seconds!

yes they've really overused the 5s penalty haven't they, ever since it was introduced. It was the same as you say with the Red Bull unsafe release in Monaco - worth risking it, as it's so feeble.

It'd be much better if they had a Naughty Boy Box at each track, where the car had to come to a stop somewhere. Not as devastating as a drive-through, but a real penalty and one we could all see on track

[NathanOlder]

Here is the first example I have found, quick search...

A car taking to the grass at turn 3/4. Ricciardo in the Toro Rosso. He jumped across the grass at the last second to avoid a crash, so he didnt plan on going across the grass until the last second (Like Vettel) He then rejoined the track, had no one closing in on him yet still didnt need to use all the track, in a car with far less grip than the current cars. So I cant understand why ex-drivers say Seb had no choice when he clearly did.












The car we are onboard with (Kimi) clearly hits the throttle harder and gets more oversteer and drifts wider showing that if you control the throttle better you can easlily control the trajectory of your car. If you listen to the ex-drivers who say Seb had no choice, it sounds like they are saying, if you go across the grass there, you can only avoid a crash by using the full width of the track! but its clear from a 10min search online that those drivers are talking BS.