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[Coronis]

I think what's most frustrating is that earlier in the race, Seb was whinging at the team to get Mark out of the way because he was supposedly holding him up. Had the team actually followed that through and asked Mark to pull over, we wouldn't have heard the end of it from Seb or his fans had Mark not done as requested.

On to far more interesting issues, does anyone know what the gap between Gutierrez and Bianchi was at the end?

Then Mark strangely began to pull away, after that complaint....

[Ferrari man 009]

Just so the Alonso bashers dont go too far:

"Ferrari say the decision to leave @alo_oficial out was their call. Not the first time in recent years they've messed up their strategy"

https://twitter.com/andrewbensonf1/stat ... 0106226688

Like I say, if the team decided he should stay out, Alonso has to go with it as he can't see the damage.

[Nin-Chin]

Unlucky 200 for Alonso

[Hammer278]

Nothing unlucky, he threw it away himself since his teammate was right on his exhaust pipe and Alonso never liked that since he entered F1.

[Nin-Chin]

It was Ferrari's call

This was after quali

Fernando Alonso believes it is positive for Ferrari to have Felipe Massa putting up a strong fight against him in qualifying after he was out-qualified by his team-mate for the fourth race in a row.

At the last two rounds of 2012 Massa was faster than Alonso in qualifying and at the start of this year he has started ahead of his team-mate on the grid at the first two races. Previously in 2012 Massa struggled to match the pace of his team-mate, but despite the danger of the Brazilian taking points off him, Alonso welcomes the competition.

"It's not the first time that we have very close competition and it was very close over the last three years as well, although I know for you [the media] it was not that close," he said. "Felipe had some bad luck, incidents and mechanical problems but in fact he was much closer than he looked in the points at the end of the year.

"This year it is again very close - no big difference - and maybe a bit closer at the last few races as I am behind on the grid. But so far on Saturday there are no points so we will keep working for Sunday. It's the best news for the team and we need to have competition between the two drivers in the team and share information. I think now all the data that we have from free practice and qualifying is very useful to compare and make yourself better. This is only good news for the team and we will push ourselves to the limit."

Speaking before the news broke that Kimi Raikkonen would face a three-place grid penalty for Sunday, Alonso tipped the Lotus driver as one to watch in the race and said grid places were not as important as strategy.

"The first lap position is not very important and we have a good race pace, as I think Kimi and Lotus have, I think they will arrive sooner or later in the race and they will put some pressure on us. We need to be very calm and Kimi started fantastically well in the race in Melbourne and has looked very strong here. The race for the championship is very long as well and it's not only Kimi fighting for the championship. At the moment it is very close with Red Bull very strong, Mercedes very strong. Nico's time in Q2 was very impressive so there are four or five teams at the moment who are in the mix."

Source:ESPN F1

[RyRy]

Webber, Hamilton and Rosberg are all class guys, respect all 3 of them and they did as their team told them to.

Vettel on the other hand was a spoiled little twat who disobayed his team and put his team in danger of losing 43 points, money and a lot of mechanics time, instead he has made himself look like a douche and now made an internal issue within the team.

Hamilton and Rosberg both know the that 3rd place should of been Rosberg's but it was dealt with beautifully and they both did their job perfectly.

The Red Bull win should of Webber's he did exactly what he was told and was thinking about the long term and the team, he turned down his engine and was bringing his car home as requested to save fuel and to make sure that he stayed on the track and made it home, Vettel upped his engine drs'ed past and got out of the 1 second time then put his car into fuel saving mode because he too was low on fuel.

He's blatantly been told of really bad behind the scenes as it makes Red Bull look really bad, it's bad for the entire company but he does actually seem to realize that he was in the wrong and I wouldn't be surprised if in a future situation he gives Webber a win back even if we don't see (simply spin your wheels once to let webber have more traction out of a corner) not even Webber will realise that the win was handed to him.

Over at Mercedes however they seem to have it setup so if X driver is ahead after the pits and they need to just bring the cars home X is given the priority (I personally don't believe this, I think Ross is thinking about the season and knows Hamilton has a higher chance of winning the championship over Rosberg because Hamilton is slightly better than Rossy.)

[racechick]

Reasons to be miserable on the podium - ONE TWO THREE

What an exiting drama filled race. The antics in the pit lane alone were drama enough. Lewis going to McLaren , the Force India's, Jenson's wheel coming off, the crash, racing in the plane....and others, especially during that first wet pitstop.
And the race itself was gripping.
I don't like team orders and have said so on many occasions. And when I first saw Rosberg in that last stint, clearly faster than Hamilton, I felt uncomfortable with it. However as more is revealed and both cars were saving fuel and engines it becomes more understandable. I will expect the same if Rosberg is leading in similar circumstances. Nico clearly understood when the facts were explained but Lewis was still uncomfortable. I think most teams call the fight off after the last pitstop. This was big result for Mercedes , especially at Petronas country, they'd have looked idiots if they took each other out with no threat from behind or chance to catch the Bulls.
Same for Red Bull, except they were preserving tyres rather than fuel. They so nearly took each other off a la Turkey, they were under no threat from behind and the fight was called off. Red Bull were playing fair there but Vettel wasn't. He's gone down in my estimation today. If I were Mark now the gloves would be off. He can't trust Seb.
But I really enjoyed that race, much better than last weeks. Lots of intrigue and excitement. 10 out of 10!!

[Big Azza]

Well he's apologised and said he will not have an easy conscience. So I'll give that to him. Unfortunately on the track Vettel is a different person to off the track.

The only that he will be able to right the wrong is if he can somehow swap positions with Mark during the next 1-2. Somehow, I just don't think Vettel is capable of making such a call in the heat of a race however.....


EDIT see interview on official F1 Website: http://www.formula1.com/news/interviews ... 14412.html

[Coronis]

Well he's apologised and said he will not have an easy conscience. So I'll give that to him. Unfortunately on the track Vettel is a different person to off the track.

The only that he will be able to right the wrong is if he can somehow swap positions with Mark during the next 1-2. Somehow, I just don't think Vettel is capable of making such a call in the heat of a race however.....


EDIT see interview on official F1 Website: http://www.formula1.com/news/interviews ... 14412.html

Would've said the same thing about Schumacher at one point

[Hammer278]

Well he's apologised and said he will not have an easy conscience. So I'll give that to him. Unfortunately on the track Vettel is a different person to off the track.

The only that he will be able to right the wrong is if he can somehow swap positions with Mark during the next 1-2. Somehow, I just don't think Vettel is capable of making such a call in the heat of a race however.....


EDIT see interview on official F1 Website: http://www.formula1.com/news/interviews ... 14412.html

Read that interview, it sounds like hogwash. When the question was put forward to him "You were told to hold onto P2 so why didn't you", his answer "I messed up".. and you only realize you messed up when you cross the finish line? Either incredibly stupid, or just repeating what the team told him to say publicly without meaning a word of it.

[Rivelution]

I fell asleep once the Red Bulls were in front.

[Hammer278]

Fernando Alonso believes his retirement from the Malaysian Grand Prix was not a result of a Ferrari error but instead "extremely bad luck".

Having got up to second place off the line, Alonso tapped the back of Sebastian Vettel's Red Bull as in turn two and damaged his front wing, which then dropped on one side and collapsed altogether on the run down to turn one on the second lap. With Ferrari able to see the damaged wing the team decided to leave Alonso out on track at the end of the first lap, but Alonso believes it was the right decision and just got unlucky.

"We touched with the front wing the car of Sebastian; it was a very, very small touch but enough to damage the front wing a lot so it's extremely bad luck in my opinion," Alonso said. "Then we were constantly talking on the radio in the first lap, the car felt OK in the first two sectors and from the television the team saw damage on the front wing. But we knew that in lap three of four we would switch to dry tyres so if we could make it to that lap we would save maybe 20 seconds or 30 seconds in the race.

"At that point we said 'at the moment everything looks OK', you don't have the front wing performance that you'd expect but we'd see how the problem would develop and then make a decision. Unfortunately on the back straight the front wing dropped and we started to see some sparks on the floor and some more damage, but at that point we were five seconds before the pit entry and we didn't make it. Then in the next straight the wing fell off and it was underneath the car and it was not possible to turn."

Alonso said ultimately it was just a case of bad luck for Ferrari that such a small collision had big consequences.

"A lot of circumstances went the wrong way. Maybe the decision could be wrong or could be good, it's very easy afterwards to see what is the best thing to do but I think it is an extremely unlucky combination of things that happened today. With so many crashes in Australian qualifying one, we saw people going off on the parade laps to the grid here and nothing happened; we touched one car at 10 kilometres an hour and we didn't have even the luck to lose the front wing, the front wing stayed half on to make us crash after one lap. So this is a fact. The other things can be a wrong decision or a good decision, you never know until you see afterwards, but the unlucky factor is there for sure."

Despite only completing one lap, Alonso felt he would have been able to challenge Red Bull for victory today.

"I think today we had a good car and I don't think we were too far from the Red Bull pace, especially in the race. They didn't have the easiest weekend here in Malaysia ... no-one was especially quick, so I think we could really fight for the win here with the Red Bulls."

_____________________________________________

[Nin-Chin]

[youtube]AiNw_TZsc-E[/youtube]

[FerrariFan63]

Just so the Alonso bashers dont go too far:

"Ferrari say the decision to leave @alo_oficial out was their call. Not the first time in recent years they've messed up their strategy"

https://twitter.com/andrewbensonf1/stat ... 0106226688

Like I say, if the team decided he should stay out, Alonso has to go with it as he can't see the damage.

Alonso has often stunned everyone with his excellent positioning and manoeuvring at the start of races. Nobody gets it right all of the time. And the front wing call would have looked inspired if it had worked out. However, I'm not sure about leaving damaged cars out racing where there is the possibility of further failure. But everyone has 20/20 hindsight.

As for the race, how many times have we heard claims on this forum that dastardly Ferrari imposes team orders while other teams let their drivers race each other? Very clear team orders from both Red Bull and Mercedes even at the second race of the year.

[andrew]

I've never seen a pre-podium room like that!

Looked like Hamilton pushed the camera away and said get out my face or something like that (it was mumbled so I could have misheard). Webber having a strop and Newey seemed to have a look of I understand why you did it but there's going to be a major . Still, it was a pretty awesome fight they had on the track.

Rosberg clearly wasn't happy going by his "I'll remember this" comment.

One thing I'm now wondering is where would Alonso have finished had his front wing not been damaged? 3rd or would he ahev been mixing it with the Red Bulls? I would have thought he'd have been black flagged by the stewards for loose bodywork and forced to pit rather than Ferrari holding on until the switch to slicks.

McLaren looked like they were on for 5th for Button which is definite progress since Melbourne. Thought they'd have gotten past fluffing up their pit stops after last season.