its a tie!

[BoyFerrari]

that's not the point at all. the point is that, as you have previously mentioned, fisichella had NO chance of closing the gap between himself and schumacher.

Yes. Because the final laps were already dry and Bridgestone is better than Michelin on dry. It only started to drizzle again in the final 3 laps when Schumi was already cruising to victory.

alonso, on the other hand, was able to close the gap. in other words, fernando alonso was indeed faster

Because Schumacher was already cruising at that time and had no need to compete with Alonso for best lap times since he was sure to take the checkered flag first.

"On a wet track Renault’s Alonso swept to a 25-second advantage over Schumacher in the Ferrari prior to the first set of pit stops. But then things began to go wrong for the champion. First Schumacher stayed on the same set of intermediate Bridgestones during his stop, whereas Alonso changed his Michelin front inters. The new ones did not give him anything like the performance of his originals. Then, to compound everything, a sticking right rear wheel nut in Alonso's second stop cost him at least seven seconds.

You are quoting that part of the race when Alonso was ahead on wet tyres. We are not talking about that time since we are not contesting that he was fast on Michelin wets. That's not the discussion we have now.

...Alonso’s final set of dry tyres was back up to par, and he soon caught and passed his team mate and started to slash into Schumacher’s advantage."

This statement simply narrated the event. It didn't say that Schumacher was in no mood to match Alonso's lap times since he was cruising to victory already evenif Alonso had a delta rocket on his engine.

Anyway, I'm not degrading Alonso's effort (for your consolation). Alonso was indeed fast, but you can't quote the last laps here to emphasize that point because Schumi was not in a mood to do neck-to-neck battle at that point. Maybe you can pick another incident in the upcoming Suzuka GP and hope you get a shoot-out between the two.

[noj]

jackie stewart once said "the best way to win a race is by maintaining the least speed required to keep the other guy well behind" :naughty2:

[weremanok]

Unless Fisichella was on intermediates, I don't think Alonso can erase a 25 sec gap with the same set of tires and machinery. Not even Schumacher can do that to Massa.

The only reason Alonso was able to catch Schumacher in the final laps is that Schumacher already slowed down to preserve the engine and prevent an unfortunate event to happen. The fact is that Alonso was driving like crazy to catch Schumacher and hope that Schumacher will have any kind of accident or mechanical failure. Schumacher on the other hand was very cautious and is only concerned of driving his Ferrari home and is not really concerned on the charging Alonso since he has a very big gap between them. He just drove it just enough to win the race in the end.

If the roles were reversed such that Schumacher was able to erase a 25 sec gap on Massa and Alonso was leading the race, I'd bet all the Ferrari haters will have a field day on that one. It's just not possible. Also, if Schumacher was able to catch up to Alonso on the final laps, all the Ferrari haters will just say that Alonso already slowed down to preserve his machinery. Let's try to be objective here.

[jim]

If the roles were reversed such that Schumacher was able to erase a 25 sec gap on Massa and Alonso was leading the race, I'd bet all the Ferrari haters will have a field day on that one. It's just not possible. Also, if Schumacher was able to catch up to Alonso on the final laps, all the Ferrari haters will just say that Alonso already slowed down to preserve his machinery. Let's try to be objective here.

I don't hate any team in F1. I don't hate any driver in F1. I love them all

I believe that all of them are smart and Ferarri just did what it needs to do, that is to block the opponent, keep the car safe and get the chequered flag. It's just playing smart, plain and simple

[CVT]

Great race! Great race! Great race!

Michelin obviously overtook Bridgestone on wet tyres development....

[CVT]

Here is an incident even a blind man will take notice: How can Fernando Alonso who is 25 seconds behind on 3rd place catch up and overtake his teammate Fisi when both of them are already on dry tyres, if not for TEAM ORDERS.

How the tables have turned. I don't hear anyone complaining though. Looks like as long as you are not Michael Schumacher, it's perfectly okay to let your champion teammate miraculously rocket himself ahead so he can defend his title or risk being lynched by an angry mob of conquistadors and matadors.

Hi BoyFerrari,- I am a Ferrari/MS fan like you. But please, let's not take away the great effort from Alonso. I think he deserved number2 for this race, as he drove like hell, after the screw up in the pit. As I said earlier,- Renault/FA is championship caliber, too.

Now, did he(Alonso) risk losing his precious Renault engine in Suzuka?

We'll see this Sunday(no more rain, please)!

This is going to be interesting....


:starwars:

[ARB]

the 40 second gap between the renaults is not because alonso was quicker they did it on purpose so that people would think that alonso was very quick compared to fisi. 25 seconds in 3 laps! ha tama if sa Ferrari nangyari yon ano kaya ang mga hirit ng mga anti Ferrari.

I think renault should be investigated because of this incident! Fisi even tried to close the door on Michael when he came out of the pits! talk about dirty tactics, buti na lang Michael is such a good driver he countered it well.

[CoDer]

25 seconds in 3 laps, I say Fisi had his Puma sneakers stuck on the brake pedal.

Team order nga yan sir BoyFerrari.

Schumis the man!

O mga schumi haters tira na!

Ay tumira na ba?

[bbt]

You are quoting that part of the race when Alonso was ahead on wet tyres. We are not talking about that time since we are not contesting that he was fast on Michelin wets. That's not the discussion we have now.

what i was quoting was actually the explanation given why alonso slowed down. what i'm trying to say is that alonso is normally faster, it's just that his package wasn't working properly for him.

This statement simply narrated the event. It didn't say that Schumacher was in no mood to match Alonso's lap times since he was cruising to victory already evenif Alonso had a delta rocket on his engine.

my point is not that alonso was faster than schumi, but that he was sufficiently fast enough to overtake fisi.

Hi BoyFerrari,- I am a Ferrari/MS fan like you. But please, let's not take away the great effort from Alonso. I think he deserved number2 for this race, as he drove like hell, after the screw up in the pit. As I said earlier,- Renault/FA is championship caliber, too.

this is exactly my point

[coiter]

sa tingin ko obvious naman na team orders. unless may serious problem si fisi to slooooow down. and when alonzo made the overtaking maneuver, walang ka challenge challenge kay fisi. no defensive move at all. unlike button and barichello (both from honda) who fought it out tooth and nail even to the last lap. though i'd have to agree that alonzo was indeed flying in the last few laps. he was really pushing it hard. galing din talaga. and this would be a great last 2 races.

[kimpOy]

pauna lang guys, debate is healthy...other than that is not...

keep to ball rolling...

[mazdamazda]

Here is an incident even a blind man will take notice: How can Fernando Alonso who is 25 seconds behind on 3rd place catch up and overtake his teammate Fisi when both of them are already on dry tyres, if not for TEAM ORDERS.

How the tables have turned. I don't hear anyone complaining though. Looks like as long as you are not Michael Schumacher, it's perfectly okay to let your champion teammate miraculously rocket himself ahead so he can defend his title or risk being lynched by an angry mob of conquistadors and matadors.

Hehehe... that's were you separate the fanboys from racing enthusiasts.

Yup - Team Orders are a given fact in F1. What's funny is how people scream holy hell when their not-so-favorite driver/team pulls this trick... then just clams up when their favorite driver/team pulls out a fast one.

[squatt3r]

go Schumi!

[CVT]

"A reporter also asked Schumacher, 37, whether he was bothered about a Renault engineers' radio call - captured live on worldwide television - sarcastically saying 'poor old Michael' when it became clear that the German would not be near pole." . This was during qualifying Saturday afternoon.


Now this one is not going to help Renault's image a bit.....

I am sure that other camp/s are acting this way too...
Tsk... tsk... tsk... - but talk about thinking aloud on worldwide TV! Whew! Priceless!



:starwars:

[gearspeed]

Kung may cable lang kami gusto ko ito mapanood.Go schumi.

[empy]

i didn't see the race so i can't comment. but i'm not in favor of 'team orders' regardless of which team does it. but the rules and scoring system of F1 encourages it, so here we are stuck with a lot of BS in almost every season.

F1 has to fix this. maybe they could double the number of teams and limit each team to enter only 1 car and driver (yeah, that's probably a pipe dream :hihihi: )

all the trash talking and arguing about fastest laps and qualifying time means nothing. what counts is Schumacher/Ferrari 1, Renault 2-3.

what was that Renault engineer thinking with his trash talking? i'm sure he didn't mean it to be broadcast to the world, but congrats for giving your arch rival and living legend some extra motivation...

[squatt3r]

di na nga pala tie hehehe.Schumi is now leading the driver's championship ahehe

[Horsepower]

jackie stewart once said "the best way to win a race is by maintaining the least speed required to keep the other guy well behind" :naughty2:

That's what Michael practically did to Alonso. That's the trademark b1tchslap from Schumi. hehehe...

Fisi didn't have to push so hard because Jenson was 72secs from his back. There's no point in chasing Alonso as it won't bring him any benefit for his Driver standing.

When Alonso overtook Fisi, i knew, it's a team order. It's too obvious. Even at the podium, seeing Fisi's sad and disappointed face despite winning 3rd.

Obviously, Schumi is really smart, even knowing how his opponents would react (like fisi going wide on turn 1). At the last lap, he was in cruise mode because there's no point in going any faster and riskin a spin because he knows that the tyres aren't that good in wet.

Alonso closed the gap to 3secs when it rained, mainly because Schumi slowed down having calculated he'd win albeit in an inferior package.

At the end of the day, people would remember that on Oct 1, 2006, Michael Schumacher in a Scuderia Ferrari car won in Shanghai disregarding everything else about the GP.

What i like about him is that he has the least of arrogance. Very humble for not crediting himself even for the victory he orchestrated.

This is one of the most exciting race(s) i've seen so far this year.

[number001]

The best way to tell what the Renault (drivers and team) were up to during the Chinese GP is to listen to the unedited pit-to-car radio. I'm sure they have those recorded somewhere. That would be very interesting to listen to.

[BoyFerrari]

Hi BoyFerrari,- I am a Ferrari/MS fan like you. But please, let's not take away the great effort from Alonso. I think he deserved number2 for this race, as he drove like hell, after the screw up in the pit. As I said earlier,- Renault/FA is championship caliber, too.

Yes, Alonso deserved to be No.2 for this race, that's why Flavio instructed Fisi to let the Spaniard pass through. Yes, he drove like hell to catch up Schumacher, but please drop the fastest lap times issue that he was faster than Schumi on dry tyres since Schumi was not in a mood for a shootout in the final laps (he recovered his brain to avenge his past Hungarian GP mental block). I don't deny the talent of these drivers, I am just saying that conclusions were made using the wrong incidents. Try to pick situations when these two are neck-to-neck, and not when the other was simply reading a pocketbook all the way to the checkered flag.

By the way, I'm just teasing people here who are allergic to F1 team orders. In fact, when Alonso was catching up on Fisi, I literally shouted at Fisi on the TV set to get out of the way and let him through. That's the game plan. And that's exactly what Fisi did. So there's nothing unusual about it. It's Formula 1 team racing.

In Suzuka and Brazil, I expect Massa and Fisi to do their job and block the others. Sabi nga ni Steve Slater ng Star Sports: It's MANO-Y-MANO!!! It's Alonso versus Schumacher. The rest can join Raikkonen in the DNF pitlane.

p.s. Pansin ko lang, talagang hindi matanggap ng iba dito that BOTH Schumi and Fisichella had switched down their engine RPM in the final laps when the podium order was already determined -- kahit i-post mo pa yung mismong interview nila. They kept insisting Alonso was beating Schumi with fastest lap times while the Ferrari was running on low rpm. That would be an insult to Alonso, if you ask me.