Adam Cooper F1

Schumacher deep in thought on the Istanbul grid

Michael Schumacher equalled the best result of his comeback when he finished fourth in Turkey, and while he was some way behind third placed Mark Webber, he beat team mate Nico Rosberg.

He set a quicker race lap time than either Rosberg or both McLaren drivers, although admittedly both Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button were in fuel saving mode as their cars got lighter.

Schumacher also enjoyed a spectacular tussle with Button on the first lap.

“We saw each other a couple of times this year!,” he said. “This time he had clearly the better end of it. I was trying my best, but it wasn’t good enough this time. Anyway as I understood he had a nice fight with Lewis, so he must have been putting in some very good laps.

“Honestly I was just trying to focus and do the maximum I could with my car. Forward, there was no chance, obviously I was watching the mirrors and making sure that I keep the tyres in shape so that whenever I had to have some reserves that they are available.”

One intriguing moment during the race came when engineer Andrew Shovlin told Michael that 2-3mm of rain was expected, a figure that the German could not relate to.

“I saw the rain from a distance. It was a clear to me there was a chance of rain, how much rain… When he came with these sort of figures, we haven’t really talked about figures, so it was the first time, and you don’t really have guidelines and experience in this field! That’s why it was easier for me to hear if he thinks it was intermediate tyres or heavy wet tyres or maybe stay on dries, which would have been more easy at that moment.”

Schumacher made it clear that the team needs to find some extra straightline speed for Montreal.

“Canada is very clearly about top speed and loss of drag, that’s what we’re working very hard on. There’s the famous F-Duct that we hope to optimise and get it working better. Then we see. So far our top speeds haven’t been the greatest, I hope we can improve massively in order to be competitive.”

Alas on the track Vettel had no one covering his rear...

Red Bull’s Helmut Marko says that Mark Webber knew he was slower than the pursuing Sebastian Vettel in Istanbul, and should have let his team mate through.

Intriguingly Christian Horner told this blog today that just before the accident Webber had radioed the team and asked that Vettel should back off a little.

That would tend to support Marko’s contention that Vettel had more speed and, with Hamilton right on his tail, couldn’t really reduce the pressure on the leader.

“Mark for whatever reason was slower,” Marko told this blog after the race. “He was getting lap by lap slower, and Vettel was getting faster and was coming under enormous pressure from Hamilton. So if he would have stayed behind Mark, he would have been overtaken. So he had to do something. And Mark knew that he was slower, so he should have let him past.

“We have to talk with all the people involved and make sure it doesn’t happen again, because we still could have been one-two. Until this incident, everything worked perfectly, our team did really well with the pit stop planning and everything.”

Meanwhile Marko made his support for his protégé clear: “It’s unbelievable how unlucky Vettel is. He showed so much speed, and if you have all these incidents it’s unbelievable how strong his morale and commitment still is. To make points in this new points system is the most important thing. And now Vettel has two zeroes.”

Had Webber not pitted for a new nose – an endplate was missing – he might have been able to keep the pressure on the McLarens as they went into fuel saving mode. But Marko has no regrets about the stop.

“At that stage we didn’t know about their fuel problem. And once you are ahead here, and especially a McLaren is ahead, they are so much quicker on the straights where should we overtake them? Once they are ahead, even if they have a fuel problem, they just go around the corners slow and then on the straights they accelerate.”

The Austrian doesn’t think that McLaren have made a dramatic step forward, and says that the Istanbul straights simply suited the F-Duct. But that of course means that the next two races, which are essentially straights and slow corners, will favour McLaren more than Red Bull.

“It’s the long straights here. As soon as there are some long corners, we’re not so worried. I think Montreal will be very difficult for us, one of the most difficult circuits. Montreal and Valencia and Monza will be worrying for us.”

Alonso made it home safely despite this amazing damage

Fernando Alonso had a lucky escape in Turkey after he ran the last four and a half laps of the race with a badly damaged left rear wheel.

A large chunk of the BBS rim was broken off when he made contact with Vitaly Petrov. The damage also explains why the Renault’s tyre deflated so quickly, as presumably it was pierced by the piece of metal.

Alonso apparently suffered no loss of pressure and indeed set his fastest lap two laps after the collision. But given the high speed nature of so many corners at the Istanbul track clearly there was a risk that either the rim or the tyre could have suffered a further failure.

Meanwhile the Spaniard managed to climb up to eighth place from his disappointing 12^th grid spot.

“We recovered some positions again, starting 12^th and finishing eighth,” he said. “But the race was quite a boring race for us, always stuck in traffic and fighting with Renault, Felipe with Robert and me with Petrov. So obviously we don’t want to fight with Renault for eighth place, we’d prefer to fight with Red Bull and McLaren for podiums, so we must improve.”

He is hoping that forthcoming update packages will make a difference: “I think we underperformed in Turkey and in Barcelona, so we need to understand the reasons why. We remain calm and optimistic because in Canada there’s a new package for us, Valencia another one, so hopefully in the next races we can recover the direction for a podium.

“I think we lack some aerodynamic efficiency, and some improvements in the car that are coming. We prepared very hard for the first half of the championship, we arrived to Bahrain with the maximum updates, and we won that race. And then we are preparing more updates for Valencia and Canada, so hopefully they pay off.

“I think in general we are one point in front of Vettel in the championship, it’s a clear example of how we maximised the potential of the car so far, because with Red Bull the quickest car at the moment, they are one point behind us. So we try to do our maximum.”

Horner: Man in the Spotlight... Photo: Cooper

Red Bull Racing boss Christian Horner has made it clear that he won’t tolerate a repeat of the collision that cost the team a one-two in Tutkey.

He refused to place total blame on either Mark Webber or Sebastian Vettel, saying that they had not given each other room, in contradiction to the usual pre-race instructions that they should.

“It was a massively close race between ourselves and McLaren today,” said Horner.  “We managed to get ourselves ahead of the McLaren, we had a better pit stop, we had a better strategy with Sebastian. And we had them in first and second.

“The time difference was so small, and Sebastian obviously on the prime tyre felt happier than Mark, and for a couple of laps was looking pretty dangerous there. And then he got a run on him and we all saw what happened. To give away 28 points to McLaren… We gave it to them on a plate today, which is disappointing for all the guys that put in so much hard work. Very frustrating.

“They are both at fault. Should they have given each other room? Yes.”

Asked to apportion blame, he said: “I think the two of them, they’re big boys. If you look at the McLaren drivers, they both gave each other room, they raced each other hard, and I didn’t see two McLarens in the fence. It’s really disappointing for the team to get into that position. The one thing we always ask, yes they can race each other, but give each other room, and that’s exactly what didn’t happen today.

“I just think that they were far too far over on the left. Sebastian had got a run, and then he came across too early. For me they didn’t give each other enough room, it’s as simple as that. As we saw with the McLarens, they fought each other and didn’t manage to hit each other.”

Horner contradicted suggestions by Red Bull motor sport boss Helmut Marko that Webber was totally at fault.

“Absolutely not. I think Sebastian had a clear run, and he was quicker at that point in the race. And Mark kept him on the dirty line, and Sebastian came over arguably a bit too early. We could see it coming for a couple of laps.

“The drivers are fairly strong willed individuals, but they both drive for the team, they both recognise that. They’ve always been very good in the past, as we’ve seen in Malaysia, as we’ve seen in other places. They’ve been racing each other very closely throughout this season. It’s hugely frustrating to see this event happen today.”

Vettel didn’t apologise when he went to the pit wall before the end of the race, but Horner said he had no issue with that.

“He hadn’t seen a replay, I think that he was frustrated, Mark’s frustrated, we need to sit down with both drivers and go through it. We’ve got to bounce back. It’s inevitably when you’ve got two guys fighting at the front that occasionally you’re going to get incidents. What you don’t expect is to see them within your own team.”

Asked whether this was his worst day as team boss, Horner said: “It’s a very frustrating day for the team, because both of them drive for the team at the end of the day, and the team lost 28 points, and both of them lost out today, and it’s really disappointing when we should have had a one-two finish.

“It’s one that we’ll have to manage. They’re both grown-ups, they both have to look at it objectively, and we need to move on from here. What’s happened, happened. We need to make sure that we go to the next race and make sure that as a team, including the drivers, they learn from this, and we don’t find ourselves in this position again.”

Will Michelin get the thumbs up from the F1 teams?

Michelin competition boss Nick Shorrock met the team principals in a FOTA meeting at the McLaren motorhome today to discuss the French company’s bid to win the 2011 tyre contract.

Those emerging from the meeting said it would be a few days before a final decision was made.

Although Pirelli appeared to have been the favoured choice, Michelin is still in the hunt. However Shorrock insists that the company has not made a last minute change to what was on the table.

“There was no intention to change anything,” said Shorrock. “The objective of this morning was to make sure the teams had fully understood the details of our offer, which is as it’s always been, in line with what the company sees as the future of competition, and within the values that the company wants to respect – which is essentially that of open competition, of being able to demonstrate the technical capability of our product, while also being able to demonstrate that there is respect for the environment.

“It was suggested that it would be useful to come and explain face to face, with all of the teams, the details of that offer. That’s what the intention was, that was the objective, and I hope it’s been achieved.

“The teams listened, they asked questions, and we tried to clarify as much as possible any doubts that they have. We’re still open to discussions if that’s what they wish.

“I think like everybody else we’ve made a proposition which we believe is reasonable, is not exaggerated. It’s up to the teams really to decide which way they want to go.”

Shorrock made it clear that time is of the essence.

“That’s something that we’ve said all along. A tyre is not something that you easily put onto an F1 car. It needs a certain amount of work, and that’s what we’ve done. We would like a decision as quickly as possible.

“It’s not our role to set a deadline, it’s the environment of the FIA, FOTA and FOM that have the job of evolving the sporting regulations in this particular instance.”

Last time Michelin was involved in F1 was with grooved tyres, but Shorrock says the translation to slicks will not be a big challenge.

“There’s a logical evolution in terms of tyre performance. Let’s not forget that Michelin is very much present in competition as whole. We’ve not been in F1, but we are very present in other disciplines, notably in endurance racing, and particularly in a couple of weeks we’ll be at Le Mans.

“That type of racing brings us enormous information. If you look over the last 10 years the durability of a Michelin tyre has increased by 35%, while car speeds have increased by 10%. So that’s something we know how to do, it’s our basic profession, to make a tyre that’s usable and safe in a competitive environment.”

Ross Brawn says that Mercedes dropped its appeal against Michael Schumacher’s Monaco penalty because it didn’t feel it could win and didn’t want the distraction of a legal case.

Mercedes dropped the appeal a few days after the Monaco race, but curiously at the same time the FIA admitted that it hadn’t got things right and was reviewing the regulations and their application. The FIA also wrote what was in effect a letter of apology to the Mercedes team. That made the decision to drop the appeal all the more unusual.

“I think there were several factors,” said Brawn. “One was a practical factor which was that if you recall two years ago we had a penalty that would have been a drive through but because it was after the race it was a time penalty [Hamilton at Spa]. And as you very well know that whole thing went to court and it was deemed you can’t appeal that type of penalty. So there was that in our minds as well.

“There was also the issue that we know Fernando was told not to race and Michael was told to race. I think if Fernando had been told to race, Michael probably wouldn’t have had the opportunity. So it seemed a bit unsporting.

“Quite frankly we decided to spend our energy on trying to produce a quicker car, because going to appeal and all the rest of it absorbs a lot of my time and the engineers’, preparing documentation, time in Paris. But we just concluded it was in our best interests not to do it. But we did feel that we had a very strong case as I think you’ve seen.

“I think the positive reaction from the FIA in terms of reviewing the whole situation is that [they admitted] there was a lot of ambiguity in reviewing the regulations, so one of those unfortunate things, but we just concluded we should move on.”

Meanwhile the FIA is looking at ways of having a fairer range of penalties.

“I think it was agreed that the time penalty that effectively put Michael to last is not a very balanced penalty. Somebody could have made a simple mistake, and because that’s the penalty applied, they would have gone straight to the back of the field because the cars were all bunched up.

“So they are going to look at that and see if there’s another scale of penalties that’s more appropriate in those particular circumstances. And I think the stewards, from what I understood, wanted to just reverse the order, but they had no capacity to. There was nothing in the regulations that allowedthem to do that.”

Curiously it seems to have been overlooked that the FIA Sporting Code, which operates in parallel with the F1 Sporting Regulations, does already give some scope for different penalties. Last year in a Porsche Supercup race supporting a Grand Prix a driver was given a 1s penalty to reverse a position.

Mark Webber’s brilliant pole position in Turkey was aided by the RBR team’s huge effort to fit a new rear wing at the very last minute.

The wing was collected from the local airport less than half an hour before qualifying started and having been rushed to the pits – in what team boss Christian Horner called ‘Starsky and Hutch’ style – it was fitted straight to the car.

The team opted for the new wing because it chose not to continue with the F-Duct it ran yesterday and thus had to switch configurations. Sebastian Vettel already had his on Saturday morning practice.

“I think Mark had a really solid qualifying and he strung together a good lap when it mattered,” said Horner. “We managed to get a last minute arrival of a rear wing assembly that went onto the car just before the session started.

“We reverted from the F-Duct and went from another configuration of rear wing that Sebastian ran this morning, and Mark had one for qualifying.

“It only arrived at the airport at twenty to two, so it was a big effort by the boys back in the factory and here to get it onto the car. It was always going to be tight, but apparently it was delayed coming out of the UK, but you certainly wouldn’t want to cut it much finer than that…”

Although on paper McLaren is much closer to RBR this weekend, Horner is adamant that had he not suffered a rollbar issue in final qualifying, Vettel would have done a much quicker time.

“We never really saw Sebastian’s ultimate pace because of a problem that he has as he entered Turn 12 on his first timed lap in Q3. On initial investigation it looks like the rollbar linkage. You’ve got no control over roll in the car, and as soon as you turn, the think rolls over. So he just locked the inside front wheel as it stuck up in the air. He set his fastest lap with that broken linkage. It’s one of those things.

“If you’re on pole it doesn’t matter by how much. Sebastian was on a mighty lap when the roll bar issue occurred. Both drivers should have been on the front row. It shows how far the team has come when you’re talking about being disappointed to be only first and third…”

Horner says he’s not concerned by the closer gap to McLaren here.

“We are very quick in the corners, the McLaren is monstrously fast up the hill on the back straight. Their strengths are in different areas to our car. We do a lot of damage at Turn 8 and in the high speed corners and so on, but you can hide the straight line advantage they have, which is quite significant.

“You certainly wouldn’t want Lewis too close behind you as you came onto the back straight because with that kind of straightline speed advantage I think he could go either side of you. But the important thing is to arrive there with a sufficient gap. The start is important as it is at any Grand Prix. Both guys just need to get their head down and get into a rhythm.”

One interesting issue tomorrow could be how driver find the fuel heavy cars on the first lap, especially at some of the knife-edge faster corners. Co-incidentally Vettel lost a potential win here last year when he screwed up on the first lap.

“Seb got out of shape at Turn 9/10 last year, but I’m sure he won’t make the same mistake twice…”

Michelin is to make a last minute pitch to win the 2011 F1 contract in a FOTA meeting with the teams in Istanbul tomorrow.

It had been widely thought that Pirelli had already been agreed upon, and that an announcement would be made this weekend. However the teams could not finalise their arrangement with the Italian company, and Michelin has confused the issue by coming back with a revised offer.

The situation has grown extremely complex of late, with Bernie Ecclestone favouring Pirelli, and Jean Todt supporting Michelin. Most of the teams have been sitting on the fence, although McLaren has been particularly vocal in support of Michelin. Surprisingly perhaps Ferrari is leaning towards Michelin, while Mercedes is said to have moved from Michelin to the Pirelli camp.

The details of the deals on offer are complex, as they involve commercial and technical matters. It’s believed that Michelin wanted to supply fewer sets of tyres per car per season than under the current Bridgestone deal, but the latest offer is said to address that.

A further complication is that not all the teams are as keen as others to have identical contractual arrangements with the supplier. It’s rumoured that there was also some consternation in a recent meeting when it emerged that one top team has been enjoying a different arrangement with Bridgestone than its rivals.

“What’s important is that it’s good for F1,” one team boss told me. “If it’s Michelin or Pirelli, it doesn’t matter.”

Another praised Pirelli for its straightforward approach, whereas Michelin has frequently moved the goalposts. As previously reported, some weeks ago it dropped its price from €5m per team to €1.5m.

Fernando Alonso says he just didn’t have the speed today after qualifying a disastrous 12th in Turkey, and failing to make it out of Q2.

Meanwhile his team mate Felipe Massa got through Q2 in fifth, before claiming eighth in the final order. Alonso had no real explanation for the lack of speed.

“I think the car felt very similar to yesterday, the car balance was OK, I didn’t have any big problem with the car,” he said. “Maybe with the prime tyres were are a little bit more competitive, we feel more comfortable. With the option we had some more problems, but nothing huge, nothing to make us be too much slower.

“In general we were not quick enough. In Q1 we were ninth and 10th and Q2 [I was] 12th. In two or three tenths you can be fourth or 12th, today we were 12th because as I said we weren’t good enough, so tomorrow we have to improve.”

Although Alonso made a very obvious mistake at the end of what should have been his best lap, he says it was already slower than his earlier time.

“In that lap I was worse than the previous lap, so that moment didn’t cost me any time or any Q3 opportunity, because I was one tenth slower. I was trying to push to recover this one tenth that I was behind.”

Nevertheless the mistake comes on the heels of his Monaco practice crash and his jumped start in China, giving critics extra ammunition. However, he doesn’t see any pattern. 

“I think today we were not quick enough, I didn’t consider any mistake today. In Monaco unfortunately we lost qualifying. With another type of accident maybe the chassis it was possible to repair, and we were in qualifying and maybe it was not so obvious the mistake, or not so much talk about it.

“I know that expectations were high for us, every Grand Prix everybody expects Ferrari to be on pole position and win the race. We are not in a position to do that, but I think I’m not doing too many bad things or too many mistakes if I’m third in the championship, three points behind.”

Jenson Button was fastest for McLaren on Friday afternoon in Turkey, but while the World Champion was happy with the overall performance of the car, he’s not kidding himself about his form relative to that of Red Bull.

The dark blue cars were second and third fastest in the session, and Button was less than a tenth clear of Mark Webber.

“We’re still trying to chase the Red Bulls, I don’t think they’re showing they’re hand just yet, so don’t get too excited about our pace today,” said Button.

“I think our car works well round here. I’m happy with the balance. There’s a few things that I have on the car this race and that I’m happy with that are different to previous races. And it seems to work well for me, especially round this type of circuit. The car’s good, but still, the Red Bulls are much quicker than they show. It’s a normal Friday.

“Tomorrow we’ll see where we stand, because you don’t catch up a second over a couple of weeks. The Red Bull is still the car to beat, and we’ve got to hope that tomorrow we get everything together in qualifying and that we can do the best job we can. Maybe that can be enough.”

Button said his day was generally a positive one: “It went reasonably well. We did some back to back work this morning, the opposite way around on the cars with the aero, and we found something reasonably interesting. This morning was reasonably good, and this afternoon was better.

“I felt that I found a better balance this afternoon, and especially on low fuel, the car is working well, which is nice to see. There’s still more to come, as always, after a Friday. The long run pace is good as well, but I just found a lot of traffic out there on my long run. I’m happy with the car at the moment. There’s always a few things that you want to sort out.

“Both tyres are working well, which is the important thing, and we don’t have any issues with graining or damaging the tyre.”