vetfever

I know there are F1 nuts in here, and I guess it's old news already, but wondering what people thought of the manipulated finish to the race and Championship this past Sunday?

Unfortunately, in an attempt to not wanting to influence the outcome, poor Michael Masi seems to have stepped in it, and instead made a huge impact on how it finished. When I say he manipulated it, I don't mean in favor of either Max or Lewis, just that he was trying to get a green flag race to the finish. He did, but with a very controversial result.

Loess

Whomever you favor, they always want to finish the race under green so no one should have been surprised they were going to rush to restart. Could you imagine if they'd ended the race under a safety car. Max had newer tires and that's what it came down to. And I'm not a fan of Max's going into corners faster than you can expect to actually make the corner. He wanted it more and he risked more.

CanuckGT4

I don't really follow it but when i watched the highlights and saw what happened, it seems like a bs finish to me.
What they did was put the race down to one lap and highly favour one driver over another.
Barring an accident, it was a foregone conclusion who would win the race AND the championship.
Now i understand all the complaints about F1 rules or lack of them, so arbitrary.
Both drivers made decisions based on the rules but then the rules were thrown out the window because that wouldn't have made for an exciting ending.
Mercedes got the short stick for no fault of their own and technically should have won albeit not very exciting, unless you discount the whole race! lol

pfitzsim

But just think of the Netflix ratings when Drive to Survive airs in the new year!!!

RonnyC

I believe Max had more race wins this year - so you could say he deserved to win the championship.

A BS finish would have been under the safety car...

fenixv8

I felt like either decision he made would have felt like a manipulation. Rock and a hard place for Michael on that last call.

iammacey

He could have immediately thrown a Red Flag when Latifi crashed. That would have given both teams the opportunity to move to fresh rubber, they could have done a standing start, no lapped traffic, and 3-4 laps of green flag racing.

The drivers definitely prefer to end under a green flag and yes, Mercedes could have pitted. If they had, RBR likely would not have. And history has shown they typically take 5-6 laps, or more, to clear that type of accident.

All the historical indicators would say don't give up the track position, this race is ending under yellow.

And then to have the FIA say lapped cars cannot overtake, then they can, but only 5... This is why Masi is under fire. In combination with other decisions he has made throughout the season. Like Saudi Arabia.

It's evident they need some SOPs in place. One of them should be that teams can't lobby against a safety car or attempt to influence if something goes to the stewards.

​​​​​​They need to do some analysis and think through some of the potential scenarios and have a communicated plan for how these things will be handled and what they will do in the more ambiguous scenarios.

I'm 100% for letting them race and not invoking penalties. It's scenarios like a crash with 5 to go that need to have clear guidelines.

991.2GTS

Definitely is a controversial finish. But Mercedes chose not to pit Lewis both time when the VSC and safety car and it did cost them.

Turbodan

Everyone knows Max was the faster driver all year long.
The chicane that he drove on was part of the track he stayed on track, unlike Lewis who cut the corner at the first lap and should have been forced to give up position.
The sport needs a new champion as Lewis was getting long in the tooth and saying/acting very unbecoming of a world champion.
Toto Wolff told Max that he deserved to be champion...that says it all. When the Mercedes boss says he deserved it, there is nothing more really to discuss IMO.
now Lewis can retire and go on to continue his weird lifestyle....sorry guys but he does not do it for me

Torontoworker

It all began when Max screwed up his set of race tires in Q2 and had no choice but to start on the soft Red's. Then he screwed up the start. But it gets weird in that he gets pushed off the corner in lap two and the four race steward's decide that even though Hamilton is now miles down the road after cutting the corner - there is no order to swap back positions. As Max said, 'typical'. Lets review where Max did the same thing the race before in Saudi Arabia and was given an order to let Hamilton by. For the exact same thing...

So Hamilton had two opportunities to change tires and due to the fact Max might stay out and take the lead - chose not to pit each time. That's on him and Merc. Red Bull rolled the dice each time and pitted. The second time with Red's as soon as they saw Latifi in the wall with 8 laps to go. A Hail Mary move.

Passive Aggressive Toto decided to badger the Race Director in a don't you dare allow lapped cars to be un-lapped. Then when he looks at the laps left and thinks, oh wait, yeah, it'll take for ever to un-lap the cars so - no problem as he wants to run the laps out under a yellow. Then he realizes to his horror that Masi only allowed the lapped cars between Hamilton and Max to go by. More freaking out occurs - near crying actually.

Did you know Mercedes brought their corporate lawyer to the race to specifically argue any penalties? Yeah. The only team to do so. In fact Toto was 'marketing' to the press that Max would slam into Hamilton during the race to take him out and win the Championship because of the fact Max had more wins. Then they stated Perez would do the dirty work - hence their lawyer in town. Neither Max or Checo came any where near hitting Hamilton.

So the s**t happens mode or as I call it - the 'Felipe Massa karma event'... (google 2008 championship season ending race) Two lap old Red's against a set of Hamilton's 30 lap white's - it was no contest. Them the breaks.

But wait! Toto hauls out his London big wig lawyer and goes after Red Bull on 1.The restart wave around of five cars was wrong and a Plan B: Max passed Hamilton under a yellow. Both were thrown out as the Race Director can over rule the re start procedures and the Max never 'passed' under yellow - he put his wing in front of Hamilton by all of four inches *before* the race restarted. But wait part two: Toto isn't done yet: He wants to appeal this again to the World Council. My bet: Mercedes tell him to give it up - bad PR and all that.

Masi the Race Director told all the teams he would do everything in his control to make sure that the race would end under a green flag. No team had a problem with that. He's Aussie - they like a good race - not a sham finish under yellow.

But how did F1 get here? Stupid rules and decisions by committee.

What I would change:

- No changing tires under a Red flag. Stop on the front straight and restart's are single file.
- Drive through penalty for not giving a racer a car width room in corners if you force him off the corner. Not appealable. (See IndyCar and IMSA for an example)
- No further radio communication between the teams and the Race Director. They abused it - so its cancelled. Both Toto and Mr Spice girl were idiots on the radio.
- No Steward's input during a race - none. The Race Director shall have the full authority during the race. Only appeals posted after the race shall be sent to the Stewart's.
- No engine penalty system that rewards teams using a fifth or sixth engine. Right now the forth engine or major components is a 10 grid penalty in the next race. But use another 10 engines for example and its still only 5 grid places each time. This is dumb. Teams like Red Bull and Merc can easily make up 5 spots during the race and still win. It should be 15 places for the 5th engine and back of the grid for each engine introduced from that point on.
- If your driver causes a crash that destroys a competitors engine. The team causing the crash must pay for that crash by a ten grid penalty OR transfer of funds to replace said engine. (Many examples: Imola with Mercedes and Williams; Silverstone with Mercedes and Red Bull; Hungary with Mercedes and Red Bull. Anyone see a trend?)
- There shall be a point awarded for pole. (Stops tie breakers)
- Penalties will incur if teammates in Championship fighting teams 'intentionally' interfere in the Championship battle by slowing too much during yellow flags to aid teammates; weave around in front and block and drive to the grid very slowly hoping to cause the pole man sitting on the grid to overheat.
- Wave by of lapped cars in the future will occur by having them drive down pit lane and re join behind the field of cars on the lead lap.

I await the FIA's application for Race Director.

bobblehead

... this saga is not over officially if MB decides to file an appeal with FIA International Court of Appeal by this Thursday.

I am ready

vetfever

Doesn’t fit your idea of a champion? He’s attracted so many new fans to the sport in the last few years.

Just cause he’s different in many respects among athletes?

Here’s another trend setter:

500

A lot of good points here and most of the recommendations are very sound. I particularly like the escalating engine penalties as the current 5-place grid drop from the second extra engine onwards is really odd.

vetfever

5 places when you only replace part of the power unit vs the whole thing...

Speed2k

I was up to watch the race at 5am PST. I think Masi should've made the call to allow the cars to un-lap themselves earlier, maybe they could've gotten all the cars out of the way; although I think Toto still would've appealed. It sucks for Hamilton, but I think it's true that most people wouldn't have wanted to see the race in with a SC finish. MB did have the opportunity to pit twice for fresher tires. Regardless, this season was a battle for the ages though; it was much more exciting watching each race, not knowing who was going to win; compared to the past few years were the question was, who would finish 3rd, 4th, and 5th because MB was so dominant. Hopefully next year other teams step up as well. Also, there's no denying that both Max and LH were in a different class this year; both out drove their team mates by a large margin and were able to maximize their car's potential and LH definitely deserves to be in the discussion as the GOAT.

Mercedes still got the constructors though, so that gets them lots of money and recognition; I'm glad Honda gets to go out on a high too!