Recurring themes… In Austria Sebastian Vettel suffered a blown right-rear tyre when trying to run a long stint in his Ferrari \u2013 just like Spa last year. A little while later Mercedes drivers Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg clashed, just like Spa 2014, or Barcelona this year.<\/p>\n
At Silverstone one week on Hamilton waltzed to victory, just as he had done there in the previous two years \u2013 and Ferrari was miles off the pace, as it invariably is around the track\u2019s fast sweeps. <\/p>\n
It illustrated how even in the multi-analysed, vastly resourced world of F1, some problems remain intractable. Pirelli and the teams continue to squabble about the safe operating limits of the tyres, Ferrari continues to fall short aerodynamically \u2013 and that retains Mercedes the performance advantage over everyone else that ensures its two drivers are fighting each other for the world title. Which in turn draws them together like magnets. <\/p>\n
Vettel in Austria to the TV cameras: \u201cI don\u2019t know what happened. Your idea is as good as mine.\u201d Clearly highly vexed after the tyre exploded with no warning as he raced down the main straight at 200mph in the lead, but only because he\u2019d yet to make his stop, trying to run long in order to be on fresher tyres than the Mercs later on. \u201cI didn\u2019t feel anything,\u201d he reported, \u201cor rather, when I felt it, it was too late. It exploded out of the blue. There were no signs before that; everything was normal.\u201d All normal, safe and secure in high-speed routine \u2013 then in a millisecond you\u2019re in survival mode, trying to wrestle a 200mph car out of the wall as it spins wildly across the track. It was over in a flash but that flash lasts an awfully long time inside the car and can make a big impression on a driver\u2019s psyche.<\/p>\n
Sitting there in the wrecked car, broadside across the track, taking in the fact that it\u2019s happened to him \u2013 again \u2013 it would be difficult not to take it personally. Afterwards he was keeping a lid on his anger \u2013 unlike at Spa last year when he lambasted the tyre company \u2013 but in a very tight-lipped way that told you it was beneath a very thin skin of diplomacy.<\/p>\n
When a tyre explodes in such a way, throwing its internals far and wide \u2013 carcass material wrapped itself around the barge board of the closely-following Mercedes of Nico Rosberg \u2013 it\u2019s almost impossible to assess afterwards the reason for failure. Pirelli suspected it might have been to do with the new kerbs, particularly those installed on the left-handed exit of what used to be called the Texaco chicane. New high-intensity 50mm-step kerbs behind the conventional 25mm ones were there in an attempt to keep drivers within track limits. Beyond the 50mm kerbs were concrete \u2018baguettes\u2019 that had already destroyed suspensions but which Vettel was adamant he\u2019d been nowhere near. Either the kerbs, said Pirelli, or debris. A thin-tread high-mileage tyre (Vettel\u2019s super-softs had done 29 laps when the explosion came) is more susceptible to debris punctures than a thick-tread low-mileage one. But also a tyre repeatedly in a nasty part of the frequency range \u2013 possibly caused by a combination of the high-step kerbs and the increased pressure limits imposed by Pirelli \u2013 might well suffer fatigue failure. If it did, it would likely fail around the shoulder. Which it did \u2013 as confirmed by slow-motion footage. <\/p>\n
Either way the failure would be linked to the mileage the tyre had completed, and Ferrari was attempting to run Vettel long on the first stint of a one-stop \u2013 and it was doing this because it couldn\u2019t threaten Mercedes any way other than strategically. It certainly couldn\u2019t do it on raw performance. <\/p>\n
The complication of Vettel\u2019s tyre failure upon Mercedes was two-fold \u2013 and led to the later clash between its drivers. 1) It made the team nervous about Hamilton\u2019s one-stop strategy. Was there a tyre risk? 2) The safety car period needed to clear the debris wiped the gap to Max Verstappen\u2019s third place Red Bull, complicating the strategy call somewhat. <\/p>\n
Rosberg \u2013 because he\u2019d started a penalised seventh as a result of a new gearbox being needed after kerb-induced suspension failure had put him into the wall in practice \u2013 was on a two-stop, as befitted his necessarily more aggressive early race laps. Therefore he\u2019d made his first stop much earlier than Hamilton and therefore he\u2019d undercut his way ahead of him and was now leading, with Hamilton right behind. <\/p>\n
So now Mercedes decided it should two-stop Hamilton too. But because that strategy change had disadvantaged him, they would bring him in first, which should have allowed him the opportunity to undercut his way back ahead of Rosberg. Except there was a delay at his pitstop with a rear wheel. Which was enough to allow Rosberg still to be in front after he was called in on the next lap and enjoyed a problem-free stop. All of which, quite understandably, conspired to alert Hamilton\u2019s paranoia antenna. The situation was further complicated by the fact they were each on a different tyre compound now \u2013 Hamilton on the tougher soft tyre (meaning his out-lap was slow), Rosberg the more delicate super-soft. That came about because that\u2019s what they had left from their allocation after the various practice dramas (rained-out Friday afternoon and later Rosberg\u2019s accident).<\/p>\n
So Hamilton caught Rosberg hand-over-fist in the late stages. On the penultimate lap Rosberg\u2019s excessive brake wear caused the electronic braking to go into fail-safe mode, meaning the brake-by-wire was non-operative. This and his badly graining front tyres conspired to induce him into a pressure error at the first corner of the last lap, hitting the inside kerb too hard, losing him momentum up the following run to Turn Two, allowing Hamilton to grind himself ahead \u2013 but on the outside \u2013 as they reached that corner. Rosberg, ignoring the apex, as he was entitled to do, ran straight on until Hamilton was forced to either concede, drive off the circuit or risk turning in. He chose the latter and Rosberg chose not to avoid contact. \u201cI didn\u2019t have an accident,\u201d emphasised Hamilton over the radio on his victory lap. Rosberg, his front wing folded beneath the car, hobbled around to fourth. <\/p>\n
Just four races after Barcelona, this was all too much for Toto Wolff. \u201cOur drivers are among the two best in F1. We try to give the best possible car. We try to push the limits, it\u2019s not always easy and we\u2019ve had moments where the car has been letting us down. I don\u2019t want to attribute any blame because every time you watch the video and you look at on-boards there is new information \u2013 you can\u2019t clearly say who is more to blame than the other. I have my personal opinion and I\u2019m not going to express it here, but it needs to be avoided. In Barcelona I was much more at ease with it because we\u2019d had 30 races without any collision. It was clear that it was eventually going to happen. It wiped out both cars and from my na\u00efve thinking I thought, \u2018OK, that\u2019s it, they\u2019ve learned their lesson, they\u2019ve seen the consequences, it\u2019s not going to happen any more.\u2019 But here we go \u2013 it happens again\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n
Silverstone was therefore all abuzz with what the fall-out might be. Would team orders be imposed? No, they were still free to race. A final warning had been issued, some new more specific terms of engagement spelt out. Bland driver comments hide the depth of competitive intensity, but the chances of this happening again are surely not remote, regardless of \u2018final warnings\u2019. This is the world championship that\u2019s up for grabs. \u201cI didn\u2019t think there was anything needed to be cleared up, anyway,\u201d said Hamilton. \u201cI\u2019ll try not to be in that position again and I\u2019m sure Nico will too. We race as we always do. We\u2019re aware of what we\u2019ve been told before this weekend. But that doesn\u2019t mean we can\u2019t continue to drive as hard as we can.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes, very clear,\u201d agreed Rosberg. \u201cIt\u2019s just a small modification to how we battle.\u201d<\/p>\n
At Silverstone any new agreement was not tested. A cloudburst pre-race meant a safety car start, but once it pulled in Hamilton drove off into the distance and Rosberg never got close, instead having his hands full fending off the impressive Verstappen. The Red Bull, running more downforce than the Mercedes, was quicker in the wet and Verstappen managed to get ahead. As it dried, the Merc was again comfortably quicker and Rosberg was able to reclaim his place, only to lose it again thanks to a penalty for a team radio transgression. <\/p>\n
Ferrari? Kimi R\u00e4ikk\u00f6nen qualified 1.6sec off pole and finished more than a minute behind the winner, in fifth. Vettel was always in traffic courtesy of his gearbox failure and attendant grid penalty. Slow and unreliable, Ferrari turned up at this most aerodynamically demanding of venues and was literally blown off the track. \u201cWe know where our weaknesses are,\u201d said Maurizio Arrivabene afterwards. But it was a repeating phrase. He\u2019d used it in Azerbaijan too. There he was asked to define them. \u201cAerodynamics,\u201d he replied. It\u2019s been this way for too long for a team so revered and well funded. Vettel\u2019s anger in Austria may ostensibly have been directed at Pirelli. But might it not have been anger at finding himself placed in this situation \u2013 at having to go for a marginal strategy on tyres he doesn\u2019t trust because the car is simply not fast enough? <\/p>\n
Actually, although Mercedes\u2019 problems were taking all the headlines, Ferrari\u2019s were far more serious. Mercedes was simply managing the route to its third consecutive championship, trying to minimise the headaches, bruised egos and shattered carbon fibre along the way. Ferrari was left pondering just how far it really is adrift of having such problems. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":752,"featured_media":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","categories":[],"tags":[167,198],"issue_decade":[121600],"issue_year":[121675],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.motorsportmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/issue_content\/53785"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.motorsportmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/issue_content"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.motorsportmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/issue_content"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.motorsportmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/752"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.motorsportmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53785"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.motorsportmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/issue_content\/53785\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":224036,"href":"https:\/\/www.motorsportmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/issue_content\/53785\/revisions\/224036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.motorsportmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53785"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.motorsportmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53785"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.motorsportmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53785"},{"taxonomy":"issue_decade","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.motorsportmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/issue_decade?post=53785"},{"taxonomy":"issue_year","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.motorsportmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/issue_year?post=53785"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}