The ever affable Brazilian seems once again to have wound up with a driver in the other red car who he has to (quite literally) play second fiddle to. Without a fiddle. This time though, Ferrari managed to make it so bleedin' obvious, that the race stewards have handed them a $100,000 fine. Still, that would buy you what? A Ferrari wing mirror, two second hand wheel nuts and a Prancing Horse key fob. Maybe. I don't know. I'm just speculating. Anyhoo, what I'm TRYING to get at is that it's a fairly paltry fine for what was a flagrant (and that's a top word, isn't it?) breach of the rules.
But... was it the wrong thing to do? We'll come back to that, shall we...?
The German GP looked likely to be a corker, with the 6 drivers most likely to win it occupying the first 6 places on the grid. Both Ferrari's made a great start, but whilst Vettel was busy trying to shove Fernando into the pit wall, Massa bombed down the fat gap they'd left him and straight into the lead. Meanwhile, two drivers of cars with Red Bull written on them continued the company's philosophy of incestuous vehicular relationships started off by Webber & Vettel, as Buemi and Alguersuarirarararai's Toro Rosso's tried to do it doggy style, leaving a post-coital mess of broken rear and front wing all over the track. Nasty. Get a garage boys.
Sutil & Liuzzi's crap weekend in the Force Indias continued, as pit-lane confusion meant they wound up leaving the pits with each other's tyres on, forcing another pit stop to sort out who had what.
Both Ferraris and McLarens engaged in some pretty close racing with their respective team mates, but it was all about to get way more controversial than that. First off, the tetchy Spaniard came on the radio to say "Guys, This is ridiculous". Not long after, it was as Massa's engineer, Rob "Easy Felipe Baby" Smedley told his charge in a slow and deliberate way that He. Was. Slower. Than. Alonso. Really? Fernando hadn't managed to pass him thus far in the race. It was pretty clear that this was a coded message to Felipe to get out of the way. He did, by clearly backing off, followed by a call from Smedley saying " Good boy, well done. Sorry".
At this point, we would like to take a break from this fascinating tale to discuss the team orders clearly at play here. Cold hard facts first. Alonso (prior to the race) has bags more points than Massa, but was a fair way from the front of the Championship table, due to crap car, bad luck, and being a whiny, petulant, temperamental git who gets over-emotional and then makes mistakes. So he still theoretically has a shout at the title, whilst Felipe probably doesn't. So.... what are Ferrari to do? Let Massa win? He deserves it - massive bonk on the head exactly one year ago that could have killed him, and the simple fact that he was in the lead and holding his own. But this would leave Ferando still 7 points down on his chance of the title. So... Do they manipulate the race to let Nando win, thus maximising their chances later in the year, and deal with all the crap they were about to have flung at them for doing so?
This is Ferrari. They have form on this sort of thing. Mr Todt may have gone, but their motto is still "He who has a chance at the title, wins". Their big problem is, it's against the rules. And frankly, their rubbish coded message (delivered in a particularly bad B-Movie over-dramatic style by Rob), clear slowing down by Massa and then everything that happened afterwards, made is flippin' obvious. Surely, a nice "Felipe, fuel setting B3" message might have worked better? Under the circumstances, they may as well just have said "Felipe, come in to the pits and have a coffee pal. We want Fernado to win this one". It would have been as convincing. I Was already feeling sorry for Ferrari's Press Officer, Luca Cuddlyani. He'd probably just realised he wasn't going to be home in time for Coronation Street. Or whatever they watch in Italy.
Back to the "race" then. De La Rosa managed some nice overtakes towards the end of the race only to have Crikey Heikki close the door on him and take his front wing off.
In the end (drama at front notwithstanding, natch) the rest of them stayed pretty much where they started, with Vettel 3rd and wondering why he just can't win from pole, Hamilton and Button 4th & 5th, Webber a lowly 6th, and Kubica, Rosberg, Schumi and Petrov rounding out the points scorers.
Alonso had the cheek to ask how Massa was on his slowing-down lap (I'm guessing "Mightily pissed off" would probably have covered that) and, although they managed a bit of a hug as they climbed from their cars, they hardly spoke before going on to the podium, and Massa's unhappy face throughout the podium (non) celebrations said it all. The press conference featured some fantastic answering by Massa, who said it all without saying anything.
Mind you, it makes the top 6 drivers even closer than before, so thumbs up, right? Right...? No....?
(Appropriately, tonight's tunes are by Madness)
Comments
Post a Comment