Makes me misty just thinking about it .
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Lauda Thinks it, Lewis admitt it on Sky, so who am I, clearly Hamiltons fault.
Well the dust has settled and we've heard more views on it. I still think both drivers are at fault with it being slightly tipped towards Nico.
It gave us an exciting race though and I'm glad to see a non-Merc car win for once.
Absolutely Hamilton's fault. Started from pole, got overtaken on the very first corner and crashed on the fourth retiring another guy with him.
All kidding aside , henners , I'm the other way around , with it tipped maybe a bit farther the other way .
Nico really should have known Lewis wouldn't back out of a try , even if he really wasn't obligated to leave room .
The only way to intimidate Lewis out of a move is to be earlier , or more forceful with the defense .
Unfortunately , his engine mode issue had him shifting it mid-corner , after Lewis had seen his red light .
That red light made it all the more necessary for Nico to assert himself clearly , as Hamilton saw the weak moment , and he didn't .
In effect , I see it as Nico having closed the door in Lewis's face , even though he knew he was running towards it .
And I see Lewis running towards a door he knew was closing .
It was close .
Had Lewis been a few feet farther along side , it would have been all down to Nico .
A few feet makes Lewis the donkey , but Nico was a bit of an a$$ , too .
Like Lewis had been so often. He has ran Nico out of space on more than one occasion (Bahrain 14, Hungray 14 spring to mind) Nico has always backed out until Spa '14 and he got publically been pilloried for it. Now, for the first time since they've been team mates, Nico had Lewis in a position where it was 'back out or crash' and Lewis dutifully caused a crash while Nico usually backed out and salvaged points. First of all that says something about Lewis's racecraft. He wanted to decide a 66-lap race in turn four of the first lap. It starkly reminds me of Hill in Adelaide 1994. Schumacher had smashed his car to bits, yet Hill tried to overtake at a stupid location instead of just sailing past a few corners later. The stewards and Merc themselves deem that a racing incident, but from a 'race craft' point of view it was entirely Lewis's fault.
He demonstrated his two main weaknesses this weekend. First was his inability to setup his car. Smoking pot at Barbeidos seems to be more important. His qualifying lap was an amazing piece of work, but it came about because he was given Rosberg's setup data. He had gone nowhere on Friday. And his second weakness is the lack of race intelligence. Lewis always operates with the crowbar. Sometimes a needle is the better tool, but he doesn't know how to use it.
The thing is that Hamilton is just not the sharpest tool in the shed but a tool nevertheless
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Not being a fanboy of either, I can see valid arguments from both sides.
Both at fault but not sure if any should be apportioned most of the blame... so a racing incident for me.
Its easy for us armchair experts to point the fingers but let's not forget how fast these things can happen at 200kph+ and also with the speed differential between the two.
So the arguments begin... Whose fault is it you ask? Well, if you can be objective then these are the facts:-
1. Hamilton lost the drag race to the first corner. Rosberg overtakes on the outside which shows how Hamilton has taken care to give Nico tons of space to avoid a collision.
2. They come out of the corner in to the short straight to turn two. Nico moves left to cover that side
3. Nico discovers that he wasd in the wrong engine mode and proceeds to correct it quickly before turn two. At this point, Nico was down on power and Hamilton was clearly much faster as he was bearing down on a slower Nico.
4. From Hamiltons perspective, Nico had the left side covered but had the right side open by more than a cars width. Hamilton, seeing the opportunity on the right, decides to overtake. Meanwhile, Nico was fiddling with knobs on the steering.
5. Nico finished just in time to see Hamilton heading for the open right side then turned sharply to cut him off. But his reaction was abit late. Hamilton had to take to the grass to avoid a collision, lost grip on the grass, spun round and crashed into Nico.
So the questions are as follows:-
Would any other driver in the grid in Hamilton's position seeing the opportunity and the clear open door to Nico's right not attempt to go for the overtake?
Did Nico, knowing he was in the incorrect engine mode, hence would be slower than the cars behind him momentarily take the right action to avoid a collision from the faster cars behind him? Hence was his attempt to defend the open right side of him under his circumstance not dangerous? Both drivers walked away from that one, but it could have also easily been a fatal accident for Hamilton.
This is racing, not an effing procession. I think Nico should have left a car's width as Hamilton left for him at turn one. His late move to defend the open right side as a result of correcting being in the wrong engine mode was reckless and unsportmanlike. It is similar to his move on Ricciado that resulted in him having a puncture to the rear when he had the opportunity to take the lead of the championship going into the mid season break in 2014.
In my opinion, the stewards at the race were crap. We wanted to see a fair fight at the front, what we saw today was very sub-standard defensive drive by Rosberg that cost Mercedes easy 43 points. I was quite surprise to hear Lauda who normally is very objective about his opinions blame Hamilton before the analysis of the accident had taken place. Hamilton was abit naive today to quickly accept fault without first waiting to see all the fact of the accident before putting his hand up to accept the fault.
Should we expect accidents to occur each time Rosberg receives challenge from a charging Hamilton? At this rate, Mercedes may hand the drivers title to Redbull or Ferrari [if they get their act together].
It is not respectable to not accept fault when it is clearly yours. Nico caused what could have been a fatal accident by not leaving a cars width. You may argue that he was in front and had the right to defend. Our conversation would haave been very different if Hamilton got killed due to that accident which was clearly very reckless.