Mercedes strategy of the Race - Monaco

[Bagwan]

"We told him to stay out." said Wolff .
To which he replied "not good" , referring to his tires being old and cold .

So , yeah , you could say he was asking to pit .

They made the decision based on the FACT that the driver wanted to pit , and that there was time to do it if the stop had gone as planned .

As it happened , Lewis was partly to blame there as well , as he didn't hit his marks right on , but went slightly deep , causing a small time loss on it's own .



Look , the decision to stop looks a whole lot dumber from here in the future .

They thought they still had time to do it and they had a very nervous driver . It's really as simple as that .
The guys behind both spoke of how nervous they were about the restart as well , on icy tires that were well worn and would not be easy to heat up as a result .

Sure , it was a team decision , but , as he stated , he is part of that team .

[Bagwan]

He knows this already, just likes to disagree for the sake of it.




Great post.

Incorrect on both points .
Give it another try .

[TMorel]

"You sure it's the best thing to stay out? These tyres have lost all their temperature. Everyone is going to be on options now."

The more I hear of the radio transmission the worse it sounds

[Bagwan]

"You sure it's the best thing to stay out? These tyres have lost all their temperature. Everyone is going to be on options now."

The more I hear of the radio transmission the worse it sounds

So , who is he angry at ?

[Tazio]

Baggie we don't need to turn this into "The Young and the Restless" It is part of human nature that in situations of sudden and extreme disappointment to be
angryyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy !!
Personally I think The Boss handled it very well. As I mentioned earlier it is some of his faithful followers that can't accept his complicity in the decision making, that is also human nature. I mean after all not everybody can be as cold and calculating as you . It really was a sudden blow, so I think all concerned parties are entitled to be upset. Personally I wasn't nearly as upset when Fred lost the WDC to Seb in Abu dhabi as it seems many are over this. I was however when Mike broke down at Suzuka in 2006, and Fred came past and gave a little wave bye, bye, oh yeah, I could have killed over that.
As I remember Mike sort of took it in stride, but he never was one to wear his heart on his sleeve, plus he already had 7 WDCs in his pocket.
Roll on Canada baby

[The Black Knight]

I haven’t heard the radio transmission in full so I guess there might be something missing, but quoting something o me without the link to the recording isn’t much use. I could write that myself so feel free to provide links.

On the other hand, if Hammy did want to come in, the fault still lies with the team for bringing him in. It is up to them to do the calculation and do it correctly. They didn’t so it is still a catastrophic case of brain fart on the Mercedes pit wall no matter what way you spin it as the final call lies with them. Plus Hammy was delayed in his pit box which added at second or so to the time, otherwise he probably would have ended up in front of Seb. At that point maybe Mercedes could have negotiated with Nico to give Hammy the place back though I have my doubts that he would have – I certainly wouldn’t if I were in his position.

As Tazio says, roll on Canada.

[Hawkmoon]

You don't have to be Ross Brawn to know that track position at Monaco is king. So even if Hamilton had requested a stop the team should have told him to stay out. They had data that Hamilton didn't. They knew Rosberg wasn't going to stop for example. The chances of losing a position to the slower Ferrari had to be no better than the chances of stuffing up the pitstop. Mercedes even claimed that they didn't have GPS so they didn't know exactly where Vettel was. Why would you stop under these circumstances?

I put this one squarely on the team.

[Nitrodaze]

"We told him to stay out." said Wolff .
To which he replied "not good" , referring to his tires being old and cold .

So , yeah , you could say he was asking to pit .

They made the decision based on the FACT that the driver wanted to pit , and that there was time to do it if the stop had gone as planned .

As it happened , Lewis was partly to blame there as well , as he didn't hit his marks right on , but went slightly deep , causing a small time loss on it's own .



Look , the decision to stop looks a whole lot dumber from here in the future .

They thought they still had time to do it and they had a very nervous driver . It's really as simple as that .
The guys behind both spoke of how nervous they were about the restart as well , on icy tires that were well worn and would not be easy to heat up as a result .

Sure , it was a team decision , but , as he stated , he is part of that team .

I am not sure which race you were watching. But the 2015 Monaco race we are talking about, the team should take the blame for this one. They are the ones who are suppose to have a clear head to make a thorough risk analysis and make the best decision for the benefit of the team and the driver or at least strongly point out the risks of pitting to the driver. Otherwise, there is no need for the pit wall crew.
The main problem here is, there was lack of evidence of good appreciation of the risk. Hence none was communicated to the driver. With Nico between Vettel and Hamilton, he was not a real threat. Nico on fresh tyres was not a threat. The clever engineers on the Nico side of the garage were not dumb to consider pitting because they could see that there was a major disadvantage to do so.
The real question is, what is the safest time buffer to make a pit stop. If the entire time to make a pit stop is 25 seconds, to cover all eventualities of driver over shooting the box, pit crew eff up and wheel gun jams, would half a second do it? The Vesterpen scenario required 5 sec. With such a high stake as was the case for Hamilton, would one say 3 to 5 seconds to spare for one to make a call to pit under the Monaco circumstances. The lack of 2.5 seconds was what cost Hamilton the race.

The error to pit early at Malaysia gave Vettel an untroubled victory as the Mercedes cars were too far back to mount a challenge. Adding the Monaco saga, one could say a pattern is beginning to emerge at Mercedes. Hence, the title may not be such a done deal as Ferrari and Red Bull can smell blood. This pattern which l call the "Brawn effect" is likely to bring ferrari and possibly Wiiliams (if they can get their act together) closer to mercedes as we draw to the close of the season. Having the faster car is not an automatic guarantee of winning the championship. It would most likely be a great spectacle if this were to transpire, don't you think? Keep effing up merc, you are spicing up the season :-).

[Bagwan]

Baggie we don't need to turn this into "The Young and the Restless" It is part of human nature that in situations of sudden and extreme disappointment to be
angryyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy !!
Personally I think The Boss handled it very well. As I mentioned earlier it is some of his faithful followers that can't accept his complicity in the decision making, that is also human nature. I mean after all not everybody can be as cold and calculating as you . It really was a sudden blow, so I think all concerned parties are entitled to be upset. Personally I wasn't nearly as upset when Fred lost the WDC to Seb in Abu dhabi as it seems many are over this. I was however when Mike broke down at Suzuka in 2006, and Fred came past and gave a little wave bye, bye, oh yeah, I could have killed over that.
As I remember Mike sort of took it in stride, but he never was one to wear his heart on his sleeve, plus he already had 7 WDCs in his pocket.
Roll on Canada baby

Asking who he's angry at is just pointing out he was complicit in the decision making process .

As Wolff said , "We told him to stay out" .
It was a pressure call , and they knew he wanted tires , so they capitulated , since they still had time to do so .

Essentially , on this point , I feel Lewis should get over this one , as he had a big part in how things went down .
Add that he stopped slightly long , losing time as the mechanics adjusted , and you have a guy who was essentially the victim of his own undoing .


It never should have been that close , but they had to delay his release as another car came by , and the signalling system didn't work properly .

So , two separate screw-ups occurred during the stop sequence .
And , neither would have been very predictable .
I expected Lewis to hit his marks , because he's a good hand .
And the team holds the current record at 1.8 seconds , don't they ?

All I'm saying is that nobody needs be hanged for the offence .

[Tazio]

All I'm saying is that nobody needs be hanged for the offence .

Fair enough, than we are in total agreement!