http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/77354
We've seen just how dangerous a loose wheel is at Brands last week, so when the team release the car while the engineer at the wheel is still desperatly clawing away at the wheel it's only right they are punished.
Shame for Alonso and Pique but mabee Alonso can run for Farrari?
Renualt are apealing the decision though,watch this space.
Was a cracking race though.
OMG. Not only did the team screw up Alonso's race, they even screwed up the next race.
Time for Alonso to jumpship over to Ferrari since Massa isn't gonna b back anytime soon.
I mean no disrespect to Henry Surtees or Felipe Massa, but I think this is a Knee-Jerk reaction more than anything else.
It wasn't a deliberate move by Renault, and I don't think it is fair to expect Renault to tell Alonso to pull over because his wheel is loose - it wasn't outwith the realms of possibility that he'd manage to get back to the pits with the wheel still on the car - as it happens he didn't, but c'est la vie.
"If you're not on the edge, you're taking up too much room!"
- me, 2005
It sends a pretty strong message which is what FIA were probably intending. The damage has already been done now, so they can scale back to a more reasonable 0 constructors points for the team but drivers allowed to race.
Be nice if they were consistent though
Originally Posted by kidzer
I think it was entirly fair to expect Alonso to pull over and stop the race after exiting the pits, what if that tire had gone into the crowd? It was as we've seen putting lives at risk.
From a racing and fans point of view though it might be a little odd to ban the team from Valencia, a hefty fine would have been better from a racing/spectator point of view.
RBR and Vettel got nothing for driving around in Melbourne for 2 laps with a wheel and suspension hanging off of his car.
Raikkonen's car had an exhaust banging around on the back of his car for half of the French GP last year. Again, nothing.
It's an entirely fair punishment if teams were warned about this sort of thing prior to the race. If not, it's a massive over-reaction based on the past couple of weekends.
Are drivers not to drive back to the pits with a puncture now? What about loose front wings? May seem petty, but it is what killed Roland Ratzenberger after all.
There's no way this penalty will remain in place in this form. The Renault legal representatives will have a field day in Paris. A penalty will likely remain, but it won't prevent Renault racing at Valencia. The stewards would be living in hiding for the next few years... and with all due respect, frankly, rightly so, because it's a shocking judgement.
Just because other cars had similar instance and nothing happened to them doesn't make a punishment wrong. The simple fact is that they have regulations regarding wheels being fixed properly and need to be followed. The view that the teams didn't know about it is a poor one as it's part of the regulations they should be following.
As for drivers not driving back to the pits with a puncture, your just being petty. When they get a puncture the rubber comes off in pieces while the wheel stays attached to the car. It's hardly comparable.
As for the other incidence, i'm hardly the person to make those comments at, the FIA have been known to be inconsistent with decisions throughout recent seasons. But you'd probably find due to past troubles with Wheels going into crowds and generally being very dangerous the regulations regarding those are both specific and harsh.
But i think with Massa we've seen what could have happened if Kimis Exhaust had fell off. Similar size to the spring and Kimi should have probably been called in the pits.
You make it sound like they did it deliberately. :\
You've never seen a tyre carcass come off an F1 car? You're not one of these Hamilton-lovers who've only recently started watching seriously are you? If not you should know fine well and seen that full tyres can come off, and while I've never known one to hit a driver, I've never known an 800-900g spring to hit a driver either. An F1 tyre weighs another 200g more than that spring.
As I said, Ratzenberger was killed by a dislodged front-wing, so petty or not, these things happen.
So where do you draw the line?
Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying Renault shouldn't be punished. The 2 events together (releasing the driver and then apparently failing to warn him sufficiently early) should be punished, but some proportion to existing recent incidents needs to be used... as I said, unless they were warned prior to the race that such irregularities would be punished more harshly than previously (where neither has been punished at all).
I'm not making it sound like they did it delibratly at all, just pointing out that the team would know about the regulations. I don't see where your getting that from in my statement.
I'm in no way one of these Hamilton lovers that just started to watch, watched it all my life.
But a tire carcass coming away is in no way as dangerous as a wheel coming loose so the 2 simply can not be compared.
As for being punished more severely the regulations in this case were that the car was knowingly released without the wheel attached, which is completly different to a wheel coming off in the race, as it's more likely to be a racing incident rather than incompetance. As far as i'm aware i've never been aware of drivers knowgly being released by the team with a wheel loose. So nothing like this has happened before as far as i can remember.
From autosport.com
The statement said that Renault "knowingly released car no. 7 from the pitstop position without one of the retaining devices for the wheel-nuts being securely in position, this being an indication that the wheel itself may not have been properly secured."
It added that Renault, "being aware of this, failed to take any action to prevent the car from leaving the pitlane....failed to inform the driver of this problem or to advise him to take appropriate action given the circumstances, even though the driver contacted the team by radio believing he had a puncture."
It said that the team's actions had compromised safety in breach of Article 3.2 of the Sporting Regulations, and in breach of Article 23.1.i had released the car from the pits before it was safe to do so.
Did I compare them? You stated tyres don't come off whole and I merely corrected you.
Yes a wheel bounces more than a tyre by itself, but that's not to say another car couldn't drive over one and have an accident, or drive over one and flick it up into a driver.
As I'd said, it's a case of where do you draw the line?
The wheel wasn't loose. The wheel was in place, the nut was on and secured (including the pin), the gun-man had stepped aside, and the all that was left was the cover to be locked into place. It wasn't, and it undid the bolt as it wound around after turn 1. The guy who did the cover presumably thought (or perhaps assumed) that he'd got the cover locked in place as the car left the pit box, as along with the rest of the mechanics, he simply turned and went back into the garage - you can see him in the background. The only guys to stay in place are the Bridgestone guys checking the temperatures of the tyres. That's not the actions of someone who had just "knowingly" let a car leave the pits with a cover loose.
As for being punished more severely, no one has ever been punished at all. Including Vettel. Including Kimi. That's the complaint - few would argue had they been punished, but that punishment had to be proportionate to the crime - not an example being made of in what appears to be a PR stunt given the recent events.
This isn't me that's saying the wheel was loose, it's the FIA and they are in a much better position to judge than you or i.
The guy checking the tyre temps was not the same guy that did the front right tyre up. As for when the car was released having all the wheel men giving the ready singnal, that's dubious as far as i'm concerned, the footage from the BBC didn't show it from a good angle after the tyres were changed and i only saw in car footage from a couple of seconds before release which still showed an engineer clawing away at the right front wheel. That's certainly showing me that the engineer knew there was something not right.
As for no one ever being punished, again i have to tell you it's a different set of regulations there looking at, that's not difficult to understand is it?
If it turns out to be completly wrong, and the team thought it was done up and indeed does turn out to have been done up, then that's another issue. At the moment they are looking at the team knowing the wheel wasn't done up. So untill they find out other wise that's the punishment that fits the crime as it were.
No other incident in recent history has been in breach or was thought to have been in breach of the same regulations, so it's ridiculous saying that there has not been people punished for this in the past, the incidents were not the same.
The FIA have said that Renualt have a right to appeal, and i would hope the ban gets changed to a hefty fine, but they certainly still need to be severely punished.
Did you read any of my post, or are you just making up what you want to read?
The regulations over which they were penalised:
23.1i: It is the responsibility of the competitor to release his car after a pit stop only when it is safe to do so.
3.2: Competitors must ensure that their cars comply with the conditions of eligibility and safety throughout practice and the race.
23.1i can be aimed at, among others: Massa in Valencia, Massa in Singapore and Webber in Hungary.
3.2 can be aimed at every example given earlier: Kimi at Magny-Cours and Vettel in Melbourne being the 2 recent, obvious ones.
None of the above were punished at all. Same regulations.
Did you read any of my post, or are you just making up what you want to read?
The regulations over which they were penalised:
23.1i: It is the responsibility of the competitor to release his car after a pit stop only when it is safe to do so.
3.2: Competitors must ensure that their cars comply with the conditions of eligibility and safety throughout practice and the race.
23.1i can be aimed at, among others: Massa in Valencia, Massa in Singapore and Webber in Hungary.
3.2 can be aimed at every example given earlier: Kimi at Magny-Cours and Vettel in Melbourne being the 2 recent, obvious ones.
None of the above were punished at all. Same regulations.
Massa was punished, he got a drive through
But the FIA have been well known to be inconsistent and giving in particular being leniant towards Farrari.
But being lax in the past doesn't mean they should be lax now, but they should certainly get thier A**e in gear and leave the punishments as a set standard as opposed to decinding each offence by just how much they like the people or not.
It's almost certainly the case that they recived a ban instead of a fine due to Flavios recent run ins with the FIA. We all want to see them race.....except mabee Max Mosely.
The wheel nut couldn't of been secured. The wheel nut is incorporated into the cover, and as the cover was spinning as soon as it left the pits it indicates that the wheel nut and locking pin was not in place. The thread on the right hand wheel hubs are right hand thread, and the cover rotating in the right hand direction would of actually tightened up the wheel nut (this is why the thread on the left hand wheel hubs are left hand thread)
As for the penalty: it's harsh, very harsh. I do agree that a penalty is due, but not one that affects the racing or the fans (I know I would be well pissed off if I'd spent a lot of money on my home GP tickets to find that the FIA have banned my home GP driver)
[IMG]http://campaigns.direct.gov.uk/firekills/images/content/article/2006-campaign.jpg
He got a drive-through for pulling into the path of Fisichella.Massa was punished, he got a drive through
The nut itself was secure when he left - it must have been, as the retaining pin was clearly in place, or the wheel would have fallen off long before turn 8, where it clearly couldn't cope with the forces acting upon it (which it isn't intended to do).
Is your argument for the nut not being in place that a loose wheel stayed solidly in place for half a mile and it should only have been getting tighter, whereas it actually got looser?
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