Why Did They Pit Hamilton Under The Safety Car?

[ToraToraTora]

What a balls up! I cannot understand the thinking.

[ToraToraTora]

you are talking absolute rot sunshine.

[BRIGHT SPARK]

TTT..if you have to resort to name calling and cheap comments its time to move on.Is there no limit to your arrogance and ignorance?

[BRIGHT SPARK]

.....sunshine :-)

[Bazile]

//..we must have viewed via different cameras then!..//

Well you certainly must have - i saw no bratish behaviour from Hamilton .

Considering that he dominated the whole weekend in practice , qualifying and the race ; only to lose the race because of a balls up by the strategists ; i think he behaved very profesionally and maturely

What did you see that was bratish behaviour ? - I seriously would like to know .

[BRIGHT SPARK]

Baz......my comment about Lewis is not a direct result of this years Monaco GP, its an opinion built up from years of viewing F1 both from the armchair and live.Talking to tech guys working at McLaren in Woking during the Lewis Jenson seasons compounds my opinion.Ron Dennis warned Lewis to curb his temper especially if cameras were around.He just managed to achieve this on Sunday.He then left the circuit in a rush........and took his ball with him.
His ex...Nicole kicked him out of bed because he would sulk for a month if he could'nt come first :-)

[scorpiojo]

:o)

[shoota]

Surprised nobodies blamed the Tory government......


Yet.

[BRIGHT SPARK]

Mikey may be along later.

[New Judge]

I've been away for the weekend and recorded the race which I have just watched. Gutted is not enough.

Last year I had conspiracy theories at Mercedes in my mind. They've surfaced again. There was absolutely no reason in the world to pit Lewis. Pitting is a risk (the car can fall off the jack, a wheelnut can get stuck, etc. etc.). No need to pit unless necessary.

There was no need to pit Lewis:

- His tyres were newer certainly than Nico's and I think newer than Vettel's;

- There was no sign of them degrading;

- It was obvious that at most ten and probably a few as seven or eight racing laps remained;

- There was no need to "cover off" anything Ferrari might have done - if Vettel had pitted he would have emerged behind where he went in;

- Overtaking is practically impossible at Monaco and Lewis had the faster car anyway.

Nothing pointed to a pitstop. I have not listened to the post-race comments as I was disgusted with Mercedes' actions. I know that teams sometimes have to make quick decisions and they will sometimes get it wrong. But I cannot see any reason whatsoever to have pitted Lewis. It should not have been up for debate and at the moment, until I clam down, this stinks.

[BRIGHT SPARK]

NJ....my thoughts are...the pit wall could see all garages preparing for stops and Lewis had indicated a concern about temperature and degrading.A split second decision was made to pit, however they did'nt realise that Vettel would stay out.They then left Nico out to reduce points damage.

[New Judge]

Maybe, BS, maybe (I still haven't calmed down yet!)

The flaw in that theory is that, had Vettel pitted he would have emerged no better than third (and probably worse than that) and would have had both Nico and Lewis to overtake in well under ten laps.

[BRIGHT SPARK]

NJ ...hindsight..:-)

[New Judge]

No, not hindsight, BS, foresight.

You needed no "data" (which Mercedes seem to be relying on in their explanations) to see that Vettel was third, would have remained third (at best) if he had pitted and would have had just six or seven laps to overtake both Mercedes cars on a track where only one decent overtaking move was successful during the previous seventy laps. Mercedes did not make the wrong call - there was no call to make.

[New Judge]

And both Mrs New Judge and I made that assumption when it was first mooted that Lewis would be brought in (without the benefit of any "data")!

[ukbod2015]

Why do people like "bright" spark have it in for Hamilton they go on as if they know him personally maybe it's just jealousy but having met him he's a very personable man who wears his feelings a bit to close to the surface.

[Hypognosis]

No-one had mentioned it yet but did any of you notice the engine note of the safety car? For a street circuit, he was pretty much gunning it! It is only coincidence that it is also a Mercedes. No conspiracies there. No connection to the team.

I only raise it as it may be the team pitted Lewis on the basis of prior experience of the laptime of the safety car in previous years. This one just happened to be a second or two quicker, just enough for Vettel to shut the door when he saw Hamilton emerging. It is quite a long pit exit/blend zone.

To the best of my knowledge there are no stats on safety car laps for the commentators to quote.