Originally Posted by
vcs316
Here you go:
The Singapore Grand Prix lights were a little too dim for some on the pitwall to think straight, and Ferrari ended up with a very disgruntled driver taking second in its first 1-2 finish of the year by accidentally reversing its cars' positions with its strategy.
But, actually, the main team-management problem in Singapore happened at Mercedes, rather than Ferrari.
Firstly, both Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas were left out too long on the softs when the writing was clearly on the wall after Sebastian Vettel had pitted at the end of lap 19 of 61.
But they kept on running despite losing over a second a lap, with Bottas not stopping until lap 22 and Hamilton lap 26 - even though Mercedes could see how the Vettel/Charles Leclerc situation was playing out.
The pace at the front of the race meant every driver knew that, on a fresh set of tyres, they could find a minimum of two seconds per lap. But with Leclerc backing everyone up to keep the gaps in traffic to a minimum, the decisions were all being made with track position post-stop in mind.
Looking just at Hamilton, Vettel and Max Verstappen the gaps were minimal. So Hamilton could have done exactly the same thing as Vettel and Verstappen. Even if he had done it a lap later, by which point Vettel had dropped into a clear track and shown everyone just how fast a top car on fresh hards could be, he would not have lost as much time and could have come out in a position to attack.
Instead, Mercedes ran both drivers long on tyres that were well past their best, in Hamilton's case mainly in the hope of a safety car. Unfortunately for Mercedes, this wasn't a repeat of 2008 when, for 'some reason' the safety car came out just at the right time for Fernando Alonso after his Renault team-mate Nelson Piquet Jr crashed. The safety car did come out three times, but all far too late to help Hamilton.
What I don't understand is that the teams have the tools to predict where a car will drop into traffic after a pitstop. It's not rocket science and sometimes you have to have confidence that a five-time world champion, one of the best overtakers out there and in a car that is the class of the field, might just be able to pull off passes on the likes of Lance Stroll and Pierre Gasly.
Secondly, ordering Bottas to run to a specific lap time so that he and the following Alex Albon didn't get ahead of Hamilton shows that whatever his new contract for 2020 says, Bottas is the definite number two at Mercedes.
A team swapping places as the race nears an end because of differing strategies to optimise one driver's points is one thing, but to slow down your second driver before even half-distance is ridiculous and it threw away any chance of Bottas improving his position later in the race.
Team boss Toto Wolff admitted it was a "not great" call to make. Bottas - who had already been unsettled by some qualifying tactics confusion with Hamilton on Saturday - said he could accept the instruction to slow down and hold Albon up because he knew under Mercedes' intra-team rules Hamilton had tactical priority as fastest qualifier.
But the driver ahead getting first call on pitstops is acceptable. The driver behind being asked to slow down so their team-mate stays ahead of them after a pitstop is a step beyond. And though Bottas was adamant Hamilton would get the same order if their situations were reversed, fans are getting very used to seeing Bottas coming off second-best in these decisions.
There was no problem with what Ferrari did. Leclerc was upset that his team called in Vettel a lap earlier that he was, meaning the four-time world champion was able to pull off the undercut and go on to win. But the Vettel stop was a reaction to Verstappen, who was about to pit, and to attack Hamilton. What else could Ferrari do?
Vettel's pace on the new hard tyres in clear air was better than Ferrari expected, giving a more powerful undercut, and given that the team needs to get his confidence back, it wasn't necessarily a bad thing for him to win.
Ferrari got a 1-2 and, in reality, it doesn't matter who wins and who is second. Had Vettel not pitted when he did, Ferrari would not have finished first and second. It was the right strategy, even if Leclerc was unhappy with it.
Leclerc was fairly emotional when he got the news that this wasn't going to be his third win in a row and he was clearly hoping Ferrari would swap them back. But this race could so easily have gone the other way for Vettel and then we would be criticising Ferrari for getting it wrong.
I've criticised Ferrari at times this season, but recently the team has shown that it's getting its act together and it got this strategy completely right. Ferrari took the bull by the horns and committed to that early call, then Vettel took no prisoners while cutting through the traffic.
It was great to see that Ferrari had an upgrade that levelled the playing field at a track where everyone thought Mercedes, or perhaps Red Bull, would dominate.
The theory that Ferrari's main problem was not being able to generate enough downforce was, in my opinion, a bit questionable. Its real problem was getting the front end to balance the car when it was running high downforce levels.
This all seems to be a thing of the past now - or that's what it looks like at face value. We'll find out more in Russia this weekend.
There has never been a Formula 1 race at Sochi not won by a Mercedes driver, so the champion team won't take things lying down, which can only enhance the battle over the rest of the season.
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FERRARI FOR EVER !!!!!!!
We would find out if indeed we have solved all our gremlins in the final 6 races of the season.
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