F1: Hamilton Takes Pole to Set Up Final Showdown

[Glaurung]

The way Hamilton has driven the last 20 laps is ridiculous, motorsport is about driving faster than your opponents.
And the way he replied to the team asking to improve the pace in order to not lose the race: "..if I've lost the world championship I can lose the race.." is dishnourable.
This make Rosber win even more deserved.

 

[yusupov]

"The way Hamilton has driven the last 20 laps is ridiculous, motorsport is about driving faster than your opponents."

and winning races involves passing the guy in front of you. 2 merc DNFs = a rosberg championship so he actually had a fair bit of room to risk, tho if he'd pulled a senna '90 it wouldve been very lame. lewis tried to win the championship, not just the race, & rosberg held his nerve. im sure the competition made the victory sweeter; the fact his sole challenger dared to make him to earn it shouldn't be controversial.

 

[Patrik Marek]

Nico deserved it, happy for him
Would love to see Vettel first, overtaking both of the Mercs , but oh well

 

[Sigwolf]

The way Hamilton has driven the last 20 laps is ridiculous, motorsport is about driving faster than your opponents.
And the way he replied to the team asking to improve the pace in order to not lose the race: "..if I've lost the world championship I can lose the race.." is dishnourable.
This make Rosber win even more deserved.

Give me a break... because Rosberg would have just driven his heart out for the win if he were in the same situation, right? It's about driving faster than your opponents unless that opponent seems to be faster than you, in which case you drive all over the track to block them, as Rosberg has done throughout his career, and numerous times this season. To even pretend that Rosberg's championship is "more deserved" is an absolute joke. He squeaked one out this year due largely to several mechanical failures for Hamilton, nothing more.

 

[Ole Andreasen]

Give me a break... because Rosberg would have just driven his heart out for the win if he were in the same situation, right? It's about driving faster than your opponents unless that opponent seems to be faster than you, in which case you drive all over the track to block them, as Rosberg has done throughout his career, and numerous times this season. To even pretend that Rosberg's championship is "more deserved" is an absolute joke. He squeaked one out this year due largely to several mechanical failures for Hamilton, nothing more.

Well I simply have to disagree with you on that one Sigwolf... but hey - mine is only an opinion too.

 

[Celestiale]

Give me a break... because Rosberg would have just driven his heart out for the win if he were in the same situation, right? It's about driving faster than your opponents unless that opponent seems to be faster than you, in which case you drive all over the track to block them, as Rosberg has done throughout his career, and numerous times this season. To even pretend that Rosberg's championship is "more deserved" is an absolute joke. He squeaked one out this year due largely to several mechanical failures for Hamilton, nothing more.

Hamilton ignored 15 direct orders from his team. 15! That makes the Wehrlein incident uproar looking hilarious in comparison. It's hugely unprofessional, worst, least loyal action in years in that respect. Defending that is just...
Bias can do many things to people..

 

[snyperal]

I've not watched the race, but he must've known the odds of winning the title were slim at best. I understand a bit of gamesmanship but if it really went on for twenty laps then... He, in my opinion, has let himself down.

 

[kmanitou81]

The number of offended snowflakes is too damn high!

 

[Chris]

Had to laugh at some of the comments disapproving of Hamilton's strategy.

If you think Rosberg would've done anything different if he were in Hamilton's position then you know nothing about F1, or competitive environments for that matter. Hamilton had no other choice, and if I were in his position, I'd have done the exact same thing. It was not unsporting, it was not bad behaviour. It was incredibly tactful racing.

He had a chance to win the world championship and did what he could to try and win it knowing full well that if he had driven off into the distance then his chances would be zero. What, would you seriously expect him to just serve up the championship on a silver platter and say "Here you go Nico"?

He's a competitor, and when you're competing for the championship you can't seriously expect someone to be a push over and just hand it to the other. It's like if Federer were down 2 sets to 1 in the Wimbledon final to Murray and then said "Hey Andy, you take this one mate".

And let's be honest, if he hadn't have slowed things down, that would have been the most boring race all season. It was front of the seat enthralling!

But hey, congrats to Nico on a fantastic year! Well deserved! Seems like a genuinely lovely bloke and has driven brilliantly pretty much all year.

 

[paracletus]

Nothing wrong with LH's tactics at all; made the last few laps somewhat interesting in what was otherwise a dire race to watch. the team will fine him, but i doubt he gives a toot.
No need for tl;dr - the driver with most points always deserves DC -- end of.

 

[Nick Hill]

Given that one of the two Merc drivers had to win the championship, I would much prefer Nico (don't care much for Hamilton - seems like the type to roll up the windows and fart in his car because he likes the smell).

That said:

(1) Hamilton is the better racer. Rosberg I don't think is a slouch by any stretch - he has very good pace, I just don't think he has the raw talent to maintain that pace in wheel to wheel situations like Hamilton.

(2) Rosberg did exactly what he needed to do to finish the year at the top of the table - no more, no less. You really can't fault him for that - his championship is every bit as legitimate as anyone elses and my advice to him would be to tune out anyone who wants to paint it as a case of a "tryer" who got lucky.

(3) Hamilton (who, again, I am NO fan of) drove his race today exactly as I would hope someone of his talent and competitiveness would. He set the pole and established himself as race leader - as far as this armchair racer is concerned, it's his right to determine how he wanted to drive that race. He has the level of talent to be able to find tune a lapspeed slow enough to put Nico under threat, but fast enough that Nico didn't have the guts/skills to make a move. Woulda done the same myself.

 

[snyperal]

I'll have to watch the race, some say it was tomfoolery others say it was fair game.

 

[Vojko Music]

Agree or disagree with me but Hamilton has more skill and Rosberg has more luck! Anyways it would be fair from us to congratulate Nico for winning Championship...being his fan or not...

 

[Ole Andreasen]

Agree or disagree with me but Hamilton has more skill and Rosberg has more luck! Anyways it would be fair from us to congratulate Nico for winning Championship...being his fan or not...

I believe that the whole idea of having a muliple race champioship - is to rule out the luck factor. You can be lucky in one race - or two - possible even three - but you cannot become world champion over all the races it takes, because of luck... I simply don´t believe that.

But again... is´t just my opinion. Your opinion is just as valid.

 

[Vojko Music]

I believe that the whole idea of having a muliple race champioship - is to rule out the luck factor. You can be lucky in one race - or two - possible even three - but you cannot become world champion over all the races it takes, because of luck... I simply don´t believe that.

But again... is´t just my opinion. Your opinion is just as valid.

Yes, I agree with you on that point. It's not all about luck or skill. It's all about the mix of both

 

[grahamw]

I think the fact that Hamilton tried to find a way to win a world championship which basically has been thrown away by his team should be admired and something which has been lacking in F1 with Mercedes showing such superiority through the whole season.

Mercedes wanted a easy 1-2 without incident and Hamilton was prepared to risk that to have a faint possibility of still taking the championship. You could argue he acted a bit like a spoilt child when things didn't go his way but surely that's better than no passion what so ever.

I thought team orders were supposed to have been a thing of the past.

The changes to F1 next year may bring some other teams closer to Mercedes making the racing more exciting, but in reality apart from the Interlagos GP most of the races this year have had little to excite the race fans after the opening few corners.

Congratulations should of course go to Nico following in his father Keke's footsteps but you can't help but feel in the head to head with both cars running things might not have ended quite the same way but that's motor racing it's not all about the drivers?

 

[k_badam]

One thing i really don't understand is why people were complaining about the fact the Hamilton was slowing Rosberg down, has no one heard of the concept 'overtaking' or is it just me? In my eyes Rosberg was using his own inability to pass as an excuse to whine to the team about the fact that Hamilton was slow.

This just reminded me of something, the team. What did they say at the start of race? Well they didn't seem to care at the start. When (i think it was DC talking to Lauda near the start of the race) the TV people talked to Mercedes he seemed to say that Lewis can back the field up, but we don't recommend it. This is contradictory, something that is okay if you say sorry and explain why but they just said that he had to speed up, not polite, no sorry's, almost shouting. That sort of thing puts drivers off, shouting, when i race, i don't want someone screaming at me on teamspeak telling me to do this or to do that, it just puts me off. If they put Hamilton off when he is going round a corner or whatever and he makes a mistake due to this and Rosberg piles into the back of him, i am sure no one would be happy.

And Mercedes should have been happy, the constructors was secured a few races ago, only two drivers, both Mercedes could win the drivers championship. The fact that the TV cameras were glued to the cars (very rare due to the domination) is great for Mercedes and their sponsors, more money = more development.