.:: 2008 Bahrain GP Thread ::.

.:: 2008 Bahrain GP ::.

Welcome to the 2008 Bahrain GP thread, where you can discuss anything to do with this weekend's race. cjek will update the thread with the latest times as they happen.

RANDOM FACT

It's another Kimi one: With exceptions to his retirement in the first ever Bahrain GP, Raikkonen has finished 3rd at every GP held here.

POINTS OF DISCUSSION:

1. With Abu Dhabi to join the calendar next year, do you feel that Bahrain could be pushed off in the future?
2. McLaren are being put in the last garage this weekend - do you feel it is more fairer to keep to traditions or to allow these movements to happen?
3. After a calm victory in Australia and a dominant victory in Malaysia, who do you think has the upper hand at the moment - Lewis, or Kimi?
4. How much of a challenge do you believe BMW can make after their surprisingly strong opening races? Is a race win possible without luck from McLaren/Ferrari issues?

ITV-F1 PRESENTS LIVE STREAMING OF THE BAHRAIN GRAND PRIX WEEKEND: FRIDAY PRACTICES, QUALIFYING & THE RACE

1. kinda hope it gets pushed off xD..... Have you ever noticed nobody (except for rich people) come to that grand prix??

2. To me it doesnt make much of a difference.... But I have to say being put behind Force India has to be at least a little insulting :P

3. Kimi..... I feel that if his car hold up till the end... He will win..... But then again... We havent seen a fair race for both of em' yet this year... Hard..... Very hard to predict....

4. Uhm.... I think BMW are on luck right now......

1. Bahrain will stay for as long as there contract states, then I'm not sure, they have won awards for the excellent facilities but the race is in a country of something like 250,000 hardly the BOOMING economy Mr Retard Ecclestone searches for.

McLaren will now be in either the best or worst place for getting out of the garage come quali but they will struggle to accomodate all their "stuff" in the smallest garage.

I hope to see Kimi win here, but I'm seeing Massa coming back strong, Kimi has never been stellar here so we'll see how the weekend goes.

BMW can perform on par with McLaren at times so their Qualifying pace will be crucial to giving McLaren a headache.

1) I'm personally not a big fan of this track, so it wouldn't bother me wether or not its put off the calendar or not. we'll just have to wait and see...

2) This might pose a bit of a problem during quali, but since they'll probably be the last out on track it means they can't hold anyone up right? But to be honest, I think they should be there every race. Its only fair to have them at the bottom of the paddock, even if they do have a lot of stuff.

3) I'm going for Kimi on this one. I think he's just started to show us what the F2008 can do! or maybe i'm just biased because i'm a Kimi fan :?

4) AS much as I want to see Kimi win, I think BMW are going to give them a run for their money. They'll be ready to take on Ferrari and McLaren at the slightest slip-up they make, so I have a feeling we may see a 3-team race quite soon :)

I hate to say it, but mosley's nazi sex story is gonna overshadow the whole thing besides the actual action on trac

Conditions are expected to be windy, so there is the posibility of sand being blown onto the track. Add this to the no TC, could be rather interesting to see them control themselves.

Looks like it's a Ferarri weekend at the moment

Hamilton has gone off heavily:

...and now the live streaming video box isn't even showing up at all. Good one ITV.Redders1989

It's lunch time. What do expect? Instead going out for a cigarette break everybody's in their offices logging on to watch Live Practice.

Once again Ferarri show that this weekend is theirs. It's too close to call in the midfield, but Williams and BMW look to have the upper hand.

I think the dust on the track as Redders was pointing out caught out lewis, and he lost the rear end, shame, but i'm sure they can repair that car for the morning.

Looks quite a rough accident though.

WHAT THE ****!?!?!

"Sorry, rights restrictions prevent us from displaying this video content to users outside the UK"ITV-F1

HOW AM I OUTSIDE OF THE UK!?!?! I'M IN THE SAME SHIRE AS SILVERSTONE!!

Disappointed with ITV's lack of being able to find where on earth I actually am, I decided to file this complaint to them:

I understand if this gets modded off (ED: I posted this in the forums section, as I've yet to find an official place to complain), but either way, I would like an answer to this issue which cost me an hour of Friday Practice 2.

Enclosed is a screenshot I took from the "Track Highlights" Session to see if I would be able to view the highlights of what I missed in FP2 when the Live Streaming feature refused to even show up, let alone appear but buffer. It was to my horror that, after finding the feature would not appear again, that I saw the text at the bottom of this screenshot:

This is not acceptable at all. I live, and was watching this service from, my home county of Northamptonshire, where the British GP of Silverstone is held. So unless Silverstone is no longer in the United Kingdom either, I would like to know why such an issue should've ever occurred in the first place.

I understand being a new feature for 2008 that teething problems were inevitable, so I accepted the problems that happened in Australia. However, it has been three weeks since then, so to have half an hour of no action whilst "Live Streaming will resume soon" (or along those lines) took place, and then to be told I've magically moved outside the UK without doing anything at all a third of the way in to FP2, seems a little worrying considering we're now three weeks past Melbourne and you have had plenty of opportunities to sort these little problems out. I'm not saying it should be absolutely perfect, of course there will be buffering issues, but those two major points I have just made are unacceptable considering the amount of time there has been for ITV to sort out these issues.

Please get in touch soon on what you are going to do to ensure such problems do not occur again.

Thanks for your co-operation.

A completely unpredictable session, with Hamilton, Raikkonen, Kovalainen and Heidfeld struggling for pace, while Rosberg topped the times. Interesting qualifying session coming right up..

FIA CONFIRMS MINIMUM LAP TIME FOR QUALIFYING:

Any driver deemed to be driving unnecessarily slowly during their out- or in-laps during qualifying, or during the reconnaissance laps for which the pit lane is open prior to the race, or in a manner which might endanger other drivers, will be reported to the stewards, the FIA have announced.

As far as Bahrain is concerned, this means cars leaving the pits will be timed between the second safety car line (50 metres before Turn One) and the first safety car line (after Turn 15), and any car exceeding a time of 1m 39s between these points will be deemed to have been driven unnecessarily slowly.

The move is designed to prevent drivers on flying qualifying laps being impeded by drivers travelling more slowly. It follows the five-place grid penalties handed to both McLaren drivers at the last round in Malaysia, where Heikki Kovalainen and Lewis Hamilton were judged to have hampered the progress of rivals.

SOURCE: F1 OFFICIAL WEBSITE

Excellent lap by Kubica to get that pole position. So perhaps Ferarri weren't as quick as expected, or maybe they've loaded up with fuel and could storm to a 1-2 finish tomorrow

Haha :lol:

cjek says on Kubica's lap: Excellent
Kubica says on Kubica's lap: Quite Good :P

FERNANDO YOU ******* :evil:

That was NOT accidental, that was a clear slow-down, that wasn't even "not getting enough acceleration"...

I DEMAND REVENGE! :lol:

Need to see Alonso's telementary I guess...

This is an awful day :(

I think it was a combination of Alonso getting revenge and Hamilton pushing hard after losing so many places. Of course we'd need to see telemetry to see how much of it was down to Alonso.

Interesting to see that BMW outpaced McLaren, but also were faster than the Ferarri's at times. We could be in for a 3 way constructor battle, which also means there are 6 drivers who could potentially challenge for the drivers title.

no post-race press conference, maybe because hamilton didnt finish on the podium ?mjk1

Haha :lol: Good one

Probably too busy wanting to get the whole team to attack Alonso :lol:

Let's see what the telementary says though...

no post-race press conference, maybe because hamilton didnt finish on the podium ?mjk1

They showed it in Malaysia though, so it's strange that they didn't show it this time. Last year they occasionally showed the first 1 or 2 drivers, but to show none was just pointless.

DRIVERS QUOTEBOARD: BAHRAIN

Kimi Raikkonen - Finished 2nd/Q4

Second place was the best I could hope for on a weekend which was definitely not the best for me. These eight points move me into the lead of the championship and that is definitely a reason for me to leave Bahrain reasonably satisfied.

I never found the ideal balance. Sometimes you get weekends like this but I am convinced that in Barcelona the situation will be different. My first pit stop was not very quick because we had a problem with the lights, but it definitely did not affect the final result.

Felipe Massa - Finished 1st/Q2

Sensational! Finally, after a start to the championship under dark clouds, I can see the sunshine again. We kept our concentration all weekend long and this is the result. We knew we could count on a great car and that certainly proved to be the case, given that I never had to push to the maximum once I was in the lead.

I made a good start, managing to overtake Robert. Then there were a few difficult laps because of oil on track between turns five and eight, but I was always in control. Clearly, I always had in mind what happened in Malaysia so I tried to pay attention all the time to ensure I brought the car home. It is nice to be back in the winner's position here at Sakhir, a track I have always liked.


BMW SAUBER

Nick Heidfeld - Finished 4th/Q6

Now after the race I'm much happier than I was yesterday. Finishing fourth is a positive result after what was a difficult weekend for me. The car's balance on this track was just not how I wanted it to be. I hope I won't have such troubles again.

Finishing the race just one position behind my team-mate, who started from pole while I was sixth, is a good result. I enjoyed overtaking Jarno Trulli and Heikki Kovalainen. Once again for us in the team everything went smoothly.

Robert Kubica - Finished 3rd/Q1

I am happy with the result. This is my second consecutive podium and the team is leading the constructors' championship. Unfortunately I had massive wheelspin at the start and hit some debris in the first corner of the second lap.

When I drove through the oil I was sure I had punctured my tyre as at that point I didn't have the information about the oil. But this was a great day for the team. I am now looking forward to Barcelona.

RENAULT

Fernando Alonso - Finished 10th/Q10

The race was difficult, as I had expected. Our qualifying yesterday in Q3 had been a big surprise, but we knew that our race pace would not allow us to do much better in the race.

We are still missing some speed but we hope to improve in Barcelona.

Nelson Piquet - DNF/Q14

I made a good start and the car was working well, then I suffered a gearbox problem. I tried to continue but it became dangerous and my engineers asked me to retire so that we would avoid a penalty in the next race.

The result is not what we wanted, but I was able to learn a lot again this weekend and that is what I need to keep doing. I will now try to prepare as best I can for the next race, and try to make the most of the next test in Barcelona in 10 days' time.


WILLIAMS

Nico Rosberg - Finished 8th/Q8

In the final analysis I guess I should go home happy as we got a point, but I don't feel satisfied. We should have done better. However it was very difficult out there: the tyre performance was very changeable and the wind conditions were different to Friday when we set our gear ratios, and in the end the car was just not good enough.

So we have got some work to do before the Spanish GP. Historically Barcelona is a difficult track for us, but we have got some new developments for the car, so I hope this will help for the next race.

Kazuki Nakajima - Finished 14th/Q16

It was not an easy day for me. I had a very bad start and then I had a spin on the oil on lap two before the high-speed esses, so it couldn't have begun any worse.

After that I managed to keep up a consistent pace, but it was difficult to make any more progress through the field than up to P14 from the back. I will see what lessons we can learn from here for the next race in Barcelona.


RED BULL RACING

David Coulthard - Finished 18th/Q17

I didn't make the best of starts. I really just wanted to get through the first corner and stay out of trouble, but unfortunately I became a bit of a pinball as a couple of cars bounced off either side of me. That caused some damage to my car; I got a puncture and had to make a pit stop.

The car was quite slow after that, but I was battling for position with Jenson, who was quicker. We got too close in one corner and had an incident, which took him out of the race and caused more damage to my car. I came into the pits again and changed the front wing. That made the car feel a little bit better, but it wasn't a great race.

Mark Webber - Finished 7th/Q11

The guys did a good job here all weekend. There were quite a few incidents in the first few laps, which we were able to capitalise on. The first lap went okay for us, but it was very tight on the track; you always have to be careful here on the first few corners.

There was oil or something on the track at the start, which made things difficult. After that I got my head down and spent the rest of the afternoon chasing Jarno Trulli.


TOYOTA

Jarno Trulli - Finished 6th/Q7

I'm delighted with another finish in the top six today. We finished right behind the top three teams so that is the most we could expect from this weekend. I made a strong start and I was able to gain a couple of places into the first corner.

The car was well balanced, I knew I was quick and we had a good strategy so I just got my head down. The car's pace was very strong, both cars finished and we looked very competitive. This result gives us a boost for the future.

Timo Glock - Finished 9th/Q13

That was a good race today and overall I was happy with the car. It was a big improvement for my driving s_tyle and I also made some small adjustments during the race which helped. The early laps were interesting with all the guys around me crashing into each other. That made it tricky with the oil in the first and middle sectors.

We could have made the points but I lost speed when I was chasing Nico Rosberg in the middle of the race. It was quite hard to fend off Fernando Alonso after that but in the end I'm happy to have finished. The car was really good in terms of set-up; now we just have to keep working on improving the rest.


SCUDERIA TORO ROSSO

Sebastien Bourdais - Finished 15th/Q15

I did the best I could, trying to drive as consistently as possible, making no mistakes. For a while I had a problem with the brakes. On the plus side, I have completed another race distance, feeling fine at the end of it, which is satisfying. But at the end of the day, I qualified 15th and finished 15th.

Maybe we did not make the best tyre choice for the start as I was very slow, but as soon as we switched to the option, it was much more competitive. A trouble-free race, a race with not much excitement either, but a useful experience.

Sebastian Vettel - DNF/Q19

I had a really good start this time after not so good ones in the previous two races. I was off like a rocket and I was able to pass two or three cars. Then going into first corner, when I was in the inside, I was blocked. We were really tight and I collided with a Force India.

My front wing was a bit damaged but this was not the main problem, which came in turn four when someone arriving from the inside hit me on the right rear, causing the big damage that forced me to retire. I do not know who he was and what he wanted to do. It's really disappointing as we could have had a good race, but we will try again next time.


HONDA RACING

Jenson Button - DNF/Q9

I got a good start and was able to make up a couple of places off the line and then I'm not sure what happened into turn five. I was hit from behind, got a puncture and had to pit, which really ruined my race from the first lap. After we'd changed the tyres, the pace of the car was really good and I felt very comfortable with the balance.

I caught up with David quite quickly as he seemed to be struggling and I had a go at passing him down into turn eight. Unfortunately he moved back over to the racing line late in the braking zone and I had nowhere to go and couldn't slow the car down in time. We had to retire as there was significant damage to the rear of the car.

Rubens Barrichello - Finished 11th/Q12

I didn't have a very good start and it was chaotic on the first lap with others going off the track. After that I was stuck behind Fisichella and lost a lot of time until the team did a great job with my first pit stop to get me out ahead of him on the road. From then on, the car felt good and I could start closing the gap to the pack ahead.

Overall we have had a very positive weekend in Bahrain. The car has shown the pace required to make Q3 and the lap times look good from the race today. Unfortunately we lacked the straight-line speed necessary to overtake on the long straights here today, which compromised our race. I'm confident that the developments that we have coming for the next few races will see us continue to improve and enable us to challenge for points.


SUPER AGURI

Takuma Sato - Finished 17th/Q22

I had an eventful few opening laps and I really enjoyed going through the middle of the pack. I had a little bit of contact and possibly damaged the aero, but nevertheless I got up to 14th position and that was exciting.

After the first lap there was quite a lot of oil on the track and that was a dangerous situation, but we got over it and I think that we had a good race. We had a problem in the second pit stop, which cost me position, but in the end it was very important that we finished the race here today and hopefully we can keep up the momentum.

Anthony Davidson - Finished 16th/Q21

It was an enjoyable race today. To come home with another two-car finish is great for the team. I had a bit of traffic for the first two stints of the race, but then once that cleared I was able to get into a good rhythm.

It was another strong race for me and I would like to thank the team for all their hard work this weekend.


FORCE INDIA

Giancarlo Fisichella - Finished 12th/Q18

I had a good start and I overtook some cars in turn one and then some more when some cars spun in turn seven. Our pace was consistent so I had a good race. In the middle stint there were some problems with the soft tyres and they did not seem to work as well as they could have, but at the end of the race the hard tyres were working well and I was comfortable.

I am really happy about my race, the team has done a good job so far and we just need to improve the car a little bit more and then we will be there.

Adrian Sutil - Finished 19th/Q20

An unlucky race for us. After quite a good start I had an accident in the first corner and lost my front wing and punctured my left tyre so I had to go into the pits. I managed to get back and change the nose and tyres so at least I could do a race distance.

The race turned out quite okay without major incidents. The car felt much better but I had some problems with the radio so I came into too early for my second pit stop. The race was a bit messy from that point of view, but at least I could finish and collect some information for the next race.


MCLAREN

Lewis Hamilton - Finished 13th/Q3

I am really disappointed and feel like I let the team down today as I always am the first to blame myself. The whole weekend has not been ideal, starting with the accident on Friday, but I will keep my chin up and bounce back at the next race. I messed up at the start as I didn't hit the switch early enough and therefore had not engaged the correct engine setting, and the anti-stall kicked in.

I lost a lot of places but things were still salvageable at that point. Then I had the incident with Fernando. I was behind him, and I moved to the right, and he moved to the right and that was it - a racing incident I guess. I am confident that we have the pace to be fighting at the front so the confidence is still there. There is a long way to go in the championship and I intend to win it.

Heikki Kovalainen - Finished 5th/Q5

Quite a tough race today. I made a great start and overtook Kimi coming into turn two, but then outbraked myself in turn four and he regained his position. I then went in too deep at turn eight and flat-spotted my right-front tyre, which caused a lot of vibration. It vibrated so much that I was worried something would fall off the car.

Things improved in the second stint and the car worked really well towards the end when we changed to the prime tyre. Fifth was the maximum I could do today. However we still scored points on a difficult day, and that is the main thing. I have total commitment to the team and a good car, and I know we will keep working hard to improve for the start of the European races.

SOURCE: ITV-F1

According to ITV, Alonso's telementary shows no lifting or braking during the incident, thus leaving Alonso's struggle for pace out of turn 3 unexplainable.Redders1989

Transmission issues maybe? Or was Hamilton that stepped on the pedal?

Could it be that the Renault was suffering lots of oversteer? during the race, the car looked a real handful to drive, so could a bit of wheelspin coming out of 3 caught Fernando out?

The thing that strikes me with the oversteer for Alonso, he has always prefered a lil bit of understeer to his set-up.

1. The Bahrain International Circuit has nice high-speed straights, fast corners, it's tough on the brakes and tires as well. If Abu Dhabi can't offer a bigger challenge and more, the BIC isn't going anywhere.

2. I don't think it makes a difference where their pit garage is. By the time Ferrari finishes their pitstop, McLaren will have just started; but when Ferrari reaches the end of the pit lane, thanks to the 80 kph speed limit, McLaren will have finished as well. This is assuming all things go according to plan, of course.

3. Too early to say. Both Raikkonen and Hamilton have shown that they're capable of winning races and driving their cars fast and hard. Lewis' race at Bahrain was just bad luck. He will bounce back and when he does, you can expect the title race will be as close as last year.

4. BMW-Sauber have shown that they are capable of keeping up with the Ferraris and McLarens. Although they will get owned in terms of straight-line speed, developments within the season will hopefully improve their performance. After seeing Kubica on pole, a race win seems possible. It's only a matter of time.