iSport F1 Pitstop: The Red Bulls did the unthinkable in Turkey – they almost took each other out. iSporter Kunal Shah shares his view on the Vettel-Webber crash. A crash that he believes could well have an impact on the 2010 World Championship.
War of the Bulls literally it was at the Turkish Grand Prix. Red Bulls after having set the pace at yet another GP this season were found fighting each other at the front of the field and not surprisingly though. Mark Webber had yet another pole on Saturday and Sebastian Vettel’s pit-stop was well timed to jump Hamilton for second place.
Well so then what just happened? How the hell did only one Bull see the flag when the team could’ve registered yet another 1-2 this season?
There are multiple stories floating around. But let’s just stick to the obvious. Let’s assess what exactly happened on the track based on TV visuals.
Mark Webber showed tremendous pace in the GP, but however, was always closely followed by Lewis Hamilton before the first round of pit-stops and his team-mate Sebastian Vettel after. While Mark’s pace wasn’t unbeatable, it surely was difficult to match for the cars behind him.
Mark, who is otherwise lauded for his flawless driving, had a mid-race error that saw him lose pace and consequently position to his team-mate Sebastian Vettel. However, it was only a few inches that Vettel could manage to go past Mark and both the Bulls had a clash that took out Vettel and his Randy Mandy.
While the F1 world is evenly divided in their support to Webber and Vettel, the Red Bull camp does seem to be biased in support of Vettel. However, in my opinion, the crash was of course avoidable and I would blame both the drivers for it. Here’s my view of the crash:
Mark Webber made an error the previous corner, only to see Vettel up and close next to him. Vettel had barely a car’s width between the white line and Webber’s car, but of course he chose to go for it. While both drivers were wheel to wheel, Vettel’s on board footage shows a straight steering angle on and just before impact.
While its only fair to make being overtaken tough, once the move was made, Webber should’ve given Vettel some room. Vettel’s move was fair and he made one the corner after Webber made a mistake. The Red Bull management have anyways released a statement saying that Webber was on fuel-saving mode and hence slower on the straights. My belief is that both drivers are to blame for the mishap. However, I think Webber is slightly more to blame, however, only slightly!
The next couple of weeks will be interesting, but certainly Red Bull will need to sort of these driver differences if they are to focus on their first ever World Championship title. First fragile cars and now I hope its not fragile driver mindsets that they have to deal with this season.
See the final Driver's Championship and Constructor's Championship standings on iSport.
Kunal Shah is a former racer and can be contacted on This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it . Read more of Kunal's work here.
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Kunal Shah
said:
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... No, infact, I am more of a Webber fan. He's been the underdog but has outperformed Vettel in the last three GPs. I am just being fair in whatever it is that i have seen and known. |
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