13-05-2014, 14:57
http://www.jamesallenonf1.com/2014/05/di...panish-gp/
Ferrari – did they give Alonso the advantage over Raikkonen?
By far the most talked about subject after the race was the strategy moves at Ferrari, which led to Fernando Alonso beating his team mate Kimi Raikkonen to the finish, despite qualifying and racing behind him for much of the race.
So did Ferrari give Alonso the better strategy, as some people are claiming?
The first point to make is that 3 stops was not faster than two. Both drivers started the race planning to stop twice, what happened was that Alonso had higher tyre degradation in the second stint and converted to a three stop at that point.
The contentious question is why did Alonso get to make the first stop on lap 16, one lap before Raikkonen? Normally the prerogative lies with the lead car. There are two explanations for this.
One is that Ferrari was trying to get Alonso ahead with a classic under cut, but if that was the case he did not pull it off. Another explanation, Ferrari’s explanation, is that he pitted first because he was under threat from Massa, who had pitted aggressively on lap 15 and they had to cover that stop with Alonso. This worked and so Raikkonen and Alonso remained ahead of the Brazilian into the second stint. The optimum stop lap was 18, so Raikkonen was the closest to that with his stop on lap 17.
According to the team, Alonso then suffered greater tyre degradation in the second stint than Raikkonen and they wanted Alonso to cover Vettel, who was clearly three stopping, so the team switched him to three stops. Raikkonen was informed of this via radio.
Ferrari – did they give Alonso the advantage over Raikkonen?
By far the most talked about subject after the race was the strategy moves at Ferrari, which led to Fernando Alonso beating his team mate Kimi Raikkonen to the finish, despite qualifying and racing behind him for much of the race.
So did Ferrari give Alonso the better strategy, as some people are claiming?
The first point to make is that 3 stops was not faster than two. Both drivers started the race planning to stop twice, what happened was that Alonso had higher tyre degradation in the second stint and converted to a three stop at that point.
The contentious question is why did Alonso get to make the first stop on lap 16, one lap before Raikkonen? Normally the prerogative lies with the lead car. There are two explanations for this.
One is that Ferrari was trying to get Alonso ahead with a classic under cut, but if that was the case he did not pull it off. Another explanation, Ferrari’s explanation, is that he pitted first because he was under threat from Massa, who had pitted aggressively on lap 15 and they had to cover that stop with Alonso. This worked and so Raikkonen and Alonso remained ahead of the Brazilian into the second stint. The optimum stop lap was 18, so Raikkonen was the closest to that with his stop on lap 17.
According to the team, Alonso then suffered greater tyre degradation in the second stint than Raikkonen and they wanted Alonso to cover Vettel, who was clearly three stopping, so the team switched him to three stops. Raikkonen was informed of this via radio.
Fernando es de otro planeta