Force India
Monaco Race: So Near, So Far, So Fun
1 STR from points
By Alianora La Canta
May 27 2009
Force India split its race strategy to convert its excellent qualifying as well as possible. For Adrian, it meant a long, lonely drive to 14th after his super-soft tyres grained badly under the heavy fuel load he carried in the first part of the race. For Giancarlo, it allowed him to get within 1.9 seconds of Force India's first point.
In large part, the fates of the respective Force India drivers were determined on Saturday evening. Monaco generally rewards drivers who take as few stops as late as possible. However, the tyres had to be taken into account as well.The super-soft tyres would give a better start (often the only time overtaking is possible in Monaco) but struggle to make half-distance. Giancarlo, having the better qualifying position, could afford to have a heavier car off the line in return to filling the car with fuel while Adrian would need the super-soft tyres on to have the best possible start.
The start was relatively tidy by Monaco's standards. Giancarlo lost two places off the line, one to Adrian and the other to Sebastien Bourdais. The latter was on the same strategy but crucially had eight kilograms less fuel on board, giving Sebastien the start he needed to eventually deny FIF1 a point.
Unfortunately Adrian's race was compromised when the super-soft tyres on his car grained massively after only a dozen or so laps. The unplanned pit stop lost a significant amount of time, resulting in Adrian finishing 14th. Even so, he was as fast as Lewis Hamilton, who won in Monaco last year but like Adrian saw his strategy fall over in the race.
Giancarlo's race was considerably more eventful. Starting on the harder compound (confusingly called a soft tyre), he found himself in a three-way battle with Sebastién Bourdais and Fernando Alonso. After Sebastien Buemi used Nelson Piquet Jr. as a braking point and Heikki Kovalainen crashed, this turned into the battle for the final point. It was also one of the few battles on the track in the latter phases of the race.
Giancarlo managed to keep Fernando at bay, though Fernando was always in touch and sometimes less than two seconds away. In addition, Sebastién showed signs of cracking under the pressure by cutting the Swimming Pool chicane twice. However, in the race the stewards appeared to be using a "three-strikes-and-out" policy (Felipe Massa also clearly a chicane twice with mere warnings), meaning Sebastién never got the drive-through that would have granted Giancarlo a point.
At the end, there was only 1.9 seconds between Giancarlo and Force India's first point. So near, so far - but so fun watching Force India in a position to fight in the midfield on merit all race. The best individual Force India result since Adrian Sutil in Melbourne - and Vijay wasn't there to celebrate (he was watching Bangalore Royal Challengers miss out on the IPL by six runs).
Not surprisingly, <a href=http://www.pitpass.com/fes_php/pitpass_news_item.php?fes_art_id=38013>the press release</a> was full of effusive praise for all things FIF1. The <a href=http://forceindiaf1.com/index/page_id/776>ForceCast for Monaco has also been posted</a> and the <a href=http://twitter.com/clubforce>Force India Twitter account</a> has been full of updates on what the team has been up to since Monaco.
Digg
Delicious
Facebook
Reddit
Stumbleupon
27/05/2009 12:26
If you do not already have an account Click here to Register.
delete this sentence, this does not make you look dumber than the dumbest.
It's nice to see a bit of own-brewed news in the site! Keep it up!
Cheers,
SdL
Quote:soluto_de_lugol
I don't think it makes Alianora look dumb.
It's nice to see a bit of own-brewed news in the site! Keep it up!
Cheers,
SdL
own-brewed beer is 1000 times better than this
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2009:05:28:13:51:27 by Sunset-Taker.
Also, this is not a brewery. Own-brewed news is possible, but there isn't a HTML protocol for producing beer (there is a spoof one for producing coffee using compatible coffee-makers, but that's not quite the same thing
). And if you think you can "brew" better news yourself, you could always write some using the guidelines in the forum and PM your writing to me. You never know - you could end up on the news page yourself! (That offer, by the way, is valid for anyone on the Force Fans Online forum).
soluto_de_lugol, I did ban Sunset-Taker. Evidently the ban has timed out otherwise he could not have submitted entries to the last two rounds of the predictions competition.
Quote:Alianora La Canta
And if you think you can "brew" better news yourself, you could always write some using the guidelines in the forum and PM your writing to me. You never know - you could end up on the news page yourself! (That offer, by the way, is valid for anyone on the Force Fans Online forum).
then it's already hopeless and senseless to even start the news - and my writing style is way too complex and people would need to know so much in first place that it really would not bring it to a... good end... or whatever
As for the tyre issues just call them hard and soft.The majority know what they are.I to watch thee bbc coverage and watch them get confused with the tyres
Quote:Alianora La Canta
Complex styles can be tidied up
that is what I mean, I would let no one edit my text anyway because it is my own written work - and if others do not understand it they have bad luck and have to live with the fact they are not as smart as they thought they were.
