Did Toyota Tell T Glock To Slow And Allow Hamilton To Gain His Place

Mike_B · November 3, 2008

Lewis has all night and all the off-season to celebrate with Nicole, and she wasn't the one who gave him the championship win by providing him with a great car and good tactics. Unlike Rob Dennis, and Lewis' father and brother, she hasn't believed in him and supported and encouraged him since he was in his early teens. So not really any wonder that he wanted to celebrate right there and then with the people who made it all possible!!

Besides, we only saw perhaps 60 seconds worth of film, and it wasn't exactly fly-on-the-wall rolling coverage. Smooching with the missus isn't as good TV as the new champion jumping up and down spraying champagne everywhere, perhaps the director just picked his coverage?

DJ Wozza · November 3, 2008

Hope this clears things up for anyone thinking about conspiracy theories

From the ITV F1 website

Lap 66 – Hamilton pits, Glock is 20 seconds behind him.
Lap 67 – Hamilton rejoins and Glock is now eight seconds ahead.

Lap 68 – Glock is 10 seconds ahead.

Lap 69 – Vettel passes Hamilton, Glock is 15 seconds up.

Lap 70 – Hamilton takes three seconds out of his lead.

Lap 71 – Glock loses 13 seconds in sectors one and two. Hamilton’s final lap is 1m26s, Glock’s is 1m 44.731s. Trulli, who also stayed on dry tyres, does a similar lap time.

Gamble by Toyota to stay on dry tyres which almost worked for them, ended up allowing

Hamilton to regain 5th & the 2008 F1 Title

TomC27 · November 3, 2008

I don't think Glock 'let' Lewis pass as if Glock finished ahead of Lewis Toyata would have been 4th in the constructors title - I read he gambled on staying out on dry tyres but it became too wet.

Wozza - as other posts have said you only need the 'rain' light on if you are on wet or intermediate tyres.

Funny the FIA havn't come back to say Lewis took too long to replace his steering wheel - lol, a big thank you must go to that official guy that made Lewis put it on as Lewis couldn't seem to get it back on and was going to walk away !!!!

Great win by Lewis - felt a little sorry for Massa (not enough to enjoy Lewis win - lol) but think overall Lewis & McClaren deserved it.

Chris.S · November 3, 2008

plus he also has no rear flashing light either ?

he was running on slicks so the light doesnt flash. its only used when in the pits or when wet tyres are fitted.

spikes · November 3, 2008

roll on next season, went to the 2008 f1 gp great day out :)

Scarlet Pimpernell · November 5, 2008

I think it was a brilliant race, and had it been anyone other than vettel in those conditions, Lewis would have finished 4th. I don't think it was fixed either - Toyota would never give up championship points like that...else they would not have gambled on staying out on grooved tyres...

I also don't think the mcLaren was all that good on that track. It din't look quick enough- and I don't know if they had detuned it slightly to conserve the engine and mak sure it didn't go POP - it was on it's 2nd race in Lewis's car...dunno if they do things like that, but only once did he lap anywhere near to Massa's time - so may be he was driving carefully...

One thing I noted was the Hamilton's rear light flashed throughout the whole race (regardless of the tyres), and as we watched him going round, my son and I were wondering at point he would get a stop go penalty, or lose his points LOL for dazzling The Ferrari pit crew...

I suppose he must be kicking himself -had he won it last year he would have had 2 in a row...at the age of 23!

PS - I know that they move to all slicks again (yipee) but what other changes are a comin'?

Monster-Mat · November 5, 2008

PS - I know that they move to all slicks again (yipee) but what other changes are a comin'?

A move back to slick tires, a reduction in downforce , a ban on many aero appendages and the introduction of KERS (Kinetic Energy Recovery Systems)

It's the sort of challenge that engineers thrive on, but on the other hand they are understandably concerned about getting it right. The biggest problem is deciding how to split R&D resources between the current season and next year's project. With relatively minor changes in recent times, teams have settled into a routine in terms of when and how they make the changeover, but that's all changed.
It's especially hard for the teams that will be challenging for the title and risk compromising their 2009 package by focusing too intently on this year's battle. It's a real issue for those teams with access to only one wind tunnel – and that includes some of the big names – while those known to have top level CFD departments (notably BMW Sauber) will clearly be a step ahead.

The KERS question was brought into focus on Saturday morning, when it was a key subject of discussion at a meeting of Bernie Ecclestone and team principals at the Toyota motorome, which was also attended by technical directors. Some teams are clearly further down the line than others with their projects, and sources says the discussions were more about the longer term development of KERS, as the FIA intends it to become more important for the next season after 2009.

In the FIA's Friday press conference five leading technical guys were asked for their thoughts on how they are preparing, and their answers proved to be very illuminating. This is what they had to say:

Pat Symonds (Renault): "It is very interesting as it's the first big change we have had for a long while. I am sure everyone knows it is a big change to the aerodynamics, and it's a replacement of grooved tires with slick tires, which in turn means using different weight distributions and all sorts of things. It is a very interesting challenge. It's, I guess, quite a difficult one. We do need to start on it early and we have started on it early. I am sure we are all the same. Obviously we have had models in the wind tunnel even though we are still discussing the finer details of the aerodynamic rules. It is a good project. I hope and believe that it will improve overtaking which is one of the main reasons for kicking it all off, so let's see what we get.

Sam Michael (Williams): "I think the rules are quite different, especially aerodynamically for a start, and getting rid of all of the majority of the appendages on the car – bargeboards, flip-ups, chimney. Physically from the outside the cars are going to look quite different with a very wide front wing and narrow rear wing. The target which came from the TWG was to improve overtaking, and it remains to be seen how much impact we will have on that. It will definitely have some impact, and that will be good. That combined with big tires and a big increase in tire grip. As Pat said everyone has started their wind tunnel programs and also CFD programs. It is quite a difficult balance this year to balance how much you develop the current car, the 2008 car, and how much you develop the '09. Normally even if you have reasonable rule changes from one year to another they are not as fundamental as this one, so you can continue developing the car right to the last race, and the bits you develop on that car can be carried over to next year's car, but it almost doesn't apply now. If you are still developing you car at the last race it will get thrown in the bin at the end of this season. It is probably harder for the three teams fighting for the championship, but it is equally hard for the teams that are fighting I would say to be the best of the rest at the moment, that fourth spot. There are three or four teams that are capable of running in that position and it is going to increase the pressure on them as well. We are all going to be doing that balancing act throughout the season."

Adrian Newey (Red Bull): "It's a new challenge for the engineers, which is great. I must admit my reservations. The biggest problem is a question of resource. As Sam said we are all in a position where we are all for our various different reasons desperately trying to improve this year's car, but at the same time we are conscious that you have got to start researching a very different car for next year. If you had limitless resources you would divide everything in two, you would go to four wind tunnels as I believe Honda are using at the moment, and off you go and start research. If you don't have those resources then it is a much more difficult juggling act. The last really big regulation change we had was 2004-05, when the front wing was lifted considerably. The great thing as far as I was concerned about that rule was it didn't really come out until the beginning of July, by which time we had all done the bulk of our development for that year. We could all go off starting from the same place, and do our best in the time available. This one is very different. We have known about it since November-December. As Pat says rules are still subtly changing but we have known the essence of it for a long time, so it really is a question of how we divide resources.

"The rules have an even more extensive set of exclusion areas where you can't put bodywork than we have currently, and on top of that there's a regulation where there's a minimum cross-sectional curvature from near the front of the side pod, all the way to the rear axle which is designed to try and prevent flick-ups and winglets and so forth. In that sense, they are pretty thorough, they are quite complicated, they'll certainly create a much simpler looking shape, I think, in all cases. From a purely technical point of view, it's quite fun at the moment to have a new set of rules to get your teeth into and think about, but ultimately they will be a more restrictive set of regulations. It depends on your viewpoint as to whether you think that's a good thing or not."

Willy Rampf (BMW Sauber): "For us it is a very demanding rule change and quite different to the last years. In the last year we had always a fluent transition from the one car to the next one as the regulations changes were fairly small. This is completely different now because we have to run the development project parallel which is not so easy, because we have the one wind tunnel. It means we have to divide the capacity of one wind tunnel and currently we are doing a lot of work on CFD to sort out the basic requirements and then go into the wind tunnel."

Aldo Costa (Ferrari): "Again, it is very interesting but it will be very difficult to measure change in aerodynamics. We have also got the KERS and the tires. This will require a rethink of all of the mass redistribution of the car. It will mean a lot of studies – not only aero study, but also a lot of research in the KERS area, a lot of research in the basic car layout, so it is very demanding, so strategic choices during this year will be to be focused more on this year's car or vice-versa. It will be very difficult to do."