You guys can stick your fingers in your ears and keep repeating "na nana na na, Fernando is the greatest" as long as you want; I couldn't care less. But when you try to convince those of us that genuinely love this sport - as opposed to idolizing a driver just because he happens to hail from the same country as us...

I didnt want to reply to my own post so I edited, I called you stupid because you dont seem like your average Alonso basher, you acknowledge that Hamilton was pushed into F1 by Ron Dennis since he was very little (he even sponsored the championship he was racing in, calling it McLarens Champions of the Future, and partially bought a Karting brand DC One even though the chassis where very similar to the Birel you like) yet you believe Ron was impartial when it came to Alonso vs Hamilton, if it was your son vs someone else, who would you support?

I dont know why Ron bought Alonso, but here are some wild guesses, all could be true, and we will never know the truth;

maybe he didnt think Hamilton was ready that year
maybe he thought, keep your friends close, but your enemies closer
maybe he needed the sponsorship from Santander
maybe Ron thought Hamilton would beat Alonso easily, specially when it was Ron who chose who got the best equipment (you must know from your karting experience that not 2 chassis are the same, or 2 engines are the same, now multiply this by 1million, you can make 2 identical cars very different in F1)






So what you are saying is that the Shumi of 10 years ago, is worst than the Shumi we see today?

I have watched this sport for almost 3 decades, but I have never seen a driver (except Trulli) being kikced out of team in the middle of season when he has done better job than his teammate, just because of one mistake in one race, that is totally absurd. Everybody - and I mean EVERYBODY - could see it was nothing more or less than Briatore wanting to keep his goldenboy out of misery and humility about getting beaten by team mate, he needed to sack Trulli before season was completed as he didnt want to have statistics in history books where mediocre driver like Trulli ends up higher in standings than Alonso with same car.

Would you think it as a clever move from Mercedes, if tomorrow Rosberg would be say, 3rd, in last lap but someone would pass him and he ended up 4th and he would then be fired because of it? Thats what happend to Trulli, he was ahead of teammate in points, used to outqualify him, then suddenly - BANG - he was out of job because he lost a one position in one corner in one race... it wasn´t even that important because it was not a battle of WDC anyway, just one f¤#king mistake - not a biggie. Would you really like to see for example Rosberg kicked out if he would lose one position tomorrow in last lap? Seriously? Is there no limits how fan one can be?

It's hard to take your argument seriously when you make laughable comments like that.

Is it that easy to forget that was the same Jarno Trulli that in 2003 was completely run over by Fernando who was on his 1st full time season with the team?. Is it so easy to forget that in 2003 Fernando was the guy who gave Renault their first pole ( 2nd race with the team by the way) and race win since they came back to the sport?. [b]Is it so easy to forget that all during the 2004 season Fernando had problems getting the best out of the car in qualifications like he had been mentioning during that year ( to be honest I think he was flat out underperforming )?
Is it so easy to forget that the reason Jarno was sacked was because he did not agreed with Flavio's offer to renew his contract (instead decided to get more money from Toyo) and the silly pass for second place Barrichello put on him in the last corner in Magny-Cours, which happened to be Renault's Home Grand Prix was the tip of the iceberg that destroyed that relationship?

But since this is 2010 and you just happen to dislike Fernando, go ahead and continue discrediting him since it looks like it hurst you very much to see Fernando Alonso doing well.

You guys can stick your fingers in your ears and keep repeating "na nana na na, Fernando is the greatest" as long as you want; I couldn't care less.

Believe - or pretend to believe - what you like. My own firm conviction since 2007 has been that Alonso will not win another championship. His character flaws stood out so starkly then that it became clear that he is only capable of winning the title under such conditions as obtained at Renault in 2005 and 2006. Any hint of a strong teammate who is free to race against him, or capable drivers in comparable equipment that are not having to play catch up but are right there with him all the way, and he is revealed for what he is: fast, but paranoid ("manipulated race" after Valencia) and mentally weak ("the only thing you should do throughout the race is to talk to Charlie about Hamilton" and similar comments in Valencia rather than concentrating on getting the best out of his own race).

Hamilton in the Ferrari Alonso is driving would probably have more points than he currently has as a McLaren driver; yet Alonso's deluded fans are climaxing on the back of second on the grid in what looks like the best car at this track - and hailing as the best driver on the grid their idol who has been making schoolboy error after schoolboy error this season, with the result that he's nearly fifty points shy of the championship lead held by a guy driving a car that's been no better than his. Oh well. Let's hope Santander soon finds another horse to back. The one they're currently backing looks lame.

So if you couldn't care less the result is a thousand words. What happens if you care?



Okay, it's understood how pissed you are about Alonso doing considerably better today than Hamilton. Calm down, it was just one qualifying, the race is tomorrow.

God save Alonso, if he wins tomorrow.

Alonso's not much of a threat at all, these days. He'll no doubt f*ck up his own race, and then blame it all on an English conspiracy.....

Why Hamilton, "the best driver on the grid" was beaten by "the inferior and slow" Button today?

I didnt want to reply to my own post so I edited, I called you stupid because you dont seem like your average Alonso basher, you acknowledge that Hamilton was pushed into F1 by Ron Dennis since he was very little (he even sponsored the championship he was racing in, calling it McLarens Champions of the Future, and partially bought a Karting brand DC One even though the chassis where very similar to the Birel you like) yet you believe Ron was impartial when it came to Alonso vs Hamilton, if it was your son vs someone else, who would you support?

I dont know why Ron bought Alonso, but here are some wild guesses, all could be true, and we will never know the truth;

maybe he didnt think Hamilton was ready that year
maybe he thought, keep your friends close, but your enemies closer
maybe he needed the sponsorship from Santander
maybe Ron thought Hamilton would beat Alonso easily, specially when it was Ron who chose who got the best equipment (you must know from your karting experience that not 2 chassis are the same, or 2 engines are the same, now multiply this by 1million, you can make 2 identical cars very different in F1)






So what you are saying is that the Shumi of 10 years ago, is worst than the Shumi we see today?

You guys can stick your fingers in your ears and keep repeating "na nana na na, Fernando is the greatest" as long as you want; I couldn't care less. But when you try to convince those of us that genuinely love this sport - as opposed to idolizing a driver just because he happens to hail from the same country as us - that Briatore's treatment of Trulli in 2004 was normal or acceptable, that is when I feel obliged to protest.

Such a bizarre course of action was unprecedented, and can only be explained in the context of an understanding of how the sport started to change after Mosley and Ecclestone decided to overhaul Balestre's corrupt regime by making it ten times more corrupt and a hundred times more lucrative. This quickly began to attract the wrong types, of whom Briatore - whom most would have quickly dismissed as a lovable spiv were it not for the fact that he was unhappily a convicted fraudster and fugitive from justice with known links to the Mafia - was just the most sinister.

This creature has always had the archetypal parasitic Mafia mentality: "where's my cut"? Whether it's earned or unearned, Flavio wants a cut of the action. Call it 'protection money' - call it what you like - Flavio doesn't care. He's richer than you are and even though he looks like a beached whale he still screws supermodels. When Trulli, by considerably improving his performance from the previous year, began to pose a threat to his latest meal ticket, there was only one thing Alonso's older and less marketable teammate - a fellow countryman of Flavio's but what does that matter when money's at stake? - could do to make it right: sign the management contract which Flavio liked to insist upon all his driver's signing, despite the obvious conflict of interest with his role as team boss. It was the least Jarno could do to offset the negative effect his beating Alonso was having on the value of the Spanish TV rights he owned and whose value to the likes of Telecinco were dependent on mass public interest in Alonso as a future superstar - the type of driver who doesn't get beaten by a a journeyman like Trulli.

When Jarno refused, he had to go - in fact he can count himself lucky he wasn't involved in a serious on-track "accident" - and the "yutaw taw, he's not a f*cking driver" playacting over that meaningless incident that Briatore presented to the world as the ostensible reason for Trulli's sacking could commence. Flavio loves playacting, but - like so many brilliant actors - it's not at all clear that he knows he's acting. He was so genuinely pissed off at what he saw as Trulli's unreasonableness in refusing to sign the management deal, that projecting that anger onto that incident with Barrichello seemed entirely natural - and almost genuine.

Yet the very same people who defend this treatment find ways to attack Ron Dennis as a bad sportsman. Someone who deliberately hampered Alonso. Quite simply, you people haven't a clue. If Dennis shared your ethics, Alonso would have been out on his ear immediately after he tried to blackmail McLaren to get his precious no. 1 status. Instead, he continued to give Alonso the equipment to win the title right up to Brazil. And to this day I am happy he did despite the fact it cost McLaren the title.

Believe - or pretend to believe - what you like. My own firm conviction since 2007 has been that Alonso will not win another championship. His character flaws stood out so starkly then that it became clear that he is only capable of winning the title under such conditions as obtained at Renault in 2005 and 2006. Any hint of a strong teammate who is free to race against him, or capable drivers in comparable equipment that are not having to play catch up but are right there with him all the way, and he is revealed for what he is: fast, but paranoid ("manipulated race" after Valencia) and mentally weak ("the only thing you should do throughout the race is to talk to Charlie about Hamilton" and similar comments in Valencia rather than concentrating on getting the best out of his own race).

Hamilton in the Ferrari Alonso is driving would probably have more points than he currently has as a McLaren driver; yet Alonso's deluded fans are climaxing on the back of second on the grid in what looks like the best car at this track - and hailing as the best driver on the grid their idol who has been making schoolboy error after schoolboy error this season, with the result that he's nearly fifty points shy of the championship lead held by a guy driving a car that's been no better than his. Oh well. Let's hope Santander soon finds another horse to back. The one they're currently backing looks lame.

Well, maybe the crash still had its impact, who knows. What I do know though, is that Massa was one of fastest qualifiers there is. He did quite fine in 2006 against Schumi in second half of season, his grid-positions in last 9 races were: 2-2-3-2-1-4-20-1-1. That was better than Schumachers (who was clear #1 at time) including 3 poles! Now he is 0.4 sec behind Alonso and you think thats their real difference? Driver who could match Schumi (the old Schumi who was fighting for WDC till last race) is suddenly almost half a second slower to someone?

Trulli was faster than Alonso when they were team mates, now Trulli is equal to Kovalainen - do you think Kovalainen is also therefore faster than Alonso, eh? You just cant compare drivers in different years, in different cars for different teammates and draw conclusions, it just wont work.

Trulli was not faster than Alonso when they were team mates. Massa could not match Schumi in qualifying in 2006. The gap was quite large despite Massa qualifying very well later in the season with a dominant car. The real difference between Massa and Alonso is the difference we are seeing unless you don't accept you are living in the real world. Massa was dominated by Schumacher and now Alonso is doing the same so I don't see the confusion here? Most educated observers always knew this would happen, but I guess some people just find it hard to accept they were wrong and misjudged Alonso and Massa.

I have watched this sport for almost 3 decades, but I have never seen a driver (except Trulli) being kikced out of team in the middle of season when he has done better job than his teammate, just because of one mistake in one race, that is totally absurd. Everybody - and I mean EVERYBODY - could see it was nothing more or less than Briatore wanting to keep his goldenboy out of misery and humility about getting beaten by team mate, he needed to sack Trulli before season was completed as he didnt want to have statistics in history books where mediocre driver like Trulli ends up higher in standings than Alonso with same car.

Would you think it as a clever move from Mercedes, if tomorrow Rosberg would be say, 3rd, in last lap but someone would pass him and he ended up 4th and he would then be fired because of it? Thats what happend to Trulli, he was ahead of teammate in points, used to outqualify him, then suddenly - BANG - he was out of job because he lost a one position in one corner in one race... it wasn´t even that important because it was not a battle of WDC anyway, just one f¤#king mistake - not a biggie. Would you really like to see for example Rosberg kicked out if he would lose one position tomorrow in last lap? Seriously? Is there no limits how fan one can be?

I don't know, Alan, I really don't know. But given that you were the one admitting just the other day that Hamilton is indeed the best driver on the grid, and that you certainly won't be able to find a post in which I have described his teammate, the current world champion whom he had outqualified mostly by pretty big margins in the preceding six races as "inferior and slow", I can only wonder why you have put those words in quotation marks. I suspect you are using what is called in English a straw man. My Spanish is not idiomatic enough to think of the equivalent - can you help me out?

Alonso was getting beat by Trulli untill mysteriously his car became very bad after Brittain in 2004. Trulli opened up and said that his car was not the same anymore and then he got fired and replaced by Villeneuve.

Obviously Flavio was protecting Alonso with his #1 status.

Whilst it is an Alonso thread, this discussion is relevant

Trulli was not faster than Alonso when they were team mates. Massa could not match Schumi in qualifying in 2006. The gap was quite large despite Massa qualifying very well later in the season with a dominant car. The real difference between Massa and Alonso is the difference we are seeing unless you don't accept you are living in the real world. Massa was dominated by Schumacher and now Alonso is doing the same so I don't see the confusion here? Most educated observers always knew this would happen, but I guess some people just find it hard to accept they were wrong and misjudged Alonso and Massa.

? explain me why?
why is trullis release from his contract relevant for alonso

No, I'm not an Alonso basher, really, I'm not a fan, but, whatever. Still doesn't make me deserving of being called stupid, but, ok.

Hamilton isn't Dennis's son, and really, up until Lewis reached lower level Formulae, it really wasn't costing Ron so much, maybe 200, or 300k per year max, I know the costs of Karting internationally, and that's pretty much it, and it's not really a hell of a lot for Mr. Dennis. It wasn't really a big investment from Ron until a few years before reaching F1. The thing is, Dennis was right, he had scouted a VERY talented young man.

As far as why Dennis hired Alonso, simple, Alonso was the best driver in the world, why wouldn't he? Dennis has always strived to have the best 2 drivers driving for him. He was going after young Schumacher while he had Hakkinen. So, he always wants the best 2 possible. If I'm not mistaken, he had bagged Alonso even before he knew he had lost Raikkonen.

It doesn't make much sense for a businessman such as Dennis (however an SOB, like him of not, he's just a businessman) to hire Alonso just to have him in there slaved as clear #2 to a rookie, that just doesn't make any sense. What does make sense is that, once Alonso blew out at the boss, the relationship collapsed, and it would make a lot of sense to say that they backed Lewis over Alonso AFTER that time. But until that time, no, I don't think there was any clear indication that Lewis was being favored, actually, the oposite, given that the team fumbled Lewis's pitstop in Melbourne allowing for Alonso to pick up the position (not saying it was on purpose, but conspiracy theorists can have a go at that, just as you have a go at the other side of the story) also there was the Monaco issue, when Lewis was left whining that Alonso was getting preferential treatment. So, you see, it's not as clear cut as you seem to try to paint it.

LOL and nice try about Schumacher! C'mon, really!!

Anyway, I think we've drifted way off the point here, my point was only that Hamilton faired well in relationship with a WDC teammate, nobody can deny that.

Take care, and don't call nice people stupid

This isn't trolling. It's an opinion about the driver on which this thread is based. This thread is for discussing Alonso, and I'm discussing Alonso.

I think Alonso did a good race so did Massa , its just that I would expect Alonso to beat his team mate on track without any team orders.

Massa clearly has forgotten the win he was handed over by Kimi -CHINA 08

Someone should have told him to stop pulling such a long face, he's out of WDC. The least he can do is help his teammate to win

I wonder if Alonso feels that this race 'was somehow manipulated'

within the team --> sure
from outside --> no

within the team it is okay, and normal
from outside it is not okay!

If this results stays than race is manipulated from outside by not handing out penalty for breaking the rule.

I wonder if Alonso feels that this race 'was somehow manipulated'

That's called team orders and they are illegal.

That's called team orders and they are illegal.

Alonso did a fantastic start but Vettel was a little on the edge pushing him. Overall fantastic speed all the race, he closed the 3 sec gap with Felipe in no time.

Regarding the incident, I'm not happy with it, I will take any day a close fight till the last lap than what Ferrari did today, but it happends in every team, save fuel, pit stops, whatever not big deal, but I'm sorry for Massa, this is never a nice thing, even when the team win.

More close to the leaders now, we need another victory next week, without team orders please