[Team] McLaren's strategy

[Born Racer]

I hate to say it but today the term 'prat perch' seemed appropriate. Hamilton was about 2 seconds a lap slower than the frontrunners for at least 4 laps. His ultimate pace was at least a few tenths, a bit more even off Alonso and Vettel, but still it would be generous to say he wasn't slowed by about 1.5 seconds when his tyres were going off and he was struggling to get the power down.

With that in mind, why did they leave him out so long? Martin Whitmarsh said on the BBC forum that if they hadn't waited, it would've brought him out in traffic but still, what traffic would have slowed him by at least 6 seconds?

[Lancsbreaker]

Tend to agree - I was yelling at the screen to pit the McLarens when it was obvious they were dropping 2 seconds a lap....

[stripedcat]

Yeah I agree, Born Racer. Unfortunately this isn't the first time McLaren have made a massive mistake with their strategy.

They could have pitted both Jenson and Lewis and kept them ahead of Webber.

What with this and their bad pit call for Hamilton in Australia. Bad calls.

[E.B]

McLaren certainly seem to have taken the title of pit dummies away from the previously unchallenged stupidity of the post Todt Ferrari, who had a period of never making the right decision.

[steve_r]

With the benefit of hindsight you lot are all experts.

[E.B]

With the benefit of hindsight?

I was hollering at my TV that the Maccas should pit even before Brundle was suggesting McLaren same. And I profess to no wisdom in such matters, if only because I dont have all of the info available.

In this case such additional info was irrelevant..... Keeping them out there losing 2 seconds per lap was idiocy if not reckless ruination of their race prospects. That has (in hindsight) been proven surely.

As much as any of the times Ferrari pitted their cars for tyres of the wrong type, even when forecasts and actual rain falling suggested insanity was prevalent in Ferrari-land.

[peckstar]

was the issue that they didnt seem to have a handle on the harder compound, they definitely did not have the spend of Alonso and Vettel

[phoenix]

Rather than looking at the pace of the McLarens compared with Alonso and Vettel (who were in a different race) I was watching the live timing and keeping an eye on Webber's pace relative to the McLarens when he had a bit of free air between overtakes as he made his way through the field. It was obvious to me that once Webber was able to match the times of Button that Button should pit for the harder tyre - I recall that had he done so within a lap or two of that happening, the gap would have been sufficient for Button to come out in front, and Webber was behind Barrichello at the time. After that I would have looked at the relative pace of Hamilton's/Webber's times. I probably would have brought Hamilton in a two or three laps maximum after Button and by my reckoning he too would have kept his place in front of both Button and Webber.

There must be reasons why McLaren didn't do this - maybe fear of another safety car, I don't know - but it seemed fairly obvious to me both at the time and now.

And this is not just the benefit of hindsight - Hamilton ending up behind Webber was fairly obvious if the gap between them was allowed to shrink too far - i.e. to less than the time it took for a pit stop.

[steve_r]

Button and Hamilton never had the gap to allow them to come out in front of Webber. Correct me if I'm wrong, but apart from pitting one of them at the same time as Webber, there was nothing they could have done with their stratagy to finish any higher.

[Born Racer]

Originally Posted by steve_r

With the benefit of hindsight you lot are all experts.

Originally Posted by E.B

I was hollering at my TV that the Maccas should pit even before Brundle was suggesting McLaren same. And I profess to no wisdom in such matters, if only because I dont have all of the info available.

Same here.

Originally Posted by steve_r

Button and Hamilton never had the gap to allow them to come out in front of Webber. Correct me if I'm wrong, but apart from pitting one of them at the same time as Webber, there was nothing they could have done with their stratagy to finish any higher.

Possibly. Martin Whitmarsh said likewise, but Hamilton would never had built an advantage over Webber when he was losing so much time. Why stay out? Unless they wanted to keep that final set on track for less time.

[Wims]

They had the gap, but if they had been released into the traffic then the gap would have shrunk really quickly negating any advantage. One thing that is impossible to see from the timing screen is where traffic is on the track, ie lapped cars. The teams have this info either by the way of GPS or possibly some software that looks at sector times and laptimes and then visualizes where the various cars are on a map

[phoenix]

Originally Posted by Wims

They had the gap, but if they had been released into the traffic then the gap would have shrunk really quickly negating any advantage. One thing that is impossible to see from the timing screen is where traffic is on the track, ie lapped cars. The teams have this info either by the way of GPS or possibly some software that looks at sector times and laptimes and then visualizes where the various cars are on a map

I was watching the GPS track positions too - it is offered by the BBC on their website.

If they came back into traffic but ahead of Webber, which they would have, then they would be no more disadvantaged than Webber who would have to negotiate the same traffic, but they would have track position. At the time they would have come back in front of Barrichello and Webber was held up behind Barrichello.

[phoenix]

Originally Posted by steve_r

Button and Hamilton never had the gap to allow them to come out in front of Webber. Correct me if I'm wrong, but apart from pitting one of them at the same time as Webber, there was nothing they could have done with their stratagy to finish any higher.

From my recollection that's not the case. Webber was behind Button and Hamilton when he pitted. When he came out on the hard tyres a) they didn't work very well and b) he had a load of slow traffic to get through and so Button and Hamilton were lapping faster than him by at least 1-2 second a lap as they were in the 1min 51s to 1min 52s bracket and Webber was 1min 53s to 1min 54s bracket - and more on occassion begind the traffic. So until they were lapping at the same or slower speed they were actually building a margin. I wish I could find the lap charts as this is from memory - anybody know where to find them? - but for a one critcal period of time they both had the gap and had just begun to lap slower than Webber (Button first 'cos he was slower than Hammy's pace). That is when they should have pitted, but didn't.

[Wims]

I looked through the live timing recording I have really quickly and this was the biggest gap I could find, about 24 seconds between Webber and Hamilton. I think a pitstop would cost about 30 seconds on this track if I remember correctly

[Marbot]

The McLaren's just weren't fast enough. End of story really.

[phoenix]

Originally Posted by Wims

I looked through the live timing recording I have really quickly and this was the biggest gap I could find, about 24 seconds between Webber and Hamilton. I think a pitstop would cost about 30 seconds on this track if I remember correctly

My mistake - I though pit stops were about 23 seconds and the gap was bigger than that just after Webber passed Schumi.

p.s. how do you record the live timing? I'd like to do that in future....

[E.B]

alternatively <here> is a table of every gap on every car for every lap.

I agree that McLaren it seems that at no stage could have pitted and returned ahead of Webber, given the required gap for Singapore pitlane is just over 30 seconds.

[Born Racer]

Again, I'm left somewhat baffled by the strategy.

Why did they think the softs were going to wear out quickly? When do they ever? They've been very durable of late.