Ah that makes sense. Not so much of an issue then, Rosberg managed the last safety car well.

Tyre choice will be interesting, but there will still be 32 laps to go, so they can't go flat out straight away.

Red flag kinda played into the hands of RBR, assuming they weren't fibbing about the tyres being marginal.

Course, I suspect the truth is that they're just making those noises to give some weigh to their protest about Pirelli using Merc' instead of Ferrari to tyre test.

Perez seems a bit clumsy to me.
Doesn't seem right that a driver can just dive up the inside and expect their opponent to either yield or crash.
I think Alonso was probably justified in moving over to avoid him and then just carrying on.

Just had an interview with Martin Whitmarsh..... Alonso supposedly told to hand place back........or that;s what McL have been told.......

Coffee time then! (Unless Martin is going to do another grid walk )

There will be, they'd only been going for an hour and it seems it won't take that long to repair. They'll give the 15 minute warning before they're completely finished repairing.

And in 2011 the final completion time was 2 hours 9 minutes due to the red flag, so it doesn't have to be exactly 2 hours.


Race restarting in 10 minutes.

Restart 10 minutes (obviously behind a safety car)

It is 2 hours max I believe (new rules) no more or less than 2 hours

They have a lot less deg than they used to. At spain Mercedes had the worst deg now they appear to have the best. A clear demonstration that they have benifited from from the secret test.

Just glad hamiltons race has gone so badly. Perhaps he could deploy the wee doggy, doesn't it help with these sort of things?

The race will have to end when 2 hours is up won't it?

Maximum race time is 2 hours but I thought there was a 4 hour overall limit for the event.

If I understood that pit radio correctly - Alonso is claiming that because he wasn't using KERS, he shouldn't have to give the place to Perez because he "could" have used KERS and stayed ahead. Imho Alonso is just throwing a hissy fit & throwing his toys out of the pram again, he needs to take it like a man.

Alonso will have to give 6th place to Perez when the race restarts, it's been made official.

He didn't seem to be throwing much of a hissy fit when he got out of the car, shook Perez's hand and agreed to let him ahead at the restart.

I guess next time alonso should launch over the kerb, get airborn and smash in to checco. Otherwise you end up having to give a place away to car which is barely along side you.

Interesting to see if Mclaren will team order button past checco and force alonso down two places.

Agreed. Be Interesting to see what happens........

Martin brundel now says it was touch and go. He campaigned for the penalty more than whitmarsh, what a lier.

Ah good that stoped the mclaren team orders.

Fernando given place back (quite rightly too in my opinion - think perez made a good move, and Alonso bailed to keep position) as they pulled off the grid.......

Yes, just where is Alfonso?

7th! HA HA HA!

Yes, they changed it a few years back.

Alonso gives the place up. Good to see.

Oh we were along side can charlie not mclaren us the place. You can tell checco is slower and should not be ahead.

You do know that circuits aren't identical, don't you? Tyre degradation is not the same at each circuit. You're making wildly unsupported allegations which seem to be clearly influence by your irrational hatred for Mercedes and particularly Hamilton.

Hamilton in wrong position just remembered he was along side webber so charle should mclaren Hamilton to second.

Checco forces another car off the track.

Kimi looses place to along side rule checco mclaren ahead by charlie again.

Eh, no, Perez cut the corner as well so he hasn't got the place.