If you haven't seen the race yet, stop reading now!

One of the most entertaining F1 races Ive seen in a long time.

BAR gets BOTH cars into the points. Fisi nearly got 6th place. Before Sato's engine blew, all 4 Hondas were in the top 10. Of course, Im sure it helped that only 11 cars finished the race, but still, to win, first you must finish. A sign of things to come I hope.

Damn, Barrichello went from 21st to 2nd in like ~ 15 laps or so. That must have been really, really fun.

And Montoya finally gets a good result after his 4th straight pole! If only he had taken the intermediate tires too.

What did yall think ?

 

It was a good race for BAR.

The new engine Honda is supplying to the BAR and Jordan must be a decent one.

As great as Shumacher is, I'm tired of him out preforming everybody else.

The qualifying was more exciting than the race it self, I thought. Montoya grabbed the P1 in the very last couple of minutes left

 

I's being re-broadcast on Speed channel @ 8 eastern.

 

I may be in the great minority here, but I personally feel that *right now*, Barichello is driving better. 21st to 2nd?!?! That's MAD driving!!!! Especially in F1 where there is almost no passing. He should have won, where, Austria? He did win in Germany (I think that's where). Now a 21st-to-2nd performance. I would just like to posess the skills he has in his big right toe.

Matt-who got up at 7:30 to watch it, and was glad he did...

 

I do think Barichello is an excellent driver. If he was in any other team, he'd be the #1 driver.

But as far as Schumacher, as much as I dislike him, No other athlete is dominant in his/her sport as he is. Period. I also think he is an excellent RACE driver. Other drivers, such as Senna was an awesome qualifier. No other driver can match the speed he put up on qualifying, but as far as the race is concerned, Schumacher has no equal.

 

i think the Bridgestone tires were the main reason for the Honda teams performances.

 

I definitely agree--It seems that ever since that little "incident" in Austria, Rubhino has been doing VERY well, and maybe has been getting a lot more attention from Ferrari. I hope he gets the chance to be world champion once Schumi retires (or decides he's had enough and becomes Ferrari's 2nd man--HAH!).

I also agree about the tires--Michelin's rain tires *sucked.* Hard. Both Ferraris blew the proverbial doors off of Montoya once the rain came. And what the hell was going on with McLaren??? It seems they've just given up, and Kimi is the only one left on the team even trying (STILL not sure how the hell Coulthard won at monaco).

 

Mclaren =

Other than that it was a pretty good race. I think we should be talking about Ralf getting the boot out of Williams soon, what a pathetic race.

Keith-who is rethinking going to Indy in an effort not to throw things a Michael Schumacher while he is on the podium.

 

I think little brother should get the boot as well, but they aren't going to do it. That's how BAR is going to end up with Button next year, once Villeneuve leaves when he won't accept the pay cut.

As for this weekend's result, yes, the tires played a huge role, but let's not overlook the fact that both BARs beat Heidfeld's Sauber - which is also on Bridgestones. Honda is now mixing it up with Renault and Sauber, where before they were dealing more with Arrows and Jaguar. They've made an improvement, that's for sure. When Barrichelo and Montoya touched during Rubens' pass, I thought they were going to take each other out and put BOTH BAR drivers on the podium. THAT would have been amazing!

Matt

 

Wasn't his placing mostly due to horrible pit stops though? He was in for 29 seconds because of the damn fuel rig, and had to come in again because of it...he was in 4th at the time...

 

I just do not believe that MS would be as dominant in another car... Can we say Eddie Irvine?

Paul


[Modified by Mr. NiceGuy, 7:32 AM 7/8/2002]

 

Great race! Apparently Mclaren was having radio problems and couldn't communicate very well with the drivers about when to come in...

I loved to see BAR do so well with the new Honda engine (they were running it for the full race for the first time). Interesting note, rathger than relying on local weather forcasts the BAR team had a helicopter in the air a few miles from the track in the direction the rain usually comes. The were on the radio with up to the minute updats.

 

You have to remember that BMW is a German company. Ralf is a German driver. On top of that, he's a Schumacher, so he is inherently adored by 99.3% of all Germans. No way he's leaving Williams (without a suitable German replacement) anytime soon. Id be willing to bet that the fact that he was contracted to Williams played a BIG part in BMW deciding to partner with Williams, as opposed to several other teams in need of engines at the time. Plus, he's got the language/culture "in" with BMW...

LOL ! And I thought I was the only one. Did yall see him jump on Ross Brawn after he got out of the car. What a dork Oh, and some of his post-race comments were pretty typical too.

As for the Hondas...

I think it's a little too early to say that they are now battling with Sauber/Renault, etc. BAR only stopped twice, whereas most others pitted 3 times. I think they'll have to prove it again on a DRY track before I believe it 100%.

 

Apparently Maclaren's radio channel was being jammed by a digital TV signal. All they could hear was a talk show. When Coultard was asked it he was concerned that his cursing was picked up by the TV broadcast, his answer was, "I don't give a **** if it was!"