How does that work exactly. Do you believe in luck or not? I know some people don't .

I think thumped is an understatement, Lewis had 10 podiums and 6 wins last year.
Heikki had 3 podiums and 1 win.

That is worse then Massa in 2006 and Fisichela in 2005...

Well, the choice of a perfect number 2 seems harder than to chose a winner for your team... good enough to pick the crumbs but slow (and manageable) enough to not stir the pot. A fickle balance...

Now in reality we've seen nothing from Kova this year, literally. Last sunday it looked like his fault alone, but I still would like to watch him doing a race distance to judge if he got closer to Hamilton in race pace than he was last year.

I qualifying it's dead-even, so far.

And then only because LH had a problem and therefore could not participate in Aus Q2.

He also has the cutest ears.....in all seriousness, next time you see him without his helmet/cap, look at his ears and tell me their not the cutest in F1.

People think Kova was a lot better than Fisi in 2007 but it just isn't true. Yes, he scored more points 30-18 but that was mainly due to Fisi making one mistake and having bad luck in races where he would've scored "big" points e.g: Indy (where Fisi spun but was very fast) and Canada. If Fisi hadn't been disqualified in Canada for the red light infringement, he would've come 2nd or 3rd. Instead, Heikki got 4th and he was in fact about a second a lap slower than Fisi for the whole weekend. And that is what hurt Fisi so much in 2007 because opportunities for the Renault to score good points that year were very rare.

The fact is that Fisi was way faster than Heikki, sometimes embarrassingly so, for the first six races up to and including Canada (in Monaco 1 second a lap faster!) but from then on he had terrible luck and missed out on many point scoring opportunities. From Indy onwards they were very closely matched in qualifying and race pace, usually only separated by 5-10 seconds by the end of a race with Heikki 6th or 7th and Fisi 8th or 9th. Hence Heikki accumulated points in the 2nd half of the season and Fisi did not.

Also, in the wet-dry race in China, Fisi was much faster than Heikki but a bad strategy cost him a good result (9th again).

Then in Fuji, Heikki grabbed 8 points in one go with a great drive which helped him massively in the points standings. Overall, I would say Heikki was very lucky that year relative to Fisi (who did not have one piece of good luck at all) and in terms of pace I would say Fisi was massively quicker than Heikki in the first half of the year and that Heikki was fractionally quicker than Fisi in the 2nd half of the year.

In 2008, Heikki had the best bit of luck ever to get his only win in Hungary where not only one but TWO cars ahead of him retired (Massa with only a few laps to go) which gave him the victory.

Overall, I would say Heikki has flattered to deceive, and although he has had some examples of bad luck, he had great luck when it mattered most.

Why would Vettel want to join McLaren and play second fiddle to Lewis?

-KB

Sure, but in general they were pretty evenly matched in every session so far. Last year there was a pretty large performance gap in race speed and IIRC Kova has mainly blamed that on tyre characteristics.

As those have changed massively from last season, let's see how it goes now. First he has to hold it together for at least 30-odd laps, obviously.

If Lewis beated Alonso in his rookie year, and Alonso is rated as God around here, then Heikki have to be Mega God to beat Lewis. He might not be MG, but he has not been that far off the Hamilton's pace in this years in qualies, lets see when he actually end's a race (that will happen eventually ) you might get surprised ...

Lewis was supposed to be second fiddle to Alonso

Massa was supposed to be second fiddle to Kimi


if you show real pace, even if the initial intention was 2nd fiddle, it gets reevaluated real quick

Kovalainen is a good driver. There won't be many that will do a better job. He's up against a driver who is peerless under race conditions and that makes him look bad. Over one lap he can match Hamilton. That shows he's quick. His season a Renault showed his pace in relation to Fisichella and he was always substantially quicker than Piquet in testing. Didn't Briatore feel there wasn't room for him and Alonso given a possible conflict? Give Kova a Brawn with Rubens as a teammate and he'd be two from two. How do you tell if one driver is bad or the other one is exceptionally good?

Enough bad luck to get a drive in the equal best car last year... and finish 7th in the WDC. He isn't even a good number 2.

He's mediocre at best; Any driver apart from Piquet, Fisi, Sutil, Nakajima or the Toro Rosso drivers (now) would have done better in that seat.

And Hungary 08 was one of the least deserving wins I have seen, Massa brained him all day.

He's got the pace - look at Nakajima now he's slow.

Yeah, he got the pace - for 50m then he crash.

No doubt you passed similar judgement about Hamilton after Bahrain 2008, didn't you?

Heikki is trying hard, maybe too hard sometimes...

Whatever, it's not like he will spin on first lap all season, will be interesting to see how his speed transfers to the race.

1-6 is still far, far better than what this ocasionally hyped Adrian guy did in F3 against the same Lewis: 1-15.

Ok, that's a simplistic comparison, but it's my way of suggesting Heikki isn't terrible.

Pantano without a drive while Kovalainen had a second go at a McLaren....


(bangs head against the wall)

Generally I don't bother to compare drivers on FP times as just like testing they can often be on a different program. Even Q1 and Q2 isnt useful as we have often seen LH only do one run, but HK has needed 2 to ensure getting thru. The only 2 sessions that really count is Q3 and the race, and I'll agree we havent seen enough to compare pace yet.

Man, what's up with the forums lately? Why this obsession with Kovalainen? Ironically, he should be the most relaxed man in McLaren these days.

Obsession? There's one thread that is only on page 2.

No, I did not mean just the Atlas forum. I meant other ones as well.

I agree. Early in the season, I was rooting for him, especially because of his bad luck. Spain for example was very frightening and stalling at Monaco was a shame. By the end of the season it was a joke.

Pretty sure he did, Ruben's diffuser had some damage. But it seemed like a non event, because Rubens would have overcooked the corner even without the hit.

Source?

Jesus how about Wilson, th epommie bloke? He's a super driver.

And so is Jos the Boss and Mika Salo....

AFA (Atlas Fanboy Association)

I agree HK brings shame to the driving heritage of finland.

Fixed.

Agree with that. I also think that Heikki suffered, as last season wore on, from the strong pro Hamilton stance within the McLaren camp. Much as Alonso did previously. Kovi actually started last season quite strongly but fell away badly as the year went on. I think it is a confidence thing with him and still think that a couple of half decent results could work wonders. I believe he could be very quick, maybe as quick as Hamilton, but needs that bit of luck and TLC.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/64352

There's no a single word proving the claim Renault didn't want Kovalainen because he was too fast. There's just Jonathan Noble's opinion without any quote proving that.

If this board relied on conclusive proof rather than informed opinion it would have very little to discuss. The informed opinion at the time was reported by Jonathan Noble amongst many others. I'm sorry that I could not find a quote from Flav stating "We welcome Nelsihno to the ING Renault team. He will not pose the threat that Heikki might have done an as such will prove an ideal number two - being around half a second a lap slower. Nelsihno?..."

"informed opinion", yeah right. IOW, you made it up.

Well I have to disagree, he is well worth the drive, or do you think that McLaren just kept him so he does not feel bad if dumbed ...

No, informed opinion is the result of following F1 in the media and on TV and reaching conclusions based on that. Those conclusions may well be wrong or biased but they are indeed valid discussion points.

Statements by teams and such are merely the starting point as they tend to present their views and then only in the best light.

We discuss them in this forum because we search the true meaning behind those statements (and because we are all anoraks with no-life ).

I remember Alonso a few years ago, when asked which rookie he rates most this season (HK was then still test driver at Renault) saying: "Kovalainen".

Australia
FP1 - Heikki faster by 1.6s
FP2 - Heikki faster by 0.01s
FP3 - Heikki faster by 0.1s
Q1 - Heikki faster by 0.3s (Lewis only did a single run)

Malaysia
FP1 - Lewis faster by 1.8s (Heikki only did 7 laps)
FP2 - Heikki faster by 0.1s
FP3 - Lewis faster by 0.1s
Q1 - Heikki faster by 0.2s
Q2 - Lewis faster by 0.02s

China
FP1 - Lewis faster by 0.3s (Heikki didn't have some aero updates)
FP2 - Heikki faster by 0.3s
FP3 - Lewis faster by 0.2s
Q1 - Heikki faster by 0.1s
Q2 - Lewis faster by 0.3s (Heikki was blocked? Still unclear)
Race - Heikki 5th, Lewis 6th
Heikki was faster on 20 out of 46 racing laps, despite carrying more fuel in the beginning.


Will McLaren let Heikki race Hamo NOW ?

It was McLaren that sabotaged his previous 2 races? GTFO of here.

Maybe there is a chance of Macca giving more equal car/strategies for Kova this year if Hamilton is looking for a better team.

Heikki had 18kg more fuel than Hamilton and still they pitted in the following laps

is it true that today team told Heiki to pit right after Hamilton despite the fact Kova had fuel for another ten laps??

I never suggested that buddy, calm down.

Those numbers show Hamilton no longer seems to have a huge advantage over Heikki, as was apparently the case last year.

Any future attempts by McLaren to screw Heikki's performances by excessive fuel loads in qualifying, or team orders during the race, will no longer be justifiable.

Rodrigol- I assume you follow F1 purely for Hamilton. He certainly seems to occupy your mind!

I've decided i'm going to be as blunt as possible when responding to nonsense such as this.

Your suggestion is still ridiculous. Heikki has been relatively poor in race pace and I haven't seen anything thats changed that. Whats the point of giving him a stratagy he won't take advantage off. Does no one remember Monza last year. Pretty sure he was given the better strategy at Silverstone too Lewis made a fool of him. Heikii has never been 'slow' in qualifying or practice. Hell this is the first race he's finished this year. 1/3 in the McLaren is embarassing. If he can string together some good results like this then maybe you'll have a point. Until then you're just having a go at McLaren for whatever agenda you have.

If you have no valid points, don't just resort to insults.

The rest of your post concerning last year has been covered to death around this place, and most of it sounds incredibly subjective.

This is about Heikki in 2009 - the guy who, despite finishing only a single race, is level on points with the current world champion. I've posted facts (now backed up with a positive race result) which suggest Kova's performance has improved since last year , and I hope that McLaren will recognise that by giving him an equal chance later on. What's wrong with that?

And finally, I don't have a problem with Lewis, but with the way his teammate was treated last year.. Bye

Yes, Heikki told in post race interview that he wondered him self why team decided to pit him so early, when he had fuel for several laps left...

I'm not usually supporting any conspiracy theories, but the decision was a bit odd in those conditions, especially when driver did not demand early stop



Nice race for Heikki, stayed out of troubles and drove constantly (unlike team mate with better aero package). Lewis and Heikki are now tied in points 4-4, so I don't see it that embarassing...

in fear of a safety car maybe? i dunno if that applies anymore but could be a possibility.

If thats the case,why didnt they tell Heikki the reason?