Kudos for the effort!
I'm not a fan of "what if" speculations but you've tried at great lengths to present your findings in an objective manner.
There are a few conclusions I find rather doubtful:
[Malaysian Grand Prix
- Kimi Räikkönen received a 5 place grid penalty for changing his gearbox, setting him back to p10, which moved up Vettel, Grosjean, Rosberg and Alonso. Considering his race pace though, he would have probably not finished ahead of Webber, who qualified ahead, anyway.
His race pace at the end though was very strong - he set fastest lap! He just went to slicks a bit too late, and that determined his result as well. He was even ahead of Webber before his last pitstop! Saying that Webber qualified ahead anyway is not in argument in this case. Just look at the outcome with Alonso and Perez - not the fastest qualifyers by any means - finishing 1st nd 2nd.
Chinese Grand Prix
- Lewis Hamilton was given a 5-place grid penalty for a gearbox change. Although Rosberg looked too strong for anyone this weekend, Hamilton would have probably taken second.
I wouldn't be so sure about that. In this specific race Jenson was simply faster all through the race and lost many valuable seconds by a botched 9.7 second pitstop! See also your comments about Hamilton losing places by botched pitstops in other races.
Spanish Grand Prix
- Underfueling Hamilton in Q3, we can assume, was not done on purpose, yet had grave consequences. Bad luck, so we put him back on pole. Judging his race pace if on pole is tricky, as his race pace from the back would not have won him the race. All throughout qualifying though, his pace was such that a win would be likely.
There's no way we can tell anything sensible about his possible race pace. Q doesn't say everything about tyre management during the race. His pace on softs -of course dictated by strategy- was nothing to write home about. A possible win is simply pure speculation.
Belgian Grand Prix
- The start crash caused by Grosjean also meant the end of the race for Alonso, Hamilton and Perez.
- Judging where Alonso and Perez would have ended up is tricky, but judging by their team-mates, it looked like the Ferrari had much better race pace than the Sauber.
There no sensible conclusion you can make about the Sauber's pace if you judge it by Kamui's performance. His car was almost mortally wounded and it was a miracle that it survived at all! I think both Saubers could have ended up pretty high if not punted.
Edited by scheivlak, 04 March 2013 - 00:02.