Хейкки Ковалайнен

[sa5h@]

опередил в гонке, но Кове поставили 6, а Петрову 7, потому что Виталий был рядом

Там по хорошему Петров должен был выше финишировать. Его новый гоночный инженер не предупредил о последнем круге.

п.с.

Порадовало командное фото Лотуса на фоне машины с надписью "Хейкки".

Классный троллинг Романа и Кими.

[Cyril_S]

И Стельмах тоже 7

Хейкки Ковалайнен – 7

Стоит с пониманием отнестись к Хейкки. Разумеется, Ковалайнен выглядел медленнее, чем Грожан. Финн проиграл старт, заехал для смены антикрыла, пострадал от проблем с KERS и продолжил печальную серию гонок без очков, начатую ещё в "Кэтерхэме". Впрочем, Хейкки на совершенно новой для себя машине смог сходу пройти в Q3, чем, разумеется, удивил общественность.

http://www.championat.com/auto/article-181177-ocenki-pilotam-za-gran-pri-ssha-formuly-1.html

[sa5h@]

Также Ярно Трулли поделился мнением по поводу ситуации в Lotus, где отказались от кандидатуры тест-пилота Давиде Вальсекки на замену Кими Райкконену.

«Эта ситуация демонстрирует, чего на самом деле сейчас стоит тест-пилот. Давиде Вальсекки оказался в крайней непростом положении. К сожалению, сейчас пилоты выходят на старт только при наличии денег, - продолжает Трулли. – У молодых гонщиков нет возможности для работы на тестах, поэтому команды предпочитают быстрым пилотам тех, кто может платить».

Ярно назвал Хейкки рентой? Неоднозначное высказывание.

[MacDimm]

Ярно назвал Хейкки рентой? Неоднозначное высказывание.

Ну Трулли, ну винодел. Знает, что Хейкки водкой отстегивает. С Кими-другом попривыкли Булье/Лопес, в зависимость попали. Так вот. Сам погибай, а Эрика с Жераром водкой накачай.

[Fenix77]

Ярно назвал Хейкки рентой? Неоднозначное высказывание.

Вот только не нужно Ярно сюда :nono: притягивать ! пожа-ста :spiteful:

[Fenix77]

Флавио тоже высказался )) Понятно .. он жэ тоже за соотечественника :D

[zlata]

Ярно назвал Хейкки рентой? Неоднозначное высказывание.

Он про Хейкки ни слова не сказал, неужели не понятно, что это не про Хейкки, а про ситуацию вообще, а она такая и есть. Я вообще даже не уверена, что он знает, что вместо Давиде посадили Хейкки :D или он сказал это еще до того как и когда Лотус думал, а не продать ли место на пару гонок...

[sa5h@]

Он про Хейкки ни слова не сказал, не ужели не понятно, что это не про Хейкки, а про ситуацию вообще, а она такая и есть. Я вообще даже не уверена, что он знает, что вместо Давиде посадили Хейкки :D или он сказал это еще до того как и когда Лотус думал, а не продать ли место на пару гонок...

Может быть. Перевод у нас висит от 17-го числа, а на gazzetta.it его что-то сходу и не нашёл.

[ilovef1(PDA)]

Поздравляю с переездом в Паддок! :good:

[jurykovalev]

Хорошо бы и после НГ тут остаться.

[Warwick]

Поздравляю с переездом в Паддок! :good:

Ну неужели перенесли )))

[jals]

Ярно назвал Хейкки рентой? Неоднозначное высказывание.

Он вообще не говорил про Хейкки в этом вью

Может быть. Перевод у нас висит от 17-го числа, а на gazzetta.it его что-то сходу и не нашёл.

Он это сказал 14-го после объявления Ковы

[Cyril_S]

Журналист Autosport Эдд Строу объяснил, почему Хейкки проделал в США отличную работу

Stand-ins are usually on a hiding to nothing in Formula 1. So while Heikki Kovalainen might have missed the points as his new team-mate claimed second, EDD STRAW argues the Finn did a fine job

Those sympathetic to reserve driver Davide Valsecchi being passed over as Kimi Raikkonen's stand-in will cite Heikki Kovalainen's 14th place in the United States Grand Prix as evidence that Lotus made the wrong decision.

But the Finn was on course for a points finish, perhaps eighth place, when a front wing problem robbed him of downforce. Those who would point to the fact that the sister Lotus of Romain Grosjean finished a strong second, making Kovalainen's performance look mediocre in comparison, fail to realise just how difficult it is to flourish in such a situation.

The fact that Kovalainen qualified in the top 10 and likely would have scored points had that wing problem, which forced a second pitstop for a nose change, and a KERS failure not intervened, was about as good as it could get for anyone in that situation.

Kovalainen's performance was not perfect, nor could it be. This was not a scenario that demanded perfection - it was all about getting by and trying to get a result.

It's far from easy. You need only look back at what happened to Luca Badoer - a driver with 48 grands prix under his belt, hundreds of thousands of miles of testing for Ferrari and who was, in his day, very quick – when he replaced the injured Felipe Massa for two races in 2009.

Badoer struggled massively when he stood in for Massa in 2009 © LAT

"This just reinforces our choice," says Lotus team principal Eric Boullier of Kovalainen's performance.

"That a guy with the experience of Heikki is still rusty when coming back shows that to put a new kid in is a big gamble, as talented as he [Valsecchi] is."

As explained here, Valsecchi is a driver of genuine ability who will hopefully get the chance to start a grand prix that he craves.

And as a GP2 champion, it's not his fault that the economic situation means he needs a wad of millions to land a race seat, or that and there are precious few testing opportunities.

But this is not about Valsecchi, it's about the job Kovalainen did. Let's have a closer look at his weekend.

FRIDAY

Thick fog delayed the first 90-minute free practice session by 40 minutes. When the session got underway it was cut to one hour, and even that was interrupted after 14 minutes thanks to a technical problem with the original medical helicopter. Not what Kovalainen needed.

Some tweaks were made to his Friday programme, particularly in the morning, to help Kovalainen adapt. "We did a slightly different programme from the more conventional one they would've done with Kimi," he says.

Permane (right) was impressed with how Kovalainen settled in © XPB

"I wanted to do some pitstops and some start practice, but when the session got delayed we were thinking about going back to more conventional running.

"But we ended up doing quite a long installation run – three laps – and did some pitstops and starts.

"Apart from that, it was quite normal. In the second session especially, it was really ordinary like they would have done with Kimi or any regular driver."

Kovalainen ended the day fifth fastest, setting a best time of 1m38.073s. That was 0.182s faster than Grosjean, which certainly grabbed the headlines.

The reality is that he was running about 10kg lighter, and the other Lotus driver had a few technical problems. But just to be in the ballpark, around two-tenths off fuel-corrected, was impressive.

"It's not as tricky as it used to be now we have things like the standard ECU, so what switches they have got available are pretty similar among teams," says head of trackside engineering Alan Permane on the process of Kovalainen adapting to the car.

"He was straight into that having driven the last few Fridays in the Caterham, and he drove in our simulator for half a day to get him up to speed with starts and bite points and all that sort of thing. The rest of it was just to give him some laps.

"It was the ideal place to do it because of the hard tyre with very low tyre degradation and we could've just done lap after lap. We put him on a pretty steady programme, as we needed the long-run information and the low-fuel information on the tyres.

"I was encouraged to see how well he did on Friday. He really did a great job."

Some seat modifications had to be made overnight to stop Kovalainen sliding around in the car, but other than that he was very comfortable after day one.

SATURDAY

Qualifying was always likely to be the biggest test, particularly up against Grosjean. Not only did he make Q3, but he managed to qualify eighth, just 0.555s off his team-mate. In normal circumstances a big gap, but not here.

Lotus said a half-second qualifying deficit to Grosjean was excellent © XPB

"He finished less than six-tenths behind Grosjean, so it really was an excellent job by Heikki," says Permane.

"Romain is absolutely at the top of his game at the moment, so to be that close to him was very good."

For reference, the average qualifying gap between Grosjean and Raikkonen in the 10 races preceding Austin (based on the delta in the final qualifying segment in which both ran) was 0.152s in the former's favour.

Taking that into account, Kovalainen hadn't done bad job at standing in for Raikkonen. Even making it to Q3 after lapping three-tenths off Grosjean in Q2 was a genuine achievement.

"It's very user-friendly and it really gives you good confidence to attack straight away," says Kovalainen of the Lotus E21. "The car feels like you can lean on it really comfortably and it doesn't snap away from you. It's a really stable car.

"That's one of the reasons why I've been able to get up to speed relatively quickly as the car has been reasonably forgiving. It's been kind on the tyres as well so doing reasonably long stints is not a concern for us.

"It's a great car, there's nothing wrong with it and it's not too difficult to get a good balance."

Crucially, Kovalainen did a decent job with the tyres on a weekend when Nico Rosberg, Jenson Button and Felipe Massa all had Q2 disasters. While by his own admission it had not been perfect, it was evidence of the experienced, intelligent head that Lotus had wanted.

"In qualifying, everyone was on the edge with tyre temperatures," says Kovalainen. "I know what to do, but whether you can always do it or not is a different thing.

"I didn't have a great preparation lap for my best run in qualifying so there was a bit more performance there. But I don't think there's anything in particular that I'm missing or don't understand.

"The Fridays that I've done this year have been helpful in that; I pay attention to the tyres probably as much as everyone else in the paddock."

SUNDAY

Kovalainen's reaction time at the start was, understandably, below par © XPB

If qualifying was the biggest challenge for Kovalainen, the race start was probably going to be the next one.

Starting on the dirty side of the grid, he was 12th by the time the safety car was deployed after Adrian Sutil's crash on the back straight.

The launch itself was "good" according to Permane, although as you might expect from a driver who last started a grand prix 12 months ago, his reaction time to the lights going out was below par.

From there, he held his own comfortably in the queue between Rosberg and Massa until pitting at the end of lap 17. This allowed him to jump Rosberg, Daniel Ricciardo and Paul di Resta, and things were looking promising until he suffered the front wing problem.

"I think we would have been right up there in the mix for good points," says Kovalainen. "I don't know where we would have ended up exactly, but we would have been fighting for them, so we're going to have to try again in Brazil.

"I haven't had any big problems this weekend even though it was a late call. There were no big issues and I've been able to work on the car normally as if I had been racing all year. It's just that Sunday didn't quite work out. That's motor racing.

"Whether to be satisfied or not satisfied? I had quite neutral emotions all weekend. We will get another go to try to have a better Sunday in Brazil."

The team was certainly satisfied, with Permane hailing him as doing "a brilliant job", even though there was unavoidable rustiness.

"He made good progress through to qualifying," says Boullier. "You cannot blame him for having a cautious start on the dirty side of the track in the pack, or the front wing and KERS problems.

"It took him only Friday to get up to speed with all of the procedures and everything. That was because of his experience."

That experience is now supplemented by a full weekend of running, so there's every reason to expect Kovalainen to score in Brazil.

With Grosjean on form and likely to pick up big points, if the Finn can nick the extra few needed to make the difference between third and fourth in the constructors' championship, his selection will have paid off handsomely.

But if not, it's testament to Kovalainen's professionalism that he did such a solid, unflustered job in the USA. The least fortune could do is give him the chance to end what's now a 62-race record pointless run and get on the scoreboard at Interlagos on Sunday.

[KarbonBody]

Удачи Хейкки!

[jurykovalev]

Похоже, что-то попало в тормоза опять,

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/111502

[red_van]

Скиньте покруговку плиз:)

[denst]

Заихла тема, а ведь опять Грожана аж в практике, аж в пятничной опередил)

[Cameo]

Заихла тема, а ведь опять Грожана аж в практике, аж в пятничной опередил)

Так это уже никого не удивляет, Хейкки вкатился.

[denst]

в пятницы?

[Stranger]

Так это уже никого не удивляет, Хейкки вкатился.

завтра увидим в квале ... вкатился или нет ... =)

[vikki]

Похоже, что-то попало в тормоза опять,

http://www.autosport...t.php/id/111502

Там осторожно так намекнули что бумажный пакет, но откуда он и случайно ли?

[дизель]

бумажный пакет, но откуда он и случайно ли?

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: Сначала я обалдел, потом глянул, за кого ты болеешь и все встало на свои места. Хотя может это просто совпадение :D .....Ты правда думаешь, что им можно было надется на бумажный пакет??!! Ты правда так думаешь?? :D

[vikki]

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: Сначала я обалдел, потом глянул, за кого ты болеешь и все встало на свои места. Хотя может это просто совпадение :D .....Ты правда думаешь, что им можно было надется на бумажный пакет??!! Ты правда так думаешь?? :D

Я не думаю, когда уже все сделано, а вот когда надо сделать, то почему бы и не подумать. :time: До того как..

[jals]

Обычно силен в таких условиях, но в этот раз не получилось

[Vander]

Обычно силен в таких условиях, но в этот раз не получилось

Неужели ждал что получится ?