Pastor Maldonado

[David AGS]

This guy copped a lot of stick by many, like being their only because he has cash, F3000 champ in his fourth year, would be thrashed by Rubens,

But young Pastor is doing a fine job.

Okay, he did do some silly mistakes at the first few races, and he does sponsor Williams, but he has done very well. He has outqualified his veteran teammate Rubens Barrichello on several races, and quali is a true indication.

Williams haven't produced the best car this season in their history, but Maldonado did qualify in the top 10 in Spain, and Monaco, and very unlucky not to score points at the twisty street circuit.

Fair to say, he aint bad, and not your typical pay driver.

[patrick]

Spain was a surprise, I think a lot of people expected him to do well in Monaco given his GP2 record there. But he needs to replicate that form on other tracks to show he is a good driver. Certainly seems like he has some potential.

[Ed24]

Yes, he's been a pleasant surprise ever since Saturday in Spain.

Hopefully he can get some confidence from Monaco.

[Ferrim]

I've already said this elsewhere but, how can a driver as erratic and error prone as Maldonado do this well at Monaco? It doesn't make sense. How come he's been running out of track during every race weekend so far and managed to avoid it at Monaco of all places? It's certainly not a one-off as he's always been fast at Monaco (as well as erratic) in lower formulae.

[FullMetalJack]

I've already said this elsewhere but, how can a driver as erratic and error prone as Maldonado do this well at Monaco? It doesn't make sense. How come he's been running out of track during every race weekend so far and managed to avoid it at Monaco of all places? It's certainly not a one-off as he's always been fast at Monaco (as well as erratic) in lower formulae.

I know, logically you'd think that Monaco is where he'd struggle most.

[Cynon]

I've already said this elsewhere but, how can a driver as erratic and error prone as Maldonado do this well at Monaco? It doesn't make sense. How come he's been running out of track during every race weekend so far and managed to avoid it at Monaco of all places? It's certainly not a one-off as he's always been fast at Monaco (as well as erratic) in lower formulae.

I'm not sure if this is relevant or not but when I race online, there's one guy who I can usually count on to fail, except on street tracks where he seldom scrapes the wall.

Some drivers are just less crash happy when the walls are closer. I'm not sure if they just don't push as hard or are more aware of what the limits are, but Pastor Maldonado is not the only driver like that. Paul Tracy was like that early in his career, but I'm not at all suggesting that Maldonado isn't in Paul Tracy's league...

[golic_2004]

Not everyone starts their F1 career in a blaze of glory. Sometimes they have reject-worthy races their first few times out before finally showing off their true potential. Perhaps this is a sign of things to come for the Venezuelan with braces.

[mario]

Not everyone starts their F1 career in a blaze of glory. Sometimes they have reject-worthy races their first few times out before finally showing off their true potential. Perhaps this is a sign of things to come for the Venezuelan with braces.

The fact that he was able to pull out a good performance was certainly a good sign; however, the question is whether he can now build upon that and either score points regularly (if the car is capable of that), or at least consistently finish ahead of Barrichello. It'll also depend on whether he is still crash prone during the free practise sessions - asides from the expense of rebuilding a car, it costs the team a lot of set up time they can ill afford to loose.
If he can do that, then it'll go a long way to shedding the tag of "pay driver" - by the end of the season, the shunts in the first few races will probably be forgotten if he had a fairly trouble free season from here on in.

[Warren Hughes]

Quite a few F1 fans wrote off Vitaly Petrov as a crash-prone pay-driver at the start of last season, but he went on to more than prove his worth and nobody is questioning his place in the Renault team any more. Pastor has taken a couple of steps towards replicating that, and time will tell if he wins people over in the same way Petrov has.

[Phoenix]

I've already said this elsewhere but, how can a driver as erratic and error prone as Maldonado do this well at Monaco? It doesn't make sense. How come he's been running out of track during every race weekend so far and managed to avoid it at Monaco of all places? It's certainly not a one-off as he's always been fast at Monaco (as well as erratic) in lower formulae.

Then try to explain the 2002 Japanese GP for Takuma Sato (I know, track knowledge and all, but it's perfectly comparable to Maldonado's results in Monaco so far).

My opinion is, this is a good springboard for Pastor to up his game and show his worth, especially if Williams picks up competitivity, which seems it's doing. We're still early in the season.

[This]

Probably Monaco is comparable to Venezolan traffic, can anyone confirm that?

[beetleman64]

He's certainly shown a decent turn of speed, but he's a known Monaco specialist. Remember that in Spain he dropped back in the race, although qualifying was a nice surprise. However, where Rubens will mostly drag the car around where it should be all the time, we don't know if Maldonado can. He's got a lot to prove, but remember the last driver we said that about: a certain K Kobayashi who is doing a brilliant job at Sauber and has brought the car home in the points at every round so far (DSQ in Melbourne aside).

[Peter]

Not only has Maldonado gotten better, so has Williams. They're now fighting with Sauber/Force India and are clear of Torro Rosso, instead of fighting Lotus like before.

[ibsey]

Not only has Maldonado gotten better, so has Williams. They're now fighting with Sauber/Force India and are clear of Torro Rosso, instead of fighting Lotus like before.

Indeed, Williams appear to have improved this weekend, particularly with their new upgrades this weekend (new floor & rear wing).

Whislt I acknowledge Pastor Maldonado did a great job at Monaco. I will however still reserve judgement on his ability until he can reproduce his Monaco performance at another race this year. We must remember that Williams has usually demostrated good speed at Monaco within the last few years. Simliarly a few drivers in front of Pastor ran into trouble (i.e. two Mercedes drivers & Massa just to name a few).

It would also be interesting to see how strong Maldonado is in the head when their is more pressure on him (i.e. should Barrichello start regularly beating him). Will Pastor up his game, or throw it in the barriers when he is under pressure?

[dnhrudi]

4th season in GP2 or not, tuggers do not win the GP2 championship, (it's not Johnny Cecotto Jr out there!) so the guy has speed for sure. as for consistency Massa never used the same line twice when he first rocked up with Sauber (from Italian F3000 for Gods sake) and look where he ended up. To me this guy deserves to be in F1 on merit and to be talked about like he's Taki Inoue is a bit out of order, especially as the Williams woofs. Lets just wait and see how he develops eh?, like with Petrov and fave rave Kobayashi.

[DanielPT]

Well, he is some kind of a Monaco specialist so I am thinking it is a bit of a one off really. At least this year.

[Waris]

I'm starting to become his fan. If he keeps up his progress, now with Williams finally improving, I look forward to being entertained by seeing him race! Being taken out so close to the end in Monte-Carlo was really sad and a true facepalm moment. I hope he scores points in Montréal.

[CarlosFerreira]

Young Pastor is indeed making a fine job - being the first man ever to be beaten by one of the newcomer teams on pure race pace has assured him a place in the hearts of the fraternity in this website. Especially when he is there to substitute the guy who landed Williams' last (ever?) pole-position.

I can only hope HRT can field a third car soon.

[f1-gast]

Pastor Maldonado is doing actually a really great job ! 2times in Q3 where his much more experienced Teammate seems to lost the joy to drive in F1.
If Hamilton wasn't acting like a serialkiller on the road Maldonado would have scored lots of points !

He looks like a bit on Pedro Diniz riught now, only he doest it in a few races and diniz in 2 seasons.
Our F1 commentator Olav Mol is always bashing him like he can;t drive but he does it much better than Granddad Rubens

[CarlosFerreira]

Go home, Pastor Maldonado:

http://img23.imageshack.us/img23/8572/h ... 2011t1.jpg

[Klon]

Young Pastor is indeed making a fine job - being the first man ever to be beaten by one of the newcomer teams on pure race pace has assured him a place in the hearts of the fraternity in this website. Especially when he is there to substitute the guy who landed Williams' last (ever?) pole-position.

Just to see more frustration from you, I hope Hülkenberg never gets a seat anywhere anymore.

[Ferrim]

Go home, Pastor Maldonado:

http://img23.imageshack.us/img23/8572/h ... 2011t1.jpg

That's why I said in the race thread that I couldn't find Hamilton to be blamed by this. Both Schumacher and Maldonado turned in very suddenly, when Hamilton was already there -and I was certain Schumacher knew, as Lewis had been already close in the previous laps. Schumacher nearly caused an accident with his turning-in, Maldonado managed to do it. The main difference is that I will excuse Maldonado because he's a rookie and had a nearly perfect weekend. Was Hamilton reckless? Maybe, but not as much as has been said. And after watching his incident with Massa, I don't find it as bad as before. Monaco is a place where nearly every passing move will be controversial, as there's just no room to make a clean move unless the other driver lets you.

[ibsey]

I agree with Ferrim. It is Interesting to see how much earlier Maldonado had turned into the corner compared to Schumi (& therefore the difference in space to the right indicated by the green lines). But as Ferrim says lets excuse Maldonado because he's a rookie. Also remember that Schumi's defending was early into the race so perhaps he was more willing to conceed a place in the hope of regaining it later on. Whereas the Maldonado's incident was very late in the race, where the two drivers attitudes were perhaps more 'desperate'.

In hindsight perhaps Maldonado should have realised Hamilton was going to try a do or die move there (like Schumi reckonised it) with it being late in the race etc & squeezed Hamilton, but then given Hamilton just enough space at the end of braking zone, (hoping that Hamilton would have his own accident & Maldonado could carry on unchallenge). In the same way that Kobayashi fought with Webber into the Nouvelle Chicane, but reckonised that the faster car would be coming through whatever the cost, so Kobayashi just bagged the points you could. As said before we can't blame Maldonado since he is a rookie, but it is important he learns from this as well.

[DanielPT]

Go home, Pastor Maldonado:

http://img23.imageshack.us/img23/8572/h ... 2011t1.jpg

That's why I said in the race thread that I couldn't find Hamilton to be blamed by this. Both Schumacher and Maldonado turned in very suddenly, when Hamilton was already there -and I was certain Schumacher knew, as Lewis had been already close in the previous laps. Schumacher nearly caused an accident with his turning-in, Maldonado managed to do it. The main difference is that I will excuse Maldonado because he's a rookie and had a nearly perfect weekend. Was Hamilton reckless? Maybe, but not as much as has been said. And after watching his incident with Massa, I don't find it as bad as before. Monaco is a place where nearly every passing move will be controversial, as there's just no room to make a clean move unless the other driver lets you.

There might be a problem in letting this off. People might start placing a third of a car next to other cars before a corner to force people going wide and thus making an optimistic move stick. While I think it is harsh penalizing a driver like this I can understand the position of the stewards. Besides, isn't this taking off even more options from a defending driver? In a time when people think they are already sitting ducks?

I thought it was decided that a driver must only wield or widen its trajectory when more than half the overtaking car is at his side and with that I don't mean leaving it late just for placing the car there when the other guy turns in. Hamilton dived and hoped that his name was enough to scare Maldonado. It clearly didn't worked, so saying that Maldonado caused the accident is also a bit harsh.

[pablo_h]

Go home, Pastor Maldonado:

http://img23.imageshack.us/img23/8572/h ... 2011t1.jpg

That's why I said in the race thread that I couldn't find Hamilton to be blamed by this. Both Schumacher and Maldonado turned in very suddenly, when Hamilton was already there -and I was certain Schumacher knew, as Lewis had been already close in the previous laps. Schumacher nearly caused an accident with his turning-in, Maldonado managed to do it. The main difference is that I will excuse Maldonado because he's a rookie and had a nearly perfect weekend. Was Hamilton reckless? Maybe, but not as much as has been said. And after watching his incident with Massa, I don't find it as bad as before. Monaco is a place where nearly every passing move will be controversial, as there's just no room to make a clean move unless the other driver lets you.

LOL WHUT?
Hamilton got lucky with the schumacher overtake. Schui and Maldonado were taking the normal racing line, in a spot where overtakes aren't normally attempted. Schumacher had to react very late and turn away abruptly to avoid a collision, he certainly didn't think hamilton would dive up the inside there.
It's a suprise schui did that, but he's been penalised a lot recently and of course stated that he's only in it for the fun of racing right now, so in that respect he reacted to stop a collision at all costs.

Maldonado on the other hand, well hamilton takes his inspiration from Senna and thinks it's his right to barge through anyone and intimidate them.

So, it's a shame maldonado didn't get some points on the board, but as rare as they would be right now, he did his career a service. Lose some points now, but let it be known he will not give up positions or be intimidated, so in the future no one will try that type of desperate move as they will know he won't concede places easily. It's a philosophy Senna relied on and said in interviews and no doubt Hamilton has taken the same stance, and only the drivers that didn't give way were the drivers shown respect.

and that's the difference between the maldanado and schumacher overtakes there. Maldonado has it all to prove, and schumacher just wanted a fun clean race and had nothing to prove. But in both occasions, Hamilton would have been to blame if contact had occured.

[CarlosFerreira]

Young Pastor is indeed making a fine job - being the first man ever to be beaten by one of the newcomer teams on pure race pace has assured him a place in the hearts of the fraternity in this website. Especially when he is there to substitute the guy who landed Williams' last (ever?) pole-position.

Just to see more frustration from you, I hope Hülkenberg never gets a seat anywhere anymore.

Gloves are off. Go home, Pastor Maldonado. And invite Colin Kolles for lunch.

My God, what are those people doing to my team...

[LionZoo]

LOL WHUT?
Hamilton got lucky with the schumacher overtake. Schui and Maldonado were taking the normal racing line, in a spot where overtakes aren't normally attempted. Schumacher had to react very late and turn away abruptly to avoid a collision, he certainly didn't think hamilton would dive up the inside there.
It's a suprise schui did that, but he's been penalised a lot recently and of course stated that he's only in it for the fun of racing right now, so in that respect he reacted to stop a collision at all costs.

Maldonado on the other hand, well hamilton takes his inspiration from Senna and thinks it's his right to barge through anyone and intimidate them.

So, it's a shame maldonado didn't get some points on the board, but as rare as they would be right now, he did his career a service. Lose some points now, but let it be known he will not give up positions or be intimidated, so in the future no one will try that type of desperate move as they will know he won't concede places easily. It's a philosophy Senna relied on and said in interviews and no doubt Hamilton has taken the same stance, and only the drivers that didn't give way were the drivers shown respect.

and that's the difference between the maldanado and schumacher overtakes there. Maldonado has it all to prove, and schumacher just wanted a fun clean race and had nothing to prove. But in both occasions, Hamilton would have been to blame if contact had occured.

Have to agree with this. Just because one person jumped out of your way doesn't make your subsequent moves correct. Let's not forget that Schumi nearly put himself into the wall to get out of Hamilton's way at Ste. Devote.

[DanielPT]

I just saw a replay of Schumacher overtaking by Hamilton and in the end Hamilton raises his hand weaving it at Schumi... What for? Schumacher forgot the red carpet?

So he really expected Maldonado to let him through...

[Ferrim]

You didn't watch the same overtake I did. Schumacher was looking like he would not really put up a fight and then, all of a sudden, he turned it, gave Hamilton almost no run, nearly caused an incident and in the end he nearly crashed himself. Maldonado was similar. Either you cover the inside line or you run your normal racing line, but if you go for your normal racing line and you found someone pretty much alongside you you can't just turn in.



This is from before Maldonado started turning in. I would say Hamilton has at least half the car alongside.

[DanielPT]

You didn't watch the same overtake I did. Schumacher was looking like he would not really put up a fight and then, all of a sudden, he turned it, gave Hamilton almost no run, nearly caused an incident and in the end he nearly crashed himself. Maldonado was similar. Either you cover the inside line or you run your normal racing line, but if you go for your normal racing line and you found someone pretty much alongside you you can't just turn in.



This is from before Maldonado started turning in. I would say Hamilton has at least half the car alongside.

Let me just say that this picture is slightly misleading. If one takes into account perspectives I would say that Hamilton front tyres are almost on par with Maldonado rear tyres. That is not half the car through, in my view. And this also plays with the fact that Hamilton hit the left of Maldonado very close to the rear tyres which means that right after your pic Maldonado turned in. I still maintain that while Hamilton was harshly penalized, Maldonado rightly stated that he would not let himself be bullied by Hamilton. It was a very similar move to the one he used against Massa in Monza last season except that Hamilton was the one in losing end. Massa didn't let Hamilton through and his decision was judged right. I think Maldonado should have a break here and not because he is a rookie...

[BlindCaveSalamander]

Hamilton got lucky with the schumacher overtake. Schui and Maldonado were taking the normal racing line, in a spot where overtakes aren't normally attempted.

Wasn't Ste. Devote where the DRS was meant to help out, though? I always thought of it as the secondary passing point on the track, after the Nouvelle Chicane. The problem was that Maldonado seemed to think the job was done halfway down the straight, that Hamilton wouldn't overtake, and moved back towards the racing line, leaving the door wide open for Hamilton to pretty much emulate his overtake on Schumacher. It would've worked had Maldonado gone all the way back to the racing line, but he was slightly more to the inside, and also turned in earlier than Schumacher, likely because Schumacher had actually realised Hamilton was on the inside.

There might be a problem in letting this off. People might start placing a third of a car next to other cars before a corner to force people going wide and thus making an optimistic move stick.

The thing is, though, that wasn't really a very opportunistic move. There was more than enough space for both cars, Hamilton was at about the same position as he was with Schumacher, and if Maldonado had realised the McLaren was on the inside, realised that there was no way to stop him at that point, and gave him space, we would be lauding another brilliant overtake for Hamilton and a mature drive for Maldonado rewarded with 6 well-deserved points.

[Ferrim]

It was a very similar move to the one he used against Massa in Monza last season except that Hamilton was the one in losing end. Massa didn't let Hamilton through and his decision was judged right. I think Maldonado should have a break here and not because he is a rookie...

I've just searched for an onboard of that, and I must accept that you've got a point there.

[jackanderton]

As someone glad to see Pastor ACTUALLY DO SOMETHING, I was crestfallen to see him get taken out like that.

Maybe we'll make an F1 driver out of him yet.

[Ferrim]

I've just understood why Maldonado defended so hard against Hamilton. He was racing in 6th position, which put him a third of the way towards escaping rejectdom; a 7th place would not do anything for him, so better crash than letting Hamilton go through. Definitely no blame at all can be put on Pastor for the incident and I guess that's why Hamilton was punished by the stewards It doesn't look like Maldonado is going to have too many chances to run so high.

[Phoenix]

It doesn't look like Maldonado is going to have too many chances to run so high.

I would definately bet against that.

[DanielPT]

I've just understood why Maldonado defended so hard against Hamilton. He was racing in 6th position, which put him a third of the way towards escaping rejectdom; a 7th place would not do anything for him, so better crash than letting Hamilton go through. Definitely no blame at all can be put on Pastor for the incident and I guess that's why Hamilton was punished by the stewards It doesn't look like Maldonado is going to have too many chances to run so high.

Exactly! He was so desperate to avoid a profile in this site that it was out of the question leaving 6th willingly!

[Phoenix]

I've just understood why Maldonado defended so hard against Hamilton. He was racing in 6th position, which put him a third of the way towards escaping rejectdom; a 7th place would not do anything for him, so better crash than letting Hamilton go through. Definitely no blame at all can be put on Pastor for the incident and I guess that's why Hamilton was punished by the stewards It doesn't look like Maldonado is going to have too many chances to run so high.

Exactly! He was so desperate to avoid a profile in this site that it was out of the question leaving 6th willingly!

Under my criteria, he'd have been instantly unrejectified, so the guy has a point

[Waris]

I don't know if anyone has made this comparison yet, but especially after that Monte-Carlo incident, I can see Maldonado becoming the new Montoya. The guy's got guts, which I like, even if he seems to be a bit hot-headed at times.