The Hamilton Paradox.

No, it's not a 1960's spy movie starring Michael Caine but it could be good point of discussion. 

Hamilton got penalized at Spa, most said too harshly, almost all agreed deservedly yet the very controversy that ensued might in some way have helped him. 

With a  few days gone by we look at this with a bit more detachment,  let's review three incidents from the Monza race. 

Let's start with Hamilton's collision with Webber and his running Glock off the track onto the wet grass at Curva Grande .  I will not argue legality or call for any sort of penalty, these moves may be within the letter of the rules but seemed like petulant acts from a driver who otherwise had a fantastic race slicing though the field in a superior car. 

I was amazed to read that some UK web sites actually blamed Webber for the collision. Call it "rubbing is racing" if you must but to blame the guy getting squeezed off the road seemed a bit excessive. I'm guessing these same people  were virulent against Schumacher's starts for example.  

The Glock incident is possibly more troubling because it was uncalled for and unnecessary .  Hamilton had misread traffic and Glock saw his snowball's chance to get the position back.  He had a decent run off the chicane until Sir Hamilton pushed him onto the grass.  Pointless because the Mclaren was so much faster than the Toyota. What's certain is that after Spa there was no way officials would look at incidents like these and consider them actionable.

With Felipe Massa we saw another effect of the Spa controversy. Massa made a great move on the outside of Nico Rosberg but was up on the curb on the second half of the chicane. It was great driving by the two of them and Massa did a great job holding on to a car which was all out of shape coming out. The pit wall told him to give the position back just in case Mclaren protested. 

But why? Massa did not "cut" the chicane, in fact his left wheels were still on the white paint. What's more that is essentially the same line Hamilton took lap after lap... In the end though the Ferrari pit wall must have figured that it was better not to risk and Massa gave up potentially precious points. So you see, paradoxically, Hamilton has had his penalty reduced already.

Discuss! and as usual direct all hate mail to the Freep.

UPDATE:  The FIA  decided... not to decide and ruled Mclaren's appeal was not admissible,  after ruling that it was.  sigh.

The Hamilton Paradox from Axis of Oversteer.com Video on Vimeo.