Takuma Sato is adamant that Michael Schumacher braked early when the
pair made contact in the Belgian Grand Prix, the accident resulting in
retirement for the German ace at a track where he has shone so often in
the past.

The coming-together happened at a restart after the safety car, on the
approach to the La Source hairpin. The BAR hit the Ferrari so hard that
the rear wing folded up and its rear suspension collapsed, leaving both
wheels hanging off the red car when Michael came to a halt at the
corner. Schumacher went to see the stewards during the race, before
making an early exit, and, after the flag, the officials gave Sato a
ten-place grid penalty for the Brazilian GP.

"At the restart, Michael and I were trying to overtake a Jordan," Sato
told Crash.net, "Michael was there in front of me, on the left was a
Jordan and, on the right, we were very close to the pit wall. So I was
kind of boxed and couldn't go anywhere.

"I was going to challenge him into turn one but, to me, it looked like
he braked so early. I reacted and hit the brakes, but simply locked up
the front wheels and contacted the back of his car. Basically, I
couldn't decelerate like I wanted to, so it looked quite big."

Schumacher made a point of walking over to the Japanese driver and
giving him a quick lecture - before hitting his visor.

"I couldn't hear what he said, he just flapped my visor," Taku
revealed, "After that, I didn't have a chance to speak to him. It's
very natural to understand that he was upset, but I was also
disappointed. Obviously, I'm very sorry for that - in the
circumstances, it's very easy to understand. But also the situation was
incredible difficult."

The incident came at a bad time, since Sato's future with the BAR team
remains in doubt. It's certainly clear that he is surplus to
requirements if Jenson Button is able to stay but, if the Englishman
leaves for Williams, Taku still has a tenuous hold at top of the
reserve list, as sources say Honda still prefers him to Anthony
Davidson.

440gtx (AT) email (DOT) com wrote:
Very close to the pit wall? Pausing the replay, there was a huge gap
on the inside, at least two cars could have been between Michael and
the pit wall, with enough room to spare for them to make it into La
Source.

Braking in those conditions for La Source was just before the 100 metre
board (from onboard video), looking at the replay of the incident, you
can see the 100 metre board in the background, they are well inside the
braking zone, approximately 50m to the corner when contact was made
(approx because it's hard to tell looking back along the circuit).
It's really hard to tell exactly where Michael braked because they
always replay things in slow motion (grr), and it's too far away to see
the attitude change, but there's no sudden Vc change with the other
cars around them. At the very worst that gives Sato 50m reaction time
to realise there was going to be contact and move inside. That's about
1.5 seconds. That's quite a lot of time for an F1 driver.

A much better argument for Sato would be to say Michael was directly
ahead, a Jordan to the left, I just missed my braking point. Admitting
guilt then coming out two days later to argue your case isn't the best
way to go about proving your innocence, especially as everybody agrees
it was Sato's fault and he has already been punished by the FIA. Are
they appealing?

<440gtx (AT) email (DOT) com> wrote

Where does it say Sato blames Schumacher? All he said is Schumacher seemed
to brake early, to him.

<440gtx (AT) email (DOT) com> wrote

Of course he did. He always does that.

Look at the replay, Sato never locked up the brakes... It's those squinty
eyes, he can't see real good. ;0)

"John Smith" <someone (AT) microsoft (DOT) com> wrote

Still not seen a GOOD view of Montoyas incident but:

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA
“It’s always tough to retire from a race but when it’s caused by matters out
of your or the team’s control its even harder. As I said in the pole
position press conference yesterday I drive for my team, so my
disappointment is even greater because as a team we were doing a great job.
I now know that Pizzonia was trying to un-lap himself on dry tyres and then
hit me from behind whilst trying to do so. This was a disappointing end to
what could have been the perfect weekend.”

"Weird Al" <weird (AT) no (DOT) fuss.com> wrote

uh, I think you jumped in on the wrong post???