The Official 2009 Malaysian GP Thread *spoilers*

Come on then, let's have a bit of discussion about the next race at Sepang.

Will KERS be more useful here than in Melbourne? And if so - which parts of the track can we expect the most action?

How many front wings are we going to see jettisoned at turn 1? When will Piquet crash?

I hate this circuit, barring Barcelona and China it's my least favourite track but hopefully the new rules will have spiced things up a little.

I was thinking the array of tight corners will provide plenty of overtaking opportunities although we should see fewer spins resulting in accidents because the walls are a long way from the track.





Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/18/2009 07:42AM by mortal.

Don't like the circuit but I'm expecting a lot of overtaking. There's 3 straights followed by hairpins...watch the KERS cars...will be interesting to see if more teams opt for it.

The effects of the new regs will probably have a more visible effect here beacuse of the nature of the circuit. Whilst Melbourne is a point n squirt layout with no long straight to speak of, Sepang is the opposite with long, wide and open corners and long straights with a couple of tight hairpins thrown in.

The KERS will be a major boost on the long straights, and it'll be interesting to see the effect of the areo package.

I don't understand the hate against sepang tbh. Really like the track. The races aren't fantastic, but I don't find them to be bad either. Last year we got a good race from it.

Anyway, Brawn was pretty good at Barcelona and that is a very aero circuit. Sepang is also an aero dependent circuit, so I expect them to be good too. I think we'll see more difference between teams now as well.

I also think Ferrari will be better here. Last year was the same story. Hopefully Kimi will wake up and win this race, and unlike last year, keep the form through the rest of the year.

Joe_Satriani Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Anyway, Brawn was pretty good at Barcelona and
> that is a very aero circuit. Sepang is also an
> aero dependent circuit, so I expect them to be
> good too. I think we'll see more difference
> between teams now as well.

To add some substance to that, McLaren are expecting a worse performance than at Melbourne (and I doubt they meant the 3rd place). Obviously McLaren's main problem is an overall lack of downforce.

Mildly interesting, Hamilton said his car was awful to drive at Melbourne... to me it looked fantastic... just slow. It certainly seemed well balanced. I don't think it suits his style yet though - Heikki easily had the measure of him all weekend. Hamilton looked slightly more nervous of the back end - he tried to never let the rears spin up and slide - I thought with slicks it would play into his hands, but perhaps not.

Difficult to judge so ill wait till Friday!

At first my thoughts were it will be a good KERS track with both the long straights being roughly 10seconds full throttle the 6.67 seconds will really only be useful for half of a straight, and it makes me think how much more useful will it be than in Aus. My opinion is that it will play a much better role during the race than over one lap, correctly used it seems a great tool (Lewis in Aus a great example).

However after reading Lewis's and Mclarens thoughts it could just play more into the hands of the 'diffuser' bunch, all of which are non KERS runners. Whether Lewis and Mclaren are simply donwplaying their chances idk but I do feel if Brawn can repeat the win and/or 1-2 I reckon for the first half of the year they will take most if not all wins if they are reliable.

On the tyres, again difficult to call! Aus is quite a mech grip track, and so tyre differences were going to be massive. But surely Sepangs quick corners and the whole braking,steering and downshifting is going to be hell for the tyres!!

Then again all our predictions could be useless given the weather prediction ! Malaysians storms headed our way, however as always the case at Malaysia it can be bright one moment, a storm the next and before you know it bright again!!!

Whatever happens a great race is a certainty!

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"Trulli was slowing down like he wanted to have a picnic" LOL

I really hope that the ferrari car ist bether in Malaysia, and felipe can fight for a top 3-5 finish

Lewis drove a cautious race that paid off...It reminded me of Alain Prost. Heikki's performance was interesting and it was a pity he was out so quickly...It was hard to get a judge of Macca's level...which I think is better than we're giving 'em judgement for.

Having said that, Piquet, if he hadn't had his brake problem, was in line for being around Hamilton's position...a less unpredictable track like Sepang will reveal much!

i think the mclarens will struggle to get into the points, a lot more cars should survive at sepang than melbourne

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used to be GPGSL's Nick Heidfeld

I'm expecting 95% of KERS to be used on the Penang and S/F straights, could well result in a few crazy moves like Fisi's on Webbo in 2005(LMAO at the photo!). Also, expecting everyone to seriously struggle on the soft tyres after only a handful of laps.
I'm thinking anyone who qualifies light and starts on the softs will be looking very handy later on.

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Apprently could be a wet weekend in Malaysia
[news.bbc.co.uk]

I'm expecting a heavy use of KERS into turn 15, and maybe through 3 into 4. Should be interesting to see if Brawn can extend their gap - IIRC Honda always did well at Malaysia compared to the rest of the year.

[skip ahead in time]

Wow, what a race! I have to say I sort of expected it from Piquet though. The Red Bull is quick but sure is unreliable... and that Renault is a dog! Great run by Kimi and Felipe, and the Brawn is quite strong but in some tracks like this we can see how KERS can help... still, was great to see Rubens drive like that again, podium! :D

And shame about Nico

I actually think that Kers will not bring that big of an advantage due to the high speed technical corners of the track. I think the diffuser three will be very strong in this race, Williams may be slower, they tend to do very good on street twisty tracks but rather poorly on fast flowing tracks like Sepang.

I think Toyota will be BGP main rivals followed by Red Bull and I think Ferrari will once again have problems with the tires due to Kers. If it rains, well, it's a lottery really, the only thing testing gave of performance in the rain was that the Toyota was about 2 seconds faster than anybody else, but even then it was testing and BGP wasn't there. I actually hope it rains because these cars are harder to drive in those conditions, it would separate the men from the boys.

So, under what category would Piquet fall?
That's not to mention the "boys" who look like teenage girls *cough*Nico*cough* :P

LOL I think Piquet would fall in the shemale category.

KERS should give an advantage here due to the long straights, but also problems due to the corners.

I think Brawn again for a win as their car was fast in Spain and that also has long straights.

I think it will be closer though.

I expect mclaren to be more off the pace in Sepang.

I hope the Williams has more grip towards the end of the race, it was a shame to see him lose places on the softs. Although this may have been because of him overworking them trying to catch the leaders(I can't remember what place he was in at the time).

I'm hpoing Lewis could pull something out in the wet, a bit Barcelona 1996.

I was hoping Piquet was being sacked before this race but it doesn't seem likely, hopefully Alonso can fight with the big guns like the last races last year, and Felipe can score a good result for Ferrari.. let's se what Kimi comes up with here... it's funny last year Massa spun and retired, yet Kimi makes a mistake in Melbourne and nobody says anything about...

anyways, go Jenson, Good luck
and go Hamilton, go away and don't come back!


ps: Glock for podium