Jump to content

Formula 1 2024


williamjm
 Share

Recommended Posts

A good victory for Perez, obviously helped by Verstappen's qualifying drama but when it looked like his team-mate might be in a position to chase him he did seem to be able to keep the gap at 4-5 seconds. Still a good result for Verstappen and keeps him in the lead of the championship. The other teams don't look like they have any answer for the Red Bulls at the moment, although Alonso must have enjoyed taking the early lead. It's a pity about the double penalty denying Alonso the podium, a big mistake by the team there, especially after Ocon got penalised for the same thing last race you would think all the teams would be cautious about working on the car early. A bit like early last year, George Russell seems to have the knack of getting good points even when the car isn't the best.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, williamjm said:

A good victory for Perez, obviously helped by Verstappen's qualifying drama but when it looked like his team-mate might be in a position to chase him he did seem to be able to keep the gap at 4-5 seconds. Still a good result for Verstappen and keeps him in the lead of the championship. The other teams don't look like they have any answer for the Red Bulls at the moment, although Alonso must have enjoyed taking the early lead. It's a pity about the double penalty denying Alonso the podium, a big mistake by the team there, especially after Ocon got penalised for the same thing last race you would think all the teams would be cautious about working on the car early. A bit like early last year, George Russell seems to have the knack of getting good points even when the car isn't the best.

They reversed the penalty decision about a half hour ago. In the letter it mentions that Aston Martin presented evidence of numerous instances where penalties were served and the jack made contact with the car.

The Ocon instance is different. In that case, there was a mechanic clearly working on the car during the penalty time.

Edited by Lord of Oop North
Link to comment
Share on other sites

37 minutes ago, Lord of Oop North said:

They reversed the penalty decision about a half hour ago...

The FAI are not covering themselves in glory either way.Ā  Announce the second penalty too late, then withdraw it after everyone points out the incompetence.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Lord of Oop North said:

They reversed the penalty decision about a half hour ago. In the letter it mentions that Aston Martin presented evidence of numerous instances where penalties were served and the jack made contact with the car.

The Ocon instance is different. In that case, there was a mechanic clearly working on the car during the penalty time.

I just saw that. I think it is a good decision to reverse it, having a 10 second penalty for that seemed very harsh.

32 minutes ago, Wilbur said:

The FAI are not covering themselves in glory either way.Ā  Announce the second penalty too late, then withdraw it after everyone points out the incompetence.

Putting out a safety car seemed unnecessary as well when Stroll seemed to have done a good job of getting his car off the track.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

To be perfectly honest, this type of domination from one team is exactly why I stopped watching Formula 1 back in the day when Ferrari did it and kept away while Mercedes were doing it. I rejoined two seasons ago when Hamilton and Verstappen were really going at it and it seemed like actual competition is back.

Also, the incompetence of race control is just staggering. It's been going on since I've started watching F1 again and it's really making it difficult to watch races. Alonso went for a tyre change around lap 20, when the safety car came on. If Aston Martin team had made a mistake, there's plenty of time to review it and give out a penalty if needed. You need to know the result of the race before handing out trophies and doing a podium ceremony! It's not that difficult, really. I mean they were reviewing Red Bull financial wrongdoings a FULL YEAR AFTER the season in question ended. Hell, the next season had ended, too! I understand that checking the finances takes a lot longer than reviewing a tyre change, but they have over 3 months between seasons. Once the new season starts, every question about the previous season must have been cleared. It's a very interesting sport but it's also extremely badly run.

Basically, the only thing that's still keeping me in it are the two guys doing F1 broadcast on Serbian cable TV and have their own podcast on F1.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

That was a potentially really interesting race but the end was a complete fiasco. They're lucky it was early in the season and not late when it could have had a more massive impact on the championship, and that any configuration of the results would not have impacted the top two, at least.

Hopefully it's the final message to the FIA that they should stop fucking around with the rules to try to manipulate the spectacle and just enforce the rules properly.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Chaotic race. Ā Perhaps itā€™s time to fit the cars with a wrap-around fender/bumper like go-karts so that they donā€™t detonate like ordinance whenever they make contact. Ā Or just reconsider the restart protocol. Ā The FIA chose this red flag restart format to rein in runaway leaders and create drama but it leads to unearned opportunities and incentivizes aggressive risks to grab gains that were impossible in actual racing ā€” which just leads to another red flag. Ā Itā€™s meant to be a race, not a demolition derby.

Iā€™m not sure if Mercedes are back in contention or if the Melbourne circuit just favors them because it has fewer of the fast corners where RB has such a downforce advantage over them.Ā 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 weeks later...

Interesting bit on the BBC podcast. They spoke to 2 drivers anonymously and both of them said that going up to 25 races per season was going to completely destroy their will to race, especially if they have 3 intensive days with races and qualifying on every single one. Verstappen, not giving a shit, has been publicly voluble about that not being something he's interested in and then outlined a whole line of other stuff that he wants to, including the hint he might only race until the end of his Red Bull contract in 2028 and then leave. He'd only be 31, but that would be his 14th season in F1. So it would be interesting if the push to 25 races and more sprint races shortens drivers' careers because the sheer exhaustion and attrition of that is going to be hard to deal with.

Also analysis that Hamilton might be in a bind here. Several teams have gloomily said that Red Bull is so far ahead they should dominate the next three seasons (including this one) and Ferrari, Mercedes and Aston Martin might get within shouting distance but are unlikely to overhaul them completely. Hamilton turns 39 in January 2023, so he is close-ish to the end of his career. If he writes off 2023, 24 and 25, that means he won't have a realistic chance to win his 8th world title (which clearly is his goal post the 2021 fiasco, otherwise he'd probably have gone already) until 2026, when he'll be 42 (and in his 19th season). Alonso has shown you can hang in there for that long, but Hamilton has to put up with 3 seasons of not being competitive in the meantime, and there is no guarantee that Red Bull won't ace the next set of regulations as well and Mercedes might get things extremely wrong again (or Aston Martin or Ferrari might blitz past both of them, or Audi come in and are instantly competitive). So Hamilton really has to decide whether he wants to hang around and maybe risk doing a Vettel-style decline that maybe damages his reputation, or hope for a miracle that Mercedes seriously ups its game quickly.

I think that's why there's been this Leclerc-Mercedes speculation because maybe Hamilton is considering calling it quits, and the new contract with Mercedes he is talking about might only be for one season.

4 hours ago, Iskaral Pust said:

Russell has renewed his torpedo mode from last year. Ā I canā€™t believe how little attention has been given to him spearing into cars ahead of him in the opening laps.

George had enough of his car up the inside (more than 50%) and then even decelerated hugely to give Verstappen room, which Verstappen didn't take advantage of. Even Horner had to agree that was reasonable, and the stewards didn't even think of looking at it. On the next corner he got his elbows out and basically did to Verstappen exactly what Verstappen has done to every other driver when he overtakes (oddly, despite it being far clearer-cut, Horner did voice a complaint over that, which is weird). Russell was just getting punchy in the way Verstappen normally does which, not atypically, Verstappen got annoyed about when it happens to him.

Edited by Werthead
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, that was terrible. I know the Baku DRS zones used to be a bit too long but taking 100 metres off them seems to have massively overcompensated in the wrong direction.

The most exciting things to happen in this race, in order:

  1. Ocon nearly ploughing into a crowd of people someone idiotically allowed into the pit lane.
  2. Lewis Hamilton hitting a water bottle on track.
  3. ???

Solid win for Perez though, and he can at least feel like a championship battle is alive after 4 races with 2 wins apiece, even if most people are sceptical he can maintain the challenge to Verstappen.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Werthead said:

Solid win for Perez though, and he can at least feel like a championship battle is alive after 4 races with 2 wins apiece, even if most people are sceptical he can maintain the challenge to Verstappen.

The weekend could hardly have gone any better for Perez. He did get lucky with the safety car, although it feels like Red Bull might have had enough time to react and tell Verstappen to abort coming into the pits. However, even with that advantage there was still a lot of time for Verstappen to catch him up, but he never quite managed it.

The pit-lane situation at the end was ridiculous, if the pit-lane reporters can see the problem developing then someone at race control should definitely be able to.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Good analysis on the BBC Radio podcast that Leclerc is in danger of having Alonso's career without the 2 WCs: undoubted talent and skill but he's not being given the equipment to do it, and the Ferrari pressure is going to explode at some point and force him to leave, and if he miscalculates in where he goes he might never have a real shot at the WC.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Spectacular grid for tomorrow.

I'd have to double check the stats and this is a random one, but is that the first time F1 has had three Spanish-speakers at the top of qualifying?

Hamilton and Verstappen both pretty annoyed with that, and Leclerc, although at least he had set a vaguely okay time before losing control. The headwinds seemed to be throwing everyone off their game and it was good from Perez that he managed to keep his head when Verstappen lost his at the end there.

Whether Perez can mount that title challenge over a whole season is still a question, but it's easy to forget the role played by confidence and success. If Perez can overhaul Max in the championship tomorrow, which seems very doable given the car park circuit is tough to overtake on, that's a shot in the arm for him and if Max keeps being as grumpy and downbeat as he has been so far, that could give Perez a reasonable shot. I still wouldn't put money on Perez though, Max's skills are formidable over a championship distance. Perez's biggest challenge tomorrow will be keeping Alonso from zapping past him at the start.

Leclerc and Russell will have zero motivation to make Verstappen's life easy for him in trying to move up the grid.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • williamjm changed the title to Formula 1 2024

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

 Share

×
×
  • Create New...