Formula 1 2024

[polishgenius]

22 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Verstappen ties Senna at 41, doing so at a considerably younger age. Very impressive.

 

 

Verstappen doing what he's doing is obviously incredibly impressive, but it's worth remembering that Senna raced in an era with far fewer races per season, so it doesn't really make sense to make the direct comparison like that. 

[Tywin et al.]

17 minutes ago, polishgenius said:

 

 

Verstappen doing what he's doing is obviously incredibly impressive, but it's worth remembering that Senna raced in an era with far fewer races per season, so it doesn't really make sense to make the direct comparison like that. 

It's unavoidable. Most sports have more games/races these days than they did when greats from yesteryear competed. The flipside is in many sports the legends competed against a smaller talent pool/number of teams. I tend to think in generally balances out. Max is clearly the best driver with the best car and if you gave him one of the three best cars in any era he'd probably have somewhat similar results. 

[polishgenius]

5 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

The flipside is in many sports the legends competed against a smaller talent pool/number of teams.

 

Sure, in many sports. In Formula 1 in 1988, though, Senna's first title winning season, there were 26 drivers on a grid and his teammate and direct title rival was Alain Prost. There's really no argument that the competition was diluted back then. 

[Werthead]

It's like the argument that Pele is one of the all-time greats, but would he be that good in the modern era where the technique and tactics of the sport are vastly more complex and overall fitness levels far higher. Some have suggested no, but others that he would operate at a much higher level in the modern era because the attitude and natural ability are what counts, and some of the other stuff is stuff that can just be learned: Senna would probably be fine at learning modern tyre management just as most modern drivers would be fine at the more seat-of-your-pants racing of that era (on the flipside, Grosjean would almost certainly have killed someone, possibly himself, if he'd been racing in the 1970s or 1980s).

[polishgenius]

My feeling always is that past a certain point it's impossible to directly compare the numbers, so the difference comes in which drivers have more drives that really defy logic. That's obviously very subjective, but hey ho, it's also fun. I remember having this argument a few years ago re: Hamilton vs Schumacher, with my feeling that Hamilton hadn't quite racked up the amount of truly legendary drives to match. He's definitely proved me wrong since then (like I'd probably still edge it to Schumi but Hamilton's in the ballpark now, undeniably).

 

What I'm saying here is that for as impressive as his numbers are, and that he'd probably do fine in other eras too given the assumption of adjusting to differences, I think Verstappen is now the one in the position where sure, he's lodging the numbers, but he doesn't really have too many races where like he came 3rd driving most of the race with one gear or won despite receiving what amounted to a 25-place grid penalty or what have you. When it gets really hairy he still has a tendency to get on the raggedy edge a bit. But he has a couple, for sure (he has the archetypal awesome wet-weather performance in the bag for example), so he's still got time to get into that conversation too. 

Edited June 18, 2023 by polishgenius

[Werthead]

7 minutes ago, polishgenius said:

What I'm saying here is that for as impressive as his numbers are, and that he'd probably do fine in other eras too given the assumption of adjusting to differences, I think Verstappen is now the one in the position where sure, he's lodging the numbers, but he doesn't really have too many races where like he came 3rd driving most of the race with one gear or won despite receiving what amounted to a 25-place grid penalty or what have you. When it gets really hairy he still has a tendency to get on the raggedy edge a bit. But he has a couple, for sure (he has the archetypal awesome wet-weather performance in the bag for example), so he's still got time to get into that conversation too. 

I'm not a major Verstappen fan, but I think his ability to start in 10th or lower at the moment with the expectation that he will win regardless , romping past his team-mate easily in the process, is quite impressive. I think he now needs a strong season-long challenge from a competitor to show if he's matured and ironed out the rough edges he had in 2021 to become a complete driver in the way Hamilton and Alonso are. I think he's certainly closer than he was.

[Tywin et al.]

25 minutes ago, polishgenius said:

 

Sure, in many sports. In Formula 1 in 1988, though, Senna's first title winning season, there were 26 drivers on a grid and his teammate and direct title rival was Alain Prost. There's really no argument that the competition was diluted back then. 

I'm not going to try and argue this given I'm a noob with F1, but I will say that the depth of talent across sport has dramatically increased over the last 35 years as far as I can tell.

20 minutes ago, Werthead said:

It's like the argument that Pele is one of the all-time greats, but would he be that good in the modern era where the technique and tactics of the sport are vastly more complex and overall fitness levels far higher. Some have suggested no, but others that he would operate at a much higher level in the modern era because the attitude and natural ability are what counts, and some of the other stuff is stuff that can just be learned: 

I think the rule of thumb is outside of sports that require a modern level of size and athleticism (so see the NBA) most all-time greats would be successful in any era. As great as they were in their time? Debatable, but someone like Pele would still be excellent today. Then you get the counterexamples like Larry Bird, a player who every basketball fan considers a top 10 player ever and yet he probably would have been way better today because of style of play and modern medicine likely could have extended his career (he dealt with a ton of back issues that stole a few years of his late prime). The sliding doors game with eras is always tricky, but racing does seem to be a sport where you can guess with a decent degree of accuracy whereas I have no clue if Babe Ruth, the legend of legends in the game of baseball, could even hit a ball today.

[Werthead]

32 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

I'm not going to try and argue this given I'm a noob with F1, but I will say that the depth of talent across sport has dramatically increased over the last 35 years as far as I can tell.

This I think is incontrovertible. From the 1950s to the 1990s you'd often see drivers rock up and drive four races and then be booted because they were too shit and someone else brought in part of the way through the season (during seasons half to two-thirds the length of modern seasons). It was a rotating shooting gallery of drivers, plus there were many more teams, to the point that the lowest tier of qualifying used to eliminate drivers from taking part in the race altogether, because you couldn't have 35 cars in a single race. Plus you unfortunately had a sadly high attrition rate of drivers in terms of both deaths and crazy injuries (I'm astonished we don't see as many broken legs or hands as we used to) and accidents used to be far more insane (probably peaking with the two cars that managed to flip into the harbour in Monaco, which I don't think is physically possible today).

From the late 1990s to now we've seen a steadily increasing quality of drivers across the grid. With the elimination (more or less) of the pay driver phenomenon, with arguably Latifi as its last hold-out, I'd say the last two years have seen the highest across-the-bar quality level we've seen in the sport, with really only some doubts over Sargent's performance level (on paper he should be great given his lower tier performance, but he's not really show it so far, given how Albon is outdriving that Williams massively in comparison), and maybe De Vries needing to up his game to match his one-off appearance from last year. But otherwise the quality in depth of the field is pretty strong. Even Stroll is okay, despite the shit he gets for having a seat due to his dad.

I mean, Verstappen Senior was a mainstay of the sport for years despite being thoroughly mediocre. He'd barely last a season today.

Edited June 18, 2023 by Werthead

[polishgenius]

I'd agree the lower end is better, but I'm not sure the top end or even the middle pack is really. I could be argued out of that position like, but even by the 80s and early 90s you had consistently solid contenders going down the field a fair bit. And because there are less cars overall it gave room to prune the dross even if the top end remained similar quality. 

[Werthead]

Arguably the high end is a bit down, as we only have 3 WCs in the pack at the moment (Hamilton, Alonso, Verstappen), whilst a few years back we had 5 (Hamilton, Alonso, Vettel, Raikkonen, Button). I think the peak the field ever had was 6, when Schumacher was driving for Mercedes.

I think the top tier is very good though with Alonso, Hamilton and Verstappen in that zone, maybe Leclerc although it's had to tell since either Ferrari or himself like to sabotage his chances (sometimes both).

The middle pack is definitely very good though: Albon, Russell and Norris are all outstanding and potential top-tier drivers, and Sainz and Perez are very solid, even if they both need to be in "the zone" a bit more than other drivers. The Hulk has been very impressive on his return (and overall has been a great midfield driver for most of his career), but Magnussen is down on his form from last year for whatever reason. Ocon and Gasly are both very solid (Ocon's consistency currently winning out over Gasly's variability, but when Gasly is on top form he is great). Piastri's performances are picking up really nicely and Tsunoda has really upped his game, as has Zhou. Bottas does seem to be in decline though, which is a shame as at his best he was a very good second-tier driver (and much closer to Lewis than Perez is to Verstappen). Stroll is perennially "okay," with real but occasional flashes of greatness which never seem to solidify into consistent great form.

[TheLastWolf]

De Vries better learn chinese. 

Eagle Freedom Logan wtf is a kilometer Sargeant is the new Goatifi

Honey Badger and Seb return in RB colours this September for the Nürburgring, the shark in the RB24 could do a lot more fun than Checo now. 

Edited June 20, 2023 by TheLastWolf

[TheLastWolf]

Checo's ill. Hope Ric gets a drive

[BigFatCoward]

Hamilton really is a cock isn't he? Wants an end to 'periods of dominance' now he is no longer dominant. What an arsehole. 

[Werthead]

14 hours ago, BigFatCoward said:

Hamilton really is a cock isn't he? Wants an end to 'periods of dominance' now he is no longer dominant. What an arsehole. 

He did say he'd have been happy for that to have been the case during his and Mercedes' period of dominance, although that might have been more convincing if he'd said it back then (although he did acknowledge that viewers were getting bored during the Mercedes era). Although he also has at least the fallback that Mercedes' edge of dominance was not as insane as Red Bull's was last and this year, and he was run ragged by Rosberg for two seasons (in one of which he was beaten) and Ferrari did put up a stiff challenge in another two of those seasons.

Although this might be a flash in the pan for Red Bull and they peak out this regulatory framework quite soon and everyone else catches up and from next year everyone's much more level, in which case two years of Red Bull supremacy won't look like a big deal (I don't think that will happen though, and RB probably have an edge from now until the current framework ends in 2025).

[BigFatCoward]

To give him his due, he's clearly correct. It just would have carried a lot more weight if he'd said it 5 years ago. 

[lmanion]

The only solution to red bull dominance is for its competitors to build a better car, the end. 

That's how F1 has always worked and it's how it should remain. I'm not even really a red bull fan and I don't like Max. Build the best car within the regulations it's that simple currently it's the bulls for 8 years it was Merc.

[Werthead]

9 hours ago, lmanion said:

The only solution to red bull dominance is for its competitors to build a better car, the end. 

That's how F1 has always worked and it's how it should remain. I'm not even really a red bull fan and I don't like Max. Build the best car within the regulations it's that simple currently it's the bulls for 8 years it was Merc.

True, and Mercedes and Ferrari should have enough firepower to take the fight to them.

However, there was a good interview with James Vowles last week and he made a good point that the cost cap, although good in many respects, is a major problem for those teams that were unable to make massive infrastructure investments before it came into place. Obviously the big teams are all set, and Aston Martin and McLaren both made huge investments in new technology, facilities and wind tunnels before it locked in, but now it's in place, the likes of Williams, Haas and Sauber/Alfa Romeo cannot make similar kind of upgrades (and if AlphaTauri are sold off, they're in a similar problem). That leaves them at the mercy of borrowing other teams' equipment and permanently locked out of catching up with the bigger teams. Fortunately F1 seems to have realised that and they are looking at ways to address that (possibly the lowest-scoring team gets an investment budget to build new infrastructure, with a sliding scale the further up the grid you go).

The other issue is that we seem to be seeing a problem that once a new regulatory framework comes in, the team that does the best at the start of the period in adapting to it gets an advantage that remains in place for a considerably long period of time. This happened with Ferrari, Red Bull (after a brief burst of insight from Brawn), Mercedes (twice) and now Red Bull. Success begets success and unless the regs are broad enough for multiple teams to land on the winning formula (as happened between the Ferrari and Red Bull eras, when multiple teams where competitive over a five-year period), whomever nails that advantage gets not just the advantage for one season, but four or five, potentially as many as seven or eight if the next reg change is not major.

[Iskaral Pust]

Nice to see Ferrari’s upgrade propel them back into contention, even as Mercedes faded this weekend after a false dawn. Verstappen had to fend off some opening lap attacks on both days. But then Verstappen was so bored later with his massive lead that he made an unnecessary pit stop for soft tires to chase (successfully) the fastest lap for  an unnecessary extra point.  The smarter strategy would have been to not risk the win at that point, so perhaps his boredom and overconfidence are the only glimmers of hope for the others.  Hubris seems to be a recurring part of F1 over the years.

Aston Martin were less competitive this weekend, while McLaren showed some good pace on both days — Norris was unfortunate that anti-stall impeded him as the Red Bulls dueled in the opening lap of the sprint.

All the penalties for track limits were farcical in the end. 

[Werthead]

McLaren's upgrades seemed to be quite effective, as were Ferrari's. Mercedes' upgrades seem to have not done very much.

Marko saying he and Horner agree that De Vries is shit: excellent way of motivating him whilst he's still in the car. And Marko seems to be saying hinting that Perez is not long for the car.

Getting rid of Perez would be interesting. Would you put in Danny Ric or would you promote the solidly-proceeding Tsunoda? Or would you make a sweep for the superbly-performing Hulkenberg?

[Iskaral Pust]

40 minutes ago, Werthead said:

McLaren's upgrades seemed to be quite effective, as were Ferrari's. Mercedes' upgrades seem to have not done very much.

Marko saying he and Horner agree that De Vries is shit: excellent way of motivating him whilst he's still in the car. And Marko seems to be saying hinting that Perez is not long for the car.

Getting rid of Perez would be interesting. Would you put in Danny Ric or would you promote the solidly-proceeding Tsunoda? Or would you make a sweep for the superbly-performing Hulkenberg?

I’d go with Hulkenberg at this stage.  Tsunoda is developing well but still erratic for a team that wants to win the Constructors title each year and will see their current design advantage recede over time.  A steadier pro has value.  Danny IMO still has a problem that his ego and expectations exceed the contribution he can make as a #2 driver.