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Formula One

So as we are approaching the half way point of the season, and had three excellent races on the bounce, seemed like a good time to kick start this thread.

A win for Max and another DNF for both Mercedes would certainly making things a little more interesting in the 2nd half of the season. Sadly I do not see that happening, but the second half of next season could be really interesting as the top three teams all seem to have closed the gap to each other.

Its going to be an interesting race, I do not think with have seen Ferrari's true pace yet, and if the rain affects qualifying, who knows what might happen. Would be great to see Lando near the top, and Russel make it through to Q1.

Outside of F1, Max and Lando teamed up in the iRacing 24 hour Spa race and won it, which is pretty cool. Worth watching the last 15 minutes of the race.
Max's brake pedal broke, so he had to slow the car down, get a tow back to the pits and Lando had to finish the race, they still managed to win, but it made for an interesting last 15 minutes.

https://wtf1.com/post/verstappen-and-norris-went-meme-crazy-as-they-won-the-iracing-spa-24-hours/

And finally, could not update this topic without mentioning my weekend away at Silverstone.

Silverstone was a special race for me, as it was 20 years since I attended my first race at Silverstone, and with it being potentially the last ever race (yay for the new 5 year deal), I had to go one final time. You can even make out the blur where we were sitting on the TV coverage, but if you missed that, here are some highlights of the weekend.


After the race, they open up the track so you can walk around, which was lots of fun.

Made even funnier when a group of lads started joking about watching out for Ferraris behind me. Talking of the Vettel\Max incident, it was great to examine the scene of the incident up close and personal. Vale is not a good corner for Max.


We than had a very special treat courtesy of Mike and his friend at Renault. I can see see the image of the back of the car without the body work in my memory like it was 10 seconds ago. F1 cars really are amazing bits of engineering.

Wondering around the Paddock was cool, getting a selfie with some of the drivers, and getting the no photos and brush off from Kimi (Which is what you would expect from Kimi, and he did spend time outside signing autographs with the fans who had been queuing ages). It was really neat to get see Adrian Newey, up close and personal and also see him racing his classic lotus :)

Also quite funny going up to the bar and finding out it was a free bar, only for it to only serve Heineken Blue until 11am.


Overall, I would give the weekend a 100 out of 100. And if you get the chance to attend a race, I would highly recommend it, watching it on TV is brilliant, but seeing it in person is a different level.
 
F1 is back, and want a fantastic and frustrating start to the season.

Going to be interesting to see how the race works out next week with it being the same track.

Only 11 cars finished, and with the Red Bulls having issues it opened the door for the midfield teams to have a chance at the Podium. It was a shame, I think the early safety car would of ruined Maxs chances anyway, but it would of been interesting to see how much pressure he could of put the two Mercedes on at the end.

Lewis contact with Alex was very frustrating. Made even more frustrating when Charles made the same move on Lando, and Lando left him space. We want to see overtaking, and we want to encourage it, so I think a five second penalty was fair. Really hope Alex gets a podium this year, he deserves it. If he had got past Lewis without incident, I think he would of been in with a good shout of winning, although he would of needed to make the pass on Bottas within the first couple of laps following him I think.

I really wanted Lando to be my driver of the day, and finishing Third was a brilliant result for him, that final lap was mega, but Charles, starting from seventh and finishing second with that pass on Lando I think just nicks it. Either way, brilliant drive from them both. Fantastic for Lando to get on the podium, and hopefully we will see plenty more. Bottas was my thrid best driver of the day, kept Lewis behind, and managed the safety car restarts really well, although the last one was cutting it very close :)

Vettel was disappointing again, he just needs something to click to find his way again. Ocon was also disappointing over the weekend, I had been a big champion for him to be given Bottas seat this year, but based on his performance compared to Ricardo, the gap was bigger than I was expecting, but hopefully finishing in the points will help him out next week. Biggest disappointment is the Ferrari engine, which for what ever reason, has taken a big step backwards compared to last year. Ocon is going to need to be careful, because George was looking very strong in the Williams again. I really hope George can pick up some points this season.
 
The Ferrari engine has taken a big step backwards as they were found to have been cheating with aspects of their old engine, but got some ridiculous deal with the FIA to just stop using it and not disclose the findings.

Vettel is a spent force, would not be at all surprised if he didn't last until the end of the season before Ferrari boot him.

I thought Hamilton's penalty was a little harsh but boarder line stuff. Should make for an interesting season with not many races to claw back lost points.
 
Rumours are emerging regarding the identity of Daniel Ricciardo's replacement at Renault next year - word is that it's going to be a certain Señor Alonso.
 
Vettel still has a lot of talent, there is just something not clicking for him currently. Not sure he is going to find what's missing at Ferrari, and not sure where he will go next season. I suspect he will retire, Only team who might have a seat available is Haas and I am not sure he would want to go there.

Alonso return is an interesting one, on one hand, I like it because it still means I have a chance to make it (although my current form in F1 2020 is anything to go by, there is more chance of winning the lotto) but on the other hand, I am not sure what he is expecting to achieve. It felt like he fell out of love with F1 in the McLaren days, but maybe some time away has made him realise how much he has missed it.
 
Regarding Alonso, I don't think it helped that 2015-2018 was spent in an uncompetitive McLaren that the team completely failed to do anything about for some time.
 


Another race weekend, and a much better weekend for Red Bull.

Lewis showed why he is the best driver in the world this weekend. He made the race win look easy, but the qualifying lap on Saturday was out of this world. Link below to anyone who has not seen it, but to be 1.2 seconds faster than Max, and 1.5 faster than Valtteri just shows how amazing that lap was. It just shows hard work pays off, from what I understand, instead of heading home after the last race, he spend the days working with his engineers to understand the issues and problems and improve, and it certainly paid off. Mercedes also did a great job resolving the gear box issues in under a week as well, and Lewis was never under any pressure from Max in the race.


Charles has gone from hero to zero, but if there is a season to make mistakes and learn from them, I think this is the season to make it when Ferrari have the 4th/5th quickest car. He made a mistake, held his hands up, and hopefully want do it again. Seb had a good qual session, and it was just a shame to not see what he could do in the race.

Lando, Lando, Lando, Thank goodness the races were not 69 laps, as he had a fantastic end of the race. McLaren and Carlos needs to be the ones Lando thanks though, as without the team orders, and Carlos co-operating he would of finished 8th or 9th. It was not a perfect weekend for him, FP1 he made a school boy error ignoring the yellow flags, and Saturday qualifying performance was a bit behind Carlos, but he certainly made up for it in the race. Carlos extra 3.5 seconds in the pit stop also really hurt his race, he got stuck behind other cars, and had to use the tryes more to get past, it would of been interesting if that issue had not happened.



Max had a solid weekend, unlucky in Qual with the Ferrari pitting on his final lap, but I still think he would of been 0.6 behind Lewis. Still again, about 1.5 seconds ahead of Alex, so just shows how much he was getting out the car. Alex was a little disappointing, it felt like the gap between him and Max had increased. Both Max and Alex defended really well, Max really making Valtteri work for it. I think even without the wing damage to the front of the Redbull (which was Maxs fault for clipping a kerb somewhere) he would not of had the pace to keep the Mercedes behind, maybe without DRS it would of been possible, but with DRS and the Mercedes engine, it was always going to happen.

I feel sorry for Sergio, he was going to be my driver of the day until he tangled with Alex. I was also worried Alex was going to end up off again, but he was the one to come away un-damaged this time. Watching the replays back, this was Sergio's fault, more than the Lewis incident as he straightens up to early, so I am surprised it was not investigated. I would not expect Sergio to get a time penalty as he did not make a place, but it seems a little unfair the Lewis gets two penalty points and Sergio did not get any penalty points for a similar incident.

It was a better weekend for Ocon, although the Renault was the only car to retire due to Mechanical issues which is not great. I felt sorry for George, he had a great Saturday, but the mistake going off cost him, I understand why that mistake happened, but hopefully with more experience he can get used to the pressure of the faster cars behind them, and not feel the need to push to hard. Good recovery drive to finish above his team mate.
 

Another good race. The Mercedes are just in a class of their own, I am not sure what is going to stop Lewis from claiming the 7th World Championship at this rate.

The heros of the day are those RedBull mechanics for fixing Max's car. I did not expect them to fix it, and I was worried all race it was going to break. But they fixed it, Max found the space on the outside to turn one, and got a well deserved second place. Summed up what I love about F1. A good 5th place for Albon, ignore the 70 second difference between Max and Albon, it was a good drive by him with good passes on the two Ferraris. I think RedBull jgot away with one for "forgetting" the air blowers at the start on Albons car. I dont think they will be doing it again any time soon.

The two HAAS made a great call to pit before the start of the race, just a shame the instruction to pit was against team orders. Hopefully this rule will be tidied up a little as it was a great call, and help HAAS claim some their first point of the season.

Bottas almost jumped the start, getting away with it because of the tolerance in the sensors.

And the fifth incident before the race even started was Kimi missing his grid slot.

My driver of the weekend is going to be Lance Stroll, 3rd in qual, beating his team mate, and finishing 4th is a great result, even if the car is a copy of the 2019 Mercedes. He had a 40 second lead over his team mate as well, not sure what went wrong for Perez in the race.

Good to see Vettel show us what he is capable of. Surprised (not really I guess) that Charles did not just let him past when he was behind. It would of been interesting to see what Charles could of done on the medium tyres.

Disappointing race for Lando, after a good qual. Hopefully he will bounce back for Silverstone.
 
The Mercedes is just incredible this year, in a class of its own. Phenomenal how they are able to do it year after year! I can only see one thing stopping Lewis from winning his 7th Championship: reliability issues.
 
Rob said:
The Mercedes is just incredible this year, in a class of its own. Phenomenal how they are able to do it year after year! I can only see one thing stopping Lewis from winning his 7th Championship: reliability issues.
Click to expand...
Given the fact both Mercedes were told to stay off the kerbs in the first Austrian race (still feels weird saying that) due to potential reliability issues that may have resulted, this could well end up being a problem for them.
 
Looks like the FIA stewards this weekend were made up of the football handball rule lawmakers, somewhat farcial to give Hamilton two 5 second time penalties for the practice starts and then decide after the race that it was actually the team's fault.

A shame as it made a boring race even more boring, we would have had a Hamilton vs Verstappen battle at some point if Hamilton had not been put 10 second down the road.
 
Yep, it was very odd but where he did his practice starts from was a little unsafe if another driver was not expecting him to be there. I think it was 50/50 who was at fault, Lewis asked if he was okay to do it, and the team said it was okay. Sign of a great driver looking for every advantage he can get. I can only assume that the FIA did not spot it initially, which is why the team did not get warned about doing a second practice from the same spot. He also got away with only a warning on Saturday for not following the race director notes about the 2nd corner chicane. Therefore, I don't think they could of just giving him a warning, and it was the 2nd and 3rd time he had breached the race directors note.

Just ban all the drivers from doing a practice start, add a bit more excitement to the start of the race. I also wonder how much tyre life they take out doing practice starts? I am surprise the team wanted to do two practice starts considering the tyres he was starting on.

I think even starting on the softs, Lewis would of had the pace to keep Bottas behind him, so we would not of seen a battle between Lewis and Max, the Mercedes is just to fast. It may of been interesting to see what Bottas could of done when Lewis Tyres went off, but I think he would of still had the pace to beat Max.

All this is going to do is delay the inevitable, Lewis is not going to lose the title this year, and it wont be long before he is past Schumacher's record.

There were some great battles during the race, Albon, Norris and Russell early on, and Albon, Norris and Gasly near the end. I was really impressed with Vettel keeping the Renaults behind him on much older tyres. Shame it ruined his race strategy, but it help Leclerc get a high finish than otherwise expected. Ocon has disappointed again though, and did not help with letting Ricardo past. Ricardo did a good drive, made a mistake, owned it when he could of easily blamed Ocon, and made sure he had a big enough gap not to lose his place.

Perez had a great drive, and he deserves a seat for next season. That being said, there is a few F2 drivers who are showing they deserve a F1 seat as well. Mick Schumacher is going a great job, so I would not be surprised to see him in a Haas or Alfa Romero next season. Illot has been just as good, and with a little bit more luck or better tyre management could easily be leading the championship.

I would love to see Tsunoda get a seat in the Alphatauri, he has had some great races and been exciting to watch but who do you drop from the Red Bull line up. Push Gasly back to the Top Team, Drop Albon to Alphatauri and then drop Kyvatt for Tsunoda. As much as I like Perez, I dont see how he can fit in to the Red Bull team currently.

But what about Perez and Schumacer in the Alfa Romero, and then move Giovinazzi and Illot to Haas?

Race highlights below:
 
Congratulations to Lewis Hamilton, brilliant performance yesterday to claim his seventh world title!

I am not a Lewis fan, but he is the best F1 Driver ever (Yes, I think he is better than Michael Schumacher) and you could argue the greatest British sports person. He might of been in the best car for the the last seven years, but I am not sure that is true, Ferrari did have a car which could of won the championships a few years back, and he also has had team mates who on their day can beat him. Rosberg claiming the 2016 championship shows that Lewis need to be on it, and while this race Bottas did not show it, on his day Bottas can push Lewis to the limit.

Watching Lewis drive, he just does things that I other drivers can not do, while Perez was getting caught by the Ferraris at the end, Lewis was still building the gap at the front.

As long as Lewis and Toto sort out their contract issue, I don't see any reason why they can not go on and win an eight drivers title next season, and hit 100 wins next season.

 
Having followed F1 for four decades, personally I think it is now absolutely tedious.
All credit to Lewis, and I think he is a decent bloke, an excellent role model, and driver, but not the best in the world.
All down to the quality, speed and, most importantly, consistent reliability of the car he has driven for years.
I got ten times more enjoyment from watching the last of the touring cars yesterday than from the F1.
The wet yesterday, combined with the resurfacing, made the race great for the first half, then the track dried out, and the usual DRS tedium kicked in.
It loses spectators and viewers by the season, apart from the chaos that is Silverstone.
 
He was not in the strongest car yesterday yet still managed to go over 50 laps on a set of tyres he turned into slicks, win by 30 seconds and lap his teammate. Hamilton has proven once again he is the best in the world, and arguably of all time.
 
It's hard to argue against Lewis being the GOAT, or at the very least one of a very small herd of potential but not directly comparable GOATS.

Was wonderful to see a bit of emotion and humility from him after the win yesterday, he can make himself a bit hard to like sometimes.

The racing certainly isn't what it once was, I find myself much less interested in races having gone from avidly watching nearly every race live to half watching highlights most of the time. It's hard to see how to remedy that without forcing a backwards step in aerodynamic development which would go against the ethos of F1.
 
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