• ℹ️ Heads up...

    This is a popular topic that is fast moving Guest - before posting, please ensure that you check out the first post in the topic for a quick reminder of guidelines, and importantly a summary of the known facts and information so far. Thanks.

Formula One

Boom! Head of the pack in a development year.

Really enjoyed the Leclerc vs Verstappen battle and even more seeing a glum Horner :tearsofjoy: Hopefully that's fixable or Red Bulls will be slowing down to complete races.

Sure it's a development war this season but I'm finally getting to celebrate a race win after 910 days, but who's counting?

Driver of the day was Leclerc but Magussen was great too. What a return for him 👏

Loving the helmet cams, the glare and lens flare makes it looking a hollywood production. So beautiful to watch.

I'm sure Lewis enjoyed getting a 3rd after watching the Red Bulls explode.

More please
 
Terrific end to the race after it looked like it might fizzle out a bit.

The early battle at the front was superb but the Human Error Champion went in too deep and cooked his tyres, Leclerc always looked like he had the pace from the start though.

Throughout the race it seemed the cars were able to follow better which is reassuring and exciting for the season ahead.

Clearly there's work to do at Mercedes who are way off the pace, but a 3 & 4 finish? They'll definitely take that.
 
Really refreshing to watch, and thrilled for Haas to get such a fantastic start to the season after everything they've been through; they definitely wouldn't have been in this position had Mazepin been retained. Gutted that Mick just missed out on the points, but shows both he and the car are capable subject to the right strategy.

Superb to see Ferrari up top. I suspect plenty of people at RB won't be sleeping tonight...
 
Cracking race to kick the season off. On a slightly different note, I'd be quite surprised if Carlos doesn't get at least one win under his belt this season.
 
It was a great opening race - Ferrari's are strong but didn't run away with it, we could well have 3 teams hunting for both championships this year (if Merc sort their issues out).

So good to see Haas and Alfa finishing in the points - 3 excellent drives and I'm sure Mick Schumacher will be up there soon. I just hope both teams can keep up with the pace of development - Haas in particular have form for starting strong but falling off as the season goes on, hope this season bucks that trend for them.

Worrying that the Merc customers have had such a poor weekend though, I'd really hoped at least one of those would be in the kind of McLaren/Ferrari position in 2021, ready to take podiums and wins when the wind blows in their favour.
 
I am shocked by McLaren, had such a promising Barca test, chatting to my dad he said the breaks being new, they might have been breaking early etc which will cause the cars to be slower, but also Mercedes customer power units need sorting

Really hoping this isn't the return of the McLaren/Honda years of the 2010's as my heart won't take it
 
A fantastic race to start the new season off. Can not wait to see Charles and Max go at it all over again next Sunday, good clean racing between the two of them. The noise from the crowd as Max went past, and then Charles got past was electric and added to the spectacle. Max pushing as hard as he can, although I would of liked to have thought that after the first two attempts did not work, he would of tried something different, but it sounds like the new tyres are worse than last years. Clearly he was not happy after the race, but did calm down later in the evening, and this is the interactions I want to see more of.



Its a shame about the retirements for RedBull, they have a fast car, but with the engine change from Honda to RBPT and compressed program for the start of the season, its a shame they have failed to spend enough time testing the new E10 fuel component. Mark Hughes does a great job of explaining what caused the fuel pumps (Which as Ted reminded us on the Notebook yesterday, are a standard part fitted to all the cars) to fail, and I think even Martyn Brundle hinted at it, at the start of the live coverage that some cars may struggle with the fuel. Link

As others have said, great to see Haas bounce back after a few rough seasons, I am sure it wont be long before Schumacher is in the points, and it will be interesting to see how he improves, now he is a more experienced driver in Magnussen to learn from.

Alfra Romeo has had a great race, and it was good to see Bottas score points, just a shame about his start,

I was really pleased for Yuki as well, not a good day in qualifying, but an excellent race, and he was able to pick up some vital points for the team.

Albon also had a really strong race, made a few positions at the start, and then did a great job in keeping the cars behind.

Race Highlights
 
Well that turned out to be a good race to watch, it definitely looked to be easier for the cars to follow each other which is encouraging for the season ahead.

To say I enjoyed seeing Verstappen having to crawl back in to the pits was an understatement. Really pleased for Ferarri, although Sainz was way off the pace of Leclerc which was strange.

Work for Mercedes to do but a great result for them in the end. It is slightly concerning to see all of the Merc powered cars towards the back, and Mercedes themselves were not fast on the straights.

Brilliant results for Haas and Alfa Romeo!
 
Great to see Leclerc not only outdrive but outwit Varstappen, even before his car went pop he was well beaten. A hilarious and well deserved start to RedBulls season after how last season ended. Hopefully they'll have knackered up those engines, which will hurt them in penalties later in the season too. Presuming engine penalties are still a thing, I've not looked into the new rules much.

If what Merc are saying is true and the bouncing they are suffering is fixable this could be a title fight with three legitimate contenders. Should be an exciting one.
 
Seemed like they got the set up on his car wrong. Russell's performance wasn't too bad so I expect Lewis to make up some places tomorrow, assuming he can avoid the carnage in front. I'm predicting three red flags tomorrow!

I hope this is the last we see of Jeddah, it feels like it's a tragedy waiting to happen, but money talks. Was a nasty collision in the F2 sprint race today and then a big shunt for Schumacher in qualifying. Add in the missile strike just a few miles away from the circuit.
 
I wonder where the last circuit was that had this many red flags across its first two GP weekends (including support sessions). By creating a street circuit that's also really fast and lined by concrete, they've created something really dangerous. I'm astonished that we haven't had any incidents which have been more serious.
 
The issue for me is the sight lines (or lack of!) and fact it's so high speed. Monaco, for example, (though I'm a big critic of it) is generally a much slower track and only has a few high-speed blind corners, Saudi Arabia is pretty much the opposite.

Mick Schumacher will not race tomorrow it has been confirmed.
 
I've driven around it a few times on F1 2021, and while I acknowledge it's not the same as real life, I don't enjoy it. Struggle to know which way I'm going, and the fact it's surrounded by concrete really scares me.
 
It was an interesting qualifying session. Perez pulled it out of the bag today, and has setup a really interesting race. First RedBull Power Train pole position :p Although felt for Yuki who had an fuel/engine issue stopping him from taking part in qualifying. Going to be interesting to see how he does coming through the field tomorrow and seeing if RBPT have fixed the issue with their engines.

The Ferraris and RedBulls are in their own race, with both cars 0.8 seconds than the Alipnes. The race result is going to have a large element of luck involved, if we see the expected Red Flags and Safety Cars. Is anyone going to pit under the safety car, they managed to avoid the red flags in the F2 race, but we all remember what happened last year, and the speeds in F1 are greater than F2.

I wonder what Lewis will do, it its the setup, with Parc Ferme rules you can not change it. I guess he could ditch his setup, and take Georges, and start from the pit lane, but if the setups are that different, is Lewis going to feel comfortable with it. Going to be interesting seeing what he can do, and how he recovers.

As for whether the race should go ahead or not, the drivers spent four hours discussing this on Friday night, with the team principles and organisers involved. At the end of that meeting, which I dont know what was said, and have seen conflicting reports of what might or might not happen if the race had been cancelled, the decision was made to go ahead with the race. As for the circuit itself, most of the drivers seem to enjoy the challenge, and think its good. Source

My opinion on street track is that I like the traditional ones such as Monaco, or Belle Isle in Detroit or Long Beach in California. The new street tracks coming to F1 are not really street tracks in my opinion, they are race tracks designed in the style of a street track. How much of these new street tracks can you drive you car down the roads most of the year? One or two in a season is fine, but it just feels like all the new tracks we are getting have to be in a street track layout, and I think it makes them less special.
 
Another fantastic race, and fantastic battle at the front between Charles and Max. Only the one safety car, although you could argue when Marshalls are on the track, it should always be a safety car. I am surprised the no one got a penalty for not slowing for the yellows on the last lap either, I suppose we are to assume the drivers did slow enough, but why did it get flagged up in the first place? Its a shame it prevents DRS on the penultimate lap, as I feel like we missed out on seeing Max defend against Charles. I am looking forward to seeing it the other way around, and see how well Max can defend against Charles.

I think its time for DRS to go, Drivers letting other drivers past is going to cause an accident at some point, maybe short term they can make the distance between the activation zone and calculation zone great to prevent what we saw?

Why is it always Latifi that causes the safety car, felt so sorry for Perez, he has had a great weekend and lucked out with the safety car being deployed. The Ferrari bluff was good to see, although I am not sure it was a bluff, more a do the opposite of Perez. Its a shame we never got to see how it would of played out.

Gutted for Yuki as well, another engine issue for RBPT, but good to see the two RedBulls finish this race.

(Race Highlights Here, well worth a watch if you have 7 minutes spare)
 
I thank you for the spoiler sir...managed to avoid the result until now, just watched the highlights.
Good race, bit more fun this year.
Agreed with the drs...it is so fake and messy.
 
Another good race. Hoping Mercedes find some pace soon as 3 teams fighting at the front would be great to watch!

I think Brawn has said that the aim is to get rid of DRS for overtaking and only have it used for getting past back markers.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top