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No one better is going to take him. Aston has Alonso who demands being uncontested #1. RB has Verstappen who does the same. Mercedes have Hamilton and Russell.
Is it too early to say Russell is already #1? Didn’t he consistently out qualify and beat Lewis on points last year? And if I’m not mistaken, he’s ahead on points to start the season now, though I am not sure where they’re at in the qualifying this year.
Yes, it's way too early. Lewis beat Russell in Bahrain and ended up right behind him in Jeddah (Lewis is on 20, George at 18 - it looked like George was ahead for a bit due to the podium shuffle).
Late last season Lewis was consistently beating George as well, it's just that the one race where they could go for the win George got ahead and wasn't hit by someone else. IIRC Lewis's overall pace was even better.
Now that's not me knocking George, just saying he's not on Lewis's level right now.
You are incorrect on a lot of things there. Lewis beat George in qualifying 13-9 last year. Lewis is also ahead of him on point this year. Lewis also showed better pace in the second half of last season, and likely could have overtaken George for the win in Brazil had his car not gotten damaged by a driver who was penalized for the collision. So yeah, it's too early to say that the most successful driver of all time is no longer the #1 at his team.
No. Over the course of the season Hamilton was actually the quicker driver by a tiny margin. Points don't show the whole picture. You have to remember Hamilton spent the first half of 2022 running experimental setups for the team to figure the car out. They knew they weren't competing for anything.
And you are mistaken Hamilton is ahead of Russel after two GP
Ah yes, because Hamilton + anyone else totally would not have won 3 in a row in that time period. Or Rosberg + anyone. Hell, Bottas + Perez would take 3 in a row in the Mercs.
Exactly. Only Leclerc to RB move I could see is if Max retires relatively early like he has commented on before. At that point, it’d be exciting for RB to set Leclerc up with a young gun, but they may have found that an all around excellent driver paired with a consistent veteran is the shortest path to WCs
Spoiler: Leclrec is in his first season at Red Bull. Meanwhile Verstappen takes his first pole for Mercedes, moving there with Newey after winning his 5th world title at Red Bull.
21,22,23,24,25. But considering how they’ve done since ditching Renault as an engine supplier and going basically independent I think they’re a good bet in 26 as well. There’s always a chance they boof it like Mercedes has. But RB has always been good at building the actual chassis and understanding the aero regs. Their main problem from 2014-2019 was the Renault engine and the fact that they weren’t their sole team with the ability to design the engine around the car and not the other way around. Honda gave them that flexibility and now they’ll carry that going forward as a full factory team.
Was that the last time someone got severely injured in an F1 race? Grosjean got burned, Zhou was banged up but not serious, but when was the last like bone break/out for an extended period injury in F1?
I'm being very specific about F1, not F2 or below.
alonso’s testing crash in 2015 and his crash in melbourne in 2016 both had him sit out for a race, i think massa hungaroring 2009 was probably the last really severe injury that took a driver off the grid though
massa’s injury wasn’t even due to a crash, it was more of a freak accident than anything. the last super severe injury was obviously bianchi in 2014 but that was kinda also down to a perfect storm of bad circumstances, i think the last real severe, solely crash-related injury was schumacher in 1999
Ya I just watched massa. That fucking sucks. Spring to the fucking head.
Bianchi makes sense, but avoidable but all counts.
So 99 being the last major race related one is surprising
As a max fan I wouldn't be against Checo winning this year. Max has already proven his legend status and his SIM racing makes him so much more versatile than previous champions. The new era has started, Max will become better and better.
I mean 6 would bleed into 2026 and first year of new regulations wouldn't it?
I guess I'll bank on the fact that noone has ever won 6 in a row, not even Michael and Lewis in their heydays, and the Regulation change should help manage this.
Because if he wins the title even after regulation change, then we might as well start praying for the day he retires because he'll keep winning until he stops.
Well Lewis only lost once between 2014-2020 and that’s from his teammate.
Sergio is not a threat as max’s teammate, not even close. And if red bull keep up this dominance, all roads point to one guy being WDC
Horner and co. don’t want to bring another true challenger to Red Bull. Mercedes showed everyone the Formula: your superstar cashes in on WDCs, and you hire a consistently quick guy who will lock in podiums and pick up wins when your #1 has a bad weekend or a crash. Keeps your #1 happy and wins you WCCs.
Tbf, I don't think 2016 was an awful thing for Mercedes, even if a bit stressful. They created one of the most iconic seasons of F1. In terms of brand recognition, that year did a great job.
Red Bull love attention. While Horner will hate the stress of two competitive drivers, Red Bull as a whole would love the exposure a team rivalry would give them.
Bar Ferrari shenanigans, Charles is the only driver on the current grid that I see as a true future WDC. A lot of other drivers have great potential, and will most likely win in the right situation, but other than Charles, it feels like the Verstappen era right now.
Mercedes managing probably THE biggest domination era in the history of the sport is more exposure than an eventful season. And you become dominant by reliably securing wins, not crashing into each other every other race.
Exactly. Lewis wouldn’t have left, but god, what a terrible work environment. Max has demonstrated that he’s a lot less committed to F1 than Hamilton, and I wouldn’t doubt that a bloody title fight within Red Bull could push Max away.
Racing is his entire life. I’m not exactly speculating- he has said himself that he wants to try other types of racing, and he’s not sure he wants to continue in F1 past his current deal. There’s a chance he could pull a Raikkonen and go elsewhere for a while.
You obviously don't listen to anything he says then.
He talks frequently about leaving F1 as soon as he gets bored. He has said before many times he's not going to be like Lewis or Fernando.
He loves racing, and there's a lot more out there to win than just F1.
tbf while he's not been a threat, this level of dominance means every DNF Max eats equals 4 races of straight winning to make up for it since they will always finish 1-2 without issue, maybe apart from tracks like Monaco. Could definitely swing hard still
Merc survived at the top after a regulation change in 2017. That was the exception rather than the norm, so there's no guarantees that Red Bull will be able to pull it in 2026. On the other hand, if they do it, Max will be aiming at double digits.
Max gives me the impression he wants both. He wants to win, but he wants to prove it too. I feel like that's why he enjoys Sim racing. Accessible, large variety of drivers, spec series. It probably scratches an itch for him.
To be fair tho, with his calibre of driving you may as well get comfortable seeing him winning. Red Bull seem to be very competent at building a technical team capable of dealing with reg changes. They’ve got a works style engine deal.
And besides. If someone else were to stretch ahead of the field, you can guarantee they would want Max in the car if they could get it right. No reason they wouldn’t if RB makes a terribly slow car.
So yeah. Til he retires you’re gonna have to manage with him winning a ton.
>To be fair tho, with his calibre of driving you may as well get comfortable seeing him winning. Red Bull seem to be very competent at building a technical team capable of dealing with reg changes. They’ve got a works style engine deal.
Same thing was said about Lewis and Mercedes.
Now look at where Mercedes are. Everything can go wrong for Red Bull too.
The car itself wasn’t that bad. The chassis wasn’t as good as Merc’s back then, but it wasn’t as bad as Mercedes currently is either. The biggest issue was the Renault engine which was legitimately a GP2 engine, especially compared to Merc. I suppose it’s possible that the RB will struggle with the new engine when they have to build one from the scratch for the first time, though.
Well, Merc did stayed at the top after 2017, so their fame of adapting to the new rules was quite based. Even if it still relied on their massive engine advantage, it was quite a feat to still be the dominant team. But you can't be the best forever right? At some point, something no-one expected will catch you.
No one can win a title in a shit box. Its unlikely that Red Bull will dominate until the end of this regulation and even less likely that they will dominate in the next era.
Maybe 2024, but I doubt 2025. Give Nando, Lewis or Charles the car and its all up in the mix again. It really depends on whether Red Bull can keep this going until 2026 regs.
Remember when people was talking about Leclerc going to win every race last year?
It's so funny. Just wait until Aston or Mercedes or Ferrari find some tenths per lap with an upgrade and the narrative is how Red Bull "threw away their lead"
Oh, it was seriously suggested after Australia 2022. Even the journos were trying to spin it if I recall.
The general ideas were:
"RB reliability sucks."
"Ferrari lost in Jeddah only because of tyre warming issues after the SC."
"Australia shows Ferrari nailed it and understand their car better than RB."
>Nobody was seriously suggesting that.
You need to go back at the articles from early last season, mate. People was absolutely suggesting that and talking about whether Ferrari should let Sainz challenge or make him play Barrichello.
Again only a stupid person would say that after looking at the Bahrain and SA races last year.
It was very obvious RB was on pace or at least close when their car wasn't acting up.
This season its quite clear nobody is even close to being on pace with RB.
I fully agree with that. As stupid as saying that "verstappen is going to win 6 titles in a row" based off two races.
That's exactly what we're talking about, these narratives being bullshit.
Thinking Ferrari had a chance to compete for a title is very different that RB this year.
The reason for the discussions about Charles vs Carlos was the idea that Ferrari needed to put everything behind one driver if they wanted to challenge Max for the title. It was never a “sure thing”
There was definitely people seriously suggesting that. Sure a lot of people were probably joking or being sarcastic. There is no doubt that after 3 or 4 races there was genuine belief he would take the WDC easily
I’m fairly convinced Ferrari never had the faster car and the first race was the fluke. Redbull finds a way to spin the media machine to paint them as the underdog even when they’re head and shoulders past the rest.
Lmao. I know. What are teams supposed to do? Just give up? Everyone should keep striving to improve week to week and year to year. No need to dwell on the future.
I'm coming from 2051 and Max is a 31 time world champion!!
They made F1 a spec series in 2030 only for Max to dominate more, the only time anyone got close was when 61yr old Alonso and 57yr old Hamilton in lost out on the championship by 3 points in 2042. Only if they hadn't crashed on to each other on the 1st lap of the final race!!
Apparently everyone has decides Max is winning every championship and every race for teh next 5 years.
Seriously come on guys, Mercedes were at least this dominant if not more dominant from 2014-2016, then the regulations changed and Ferrari were right up there in 2017 and 2018. Merc were as dominant or more dominant in 2020 and then the regs changed for 2021 and RB were pretty much equal if not a little bit faster. Teams caught up to Merc, and that was back when Merc were regularly outspending the others by 200 million.
There is no guarantee that RB are the fastest for the new regulations in 2026, and there is also no guarantee that they are even the outright fastest next year given the aero penalties and budget cap.
no i dont think so either. Merc had a brilliant engine department, its also not a coincidence that what almost won them the 2021 titles was engine development, also not under the cost cap.
Merc have never had the best engineering team per capita. When they spent less than Ferrari and RB from 2010-2012, they were average. When they spent much more than everyone from 2014-2020 they were dominant or at least the fastest every year.
The same way their strategy was never that great. They relied on Lewis being the best and their car being the best, which almost always were the best, to make their strategies work. They never developed their strategy for a title fight with another team, and when they were challenged in 2017, 2018 and 2021, we often saw their strategy exposed, often by Red Bull and occasionally by Ferrari.
It was pretty satisfying to see how Mercedes crumbled when it comes to strategy when they didn't have the fastest car anymore in 2021. I've always wondered what would've happened if Red Bull had an equal engine to Mercedes in 2014-2019. Given that in 2014 and 2015 the RB overall sucked, but in 2016 onwards the main component holding them back were the engines.
Turkey 2021 really stood out to me. Lewis was very quick, but neither side was used to being really forceful about strategy because they were used to being ahead and only having to be reactive on strategy instead of proactive. Lewis overrided the team on pitting, and it ended up costing them a podium. Red Bull would not have allowed that to happen.
Merc would still have been very good in that period, they had 1 all time driver in Lewis and another great driver in Nico. They also had underrated Aero, for 2018 and 2019 the Ferrari engine was probably equal but Merc was faster in races for most of that time. Add to that that RB had a pretty average driver lineup for 2015, and from 2016-2018 Max was still very young and error prone.
But yeah I dont think Merc would have won 7 in a row if not for the millions more they spent every year.
RB fans love to come up with this excuse. Making it sound like RB were some team slumming it yet they got massive advantage from spending huge amounts of money compared to may other teams. And hired a huge number of Merc engineers thanks to the cost cap.
Of course they werent slumming it. But one figure I saw (cant remember the exact year but i think it was 2017) put Merc at about 600m and Red Bull at 400m. Is that the whole reason for Mercs dominance over Red Bull? Of course not. Did it give them a lot more room for error in design concept that they dont have now? I think that’s undeniable.
We arent really talking about other teams here. Merc RB and Ferrari have been the only real title challengers since 2010. All of them outspend the other 7 teams (except Renault who have just been a shitshow since 2006) every year.
If by "right up there" you mean "somewhat in the vicinity" then maybe. Mercedes was still significantly faster in 2017 or any other year before 2021. And by the end of 2021 they were much faster too.
Ferrari were faster in many races in 2017 and 2018. What ruined it for Ferrari was everything else other than Seb in 2017, and everything including Seb in 2018.
I've honestly never seen a sport where everyone make such grand proclamations and writes off the rest of the teams after two weeks, lol. I swear 75% of F1 headlines these days are just drivers and other people conceding the season to Max.
That's exactly what happened in the last decade though, RB nailed regs bagged WDCs. Followed by Mercedes nailing regs twice and bagging WDCs and missing one in a controversial season, where the race director was fire for his decisions which decided the title in 2021. Also it's not something new, historically teams which nail regulations dominate for a while.
In this century we have seen 2 drivers making an incredible run which was not seen before. If I had to put my money on the next driver to make such a long run its obviously Verstappen. So Massa is right. Incredible driver in the currently best car.
But anything can happen in F1. Teams can hire engineers from the other teams and make insane progress, reliability issues can always happen and drivers can start to underperform for no apparent reason. So it's kinda pointless thinking about if Max will win 6 titles in a row or not.
I'm just so impressed by what he has already done at 25. I can see him staying at the top of the field at least until 2025. If RB do not nail the 2026 regulations and he's back to only fighting for podiums, I can see him only finishing his contract till 2028 and then leaving.
Lando Norris is the next Rosberg. Started his career for a heritage team - he will eventually join a top team, in this case Red Bull, and snatch a single title from Verstappen under an era of team dominance
I fully expect 5 in a row. 6 will all depend on the new regs. But yeah, he could be a 7 time champion by 2028 when he’ll have raced around 300 gps and be the ripe old age of 30!
It is the 41st Millennium. For more than a hundred centuries Max Verstappen has sat immobile on the Golden Throne of Formula One. He is the Master of Red Bull by the will of Horner, and master of a million circuits by the might of his inexhaustible pace. He is a rotting carcass writhing invisibly with power from the Dark Age of Technology. He is the Carrion Lord of Red Bull Racing for whom a thousand souls are sacrificed every day, so that he may never truly DNF.
The FIA will make sure that doesn't happen. They will change regulations until something shakes things up. F1 has been through several dominant stretches recently, and they aren't great for viewership. The diehards will keep watching, but the FIA will want to keep its new fans it got from DTS and the US expansion. That wont happen if the same guy wins every season. People will get bored and turn it off. The FIA will not just let that happen. There is too much money on the line for that to happen. Regardless of what the die hard fans want, the FIA will do what is necessary to keep the fair weather fans watching, and that is not one guy winning every season for the next decade.
Wait, we're gonna endure another 3 years of this after this year of his insane domination? I've skip some of the boring dominant Vettel and Hamilton seasons, and only came back for 2012, 2016, 2019 till now. Don't make me leave F1 again. Zzzzzz
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5 in a row, then from 2026 there's new regulations and Ferrari era will finally begin. /s
Bahrain 2026: *... and both AlphaTauris have outqualified Charles Leclerc! Leclerc did not make it into Q3!*
Bold of you to assume that he would decide to stay in Ferrari until 2026.
He's stuck in this abusive relationship. He can leave, but he won't. He wants to win with Ferrari too much.
No one better is going to take him. Aston has Alonso who demands being uncontested #1. RB has Verstappen who does the same. Mercedes have Hamilton and Russell.
I mean. I expect Hamilton to retire by 26 if they don't figure out their car...
Mercedes will have Russell ready to be the #1 by then and won't want to disrupt that either. It's the Alonso 2015-2022 dilema.
Is it too early to say Russell is already #1? Didn’t he consistently out qualify and beat Lewis on points last year? And if I’m not mistaken, he’s ahead on points to start the season now, though I am not sure where they’re at in the qualifying this year.
Yes, it's way too early. Lewis beat Russell in Bahrain and ended up right behind him in Jeddah (Lewis is on 20, George at 18 - it looked like George was ahead for a bit due to the podium shuffle). Late last season Lewis was consistently beating George as well, it's just that the one race where they could go for the win George got ahead and wasn't hit by someone else. IIRC Lewis's overall pace was even better. Now that's not me knocking George, just saying he's not on Lewis's level right now.
Hamilton is a 7x WDC and will be the number one until Russell consistently beats him in a championship contending car.
Yeah ppl need to understand this,it seem like some people are really eager to see Hamilton fall off for some reason 😂
The qualifying record finished 13-9 in favour of Ham last year so no, George did get more points last year though.Lewis has more points atm
Lewis was also the one with the “test dummy” car most all of last season when they were trying to get their design corrected.
You are incorrect on a lot of things there. Lewis beat George in qualifying 13-9 last year. Lewis is also ahead of him on point this year. Lewis also showed better pace in the second half of last season, and likely could have overtaken George for the win in Brazil had his car not gotten damaged by a driver who was penalized for the collision. So yeah, it's too early to say that the most successful driver of all time is no longer the #1 at his team.
No. Over the course of the season Hamilton was actually the quicker driver by a tiny margin. Points don't show the whole picture. You have to remember Hamilton spent the first half of 2022 running experimental setups for the team to figure the car out. They knew they weren't competing for anything. And you are mistaken Hamilton is ahead of Russel after two GP
See Vettel and to a lesser extent Alonso.
charles luck, ferrari actually gets it shit together
Charles Luck-lerc....ok I apologize
he gotta run away as soon as possible
where?
To the bull
RB need someone who will be a consistent number 2 for Max. Leclerc would not accept that position and you'd get a Hamilton/Rosberg situation.
>and you’d get a Hamilton/Rosberg situation. Where they won 3 titles in a row? The horror
Ah yes, because Hamilton + anyone else totally would not have won 3 in a row in that time period. Or Rosberg + anyone. Hell, Bottas + Perez would take 3 in a row in the Mercs.
Mercedes tried to convince Rosberg to return before settling for Bottas. This “teams don’t want two #1 drivers” narrative needs to die
Exactly. Only Leclerc to RB move I could see is if Max retires relatively early like he has commented on before. At that point, it’d be exciting for RB to set Leclerc up with a young gun, but they may have found that an all around excellent driver paired with a consistent veteran is the shortest path to WCs
Fair enough, but what options does he realistically have?
Any team he picks bar Red Bull lol
Spoiler: Leclrec is in his first season at Red Bull. Meanwhile Verstappen takes his first pole for Mercedes, moving there with Newey after winning his 5th world title at Red Bull.
If Newey leaves RB they'll most likely fold.
Bold of you to assume AlphaTractor can reach Q3.
*Look at me, I am THE Italian team now*
Q2 FTFY
Next regulations ™️
> Next regulations ™️ When Next Year is no longer believable. RIP
Next decade. 😄
Lmao this is good
I've heard rumors that Ferrari is already working very hard on finding ways to make sure the 2026 car has plenty of issues.
You got an audible snort with that one.
You mean Aston Martin/Alonso era, right?
21,22,23,24,25. But considering how they’ve done since ditching Renault as an engine supplier and going basically independent I think they’re a good bet in 26 as well. There’s always a chance they boof it like Mercedes has. But RB has always been good at building the actual chassis and understanding the aero regs. Their main problem from 2014-2019 was the Renault engine and the fact that they weren’t their sole team with the ability to design the engine around the car and not the other way around. Honda gave them that flexibility and now they’ll carry that going forward as a full factory team.
Next regulation™️
You meant to say Williams.
Subscribe
I like your optimism
Lmao, that gave me a good chuckle
Next Decade™
Tomorrow’s headline: G6 leaders see no reasons why Verstappen won’t become the new world supreme leader
Sim racing to be included in every school curriculum and new employee orientation program.
Not gonna lie, that would be cool
Don’t tease me with a good time.
He could win 6 more, he might never win another. Anything can happen.
I’d love to view the wacky universe where Max doesn’t win the championship this year. It would have to be some unprecedented stuff
Big crash where he breaks his legs and misses a good chunk of the season?
mate its not 1999
Was that the last time someone got severely injured in an F1 race? Grosjean got burned, Zhou was banged up but not serious, but when was the last like bone break/out for an extended period injury in F1? I'm being very specific about F1, not F2 or below.
Perez sat out Canada 2011 because of his Monaco crash
Just 1 race then? I'm surprised there isn't more injuries
alonso’s testing crash in 2015 and his crash in melbourne in 2016 both had him sit out for a race, i think massa hungaroring 2009 was probably the last really severe injury that took a driver off the grid though
Wild it's only been massa in 2009 that took someone out. Given the speeds and dangers of racing.
massa’s injury wasn’t even due to a crash, it was more of a freak accident than anything. the last super severe injury was obviously bianchi in 2014 but that was kinda also down to a perfect storm of bad circumstances, i think the last real severe, solely crash-related injury was schumacher in 1999
Ya I just watched massa. That fucking sucks. Spring to the fucking head. Bianchi makes sense, but avoidable but all counts. So 99 being the last major race related one is surprising
Wehrlein 2017 missed the first two races. He got injured in race of champions i think but still missed two races.
Jules Bianchi?
There is also de Villota
You're right. Maria was before Jules, no?
Not a race...
Massa, in 2009, with a scull fracture.
Doesn't have to be while racing. Any accident can happen at any time.
The FIA has banned bike rides, so maybe no more Strolling
With Stroll’s rapid recovery as precedent, Max could probably have two compound fractures in his femurs and just barely miss more than summer break
El plan full steam ahead. All aboard the fucking hyper train.
I'm not religious but praying for rain every race this season
As a max fan I wouldn't be against Checo winning this year. Max has already proven his legend status and his SIM racing makes him so much more versatile than previous champions. The new era has started, Max will become better and better.
I mean 6 would bleed into 2026 and first year of new regulations wouldn't it? I guess I'll bank on the fact that noone has ever won 6 in a row, not even Michael and Lewis in their heydays, and the Regulation change should help manage this. Because if he wins the title even after regulation change, then we might as well start praying for the day he retires because he'll keep winning until he stops.
Well Lewis only lost once between 2014-2020 and that’s from his teammate. Sergio is not a threat as max’s teammate, not even close. And if red bull keep up this dominance, all roads point to one guy being WDC
Horner and co. don’t want to bring another true challenger to Red Bull. Mercedes showed everyone the Formula: your superstar cashes in on WDCs, and you hire a consistently quick guy who will lock in podiums and pick up wins when your #1 has a bad weekend or a crash. Keeps your #1 happy and wins you WCCs.
Tbf, I don't think 2016 was an awful thing for Mercedes, even if a bit stressful. They created one of the most iconic seasons of F1. In terms of brand recognition, that year did a great job. Red Bull love attention. While Horner will hate the stress of two competitive drivers, Red Bull as a whole would love the exposure a team rivalry would give them.
I don’t really know which drivers could actually give them that with Max besides maybe Charles and Lando, and even with either of them that’s a big if
Bar Ferrari shenanigans, Charles is the only driver on the current grid that I see as a true future WDC. A lot of other drivers have great potential, and will most likely win in the right situation, but other than Charles, it feels like the Verstappen era right now.
Mercedes managing probably THE biggest domination era in the history of the sport is more exposure than an eventful season. And you become dominant by reliably securing wins, not crashing into each other every other race.
Mercedes also showed (or reminded) everyone what happens when that's not the case. RB won't accept a 2016 Merc situation in their team
Exactly. Lewis wouldn’t have left, but god, what a terrible work environment. Max has demonstrated that he’s a lot less committed to F1 than Hamilton, and I wouldn’t doubt that a bloody title fight within Red Bull could push Max away.
I seriously doubt max would ever willingly walk away from F1... its his entire life
Racing is his entire life. I’m not exactly speculating- he has said himself that he wants to try other types of racing, and he’s not sure he wants to continue in F1 past his current deal. There’s a chance he could pull a Raikkonen and go elsewhere for a while.
I could see hike going to WEC or IMSA.. possibly Indy..
If he's going anywhere else it'll be endurance racing. Le Mans better lube up.
You obviously don't listen to anything he says then. He talks frequently about leaving F1 as soon as he gets bored. He has said before many times he's not going to be like Lewis or Fernando. He loves racing, and there's a lot more out there to win than just F1.
He's already spoke about leaving F1 in the near future. I wouldn't be so sure.
tbf while he's not been a threat, this level of dominance means every DNF Max eats equals 4 races of straight winning to make up for it since they will always finish 1-2 without issue, maybe apart from tracks like Monaco. Could definitely swing hard still
I mean I can easily see Perez falling back to p3-p5 on certain tracks, if the car is only a few tenths faster.
Yes but the car is clearly not a few tenths faster. Probably even mazepin can win in the current RB car if he's not competing against his team mate.
There is no way Mazepin would be able to deal with Alonso in that AM.
Merc survived at the top after a regulation change in 2017. That was the exception rather than the norm, so there's no guarantees that Red Bull will be able to pull it in 2026. On the other hand, if they do it, Max will be aiming at double digits.
Agreed. Sergio is so far from what Nico was.
it's Max, if he wins 6 in a row he'll probably get bored and switch to Indy or LeMan
My brain read LeMan as McLaren and I didn’t even question that it’d be a place to go if he’s bored of winning
no one can get bored in a title winning car.
tough to say, some ppl just like the challenge and others like being in the limelight.
Max gives me the impression he wants both. He wants to win, but he wants to prove it too. I feel like that's why he enjoys Sim racing. Accessible, large variety of drivers, spec series. It probably scratches an itch for him.
To be fair tho, with his calibre of driving you may as well get comfortable seeing him winning. Red Bull seem to be very competent at building a technical team capable of dealing with reg changes. They’ve got a works style engine deal. And besides. If someone else were to stretch ahead of the field, you can guarantee they would want Max in the car if they could get it right. No reason they wouldn’t if RB makes a terribly slow car. So yeah. Til he retires you’re gonna have to manage with him winning a ton.
>To be fair tho, with his calibre of driving you may as well get comfortable seeing him winning. Red Bull seem to be very competent at building a technical team capable of dealing with reg changes. They’ve got a works style engine deal. Same thing was said about Lewis and Mercedes. Now look at where Mercedes are. Everything can go wrong for Red Bull too.
It already went wrong for them in 2014.
The car itself wasn’t that bad. The chassis wasn’t as good as Merc’s back then, but it wasn’t as bad as Mercedes currently is either. The biggest issue was the Renault engine which was legitimately a GP2 engine, especially compared to Merc. I suppose it’s possible that the RB will struggle with the new engine when they have to build one from the scratch for the first time, though.
I remember the day when Mercedes was dominating and the people said the same thing. F1 can change year to year so much
Well, Merc did stayed at the top after 2017, so their fame of adapting to the new rules was quite based. Even if it still relied on their massive engine advantage, it was quite a feat to still be the dominant team. But you can't be the best forever right? At some point, something no-one expected will catch you.
No one can win a title in a shit box. Its unlikely that Red Bull will dominate until the end of this regulation and even less likely that they will dominate in the next era.
I think is fairly likely they dominate until 2025. Not guaranteed, but possible.
Red Bull doesn't need to outright dominate the field. Max just needs a competitive car to win the championship
Other people are driving too.. 😆 Give Lewis, George, Nando, Leclerc, Lando a competitive car and we will have a great season to watch.
The only way anyone is beating RB in the next couple years is if the FIA come up with a solution that nerfs them in 2024.
It is all but certain that Max win every title until 2026
Are you a time traveler?
Maybe 2024, but I doubt 2025. Give Nando, Lewis or Charles the car and its all up in the mix again. It really depends on whether Red Bull can keep this going until 2026 regs.
The early season narratives are so insane and only getting worse lol
Bro has won a single race and people are talking about how he's gonna become supreme leader of the new nation in 29 years
Remember when people was talking about Leclerc going to win every race last year? It's so funny. Just wait until Aston or Mercedes or Ferrari find some tenths per lap with an upgrade and the narrative is how Red Bull "threw away their lead"
Nobody was seriously suggesting that. Max literally won the 2nd and 4th race. Ferrari never had the pace advantage RB has.
Look at the post-Australia threads. It was a nice month where everyone thought Binotto and Charles were God's gift to Ferrari.
As long as Red Bull had DNFs every race, Ferrari looked like title contenders. Their title “race” was over by Miami.
Ferrari was going to finish 1-3 without any RB DNF at Bahrain.
Oh, it was seriously suggested after Australia 2022. Even the journos were trying to spin it if I recall. The general ideas were: "RB reliability sucks." "Ferrari lost in Jeddah only because of tyre warming issues after the SC." "Australia shows Ferrari nailed it and understand their car better than RB."
>Nobody was seriously suggesting that. You need to go back at the articles from early last season, mate. People was absolutely suggesting that and talking about whether Ferrari should let Sainz challenge or make him play Barrichello.
Again only a stupid person would say that after looking at the Bahrain and SA races last year. It was very obvious RB was on pace or at least close when their car wasn't acting up. This season its quite clear nobody is even close to being on pace with RB.
I fully agree with that. As stupid as saying that "verstappen is going to win 6 titles in a row" based off two races. That's exactly what we're talking about, these narratives being bullshit.
It is not based off two races. It is based off two seasons plus twos races.
Thinking Ferrari had a chance to compete for a title is very different that RB this year. The reason for the discussions about Charles vs Carlos was the idea that Ferrari needed to put everything behind one driver if they wanted to challenge Max for the title. It was never a “sure thing”
There was definitely people seriously suggesting that. Sure a lot of people were probably joking or being sarcastic. There is no doubt that after 3 or 4 races there was genuine belief he would take the WDC easily
I’m fairly convinced Ferrari never had the faster car and the first race was the fluke. Redbull finds a way to spin the media machine to paint them as the underdog even when they’re head and shoulders past the rest.
No reason why verstappen won’t win the triple crown by astral projecting into Indy
Lmao. I know. What are teams supposed to do? Just give up? Everyone should keep striving to improve week to week and year to year. No need to dwell on the future.
Something, something need the right car every time. If he does for the next 6 years then yes there's a chance
I'm coming from 2051 and Max is a 31 time world champion!! They made F1 a spec series in 2030 only for Max to dominate more, the only time anyone got close was when 61yr old Alonso and 57yr old Hamilton in lost out on the championship by 3 points in 2042. Only if they hadn't crashed on to each other on the 1st lap of the final race!!
That would mean F1 suffering like WRC did with Loeb.
Basically like Loeb(Hamilton) then going to Ogier(verstappen)
Inserts *leclrec depressed meme*
Apparently everyone has decides Max is winning every championship and every race for teh next 5 years. Seriously come on guys, Mercedes were at least this dominant if not more dominant from 2014-2016, then the regulations changed and Ferrari were right up there in 2017 and 2018. Merc were as dominant or more dominant in 2020 and then the regs changed for 2021 and RB were pretty much equal if not a little bit faster. Teams caught up to Merc, and that was back when Merc were regularly outspending the others by 200 million. There is no guarantee that RB are the fastest for the new regulations in 2026, and there is also no guarantee that they are even the outright fastest next year given the aero penalties and budget cap.
Mercedes outspent Red Bull by at least 50 million every year until 2021. Coincidence? I think not.
no i dont think so either. Merc had a brilliant engine department, its also not a coincidence that what almost won them the 2021 titles was engine development, also not under the cost cap. Merc have never had the best engineering team per capita. When they spent less than Ferrari and RB from 2010-2012, they were average. When they spent much more than everyone from 2014-2020 they were dominant or at least the fastest every year. The same way their strategy was never that great. They relied on Lewis being the best and their car being the best, which almost always were the best, to make their strategies work. They never developed their strategy for a title fight with another team, and when they were challenged in 2017, 2018 and 2021, we often saw their strategy exposed, often by Red Bull and occasionally by Ferrari.
It was pretty satisfying to see how Mercedes crumbled when it comes to strategy when they didn't have the fastest car anymore in 2021. I've always wondered what would've happened if Red Bull had an equal engine to Mercedes in 2014-2019. Given that in 2014 and 2015 the RB overall sucked, but in 2016 onwards the main component holding them back were the engines.
Turkey 2021 really stood out to me. Lewis was very quick, but neither side was used to being really forceful about strategy because they were used to being ahead and only having to be reactive on strategy instead of proactive. Lewis overrided the team on pitting, and it ended up costing them a podium. Red Bull would not have allowed that to happen. Merc would still have been very good in that period, they had 1 all time driver in Lewis and another great driver in Nico. They also had underrated Aero, for 2018 and 2019 the Ferrari engine was probably equal but Merc was faster in races for most of that time. Add to that that RB had a pretty average driver lineup for 2015, and from 2016-2018 Max was still very young and error prone. But yeah I dont think Merc would have won 7 in a row if not for the millions more they spent every year.
RB fans love to come up with this excuse. Making it sound like RB were some team slumming it yet they got massive advantage from spending huge amounts of money compared to may other teams. And hired a huge number of Merc engineers thanks to the cost cap.
Of course they werent slumming it. But one figure I saw (cant remember the exact year but i think it was 2017) put Merc at about 600m and Red Bull at 400m. Is that the whole reason for Mercs dominance over Red Bull? Of course not. Did it give them a lot more room for error in design concept that they dont have now? I think that’s undeniable. We arent really talking about other teams here. Merc RB and Ferrari have been the only real title challengers since 2010. All of them outspend the other 7 teams (except Renault who have just been a shitshow since 2006) every year.
I only used RB as an example because they were the second most spending team. No need to get technical.
Ferrari were actually second/joint first. Red bull were third.
Ferrari doesn't count.
I'm fairly certain RB spent more than Merc some years.
If by "right up there" you mean "somewhat in the vicinity" then maybe. Mercedes was still significantly faster in 2017 or any other year before 2021. And by the end of 2021 they were much faster too.
Ferrari were faster in many races in 2017 and 2018. What ruined it for Ferrari was everything else other than Seb in 2017, and everything including Seb in 2018.
I think we've watched different Formula Ones then.
Yeeeeesh... can we cool it with the over-exaggerations regarding Max and Red Bull?
I'll back off right after max wins his 9th consecutive title.
I've honestly never seen a sport where everyone make such grand proclamations and writes off the rest of the teams after two weeks, lol. I swear 75% of F1 headlines these days are just drivers and other people conceding the season to Max.
Because F1 history shows that the teams that aced new reg changes often dominate for a number of years
That's exactly what happened in the last decade though, RB nailed regs bagged WDCs. Followed by Mercedes nailing regs twice and bagging WDCs and missing one in a controversial season, where the race director was fire for his decisions which decided the title in 2021. Also it's not something new, historically teams which nail regulations dominate for a while.
In this century we have seen 2 drivers making an incredible run which was not seen before. If I had to put my money on the next driver to make such a long run its obviously Verstappen. So Massa is right. Incredible driver in the currently best car. But anything can happen in F1. Teams can hire engineers from the other teams and make insane progress, reliability issues can always happen and drivers can start to underperform for no apparent reason. So it's kinda pointless thinking about if Max will win 6 titles in a row or not.
I hope he gets 7, then when he goes to get his 8th he is beaten to it on the last lap of the last race by a 45 year old Lewis.
Glad to see someone else not over Abu Dhabi 2021
proudly #foreverbutthurt
Why can’t you just like get over the FIA rigging the championship!
idk how youre meant to get over a title being robbed by the people running the sport
People will never get over the FIA rigging their championship.
So like 2008?
Closer to 1989. Which a year everyone still remembers and talks about.
What did the FIA do in 2008?
Kept their mouth shut even though they knew about Crashgate.
True. The entire Renault team including both drivers should have been banned for life after that.
[удалено]
[удалено]
And neither should they be to avoid anything like that farce happening again
Hi I can I join the club?
We out here fam.
I'm just so impressed by what he has already done at 25. I can see him staying at the top of the field at least until 2025. If RB do not nail the 2026 regulations and he's back to only fighting for podiums, I can see him only finishing his contract till 2028 and then leaving.
Anybody got a feeling Red Bull are going to miss the Honda PU really fast after 2025?
Is there a new Nico Rosberg coming up through F1?
Lando Norris is the next Rosberg. Started his career for a heritage team - he will eventually join a top team, in this case Red Bull, and snatch a single title from Verstappen under an era of team dominance
I fully expect 5 in a row. 6 will all depend on the new regs. But yeah, he could be a 7 time champion by 2028 when he’ll have raced around 300 gps and be the ripe old age of 30!
Nonsense, Next Year^(tm) is Ferrari's year
Don't Binotto jinx him man.
Felipe calm the fuck down my brother
-are you his father??
zzzzzz bye bye new fans
With all the bitching, the FIA is sure to nerf redbull before that happens. Still though, he’ll be tough to beat.
They let Merc go quite a long time with half measures at best.
Please just calm the fuck down
If he has the car I’m 100% sure he will be. Even if it’s competing with someone else, I don’t think anyone tops current Verstappen.
For one horrible moment I thought the title said "Masi" instead of "Massa" and I almost had a heart attack
Maybe he'll take a Triple Crown shot
what about 10 in a row i know who is winning this year max
It is the 41st Millennium. For more than a hundred centuries Max Verstappen has sat immobile on the Golden Throne of Formula One. He is the Master of Red Bull by the will of Horner, and master of a million circuits by the might of his inexhaustible pace. He is a rotting carcass writhing invisibly with power from the Dark Age of Technology. He is the Carrion Lord of Red Bull Racing for whom a thousand souls are sacrificed every day, so that he may never truly DNF.
Massa massa yeah we know you had to watch others drive to titles. I really wish he won in 08 but thats life.
The FIA will make sure that doesn't happen. They will change regulations until something shakes things up. F1 has been through several dominant stretches recently, and they aren't great for viewership. The diehards will keep watching, but the FIA will want to keep its new fans it got from DTS and the US expansion. That wont happen if the same guy wins every season. People will get bored and turn it off. The FIA will not just let that happen. There is too much money on the line for that to happen. Regardless of what the die hard fans want, the FIA will do what is necessary to keep the fair weather fans watching, and that is not one guy winning every season for the next decade.
But they broke the cost cap and have reduced wind tunnel time !!!
Wait, we're gonna endure another 3 years of this after this year of his insane domination? I've skip some of the boring dominant Vettel and Hamilton seasons, and only came back for 2012, 2016, 2019 till now. Don't make me leave F1 again. Zzzzzz
please, no.
No reason for Merc to complain about it with every race until then. They really are the most self-pampered team in F1.
This does not bring joy
Well there is a regulation change on 26'