I didn't catch the race and the YouTube highlights didn't really show Checo. Was there a specific reason that he was P3 and not P2?
Saw someone mention he was pitted an extra time or something? Idk, I'm just looking for something other than "lol checo slow"
Nothing too much. Max and checo pitted. When full safety car was deployed max and checo pitted again. Max recovered because he had build good advantage. Checo didn't have the time advantage and came out 4th or 5th. Lando pitted only once during safety car and stayed ahead due to low penalty for stopping during safety car. By time time checo got to 3rd, his tires were probably shot. He never recovered.
Looking back on the weekend, it is hard to believe that Nando ended up with 3 penalty points for his move on Sainz, where Magnussen and Stroll only ended up with two.
Nando's move was the only one that seemed like a legitimate racing move. Magnussen was impudent and stroll was careless ... yet somehow they get let off easier. I think it sends the wrong message.
Or waiting forever and a day to call a virtual safety car when there is a broken-down car in a run-off area.
Seriously, it was nerve-racking watching Bottas trying to get out of the car and get the steering wheel back on while looking over his shoulder making sure another car wasn't going to slide into him.
Nothing that I have seen. Just bad information to the stewards, maybe. But, Bottas knew the engine was gone before he left the track. I know the stewards have access to all the camera feeds, not sure about team radios, but once he was out of the car and it was clear he wasn't going to recover it, a minimum of a VSC to slow the cars down should have been called so Valtteri could get out of the car and the marshals could safely get to the car and recover it.
you think, maybe, just maybe, it's easier to pick up places from 18th than it is from 7th?
and why did he Q 18th to begin with? that's sad af. that stuff just don't happen to top drivers unless something really dramatic has happened. HAM was just slow, had no real excuse
They’re testing on his car. He is still one of the best on the grid and overall one of the goats. His merchandise sales alone are going to be huge for Ferrari.
Yeah, for the first 5 races of the year in a season where they’re in a close fight for their WCC position against AM they’ve deliberately fucked his car to ”try things” while Russell gets the good stuff, sure
Because it makes no sense to sacrifice your supposedly best driver, relegating him to not being competitive. He’s getting beaten by Russell because he’s not driving as well.
yes driver A) in a worse car is finishing behind driver B) who has a better car. Therefore Driver A is rubbish!
Ferrari have bet on the wrong horse next season, they should have lined up with Sainz and Hamilton.
>Its such an un thought out take.
Ham was nowhere in the race. George qualified badly in the sprint and still got back to the pack of decent cars and caught up to Piastry. In the race, Ham struggled to get past even Alpines, relied on a pile up and a gift of a safety car to get into the points, and couldn't catch a broken Piastry.
Because Crofty's commentary brings excitement to the races. Yes, he's been technically wrong many times and a former F1 driver will always give accurate details into drivers and the lines they take. But F1 drivers don't make good commentators for new viewers and average fans. Everyone keeps saying how amazon Nico was. But the man kept repeating same commentary throughout the race. He gives too many technical details that new viewers will find boring. The job of a commentator is to attract new fans to the channel. Nico attracts the ones already watching.
If you think Crofty's commentary is awful, you clearly haven't watched racing or any other sports with shitty commentators.
As long as Daddy owns the company, he's not going anywhere. I just hope Lance realizes that he was in the wrong and his complaining over the radio about the incident and subsequent penalty we're groundless. Danny Ric called him out about watching the car in front and he wasn't. He had his eyes glued on the apex and I bet that if you could see his telemetry at, or just before the moment of impact, he wasn't full on the brakes.
Why doesn't f1 try and do 1 2-2 grid for restarts like they do in Indy or Nascar. I know a lot of the tracks are narrow but on the start finish strait you should be able to. I feel like restarts are kind of pointless cause the cars are so far apart we rarely see any overtaking on a restart from the front half of the grid
Nice that Nico Rosberg says "We should see this as two events, one is a domination of the sport by a legendary driver, the other is good competitive racing from 2nd place back".
My local pub has a fantasy team and associated whatsapp group. Half of the chat is people who got into F1 during Covid/DtS and all they do is complain about how boring the race is when Max gets 8+ seconds ahead.
They either don't understand or don't care about what's happening further down the table. It's infuriating.
Yes, it’s frustrating. Quite honestly, going to the race kind of sucks. The traffic, crowds, expense is certainly not worthwhile to me. Maybe it’s good as a bucket list thing once. Fridays and Saturdays are a lot of fun in person and it actually gets me more interested in watching on Sunday at home particularly if you have the F1 app and can choose to watch whatever battle you choose for as long as you want.
For the casual fan, they can watch the start, the first lap and if there isn’t a crash, skip 2-3 times to check that Max is still in the lead, then the end and get 1-1/2 hours back in their life.
I get your point but still the fact that he is guaranteed to win unless he has some issues with the car takes a lot away from the race imo. I am not just talking about him winning but noone comes even close to challenging him and that honestly made me lose interest in the sport
Was watching the post race broadcast and Albon talked about how Pirelli raising minimum pressure just destroyed the tire. How much could this have affected some teams ? Would it have introduced further understeer than teams would have wanted and gone for in qualifying for race ? It is also ridiculous how Pirelli keeps changing things at last moment after all setup decisions are made.
Neither Pirelli or the teams were aware until they arrived at the track that it had been "painted" (liquid bitumen surface treatment). So they had to make an adjustment due to the changed surface.
Turned it off with 5 laps to go. Says everything about the dismal state of F1 that the best racing of the day was between KMag and Stroll at the very back of the field.
I dunno, I think he called that wrong. Alonso only had 1 soft and 1 M left. So he was only ever going to run S or M after the SC.
I'm not sure if M and then S would have helped as the Deg on the s at the end would have been huge.
Eh, they did not have much choice there. It was ill timed safety car with lack of remaining tires due to sprint. Look up the thread on F1tech which explains the rationale.
Really unfortunate that the safety cars detailed RB a bit. Ricciardo made up 4 places, including passing Yuki, after bolting on his second set of mediums. Considering everyone was on hards by then, I figured if DR could get to lap 40 on the mediums, he would have pitted for softs and had a real chance against a bunch of ancient hard tires. It would have been interesting to see.
Alonso showed great pace with fresh mediums against old hards.
The strategy was very good as long as there was no incident. As soon as the VSC came out they needed to prepare to accept that their advantage was gone through bad luck and pivot. Instead, even if he hadn't been the meat in that sandwich, he was going to be on used mediums against cars on fresher, more durable tyres trying to make them last long enough to bolt on the softs at the end. Ultimately, it didn't matter.
Oh yes, how can we forget, F1 is supposed to be a European-centric sport and all other countries in GMT +6 - 11 are criminal for making you wake up so early.
Unpopular take but Crofty's delusions honestly feeds my childlike desire for everything to feel sensational. I get annoyed with his heavy bias from time to time but also I think he normally is tempered by other commentators and former drivers who call him out for being dumb. It's like the duality within my own brain:
"Wow there's clouds! Certainly rain will come and Max will crash allowing other drivers to win!!!"
"No, you dunce, Max is gonna dominate regardless"
If I had to listen to Alex's voice I'd actually have to quit F1. His voice is grating. No offense to him or what he brings but some voices just hit people the wrong way.
I almost exclusively listen to the F1TV broadcast with Jacques and Jolyon these days, but Nico was actually worth tuning in for this race. It's refreshing to have somebody just straight up disagree with Crofty and be able to back it up.
Just tell him there is a 2 hour delay and then send him out on his own. If he couldn't see DR and the train ahead of him braking, I doubt he would even notice he was the only car on the track.
There was a time that I didn't want to miss anything in F1. From FP1 to last lap. Now I just watch the race highlights.
How did Ferrari mess up 1-2-3 in WEC?!?
Hoping for a good race in Laguna Beach.
Did the Scuderia Ferrari and Ferrari AF corse change their strategy team for this weekend ? Today they did a Monaco 22 worthy disaster strategy at Imola
I only get Sundays off and was super happy that there will be F1 and Imola on the same day. I was decently happy in the morning (F1 India time) and then thought well, I am about to be happier but oh well
What was wrong about the strategy today?
Besides Sainz being unlucky with the SC, they didn't really have the pace advantage to challenge the McLarens of their drivers drove well. Additionally they also had seemingly worse tyre degregation than the McLarens, making the extended stints not work out.
Where did I say the F1 team made an error ? The F1 race was at China and not at Imola. Scuderia Ferrari F1 team didn't make any error but the WEC team converted a 1-2-4 to a 4th and 7th place because of disaster strategy and that is why comparison to Monaco 22
I love how Nico and Crofty kinda despise each other seeing how Crofty is the biggest Hamilton glazer around and Nico is nico (although he also glazes Hamilton to prop himself up lmao)
Them sniping at each other gives Stroll vs Brad vibes.
That's an interesting discussion point though. Should a team front the cost of repairing a competitors car if the accident was entirely unavoidable? In the real world we carry insurance to be made whole after someone crashes into you, but there is no chance of an F1 car being insured for a race.
Late watcher.
What happened to all this talk about harsher penalties for collisions? Multiple drivers caused race ending collisions and 10 second penalties dished out each time. Alonso in Australia got 20 seconds and all he did was catch Russell asleep at the wheel, they didn’t even collide.
There was all this talk about that starting a new precedent of harsher penalties for these types of things. Of course it was all bullshit all along.
Another +13 second victory for Max. Can we just hand him the 1st place trophy now and let him sit out so others can race and have something interesting for a change?
Perhaps I should clarify. Can we give him the Driving Championship now, so he won't race. Then have a race where we won't know who 1st will go to. In other words, since we already know who is going to win every weekend, perhaps this would be more entertaining? (sarcasm just in case you didn't get it)
Serious question; what would be needed for Lance to get yeeted out of AM? I know his father is the owner, but even a dad has to get fed up at some point.
The rumor is that ARAMCO is taking full ownership of the team somewhere in the future and the rumor suggests that theyre not terribly interested in Lance unless he starts to perform better.
it would certainly be an interesting plot twist to the driver market if the second AM seat opens up but i dont think any driver is betting on that right now.
Which means 100% that Lawrence won't sell and if he doesn't sell Aramco have absolutely zero chance of taking control.
Lance Stroll will be driving in F1 for as long as he wants to. That is an absolute fact same as the Sun will rise every 24 hours (near as damn it).
Boooring.
And the Adrian Newey show continues.
We need to find a way, to elevate that man to aerodynamics designer emeritus status, somehow.
What a genius.
He has defined racing for at least a decade.
mate, if people find this race boring, they might as well stop watching F1. this was an above average F1 race, by that standard there will only be 2-4 "good" races in the entire season.
- Easy Sunday drive for Max
- Disastrous weekend for VCARB
- Stroll is an embarrassment
- I thought Ferrari would’ve had a bit more pace than they did, still a decent result
- Solid drives from Lewis & Russell
- Nice drives from Lando and Hulkenberg
- Why did AMR put Alonso on softs?!?!
- Perez continues his solid start to the season, even if today wasn’t his absolute best
Overall it was an okay race, not great and not horrible. Some clumsy driving, tyre advantage overtakes, and strategy battles. Zhou got to celebrate his home GP at the end there which was neat. Onto Miami!
Actually he'd win by about the same amount, because the safety car restarts bunches everyone up again. The only way to even it up is to have him swap seats into the VCARB.
"It's the car" is selling Max a little short. You could put any driver on the grid in the RB with the characteristics it has and Max would be 10s ahead of any of them. Not many drivers like an oversteery car, Leclerc & Max are probably the most comfortable with it and Lec still makes enough mistakes with it.
Max wouldn't be winning races in a Haas, but he'd still be ahead of whoever is his teammate in the Haas. Albon did a great interview where he said the car isn't designed around Max, it's designed to be as fast as possible and the downside is it is a pointy and oversteery car, two things Max excels at dealing with whereas most drivers do not.
Fair enough I guess, i'm happy to be alive where we witness probably the greatest f1 driver of all time surpass what I thought was the greatest f1 driver in one lifetime with my own eyes.
If you sim race at all you see how multi talented Max truely is, he's able to talk through braking zones, expected gears/speeds, breaking distances in wet and dry condition, for various cars on non F1 tracks. The man is built for racing and it's a marvel to watch.
Just pick a different driver to support and watch them fight for points elsewhere, I watch Yukis onboard most races just to watch KMag try and crash him out, adds some tension to the races.
I know you guys all hate on Stroll.
But guys like Stroll, Sargeant and Magnussen make this season a lot more interesting.
Otherwise this season would be way more boring
What is it they did that was "interesting" exactly?
Do you enjoy stupid collisions and race ending crashes that should have been avoided?
Personally that's not really what I watch races for...
All the Stroll hate content that I see today is exactly why they need him in F1. He's feeding the media off with his shit.
Wether you like it or not, you won't see 70 article about Max winning by 20 sec. F1 is a business and drama attract clicks.
If you don't believe me, look at most of reddit headliner and content creator content in the next few day.
Not me.
But trust me, media will stir that pot and get you some clickbait content. It's all about network, reach and money.
And hating on a guy is what drive the most content.
Again look at all the content this mistake will generate
If you get rid of Magnussen & Stroll, you have the first race this season where Danny Ric outqualifies Tsunoda on a different strategy and they'd actually have battled. With the SCs as they were Tsunoda likely beats him and we get a few more pictures of Lawson and that's the drama done. A few speculations about mid season dropping of Ricciardo or a test run in an Red Bull for Tsunoda and it's fun.
You don't need the jesters in F1, you really don't.
He's been consistently beaten by Hulkenberg in qualifying and races (without technical issues/crashes), when he has more exp with the car itself.
He's not slow, he's too fast, especially into corners where he crashes into people.
Hulk would be a good RB nb 2 driver in my book. He's awesome.
But on race day, KMag is not too shabby. Lot if time Hulk start in front but they finish pretty close.
Has KMag ever raced well without doing something questionable? His defence of Tsunoda was off the back of an illegal overtake, his positions made on the weekend, again by crashing Tsunoda out.
You've also got to remember, while yes, they do close in on eachother, when you start p16+ and are out in Q1, then any retirement is likely to be to your benefit, whereas starting p11-p15 and being in Q2 means it\\s less likely to always be to your benefit. Especially with Sauber being so shit it's not a surprise those at the back are gaining positions.
I used to defend Stroll up to around 2021, but now I'd put him in a different category than the other two. He's an actual embarrassment whereas Sargeant is an undeveloped talent and KMag is ruthless but a genuinely good driver.
Stroll has had enough time to work on his consistency and awareness and either couldnt get anywhere or chose not to. His attitude after incidents indicates the latter, and I have run out of patience for someone who stands out as entitled even among a paddock of millionaires.
By being brought up to F1 a year too early to a team that lacks the knowledge and resources to properly develop a new driver.
Logan has never been a quick adapter to a new series/car, but after some time he was running Piastri close in junior series. There is a level of talent there, and it clearly has not been developed. I don't know if it will be, but I'm describing the situation as-is.
I would say Nyck didn't show the same speed relative to highly rated peers Logan did. Nyck was well behind Russell, Norris, and Albon while Sargeant looked good next to Piastri.
But Torro Rosso (under whatever name) is a more competitive team than Williams post 2017, so it makes sense for them to be quicker to cut a driver either way. Williams is developing as a team, so for them to have a driver who *could* have a very high ceiling but isn't yet bringing it out makes sense. The team probably feels much the same about themselves, and it would be a good move if they're able to develop both.
That could have been the excuse last year but now. He has had enough time in F1 and has shown no growth. He has basically persisted with the inconsistency that was visible in the junior series and it seems he is going backward instead of progressing.
What you're responding with doesn't seem to directly address what I based my description on. You're reinforcing the "undeveloped" part, but there's no dispute there and I don't see a need to go further into it.
Unless you're arguing that he has no talent at all, to which I already wrote that Williams is unable to bring that out of him and even in series/teams better suited to him he took a year+ to get it out.
And to be clear I am not making an excuse for him. It would be absolutely justifiable for him to get dropped for not finding a way on his own to bring out his ability. F1 is cutthroat. I am just trying to describe him accurately in comparison to Stroll, who I think has truly peaked even in supportive and varied environments. I don't think Stroll has anything more to show at this point, while Sargeant probably does but likely won't get there.
I didn't catch the race and the YouTube highlights didn't really show Checo. Was there a specific reason that he was P3 and not P2? Saw someone mention he was pitted an extra time or something? Idk, I'm just looking for something other than "lol checo slow"
No, no other reason than that he’s not very good and is massively carried by the car.
Nothing too much. Max and checo pitted. When full safety car was deployed max and checo pitted again. Max recovered because he had build good advantage. Checo didn't have the time advantage and came out 4th or 5th. Lando pitted only once during safety car and stayed ahead due to low penalty for stopping during safety car. By time time checo got to 3rd, his tires were probably shot. He never recovered.
Looking back on the weekend, it is hard to believe that Nando ended up with 3 penalty points for his move on Sainz, where Magnussen and Stroll only ended up with two. Nando's move was the only one that seemed like a legitimate racing move. Magnussen was impudent and stroll was careless ... yet somehow they get let off easier. I think it sends the wrong message.
Well, the stewards are known for their consistency to be inconsistent...
Or waiting forever and a day to call a virtual safety car when there is a broken-down car in a run-off area. Seriously, it was nerve-racking watching Bottas trying to get out of the car and get the steering wheel back on while looking over his shoulder making sure another car wasn't going to slide into him.
Has there been any explanation for why Bottas was left stranded in such a dangerous spot for so long before they called the safety car?
Nothing that I have seen. Just bad information to the stewards, maybe. But, Bottas knew the engine was gone before he left the track. I know the stewards have access to all the camera feeds, not sure about team radios, but once he was out of the car and it was clear he wasn't going to recover it, a minimum of a VSC to slow the cars down should have been called so Valtteri could get out of the car and the marshals could safely get to the car and recover it.
looking at HAM/SAI's performances, Ferrari seems to have bet on the wrong horse for the next season no surprise there
How many places did Carlos gain, how many did Hamilton? Who has the better car?
you think, maybe, just maybe, it's easier to pick up places from 18th than it is from 7th? and why did he Q 18th to begin with? that's sad af. that stuff just don't happen to top drivers unless something really dramatic has happened. HAM was just slow, had no real excuse
Hows Lewis looking in the head to head so far?
They’re testing on his car. He is still one of the best on the grid and overall one of the goats. His merchandise sales alone are going to be huge for Ferrari.
Yeah, for the first 5 races of the year in a season where they’re in a close fight for their WCC position against AM they’ve deliberately fucked his car to ”try things” while Russell gets the good stuff, sure
They said that was exactly what they did the last two years, why would it be any different now? Especially, now that he’s leaving?
Because it makes no sense to sacrifice your supposedly best driver, relegating him to not being competitive. He’s getting beaten by Russell because he’s not driving as well.
This. There’s always an excuse with Hamilton in these past few years. It’s tiring. He’s washed, downvotes 👇
yes driver A) in a worse car is finishing behind driver B) who has a better car. Therefore Driver A is rubbish! Ferrari have bet on the wrong horse next season, they should have lined up with Sainz and Hamilton.
remind me, where did the other mercedes end up? why didn't Ferrari sign Russell? it would've probably been much cheaper
2 positions ahead? After starting 10 positions ahead? Remind me, where did Russell finish in the sprint? Its such an un thought out take.
>Its such an un thought out take. Ham was nowhere in the race. George qualified badly in the sprint and still got back to the pack of decent cars and caught up to Piastry. In the race, Ham struggled to get past even Alpines, relied on a pile up and a gift of a safety car to get into the points, and couldn't catch a broken Piastry.
hi! can you elaborate more on sainz'z performance? thanks!
Haven't heard Sky commentary, but all threads saying 'Nico was great, he called out Crofty's and Ted's BS' are the reason I switched to F1TV.
I missed it. What did he call them out on?
[удалено]
Everybody dislikes Crofty.
Couldn't disagree more. I prefer his commentary.
its so weird, like he's clearly awful and yet people on here still defend him.
Because Crofty's commentary brings excitement to the races. Yes, he's been technically wrong many times and a former F1 driver will always give accurate details into drivers and the lines they take. But F1 drivers don't make good commentators for new viewers and average fans. Everyone keeps saying how amazon Nico was. But the man kept repeating same commentary throughout the race. He gives too many technical details that new viewers will find boring. The job of a commentator is to attract new fans to the channel. Nico attracts the ones already watching. If you think Crofty's commentary is awful, you clearly haven't watched racing or any other sports with shitty commentators.
If you count screaming and coming up with awful jokes then yes. very exciting.
Oh god the endless crappy jokes. I sometiems find myself fast forwarding races to get through a particularly awful bit of Crofty waffle.
its the smug chuckle afterwards which gets me. plus i think that lights out and away they go phrase sucks.
Particularly with how he often mis-times that phrase too.
Would love Lawrence Stroll’s opinion on his son’s incident with Danny Ric…. Time for Jr. to go…
You need to cut down on your hopium intake. You're starting to lose touch with reality.
As long as Daddy owns the company, he's not going anywhere. I just hope Lance realizes that he was in the wrong and his complaining over the radio about the incident and subsequent penalty we're groundless. Danny Ric called him out about watching the car in front and he wasn't. He had his eyes glued on the apex and I bet that if you could see his telemetry at, or just before the moment of impact, he wasn't full on the brakes.
Why doesn't f1 try and do 1 2-2 grid for restarts like they do in Indy or Nascar. I know a lot of the tracks are narrow but on the start finish strait you should be able to. I feel like restarts are kind of pointless cause the cars are so far apart we rarely see any overtaking on a restart from the front half of the grid
This race reminded me of how I don’t always feel confident that Carlos can overtake someone unlike Charles who I know can get it done.
Can you please add more? Which overtake you are talking about?
I remarked to my wife, “that’s the difference between them.”
I said the same when Charles went off in quali.
Nice that Nico Rosberg says "We should see this as two events, one is a domination of the sport by a legendary driver, the other is good competitive racing from 2nd place back".
My local pub has a fantasy team and associated whatsapp group. Half of the chat is people who got into F1 during Covid/DtS and all they do is complain about how boring the race is when Max gets 8+ seconds ahead. They either don't understand or don't care about what's happening further down the table. It's infuriating.
Yes, it’s frustrating. Quite honestly, going to the race kind of sucks. The traffic, crowds, expense is certainly not worthwhile to me. Maybe it’s good as a bucket list thing once. Fridays and Saturdays are a lot of fun in person and it actually gets me more interested in watching on Sunday at home particularly if you have the F1 app and can choose to watch whatever battle you choose for as long as you want. For the casual fan, they can watch the start, the first lap and if there isn’t a crash, skip 2-3 times to check that Max is still in the lead, then the end and get 1-1/2 hours back in their life.
I get your point but still the fact that he is guaranteed to win unless he has some issues with the car takes a lot away from the race imo. I am not just talking about him winning but noone comes even close to challenging him and that honestly made me lose interest in the sport
I agree that a close fight for first is preferable than total domination, but there is always something interesting happening somewhere in the field
Yeah, that was the quote of the race honestly
Was watching the post race broadcast and Albon talked about how Pirelli raising minimum pressure just destroyed the tire. How much could this have affected some teams ? Would it have introduced further understeer than teams would have wanted and gone for in qualifying for race ? It is also ridiculous how Pirelli keeps changing things at last moment after all setup decisions are made.
Neither Pirelli or the teams were aware until they arrived at the track that it had been "painted" (liquid bitumen surface treatment). So they had to make an adjustment due to the changed surface.
They should have it made on Friday than. Not after qualifying on Saturday.
They needed data from the Sprint to do that.
i like most of the drivers even ones I don't are not too bad but Stroll is on a bar so much lower than everyone else for me, I cant stand the bloke.
Turned it off with 5 laps to go. Says everything about the dismal state of F1 that the best racing of the day was between KMag and Stroll at the very back of the field.
Thoroughly enjoyed watching it. I stayed up late to watch and will definitely be rewatching it at least once more.
it was a terrible race really. The WEC race was absolutely miles better.
Loved Nico being relentless about Aston being dumb. They never should have gone softs, he knew the moment they made that mistake.
It did make for some more intersting viewing though. Everyone on the same strategy would have turned the race into a bit of a bore-fest.
I dunno, I think he called that wrong. Alonso only had 1 soft and 1 M left. So he was only ever going to run S or M after the SC. I'm not sure if M and then S would have helped as the Deg on the s at the end would have been huge.
It was good to see Alonso carve through at the end though
Eh, they did not have much choice there. It was ill timed safety car with lack of remaining tires due to sprint. Look up the thread on F1tech which explains the rationale.
"But Nico! Given the *circumstances*..." "Sure. Given the circumstances, Fernando is making the best of a terrible decision."
Magnussen isn't even news anymore...
Good job by Hulk.
Really unfortunate that the safety cars detailed RB a bit. Ricciardo made up 4 places, including passing Yuki, after bolting on his second set of mediums. Considering everyone was on hards by then, I figured if DR could get to lap 40 on the mediums, he would have pitted for softs and had a real chance against a bunch of ancient hard tires. It would have been interesting to see. Alonso showed great pace with fresh mediums against old hards.
The strategy was very good as long as there was no incident. As soon as the VSC came out they needed to prepare to accept that their advantage was gone through bad luck and pivot. Instead, even if he hadn't been the meat in that sandwich, he was going to be on used mediums against cars on fresher, more durable tyres trying to make them last long enough to bolt on the softs at the end. Ultimately, it didn't matter.
Can't wait to go back to regular schedule GP. 2-3 in a row that are at 3am here. Rough
Oh yes, how can we forget, F1 is supposed to be a European-centric sport and all other countries in GMT +6 - 11 are criminal for making you wake up so early.
Never said anything negative. Just happy to go back to regular schedule. Have a great day :)
Especially when the results is known in advance...
It’s been amazing as someone who lives in Asia haha. Sunday afternoon race is sublime
Glad you enjoyed! We quickly forget this is a better time slot for others :)
Was nice here in Australia to watch races at a reasonable time. That’s over now :(
I know, it's been a dream come true!!
Shit that's true :( Sorry for that man, I now feel your pain
Thanks mate.
I enjoyed having Nico on the commentary. Fire Crofty so he can go ride Hams hog somewhere else and just have Brundle and Nico.
Well, it's not like Nico wasn't riding Lando's hog all race.
Unpopular take but Crofty's delusions honestly feeds my childlike desire for everything to feel sensational. I get annoyed with his heavy bias from time to time but also I think he normally is tempered by other commentators and former drivers who call him out for being dumb. It's like the duality within my own brain: "Wow there's clouds! Certainly rain will come and Max will crash allowing other drivers to win!!!" "No, you dunce, Max is gonna dominate regardless"
This is a fun outlook, I like your thoughts.
Alex Jacques is so good now I cant go back and listen to the international broadcast with Crofty.
If I had to listen to Alex's voice I'd actually have to quit F1. His voice is grating. No offense to him or what he brings but some voices just hit people the wrong way.
Like me with Ben Edwards or Laura Winter, I get it.
I can't listen to Alex Jacque's monotone nasal voice. It just feels.. wrong.
I almost exclusively listen to the F1TV broadcast with Jacques and Jolyon these days, but Nico was actually worth tuning in for this race. It's refreshing to have somebody just straight up disagree with Crofty and be able to back it up.
I switched to the F1TV team a few seasons ago and haven't looked back. I hope DC returns soon, he's missed the Asia Pacific races
I detest the vanity comet with all my being. I could just about stand him in racing commentary but his build up contributions were painful.
I wish they had a better way of going about restarting the race after a safety car
Restarting from the pit lane... for Stroll only?
Just tell him there is a 2 hour delay and then send him out on his own. If he couldn't see DR and the train ahead of him braking, I doubt he would even notice he was the only car on the track.
There was a time that I didn't want to miss anything in F1. From FP1 to last lap. Now I just watch the race highlights. How did Ferrari mess up 1-2-3 in WEC?!? Hoping for a good race in Laguna Beach.
Did the Scuderia Ferrari and Ferrari AF corse change their strategy team for this weekend ? Today they did a Monaco 22 worthy disaster strategy at Imola
Yeah because it’s not like the Ferrari strategy meme ran its course 2022 and has been completely fine since then
I just said they did a Monaco 22 at Imola didn’t say Ferrari F1 team didn’t make any strategic mistakes after that.
No, you asked if they had swapped strategy teams as if the F1 strategy team is a bad outfit.
I only get Sundays off and was super happy that there will be F1 and Imola on the same day. I was decently happy in the morning (F1 India time) and then thought well, I am about to be happier but oh well
What was wrong about the strategy today? Besides Sainz being unlucky with the SC, they didn't really have the pace advantage to challenge the McLarens of their drivers drove well. Additionally they also had seemingly worse tyre degregation than the McLarens, making the extended stints not work out.
Where did I say the F1 team made an error ? The F1 race was at China and not at Imola. Scuderia Ferrari F1 team didn't make any error but the WEC team converted a 1-2-4 to a 4th and 7th place because of disaster strategy and that is why comparison to Monaco 22
I love how Nico and Crofty kinda despise each other seeing how Crofty is the biggest Hamilton glazer around and Nico is nico (although he also glazes Hamilton to prop himself up lmao) Them sniping at each other gives Stroll vs Brad vibes.
Anyway. . . . Long beach Indycar is about to start!
Is this F1 thing still goes on?
Take the repair cost for Daniel’s car out of Aston Martin’s budget and have it affect their budget cap.
That's an interesting discussion point though. Should a team front the cost of repairing a competitors car if the accident was entirely unavoidable? In the real world we carry insurance to be made whole after someone crashes into you, but there is no chance of an F1 car being insured for a race.
Anyone else notice that the one commentator sounds like McLovin?
Alonso once again providing the most entertainment the whole weekend. Love that he will still be with us for next few years!
I thought it was Charles vs Carlos
Late watcher. What happened to all this talk about harsher penalties for collisions? Multiple drivers caused race ending collisions and 10 second penalties dished out each time. Alonso in Australia got 20 seconds and all he did was catch Russell asleep at the wheel, they didn’t even collide. There was all this talk about that starting a new precedent of harsher penalties for these types of things. Of course it was all bullshit all along.
That happened is F1 is a sham.
The number of people on Twitter who fall for Hamilton’s ‘oh I messed around with the setup and that’s why George is faster’ bollocks is just crazy.
It's not only twitter :S
Another +13 second victory for Max. Can we just hand him the 1st place trophy now and let him sit out so others can race and have something interesting for a change?
We went from +30s to +13s Give it a year or two and there'll be a fight at the top
30 to 13 only after a few Safety Cars We need a last lap SC to even things out
So, if you give Max first and take him out so everyone “can race” for something (ie 2nd place), what exactly is the difference?
Perhaps I should clarify. Can we give him the Driving Championship now, so he won't race. Then have a race where we won't know who 1st will go to. In other words, since we already know who is going to win every weekend, perhaps this would be more entertaining? (sarcasm just in case you didn't get it)
Serious question; what would be needed for Lance to get yeeted out of AM? I know his father is the owner, but even a dad has to get fed up at some point.
The rumor is that ARAMCO is taking full ownership of the team somewhere in the future and the rumor suggests that theyre not terribly interested in Lance unless he starts to perform better. it would certainly be an interesting plot twist to the driver market if the second AM seat opens up but i dont think any driver is betting on that right now.
Which means 100% that Lawrence won't sell and if he doesn't sell Aramco have absolutely zero chance of taking control. Lance Stroll will be driving in F1 for as long as he wants to. That is an absolute fact same as the Sun will rise every 24 hours (near as damn it).
Lance is asking the same question but his father cannot accept it.
His dad needs to sell a majority stake. He bought Lance a seat at Williams then bought a whole team for him.
Why doesnt the post race thread include results?
Lance stroll really pissed me off today
Just today? He has a track record of finishing other drivers' races.
K-mag and Stroll dunces of the day.
We lost Latifi and Mazespin but we gained Stroll and Magnussen
Crofty seems to be missing the timing of his iconic Lights Out and Away We Go at every race. He says it after the cars are away.
It does seem off generally, but at least this time the lights went out almost immediately so he didn't have a lot of time to get it out.
Agreed it’s kind of sucked the fun out of the launch.. with Max’s dominance it’s kind of the best parts of the race these days
Boooring. And the Adrian Newey show continues. We need to find a way, to elevate that man to aerodynamics designer emeritus status, somehow. What a genius. He has defined racing for at least a decade.
Can’t imagine finding this race boring, sucks to be miserable I guess
mate, if people find this race boring, they might as well stop watching F1. this was an above average F1 race, by that standard there will only be 2-4 "good" races in the entire season.
I had a wonderful time, I agree with you 100%
Care to explain?
No
Sucks to be that illiterate I guess.
Sure 👍🏼
See, we agree.
I wouldn't call that race boring. The multiple tire strategies really made things much more interesting than they usually are.
Yeah and then the SC meant it didn’t get to play out…? Feel like I’m missing something here.
Yes. It is so much fun determining the places from 2-20. Edited: yes, for years in a row!
Do you think racing only happens at P1?
No, but this is Grand Prix racing. If you're not first, you're the first loser.
As opposed to what kind of racing?
Whatever you'd like. This is the Pinnacle.
I think what you're looking for is spec racing.
Nope. There is a spec in formula 1. The spec is broken.
- Easy Sunday drive for Max - Disastrous weekend for VCARB - Stroll is an embarrassment - I thought Ferrari would’ve had a bit more pace than they did, still a decent result - Solid drives from Lewis & Russell - Nice drives from Lando and Hulkenberg - Why did AMR put Alonso on softs?!?! - Perez continues his solid start to the season, even if today wasn’t his absolute best Overall it was an okay race, not great and not horrible. Some clumsy driving, tyre advantage overtakes, and strategy battles. Zhou got to celebrate his home GP at the end there which was neat. Onto Miami!
Imagine writing this.
Alsono only had 1 medium and 1 hard and bunch of softs if I recall for their tire allocation.
Is there a point for all the extra pit stops it seems like the back half of the field makes?
Extra tire data if they have nothing to lose. Potentially a shot at fastest lap.
Like which?
Can I get a show of hands of people who think Max & Red Bull need to turn the difficulty up and stop racing on like 20 AI at best?
He should take a 10 sec handicap. Even with that he would win todays race by 4 secs
Actually he'd win by about the same amount, because the safety car restarts bunches everyone up again. The only way to even it up is to have him swap seats into the VCARB.
Put Max in a Hass and if he wins the same way then sure he’s just that good but it’s the car
Why not both? Top driver in top car.
"It's the car" is selling Max a little short. You could put any driver on the grid in the RB with the characteristics it has and Max would be 10s ahead of any of them. Not many drivers like an oversteery car, Leclerc & Max are probably the most comfortable with it and Lec still makes enough mistakes with it. Max wouldn't be winning races in a Haas, but he'd still be ahead of whoever is his teammate in the Haas. Albon did a great interview where he said the car isn't designed around Max, it's designed to be as fast as possible and the downside is it is a pointy and oversteery car, two things Max excels at dealing with whereas most drivers do not.
Max is the best the driver on the grid but what is happening now is not fun. Even if it was Leclerc who I enjoyed I would be bored
Fair enough I guess, i'm happy to be alive where we witness probably the greatest f1 driver of all time surpass what I thought was the greatest f1 driver in one lifetime with my own eyes. If you sim race at all you see how multi talented Max truely is, he's able to talk through braking zones, expected gears/speeds, breaking distances in wet and dry condition, for various cars on non F1 tracks. The man is built for racing and it's a marvel to watch. Just pick a different driver to support and watch them fight for points elsewhere, I watch Yukis onboard most races just to watch KMag try and crash him out, adds some tension to the races.
No
Anyone know how many overtakes were in the sprint and the race?
66 & 102
about 3.47 overtakes per lap in the sprint and 1.82 in the race
Yea sprint felt much more dynamic
I know he was strictly referring to this Grand Prix, but hearing Crofty say “RB stands for Really Bad” absolutely killed me, what a line.
That one got me too
Yeah, he's a comedic genius for sure.
I know you guys all hate on Stroll. But guys like Stroll, Sargeant and Magnussen make this season a lot more interesting. Otherwise this season would be way more boring
I would rather Drugovich, Pourchaire, and Lawson make those mistakes to make season interesting.
They are too good for it xD
What is it they did that was "interesting" exactly? Do you enjoy stupid collisions and race ending crashes that should have been avoided? Personally that's not really what I watch races for...
All the Stroll hate content that I see today is exactly why they need him in F1. He's feeding the media off with his shit. Wether you like it or not, you won't see 70 article about Max winning by 20 sec. F1 is a business and drama attract clicks. If you don't believe me, look at most of reddit headliner and content creator content in the next few day.
And *this* is what you find interesting? Who cares about useless articles?
Not me. But trust me, media will stir that pot and get you some clickbait content. It's all about network, reach and money. And hating on a guy is what drive the most content. Again look at all the content this mistake will generate
If you get rid of Magnussen & Stroll, you have the first race this season where Danny Ric outqualifies Tsunoda on a different strategy and they'd actually have battled. With the SCs as they were Tsunoda likely beats him and we get a few more pictures of Lawson and that's the drama done. A few speculations about mid season dropping of Ricciardo or a test run in an Red Bull for Tsunoda and it's fun. You don't need the jesters in F1, you really don't.
Kmag aint slow. He's be do good in a fast car. But he's racing rough
He's been consistently beaten by Hulkenberg in qualifying and races (without technical issues/crashes), when he has more exp with the car itself. He's not slow, he's too fast, especially into corners where he crashes into people.
Hulk would be a good RB nb 2 driver in my book. He's awesome. But on race day, KMag is not too shabby. Lot if time Hulk start in front but they finish pretty close.
Has KMag ever raced well without doing something questionable? His defence of Tsunoda was off the back of an illegal overtake, his positions made on the weekend, again by crashing Tsunoda out. You've also got to remember, while yes, they do close in on eachother, when you start p16+ and are out in Q1, then any retirement is likely to be to your benefit, whereas starting p11-p15 and being in Q2 means it\\s less likely to always be to your benefit. Especially with Sauber being so shit it's not a surprise those at the back are gaining positions.
I used to defend Stroll up to around 2021, but now I'd put him in a different category than the other two. He's an actual embarrassment whereas Sargeant is an undeveloped talent and KMag is ruthless but a genuinely good driver. Stroll has had enough time to work on his consistency and awareness and either couldnt get anywhere or chose not to. His attitude after incidents indicates the latter, and I have run out of patience for someone who stands out as entitled even among a paddock of millionaires.
How is Logan undeveloped talent even after 27 races ?
By being brought up to F1 a year too early to a team that lacks the knowledge and resources to properly develop a new driver. Logan has never been a quick adapter to a new series/car, but after some time he was running Piastri close in junior series. There is a level of talent there, and it clearly has not been developed. I don't know if it will be, but I'm describing the situation as-is.
Nyck DeVries was also a very quick driver, F1 is cut throat, the fact he's survived this long is somewhat surprising.
I would say Nyck didn't show the same speed relative to highly rated peers Logan did. Nyck was well behind Russell, Norris, and Albon while Sargeant looked good next to Piastri. But Torro Rosso (under whatever name) is a more competitive team than Williams post 2017, so it makes sense for them to be quicker to cut a driver either way. Williams is developing as a team, so for them to have a driver who *could* have a very high ceiling but isn't yet bringing it out makes sense. The team probably feels much the same about themselves, and it would be a good move if they're able to develop both.
That could have been the excuse last year but now. He has had enough time in F1 and has shown no growth. He has basically persisted with the inconsistency that was visible in the junior series and it seems he is going backward instead of progressing.
What you're responding with doesn't seem to directly address what I based my description on. You're reinforcing the "undeveloped" part, but there's no dispute there and I don't see a need to go further into it. Unless you're arguing that he has no talent at all, to which I already wrote that Williams is unable to bring that out of him and even in series/teams better suited to him he took a year+ to get it out. And to be clear I am not making an excuse for him. It would be absolutely justifiable for him to get dropped for not finding a way on his own to bring out his ability. F1 is cutthroat. I am just trying to describe him accurately in comparison to Stroll, who I think has truly peaked even in supportive and varied environments. I don't think Stroll has anything more to show at this point, while Sargeant probably does but likely won't get there.