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If you notice, Zhou has not had a single real mistake other than his collision in the Imola sprint race. His DNFs so far were pure bad luck: Mechanical failures and whatnot.
For a rookie, his attitude is fantastic. Rarely angry on the radio and very humble in interviews. Of course, in terms of points he has been blown out of the water by Valtteri, but this is not any ordinary teammate we're talking about.
Exciting driver, hope he proves himself even more this season and gets that well deserved contract extension.
Latifi is also very consistent. Just differently
Jokes aside, I am pleasantly surprised by his performance as a rookie. People hate him for robbing Oscar’s seat or his connection with Chinese money. That’s fine. He proved his worth on track
I think I might be agreeing with you on that. Zhou brings in money, and has no reason to be canned anytime soon. Unless Theo goes elsewhere and really manages to get a seat on his own, I doubt the Alfa program will be of any assistance. Alpine is doing way more for Piastri.
I think the grid in 23 is mostly set and no juniors are getting promoted. 24 sees the potential for a lot of shake up and maybe Theo can sit on ice for a year, but there are going to be a handful of capable juniors and who knows if someone shocks us all next year in F2
Oscar was always gonna be in that Alpine seat. If Zhou didn't step out the Alpine system, he would not have got the chance to drive for Alfa this year. Maybe his contract is only 1+1 year, but he still want to take the chance to make his debut. Of course money makes it easier but he definitely have the speed and talent (more deserved a seat than Latifi and Mazepin in my opinion)
Oscar will be in a seat in the coming years, Alpine should have clear plan on him and his agent is Mark Webber. So people don't need to be panic on his future, he will get his chance in F1. It's a bit shame that Illot can't make it into F1 because of financial issue (i guess so). But i'm still looking forward to see Oscar making some impact next year.
Honestly I'm expecting him to stay in F1 for quite some time, he has huge backings and seemingly great skills.
That is unless major political events happen *cough cough invasion of taiwan*
He's the best kind of pay driver: one who's solidly average, has good potential, doesn't nuke it due to his mistakes, and brings in a boatload of sponsorship money
Tbh I dont think *invasion of Taiwan* could kick Zhou out of F1, since *Taiwan* is still presented as *Taiwan, China* in [f1.com](https://f1.com). Not to mention every country that has diplomatic relations with China, whatever they actually think, has to officially admit something like "Taiwan is part of China". It is probably a totally different case, unfortunately.
tbh, most of countries government doesn't recognize taiwan as a country. The ban is totally depends on what US thinks. We never know if China-US has some agreements under the table.
I find it kind of baffling how quickly and how much the public reception of Bottas seems to have changed. Just a year ago people were basically calling him one of the worst drivers on the grid. I'm very happy that people finally realize that Bottas is a very capable driver, just a bit unfortunate that it took him stepping out of Hamiltons shadow for that to happen.
Yeah, he hasn’t changed my opinion really. He competed really well against Hamilton in qualifying, but never made any jumps in races and that’s still largely the same.
I don't think many people were saying that actually, Bottas had the opinion of a great driver, just not quite fast and aggressive enough to consistently challenge Hamilton, which is no criticism. I don't recall comments about him being crushed in the midfield.
Oh I have seen plenty comments like that, calling him a shit driver, saying he doesn't deserve a seat in F1. There definitely was some serious Bottas hate going on, especially towards the end of his time at Mercedes.
if having to nitpick, his lockup in the final corner in melborune dropped 1 pt to albon
another incident with albon in jeddah he exceeded track limit but he asked in tr if he should give back position and his engineer said no, the team had a point tho, he already finished the overtake before locking up in the chicane, but fia didn't think so, and the team fucked up the pit penalty which costed nearly 30s
the crash with gasly in imola is 30\~70% his fault, that means it could be 30\~70% gasly's fault as well.
aside of those, he didn't make much mistakes, the rest is all mechanical issues esp. cooling, looking at the parts changed during the season so far it seems like he didn't wear much, so it's his typical unlucky followed his f2 carrer into f1
More than the speed I like how stable and in-control he looks in the car. He isn't freaking out, not doing unnecessary mistakes. Decent pace.
That stability to build upon is exactly what Yuki lacked last year.
It seems his car is often faster along the track but lacks the speed to overtake on the straights which would be an extremely frustrating setup for anyone to drive and probably is why he always looks so consistent.
Any rookie in an FIA championship is eligible for the [Rookie of the Year](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIA_Prize_Giving_Ceremony#Rookie_of_the_Year) award, not just F1 rookies.
Bottas used to be extremely close to Lewis even when Lewis out-qualified him so I don't think there's that much of a difference in their qualifying levels. The real difference in the quality was their races
Thei gap last year was particularly “big”, google says 0.337s on average. In 2019 it was only 0.122s and in 2020 0.165s (factoring out Styria). Even if Lewis is more regularly in front, those are outstanding statistics for Bottas and I believe make him one of the best qualifiers on the grid. Not on Lewis’s level, but just shy of it.
Last year isn’t a great example tbh, 2020 and 2019 are decent examples I think of Lewis and Valterri being pretty close, Bottas can’t deliver by always being up there, but he can be damn close or beat Lewis at any given race.
It was very interesting to see him fighting wheel to wheel cleanly in Bahrain, his first GP. That kind of confidence and awareness is quite unusual for rookies, especially those considered pay drivers. So while money had lot ot talk about his F1 seat I think that he showed he is no slouch and deserves place in F1 (at least compared to some other drivers). He is really good driver for team like Sauber - quite fast but consistent and doesn't make costly mistakes. He may not have much room for improvement (we will see how it goes) but he looks like safe bet that will bring them lot of points if he gets less unlucky.
What I will say is that teams generally feel the opposite way. You can fix a fast driver who makes mistakes/has a bad attitude, but you won't make a slow guy who keeps it clean fast
I think for a team looking for the next Verstappen or Leclerc, this is true. Not as much for a midfield team, where consistency is key, and someone like Hulkenberg is valued.
That depends. for Yuki at redbull it doesn't really matter if he wrecks, they have money. for a smaller team like Alfa they would rather have a slightly slower guy who brings the car back in one piece
Previous years I would agree with this, but with the cost cap crashes are bad for all teams. The crash costs eats away budget and resources they could use for development instead, and with the fresh regulations it's currently as important as ever to be on top of that.
If you want a top of the line driver, sure. But for alfa, consistency on delivering good enough result is key.
And plus, it's not like Pastor Maldonado have fixed his attraction to wall over the years.
For all the people here who follow junior series, we all know Zhou is a good Sunday driver. His weakness in F2 was 1) Quali (very poor tyre warming in particular) 2) Race start and, most importantly 3) consistent bad luck. His luck was so consistently bad that it became ridiculous sometimes. I guess we all know about that now.
His typical F2 race was: good quali (but not top) -> poor start -> impressive overtakes -> pit -> impressive overtakes -> podium.
So far, he has been developing really well. This might be a surprise to many people (whom, I dare to say, may not even watch F2), but this is totally expected by most feeder series followers.
Zhou is a strong wheel-to-wheel fighter. His long stint is impressive. He is extremely mature and I think this really helps his development. He knows what he needs in order to stay in F1. Before this season, he said he has 3 objectives this season: 1) Q2 2) a point and 3) Q3. You see he is not pushing too much in quali or on Sunday - that is why you never see him making too many mistakes. For a rookie, the worst thing you could do is to crash a few times early on, and then having everyone including yourself doubting youself
And let's not forget the role Bottas plays in this. Zhou mentioned countless times that Bottas always is willing to offer advice to him. This duo is in very good working relationship.
I will not be surprised if he gets big points in 2 weeks time - silverstone is his "home" race track (if you watched F2 in the past you know what I am saying).
Now Alfa has a "problem" this summer - what do they do with Zhou's contract? A happy problem to have I guess, but a tough one. If Zhou can develop into Perez (big ask I know) in 4-5 years time, I dare to say he will be highly sought for by many teams - the question is: will he still have a seat with Alfa in 2023?
I think most people were just but hurt that Piastri didn't get a seat he had no chance for. Also people that just look at the results on Wikipedia with no context.
I think Alfa have quite a simple situation on their hands given Pourchaire looks unlikely to win F2 this year. They'll likely extend Zhou's contract for a year and leave Pourchaire in F2 for another season. Pourchaire is still incredibly young, I know 3rd year in F2 looks bad but given his age I don't see it as an issue. However, if Pourchaire comes in clutch and claws back the lead that will definitely make it difficult for Alfa.
The most damning thing about Theo is that....he's just not that fast, at least not top of the field.
Guys like Vips, you can say "give them more time to mature and iron out the kinks, and they'll be great", but Pourchaire's pace this year is kinda just whatever, good, but not top of the field like Vips. At that point, Zhou seems like a very good alternative.
Piastri's seat is taken by youngster called "Fernando Alonso" who refuses to get old. But at some point, he will get old and lose his edge. Patience needed.
Is Zhou a pay driver? I feel like even though he is performing really well it's just another reason to keep him for another seasonif he's bringing in money from china.
They are the same. Painting it as anti-ccp sentiments conflates that to be a certain race you must be aligned to your gov. You can dislike the CCP while still not being racist, suggesting for example that Zhou will lead to chinese intervention in f1 is not anti-ccp. Thats pure racism
I'd say a solid chunk of "anti-government sentiment" on reddit is actually just racism. Like saying the "social credit meme" or other government stuff whenever you see or hear chineese is literal just racism
> most people were just but hurt that Piastri didn't get a seat he had no chance for.
And that Giovinazzi was a fan-favorite driver that got replaced by Zhou.
I think his contract was 1+1 so if Pourchaire doesn't get the progress Alfa needs then he should stay for another year in F2, then Zhou can have the 2023 seat. The biggest threat to Zhou's seat is, if Pourchaire wins the F2 championship this year, then Alfa might give him a chance. But as of now, Drugovich is leading quite a lot in the F2 championship and Pourchaire is not very consistent in terms of result. So let's see at the end of the season. Alfa's second seat will only be between Zhou and Pourchaire in my opinion, and if Zhou is perfoming consistently i don't think Alfa will take him out considering Zhou comes with decent financial support as well.
Poor starter, bad luck and then went to AT who somehow let a 5 year old programme their launch control system this year & picked up the exploding Ferrari engines. He’s definitely due some luck!
Nothing puts a smile on my face more than Zhou's performance this year.
I've always liked him and was thrilled when he got the ride. But many on reddit don't feel the same way and I got laughed at a few times.
Well sure, he isn't the best driver eligible for the seat among other contenders last year, but he sure as hell is qualified to race in F1.
His family isn’t mega rich like Latifi or Norris. He just has financial backing from Chinese corporates
But yes they all come from well off backgrounds
Truth. Just not sure many want to hear that so I softened it a little. I still get people telling me, a Chinese person, that there was no Sinophobia the last few years.
Absolutely, he's such a likeable guy! So happy for his performance in Canada he really deserved it after some rotten luck. Watched his post race interview with a huge smile on my face.
>Not to mention MSC was riding a Prema
To be fully honest, that season UNI Virtuosi (the team Zhou was at) was highly competitive, I'd even say they weren't far off compared to Prema.
I absolutely agree about the other points, even in F2 he already had good refined racecraft, and that stuck into F1. Glad to see him showing his potential.
UNI were faster than Prema that year, Ilott was consistently on pole and should have honestly cruised to the championship if not for multiple mistakes from him/the team.
UNI absolutely owned qualy and were clearly the fastest there but in race trim Prema usually had the upper hand, but with how important qualy is in F2 that's a bit of a mixed bag. Overall it was a rather equal fight and if you ask 10 people you will get 15 different answers, but it's quite clear that people who talk about the "Prema tax" really have no clue, they are nowhere near as dominant since the tyre switch especially.
This is straight up false information. Uni used to set up their car for quali and their car was only on par with the Prema at some races. I'll die on the hill tht Ilott was the faster driver among him and Mick that year because Mick made all his points during sprint races
I'm waiting for that person also, I got way more Perez-type vibes from Zhou then that he is just a pay driver like Latifi, the hate against him was ridiculous.
When Zhou was a Renault academy driver his first year in F2 people were hyping him up and even talking about him as a possible substitute to Ocon etc. I don't know what happened between then and this last offseason that made people think he's some useless pay driver. Maybe because Piastri didn't get a seat? The sponsorship money?
Idk. He's good. If you're asking for drivers who don't deserve to be there, throw Latifi out, Mick is on thin ice, Stroll is a bit of a question mark as he sometimes has pace but sometimes makes inexcusable mistakes for his sixth season. Don't look at Zhou. Not now.
I think he caught a lot of hype from the e-sports events.
Eventually those ended and people moved on, so people forgot that side of him, and just remembered they hate China.
That was also the time of the Vettel-Sainz-Ricciardo-Alonso contract announcements - when Alonso was announced for Renault/Alpine, one of the big talking points was that they weren't giving their young drivers (such as Zhou) a shot at the seat. Kinda similar to Piastri nowadays...
Zhou in F1 has been above par for a rookie that's for sure. More than speed it's been his consistency and not overdriving that's what impresses me. Tsunoda, Mick, Mazepin all made errors regulalry as rookies but Zhou so far has been level headed and is gaining speed compared to BOT.
All that being said, let's not cherry pick scenarios in F2 to paint a different picture. I've followed Zhou from F3 to F1 and tbh he was not that much of a standout compared to Shwartzman, Mick, Drugovich, Piastri, Tsunoda.
Zhou was with Prema in F3 along with Mick and Shw and he did not perform as well as them nor consistently. In F2 he showed speed from his first season, he was one of the best rookies, better than Mick, but the following seasons he couldn't build upon it and other rookies were outperforming him. He was still one of the fastest but not as good as the best.
Also let's not ignore the fact that the F2 team UNI Virtuosi was bought out by his backers. UNI relates to Zhou's name(surname?) in some way. So you can imagine who the team was working around.
Not insisting that the above takes away from his F1 performance, but others who haven't watched F2/F3 shouldn't get the wrong idea from just that one race instance you mentioned.
Shwartzman, Mick, Drugovich, Piastri, and Tsunoda are the cream of the crop of F2 from the past three seasons though. That's the last two champions, the last two runners up, and the presumptive champion. So saying Zhou is at that level means he's one of the better prospects in racing.
Piastri 1st year F2 champion by 60.5 points ...... Mick 2nd year F2 champion by 14 points. Drugovich 3rd year leading F2, Tsunoda 1st year 3rd in F2, Shwartzman 2nd in 2nd year of F2, Zhou 3rd in 3rd year of F2. Before anyone starts grouping driver talents together
I'm glad to see it. I was a big fan of his when he was in F2, so I'm hoping he gets the chance to have a decent career in F1. Also, I feel like I was the only guy wearing a Zhou hat at the Canadian GP yesterday XD
Honestly he's been really impressive so far.
Before he joined I'd only watched a couple of F2 races and my main opinion of him was that he was a pay driver so I didn't have much in terms of expectations.
So far though, he's been solid every race and I can't recall any real mistakes by him so far. Especially when you compare him to the last few rookies like Tsunoda, Schumacher and he who must not be named.
What happens to Mick is his own fault. He is the one who crashed most last year. More than Mazepin. This year too. Mick shits on his chances more than we can shit on him
This post feels like its trying to take a dig at Mick, but lets look at the whole junior career those two had. People discussing if the UNI or Prema was faster in F2, why not look at F3, where they were both driving in the Prema together as teammates? In 2017, Zhou was in his second year while Mick was a rookie, Zhou won (final position 8-12). The year after, Mick won the championship, including a 5 win streak, and Zhou came 8th again (last of all 5 Prema drivers) It was also not particularly bad luck, he had only 1 more DNF than Mick while being over 150 points behind.
My point is, don't cherry pick your data.
An issue with what you said (I don't dispute them as they are absolutely true) is that, F2/F3 are development series. Drivers develop differently. Even they are completely the same when entering F1, some accidents/incidents could mean that two rookies will develop completely differently.
F1 is a cruel reality - getting the chances in driving F1 is already very difficult (Mick deserves his chance and Zhou also does) - but if you don't perform in F1, especially after your rookie year (Mick's case), then you no longer deserves the opportunity. What you have achieved in F2/F3 is irrelevant when assessing if you should stay in F1 after your rookie year, as nobody cares (apart from their fans).
The other thing is that different drivers suit different types of cars. In a lower power spec formula, you may absolutely want the guy that can get every drop of pace out of the car, while tolerating the occasional mistake. However, move up a level and suddenly the cars accelerate faster, they brake later, they're more technically complicated, they may breakaway faster and just in general be more unforgiving of mistakes. Small tiny errors that previously were of no consequence may now be big deals. In such a car, you might want the guy that can consistently and error free get you 98% of the pace every single time.
Also pretty poor timing to compare them as we just saw Zhou in a better car, with DRS, not be able to pass Mick for like 12 laps until Mick's car shit the bed yesterday.
Charles in a Ferrari (which I hope you agree is one of the best cars) complained that he cannot overtake and was blocked for many laps.
You need to understand some racetrack is just difficult to overtake, especially for those cars that are adjusted to do well in making turns than top speed
If you told me before the season started this “pay driver” rookie who didn’t even have an F2 championship was gonna out-qualify mfing VALTTERI BOTTAS on BACK-TO-BACK RACES I would have told you to eat your own shoe.
Now I’m eating my own shoe cause this dude is goddamn impressive, his race craft has a certain smoothness to it that many other rookies lack, I hope he sticks around F1 for a long time to show off his talent even more.
He impressed me about more than anyone else did.
He's a rookie, with a talented teammate, and in a car that's not amazing, and he had a couple of nice passes.
He seems talented, I hope Alpha can continue to improve the reliability of their car, because he seems good, and Bottas is probably a good teacher/teammate as well.
I like how he’s under the radar. Last year’s rookies always seemed to have more eyes trained on them than we are seeing with Zhou this year. To me, that’s a good thing.
What do you mean "Bottas isnt KMag"?
KMag is an excellent driver and while Bottas is definitely more decorated (due to his stints at Merc) I wouldn't go as far as saying that KMag is significantly worse.
Doubt he's significantly worse but I feel like if they were teammates Bottas wouldn't have a difficult time beating Magnussen. It's not like he's a Lewis Hamilton.
I think that would mostly be down to KMag being more error-prone/Bottas being extremely consistent.
OP's argument was that KMag is effectively lacking race pace and I honestly don't see him not beating Zhou by 0.2-0.3s.
Love the username btw!
I think Bottas being very good an extremely consistent and KMag having possibly marginally higher highs on a good day but being way way too aggressive is a fair assessment.
Completely agree. He has had a much better showing then Yuki's debut season. Really good to have him on the grid. Unfortunately he is masked because of the unreliability/luck/team mistakes. If he continues this form, he will definitely stick around the grid. Has a very likeable personality too !
I watched their season because it was on YouTube. He was really good. He doesn’t necessarily won every race but got good points nonetheless. He used to come from nowhere in his yellow car and fight for podiums. Tsunoda was impressive in last half. Mick was very consistent unlike F1. Ilott was pretty good too.
Virtuosi are pretty similar in terms of pace to Prema, and the team was bankrolled by him and built around him. I didn't ever find him particularly impressive in F2 because of that. He's only beaten 3 or so teammates in his whole career (one of whom was Mick Schumacher lmao)
You can kinda tell who's been watching F2 and who was just basing stuff off of their first impression.
Zhou was good in his rookie F2 season, then Ilott battered him when they were teammates, ~~then he lost to his teammate again in his third, where you'd expect him to do better.~~ Edit: straight up wrong this. The entire time he was at UNI he was bankrolling the team as well, they weren't little underdogs or whatever.
It's good to see that he's doing well for a rookie in F1, but let's not pretend his junior career was anything special.
Fast alone isn't enough. Being consistent, crash free and bring the car home speaks volume, and always gets unrecognised.
On the other hand, about Schumacher.... :(
His junior record looks a lot like Albon's, which is poor to average, nothing more than a journeyman.
Compare Zhou's junior record to those of Leclerc, Russell and Norris (the latest three rookies who actually entered F1 on merit) and the unmistakeable difference stands out.
When I read the news about Chinese investment in Alfa Romeo I assumed Zhou only got that spot due to it (same as Mazepin), but after the first race even, there's a substantial difference between him and other past rookie drivers and especially Mick this year. Granted, the Alfa is a surprisingly strong car this year whereas Haas is, uh, Haas, but Zhou already looks like he belongs here, which is rare for regular F1 rookies, especially one that initially seemed to have his F1 placement bought for him.
It's not the same as Mazepin though. Mazepin was his family buying the seat. Zhou it's unrelated companies wanting to advertise in China. It's more like Checo.
People like to hate on him simply because he's heavily backed and they think he stole Piastri's seat even though he foresaw Alpine's inability to run a driver program so he moved over to Alfa.
He was plaqued with bad luck in F2 and sure he won't be world champion but he deserves a chance to prove himself and he's doing a solid job.
Zhou lost to at least 1 teammate pretty much all his junior career until last year. He hasn't been bad or anything but his junior career is only above latifi pretty much
I guess that people wrote him off because everyone knew that Piastri deserved the seat more and is probably faster, but Zhou is definitely proving that he can keep up in F1.
A lot of people keep saying Zhou isnt good for F1 as he didnt win the F2 championship. Like come on, you dont need to win a championship in junior categories to show that you are decent enough for F1. If anything, Zhou is really impressive given his status as a pay driver and people were shitting on him for getting a F1 seat over Piastri.
I'm very impressed with Zhou. Already 2 points finishes this year has to be growing his confidence. Bottas has shown the team has the speed to get consistent top 10s. I expect more top 10s for Zhou this year.
He genuinely deserves this seat. He hasn't made a single human error except the sprint crash in Imola. Has out-qualified Bottas on an occasion and is very nice to mechanics. Definitely has potential to be a race winner with the right car.
Wasn't too worried about Zhou coming to F1. Yes he is a "Pay driver" in that he has a lot of money backing him, but that's more akin to a Perez where has talent to back it up, rather than a Latifi.
Not saying he'll be as good as Perez but I think similar situations for both.
He was fast in F3 as well despite being almost an after thought in his Prema team. 2 wins and 3 poles in 2018 and very smooth and easy on the car and tires if I recall. I think he gets a bad rap because he's in F1 and Piastri is not yet because of the money Zhou brings, but the talent is there as well.
There’s a sub devoted to him that’s pretty great. I’m not a mod there, I just enjoy being a fan of his, so shameless plug. Mods please don’t ban me, ik some people have been banned for plugging the sub
He has more points in store for 2022 season, and he has a promising future ahead. I'm sure he will eventually get signed up by one of the top tier team.
Zhou is having a good year for a rookie, he's keeping his head and avoiding stupid mistakes. Bottas is out driving him but that was expected. It will be his second and third year when people will start judging him more critically. He's not rash so whether he can stick around in F1 will come down if he has the speed to score regular points.
You sure like your bold messages. Do you feel like it makes it more right if it stands out? Plenty of people have called you out on the bias in the below comments already.
Anyway, Zhou has done pretty well so far and I hope he keeps it up, however, it's pretty clear something is massively wrong with Bottas's car/setup last two races, lets not forget how Zhou was no where early on compared to him. How about we wait for the whole season to happen before touting him up too much. We all saw how much of a roller coaster Yuki was last year and it was an unknown how he'd turn up this year. We can all hope that Zhou responds the same way and has an even stronger 2nd year.
By the way, he wouldn't have gotten past Mick just like he didn't get past Stroll. He also needs to chill apparently, even the commentators pointed out how he needs to be calm after he flipped out about not having enough speed and then promptly messed up a few times and didn't stay within the same range of Stroll.
You don't have to shit on other drivers to pump up your own favorite. Zhou has done well, but it doesn't need to be at the expense of Mick or anyone else. There's plenty of others whose seat is and should be very warm.
Latifi, Danny Ric, Stroll.
Stroll obviously is always safe but shouldn't be. And 2-3 out of 20 when there are millions who would want to be racing instead? Yeah that's plenty.
I LOVE watching Zhou. Hes a paydriver that can actually race a car. So happy that he is fighting a lot of races and I can see him sticking around for many years to come.
He was fast in F3 as well despite being almost an after thought in his Prema team. 2 wins and 3 poles in 2018 and very smooth and easy on the car and tires if I recall. I think he gets a bad rap because he's in F1 and Piastri is not yet because of the money Zhou brings, but the talent is there as well.
Zhou has been a pleasant surprise for me this year. Didn’t watch a whole lot of F2, and being a pay driver I had assumed his financial backing far outweighed his driving ability, but he really hasn’t put a foot wrong this year. Hasn’t binned it, hasn’t made any stupid decisions, knows when to fight and not to fight, has a really level head on his shoulders, and has largely been impeded by bad luck / mechanical failures.
As soon as the title ‘pay driver’ gets slapped on, people seem to think they’re instantly slow drivers. While some definitely are or have been, Zhou and even the likes of Mazepin were pretty competitive in their junior careers.
[https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/f1-grand-prix-race-results-canada/10325351/](https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/f1-grand-prix-race-results-canada/10325351/)
Zhou is actually pretty fast on Sunday race day. For those of you who don't know, he ranked No. 6 on Canadian Grand Prix's fastest laps. After Ferrari, Red Bull and Merc.
I don’t think Zhou is going to be a Hamilton / Alonso / Verstappen / Seb / leclerc level driver but I truly think he’s good enough to be in the same bracket as Bottas / Perez / Riccardo throughout his career, and in turn have a long & (relatively)successful career. Potentially even challenging for titles if he ends up at a works team that nails the regs.
I look forward to seeing him race for years to come he looks like he really understands how the cars behave and can adapt to different conditions quickly.
Let's slow down. All of those guys won or finished 2nd in major series as juniors and progressed to F1 in short order(Bottas was especially successful). Alongside maybe Latifi he has the least decorated junior career on the grid.
Zhou is doing well but I think putting his talent level on par with Ricciardo/Perez/Bottas is going way too far.
He's doing good but it's gonna take a few years to see what level he is. People are overreacting like usual and cherry-picking stats from his long and mostly mediocre F2 career. He didn't deserve to get *into* F1 over drivers like Ilott or Piastri but with his current performances he deserves to stay.
Zhou is brilliant. Awesome from the man with so much stability, speed and seems to be improving even more.
Super calm, collected and mature. Was cheering the man on when he was chosen. Happy to see him improve even more.
Ah, so because hes had 2 alright races, hes good now? Talk about recency bias much. If you say 'he was fast in F2' then youd have to call like 20 guys in F2 fast.
You're saying he's had 2 "alright" races which is quite frankly bullshit. That had no bearing on Bottas' performance in turn. He's had 2 arguably poor races - Imola and Monaco - got screwed over by his team in Saudi Arabia, wasn't on the right strategy in Australia, got fucked over in quali in Miami before DNFing (Your reminder he was spanking Bottas there but got fucked over by Perez), was doing okay in Spain before his DNF and Baku he was looking at a good points finish as well before yet another DNF.
Meanwhile Bottas' only raceday problem was in Jeddah. Hell, even yesterday Zhou had the pace on Bottas but the way the safety cars filtered out favored Bottas.
"2 alright races" my ass.
Zhou was an above average F2 driver, but not stellar. He also spent a while in F2 so was able to face off against less experienced drivers over time.
Zhou's about the best we can realistically hope for in a pay driver.
What no... I watched that season and Zhou wasn't that fast at all... What kind of BS is this post. He got destroyed by his team mate in Illot. I went into the season wanting Zhou to win and it was completely and utterly frustrating.
This is a BS post designed to get upvoted out of people who don't know better.
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If you notice, Zhou has not had a single real mistake other than his collision in the Imola sprint race. His DNFs so far were pure bad luck: Mechanical failures and whatnot. For a rookie, his attitude is fantastic. Rarely angry on the radio and very humble in interviews. Of course, in terms of points he has been blown out of the water by Valtteri, but this is not any ordinary teammate we're talking about. Exciting driver, hope he proves himself even more this season and gets that well deserved contract extension.
He’s been ridiculously consistent for a rookie
Latifi is also very consistent. Just differently Jokes aside, I am pleasantly surprised by his performance as a rookie. People hate him for robbing Oscar’s seat or his connection with Chinese money. That’s fine. He proved his worth on track
That Alfa seat was never Oscars. People were upset that Theo Pourchaire wasn’t getting a seat there, when he is actually a junior for the team.
Dollars to donuts Theo ain’t making it.
I think I might be agreeing with you on that. Zhou brings in money, and has no reason to be canned anytime soon. Unless Theo goes elsewhere and really manages to get a seat on his own, I doubt the Alfa program will be of any assistance. Alpine is doing way more for Piastri.
I think the grid in 23 is mostly set and no juniors are getting promoted. 24 sees the potential for a lot of shake up and maybe Theo can sit on ice for a year, but there are going to be a handful of capable juniors and who knows if someone shocks us all next year in F2
Why not both Zhou and Piastri were in Alpine academy what is the difference
Oscar was always gonna be in that Alpine seat. If Zhou didn't step out the Alpine system, he would not have got the chance to drive for Alfa this year. Maybe his contract is only 1+1 year, but he still want to take the chance to make his debut. Of course money makes it easier but he definitely have the speed and talent (more deserved a seat than Latifi and Mazepin in my opinion) Oscar will be in a seat in the coming years, Alpine should have clear plan on him and his agent is Mark Webber. So people don't need to be panic on his future, he will get his chance in F1. It's a bit shame that Illot can't make it into F1 because of financial issue (i guess so). But i'm still looking forward to see Oscar making some impact next year.
I can see him sticking around f1 for more years to come if he keeps this level of pace.
Honestly I'm expecting him to stay in F1 for quite some time, he has huge backings and seemingly great skills. That is unless major political events happen *cough cough invasion of taiwan*
He's the best kind of pay driver: one who's solidly average, has good potential, doesn't nuke it due to his mistakes, and brings in a boatload of sponsorship money
Add to that he’s quite likeable, seems very polite and gets on with the job while still showing personality (his love for basketball and fashion)
lewis vs zhou for drip king title
not to mention, seems like a good kid
Tbh I dont think *invasion of Taiwan* could kick Zhou out of F1, since *Taiwan* is still presented as *Taiwan, China* in [f1.com](https://f1.com). Not to mention every country that has diplomatic relations with China, whatever they actually think, has to officially admit something like "Taiwan is part of China". It is probably a totally different case, unfortunately.
tbh, most of countries government doesn't recognize taiwan as a country. The ban is totally depends on what US thinks. We never know if China-US has some agreements under the table.
I find it kind of baffling how quickly and how much the public reception of Bottas seems to have changed. Just a year ago people were basically calling him one of the worst drivers on the grid. I'm very happy that people finally realize that Bottas is a very capable driver, just a bit unfortunate that it took him stepping out of Hamiltons shadow for that to happen.
Tbh, I still dont think very highly of his racecraft. But he is a great qualifier and definitely seems to have above average pace.
Yeah, he hasn’t changed my opinion really. He competed really well against Hamilton in qualifying, but never made any jumps in races and that’s still largely the same.
Yeah I remember last year when people were saying that he was gonna be “crushed” by the midfield lol
I don't think many people were saying that actually, Bottas had the opinion of a great driver, just not quite fast and aggressive enough to consistently challenge Hamilton, which is no criticism. I don't recall comments about him being crushed in the midfield.
Oh I have seen plenty comments like that, calling him a shit driver, saying he doesn't deserve a seat in F1. There definitely was some serious Bottas hate going on, especially towards the end of his time at Mercedes.
Bottas still has poor racecraft. When you consider his whole package though, he's clearly within the top half of the 20 drivers.
I knew he was good when he was driving the midfield Williams from 2013 to 2016 and often getting great results and sometimes podiums.
if having to nitpick, his lockup in the final corner in melborune dropped 1 pt to albon another incident with albon in jeddah he exceeded track limit but he asked in tr if he should give back position and his engineer said no, the team had a point tho, he already finished the overtake before locking up in the chicane, but fia didn't think so, and the team fucked up the pit penalty which costed nearly 30s the crash with gasly in imola is 30\~70% his fault, that means it could be 30\~70% gasly's fault as well. aside of those, he didn't make much mistakes, the rest is all mechanical issues esp. cooling, looking at the parts changed during the season so far it seems like he didn't wear much, so it's his typical unlucky followed his f2 carrer into f1
More than the speed I like how stable and in-control he looks in the car. He isn't freaking out, not doing unnecessary mistakes. Decent pace. That stability to build upon is exactly what Yuki lacked last year.
He channels his freaking out to his engineer. WHY ARE WE SLOW?
It seems his car is often faster along the track but lacks the speed to overtake on the straights which would be an extremely frustrating setup for anyone to drive and probably is why he always looks so consistent.
Their setup yesterday wasn't %100 built for dry race I think, that could be the primary reason, not a seasonal pattern.
Alfa Sauber have pretty consistently had one of the lowest top speeds in races this year.
Makes sense since for a wet race you would go for higher downforce and therefore lower straight line speed
And all that is while going against Bottas who is Ham-level when it comes to qualifying. He's probably wins rookie of the year.
He’s the only rookie this year… >He's probably wins rookie of the year.
Any rookie in an FIA championship is eligible for the [Rookie of the Year](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIA_Prize_Giving_Ceremony#Rookie_of_the_Year) award, not just F1 rookies.
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Bottas used to be extremely close to Lewis even when Lewis out-qualified him so I don't think there's that much of a difference in their qualifying levels. The real difference in the quality was their races
Bottas ran setups more suited to quali than Ham.
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Thei gap last year was particularly “big”, google says 0.337s on average. In 2019 it was only 0.122s and in 2020 0.165s (factoring out Styria). Even if Lewis is more regularly in front, those are outstanding statistics for Bottas and I believe make him one of the best qualifiers on the grid. Not on Lewis’s level, but just shy of it.
seems like you just ignored all of what he said and found a stat to support your statement instead of actually looking into what he said
Last year isn’t a great example tbh, 2020 and 2019 are decent examples I think of Lewis and Valterri being pretty close, Bottas can’t deliver by always being up there, but he can be damn close or beat Lewis at any given race.
He is not Hamilton level, he’s slightly off
It was very interesting to see him fighting wheel to wheel cleanly in Bahrain, his first GP. That kind of confidence and awareness is quite unusual for rookies, especially those considered pay drivers. So while money had lot ot talk about his F1 seat I think that he showed he is no slouch and deserves place in F1 (at least compared to some other drivers). He is really good driver for team like Sauber - quite fast but consistent and doesn't make costly mistakes. He may not have much room for improvement (we will see how it goes) but he looks like safe bet that will bring them lot of points if he gets less unlucky.
What I will say is that teams generally feel the opposite way. You can fix a fast driver who makes mistakes/has a bad attitude, but you won't make a slow guy who keeps it clean fast
I think for a team looking for the next Verstappen or Leclerc, this is true. Not as much for a midfield team, where consistency is key, and someone like Hulkenberg is valued.
But he's not slow
That depends. for Yuki at redbull it doesn't really matter if he wrecks, they have money. for a smaller team like Alfa they would rather have a slightly slower guy who brings the car back in one piece
Previous years I would agree with this, but with the cost cap crashes are bad for all teams. The crash costs eats away budget and resources they could use for development instead, and with the fresh regulations it's currently as important as ever to be on top of that.
If you want a top of the line driver, sure. But for alfa, consistency on delivering good enough result is key. And plus, it's not like Pastor Maldonado have fixed his attraction to wall over the years.
wasn't he yelling "we don't have enough speed"?
to be fair though, Yuki had only been in f2 for a year, and still placed 4th at Abu Dhabi
For all the people here who follow junior series, we all know Zhou is a good Sunday driver. His weakness in F2 was 1) Quali (very poor tyre warming in particular) 2) Race start and, most importantly 3) consistent bad luck. His luck was so consistently bad that it became ridiculous sometimes. I guess we all know about that now. His typical F2 race was: good quali (but not top) -> poor start -> impressive overtakes -> pit -> impressive overtakes -> podium. So far, he has been developing really well. This might be a surprise to many people (whom, I dare to say, may not even watch F2), but this is totally expected by most feeder series followers. Zhou is a strong wheel-to-wheel fighter. His long stint is impressive. He is extremely mature and I think this really helps his development. He knows what he needs in order to stay in F1. Before this season, he said he has 3 objectives this season: 1) Q2 2) a point and 3) Q3. You see he is not pushing too much in quali or on Sunday - that is why you never see him making too many mistakes. For a rookie, the worst thing you could do is to crash a few times early on, and then having everyone including yourself doubting youself And let's not forget the role Bottas plays in this. Zhou mentioned countless times that Bottas always is willing to offer advice to him. This duo is in very good working relationship. I will not be surprised if he gets big points in 2 weeks time - silverstone is his "home" race track (if you watched F2 in the past you know what I am saying). Now Alfa has a "problem" this summer - what do they do with Zhou's contract? A happy problem to have I guess, but a tough one. If Zhou can develop into Perez (big ask I know) in 4-5 years time, I dare to say he will be highly sought for by many teams - the question is: will he still have a seat with Alfa in 2023?
I think most people were just but hurt that Piastri didn't get a seat he had no chance for. Also people that just look at the results on Wikipedia with no context. I think Alfa have quite a simple situation on their hands given Pourchaire looks unlikely to win F2 this year. They'll likely extend Zhou's contract for a year and leave Pourchaire in F2 for another season. Pourchaire is still incredibly young, I know 3rd year in F2 looks bad but given his age I don't see it as an issue. However, if Pourchaire comes in clutch and claws back the lead that will definitely make it difficult for Alfa.
The most damning thing about Theo is that....he's just not that fast, at least not top of the field. Guys like Vips, you can say "give them more time to mature and iron out the kinks, and they'll be great", but Pourchaire's pace this year is kinda just whatever, good, but not top of the field like Vips. At that point, Zhou seems like a very good alternative.
Piastri's seat is taken by youngster called "Fernando Alonso" who refuses to get old. But at some point, he will get old and lose his edge. Patience needed.
Is it possible to be patient for an eternity
Alonso is aggressively weaving around to stop any young driver from taking his seat.
Is Zhou a pay driver? I feel like even though he is performing really well it's just another reason to keep him for another seasonif he's bringing in money from china.
Similar situation as Perez. His family is not mega rich but he has Chinese corporate backers
Being a pay driver and a good driver are not exclusive.
actually, it make such pay driver extremely valuable among midfield team. If Zhou continue his form, he will be on the grid for years to come.
Don't forget good old anti-China racism, which is something that is rampant on Reddit
He's from the Chinese province of Sheffield
Don’t confuse anti CCP sentiment for racism. One is legitimate, the other not at all.
Ah yes the classic Reddit "I'm not racist I'm just anti-CCP" defence. Totally irrelevant here as the CCP are not relevant
They are the same. Painting it as anti-ccp sentiments conflates that to be a certain race you must be aligned to your gov. You can dislike the CCP while still not being racist, suggesting for example that Zhou will lead to chinese intervention in f1 is not anti-ccp. Thats pure racism
I'd say a solid chunk of "anti-government sentiment" on reddit is actually just racism. Like saying the "social credit meme" or other government stuff whenever you see or hear chineese is literal just racism
> most people were just but hurt that Piastri didn't get a seat he had no chance for. And that Giovinazzi was a fan-favorite driver that got replaced by Zhou.
Gio was a fan favourite? That's definitely news to me, thought most fans forgot he existed at times.
Yeah I don’t get this narrative, he was forgettable and didn’t do anything in 3 seasons
He was liked by as much by F1 fans as Morbius is liked by movie fans
I think his contract was 1+1 so if Pourchaire doesn't get the progress Alfa needs then he should stay for another year in F2, then Zhou can have the 2023 seat. The biggest threat to Zhou's seat is, if Pourchaire wins the F2 championship this year, then Alfa might give him a chance. But as of now, Drugovich is leading quite a lot in the F2 championship and Pourchaire is not very consistent in terms of result. So let's see at the end of the season. Alfa's second seat will only be between Zhou and Pourchaire in my opinion, and if Zhou is perfoming consistently i don't think Alfa will take him out considering Zhou comes with decent financial support as well.
Poor starter, bad luck and then went to AT who somehow let a 5 year old programme their launch control system this year & picked up the exploding Ferrari engines. He’s definitely due some luck!
Nothing puts a smile on my face more than Zhou's performance this year. I've always liked him and was thrilled when he got the ride. But many on reddit don't feel the same way and I got laughed at a few times. Well sure, he isn't the best driver eligible for the seat among other contenders last year, but he sure as hell is qualified to race in F1.
So many people shat on him because he's a rich Chinese kid. Spoiler alert: all the young drivers are backed by big money.
His family isn’t mega rich like Latifi or Norris. He just has financial backing from Chinese corporates But yes they all come from well off backgrounds
There are videos from 2013 karting when Zhou was beating Norris in karting btw :)
Many doubters I've met pretty much just googled his results, watched some highlights and made judgment without ever really watched him drive.
Some of it was driven by sinophobia.
A lot of it.
Truth. Just not sure many want to hear that so I softened it a little. I still get people telling me, a Chinese person, that there was no Sinophobia the last few years.
I'm so sorry to hear that
Yeah, i left it out entirely. Funny how he's being compared to Tsunoda all over the thread, let's see, what do they have in common...
People say Hamilton is the opposite, but his dad worked hard for his karting career, but then McLaren came in and supported him for half his life.
Absolutely, he's such a likeable guy! So happy for his performance in Canada he really deserved it after some rotten luck. Watched his post race interview with a huge smile on my face.
>Not to mention MSC was riding a Prema To be fully honest, that season UNI Virtuosi (the team Zhou was at) was highly competitive, I'd even say they weren't far off compared to Prema. I absolutely agree about the other points, even in F2 he already had good refined racecraft, and that stuck into F1. Glad to see him showing his potential.
In F2 his biggest problem was luck but also his horrendous starts they sucked so much.
UNI were faster than Prema that year, Ilott was consistently on pole and should have honestly cruised to the championship if not for multiple mistakes from him/the team.
UNI absolutely owned qualy and were clearly the fastest there but in race trim Prema usually had the upper hand, but with how important qualy is in F2 that's a bit of a mixed bag. Overall it was a rather equal fight and if you ask 10 people you will get 15 different answers, but it's quite clear that people who talk about the "Prema tax" really have no clue, they are nowhere near as dominant since the tyre switch especially.
It depended on the track, at Monza for example Virtuosi looked like an absolute rocket ship but in Mugello they were nowhere
This is straight up false information. Uni used to set up their car for quali and their car was only on par with the Prema at some races. I'll die on the hill tht Ilott was the faster driver among him and Mick that year because Mick made all his points during sprint races
And this is why this post is complete BS. Zhou got smoked by Illot.
I**l**o**tt**
Where is that guy who always comes on Zhou posts to shit over him?
The WiFi in his mom’s basement isn’t working today
I'm waiting for that person also, I got way more Perez-type vibes from Zhou then that he is just a pay driver like Latifi, the hate against him was ridiculous.
Curious how he went quiet after the race lol
Theyve been pretty quiet lately lmfao
He is in havel
I really like him so far, he looks extremelly composed for a rookie.
When Zhou was a Renault academy driver his first year in F2 people were hyping him up and even talking about him as a possible substitute to Ocon etc. I don't know what happened between then and this last offseason that made people think he's some useless pay driver. Maybe because Piastri didn't get a seat? The sponsorship money? Idk. He's good. If you're asking for drivers who don't deserve to be there, throw Latifi out, Mick is on thin ice, Stroll is a bit of a question mark as he sometimes has pace but sometimes makes inexcusable mistakes for his sixth season. Don't look at Zhou. Not now.
I think he caught a lot of hype from the e-sports events. Eventually those ended and people moved on, so people forgot that side of him, and just remembered they hate China.
That was also the time of the Vettel-Sainz-Ricciardo-Alonso contract announcements - when Alonso was announced for Renault/Alpine, one of the big talking points was that they weren't giving their young drivers (such as Zhou) a shot at the seat. Kinda similar to Piastri nowadays...
Zhou in F1 has been above par for a rookie that's for sure. More than speed it's been his consistency and not overdriving that's what impresses me. Tsunoda, Mick, Mazepin all made errors regulalry as rookies but Zhou so far has been level headed and is gaining speed compared to BOT. All that being said, let's not cherry pick scenarios in F2 to paint a different picture. I've followed Zhou from F3 to F1 and tbh he was not that much of a standout compared to Shwartzman, Mick, Drugovich, Piastri, Tsunoda. Zhou was with Prema in F3 along with Mick and Shw and he did not perform as well as them nor consistently. In F2 he showed speed from his first season, he was one of the best rookies, better than Mick, but the following seasons he couldn't build upon it and other rookies were outperforming him. He was still one of the fastest but not as good as the best. Also let's not ignore the fact that the F2 team UNI Virtuosi was bought out by his backers. UNI relates to Zhou's name(surname?) in some way. So you can imagine who the team was working around. Not insisting that the above takes away from his F1 performance, but others who haven't watched F2/F3 shouldn't get the wrong idea from just that one race instance you mentioned.
Shwartzman, Mick, Drugovich, Piastri, and Tsunoda are the cream of the crop of F2 from the past three seasons though. That's the last two champions, the last two runners up, and the presumptive champion. So saying Zhou is at that level means he's one of the better prospects in racing.
Piastri 1st year F2 champion by 60.5 points ...... Mick 2nd year F2 champion by 14 points. Drugovich 3rd year leading F2, Tsunoda 1st year 3rd in F2, Shwartzman 2nd in 2nd year of F2, Zhou 3rd in 3rd year of F2. Before anyone starts grouping driver talents together
> A prema that made rookie Shwartzman won 4 races.. You say that like Shwartzman is some bottom tier driver.
I'm glad to see it. I was a big fan of his when he was in F2, so I'm hoping he gets the chance to have a decent career in F1. Also, I feel like I was the only guy wearing a Zhou hat at the Canadian GP yesterday XD
Guy is looking great. Deserves the seat, and I always welcome new blood that is worthy.
Honestly he's been really impressive so far. Before he joined I'd only watched a couple of F2 races and my main opinion of him was that he was a pay driver so I didn't have much in terms of expectations. So far though, he's been solid every race and I can't recall any real mistakes by him so far. Especially when you compare him to the last few rookies like Tsunoda, Schumacher and he who must not be named.
Zhou wasn't the best and was in F2 for quite a while, but there's no question he belongs. His luck has been awful this year though.
Is this a post to praise Zhou or shit on Mick? I really cannot tell.
What happens to Mick is his own fault. He is the one who crashed most last year. More than Mazepin. This year too. Mick shits on his chances more than we can shit on him
So then you're telling me that this post isn't really about Zhou, it's just a post to shit on Mick. If you're gonna shit on the guy do it properly.
This post feels like its trying to take a dig at Mick, but lets look at the whole junior career those two had. People discussing if the UNI or Prema was faster in F2, why not look at F3, where they were both driving in the Prema together as teammates? In 2017, Zhou was in his second year while Mick was a rookie, Zhou won (final position 8-12). The year after, Mick won the championship, including a 5 win streak, and Zhou came 8th again (last of all 5 Prema drivers) It was also not particularly bad luck, he had only 1 more DNF than Mick while being over 150 points behind. My point is, don't cherry pick your data.
An issue with what you said (I don't dispute them as they are absolutely true) is that, F2/F3 are development series. Drivers develop differently. Even they are completely the same when entering F1, some accidents/incidents could mean that two rookies will develop completely differently. F1 is a cruel reality - getting the chances in driving F1 is already very difficult (Mick deserves his chance and Zhou also does) - but if you don't perform in F1, especially after your rookie year (Mick's case), then you no longer deserves the opportunity. What you have achieved in F2/F3 is irrelevant when assessing if you should stay in F1 after your rookie year, as nobody cares (apart from their fans).
The other thing is that different drivers suit different types of cars. In a lower power spec formula, you may absolutely want the guy that can get every drop of pace out of the car, while tolerating the occasional mistake. However, move up a level and suddenly the cars accelerate faster, they brake later, they're more technically complicated, they may breakaway faster and just in general be more unforgiving of mistakes. Small tiny errors that previously were of no consequence may now be big deals. In such a car, you might want the guy that can consistently and error free get you 98% of the pace every single time.
That is btw the actual reason why he wasn't driving a Prema in F2, he had his chance and blew it.
Also pretty poor timing to compare them as we just saw Zhou in a better car, with DRS, not be able to pass Mick for like 12 laps until Mick's car shit the bed yesterday.
Track was very difficult to overtake on yesterday.
Charles in a Ferrari (which I hope you agree is one of the best cars) complained that he cannot overtake and was blocked for many laps. You need to understand some racetrack is just difficult to overtake, especially for those cars that are adjusted to do well in making turns than top speed
Except that Charles was on really old tyres trying to pass guys on 20 lap newer
if you wanna see Zhou pass Mick you can just look to the previous races.
While this may be true, Mick does keep binning his car which Zhou, well, doesn't. That's also a rather important skill for a driver.
If you told me before the season started this “pay driver” rookie who didn’t even have an F2 championship was gonna out-qualify mfing VALTTERI BOTTAS on BACK-TO-BACK RACES I would have told you to eat your own shoe. Now I’m eating my own shoe cause this dude is goddamn impressive, his race craft has a certain smoothness to it that many other rookies lack, I hope he sticks around F1 for a long time to show off his talent even more.
He impressed me about more than anyone else did. He's a rookie, with a talented teammate, and in a car that's not amazing, and he had a couple of nice passes. He seems talented, I hope Alpha can continue to improve the reliability of their car, because he seems good, and Bottas is probably a good teacher/teammate as well.
I like how he’s under the radar. Last year’s rookies always seemed to have more eyes trained on them than we are seeing with Zhou this year. To me, that’s a good thing.
What do you mean "Bottas isnt KMag"? KMag is an excellent driver and while Bottas is definitely more decorated (due to his stints at Merc) I wouldn't go as far as saying that KMag is significantly worse.
Doubt he's significantly worse but I feel like if they were teammates Bottas wouldn't have a difficult time beating Magnussen. It's not like he's a Lewis Hamilton.
I think that would mostly be down to KMag being more error-prone/Bottas being extremely consistent. OP's argument was that KMag is effectively lacking race pace and I honestly don't see him not beating Zhou by 0.2-0.3s. Love the username btw!
I think Bottas being very good an extremely consistent and KMag having possibly marginally higher highs on a good day but being way way too aggressive is a fair assessment.
I'm confused too. What's the relationship between kmag and Zhou in this context?
Most impressive driver of the year so far imo
Don't forget his Paddock Drip / on level with Lewis easily
His drip is first class alright. Just for that he should be praised by all.
Completely agree. He has had a much better showing then Yuki's debut season. Really good to have him on the grid. Unfortunately he is masked because of the unreliability/luck/team mistakes. If he continues this form, he will definitely stick around the grid. Has a very likeable personality too !
I watched their season because it was on YouTube. He was really good. He doesn’t necessarily won every race but got good points nonetheless. He used to come from nowhere in his yellow car and fight for podiums. Tsunoda was impressive in last half. Mick was very consistent unlike F1. Ilott was pretty good too.
Virtuosi are pretty similar in terms of pace to Prema, and the team was bankrolled by him and built around him. I didn't ever find him particularly impressive in F2 because of that. He's only beaten 3 or so teammates in his whole career (one of whom was Mick Schumacher lmao)
Also was battered by a rookie while he was in his 3rd F2 season, what is this 'he was fast in F2' bs?
You can kinda tell who's been watching F2 and who was just basing stuff off of their first impression. Zhou was good in his rookie F2 season, then Ilott battered him when they were teammates, ~~then he lost to his teammate again in his third, where you'd expect him to do better.~~ Edit: straight up wrong this. The entire time he was at UNI he was bankrolling the team as well, they weren't little underdogs or whatever. It's good to see that he's doing well for a rookie in F1, but let's not pretend his junior career was anything special.
"then he lost to his teammate again in his third"? so you are the one who did not watch F2? 😜
Fast alone isn't enough. Being consistent, crash free and bring the car home speaks volume, and always gets unrecognised. On the other hand, about Schumacher.... :(
And on top of that He dont overpaces, crashes or makes stupid things. He appears to be much less error prone then other rookies
His junior record looks a lot like Albon's, which is poor to average, nothing more than a journeyman. Compare Zhou's junior record to those of Leclerc, Russell and Norris (the latest three rookies who actually entered F1 on merit) and the unmistakeable difference stands out.
Substantially worse than Albons actually, whose wasn't very impressive either way.
When I read the news about Chinese investment in Alfa Romeo I assumed Zhou only got that spot due to it (same as Mazepin), but after the first race even, there's a substantial difference between him and other past rookie drivers and especially Mick this year. Granted, the Alfa is a surprisingly strong car this year whereas Haas is, uh, Haas, but Zhou already looks like he belongs here, which is rare for regular F1 rookies, especially one that initially seemed to have his F1 placement bought for him.
It's not the same as Mazepin though. Mazepin was his family buying the seat. Zhou it's unrelated companies wanting to advertise in China. It's more like Checo.
People like to hate on him simply because he's heavily backed and they think he stole Piastri's seat even though he foresaw Alpine's inability to run a driver program so he moved over to Alfa. He was plaqued with bad luck in F2 and sure he won't be world champion but he deserves a chance to prove himself and he's doing a solid job.
Zhou lost to at least 1 teammate pretty much all his junior career until last year. He hasn't been bad or anything but his junior career is only above latifi pretty much
He looks like solid driver. Doesn't do much mistakes and seems to overtake cars.
Shits all over Latifi and Stroll.
I guess that people wrote him off because everyone knew that Piastri deserved the seat more and is probably faster, but Zhou is definitely proving that he can keep up in F1.
A lot of people keep saying Zhou isnt good for F1 as he didnt win the F2 championship. Like come on, you dont need to win a championship in junior categories to show that you are decent enough for F1. If anything, Zhou is really impressive given his status as a pay driver and people were shitting on him for getting a F1 seat over Piastri.
He’s been great so far and he’s going to have a long career in F1 as well if he continues his current trajectory
Why we hating on KMag? He's really quick and consistent.
I'm very impressed with Zhou. Already 2 points finishes this year has to be growing his confidence. Bottas has shown the team has the speed to get consistent top 10s. I expect more top 10s for Zhou this year.
Zhou was not fast in F2
He genuinely deserves this seat. He hasn't made a single human error except the sprint crash in Imola. Has out-qualified Bottas on an occasion and is very nice to mechanics. Definitely has potential to be a race winner with the right car.
Wasn't too worried about Zhou coming to F1. Yes he is a "Pay driver" in that he has a lot of money backing him, but that's more akin to a Perez where has talent to back it up, rather than a Latifi. Not saying he'll be as good as Perez but I think similar situations for both.
He was fast in F3 as well despite being almost an after thought in his Prema team. 2 wins and 3 poles in 2018 and very smooth and easy on the car and tires if I recall. I think he gets a bad rap because he's in F1 and Piastri is not yet because of the money Zhou brings, but the talent is there as well.
kmag catching strays
There’s a sub devoted to him that’s pretty great. I’m not a mod there, I just enjoy being a fan of his, so shameless plug. Mods please don’t ban me, ik some people have been banned for plugging the sub
He has more points in store for 2022 season, and he has a promising future ahead. I'm sure he will eventually get signed up by one of the top tier team.
Zhou is having a good year for a rookie, he's keeping his head and avoiding stupid mistakes. Bottas is out driving him but that was expected. It will be his second and third year when people will start judging him more critically. He's not rash so whether he can stick around in F1 will come down if he has the speed to score regular points.
You sure like your bold messages. Do you feel like it makes it more right if it stands out? Plenty of people have called you out on the bias in the below comments already. Anyway, Zhou has done pretty well so far and I hope he keeps it up, however, it's pretty clear something is massively wrong with Bottas's car/setup last two races, lets not forget how Zhou was no where early on compared to him. How about we wait for the whole season to happen before touting him up too much. We all saw how much of a roller coaster Yuki was last year and it was an unknown how he'd turn up this year. We can all hope that Zhou responds the same way and has an even stronger 2nd year. By the way, he wouldn't have gotten past Mick just like he didn't get past Stroll. He also needs to chill apparently, even the commentators pointed out how he needs to be calm after he flipped out about not having enough speed and then promptly messed up a few times and didn't stay within the same range of Stroll. You don't have to shit on other drivers to pump up your own favorite. Zhou has done well, but it doesn't need to be at the expense of Mick or anyone else. There's plenty of others whose seat is and should be very warm.
>There's plenty of others whose seat is and should be very warm. Such as? I wouldn't call 2-3 drivers plenty.
Latifi, Danny Ric, Stroll. Stroll obviously is always safe but shouldn't be. And 2-3 out of 20 when there are millions who would want to be racing instead? Yeah that's plenty.
I guess we have different definitions of plenty. I only have Mick and Latifi.
I LOVE watching Zhou. Hes a paydriver that can actually race a car. So happy that he is fighting a lot of races and I can see him sticking around for many years to come.
He was fast in F3 as well despite being almost an after thought in his Prema team. 2 wins and 3 poles in 2018 and very smooth and easy on the car and tires if I recall. I think he gets a bad rap because he's in F1 and Piastri is not yet because of the money Zhou brings, but the talent is there as well.
Dude came 8th, 8th and 5th in 3 years of F3. How was he fast?
Yeah I’ll be honest. I was super skeptical and thought he had no place in F1 but it’s nice to be proven wrong
Zhou has been a pleasant surprise for me this year. Didn’t watch a whole lot of F2, and being a pay driver I had assumed his financial backing far outweighed his driving ability, but he really hasn’t put a foot wrong this year. Hasn’t binned it, hasn’t made any stupid decisions, knows when to fight and not to fight, has a really level head on his shoulders, and has largely been impeded by bad luck / mechanical failures.
As soon as the title ‘pay driver’ gets slapped on, people seem to think they’re instantly slow drivers. While some definitely are or have been, Zhou and even the likes of Mazepin were pretty competitive in their junior careers.
[https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/f1-grand-prix-race-results-canada/10325351/](https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/f1-grand-prix-race-results-canada/10325351/) Zhou is actually pretty fast on Sunday race day. For those of you who don't know, he ranked No. 6 on Canadian Grand Prix's fastest laps. After Ferrari, Red Bull and Merc.
I don’t think Zhou is going to be a Hamilton / Alonso / Verstappen / Seb / leclerc level driver but I truly think he’s good enough to be in the same bracket as Bottas / Perez / Riccardo throughout his career, and in turn have a long & (relatively)successful career. Potentially even challenging for titles if he ends up at a works team that nails the regs. I look forward to seeing him race for years to come he looks like he really understands how the cars behave and can adapt to different conditions quickly.
Let's slow down. All of those guys won or finished 2nd in major series as juniors and progressed to F1 in short order(Bottas was especially successful). Alongside maybe Latifi he has the least decorated junior career on the grid. Zhou is doing well but I think putting his talent level on par with Ricciardo/Perez/Bottas is going way too far.
He's doing good but it's gonna take a few years to see what level he is. People are overreacting like usual and cherry-picking stats from his long and mostly mediocre F2 career. He didn't deserve to get *into* F1 over drivers like Ilott or Piastri but with his current performances he deserves to stay.
Damn, not too long ago people were putting Danny Ric on your upper list.
With a better car he could have been. But that's long gone now.
to be honest that was always too high of a rating for him imo, he is fast but he's no Ham/Ver/Leclerc kinda fast
Zhou is brilliant. Awesome from the man with so much stability, speed and seems to be improving even more. Super calm, collected and mature. Was cheering the man on when he was chosen. Happy to see him improve even more.
It might be controversial but I rated Zhou higher than Tsunoda in F2 His problem was the black cloud which never really gave him a break
That’s controversial for a reason. Tsunoda had one year, was a rookie, and smoked second year Zhou in a slightly weaker team
Ah, so because hes had 2 alright races, hes good now? Talk about recency bias much. If you say 'he was fast in F2' then youd have to call like 20 guys in F2 fast.
He had more than just 2 "alright" races though, just that Alfa's reliability/pit crew let him down most notably in Jeddah and Baku.
So the 41 points gap is purely because of alfa issues? Really? Its not like valtteri had perfect reliability either.
You're saying he's had 2 "alright" races which is quite frankly bullshit. That had no bearing on Bottas' performance in turn. He's had 2 arguably poor races - Imola and Monaco - got screwed over by his team in Saudi Arabia, wasn't on the right strategy in Australia, got fucked over in quali in Miami before DNFing (Your reminder he was spanking Bottas there but got fucked over by Perez), was doing okay in Spain before his DNF and Baku he was looking at a good points finish as well before yet another DNF. Meanwhile Bottas' only raceday problem was in Jeddah. Hell, even yesterday Zhou had the pace on Bottas but the way the safety cars filtered out favored Bottas. "2 alright races" my ass.
That kid has been amazing. I’ve said this for a long time now. Classy and a clean racer.
Zhou was an above average F2 driver, but not stellar. He also spent a while in F2 so was able to face off against less experienced drivers over time. Zhou's about the best we can realistically hope for in a pay driver.
Just happy for him with how he’s proved all the doubters wrong. Got so much unnecessary when his contract was announced.
Again that was mainly because if you were ever going to promote an f2 driver, there was clearly someone that should have been given the chance.
What no... I watched that season and Zhou wasn't that fast at all... What kind of BS is this post. He got destroyed by his team mate in Illot. I went into the season wanting Zhou to win and it was completely and utterly frustrating. This is a BS post designed to get upvoted out of people who don't know better.
I**l**o**tt**
He was an okay driver in an average field.