The F1 thread

Teetonetal

That flying lap of Hamilton's really showed how good a driver he is. The race showed how these things are won and lost on strategy.  I bet most races are won by eitherthe driver who gets to corner 1 first or the team who get strategy spot on for a virtual overtake.

prowla

Well, I started watching the race recorded highlights, but got bored and switched off.
The halos look stupid and cars can't overtake.
Good on Ferrari for showing a bit of imagination; there's always a couple of safety cars in Oz, so they did their homework.

HAL9000

Handily, Red Bull have come up with this...

'It’s day one of a new season, the cars have fired up in anger for the first time and that means only one thing – obfuscation, clarification and investigation. Here are a handful of the most common phrases you’re likely to hear this evening and their real meanings.

1. ‘The car is at a very early stage of development’ = ‘We have built a terrible, terrible car and have no idea how to fix it’.

2. ‘We suffered a small technical issue that temporarily interrupted running’ = Fire! Fire! Fire! Run for cover.

3. ‘The problems we had didn’t affect our weekend preparations’ = It really isn’t going to get any better than this.

4. ‘Friday times aren’t representative’ = Friday times are totally representative and we will be eliminated in Q1 all season.

5. ‘Rookie Driver X’s feedback was excellent’ = Oh God, this one is not only slow, he’s stupid as well. It’s a good job he’s rich.

6. ‘It takes time to build a new relationship’ = We cannot bolt the gearbox to the engine.

7. ‘Obviously there is always room for improvement’ = There is no way of improving this.

8. ‘We are still trying to understand the tyres’ = We don’t understand the tyres and we probably never will.

9. ‘It’s incredibly tight in the midfield’ = We are going to finish 9th this season.

10. ‘The Albert Park Circuit is not representative’ = It’s going to be even worse when we get to Barcelona.'

Fretwired

Lewis quit's Mercedes at the end of the season to race in Motogp .....


;-)

PC_Dave

Hmmmm, I'm pretty sure a certain Mr Alonso was on record this week saying McLaren will have no trouble fighting the top 3 teams... rather awkwardly it would appear 11th and 13th in free practice means his predictions may be a fair way off yet....

Fretwired

PC_Dave said:

Hmmmm, I'm pretty sure a certain Mr Alonso was on record this week saying McLaren will have no trouble fighting the top 3 teams... rather awkwardly it would appear 11th and 13th in free practice means his predictions may be a fair way off yet....

They were trying new bits and will have data - they did say it will take a few races to unlock their cars performance. They are on the back foot switching engine supplier.

Mercedes not impressed with Liberties plans for F1. I wonder if they'll walk in 2020 and focus on the electric car.

Cols

PC_Dave said:

Hmmmm, I'm pretty sure a certain Mr Alonso was on record this week saying McLaren will have no trouble fighting the top 3 teams... rather awkwardly it would appear 11th and 13th in free practice means his predictions may be a fair way off yet....

Better in 2nd practice... but one of the Toro Rossos is ahead of the McLarens.  And in front of the team owners as well.

  Boullier must be bricking it.

PC_Dave

Cols said:

PC_Dave said:

Hmmmm, I'm pretty sure a certain Mr Alonso was on record this week saying McLaren will have no trouble fighting the top 3 teams... rather awkwardly it would appear 11th and 13th in free practice means his predictions may be a fair way off yet....

Better in 2nd practice... but one of the Toro Rossos is ahead of the McLarens.  And in front of the team owners as well.

  Boullier must be bricking it.

I bet he’s writing his CV as we discuss this...!

Fretwired

Grid penalties for Hamilton ... when are the FIA going to put a stop to this farce? Fans want to see him race Vettel at the front ... no doubt he'll just turn his motor down and poodle round the track to save it for another day.

Cols

Fretwired said:

Grid penalties for Hamilton ... when are the FIA going to put a stop to this farce? Fans want to see him race Vettel at the front ... no doubt he'll just turn his motor down and poodle round the track to save it for another day.

All these penalties for engine and gearbox changes add nothing.  I understand the objective is to control costs, but I wonder how much money is actually saved?  Back in the 90s we didn’t have any of these restrictions, the teams brought a t-car to each race, testing wasn’t limited... and no-one was complaining about costs.  What happened?

Garthy

Cols said:

Fretwired said:

Grid penalties for Hamilton ... when are the FIA going to put a stop to this farce? Fans want to see him race Vettel at the front ... no doubt he'll just turn his motor down and poodle round the track to save it for another day.

All these penalties for engine and gearbox changes add nothing.  I understand the objective is to control costs, but I wonder how much money is actually saved?  Back in the 90s we didn’t have any of these restrictions, the teams brought a t-car to each race, testing wasn’t limited... and no-one was complaining about costs.  What happened?

People have complained about costs since the very first season.  Teams will spend their entire budget regardless. If they can't spend $100m on an engine they'll spend it on aero. Even the catering bill is $5m for some teams.

No money is saved on longevity, quite the opposite as the it is R&D that costs the money actually building the things is small fry, which is why Merc and Ferrari so pissed off with increasing three engines as they had already spent an enormous sum of money on R&D, more so than Toyota who spent $500m in 2005 on 300 V10s.

The other reason Merc are against the cost cap is that he is going to have to make the thick end of 1200 redundancies and out of their $150m they have to make and supply an engine and gearbox for themselves and customers, while RBR can spend their entire $150m on the chassis and buy an engine, plus receive massive amounts of R&D from RBT who aren't bound by a cost cap or the Concorde agreement.

stickyfiddle

Aaaand Max has binned it again. I like him, but he's just trying too hard lately. Makes DannyRic look good though, and should make the race more exciting, so I'm all for it.

Dontgiveupyourdayjob

I like Max, but have to say that was just plain sloppy. Pretty poor.

Surprising to see Grosjean out in Q1, they looked pretty rapid throughout Melbourne (when the wheels weren't falling off).

Fretwired

stickyfiddle said:

Aaaand Max has binned it again. I like him, but he's just trying too hard lately. Makes DannyRic look good though, and should make the race more exciting, so I'm all for it.

I can't see how the race will be exciting. So long as the Ferrari's are one and two into the first corner that's the race sewn up. Kimi will back everyone up, Seb will roar off into the night, Botas will remain third and Lewis will get to about fifth before turning his motor down to save it. Danny will probably banzai his way past Bottas for third.

Top three:

Vettel
Raikkenen
Ricciardo


Caveat: my predictions are usually wrong.

Heartfeltdawn

Cols said:

Fretwired said:

Grid penalties for Hamilton ... when are the FIA going to put a stop to this farce? Fans want to see him race Vettel at the front ... no doubt he'll just turn his motor down and poodle round the track to save it for another day.

All these penalties for engine and gearbox changes add nothing.  I understand the objective is to control costs, but I wonder how much money is actually saved?  Back in the 90s we didn’t have any of these restrictions, the teams brought a t-car to each race, testing wasn’t limited... and no-one was complaining about costs.  What happened?

One obvious difference is the number of races and the location. 16 races in 1994, 11 of them in Europe. Now we have 21 races with 9 in Europe. Transportation costs are up. 

Have a gander at this.

https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/archive/article/march-2015/26/root-f1-s-cash-crisis

Cols

Heartfeltdawn said:

Cols said:

Fretwired said:

Grid penalties for Hamilton ... when are the FIA going to put a stop to this farce? Fans want to see him race Vettel at the front ... no doubt he'll just turn his motor down and poodle round the track to save it for another day.

All these penalties for engine and gearbox changes add nothing.  I understand the objective is to control costs, but I wonder how much money is actually saved?  Back in the 90s we didn’t have any of these restrictions, the teams brought a t-car to each race, testing wasn’t limited... and no-one was complaining about costs.  What happened?

One obvious difference is the number of races and the location. 16 races in 1994, 11 of them in Europe. Now we have 21 races with 9 in Europe. Transportation costs are up. 

Have a gander at this.

https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/archive/article/march-2015/26/root-f1-s-cash-crisis

Excellent article!

Cols

PC_Dave said:

Cols said:

PC_Dave said:

Hmmmm, I'm pretty sure a certain Mr Alonso was on record this week saying McLaren will have no trouble fighting the top 3 teams... rather awkwardly it would appear 11th and 13th in free practice means his predictions may be a fair way off yet....

Better in 2nd practice... but one of the Toro Rossos is ahead of the McLarens.  And in front of the team owners as well.

  Boullier must be bricking it.

I bet he’s writing his CV as we discuss this...!

Slowest of the Renault powered cars, and Toro Rosso Honda ahead.  A well-polished CV isn’t going to be enough.

PC_Dave

Well that was a nail biter!!

Amazing drive by Gasly!!

Oh, and I hope the Ferarri mechanic is ok!

thumpingrug

Much better race, with a real chance of Bottas catching Vettel in the last few laps.  Its of action throughout the track.  Great drive by Gasly but pretty much gifted 3 places by Red Bull and Rikkonen going out.  Nasty watching that Ferrari pit stop, hope he ok as well.
  

Hoof

He's not OK. Broken leg. The sport really needs to go back to the lollipop man system. There's been quite a few pitlane incidents caused by the automated systems over the past few years and teams are spending money on a system that is putting crews in danger.

Great race though.