The F1 thread

stickyfiddle

Good write up from Racefans with radio transcripts 

https://www.racefans.net/2019/09/07/analysis-drivers-team-radio-transcripts-reveal-how-f1s-qualifying-shambles-unfolded/

Dontgiveupyourdayjob

Another fantastic race, and another fantastic performance from Charles Leclerc! Incredible mental toughness under that amount of pressure for pretty much the entire race!

It's gonna be fascinating to se how the team politics at Ferrari play out for the rest of this season and into next. Vettel has never really liked being challenged by a teammate and so far has always had his own way in the team pecking order wherever he's been. On current form there's only one driver who I'd consider giving top billing to at Ferrari, and it ain't Vettel!

stickyfiddle

Crikey, I’ve been travelling so following on the text feeds. Absolute blinder but he Espinosa of it- will have to find a replay online.  So so happy for Charles. 

Stroll doing his usual of going backwards with mistakes while Perez goes forwards by not making any. 

What happened with Russell? In front of Kimi and Grosjean seems a phenomenal result.

And both Renaults in front of both RBs is fun...

Cols

stickyfiddle said:

Stroll doing his usual of going backwards with mistakes while Perez goes forwards by not making any.

Not Stroll’s fault; Vettel spun and, while rejoining, hit him coming back onto the track.  Stroll spun as a result and, while rejoining, ended up causing Gasly to run off track.  He got a drive through for that.  Up to that point he was running well.

Vettel should really get a race ban for the way he rejoined; it could have caused a serious accident, and a multiple world champion should really know better.

sinbaadi

Leclerc got lucky with that incident.  Had Hamilton not backed out, they would have both been off and it would have been entirely Leclerc's fault.  

I doubt Hamilton will always be so cautious.

I also just don't like defending like that, it ruins the spectacle.

stickyfiddle

Cols said:

stickyfiddle said:

Stroll doing his usual of going backwards with mistakes while Perez goes forwards by not making any.

Not Stroll’s fault; Vettel spun and, while rejoining, hit him coming back onto the track.  Stroll spun as a result and, while rejoining, ended up causing Gasly to run off track.  He got a drive through for that.  Up to that point he was running well.

Vettel should really get a race ban for the way he rejoined; it could have caused a serious accident, and a multiple world champion should really know better.

Yeah, agreed now I've seen it. 

I do wonder with all the head protection if they've gone to the point they literally can't see what's coming in that scenario. With HANS restricting head movement and the massive padded bits on the sides of the cockpits it must be all but impossible to see anything beyond 90 degrees in either direction.

Octafish

sinbaadi said:

Leclerc got lucky with that incident.  Had Hamilton not backed out, they would have both been off and it would have been entirely Leclerc's fault.  

I doubt Hamilton will always be so cautious.

I also just don't like defending like that, it ruins the spectacle.

2011 Hamilton would have been happy to let Leclerc take them both out to prove a point, but 2019 Hamilton is an mature experienced driver. He knows when to concede the battle (race) and focus on winning the war (WDC). Leclerc still got to learn that and wouldn't have been so lucky had it been Verstappen instead of Hamilton.

Octafish

stickyfiddle said:

Cols said:

stickyfiddle said:

Stroll doing his usual of going backwards with mistakes while Perez goes forwards by not making any.

Not Stroll’s fault; Vettel spun and, while rejoining, hit him coming back onto the track.  Stroll spun as a result and, while rejoining, ended up causing Gasly to run off track.  He got a drive through for that.  Up to that point he was running well.

Vettel should really get a race ban for the way he rejoined; it could have caused a serious accident, and a multiple world champion should really know better.

Yeah, agreed now I've seen it. 

I do wonder with all the head protection if they've gone to the point they literally can't see what's coming in that scenario. With HANS restricting head movement and the massive padded bits on the sides of the cockpits it must be all but impossible to see anything beyond 90 degrees in either direction.

That is a valid point, but it's also notable that Vettel just losses the plot in such situations. It was early in the race and he was running 4th, it was obvious a lot of cars would be coming through. He should've either tried to reverse a bit to give himself more room to safely turn or wait for his race engineer to tell him he was clear to rejoin, instead he went into his usual panic and boot it mode.

Vettel doesn't have the feel/car control to consistently cope with a car (a winning one at that) that hasn't got the back-end glued to the floor with a blown diffuser (Monza 2019, Canada 2019, Bahrain 2019, Monza 2018, Hockenheim 2018 etc). As I predicted in a post on 30th July....

Octafish said:

Yep exactly, Hamilton makes his first serious points-costing mistake in several years, Vettel has already made three this year and will likely make more plus Ferrari don't really have the car enough of the time and even when they do, they squander it.

stickyfiddle

Yeah, not disagreeing with that. Vettel is clearly going through a tough time mentally atm. Failing to win at Ferrari is huge for him, even though it's mostly not been his fault. He has *always* overdriven when in a car that's just not quite quick enough - he was often the same at RB. Ham had the same thing at McLaren at times. And Charles coming in and being the obvious megastar that he is can't help that. 

I hope he sorts himself out as he's a fantastic driver at his best and it would be a shame for him to bow out quietly.

Fretwired

Octafish said:

Yep exactly, Hamilton makes his first serious points-costing mistake in several years, Vettel has already made three this year and will likely make more plus Ferrari don't really have the car enough of the time and even when they do, they squander it.

Great race - glad Charles won he put up with some serious pressure from Lewis but managed it well and was able to deploy his battery power in the right place to keep Lewis at bay. I loved the way Charles stuck his elbows out to keep Lewis behind him. Feisty racing - if Verstappen can join the party we could have a great three-way scrap at the front between the top three drivers in F1.

I don't think Lewis made a mistake .. he'd been pushing hard and his tyres were shot and it was likely Mercedes would have asked him to let Bottas through. Speaking of Bottas - he couldn't chase Charles down and made mistakes - Wolff's face said it all - he didn't look happy. Interesting that Bottas got the extra power mode but Lewis didn't.

Charles is now the number one at Ferrari and I suspect Vettel will be heading for the door. His body language is negative .. I don't think he's enjoying F1 right now. Vettel should have been black flagged for putting other drivers lives at risk.

Cols

stickyfiddle said:

I do wonder with all the head protection if they've gone to the point they literally can't see what's coming in that scenario. With HANS restricting head movement and the massive padded bits on the sides of the cockpits it must be all but impossible to see anything beyond 90 degrees in either direction.

It’s a difficult situation, and one in which there are no good choices.  However “I can’t see a thing - fingers crossed!” is one of the worst ones, only one step down from ‘Floor the throttle and create a James Bond smokescreen’.

Not being in a position to see oncoming cars, he should’ve been onto his engineer to say “Tell me when I can go”.  They can see from GPS where every car is on track.

Yes, it’s easy for me to criticise split-second decisions from the comfort of my armchair.  But I’m not the one being paid $45 million a year to drive.

Garthy

Octafish said:

sinbaadi said:

Leclerc got lucky with that incident.  Had Hamilton not backed out, they would have both been off and it would have been entirely Leclerc's fault.  

I doubt Hamilton will always be so cautious.

I also just don't like defending like that, it ruins the spectacle.

2011 Hamilton would have been happy to let Leclerc take them both out to prove a point, but 2019 Hamilton is an mature experienced driver. He knows when to concede the battle (race) and focus on winning the war (WDC). Leclerc still got to learn that and wouldn't have been so lucky had it been Verstappen instead of Hamilton.

A few years ago Verstappen was putting people into a Senna style predicament of 'let me through or we are both off' and it worked with most people then he did it to Hamilton-once. The next time he tried it in China, Hamilton panicked him into the cabbage and since then Max has been a little more cautious around Hamilton than he is with others. After hearing Hamilton's comments after the race I think LeClerc is about to get the same lesson, as he did himself with Max after Austria ironically.

boogieman

Good race with some decent excitement. WTF is it with the tv coverage though? It happens time and time again.... two cars going wheel to wheel into a corner and the director cuts away to show the friggin crowd. Argh!!! 

breakstuff

boogieman said:

Good race with some decent excitement. WTF is it with the tv coverage though? It happens time and time again.... two cars going wheel to wheel into a corner and the director cuts away to show the friggin crowd. Argh!!! 

Yeah, noticed this happening a lot yesterday.Bloody annoying. 

Had a mini rant about it to the wife. She wasn't very interested though. 

stickyfiddle

Aaaamd Haas has cancelled its contract with Rich Bullshit. Cars apparently staying black & gold but with logos gone. I can’t help wondering if they’d do a quick tie-up with Whyte bikes just for one race...

TimmyO

stickyfiddle said:

Cols said:

stickyfiddle said:

Stroll doing his usual of going backwards with mistakes while Perez goes forwards by not making any.

Not Stroll’s fault; Vettel spun and, while rejoining, hit him coming back onto the track.  Stroll spun as a result and, while rejoining, ended up causing Gasly to run off track.  He got a drive through for that.  Up to that point he was running well.

Vettel should really get a race ban for the way he rejoined; it could have caused a serious accident, and a multiple world champion should really know better.

Yeah, agreed now I've seen it. 

I do wonder with all the head protection if they've gone to the point they literally can't see what's coming in that scenario. With HANS restricting head movement and the massive padded bits on the sides of the cockpits it must be all but impossible to see anything beyond 90 degrees in either direction.

In which case wait for the team to tell you it's clear - don't just drive on knowing you're near the front of the field and cars are coming 

Garthy

It could so easily have ended with a recreation of the spa crash.

Heartfeltdawn

stickyfiddle said:

Aaaamd Haas has cancelled its contract with Rich Bullshit. Cars apparently staying black & gold but with logos gone. I can’t help wondering if they’d do a quick tie-up with Whyte bikes just for one race...

That was quite expected. Toby Sowery's been racing in Indy Lights this season and a whole race sans logo. It was back at the last event but for how long? 

Storey's been a serial bullshitter from the start.

stickyfiddle

Heartfeltdawn said:

stickyfiddle said:

Aaaamd Haas has cancelled its contract with Rich Bullshit. Cars apparently staying black & gold but with logos gone. I can’t help wondering if they’d do a quick tie-up with Whyte bikes just for one race...

That was quite expected. Toby Sowery's been racing in Indy Lights this season and a whole race sans logo. It was back at the last event but for how long? 

Storey's been a serial bullshitter from the start.

Absolutely. I'm honestly very surprised it's taken this long. Probably down to Haas waiting for a payment to be late by a certain duration, or for an escrow to mature.

Octafish

Fretwired said:

Octafish said:

Yep exactly, Hamilton makes his first serious points-costing mistake in several years, Vettel has already made three this year and will likely make more plus Ferrari don't really have the car enough of the time and even when they do, they squander it.

Great race - glad Charles won he put up with some serious pressure from Lewis but managed it well and was able to deploy his battery power in the right place to keep Lewis at bay. I loved the way Charles stuck his elbows out to keep Lewis behind him. Feisty racing - if Verstappen can join the party we could have a great three-way scrap at the front between the top three drivers in F1.

I don't think Lewis made a mistake .. he'd been pushing hard and his tyres were shot and it was likely Mercedes would have asked him to let Bottas through. Speaking of Bottas - he couldn't chase Charles down and made mistakes - Wolff's face said it all - he didn't look happy. Interesting that Bottas got the extra power mode but Lewis didn't.

Charles is now the number one at Ferrari and I suspect Vettel will be heading for the door. His body language is negative .. I don't think he's enjoying F1 right now. Vettel should have been black flagged for putting other drivers lives at risk.

That was an old post of mine, it was from just after the German GP and referring to Hamilton's mistake in that race. I was quoting it to be smug about my prediction about Vettel .

It was unfortunate for Hamilton (in Monza) that he locked up when he did. He was already dropping back from Leclerc and out of DRS range and, as you say, his tyres were shot. Had he purposely let Bottas by around then he could have done it under the old "I'll let him past to have a go, but if he can't pass for the lead we swap back on the last lap" proviso and still finished 2nd.