The F1 thread

Fretwired

TimmyO said:

Maybe the Taliban can scrape enough together - be good for their image 

Or if the Saudis takeover F1 the Taliban could sponsor the F1 safety car .. :-)

No need for stewards .. instant on track justice .. :-)

dazzajl

TimmyO said:

Maybe the Taliban can scrape enough together - be good for their image 

Would be nice to see the HiLux brand in F1. 

Dontgiveupyourdayjob

It'd be a shame to lose Liberty Media. They've done some great work in livening up the image and coverage of the sport. I'd hate see a return to the staid, ultra-corporate ways of the Ecclestone years.

In other news, good to see Papa Stroll putting his money where his mouth is...

https://www.astonmartinf1.com/en-GB/news/announcement/ground-broken-on-new-aston-martin-cognizant-formula-one-tm-team-factory

Fretwired

Dontgiveupyourdayjob said:

It'd be a shame to lose Liberty Media. They've done some great work in livening up the image and coverage of the sport. I'd hate see a return to the staid, ultra-corporate ways of the Ecclestone years.

In other news, good to see Papa Stroll putting his money where his mouth is...

https://www.astonmartinf1.com/en-GB/news/announcement/ground-broken-on-new-aston-martin-cognizant-formula-one-tm-team-factory

Stroll's a sharp businessman. He knows that success in F1 leads to car sales and profits for the Aston Martin car company. He only has to look at Mercedes success to see how that translates into profits, and Wolff is an AM shareholder so I guess Stroll has picked his brain and asked for his advice.

Great to see this sort of investment in the UK. Now all he now needs to do is poach someone like Russell or Norris in a few years time.

TimmyO

In light of Lewis’ Met Gala Ball outfit choice he’s been referred to have another head in jury assessment … 

Dontgiveupyourdayjob

TimmyO said:

In light of Lewis’ Met Gala Ball outfit choice he’s been referred to have another head in jury assessment … 

In fairness to Lewis, his was just about the most sober and restrained of all the outfits on show judging by some of the pics I've seen...

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-58553594

skullfunkerry

Finally Marko has waded in:

https://www.planetf1.com/news/helmut-marko-show-lewis-hamilton-is-injured/

Now, who was it who kept going on and on about "Max is in hospital" after the Silverstone crash?  

stickyfiddle

Well it's hardly news that Marko is a dick, is it?  

Cols

Marko has a very simple thought process:

Verstappen wins?  Be a dick.
Verstappen doesn’t win?  Be a dick.
Hamilton wins?  Monster dick.
Gasly wins?  Mega dick.

thumpingrug

It was fairly clear to see that Lewis had a F1 car on his head.  I'm pretty sure most people would have a bit of a headache/neck pain after that.  My respect for Red Bull just keeps dropping.

sinbaadi

I've no doubt that the halo was a factor in this crash, but whether this would have been a fatality or not I'm not sure.  What do I know it's that if this is the assumption of the FIA, then that's two fatalities that have been prevented by halo in the last two seasons, and in the modern era that would be unthinkable.  The FIA needs to investigate how halo has (if it has) changed the way drivers drive, and it would be imprudent to not treat this as if it had been a fatality, in the same way Grosjean's was/is and investigate accordingly.

TimmyO

sinbaadi said:

I've no doubt that the halo was a factor in this crash, but whether this would have been a fatality or not I'm not sure.  What do I know it's that if this is the assumption of the FIA, then that's two fatalities that have been prevented by halo in the last two seasons, and in the modern era that would be unthinkable.  The FIA needs to investigate how halo has (if it has) changed the way drivers drive, and it would be imprudent to not treat this as if it had been a fatality, in the same way Grosjean's was/is and investigate accordingly.

I think that’s an odd read on things 

Cols

No, he’s right.  With all of the modern safety features, drivers have got far too relaxed about causing an accident.  The penalty point system isn’t working; when was the last time you saw a driver get a race ban?

They’ve got a six point safety harness.  Instead of giving them penalty points, just cut through one of their belts after each incident.  That’ll focus their attention.

TimmyO

Nonsense 

sinbaadi

TimmyO said:

sinbaadi said:

I've no doubt that the halo was a factor in this crash, but whether this would have been a fatality or not I'm not sure.  What do I know it's that if this is the assumption of the FIA, then that's two fatalities that have been prevented by halo in the last two seasons, and in the modern era that would be unthinkable.  The FIA needs to investigate how halo has (if it has) changed the way drivers drive, and it would be imprudent to not treat this as if it had been a fatality, in the same way Grosjean's was/is and investigate accordingly.

I think that’s an odd read on things 

I guess!
I suppose we can just be glad that we got the halo, I just think it's a bit basic to not look at it any further.

What if for the next 5 years we attribute one life saved per year, on average, by halo?  

YellowLedBetterMan

I see the point he's trying to make. If the halo has thus far saved 1 life per season, is it because people are driving more recklessly as a result? We weren't getting a fatality a year without it.

skullfunkerry

YellowLedBetterMan said:

I see the point he's trying to make. If the halo has thus far saved 1 life per season, is it because people are driving more recklessly as a result? We weren't getting a fatality a year without it.

Lots of the older generation of drivers (Jackie Stewart most vociferously) have been saying for years that the cars are so safe and run-off areas so wide now that drivers take risks that wouldn't have even been considered 30 years ago. That's a hard one isn't it? They could hardly take deliberate steps to make the cars more dangerous... I guess the only way to police it is ironclad rules and severe penalties; but even then at least one of the teams would find a grey area

poopot

At least lewis seems to be ok a few days on.

Cols

TimmyO said:

Nonsense 

‘‘Twas a joke.  I’m not actually advocating “they’d all be much better drivers if we got rid of the helmet and seatbelts and, for good measure, put a nice big spike in the middle of the steering wheel”.

It’s a topic which has been around for decades now; the safety features of modern F1 cars make it unlikely that they’ll suffer a serious injury.  Has this made it more likely that drivers will deliberately cause a serious accident, safe in the knowledge that anyone involved will walk away from it?

If we look specifically at the halo - no.  There are three accidents in F1 since its introduction where it saved a driver from serious injury or death.

The first one was at the 2018 Belgian GP.  Hulkenberg missed his braking point at the start, hitting Alonso who was then launched over Leclerc’s car.  Without the halo, Leclerc would have been hit on the head by Alonso’s wheel.

The second was Grosjean’s accident last year, which he essentially caused on his own entirely by accident.  Without the halo, he would have been decapitated.

And the third was last weekend.

The only one of those three where a driver was really driving recklessly was last weekend.  Although Verstappen effectively said “either I’m coming through, or we’re going to have an accident”, I don’t believe he had the swiftness of thought to think “we’ll have an accident, my car will triumphantly mount his and stop him from making an escape, and that’s alright because he’s protected by that halo thing”.

Verstappen has been unusually aggressive in both attack and defence for his whole F1 career.  Strangely, he wasn’t pulled up for it by the authorities early on, and it’s ingrained now.  His behaviour predates the halo, and last weekend was just a continuation of it.

There are a handful of drivers in F1 who are happy to put someone in the wall; Verstappen, Perez, Mazepin, Vettel (although Seb hasn’t done that for a while).  Largely they go unpunished, and that’s why they continue to drive that way.  Making F1 cars more dangerous won’t stop them from driving like twats.

stickyfiddle

I’m not sure there’s much difference in recklessness from the beginning of the “Max era” to now. You might argue things have got more bolshy since Max started racing, but before him we had Maldonado and early-years Grosjean, and before them you had Schumacher whose #1 defensive move was to run people towards walls giving them literally inches of extra space. 

But the cars have got dramatically faster... Just grabbing a handful of pole times from a couple of circuits from recent years (trying to find years and tracks where it was all dry and no major changes to tracks happened...)

Monaco:
2010 -  1:13.826
2016 -  1:13.622
2021 -  1:10.346 

Silverstone:
2010 - 1:29.615

2016 - 1:29.287

2021 - 1:26.134 (Friday quali P1 time)

Monza:
2010 - 1:21.962
2016 - 1:21.135
2021 - 1:19.555 (Friday quali P1 time)

That's some pretty minor change from 2010 to 2016 but massive increases in average speeds from 2016 to 2021 - and that's mostly from faster cornering, which is where most accidents happen (Grosjean's Bahrain incident aside).