Formula 1-2021 Season

JimS said:

Yeah, he drove fine until last lap last turn. Has always smelled fishy to me. 

He was on slicks in the rain, there's no conspiracy here.  The only reason he was in front of Hamilton in the first place was that the two Toyotas stayed out when the rain started with just a couple of laps to go and everyone else pitted.  They gambled they could make it to the end on slicks -- they did, and IIRC Glock actually gained one or two places over where he would have been if he'd done what everyone else did.  He just didn't gain enough to satisfy the Hamilton-haters.

Since it keeps coming up..

It's Glock!

THAT'S Glock!

Everyone  has an opinion on the Max/Lewis deal, but the guys at Door, Bumper, Clear (A nascar spotters podcast) were fascinated that the teams had a direct line to the race director, and even more so, that the conversation was so calm.  I must admit, that crossed my mind when they were broadcasting.

Stewards assess situations and decide penalties, not race directors. They are expected to free from team interference. You get to talk with them at their request, not usually a pleasurable position.

Just saw a headline.... Red Bull is hiring lawyers because of Hamilton.  Not sure how true that is, but the fact that they are still talking about it is good news for Mercedes.  Stay distracted.

That sounds like a headline fabricated from things like "Red Bull has a job opening for a lawyer" and Helmut Marko randomly frothing at the mouth. I can't see them trying to bring some sort of courtroom attack on on-track behavior.

If they did, it would probably backfire and motivate Toto, Lewis and Mercedes even further.

As for the race director - the teams need access to the RD during the race, and the RD acts as a buffer to keep the teams from harassing the stewards. Seems like a good idea to me, the only thing that was unusual in this incident was the TV producer deciding to broadcast those messages to amp up the drama. As for politeness instead of screaming, well, if you want someone to keep taking your calls and listening, screaming and ranting isn't always the best way :) There is a different culture at NASCAR perhaps.

alfadriver said:

Just saw a headline.... Red Bull is hiring lawyers because of Hamilton.  Not sure how true that is, but the fact that they are still talking about it is good news for Mercedes.  Stay distracted.

Utterly ridiculous. The fact that such an idea is even credible shows everything wrong with F1, in my opinion.

Tom_Spangler (Forum Supporter) said:

alfadriver said:

Just saw a headline.... Red Bull is hiring lawyers because of Hamilton.  Not sure how true that is, but the fact that they are still talking about it is good news for Mercedes.  Stay distracted.

Utterly ridiculous. The fact that such an idea is even credible shows everything wrong with F1, in my opinion.

Meh spend some more of your "tight after the crash" budget cap on lawyers lol.

When the lawyer thing popped up on reddit earlier in the week the source at that time was basically a tabloid so I wouldn't put too much in it.

In reply to adam525i :

As a Hamilton fan, anything that keeps Red Bull distracted is fine with me.  

alfadriver said:

Just saw a headline.... Red Bull is hiring lawyers because of Hamilton.  Not sure how true that is, but the fact that they are still talking about it is good news for Mercedes.  Stay distracted.

I would be extremely cautious in believing the tabloid gossip surrounding F1; the sport is already a soap opera for (mostly, but not exclusively) men if you stick to the more credible sources. Most of the crap posted is from garbage clickbait sites who looooove this fake outrage stuff, and essentially treat PT Barnum's "sucker born every minute" as the highest holy prophecy.

In reply to AaronT :

If it means Horner and/or Marko get questions over the week, and Verstappen gets questioned over it, I'm fine with that, too.  I honesty don't think they can keep from getting distracted.  At least Horner and Marko, given their reactions.

The lawyer thing is real.  Marko was talking about it on some f1 podcast.

Marko is having lawyers look at what they can do based on the regulations.

It does not say he is trying to punish Hamilton or anything.  Just reviewing the incident. 

In reply to wvumtnbkr :

If it distracts the team in any manner, that's completely ok.

I saw this morning on F1.com that Red Bull estimates the damage bill to their car is $1.8 M. Holy cow!

New York Nick said:

I saw this morning on F1.com that Red Bull estimates the damage bill to their car is $1.8 M. Holy cow!

I guess my response is... so what? Race teams write off cars all the time. It's a cost of doing business. This is the first time I've heard a team talk about how much it costs. Is it because of the budget cap?

New York Nick said:

I saw this morning on F1.com that Red Bull estimates the damage bill to their car is $1.8 M. Holy cow!

Interesting that it's news now when it was Hamilton taking out one Red Bull- but when Verstappen takes out BOTH Red Bulls in a very dangerous braking zone, it's not a big deal.  

And maybe the cost will have Horner tell Max to not risk an accident so much?  Yea, never happen.

Tom_Spangler (Forum Supporter) said:

New York Nick said:

I saw this morning on F1.com that Red Bull estimates the damage bill to their car is $1.8 M. Holy cow!

I guess my response is... so what? Race teams write off cars all the time. It's a cost of doing business. This is the first time I've heard a team talk about how much it costs. Is it because of the budget cap?

Toto talked about it quite a bit after Imola early this season. 

AaronT said:

Tom_Spangler (Forum Supporter) said:

New York Nick said:

I saw this morning on F1.com that Red Bull estimates the damage bill to their car is $1.8 M. Holy cow!

I guess my response is... so what? Race teams write off cars all the time. It's a cost of doing business. This is the first time I've heard a team talk about how much it costs. Is it because of the budget cap?

Toto talked about it quite a bit after Imola early this season. 

Yes, it's the budget cap that makes it matter, at least to the top teams.  Realistically, if the Mercedes F1 team goes to Mercedes corporate and says they need another $2M to win the championship, that's not going to be a problem.  OTOH, if they have to take that $2M out of some other budget line then that gets more complicated.

There have been other instances in the past of teams taking the FIA to court when they were unhappy with the results of a ruling.  Usually, though, it's the team that got penalized who thinks its unfair rather than a different team who thinks the penalty wasn't harsh enough.  I'm not sure I've ever actually seen it change anything, though.

As far as Toto Wolff going up to see the stewards -- I find it kind of odd that Michael Masi is making such a big deal out of it after he was the one who told Toto to go up there when he got tired of talking about it on the radio...

In reply to AaronT :

Yes he did but I never heard a number. You see the yearly budget numbers but to see in a reputable place that oh this car cost $x I thought was pretty interesting. 

It seems like a lot of dough, but I doubt there was much left on that car to re use.  Suspension, no. Tub, no. Trans, no. Seat, no.  And so on.

It's possible the one front wheel, and maybe the engine survived, but I doubt it.  "Toss it in the skip, boys!"

In reply to New York Nick :

With the over dramatization of the whole thing from RB they likely at least doubled the actual cost for added effect.

I am excited that each race has a potential for either RB or MB to win and also for Ferrari vs McLaren battle. 

I am enjoying this season. I am not a fan of Hungaroring. I love Spa even though the racing has at times been boring and then we have Zanvoort. 

kevlarcorolla said:

In reply to New York Nick :

With the over dramatization of the whole thing from RB they likely at least doubled the actual cost for added effect.

I doubt. A steering wheel is $50k+, front wing $30k+, etc. 

z31maniac said:

kevlarcorolla said:

In reply to New York Nick :

With the over dramatization of the whole thing from RB they likely at least doubled the actual cost for added effect.

I doubt. A steering wheel is $50k+, front wing $30k+, etc. 

To a certain extent these suffer from the same "million dollar toilet seat" problem that military hardware does.  If you have something that costs a lot to design and then only produce small number of units, amortizing the design cost makes the individual units look quite expensive.

For example, imagine that you spend $190K designing a steering wheel, with a $2500 per-unit cost and then make 4.  That would get a cost of $50K per wheel, but if you wanted to make another one to replace one that had been damaged it would only cost you $2500.  I suspect that's true of a lot of the parts on an F1 car.

Mercedes was making the same sort of statements after the Bottas/Russell whoopsie earlier this season. It was going to take a major hit to the budget. I wonder if the chassis can be reused on either car? Seems to me that would be a pretty complex and expensive piece.