Formula 1-2021 Season

In reply to NY Nick :

I am frustrated and then I try to shift to being hopeful about the new cars next year. But my wife tried to understand why I was soo sad Sunday. I could only say, "What I thought racing and F1 were, what I have watched since 1997 wasn't what I just saw."

It will take some time for me to maybe be as excited. But it may be a lost cause if they continue to manipulate things for entertainment purposes. 

Advan046 said:

It was nice to see Max show some true joy. 

So was this the capper on Horner's career? Time to move on?

Yeah, Red Bull Racing has joined up with Alinghi to take on the next America's Cup, Christian was part of the announcement virtually from the last GP. Hey, look at that, INEOS Britannia is one of the teams they are going up against, that same Ineos that has a 1/3 share of the Mercedes GP team along with Toto. I'm sure that will go smoother and no lawyers will be involved lol.

Streetwiseguy said:

Yes, if there is one thing that is really nice about this whole debacle, it's Honda winning.  Good for them.

HONDA!!!! F1 champion engine builders. Seemed to have an edge over MB all year. Sad that they are always bailing at the cusp of starting a good era of results. Maybe they will surprise again and show up when the next engine change occurs. 

For all of you who were put off by "The Lunge:"  Max could've won the Championship by crashing out of the race and taking SIR Lewis with him.  He would capture the championship based on winning more races than his worthy adversary.  I thought we might have a Senna-Prost replay but we didn't.  Anyone thinking about Max's sometimes immature penchant for doing stupid, physics-defying E36 M3 should realize what he could have done but didn't.

Jerry From LA said:

For all of you who were put off by "The Lunge:"  Max could've won the Championship by crashing out of the race and taking SIR Lewis with him.  He would capture the championship based on winning more races than his worthy adversary.  I thought we might have a Senna-Prost replay but we didn't.  Anyone thinking about Max's sometimes immature penchant for doing stupid, physics-defying E36 M3 should realize what he could have done but didn't.

There were a couple of official statements before the race about how stewards had the power to take away previously-awarded points for egregious behaviour.  That was a not-so-subtle hint that doing what you describe intentionally would NOT net Verstappen the championship.

In reply to Advan046 :

Yep. I was very excited about next season and I have found myself much more subdued about it since Sunday. It's less about the result than about how it happened. 
 

Jerry From LA said:

For all of you who were put off by "The Lunge:"  Max could've won the Championship by crashing out of the race and taking SIR Lewis with him.  He would capture the championship based on winning more races than his worthy adversary.  I thought we might have a Senna-Prost replay but we didn't.  Anyone thinking about Max's sometimes immature penchant for doing stupid, physics-defying E36 M3 should realize what he could have done but didn't.

We all knew that, 9 wins to 8.

And like codrus said, the FIA understood that as well hence the very public warning about an intentional incident.

z31maniac said:

We all knew that, 9 wins to 8.

8.5 wins -- Spa only counted as half. :)

Mercedes has withdrawn it's appeal https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/mercedes-statement-abu-dhabi-gp-appeal/6885780/

06HHR (Forum Supporter) said:

Mercedes has withdrawn it's appeal https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/mercedes-statement-abu-dhabi-gp-appeal/6885780/

That's good.  Leave the past in the past, and move on to kick their asses in the future.

In reply to 06HHR (Forum Supporter) :

They had to. If they fought they look like shiny happy people and so does Lewis (who seems to be taking this like a real class act). As I said on previous pages, if they won the appeal it would destroy the sport. The FIA did the smart thing and set up a commission to fix all this bull E36 M3 for next year. I hope they are successful because the officiating from this year is a huge black eye. I mean all of it too, not just the travesty that happened in Abu Dhabi. 

 Brawn says no more team principle to race director calls for next yr.

 I say no calls from anyone to the director,only from the director to the team if needed.

codrus (Forum Supporter) said:

z31maniac said:

We all knew that, 9 wins to 8.

8.5 wins -- Spa only counted as half. :)

 

Yes, fair enough. 

Just hoping Merc and Hammy can come back next year and knock RBR and Max's richard in the dirt. 

Nice article from F1 about Hamilton https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/article.no-title-fewer-wins-and-poles-but-heres-why-2021-was-lewis-hamiltons-best.3YznGTJlmMyVkW4coxH0CM.html

I don't know if it has been mentioned but why can't they do a green-white-checker like nascar to get an actual finish to a race?  Is it due to no fueling during races and the fuel load wouldn't support a few extra laps?  Having the season ending, championship deciding race end behind a safety car would have been a horrible finish to what was an incredible season to watch.

Jerry From LA said:

For all of you who were put off by "The Lunge:"  Max could've won the Championship by crashing out of the race and taking SIR Lewis with him.  He would capture the championship based on winning more races than his worthy adversary.  I thought we might have a Senna-Prost replay but we didn't.  Anyone thinking about Max's sometimes immature penchant for doing stupid, physics-defying E36 M3 should realize what he could have done but didn't.

The only reason there WASN'T a collision was Lewis went off track to avoid it!!! He did his part to make it happen. 

Region_Rat said:

I don't know if it has been mentioned but why can't they do a green-white-checker like nascar to get an actual finish to a race?  Is it due to no fueling during races and the fuel load wouldn't support a few extra laps?  Having the season ending, championship deciding race end behind a safety car would have been a horrible finish to what was an incredible season to watch.

While it would certainly have been an anticlimax, I would argue it would have been less horrible than the farce we wound up with.

And yes, refueling an F1 car during a race is not allowed by the rules at this point, and as a result they don't have easy access to the filler tubes.  You need to take bodywork off, etc.  Some of the cars might have had enough fuel to do a few more laps (laps behind safety cars and VSCs burn less), but adding laps to the end of the race is the same kind of abitrary rules changing with no notice as changing the safety car procedure and would have been equally unfair to whatever teams didn't have enough in the tank. 

GWC wouldn't work for the reasons of fuel and it wouldn't have solved the issue, the issue was you had one car on brand new softs and one car on used hards. That decision on tires was based on the assumption that race control would follow standard ops and the race would end in the status quo. The race director didn't do that. To be fair to Masi he picked the winner either way but the way he picked it had 2 issues: first he reversed the finishing order, if he let the race end under caution then the car that lead would have won the race. second: I wanted Lewis to win so I don't like it.... .

In all seriousness if they wanted a race they should have red flagged as soon as it happened, everyone gets new tires, and we have a shootout of the two championship leaders for 4 laps or until one (or both) of them is in the wall. A lot less people to be angry with that choice.

Jerry From LA said:

For all of you who were put off by "The Lunge:"  Max could've won the Championship by crashing out of the race and taking SIR Lewis with him.  He would capture the championship based on winning more races than his worthy adversary.  I thought we might have a Senna-Prost replay but we didn't.  Anyone thinking about Max's sometimes immature penchant for doing stupid, physics-defying E36 M3 should realize what he could have done but didn't.

The problem isn't that Max is willing to intentionally wreck someone to win, it's that he constantly puts people into a place where they have to decide to move out of his way or accept contact.

Cool, he's not willing to pull a Schumacher on anyone, kudos to him, but when his competitors stop driving off the track to accommodate his aggression he's going to have a bad time.

Not that it matters what I'd do because I'll certainly never even be within spitting distance of a real F1 car, but if I were I'd just let him take us both out.

NY Nick said:

GWC wouldn't work for the reasons of fuel and it wouldn't have solved the issue, the issue was you had one car on brand new softs and one car on used hards. That decision on tires was based on the assumption that race control would follow standard ops and the race would end in the status quo. The race director didn't do that. To be fair to Masi he picked the winner either way but the way he picked it had 2 issues: first he reversed the finishing order, if he let the race end under caution then the car that lead would have won the race. second: I wanted Lewis to win so I don't like it.... .

In all seriousness if they wanted a race they should have red flagged as soon as it happened, everyone gets new tires, and we have a shootout of the two championship leaders for 4 laps or until one (or both) of them is in the wall. A lot less people to be angry with that choice.

It was more complicated than that. The reason one ended up on fresh softs and the other on old hards is because both teams were formulating their strategy on Masi's initial declaration that lapped traffic would be kept in place. If Lewis came in he risked losing track position and if the race ended under safety car he lost, but if there was one more lap he had a head start as Max would start six whole cars back, giving Lewis a good fighting chance.

The actual problem was that Masi called an audible after his initial declaration because Horner whined and complained, leading to only unlapping the five cars between Lewis and Max, and then adding a cherry on top in the form of pulling the safety car in an entire lap early.

Had Masi declared immediately upon deploying the safety car that lapped cars would unlap and the safety car would be pulled in early everyone would have quickly formulated their strategies on that and it all would have been above board. Instead Mercedes was hit with a bait and switch where they set their strategy on the bait and got screwed by the switch.

What makes this whoe situation unforgivable is that Masi and his team were just doing this on the fly. This was an entirely predictable scenario, all of these decisions regarding how to handle this should have been made before the race even started.

In reply to MrFancypants :

All true and that is another wrinkle to the scenario. I was attempting to simplify. But the same thing applies, he could have thrown a red flag at that point and then it would have been a fair(er) 1 lap shoot out with both cars having new tires. It was the tire discrepancy that made Masi's decision the only factor in the race outcome. 

In reply to MrFancypants :

It could be argued that all of those decisions WERE made before the race started in the form of published safety car procedures.

NY Nick said:

In reply to MrFancypants :

All true and that is another wrinkle to the scenario. I was attempting to simplify. But the same thing applies, he could have thrown a red flag at that point and then it would have been a fair(er) 1 lap shoot out with both cars having new tires. It was the tire discrepancy that made Masi's decision the only factor in the race outcome. 

Yeah, but I think I've read somewhere that throwing a red flag would have been somewhat against the rules as well. But if we're going to bend the rules in a desperate attempt to get one more lap under green they may as well have flown red anyway, at least then both drivers would be on an even footing.

Keith Tanner said:

In reply to MrFancypants :

It could be argued that all of those decisions WERE made before the race started in the form of published safety car procedures.

Can't disagree with you, it's true.

In reply to Keith Tanner :

Well.. that's why they write the rules right?  Unless...