Formula One - 2018

Just watched the replay on the duce- as bad as it was that Vettel knocked out Bottas, that could have been a lot worse.  Seeing Seb brake early, he knew that there would be no aero to help stop, and that was barely too late to avoid Bottas.  Remember the similar position that Verstappen put Ricciardo in- took out both cars since there was no braking.  Seb at least kept out of Lewis' rear- if he collected both cars, that would have been a huge wreck to start the race.

5 seconds was strong enough.  And Seb paid in points, too.

Sorry, Alfa, disagree. He was being too ambitious, as usual. He has spent his entire career shoving cars off track and blaming everyone else. The rest of the drivers need to sit him down, addince no one else will, and let him know. Max is improving. Seb is getting worse.

Did you guys see the post race press conference?  Max was interesting, and Lewis was very amused.

markwemple said:

Sorry, Alfa, disagree. He was being too ambitious, as usual. He has spent his entire career shoving cars off track and blaming everyone else. The rest of the drivers need to sit him down, addince no one else will, and let him know. Max is improving. Seb is getting worse.

Of course you are right, in your own mind.  

Watch the start again- Lewis and Valteri had a REALLY solid plan to deal with Vettel- they totally boxed him in, and gave him no place to go what so ever.  He braked earlier than Bottas did, but a moment too late since his wing still didn't have enough downforce.  I'm not saying that it wasn't his fault, and that he could have done a better job.  But to ban him?  Nah.  

I'm in the 5 second penalty was appropriate camp here.  Vettle got an epic start, Merc should be looking at that closely, he was way way faster than them.  He was alongside then past Bottas, but they all had to hit the brakes for the corner, with the tow and hole in the air he had, he was certainly low on front downforce and got the braking wrong.  Every one berkeleys up form time to time, he does it too often, but this was appropriate. 

I don't see how he ruined the race for half the field.  The other incidents on the opening lap were stand alone and nothing too do with him and Bottas.  Talking of Bottas, I think he's winning the bad Luck of the season award so far.  I can't think of anyone who's had more consistent bad luck and issues beyond his control.  He must look up every time he steps out of the hotel on a race weekend to see if an ACME anvil is teetering precariously  on a ledge above him.  

Good race for Kimi, but it's really time Ferrari put LeClerc oor Danny Ric in that seat.

P.S. How the berk did Vettle get driver of the day.  He should have been automatically barred from that and did the people voting not look at LeClerc ???

With ya 100%. LeClerc has been very impressive

In reply to Adrian_Thompson :

The rest of the accidents started when Grojean hit Ocon just after the start- that damaged both cars, and put Ocon in a bad position in turn 3.  From there, you can debate Gasley vs. Ocon and who did wrong.

And it was THAT accident that gave Vettel 5th place back.  Had there not been a SC from the accident, no way Seb would have been able to slice through the field that far.  Some, sure, but not that far..

LeClerc has been amazing, and I hope that he can keep bringing Sauber up the field, beyond where they would be expected to run.  I don't see how Kimi stays when Ferrari has this guy in their wings.

Leclerc's drive was not great on race day.  He did a great job to maintain points, but otherwise finished 2 points behind where he started.  Hardly driver of the day.  

Grosjean continues to be a moron, I've lost confidence in him.  First in Quali and then with Ocon.  Should have been in the points, on raw pace alone. The Grosjean factor makes that a particularly poor assumption this season.  

Brendon's drive was also pretty disappointing.  Maybe he picked up damage, I'm not sure.  It's too bad because he has been WEC world champion and won LeMans, but can't seem to string together a good race.  I fear he's running out of time.

I would be surprised if Grosjean has much left of his F1 career.

Vettel - opinions vary on the contact. Either he was too ambitious or Bottas tried to overtake him in the turn and maybe that was a bit ambitious. Either way, Vettel showed his skills at getting back up through the field. Bottas to me is just about the least inspiring driver in the field.

I thing F1 should have a deal where there is like a 5% chance of a reverse grid for each race. Imagine how a race would play out if Williams started on the front row and the 6 cars with a chance to win started in the last 6 spots.

T.J. said:

I would be surprised if Grosjean has much left of his F1 career.

Vettel - opinions vary on the contact. Either he was too ambitious or Bottas tried to overtake him in the turn and maybe that was a bit ambitious. Either way, Vettel showed his skills at getting back up through the field. Bottas to me is just about the least inspiring driver in the field.

The accident was Vettel's fault, but he came out of it better than Bottas. I think the penalty was a bit light, but considering he only got 10 seconds last year for hitting Hamilton twice under the safety car, it's about what you'd expect.

The Mercedes did well to claw back as far as it did with floor damage and that terrible pit stop. And if you don't think Bottas is inspiring, you've forgotten about Baku 2017, where he came from a lap down to steal second place on the last corner. I was on the edge of my seat for that run.

I believe that Vet started on supersofts, whereas HamBot were on softs. The Sky commentators noted that this probably gave Vet a 3 meter advantage at the end of the straight. So, I agree with Alfa that HamBot probably had a plan to deal with this situation and they worked the plan fairly effectively, although much to Bot's disadvantage. I suspect, knowing Vet, that they realized there was some chance that he would hit at least one of them.

I like Bottas and I think he is a better, albeit low key, driver than many give him credit for. Vettel's charge through the field was impressive, but many of his competitors had significant incentive not to slow the Ferrari in any way. There was no such incentive for them to play nice with Bottas. I think he did an admirable job working with the hand he was dealt.

-chris r.

There were a lot of Ferrari customers in those backmarkers I'm not sure it would have made a lot of difference overall though.

Spent the weekend working on various German cars, didn't get around to watching the race last night.  Not much to add, except that I'm not a fan of the "5 second" penalties in general.  A stop-go is too big a penalty most of the time, but this 5 second one is too light.  They're too decoupled from the incident, and they simply become a minor setback that the team strategists just work to figure out how to minimize.

IMHO, the minimum penalty for "causing a collision" should be that your finishing position gets pushed back to behind the guy you hit.

Ha, that's a good one. And if it was implemented, imagine the damage that Bottas could have done to Vettel's title hopes by meandering around at the back of the pack.

Race in Miami next year ?

BBC says Leclerc to Ferrari is all but a done deal http://www.bbc.com/sport/formula1/44660670

Another odd race. So many mechanical failures on what isn’t a tough track- not all that fast, not many corners/ shifts, not that hot.

but there were a bunch of gearbox failures, some engine failures, and some serious tire struggles. 

I’d suggest that the engineering models need some serious updates. 

Great job by Haas, both cars easily fasted out of the top three teams, and both cars finish. 

More progress from Sauber, too. 

Mercedes once again show that they have no clue how to deal with any SC issue, virtual or not. In the end, turned to be a moot point. 

Great job by Haas. They certainly benefitted from some of the failures, but great job to be in a position to capilize nevertheless. 

Good job by Max too, that's a few good efforts in a row that he's strung together now without causing a calamity. Missed the first half of the race, so I didn't see how he was able to make it to the front, but he managed the car well and held Kimi to a comfortable distance. 

It was hot - unusually so. I think that's why Max did so well, he got clear and could manage his tires at will.  

Man, those first couple of laps were wild with real racing and not just bumper cars. The move that Vettel pulled on Hamilton was beautiful, too. 

I figured the MB SC move was to retain track position, but it became pretty obvious that it didn't work out. It could have just as easily been Max that stayed out while Lewis suffered the same fate as Danni with rapid degradation. With MB in the lead, the other teams had the option of reacting to whatever they did. Its easy to play QB when you're not on the field. 

Nice work Grosjean. Way to break a slump. 

Interesting that Ferrari was the only car that had no tire blistering.  Some of the rears were spectacularly bad on the other cars.

In reply to Keith Tanner :

It was hot for Austria, perhaps, but 74F ambient is far from the hottest these cars will see. Same for the track temp.

which is why I think the models sucked pretty bad. 

So, Liberty is fixing GP’s already?

So, Haas wins in America this year?