FORMULA ONE - 2019

T.J. said:

In reply to Streetwiseguy :

I too am impressed with Bottas. I was a doubter. Not in his driving ability, but his mental game. Last season he really was just a wingman for the most part. This year he is out there to win and take the fight to Lewis. He looks to be the real competition this year, since Vettel apparently can only win anymore if he has the best car and no pressure from behind and Leclerc is still learning.

 

 

 

Vettel has always required the best car to win. I think Leclerc is going to take the first Ferrari win of the season. Probably in September at this rate, but still. I'm more and more impressed with him the more I see him. In large part because he's got his head on right, a great contrast to Max. On the subject of Red Bull, how long until Albon is sitting in that second seat?

Bottas has definitely stepped up his game. I was a fan of his when he was at Williams (the only piece of F1 merch I have is a #77 Williams hat) and I'm glad to see his potential is starting to show. I think the relationship between him and Lewis is a good one, they'll spur each other on instead of developing the toxic environment that happened with Nico. Those first few turns at Baku were awesome. Bottas is not intimidated by his teammate at all. Hamilton was right  in his analysis - if he'd been 0.06s faster in qualifying, Bottas never would have had a chance because Lewis would have been two car lengths ahead at Turn 1.

LeClerc was again a victim of Ferrari's poor strategy.  If they had pitted him around lap 25 for another set of yellow tires and again around 40 for reds I think he could have won easily.

Lewis on racing his teammate:   ‘I was too friendly in Turn 1’ at the start

A few observations:

Lewis will continue to respect his team mate, and work together, until he becomes a real threat later in the year to take the drivers championship.  Then, we shall see.  And, don't get me wrong, I would totally be onside with them pushing each other super hard.

After four races, both Mercs could crash on the first lap, Seb could win, and both  would still have a handy lead in the points.  That is some serious domination.

After the two Quali crashes, somebody flippantly said, "Kubica got the grip that Le Clerk was looking for."  Based on a pre race comment from Kubica, that was way closer to the truth than we might have thought.

Croftey went for a ride with the Alfa drivers in the pre race show.  Kimi was super funny.  

What was the other thing?  I guess I can edit later, if it turns out to be as brilliant as I think it must be.

McLaren is 4th and HAAS is 8th?!?

In reply to Javelin :

Yeah Haas is having a bad start to the season. As they are linked with Ferrari through similar parts maybe their tire issue during the races is similar to the Ferrari issue in the race. 

McLaren definitely made a good car this year. 

In reply to Advan046 :

Haas also has Grosjean  

T.J. said:

In reply to Advan046 :

Haas also has Grosjean  

 

Who would you put in the car? I think running Ferrari engines limits them maybe to running some Ferrari rookies? 

Hartley?

Wehrlein?

Giovinnazi?

I am asking openly not challenging you but I am not sure if they had a "free agent" that was much better. 

Advan046 said:

Who would you put in the car? I think running Ferrari engines limits them maybe to running some Ferrari rookies? 

Mick Schumacher? :)

Keith Tanner said:

 

Vettel has always required the best car to win.

I don't think the Toro Rosso was the best car in 2008 when he won at Monza, but in general I agree with you in that for the seasons where he's won the driver's championship, he had the best car.  Vettel pretty much admitted Baku scared him a bit at the beginning of the race because of lack of grip and closeness of the walls. I'm guessing 2008 Vettle was more like Leclerc. Young and still thought himself invincible.

In reply to Advan046 :

I would've tried to buy Ocon away from Mercedes (Doubt that would work) or tried to get Kimi before he went off to Sauber. Sauber prides itself on finding young drivers who later move on to better teams and better results, so Kimi was a bit of strange get for them. Maybe he would've been better at Haas. Who knows.

If I really knew what I was talking about, I'd be running an F1 team, or at least making a living commenting on it - I clearly don't know what I'm talking about. just expressing my opinion. I would've axed Grosjean after last season and replaced him with somebody, pretty much anybody.

T.J. said:

Keith Tanner said:

 

Vettel has always required the best car to win.

I don't think the Toro Rosso was the best car in 2008 when he won at Monza, but in general I agree with you in that for the seasons where he's won the driver's championship, he had the best car.  Vettel pretty much admitted Baku scared him a bit at the beginning of the race because of lack of grip and closeness of the walls. I'm guessing 2008 Vettle was more like Leclerc. Young and still thought himself invincible.

Yeah, all bets are off in the rain. When just a year earlier in Fuji in the rain he took out himself and Webber under the safety car.

In reply to T.J. :

Ok I see I was hoping you would enlighten me on someone I forgot! Ha .

I used to know the rookies before they arrived in F1. But I don't have the time to follow the dozens of feeder series anymore. So Lando, Albon, LeClerc and Gasly are total unknowns to me. 

In reply to Advan046 :

I barely have time to keep up with F1. I don't follow any of the feeder series at all either.

Success in the lower ranks seems to sometimes translates to promise in F1(Lando, Albon,LeClerc) and sometimes doesn't (Stoffel VanDoorne).

Giovannazi is still a bit of a question mark in my mind on which way he will go. George Russel also is hard to tell because Williams, although I like his attitude and hope he can remain positive until Williams turns things around or he lands a better seat.

In reply to T.J. :

One interesting note about Russel is that he's consistently faster than Kubica.  And Kubica was very highly regarded a year ago, relative to the other Williams drivers.  

It sucks that Williams is so far behind the game, but I hope Russel does not give up.

(My read on Williams is that their aero package is very not robust- that they get very variable downforce.  Which tells me that their model correlation is pretty bad.)

In reply to alfadriver :

Yeah, Williams is so far off the pace, that the only comparison one can really make with Russel is to Kubica. Hard to tell what pace either of them would have in a better car, but it does seem that young Russell has the upper hand, at least up to this point in the season.

Advan046 said:

In reply to T.J. :

Ok I see I was hoping you would enlighten me on someone I forgot! Ha .

I used to know the rookies before they arrived in F1. But I don't have the time to follow the dozens of feeder series anymore. So Lando, Albon, LeClerc and Gasly are total unknowns to me. 

LeClerc at least shouldn't be a total unknown, this is his second season in F1 and he was noticeable last year for his performance. Gasly also drove last year for Toro Rosso.

I'm really hoping Ocon gets a seat again soon. Being the test driver for Mercedes can't be all bad, it'll get him experience on the inside of the best team on the grid. If I was a midfield team, I'd rate that pretty highly.

I don't follow F1 but I would like to thank this thread for making me pre-understand the reference Jimmy Broadbent made in his latest video (driving F1 cars at Zandvoort).

"Hey guys, 'Make sure your recovery truck can fit under a bridge before taking my car back to the pits' boy here, and welcome back to Assetto Corsa for another video..."

T.J. said:

Success in the lower ranks seems to sometimes translates to promise in F1(Lando, Albon,LeClerc) and sometimes doesn't (Stoffel VanDoorne).

Indeed.  It's been a long time since I paid attention to those levels, but for example in 2005 the top 3 GP2 finishers were Rosberg, Kovaleinin, and Scott Speed (in that order).  The next year was Hamilton, Piquet Jr, and Alex Premat.

Pretty much spans the gamut:  one 5 time champion, one 1 time champion, one also-ran in a good car, one totally forgettable if he wasn't American, one cheater, and one guy who only drove a single event for one session in Friday practice.

The good thing is you can get the f2 races off the espn app. I watch those with more interest than the F1 races as they are usually more interesting. They have them on demand with the Sky broadcast. 

In reply to bmw88rider :

I have the app, but haven’t watched one yet. Maybe I’ll check one out. 

The best part about the F2 cars is the way the exhaust is very obviously styled to look like a rocket engine complete with flames. Childish but so fun.

Ok here we go the European spec F1 cars are going to hit the track. 

Williams will all of a sudden be the third fastest team!!!!!!

Yeah dreams...

In reply to Advan046 :

It's interesting to hear the upgrades coming.  Of course, everyone expects body changes...

Then some were shocked that Honda is bringing a big upgrade early- which suggests some odd things for engine usage at the end of the season.  Raised some eyebrows.

Then Ferrari announced the exact same thing.  Huh.  

So two of the engine makers are kind of sticking their necks out early to find some speed.  Honda could totally be expected.  Ferrari, with the reportedly most powerful engine- not so much.

Well, I guess I will really now have to become a McLaren fan. With now both my Employer....Dell and my Customer...Arrow sponsoring the team. It looks like I'll be in Orange at SG and US GP