Formula 1 Discussion - And favourite driver?

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Entering the sport of F1 can be a daunting prospect at the best of times. For austere religious scholar, and Houthi team principal, Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, the already intimidating learning curve was steepened by a less than warm welcome from the other teams.

“They were almost unanimous in their decision; they did not want us to join,” he tells me, a few minutes prior to my beheading, at the team HQ, located in an underground bunker, outside the Northern Yemen city of Saada.

With many predicting that Houthi wouldn't get near a circuit in 2022, the team surprised everyone when they arrived in Jeddah, ready to take part in the sophomore race of the season.

“With the assistance of our Iranian sponsors, and the extra time that has been granted to us in the wind tunnel, in recognition of our low standing in the sport, we have been able to refine a competitive aerodynamic package,” he states. “The data we have received from our brothers in Afghanistan, regarding the performance of dodgems, has allowed us to avoid the crucial mistakes that were made by the McLaren team during the development of their car.”

Porpoising, he admits, remains an issue, but not one that is likely to damage the team's prospects in the race:

“Any unwanted variation in movement is offset by our straight-line speed,” he claims. “Inshallah, we will be in a position to chase down the preening infidel rapper, Lewis Hamilton, in his under performing Mercedes.”

Al-Houthi blames his poor relations with other teams on his opposition to what he describes as “Formula One's colonial expansionist tendencies”. He favours limitations on the availability of fuel, a reduction in the numbers of drivers, that would go hand in hand with a reduction in driver height, and less circuits “as one-by-one they are reduced to smouldering rubble and their support staff enslaved for the glory of Allah".

“It has been a trial by fire, rained down upon us by squadrons of Saudi bombers, yet still we endure, as is the will of God,” he says. “We expect to be able to challenge for both the constructors and drivers championships in 2024, after the ashes of our enemies have been scattered to the winds.”
 
Watching F2 there is very clearly a Saudi cruiser just off the coast near the circuit.

F2 race control fucked it up. "Cars must go throught the pitlane" and "pitlane closed" messages in quick sicession. So some went through the pits (including the leader) and lost lots of places to those that didn't. Then gave a 10 second stop/go penaltyto those entering the pits.

It has taken absolutely ages for them to clear up a couple of cars. It doesn't bode well for Sunday.
 
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I didn't catch that, good spot! 2 SCs already.

Yeah, a fuckup on that SC protocol. But, I thought all drivers knew that when SC is on track they follow it, even if it drives off a cliff or something. Isn't that a clear rule somewhere?

I think it was only Hauger who went through.

The winner of that F2 race is another driver who should be on a quick path to F1 like Piastri. He did well in DTM last year with Ferrari, getting robbed of title in last race. Every other category he has been in he has done well too.

If Stroll and Latifi (both are CDNs like me yet I'd rather see other drivers in their seats!) weren't paying for their seats, both OP and LL would be fine rookies for 2023.
 
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Merc looking 5th best team so far. Nice. Hope it stays that way.

I just spent 10 mins thinking about my picks. Going to resist the urge to swap out Alfa/Bot with AT/Gas. Keeping Mag, hope that doesn't end up being a bad move.
 
Right I take some days off to game and install a new CPU cooler, and missles are hitting fuel depots...

Anyway as much as I hate to admit it, it looks like Brixworth has fucked up, 14th to 20th all Merc PUs.
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Yes I know it's only FP3 but I don't see it getting much better this weekend.

Could at least have made a 2005 style engine, vroom or boom.
 
Is it flying the "we race as one" flag?
No it has "nice equipment you have there, be a shame if it got impounded in customs" sign though.

Super telling that when Toto was asked about straight line speed deficit he instantly jumped to "it's not the PU". Rather defensive there Toto.
 
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Right I take some days off to game and install a new CPU cooler, and missles are hitting fuel depots...

Anyway as much as I hate to admit it, it looks like Brixworth has fucked up, 14th to 20th all Merc PUs.
View attachment 3110845
Yes I know it's only FP3 but I don't see it getting much better this weekend.

Could at least have made a 2005 style engine, vroom or boom.
Check out these gaps:

Leclerc, Verstappen and Perez within .1 second.
A tiny gap of almost .2s to Sainz, then there's Bottas right behind that.
A .1s gap to Ocon and Gasly.
A .1 gap to a somewhat more loose group of three drivers: Magnussen, Alonso and Tsunoda.
Then there is almost a .3s gap to Hamilton being followed by Schumacher and another .2s gap to Zhou and then Russel.
The next 5 cars are within roughly .4s, then there is a .5s gap and then there's Latifi.

At the top ten, you have 4 groups of drivers doing similar lap-times and Hamilton is .3s off of that pace.

If Merc isn't sandbagging, their car is fucking garbage on this track. Let's hope it'll stay that way. Even though it breaks my heart to see AM and McLaren struggle like this.

On the positive side of things, Haas is doing good, Alfa Romeo is doing nice (especially Bottas). I like it.
 
Yes, it is still early into the season but one can't help frothing at the mouth at the prospects of Merc being lucky to come 5th in the WCC. They got lucky last weekend in Bahrain too. Reasonably, 5th and 6th should have been the result for them, not 3+4. From looks of it, Alfa and Haas both better than them, and AT possbly too. Alpine looks fairly good as well. Like as has been noted, basically any non-Merc powered team is better than Mercedes. Could they possibly even finish 6th or 7th at end of year? What a glorious downfall that would be! 8 straight titles and BAM, also-ran for next 4 seasons.

If this is indeed an indication that Merc is behind the other engines, and/or their car is not good, with the gaps at this point and the anticipated continued development of the teams ahead of them, they won't have it easy to rise back to the top. It could just be this track is really bad and in next race they top 4, but what is happening currently is very promising for us not to see much of the Mercs going for a win. With the engines kind of being homologated to an extent, if their engine is behind others, then they are starting to look like they up a creek without a paddle as saying goes.

Early days is the caveat, but they have to be seriously concerned now. See after next 2 races where they all are and then I will be believing Merc are out of contention this year.

PS, I swapped out Russell and took Checo and now my teams are set for what I hope is a Qualifying with neither Merc in Q3. I will gladly take RB, the 3 Ferrari powered teams and AT as my top 10!
 
If the Mercedes engine was really well tailored to maximising the power out of that fuel then they would have had the hardest time adapting to E10. Plus don't forget Red Bull power trains stole a few of the top people at merc power trains too.

Don't forget the teams use their own fuel suppliers too, could be Petronas is lagging behind Shell (ferrari), ExxonMobil (Red bull) and BP (Alpine) in terms of fuel quality. All those latter 3 serve the European market for fuels which have been E10 by law for a while, I don't know what petronas' key markets use, could be they don't have as much research in that area before.
 
@Coccxys would probably know better or if likely, but any chance the Mercedes PU and the way it is designed or has the weight distributed causes the bouncing effect greater than in the other cars?

I highly doubt that plays a role, but I honestly don't know. But if it doesn't, then its either all Merc powered teams fucked up somewhere in the car design or the Merc PU is bad.

On fuel, also didn't Shell put a lot of effort into delivering a good fuel for Ferrari? I remember talk of that around beginning of testing. Does Haas and Alfa also use that fuel?

Whatever it is, something is amiss with the Merc engines, or all the Merc teams fucked up royally. What would the odds be in that?
 
@Coccxys would probably know better or if likely, but any chance the Mercedes PU and the way it is designed or has the weight distributed causes the bouncing effect greater than in the other cars?
Unlikely weight distribution but the shape could well be dictating certain things about the shape of the body/floor that is contributing to issues.

On fuel, also didn't Shell put a lot of effort into delivering a good fuel for Ferrari? I remember talk of that around beginning of testing. Does Haas and Alfa also use that fuel?
Yes, all engines are designed in cooperation with the fuel company so the engine supply comes with using that type of fuel. McLaren is the exception using gulf (as part of their partnership) which might also be something merc had an issue with having multiple fluid suppliers to design with.
 
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