His skill definitely atrophied once no-one could compete against him though. The Hamilton that brought the shitheap 2009 car to a victory would have trounced the 2020 Hamilton. 2021 was a massive kick up the ass in comparison.
Mercedes does not deserve another win until Toto packs his shit and takes his favorite shitpacker right back home with him.
Off the top of my head:
That was actually Adrian Newey and Red Bull. The original plan for turbo-hybrid was to drop down to a inline four, but Newey argued (correctly) that a V6 configuration would allow you to use the engine as a stressed member, whereas an inline four would require the use of a space frame. He was taking a page from Colin Chapman and the Lotus 49 there.
Indycar's going to a simpler but still hybrid system. And the whys for that are probably why F1 sticks with it. The manufacturers want it to make like they're developing EV tech. Lookin' all 'green'.
Absolutely. Motorsports are being subjected to the same political and social forces as everything else. And it's been that way for a while.
We took a long drive to start our vacation yesterday. I was explaining to the SO exactly how hard motorsports was fucked by the end of tobacco. I suspect that now, almost 20 years on we're really starting to see the effects - Indycar barely filled the field for the 500 this year, and Kyle Busch in Cup seemingly unable to get a sponsor commensurate with his past performance/talent level.
To be fair she was pretty decent at Indy and probably should have stuck with it.
Brand awareness. Mission Winnow appears as a sponsor, and people look into Mission Winnow and realise it's just Marlboro hiding behind a shell company. Et voila, you've just remembered that Marlboro exists and is a longtime Ferrari sponsor, and if you ever fancy taking up smoking a brand name to ask for has just been planted in your mind.
Even without the wordage, your profile picture of the red chevron on top of a white box/triangle is enough to tell anyone looking at it what it represents.
For once I would be happier if I was European and turned up my nose at left turns. For those who don't watch Nascar, Bubba Wallace is basically Lewis Hamilton without any talent. He finishes 15th every week in equipment that should be contending for wins and yet the company loves him and puts him front and center in every ad. They banned spectators from bringing in Confederate flags because he and he alone whined about it. They've allowed him to get away with quite a few rule breaks, such as cutting a corner at Indy and gaining 10 spots without penalty. Sponsors are tripping over each other to sponsor him while good drivers never make it out of Trucks because they don't have the money. Meanwhile the company astroturfs this guy as the "most popular driver" because he is black (enough) and woke and he brings so much money because of ESG he can essentially race forever until he gets tired of it and decides to go be a full-time Kaepernick.
Case in point, Vettel during the Leaf GP where he called out the Alberta oil sands for being "unethical" and "a crime" even though it's probably one of the more ethically sourced oil/gas operations on the planet, while he himself carries the logo of Aramco on his suit and on his car. It doesn't have to make sense, the logic doesn't have to work. It just has to look pretty and make the "correct" statement.
Reminds me of a driver in F1, his name escapes me at the moment.
You could literally replace certain words in your post with "signs that say mean things about him", "Bahrain over 20 times without penalty until his championship rival did the same" and "F2" and you'd still be mostly right.
