Formula 1 Discussion - And favourite driver?

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Monaco Quali in a nutshell
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Don't look good for Leclerc's pole:

link to an article.

Basically, Ferrari priotizes reliability over the pole, so if the gearbox has the tiniest indication of damage, they'll replace it and Leclerc will eat a 5-position grid penalty.
 
No serious damage to gear box.

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Edit: amazing the different tone between the two articles.

IMO It would be crazy to take a 5 place grid penalty at Monaco of all places. There is no realistic prospect of him gaining those places back. Unusually it is ferrari with the strategic upper hand with 2 cars quite close while Bottas and Vestappen have their team mate a good distance back, on a track where being held up by a much slower car and losing a pit stop amount of time in 5-10 laps is perfectly possible. Also starting 1st means staying out of 1st corner trouble which, again, at Monaco is likely.
 
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perfect opportunity for verstappen to bite into Hamilton's lead, but unfortunately not for the constructors because perez is further behind than lewis :|
 
IMO It would be crazy to take a 5 place grid penalty at Monaco of all places. There is no realistic prospect of him gaining those places back. Unusually it is ferrari with the strategic upper hand with 2 cars quite close while Bottas and Vestappen have their team mate a good distance back, on a track where being held up by a much slower car and losing a pit stop amount of time in 5-10 laps is perfectly possible. Also starting 1st means staying out of 1st corner trouble which, again, at Monaco is likely.
6th place is better than DNF due to gearbox failure though. Personally, I'd still take the chance and go with the pole.
 
perfect opportunity for verstappen to bite into Hamilton's lead, but unfortunately not for the constructors because perez is further behind than lewis :|
Depends if perez "accidentally" kamikazes Hamilton at the first corner. Would be great for Max and the team.

6th place is better than DNF due to gearbox failure though. Personally, I'd still take the chance and go with the pole.
I'd risk the DNF to go for a win (especially as its Charles' home GP) because this is realistically ferrari's only chance of one this season. If the gearbox does break but just about hangs one then Monaco is the best place to try and keep someone behind, pull a Senna 92 or Ricciardo 18 on the.

From a Ferrari perspective they need to be getting Charles some wins because if they can't deliver the car to do so then another team will. It is becoming increasingly important in F1 to hang on to your main future tallent (which is why anyone in RBR seat 2 knows damn well they're in seat 2 and entirely disposable).
 
this season has been the season of disapointment. How many drivers switched teams or re-entered formula 1, got hyped up, and are not delivering? Alonso, Vettel, Tsunoda a little bit, Ricciardo, Perez
 
Alonso, Vettel, Tsunoda a little bit, Ricciardo, Perez
I think the 2 years out are taking their toll on Alonso. I'm hopeful he'll get back to where he was. He will be back at the factory making sure that the 22 car suits him which is basically his stated reason for coming back this season.

Vettel has had a tough few years, the rule changes have fucked AM. Hopefully they will build a great car around him for 22. He has a style that needs a super stable rear end and if AM are smart that will be the main requirement for the 22 car.

Tsunoda went well in the first race but is struggling from lack of experience. He's ever raced any car in monaco and Gastly out performes that car constantly which is not favourable for Tsunoda.

Ricciardo seems to be struggling with the McLaren handling characteristics which again with Norris going so well is making him look pedestrian. He's going to have to get up to speed with that car because McLaren have firmly hitched their waggon to Norris and they will build the 22 car for him.

Perez has a serious case of the RedBull second seat curse. RedBull always builds their car for their lead driver and it looks like Vestappen likes his cars near undrivable for others. It shows how bad it is when drivers are dropped from RedBull they seem to instantly do better in a much nicer (but slower) car to drive.
 
Someone's worried the rule change will mean it isn't just handed to him all the time.

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Race driver excuses months out from the first race until 2022 regs are rolled out? I wouldn't expect any less from Hambone.

this season has been the season of disapointment. How many drivers switched teams or re-entered formula 1, got hyped up, and are not delivering? Alonso, Vettel, Tsunoda a little bit, Ricciardo, Perez
Alonso is past it. Coming back after two seasons away, especially at his age, was a silly idea.

Seb has been in the wilderness for a while. I'm hopeful, but not optimistic, that he can bounce back with AM in 2022 so that he can at least finish his F1 career on a high note.

Tsunoda is still a bit too green for F1 IMHO. Another year in F2 would've served him well. He's not the worst F1 rookie out there, but nor is he the best.

Danny Ric is an odd case. He's an excellent driver, but I can't see him winning a WDC. TBH I can see him retiring from F1 once he finishes up with McLaren, but not until another Aussie such as Oscar Piastri or Jack Doohan has worked their way up to F1.

I agree with @Coccxys wrt Checo. That second RB seat is bad news. However, it's not as though he's disgraced himself. When you consider the calibre of drivers that he's sandwiched between on the current F1 WDC standings (6th, between LeClerc and Danny Ric), he's had a respectable season thus far. I'd argue that the standings say as much about the rising talents of Lando and LeClerc as anything else.

If RB wins the Constructor's championship, Helmut and Horner would probably be delighted to keep Checo on in 2022, if only to prove that their second banana is better than M-B's.
 
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Danny Ric is an odd case. He's an excellent driver, but I can't see him winning a WDC.
Ricciardo is one of those lost generation of drivers where he got into a car capable of winning while the old guard were still winning and the up and coming tallent to replace the old guard was starting to get snatched up.

See also Perez and Grosjean as good drivers who started when big names were in the top teams but too early for teams to be snatching up potential replacements.

Ricciardo is a great driver but his only opportunity to win was at a Red Bull team who were totally focussed on keeping their new star in Max and Ricciardo was quickly playing second fiddle.
 
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So, the last Monegasque to take pole at Monaco was Louis Chiron. Bugatti Leclerc when?
Bugatti would be a perfect branding for VW's effort in this but the problem is that VW's motorsports programs have been on the backburner ever since Dieselgate. It would also require a billion dollars minimum for the team to get off the ground and it would most likely be set-up in the UK, France or Germany. That said, It can work but it's unlikely to result in much of anything compared to just developing a hypercar for the new ruleset in Le Mans.
 
Vettel has had a tough few years, the rule changes have fucked AM. Hopefully they will build a great car around him for 22. He has a style that needs a super stable rear end and if AM are smart that will be the main requirement for the 22 car.
Vettels last season was atrocious, but when you look at Leclerc, that wasn't a stellar run either (thanks to FIA banning Ferraris fuel fuckery). Like, assuming Vettel and Leclerc had performed on the same level, the season would still have been bad and I'd argue that a lot of times, Ferrari threw Vettel under the bus to act as a roadblock in favor of Leclerc. Like keeping him out way longer than he should be on worn tyres, so he'd slow down the rest of the field so Leclerc would lose less positions during a stop. It became blatantly obvious at times, when Vettel was almost begging to change medium tyres after 25ish laps and Ferrari refusing him a pitstop, so he drove on medium tyres for half the race until Leclerc caught up with him after his pitstop and then, they'd call in Vettel, give him hard tyres for 10 laps and then pit him again for medium tyres for the last 20 laps for no fucking reason. Or pitting him when he'd end up in thick traffic.

Sure, Vettel's performance in the 2020 Ferrari was so bad, he would not have done much better anyway, but the strategy buttfucked him so many times in such obvious ways, it was just disheartening.
His prime days are over, but last season wasn't really indicative of his skills and most people trashtalking him now conveniently overlook that he was the only driver in the past couple years that got even close to challenge Hamalam.
2020 was so bad, Vettel needs to rebuilt himself and his confidence from the ground up and I think you can tell that he's slowly warming up to the AM, given that his performance in Qualifying has become better and better . . . it's just equally obvious that AM is not competetive with the top teams at the moment. Hopefully, they'll put out a decent 22 car. I want to see Vettel leave on a high note.

I know I sound a lot like Vettel-fanboy here... well. maybe I am. It's just weird that I never gave much of a shit about him before 2020 and his bad performance in that year made me root for him. I guess I think it's unfair to overlook his great performance of the past and pretend that had nothing to do with his skill, just cause he had a bad 2019 season and an even worse season last year (a time when Ferrari was very clearly leaving him out in the rain, too).

Perez has a serious case of the RedBull second seat curse. RedBull always builds their car for their lead driver and it looks like Vestappen likes his cars near undrivable for others. It shows how bad it is when drivers are dropped from RedBull they seem to instantly do better in a much nicer (but slower) car to drive.
I would say Perez is doing quite good actually. Sure, he's not on the same level as Verstappen, but his performance this far was very solid and he shone last race, when he nursed his tyres for almost the entire race. I doubt anyone could copy that feat.

He was just tremendeously unlucky to run into the back of not one but three slow cars right before the last few corners yesterday in Qualifying. He had to slow down and missed the racing line for the last corners. Dunno how fast the rest of his lap was, but his bad starting position today is not a lack of skill, it was just really awful luck.
 
I would say Perez is doing quite good actually. Sure, he's not on the same level as Verstappen, but his performance this far was very solid and he shone last race, when he nursed his tyres for almost the entire race. I doubt anyone could copy that feat.
I would argue his qualifying and race performance in Barcelona was what cost Max the win. If Perez had been withing a pit stop distance of Hamilton Mercades wouldn't have made that call because Perez would have held him up. RedBull are always fighting merc 2 on 1 because the 2nd car can never keep up.
 
Leclerc's gearbox fucked, and probably without enough time to change it.

Edit: going to be a pitlane start (assuming it starts at all).

Edit 2: not starting at all, drive shaft fucked not enough time to change. You'd think Ferrari would have some top notch NDT equipment to have found that, maybe time to invest in some.
 
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Ferrari is such a fucking joke...
And of all the situations where it could have happened, it's not just when Leclerc is on pole, but when he's on pole on his home racetrack, the poor guy, this would have been such a great race for him. Sure, it was him who crashed and caused the problem, but for Ferrari to wibble-wobble on this issue until it's too late, fuck that shit.

I'm actually a bit anxious about the start. Hamilton on 7 is a recipe for heroics into saint devote. I sincerely hope there's no contact between him and Vettel :(
 
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