If he didn’t have the pace to overtake Norri I can’t see how he would have done any better against Verstappen. It would have also handed over the lead in the drivers championship from Norris to Verstappen, so it would be hard to believe that McLaren would have done that
They could have said, swap places and see if you can get Verstappen, if not swap back on last lap. It looked like he had the pace to attack at least, getting past Max is another matter of course 😁
Lando has proven he can’t overtake Max - Max is just too smart for him.
I’ll admit I’m not a huge Lando fan, he just seems a bit lax in his approach.
If Lando can't pass Max and Oscar can't pass Lando, there's not much chance that Oscar can pass Max. Lando outqualified Oscar and led him all race, plus is ahead in the championship, why would McLaren impose team orders?
Well that was dull.
😴 😴 😴 😴 struggled to stay awake through out the race 😴 😴 😴 😴
Was Hamilton the only one in the top ten to overtake someone for a different position from where they qualified?
They were under no threat from behind - there was no risk to trying it.
Let Piastri go and have a go at Max.
if he can’t overtake flip the positions back (as many other teams have done in the past).
If he did overtake he could then try and back Max into Lando.
A safe strategy from McLaren, and history as shown you can’t gift Max wins. Red Bull are getting on top of this seasons car. McLaren can’t assume they’ll have a season long advantage.
Just watched the 1st two laps and then sped up to 6x for the rest. Normal speed for the pit incident which just looked like the McClaren was either unsafe release or just driving hoping that someone had added some new track. Weird.
After a race that promised much, I was disappointed. Did I miss anything, other than an evening watching something else?
Did I miss anything, other than an evening watching something else?
Nope! Probably the most processional "race" I've ever sat thru...
Probably the most processional "race" I've ever sat thru...
It was a pretty typical F1 race. There was tension because any of the top three could have won it up to the final lap if the guys in front made a mistake, but that didn't happen and they finished the way they started.
It was a pretty typical F1 race.
Apart from Hamilton and Hadjar swapping 7th and 8th (and that was almost entirely attributable to Hamiltons' different tyre strategy), the top ten qualifiers finished in exactly the same order as they started. I don't recall* any other on-track overtaking within the top 10 and even during the pit stops, there was little, if any, real changes in position.
Outside of Monaco, has that ever happened before??
Also, there seemed to be no tyre degradation or strategy jeopardy, no mechanical issues, no crashes or red flags. I don't even recall any yellow flags....
The two highlights/controversies were manufactured by McLaren but were non events:
The LN/MV pitlane exit race and the "will they/won't they" swap Norris and Patrasi positions.
So, not what I would call a typical race at all!
* I might have been asleep at various stages of the race
Ha: Patrasi meaning Piastri, obviously!
I thought it was an intriguing race. It had the potential to come alive towards the end but fizzled out.
Max basically controlled the entire field in his slower car, meaning the cars were so close there were no gaps to fall into so everyone stuck with their safe or sub-optimal pit stop strategies.
It's more boring when someone romps off into the distance and has a 20 second lead after 10 laps!
The lack of overtaking was partly due to Pirelli bringing tyres at least 1 step too hard to the race. That meant an easy one stop with no significant degradation of the hards so no opportunity for the cars/drivers that are kinder to their tyres to make a difference. The rain would've spiced things up a bit but that didn't happen and nobody really went off apart from skipping the chicane. I expect this is a blip (apart from Monaco) and Bahrain will serve up more action - though IIRC there was a Bahrain GP a few years back where pretty much nothing changed from lights to flag.
The lack of overtaking was partly due to Pirelli bringing tyres at least 1 step too hard to the race. That meant an easy one stop with no significant degradation of the hards so no opportunity for the cars/drivers that are kinder to their tyres to make a difference. The rain would've spiced things up a bit but that didn't happen and nobody really went off apart from skipping the chicane. I expect this is a blip (apart from Monaco) and Bahrain will serve up more action - though IIRC there was a Bahrain GP a few years back where pretty much nothing changed from lights to flag.
Yes I think you're right there. It's a tough track to overtake at in a recent F1 car anyway, and the chilly weather & too hard compound nullified the tyre differences. The next 3 races (Bahrain, Saudi & Miami) are much warmer so should be more normal in that regard.
I think the cars are also starting to get more sensitive to dirty air again (and/or they're chucking out more dirty air).
Glad it’s been a bit unpredictable start to the season, as I’m off to Suzuka next week. The flight and F1 ticket when I booked in September was still cheaper then going to Silverstone…
So how was the trip? Expect you're either still there or still on a plane.
“The lack of overtaking was partly due to Pirelli bringing tyres at least 1 step too hard to the race.”
I wonder if they got caught out by the new surface
I wonder if they got caught out by the new surface
I think everyone did. Thing is, the drivers usually moan about the tyres being too fragile and they have to nurse them. That was done deliberately to try and stop races being a procession. Now that we had a race where the tyres didn't fall apart and the drivers could race without nursing them, everyone's complaining that it was a procession. If it had rained, it would have brought the race alive. That would be easy to fix, just put sprinklers around the circuit and use some sort of randomized algorithm to make it rain unpredictably every race.
Even the 8 minute long highlights well dull .
Yeah a dull race and much as I dislike verstappen there was nothing wrong with the pit lane exit. Even the onboard showed he didn’t turn towards lando.
Yeah a dull race and much as I dislike verstappen there was nothing wrong with the pit lane exit. Even the onboard showed he didn’t turn towards lando.
Yeah, I thought that Max would squeeze him right to the edge, but to his credit Max gave him space and made him look silly. Credit to Lando though, he timed switching the pit limiter off to perfection which gave him the jump. A second more advantage from the pit stop and he could have had joined the track slightly ahead then had the inside line into T1.
So yeah worth a punt, but wasn't quite on!
First time I can ever remember seeing Verstappen being involved in something and thinking 'that wasn't really his fault', just Norris being optimistic
.
Incredibly dull race but quite a few people performing better than expected - Verstappen, Antonelli, Hadjar, Albon, Bearman, all very good
What happened to Stroll? He'd actually started the season really well but he was just nowhere this time.
Pmsl ‘night max’
Piastri is looking pretty racey
Piastri is looking pretty racey
Yeah, if he can keep it in front at turn one then it should be a good opportunity for him vs Lando in the WDC.
I hope to be proved wrong but I think the Mclaren will be much stronger than the Ferrari or the Merc over a race distance.
edit- bit shitty about the late deleted laps
mercs demoted one place due to the medical car thing
Piastri is looking pretty racey
I’m going to double down on my prediction from earlier in the thread: he’ll beat Norris this year. Before long I might even start predicting that either Verstappen or Russell will as well.
Yuki’s looking good. Antonelli and Hadjar still mighty impressive. Good to see Sainz getting the ball rolling. Hamilton looks lost—hard to know whether he simply can’t get on with the ground effect cars or he’s done an Alonso and left Merc just as they nail their car. Or both.
Norris just doesn't seem to have the edge needed to be WDC. His language about himself is very defeatist at times.
The WDC is for Piastri to loose now to my mind, this is a huge blow for Norris. Think it's even worse with it being Bahrain where they do winter testing, so he can't say I'm not familiar with the track.
He'll start overdrive next making more and more mistakes.
Norris just doesn't seem to have the edge needed to be WDC. His language about himself is very defeatist at times.
It wasn’t until watching Drive To Survive earlier this year that I realised the extent of Lando’s self-doubt and his apparent inability focus on just winning at all costs. I don’t think I’ve seen that from anyone who’s reached F1, let alone someone with a shot at the WDC. (See also the scene in the Red Bull garage at the end of Hungary where Horner says, “Max never would have done that”.) And even before DTS, Monza last year was very telling: it was clear then that if Piastri could be closer to Norris on pace and more consistent with it, any resulting fight was only ever going to go one way.
Should make for an interesting bit of soap opera this year, I think.
Nice battle there at the end, expect there will be a 5s penalty for GR though - which I think drops him back below LEC.
A good race that; some great overtakes, close battles and Max anonymous!
Max anonymous!
You say that, but he still scraped a P6 out of it
Masterclass from Piastri. Currently looking the stronger of the 2 McLaren drivers
no further action re. George DRS
Tensions running high at Red Bull...
https://bsky.app/profile/crashnetf1.bsky.social/post/3lmppwvceac2l
My money's on Max moving to Merc next year.
Good race with lots of action. Lewis clearly hasn’t figured out the car. No5 sure if it’s time to play catch up with leclerc or if he’s just not here he was anymore.
As for max and next year that’s a big risk as who knows what the ne2 car pecking order will be with the new regulation. No one would have predicted Mercedes so wrong for these regs.
Lewis is working on it - article about it below. And he also said he'd no used Brembo brakes in 15 years, always Carbon Industries ones...
Looks like pole position is going to be a McLaren then. Is anyone else expecting the McLaren dominance to end once the flexi wings are banned? Or am I missing something?
McLaren don't think that will be the case...
https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/mclaren-hits-back-at-red-bull-over-flexi-wing-accusations-f1/
Well Lando’s dropped it so it’ll not be him! Max is back…
Max is a tough bugger to beat, isn’t he?! I put a cheeky bet on him to win the championship back at the start of the season when the odds were good, I’ll win a fairly decent amount if he pulls it off
x2 races in a row where Lando hasnt made the most of quali.
Advantage to Oscar again
Max is a tough bugger to beat, isn’t he?! I put a cheeky bet on him to win the championship back at the start of the season when the odds were good, I’ll win a fairly decent amount if he pulls it off
My feeling is it going to be a Prost/Mansell/Piquet scenario where teammates take points off each other and keep the other driver in contention.
