Looks a bit daft IMHO

Maybe it’s a weight saving tactic by LH. They give him back his chain before he gets weighed in after the race and the fraction of a second a lap he gains during the race adds up to a couple of seconds at the end.

“Straight outta Stevenage”

What a **** penis.

Boring but interesting race from a technical point of view.

Button managing to finish and only 2 laps down? Would’ve got god odds on that! Feel sorry for Magnussen though, all the hope of a drive and it nukes itself before the start! Oh well, one less engine for Alonso 😆
Ferrari are on the up at least.
Real shame Bottas couldn’t race as he’d probably have beaten Vettel.
If you look behind Mercedes then the rest of the teams should be squabbling over the rest of the season for any advantage.
Renault really have cocked up the engine! Are RBR strongly talking them down in the hope of buying the facilities cheap?
Hope Manor manage to run at Malaysia, otherwise it will be a lost cause for them I fear. No software for the ECU is not insurmountable in 9 days.

The season could go either way in terms of interest really. As long as there’s good racing down the field to keep the interest I’ll be happy.

As for Hamilton’s chain? In the circles he moves in you wear your wealth on you aka bling. He’s very wealthy so that means a big bit of bling! Not my thing (and I agree it does look ridiculous) but at least he’s doing things a bit different.

despite being cleared by his doctors?

He failed the car exit test! Where is the conspiracy?

Renault have talked about a full factory team again; maybe they will buy RedBull when they throw the rattle right out of the pram?

When I saw that pic of Lewis I initially thought that Hiplok had brought out a limited edition.
Wonder what bike he rides.

this guy was in town

Pleased that Button managed to finish; even if that car is way off the pace. Like he said though, it does appear to be a good basic package, so perhaps something that they can work on. Be amazed if they get any higher than mid-pack though, with the amount of ground they have to make up.
I love the fact that Button on the face of it, manages to stay optimistic. He looks a bit more enthused than he did last year.

Great to see Sauber getting involved and the rookie drivers having some decent results and not doing a ‘Grosjean’ with the over-enthusiastic first corner lunges.

I’m looking forward to LH’s first song release; it’s got to be in the pipeline…..
He does like to show his wealth off – used to follow him on Facebook, but it’s just a stream of photo’s of his many supercars, him getting on or off a private jet and a few pics of his bulldog. Very little about his actual racing, which is what I followed him for in the first place.

Stunning drive from Lewis

He just did his job, started from pole in the best car and won.

I quite like Lewis him trying to bring a bit of hiphop into the world of F1 makes me laugh. That chain must weigh a bit and he is a wee chap so I guess wearing it is part of some fitness regime.

Will be interesting who Williams get to drive if Bo77as isn’t fit for Malaysia, Wolf has no superlicense, neither does their other tester.
Mercedes are so far ahead its unreal, Hamilton is so full of swagger atm even at this stage I reckon the championship is his to lose.

It’ll be worth keeping an eye on which toys Horner throws out of the pram next, the Renault engine really is a turd, and with Newey taking a back seat its issues will be shown even more.

Remember how far ahead Button was in the Brawn – then halfway through the season everyone caught up.

The other Merc engine cars could improve.

The battle for 3rd will be great, and we should get the fun of the two Mercs dicing it out in Qually and race just like we did last year.

So it has all the ingredients to be a good spectacle.

“That chain must weigh a bit and he is a wee chap so I guess wearing it is part of some fitness regime.”

Do you think its a sort of neck strengthener to help with the G forces.

I quite like Lewis him trying to bring a bit of hiphop into the world of F1 makes me laugh. That chain must weigh a bit and he is a wee chap so I guess wearing it is part of some fitness regime.

I think eddiebaby has it. There’s probably a 24 carat bike in the garage.

Still, Bernie should be pleased that Lewis is widening the demographic of the audience for F1.

This may be like seeing things in clouds, but that peeking tatoo is unfortunate….

massa was making noises and eluding to the fact that maybe the williams engine wasnt the same as the one in the merc. I’m not sure if that is true but I still cant see how the engine formula of f12014/2015 can cause such disparity. I see the ferrari engined cars close ( bar manor) and also the renault engines too.

Yes aero to an a point but I think the regulations pretty much restrict too much innovation and change. Driveabilty seems to be bandied about but if the powertrain is the same its just down to configuration and setup of the car.

As much as the merc guys want a fight its not going to happen anytime soon and I suspect they could turn up the power later on.

To quote Grosjean ” I need more pooahhh”

So, from 2 weeks ago

So, money where your mouths are. Top 6 in Oz (assuming no crashes…).

I’m going for

1 Rosberg
2 Hamilton
3 Ricciardo
4 Vettel
5 Raikkonen
6 Kyvat

And an additional bet that McL will not finish either car, Maldonado will hit someone.

Didn’t do very well 😳

I did of course get Maldonado right 😉

Rosberg
Hamilton
Massa
Bottas
Vettel
Kimi
Grosjean
Ricciardo
Kyvat
Hulkenberg
Maldonado
Alonso
Verstappen
Erikson
Stevens
Nasr -dnf
Sainz -dnf
Button – dnf
Perez – dnf

Absolutely rubbish .. I reckon Alonso is going to race in malaysia and for Vettel to win the race 🙂

I did of course get Maldonado right

To be fair I think someone hit him! 🙂

massa was making noises and eluding to the fact that maybe the williams engine wasnt the same as the one in the merc.

Can someone please tell him the chassis and aero design can make a huge difference too.

As for people complaining- plenty of F1 races each season are processions. During the Schu years I stopped watching at one point and remember the odd races where everyones lapped but 1 etc?

Massa is almost certainly right – it came out last year too that Merc were giving their drivers more full power running than their customer teams. I wouldn’t be surprised if Merc get the latest engine maps/software ahead of the other teams too.

Obviously it’s not all down to the engines – the Merc chassis is clearly excellent but F1 is all about small margins (well, usually – Merc’s gap to the rest is anything but small…).

I think Williams run their own Hybrid system, they also run different fuel.

Renault really have cocked-up though. They’ve had a long time to close the gap. They need to be using some of their development tokens pretty sharpish or Merc will have this season wound up by Hungary.

No, that was in the past. The hybrid system is part of the Merc PU.

Brawn had no development budget.

Did you watch last year?

as for McL Honda, even running as others have said on this forum in “de-tuned” mode – allegedly, although i dont believe it, they couldnt get 2 cars to the grid.

They got one car to the finish, which is as many as Red Bull managed, and more than Lotus – teams which have had an extra year of development on their PUs. I presume your lack of belief in the Honda running detuned is based on the same level of knowledge you’re showing about everything else.

Good point about Brawn and his lack of budget.

I wonder if the others can come up with some aero developments to close the gap ?

back2basics – Member

as for McL Honda, even running as others have said on this forum in “de-tuned” mode – allegedly, although i dont believe it, they couldnt get 2 cars to the grid.
2 more races for Ron i think too….

Let me educate you a little bit

Ron Dennis now owns 75% of the business he is not about fire himself…

A Honda engineer has confirmed before the race that they had mapped the engine to run at 63.5% for reliability. After the race Arai said the specific issues they are having is air intake temperatures in the ICE and severe harvesting issues with the MGU-K.

Have you got a sauce for that? If so, then it’s just possible that the McHonda could be awesome when (if?) they fix those problems and can turn it up – I saw something suggesting the lap time difference to Mercedes was equivalent to 240bhp, which if that is true they could have in hand.

Oh, and right on cue:
http://www.espn.co.uk/f1/motorsport/story/194721.html

“When we were winning, and we were never winning to the advantage that they have, I remember that double diffusers were banned, exhausts were moved, flexible bodywork was prohibited, engine mapping mid-season was changed …
Read more at http://en.espnf1.com/f1/motorsport/story/194721.html#F3LzVwgmx1ToI3MA.99

http://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/fia-changed-rules-to-slow-red-bull-horner/
And asked if he feels Red Bull has been treated unfairly in other ways, he added: “Let’s put it this way — some of the decisions we have seen this year I think you could say were quite harsh.”

http://www.crash.net/f1/news/162083/1/red-bull-flexible-front-wings-fuss-a-compliment.html
“As always there is never a silver bullet. The performance of any car comes down to how design philosophy and a combination of components work as opposed to any one particular component.

“There are stringent tests. I am happy that our car complies with all the regulations and take it as a compliment to our engineers when a fuss like this is sometimes made by rival teams,” he added.

Whine, whine, whine…

Cry moar Red Bull.

Just because you can no longer win by ‘flexibly’ interpreting (SWIDT) the front wing rules they now have sand in their vaginas.

Every time I see Christian Horner and Helmut Weirdo’s sad little faces it cheers me up no end.

There was a lot more to their speed than flexy wings, mind…

aracer – Member

Have you got a sauce for that? If so, then it’s just possible that the McHonda could be awesome when (if?) they fix those problems and can turn it up – I saw something suggesting the lap time difference to Mercedes was equivalent to 240bhp, which if that is true they could have in hand.

Oh, and right on cue:
http://www.espn.co.uk/f1/motorsport/story/194721.html

Sorry it was 63%

It was a Fox Sports Asia interview by Alex Yoong of a Honda engineer pre race apparently he said.

decided to run at approximately 63% engine mapping to ensure they finish this race, but will tune it up and down in the race to further test some key components of the engines + Mclaren parts

The question though is what percentage would be normal for a race rather than qualifying for example – 80%, 90%, ?

Every time I see Christian Horner and Helmut Weirdo’s sad little faces it cheers me up no end.

Yeah, it’d be shit if there was another team capable of winning

but will tune it up and down in the race to further test some key components of the engines + Mclaren parts

Unless the drivers can do this from the steering wheel they can’t do this. Telemetry is 1 way, no adjustments can be sent back to the car.

The driver can do this from the car (to some extent) with different engine modes.

nemesis – Member
The question though is what percentage would be normal for a race rather than qualifying for example – 80%, 90%, ?

You are quite right it is impossible to extrapolate that figure all we can say is that it is massively detuned.

I think Arai also said over the weekend that on the dyno the results matched the Merc PU.

I’d have a small, not too large mind!, bet that a McLaren will be on the podium before the season is out.

Renault cars will be mid-points all season, and Ferrari may pick up a win if Lewis and Nico collide.

Gobsmacking though that people think ‘brand new back/brand new engine+limited testing and Mclarens chassis from 2014 – like everyone was going to be expecting podiums from the off for McLaren?

severe harvesting issues with the MGU-K.

Honda should get one of these 😉

I suppose the question is how much merc managed to improve their engine between the start of last year and this year as it was generally fairly reliable from the off – nothing like Honda – so it is possible.

And the chassis ditto.

Unlikely though, I agree but similarly there are plenty of races and if they can chip away at the problems podiums aren’t a crazy prospect.