The F1 2015 thread…

I reckon Hamilton will still win this – although it looks like it will come down to pit stops.

Williams need to pit bottas first, give him the bonus of the under cut while massa backs up the mercs, then that might buy them time. If Hamilton pits first he’ll win

Edit right on cue Lewis pits. Bet he’s a mile ahead one the Williams are done

Showers inbound. Reckon that’ll sort things out a bit

Must be due a whiney Rosberg radio msg soon.

I was wondering how long it would take for the rain to get over there. We have a torrential downpour around the start of the race here in north Somerset.

roll of the dice there

Hamilton may have just made a very smart move

Got to feel that Williams had the pace to do better today but just didn’t make the most of it.

Bottas certainly lost out today. Shame, it would have made a more exciting race if he had got past Massa early on. He deserves a podium really.

That was an entertaining race, thank god for rain and fast starting Williams

Yeah, seconded – really enjoyed that. 🙂

Hamilton may have just made a very smart move

Definitely make or break – honestly, I thought it was race lost right there but he called that perfectly, as did Vettel. Belting stuff. 🙂 Shame for the Williams folks, felt like the weather messed them up today.

Shame for the Williams folks, felt like the weather messed them up today.

Williams messed their own race up today – with their pace Vettel shouldn’t have been anywhere near.

PS – Is it wrong to think of this as a British GP win for Tyrrell? 🙂

pondo – yeah here’s to uncle ken and the Horsley crew!

Williams messed their own race up today – with their pace Vettel shouldn’t have been anywhere near.

To be fair, was that not made by Vettel making the same inspired stop that Hamilton made?

I get the feeling Williams have forgotten how to win. They dont seem to want to roll the dice or react quickly enough. their steady eddy approach which may be good for a few points. Unfortunate to see them drop from 1-2 to 4-5 as I really wanted them to win. Some one help out the trackside operations please.
“Felipe the car behind is faster than you!”

More financial trouble for Lotus (bargain price for Renault!?)…

http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/2015/07/07/f1-fanatic-round-up-0707-2/

Bottas seemed to go to pieces when it rained. He would have pitted earlier than Kimi if they’d let him.

Is he a bit ropey in the wet, or is the Williams crap in the rain?

the williams was crap in the rain, the merc had more wing

Williams always run low down force compared to say merc, so they struggle with changeable conditions.

Yep – in the dry they still have good enough cornering speed and plenty enough straight line speed to hold of Mercedes once in front. In the wet it’s a different matter and they’re sitting ducks. Hence their strategy made no difference – at best they might have finished ahead of Vettel, but that’s unlikely.

Very sad news today about Jules Bianchi.

Link

Very sad indeed. Rest well Jukes…

RIP jules

Very sad news and a totally tragic set of circumstances with the accident. RIP Jules.

RIP jb17 p9 in monaco

sad day indeed – although the press are saying its the first f1 driver to die since senna in 94, although technically should that not be Maria de Villota? as she was in an F1 car and contracted as a an F1 test driver.

Bottassssssssssssssssssssssssss wearing the prancing horse next year…
I wonder now about the Williams line up for next year- certainly they are not as cash strapped as before, but a high profile driver bringing in some money would always be a help – i cannot see Williams winning a title with the Merc engine, simply because of its “customer” status — they are either going to have to go it alone on the engine front or become a works team for another supplier…..*cough*Renault*cough*………….

Sad news RIP Jules

Sad news, RIP. The whole incident, like that of de Villota seemed so avoidable.

become a works team for another supplier…..*cough*Renault*cough*………….

Won’t be winning a title with that engine unless Renault pull the finger out….

the RBR Renault relationship has gone past the point of no return – Lotus are in trouble with finances so Renault and Williams tie up not so hard to believe -would generate a bit of Press due to the history of the team,
but
do williams want to potentially spend another few years in the potential midfield that they have just got out of….

I think the Renault engine debacle is a smokescreen from Horner. Fact is that they are also getting beaten by other teams with the same engine, so first they need to do a better job and be the best Renault runner before they can start laying into the engine supplier. In fact I wonder if their current car would be beating Williams if they could bolt a Merc into the back of it.

I think Renault will most likely be buying up/back Lotus – it’d be competitive suicide for Williams to go away from merc at the moment, though remembering the Judd days it’s not beyond the realms of possibility. The team should be starting to work well now though, the 2013 staff changes should be bedding in, the 2014 prize money starting to have an impact and strengthening their commercial/sponsorship opportunities to bring a few £M more for 2016. Plus the cash they’ll be getting for BOTTAS of course.

It’ll be interesting to see how the first tranche of reg changes affect things in Hungary. Of the current crop of drivers it seems that Nico is one of the most reliant on pit info/instructions.

A really dominant performance from Lewis Hamilton today: James Allen on F1[/url]. Is Rosberg starting to crumble?

and in other news McLaren & Honda turn up the engine ……..again………..
the cars a lemon, they must be thinking of abandoning any development on the car and starting the 2016 car , but i guess they will to know what drivers they will be driving – because its not alonso or button (IMHO)…. Ron will also need to be looking for a new job too, or perhaps he’ll just go back to marketing his sports cars…

lets hope for rain , otherwise we could be in for a boring race up front.

lets hope for rain , otherwise we could be in for a boring race up front.

I think that there could be an interesting battle between Red Bull and Ferrari though

Why is everyone talking about the starts changing from Spa? I half heard something regarding the clutches I think?

alonso is on his way….

2016:
he’ll be in leMans next year
button at williams
mclaren with 2 teenage drivers
ron dennis on gardening leave

…as for clutches
they used to practice “bite point” tests on the warm up lap and the team will give them data on whats the best point and setting to use, now they are not allowed to do that as thats “telling the drivers how to drive the car” which brakes some stupidarserule about the drivers must drive the car alone…
its basically one of those great f1 fudges that come in every time someone dominates and they try and change things around without actually changing the rules because teams would then block the rule change….

Some interesting extrapolation from the linked article there back2basics.

its basically one of those great f1 fudges that come in every time someone dominates and they try and change things around without actually changing the rules because teams would then block the rule change….

Isn’t it more to do with starts becoming pretty much fully automatic, rather than domination?

Although yesterday it looked like Merc has already found a way around the new regs. Lewis and Nico were testing bitepoints when they stopped after qually.

Re Alonso – I think at the very least we’ll see him in 2016. Seems odd to endure a season such as this just to pack in when things could be very different next year.

According to b2bs earlier posts alonso should have already quit taking Ron with him. I reckon they’ll both keep their seats next year. Though a team of button webber and alonso at le mans would be interesting