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F1 2017

scott43

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I think Bottas expects (or hopes..) to be at Mercedes longer than Lewis..probably he didn't want to be That Guy who starts causing waves. Maybe he's banking some karma to be used up later. Ultimately, if he's not on pace, he's going to be asked to let him by..and if you make it too obvious..you get another whatshisname situation..where everyone holds up their hands and says "The sky is falling!". ogsmile I like to think Bottas graciously dedicated himself to team happiness.
 

Mikey

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I agree with everything you typed. I think that is the exactly Bottas mindset. But, the words up until yesterday were, "we are going to let our guys race" and that didn't happen. Now Toto comes out and says, ya, we are going to look at team orders. His words say it will be equal between the two drivers. i.e. if a situation similar to Bahrain is reversed then Hamilton will be asked to move over. I just don't see that happening. I think the season will turn out that fans will have never seen a more obvious #2 than Bottas.

I'm not even sure you'll see much of an uproar about team orders. How was the coverage in Canada? Do you get the NBC sports feed with all British team Matchett, Diffey, Hobbs, and Buxton? Over here in Asia, we get Fox Sports 1 with all British Martin Brundle and David Croft. A lot of air time was spent talking about team orders and when Bottas would move over as if that was a given and acceptable.

Hope Ferrari and Vettel can keep bringing it. They seem to be down just a bit on overall power, but make up for it by being easier on their tires. Starts for Ferrari are crucial where they need to at least be in 2nd position. Any bets on when the driver love-fest ends and smiles disappear? It's close now :)
 

scott43

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We get the Brit feed with Brundle. I think, ultimately, it's a team sport. I know they say they can race each other..but at the same time, if team-mates collide I'm sure it's a heated exchange with team leaders afterward. I'd like to see them race but I get the team orders thing. There's a lot of money in it for those teams and if blow each other up to the benefit of Ferrari, questions will be raised. It's a tough thing but I get it. Like I say, Lewis may be done F1 shortly and Bottas is probably waiting his turn.
 

Erik Timmerman

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I don't know if it would have mattered, but it seems like Mercedes should have covered the undercut with at least one of their cars (probably Bottas). The safety car negated that, but it seems like they are really slipping when it comes to strategy.

Was anybody else surprised to see Massa finish where he did?
 

Mikey

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@epic, ya, great finish by Massa, however there were 6 drivers who didn't finish the race. Almost certainly Verstappen would have have been ahead. Of the others, his teammate Stroll might have been in the mix had he not been T-boned by Sainz, Magnussen/Haas could have been in there as well. There really is some great racing from 4th place on back. Nice aggressive, even wheel banging passing. Love it.

@scott43 and @epic, sure, I understand that there are team orders to some extent, but overt #1 and #2 drivers became very taboo in the Michael Schumacher/Rubens Barrichello era (don't want to open up that wound Scott...just bringing up the example for this discussion ogsmile ). Heck, even for a MS fan like me, I found the whole thing really distasteful in Austria in 2001 and really felt like the teammates should always have been allowed to race. Point being, from that point on, everyone seemed to be clear. Team orders bad. Now... I don't know.. maybe my dislike for Hamilton and a biased British media that IMO, played a part in Rosberg exiting, has me seeing ghosts, but it just seems like it is all now very acceptable. My fear is that Bottas will no longer be racing to win but will instead be blocking for Hamilton. Probably paranoid of the bogeyman hiding in the closet, but we'll see ;-)

I'm also not so sure about Hamilton exiting F1 being a given. I agree that happens if he can't win the championship this year and can't see a way to do it easily over the course of the next 4 to 5 years (matching or beating MS total).

Having said all that...this season is so far shaping up very nicely. Maybe RB can get it together and get into the mix. If only we can get some real passing at the front instead of getting it done through tire strategy and being told to move over :P
 

Mikey

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Anyone going to be watching the Indy 500 this year to see how Alonso fares? Would love to see him do well.
 

Erik Timmerman

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I will be. Haven't watched in years. Probably not since Penske ran those crazy ILMOR engines. Definitely not since the IRL split.
 

scott43

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Anyone going to be watching the Indy 500 this year to see how Alonso fares? Would love to see him do well.

I'll probably watch for the circus aspect of it. I highly respect his driving ability. If anyone can get up to speed it might be him. It's a jump though..I don't think it will be as easy as he thinks..or maybe everyone else thinks..I think he probably has an idea that it won't be simple.
 

Mikey

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I will be. Haven't watched in years. Probably not since Penske ran those crazy ILMOR engines. Definitely not since the IRL split.

Don't get me started on that topic... :nono:

Same boat. Haven't cared since then either. Ya, I'm guessing it'll be a circus and I'm sure a breathless story line. Still, he's got one of the best in the business guiding him. If he's really serious and driven to win the 500, we could see him near the top. It'll be interesting to see how May develops.
 

Mikey

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Was Sochi a snore-fest or what? Not one pass after the safety car?

Great individual race by Bottas though especially recovering from the flat spot, going quick enough and not making any mistakes. Very classy of Vettel with his post-race remarks.

My problem, once again is with Brundle and Croft, the non-dynamic duo. While they were doing the "What If's" at the end and saying something to the effect, "Well, Mercedes couldn't get Hamilton up close enough to engineer anything" and made another comment as well. So are they really accepting and promoting, this early in the season of team orders that are as clear as they are suggesting? Hypocritically, the two seemed giddy that Vettel was sure to come out in back of Raikkonnen (Did they *really* think Ferrari wasn't managing things?). Anyway, the conversation then became about if that happens, Ferrari will have a real problem with one of their drivers being unhappy. Croft went on to say something like, "Well if Raikkonen is asked to move over, I hope Raikkonen refuses".

The bias in their reporting is pretty obvious. Blatant and nauseating at times.

I never got a chance to hear Murray Walker at length, but from what I heard, he just reported racing in an enthusiastic, yet neutral way, much the way Nick Harris of Motogp announces. I guess those days are just about gone.
 

scott43

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Yeah, pretty boring. Seems like the buffer to following cars is up around 3 seconds. They couldn't really seem to get any closer..too much aero disturbance for cooling and grip. Was horrendously boring. Except for Grosjean and Palmer trying to put 2 cars into a 1 car parking space... :roflmao:
 

DbSki

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Go back to some degree's of ground effect systems and get rid of above car only aero so cars can follow closer to exploit overtaking opportunities.
 

Mikey

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Go back to some degree's of ground effect systems and get rid of above car only aero so cars can follow closer to exploit overtaking opportunities.

I'm hopeful that Brawn and team can come up with the right answers. I know there are downsides to ground effect systems, but as you said, some degree may not be bad. I'd say get rid of strong aero above or below the car. Make the cars harder to handle and put a premium on getting it right in the braking zone.

Did you see the video of that horrendous crash of Billy Monger in F4? What stood out to me was how much of a handful that car was. F1 drivers barely move the steering wheel nowadays. I guess one of the problems is GP2/Formula 2 is getting a lot faster so Formula 1 has to be faster. Fairly recently GP2’s fastest qualifiers were occasionally faster than the slowest F1 drivers.

It's tricky at this point of the technical evolution of motorsports. Maybe get rid of GP2? That would leave a little breathing room for Formula 1 to be technically advanced in some key areas while keeping it simple in other areas to allow for closer racing.

Or....just start completely over to include all the racetracks and design it for the next 40 years of technical evolution. :huh:
 

DbSki

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A ground effect system that used air from above for the effect would be less dangerous than one that relied critically on ground clearance.
Blown diffusers allowed again, and other measures to reduce above car aero wake not necessarily ground effect systems.
Like something on the rear that promotes cleaner flow off the rear of the car and reduces side wake so that other cars can get closer to them and not suffer as badly.
 

Erik Timmerman

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I actually thought the race at the front was pretty exciting. Vettel staying out 10 laps longer on Ultras? Watching the time and trying to guess at the pit stop delta. Had Bottas stopped too early. Seeing the huge 6 second gap close down so fast on the final stint. Back markers, etc. There was stuff happening if you knew where to look.
 

scott43

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I understand your enthusiasm epic but when you're pointing at passes of backmarkers as excitement there's a problem!! :D
 

Mikey

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I actually thought the race at the front was pretty exciting. Vettel staying out 10 laps longer on Ultras? Watching the time and trying to guess at the pit stop delta. Had Bottas stopped too early. Seeing the huge 6 second gap close down so fast on the final stint. Back markers, etc. There was stuff happening if you knew where to look.

Sure, the suspense to see how Ferrari's evolving strategy would pan out was a welcome bright spot to an otherwise boring race ogsmile Really though, no passes for position after the safety car? Personally, I wasn't worried about the gap or that they had made a mistake as the announcers (Brundle and Croft) were trying to make out. He had +-27 seconds in hand and they were on a 1 stop race, so no way would Ferrari screw it up that bad. I thought for sure once Bottas flat-spotted, he was done and he did a great job keeping it together. Too bad Massa got in the way either on purpose or accident. As Vettel said, he doubted he'd get by Bottas, but it would have been even closer. Wonder what would have happened had they brought Vettel in a couple laps earlier.

Well, we'll start hearing more and more news on how Alonso is doing at Indy. Speaking of Alonso..man, you have to feel for the guy. The picture of pure disgust, pulling in to the start of the pit lane before the start, getting out and walking away quickly. Sure hope Honda can get it together. It's a much different culture in Japan, wonder what is being said behind the scenes at Honda. Eddie Jordan thinks McLaren has already made a deal with Mercedes which McLaren flatly denies.
 

Erik Timmerman

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I sort of wondered if Alonso parked it where he did to force the extra lap out of pure loathing. I mean could he not have pulled behind a wall somewhere earlier in the lap? Could he not have made it down pit lane? Or was he troubleshooting the car the whole time and it finally died right where he stopped? Not that I blame him. What a fiasco.
 

Mikey

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Ya, I thought the same thing. Leaving the dead Honda out in the open for the entire world to see.
 

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