Well this season is starting to get really interesting. We are seeing Norris (slightly) crack under the pressure and weight of being the overwhelming favourite to struggling to keep up with his less experienced teammate. How long will the teammates stay “friendly” towards each other?
Then we have Max, who on his day, can be brilliant. However, he is very Jekyll & Hyde and in the Spanish GP, we saw his worst. Now, I’m not a Max fan but the F1 / FIA need to start taking stronger action against him or there could be a situation where he might hurt someone badly.
The rest of the field is proving very interesting to watch, Mercedes being dark horses but can they keep up? The Ferrari’s have done what they normally do, look excellent at testing and then fall off quickly. Hamilton’s decline is starting to be really noticeable (hopefully I’m wrong).
Piastri is clearly a better driver and more likely world champion. It’ll be interesting to see how McLaren handle it as the season unfolds. When will Lando become the de facto number 2.
Max is very good at driving a far superior car off into the distance, the jury is still out on whether he’s a good racer. Of course he was very poorly managed by his team (twice) in the safety car period yesterday. They should have left him out and then they shouldn’t have told him to give the place back to Russell. He certainly should have received a harsher penlaty, as per Schumacher in 97 and Senna in 89.
Lewis’s struggles at Ferrari are exactly what i was worried about. The team have given him a slow car and lack the professionalism he was used to at Merc. I can see next season being his last if Ferrari don’t adapt to the new regs quickly.
Hmm, I think we’re way too early in the season to make that judgement. Lando’s biggest issue is overdriving in qualifying and getting off the line, his race craft is excellent.
In fact, with McLaren’s genius development on what they have done with the brake ducts, bringing in cooling allowing for much longer deg, this has actually masked Piastri’s biggest weakness, his tyre management.
McLaren are a long way from calling a number 2 - why would they? They should have the WCC sown up by August which is what they actually get paid on, after that, they will let the boys race until the final Grand Prix unless it becomes mathematically impossible for the other, then they will run rear gunner.
There are plenty of swings and roundabouts in this season yet.
Max is a good racer but only when things are going his way. He is too emotional in the cockpit which caused the problems yesterday and he isn’t able to let things go. If he was driving from Mercedes or McLaren, they wouldn’t take it. Lauda would have stamped that out of his very quickly (if they ever worked together).
I have a feeling that this is Lewis’ last season. I know he has 2 yrs on his contract but Ferrari won’t keep a struggling ex-champion, it’ll damage the brand too much & after Lewis’ press yesterday, it sounded like he’s given up.
a generationally awful thread, this
In terms of subject matter or commentary?
I don’t really follow F1. I’ve tried, I’ve dabbled, I can’t get into it. Albeit I came onto this thread because I saw the events of last weekend and it piqued my interest. I don’t know anything about brakes, cooling or anything technical, but an emotionally charged dust-up was fascinating to watch.
It’s no worse than cricket
Everyone has different interests when it comes to sport. I can’t stand NFL because its so stop start & I see Darts & Snooker as not being a sport, more of a pub game but thats just me.
@eric_plant, if you don’t like a thread, don’t read it…?
When the race is on a proper circuit, the race is more enjoyable to watch. Circuits like Monaco have the history but as they haven’t changed, it makes the race a non-event.
Everyone like some emotion coming out which adds the extra dynamic. They pop up every few seasons that can include some of the battles like Hamilton vs Rosberg, Vettel vs Webber & Hamilton vs Max V.
We have a decent race next; Montreal. Lots of overtaking opportunities and quite often brings in some mixed weather.
Also one of the drivers’ favourite circuits and a firm fans favourite.
With some slow corners, T1, T2 and T10, expect Ferrari and Mercedes to be back in this fighting the McLaren’s and RBR.
Too early to see what the weather will be like, but basically, with McLaren being ballerinas with their tyres, the cooler the temps, the better for the opposition to attack McLaren although they still start very firm favourites purely down to overall package.
From what George Russell said this weekend, it seems that the Mercedes performs better at cooler temperatures so they might be a dark horse for the next GP
Correct. Colder temps; less degradation although the circuit is quite easy on tyres full stop as there is only really one heavy breaking zone (T10).
Mercedes proved their pace at a similar medium speed circuit at Imola with Kimi on pole.
Should be a cracking race.
I’m not into motor racing but I only glanced at the thread headline and thought it was going to be an appraisal of our season in League One. In fact, reading the opening paragraph, I assumed that the reference to Norris and his less experienced teammate was about Will and Franco. Even the start of the second paragraph about Max rang true until the reference to his participation in the Spanish GP.
Feel a bit bad for Lando, it was a brilliant move at the hairpin, but he ended up going for a gap that simply wasn’t there.
It was bound to happen at some point and it was exactly the same thing that happened between Button & Hamilton
Silly move but at least he took responsibly for it and didn’t take out his teammate.
Unfortunately, with Piastri having DRS by that time, he lost his opportunity.
It’s far from terminal for Lando, still 14 races to go; but you do wonder if that was a pivotal moment in the WDC.
And whilst Montreal is a weaker track for McLaren, I suspect Norris will be taking one hell of a bollocking from management throwing away those WCC points as Red Bull, Mercedes and Ferrari continue to develop.
When do you think the teams will stop trying to improve their current car and focus on the 2026 car (as I’m guessing they are allowed to start designing it now?)
That’s partly why i feel bad for him. He seems like a nice kid, just not ruthless enough to be a world champion.
The top teams confirmed this week they haven’t yet, i would imagine Aston and Adrian Newey started a long time ago.
I thought there was a blanket rule that teams weren’t allowed to start designing their cars until a certain point in the season as the FIA didn’t want teams to reach the limit of these new cars by next season
Teams can work on next year’s car whenever they want; provided they don’t breach budget cap limits.