Bring back Hunt The Shunt!
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Did you see Jenson driving his old car?
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I know they’re new cars but how could every other team get it so wrong or is it simply Red Bull has wiings
Ferrari had the faster car for a large part of this season, but keep messing up their strategy plus their drivers make more mistakes. Mercedes, now they’ve resolved their porpoising issues, are starting to look like they’re closing up, could have won this race. They also messed up their strategy at the end.
I think the standings give a skewed view of this season. It should have been much closer.
Red Bull and it’s drivers have just been very consistent. Good strategy, no mistakes, maximising points when they couldn’t win.
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Perez has not been consistent. Max’s car is different in its set up to Max’s.
Max and his car at their best and I think Red bull are pushing his car and hoping it will last the season. It’s a gamble that is paying off.
I think Perez has just been slow, not inconsistent.
One problem is that the type of car that suits his driving style is not the same as suits Verstappen’s. But then again, even the first couple of races where the car was more suited to him and Verstappen didn’t feel comfortable in it, Verstappen was still faster! That difference only increased as the car was developed to suit Verstappen better.
I wonder if RedBull regret that multi year contract by now.
Well, thank heavens there’re not considering VAR.
Yet…
That’s what they have as of this season (can’t recall which name they use, but it’s exactly that). It was one of the measures implemented after last season’s problems.
I don’t think Merc messed up their strategy at all, as soon as the safety car came out, Lewis was doomed.
George made the call to switch to softs and Merc agreed.
Lewis didn’t help himself by having the engine in the worng mode at the restart, which is why Max got past him so easily (he should also perhaps, just perhaps, have left flooring it until a bit later before the line to try and stop Max getting the tow) but frankly he would have only had a lap at most anyway.
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I think they did. They could have either tried to go for a Lewis victory by also keeping Russel out for him to try and hold up Verstappen as Lewis created a gap. I think the worst case scenario would have been 2nd and 4th as now. Or, even better, pitted both and clinched an easy 2nd and 3rd.
I don’t see how what they did is not a strategic mistake. I don’t see any scenario in which this could have resulted in anything better than the other two options.
Not a chance. Once the safety car came out and Max/Red Bull committed to a fresh pair of softs there was no way Lewis and/or George would be able to hold off the very rapid RB which was now right on their bum.
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I agree but Merc threw away a second and third, for a second and fourth.
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But as I (and @bruss ) wrote, the worst case scenario was the current result. With keeping both cars on the same strategy they had a chance of something better. Either an (outside) chance of winning, or an almost certain 2nd and 3rd.
For reasons best known to themselves they went with the option that resulted 2nd and 4th, and might have easily been 2nd and 5th.
Hamilton of course realised, that’s why he was so angry. Russel moved up a place compared to the other strategies at the expense of Hamilton dropping a minium of two. He had been stuffed in his own words.
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This seems a possibility. Think of a driver like Alonso in second making his car as wide as possible. But such a plan relies on George driving for the team and not himself. I don’t see much evidence of that happening. He acts like the seven times World Champion he isn’t.
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I like George. The face of fresh innocence. The driving ability which could be among the very best. The TV persona of Joe Clean. The steely heart of a cold, single minded bastard.
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Yes he has the right attitude to win. He just hasn’t yet.
And this weekend I think it cost the team.
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Innocence, LOL. You don’t get to the front of F1 by being innocent.
He hasn’t got there yet
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“The thinking was that we had a medium that had five racing laps on plus track position, and we took that decision,” Wolff explained. "I don’t think that on a par with the same tyre we could have overtaken the Red Bull with the straight-line speed.
“We’ve seen that with [Carlos] Sainz that we aren’t really able to pass him at the beginning, so that was the call. Every single day of my life I would rather risk everything for winning the race rather than cementing in second and third.”
It’s unclear to me which RedBull they would have had to overtake. Not for any of the scenarios above anyway.
Also this seems to be about Hamilton only, where the issue was they did pit Russell. They should have either pitted both or neither.