Formula 1 2023 Season

Lewis says his Mea Culpa.. Luckily George doesn't seem to have a lot of damage. Sucks since George has the pace to run with the lead pack (Alonso and the Macs anyway)

I'm digging the max laps vs the usual cruising around to save a stop deal.

Perez really made the most of the Hamilton DNF to solidify his second place in the championship lol

Booooooooooring.

There were some moments and the heat had the drivers working hard but it was still boring.

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In reply to Tom1200 :

Imagine how boring it would be as 1 or 2 stopper with everyone afraid to actually use the tires.

That maximum tire stint really shook things up with regards to tire strategy and degradation.  I assume the teams already do a lot of this math with all tires having an effective life, but the hard cut seemed to make it a lot more inportant. 

George was really fun to watch, he was on a mission. If it hadn't been for Lewis's mistake in the first turn, the Mercs might have taken the fight to Max. 

I'm really loving McLaren's hot streak and Oscar is awesome! Will they pass Aston for fourth?

Lewis looked a fool. 

Russell has no luck but is damn good driver. 

Perez doesn't deserve his seat. 

In reply to Javelin :

Perez is the unenviable position of having a car set up in a polar opposite of his driving style.

I'm a casual follower of F1 so I don't know all the little inside news. So I have a serious question. How do you know that Perez's car isn't set up for him?

I really think Danny Ric or the new kid is in the second RB next year.  Checo has outlived his skillset.  

Tom1200 said:

Booooooooooring.

There were some moments and the heat had the drivers working hard but it was still boring.

Really?  There were passes every lap and varying strategies.  I thought it was excellent!

Streetwiseguy said:

I really think Danny Ric or the new kid is in the second RB next year.  Checo has outlived his skillset.  

We can only hope, it would be nice to have a second driver that could push Max and make the races a bit more interesting. Not sure Redbull will let that happen (Weber and Vettel) and Max will probably crush whoever is in that second seat.

JimS said:

I'm a casual follower of F1 so I don't know all the little inside news. So I have a serious question. How do you know that Perez's car isn't set up for him?

I would expect that the easily-adjustable parts of the setup are adjusted to Perez's liking.  That said, though, some of the driving dynamics are inherent to the design of the car and for that you have to pick one of your drivers to have it suit him.  If one of your drivers is a multiple world champion and the other has just won a handful of races, it's pretty obvious which one you're going to pick.  From what various people in the paddock have said in interviews, it seems that Verstappen likes a car that drives differently to the way many/most other drivers prefer it.

Keith Tanner said:

Yeah, he's gonna have to own that one. Just didn't leave George any room. 

I think Hamilton is starting to age out of being at the top of F1.  One thing I've noticed is that when the best drivers get close to 40, they start making stupid mistakes like that -- misjudging close passes and tearing corners off of cars, stuff that they would never have done earlier in their careers.  My hypothesis is that they're used to having the reaction time to make stuff like that happen without really thinking about it.  Reaction times slow down as we age, and at some point it starts to betray them.  Schumacher did similar things when he came back to drive for Mercedes and Kimi did it as well the last couple years he was in F1 too.

Alonso seems to be at least a little bit of an exception to this, though.

codrus (Forum Supporter) said:

JimS said:

I'm a casual follower of F1 so I don't know all the little inside news. So I have a serious question. How do you know that Perez's car isn't set up for him?

I would expect that the easily-adjustable parts of the setup are adjusted to Perez's liking.  That said, though, some of the driving dynamics are inherent to the design of the car and for that you have to pick one of your drivers to have it suit him.  If one of your drivers is a multiple world champion and the other has just won a handful of races, it's pretty obvious which one you're going to pick.  From what various people in the paddock have said in interviews, it seems that Verstappen likes a car that drives differently to the way many/most other drivers prefer it.

I keep reading this, but I don't buy it. These are the best drivers in the world. They came up in carts, up through the feeder series and into F1. All of those cars are so incredibly different, and to make it this far they've had to adapt quickly. Red Bull clearly has an advantage but Perez is unable to adapt and capitalize on it.

Remember Silverstone 2021 when Lewis was where George was and vice versa? That was deemed to be Lewis' fault and now with the tables turned, it's still his fault? But Lewis is a class act and admits it when he makes a mistake, where Max will never admit he's wrong

So I know I am a Lewis fan boi so my objectivity is questionable but my take is;

Lewis was ahead going into the corner and I didn't see anyway grape comes out of that in anything but third. But longer thinking for the team, Lewis is on softs, they should have had the team strategy for Lewis to go ahead if he could do it, by lap 10 George is passing him anyway once the softs are done. 

loosecannon said:

Remember Silverstone 2021 when Lewis was where George was and vice versa? That was deemed to be Lewis' fault and now with the tables turned, it's still his fault? But Lewis is a class act and admits it when he makes a mistake, where Max will never admit he's wrong

 

 

You just had to open that can of worms again! lol

In reply to adam525i :

I don't think Lewis gets enough credit for how clean a racer he is and Max doesn't get enough flack for how dirty a racer he is. I'm going to keep banging that drum until the message gets through

So thinking on McLaren's season this year it has kind of been perfect for getting Oscar up to speed. Lots of other top drivers these days come into a lesser team to get experience without the same pressure as being in a top team and it helps them develop and show their potential as there isn't the opportunity for lots of testing these days.

Oscar comes in and the car is garbage with his highly regarded teammate struggling to get anything out of it. He can focus on getting through races cleanly and adapting to F1. Now most of the way through the season the car comes alive and even though Norris still has the speed and race pace advantage, when Norris makes a tiny little mistake that is enough for Oscar to be ahead of him. If they'd started out the season with that car and Norris was on the podium and Oscar isn't there you could see it possibly throwing him off like a teammate of Max.

Or maybe he has the talent to be there out of the gate?

In reply to loosecannon :

I don't disagree with you, it's why I want to see Max have a teammate operating at his level so we can see his true colours shine again lol.

Lewis has had his run ins in the past but it's been a long time since we've seen him not stand up and say that it was his fault even when some of those incidents weren't 100% his fault (thinking about Albon leaving the door wide open and being surprised someone went for it late in the race).

The difference between Silverstone and today is the third car. There was nowhere for George to go, and Max had every right to be where he was and couldn't tuck in any further. Lewis simply should have left more room because he was the only one who really had the ability to avoid that accident.  It was an error in judgement, probably brought about by the fact that he knew he had only a few laps until those tires went off so it was now or never.

Red Bull has never taken both top spots in the driver's championship. They may not this year either depending on how the next six races go. That says a lot about their car setup choices and driver prioritization.

In reply to Keith Tanner :

Maybe all the mechanics/engineers are just afraid of Jos taking a crack at them if they don't give 100% to his son. Maybe papa Perez needs to have a few Mexican "friends" show up and hangout in the pits for few more races lol

loosecannon said:

Remember Silverstone 2021 when Lewis was where George was and vice versa? That was deemed to be Lewis' fault and now with the tables turned, it's still his fault? But Lewis is a class act and admits it when he makes a mistake, where Max will never admit he's wrong

 

 

There was no car to the inside of Lewis at silverstone.