Formula 1 2018: General Discussion Thread

Gintonious

Gintonious wrote: »

The one they tested in the states didn't have any glare, and they tested it under lights as well. I think the material they used to make it is different.

Aye the IndyCar one is dead on. Thought it looked poor in still but you'd completely forget about it during the race.

Cool_CM

Access to free Motorsport.com Prime courtesy of Fernando - 3 months by the looks of things.

People on reddit saying not to download the app if you don't want to continue after 3 months as it will renew automatically and charge you.

https://www.reddit.com/r/formula1/comments/87gtv1/alonso_has_a_gift_of_motorsport_prime_code/

Just signed up there and it didn't ask for credit card details - nice one!

eviltimeban

The halo hasn't bothered me, the cars all look very cool this year. The McLaren really stands out, great colour scheme.

It's the lack of racing that bothers!

skipper_G

Cool_CM wrote: »

Access to free Motorsport.com Prime courtesy of Fernando - 3 months by the looks of things.

People on reddit saying not to download the app if you don't want to continue after 3 months as it will renew automatically and charge you.

https://www.reddit.com/r/formula1/comments/87gtv1/alonso_has_a_gift_of_motorsport_prime_code/

Just signed up there and it didn't ask for credit card details - nice one!

Nice one! Works a treat
Direct link here https://www.motorsport.com/prime/promo/?code=ALONSO2018

Adamocovic

goat2 wrote: »

Any one going to the French GP this year, it is held in the most beautiful place , South France, not far from Nice or Monaco

Been looking at it myself as I live not far from it now.

Only thing is it seems to be a bit out from any nearby towns, I think there is a campsite near the track though.

I'm leaving it late! haha

Harika

The coastal road from Nice to Cannes was amazing, but generally the south coast of France is a great place to do vacation.

HighLine

Who needs grid girls when we can Axel

https://twitter.com/adamcooperF1/status/980454360437141504

Mike Litoris

HighLine wrote: »

Who needs grid girls when we can Axel

https://twitter.com/adamcooperF1/status/980454360437141504

Good God! "Edgy" and "Urban Dance".....sounds ace.

PopePalpatine

When was the last time "edgy" was explicitly mentioned in a marketing campaign? Maybe the XFL?

April Fools?

ayux4rj6zql2ph

This post has been deleted.

Wanderer78

wtf!

https://www.rte.ie/sport/motorsport/2018/0324/949774-hamilton-on-top-of-grid-down-under/

ayux4rj6zql2ph

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AMKC

Wanderer78 wrote: »

wtf!

https://www.rte.ie/sport/motorsport/2018/0324/949774-hamilton-on-top-of-grid-down-under/

Ha lol I knew Australia was behind a bit but not by that much. Maybe he was just busy last weekend and only watched it now. I wonder when he is planning to watch a post on the race lol. Next one only 5 days away.

Wanderer78

AMKC wrote: »

Ha lol I knew Australia was behind a bit but not by that much. Maybe he was just busy last weekend and only watched it now.

sloppy journalism though, dreadfully unprofessional, this story is flashing up on news now as well, somebody asleep at the wheel

Mike Litoris

Wanderer78 wrote: »

sloppy journalism though, dreadfully unprofessional, this story is flashing up on news now as well, somebody asleep at the wheel

What was it? It's been taken down.

Wanderer78

Mike Litoris wrote: »

What was it? It's been taken down.

should have taken a screenshot, a seriously outdated piece of 'journalism', very sloppy

Mike Litoris

Deleted User wrote: »

April Fools?

Ah jaysus, Stung!


No excuses but as Prisoner said it wouldn't be surprising these days.

Wanderer78

Mike Litoris wrote: »

Ah jaysus, Stung!


No excuses but as Prisoner said it wouldn't be surprising these days.

i did consider this but being pedantic, that was yesterday

flazio

Mike Litoris wrote: »

What was it? It's been taken down.

A report on the qualifying session of the Australian Grand Prix, dated today.

ayux4rj6zql2ph

This post has been deleted.

Charlie-Bravo

Wanderer78 wrote: »

should have taken a screenshot, a seriously outdated piece of 'journalism', very sloppy

From a Google web cache:

Hamilton on top of grid Down Under
Updated / Monday, 2 Apr 2018 08:29 0

Lewis Hamilton is in prime position to open his Formula One championship with a victory after storming to pole at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix.

Hamilton was in a class of one as he steered his Mercedes to the front slot of the grid with an utterly emphatic display which will send out an all-to-familiar warning to his rivals.

The 33-year-old British driver's best lap was more than an eye-watering six tenths of a second faster than the rest of the field with Kimi Raikkonen edging out his Ferrari team-mate Sebastian Vettel for second.



Red Bull's Max Verstappen qualified fourth ahead of his team-mate Daniel Ricciardo, who is due to serve a three-place grid drop following an infringement in practice on Friday.

But it was not a perfect session for Hamilton's Mercedes team after Valtteri Bottas crashed into the wall and out of qualifying at the exit of turn two.

Bottas emerged unscathed from the 110mph smash, which happened on his very first lap in the battle for pole, but the same could not be said of his car.

The rear of his Mercedes, which bore the brunt of the high-speed impact was destroyed with bits of his car littering the asphalt. Bottas was taken to the medical centre for a precautionary check-up before he was swiftly given the all-clear.

The session was suspended to deal with the swathes of Mercedes debris on the track, but following a 10-minute delay, the top-10 shootout resumed and it was Hamilton who blitzed the pack with a lap he described as close to perfection.


"You would think that with these results we have had it would start to feel like the norm, but it doesn't," said an ecstatic Hamilton after securing his seventh pole in Melbourne.

"My heart is racing. I am so happy with that lap. It was such a nice lap. I am always striving for perfection and that was as close as I could get."

McLaren arrived here in Melbourne on the back foot after a thoroughly underwhelming pre-season campaign which was blighted by reliability issues.

They ran into further trouble here on Friday after their star driver Fernando Alonso and his team-mate Stoffel Vandoorne suffered exhaust leaks.

Both men managed to get through qualifying in one piece, but they fell at the second phase with Alonso due to start 11th and Vandoorne 12th.

The McLaren hierarchy had targeted a battle with Red Bull this season following their divorce from Honda engines and switch to Renault power.

But Alonso was more than one second adrift of the Red Bull cars, proving there is plenty of work to be done by the Woking marque. Indeed, Alonso qualified 13th in Melbourne last year, and 12th in 2016.

"That is okay," said Alonso, when informed of his grid position, but you fancy both the Spaniard and his team will have harboured greater expectations heading into the opening race.

Kevin Magnussen and Romain Grosjean qualified an impressive sixth and seventh for Haas ahead of the Renault duo of Nico Hulkenberg and Carlos Sainz.

Looks like a copy and paste job... Two other sites have the same article but dated from after qualy.

https://www.timesofmalta.com/mobile/articles/view/20180324/f1/hamilton-takes-pole-in-melbourne.674309

https://www.google.ie/amp/s/www.mirror.co.uk/sport/formula-1/lewis-hamilton-lands-pole-position-12244294.amp

H3llR4iser

eviltimeban wrote: »

^ the glare / shine from the visor would make identifying the drivers even tougher than halo. I don't know why they can't include the driver name in big letters on the body. I know the numbers are there, but people can't be expected to know 22 random numbers!

In all fairness, moders helmet designs are so "busy" and complex that it's often difficult to distinguish them altogether, unless there are glaring colour differences; Some teams have heavy sponsorship / design cues on their driver's helmets as to make them virtually unrecognizable from most TV angles (e.g. the Red Bull drivers, the FI ones).

Quickest solution would be to put markers on the wings (or even the Halo itself) on one of each team's car - Ferrari did it throughout the '80s and '90s, with the famous "yellow squares" on the wings.

As for the numbers, it's a pet peeve for me - the current numbering system is just a silly copycat of Nascar/MotoGP that has nothing to do with F1's history, especially the WDC racing without the #1 on his car.

Numbers should be assigned to the teams on historical basis, and cars of the same team should have consecutive numbers - 5 and 6 for Williams, 15 and 16 for Renault, 7 and 8 for McLaren, 27 and 28 for Ferrari, 22 and 23 for Alfa (or Sauber's 29 and 30) and so on. The WDC shuould ALWAYS bear #1. As far as merchandising goes, a #5 Williams Cap, or a #27 Ferrari T-shirt would most likely sell like hot cakes.

Infoanon

H3llR4iser wrote: »

In all fairness, moders helmet designs are so "busy" and complex that it's often difficult to distinguish them altogether, unless there are glaring colour differences; Some teams have heavy sponsorship / design cues on their driver's helmets as to make them virtually unrecognizable from most TV angles (e.g. the Red Bull drivers, the FI ones).

Quickest solution would be to put markers on the wings (or even the Halo itself) on one of each team's car - Ferrari did it throughout the '80s and '90s, with the famous "yellow squares" on the wings.

As for the numbers, it's a pet peeve for me - the current numbering system is just a silly copycat of Nascar/MotoGP that has nothing to do with F1's history, especially the WDC racing without the #1 on his car.

Numbers should be assigned to the teams on historical basis, and cars of the same team should have consecutive numbers - 5 and 6 for Williams, 15 and 16 for Renault, 7 and 8 for McLaren, 27 and 28 for Ferrari, 22 and 23 for Alfa (or Sauber's 29 and 30) and so on. The WDC shuould ALWAYS bear #1. As far as merchandising goes, a #5 Williams Cap, or a #27 Ferrari T-shirt would most likely sell like hot cakes.

Its the driver associated with the number that made them famous-#5 Mansell / #27 Villenueve , Nascar use a different system then motogp and F1 where the number is associated with the team similar to the old days in F1, then Bernie messed it all up with the numbers changing every year - F1 marketing men looked at moto gp - saw the power of #46worldwide and adopted the same idea.
The current F1 system I personally feel is the best for both viewers and marketing

ayux4rj6zql2ph

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Infoanon

Prisoner 6753 wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

Could not disagree more - it was confusing to the viewer and a disaster for marketing.
As for the number 0 - Ayrton Senna refused to use 0 as to him it meant the driver was nothing - worse then #2
Bizzarely no team in the modern era used #13 until Pastor Maldonaldo decided to make use of the number when the rules changed. #13 has been used in Nascar and MotoGP

H3llR4iser

Infoanon wrote: »

Its the driver associated with the number that made them famous-#5 Mansell / #27 Villenueve , Nascar use a different system then motogp and F1 where the number is associated with the team similar to the old days in F1, then Bernie messed it all up with the numbers changing every year - F1 marketing men looked at moto gp - saw the power of #46worldwide and adopted the same idea.
The current F1 system I personally feel is the best for both viewers and marketing

I would agree that the "numbers according to the costructor's championship positions" system was idiotic, no doubt; But one thing F1 did right, compared to other motorsports, was order and symmetry: each team with two cars, both cars identical in livery and external appeareance, both cars carrying sequential numbers. It said something when compared to Nascar, Indycar, Touring Cars and even most bike racing series: we do things differently. In a way, it mirrored the absolute engineering perfection required by the discipline. The current system instead, looks like an horrendous mess.

Also, F1 (and car racing in general) is actually about the teams and cars more than the drivers; The best car will win with an average driver at the wheel, the best driver won't get anywhere in an average car.

That's why numbers should be associated with teams, not drivers - the #27 is historic because it was on a Ferrari for 20 years, it would still be meaningful on a red car; It would carry an historical reference to the yesteryear of the sport; Drivers would consider racing in a #27 Ferrari to be a privilege, and the same could be said for a Williams bearing #5 or a McLaren with the #7. Currently, #27 on Hulkenberg's Renault it is completely anonymous. Might as well not be there at all.

And the #1 MUST be on the grid on the WDC car, if he is racing.

the_pen_turner

''''''''Also, F1 (and car racing in general) is actually about the teams and cars more than the drivers; The best car will win with an average driver at the wheel, the best driver won't get anywhere in an average car. '''''''''




this is exactly whats wrong with the the sport. no ability for the better driver in ok car to win.

H3llR4iser

the_pen_turner wrote: »

''''''''Also, F1 (and car racing in general) is actually about the teams and cars more than the drivers; The best car will win with an average driver at the wheel, the best driver won't get anywhere in an average car. '''''''''




this is exactly whats wrong with the the sport. no ability for the better driver in ok car to win.

It's always been like this, even 'though some people want to believe it's not the case, and it will always be that the best car wins.

What was different in the past was that the car that destroyed the competition in qualifying, wasn't necessary up to pace in the race (e.g. Lotus in 1986/1987); Other times, one car would prove brilliantly suited to a specific track and then under perform on the next race and so on - now we don't get this anymore because of simulations and computer models. Nothing that can be done about it - I don't see how the use of computers could be banned for teams.

In the distant past, some team principals (Enzo Ferrari above all, but at some level also Frank Williams) used to make a point about hiring unknown drivers - to prove it was their car allowing them to win.

I don't get the point of the numbers. Maybe I'm too young to but I remember but all I remember was Hill was 0 and after that the numbers more or less reflected the previous season. I dislike the stylised stuff too. Works in NASCAR with a massive roof to cover with the number but not so much in F1 and less again with them shrunk way down for graphics.

At the end of the day I don't really care though and it seems a silly marketing endeavour to me. Maybe the "branding" has worked with younger fans, I dunno.