Formula 1 2020 - General Discussion Thread (See MOD warning on first post)

Man with broke phone

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

I wouldn’t expect Stroll to beat Vettel over the season, but I’d expect it will be relatively close and Stroll will benefit by proximity to Vettel - Vettel will likewise be diminished by the same association.

When LeClerc joined Ferrari, the view was if he could even hang with Vettel then it would be a massive success and advantage LeClerc. He beat Vettel last year and this year is turning into an annihilation (LeClerc has four times as many points 75-18 and a commanding lead in quali and race finishes).

The notion that Vettel is actually a top driver like max and Lewis, is purely fantasy based and not at all fact based. The idea that he’ll bounce back next year is is a real Hail Mary. It’s not impossible that he’ll show he’s been a top driver all along but it would be seriously against form.

Fact is, he’s been fine with an inferior teammate and crumbled/left the team when he’s beaten.

This is absolutely astonishing.

Do you remember Vettel winning the championship? He has won 4 of them. He finished first in 53 Grand Prixs.

To suggest he isnt a good driver is rediculous.

What makes Max and Hamilton great drivers? Is it just a general feeling when you see them in the car? What are your metrics?

Do you think Vettel was bluffing it all the way to Ferrari then suddenly he was expected to drive the car himself and got found out?

The difference in laptime and general racyness off the two yesterday was more than just a few driver errors.

I noticed this because I watch Perez. He went by Vettel after his crash without incident and watching the times was constantly catching him at a relentless pace, he couldnt catch leClerc. Before he changed tyres he was steady ahead of the car behind him but he was slowly losing time to LeClerc. Vettels car was consistently miles behind.

If it was bad driving it would be inconsistant, every now and again Vettel would get a good lap in, he was world champion 4 times surely if he was just past it he might get one or two good laps in the 66 yesterday.

El_Duderino 09

skipper_G wrote: »

Stroll isn't terrible, but he's not great either. He's inconsistent, makes silly mistakes and doesn't learn from them. The absolute worst thing though is having to listen to the excuses, everything is excused, 'didn't see him' is the most overused one. The team will never ever suggest he made a mistake. Otmar is like a Catholic priest talking about The Pope, he's infallible.

Stroll’s ok. He’s developed from terrible to ok and could develop further. He would have been dropped under normal circumstances for being crap at the start.

But he’s not an endearing character at all. His whinging on the radio yesterday was terrible. He was told they had exceed track limits 3 times and the next one would be a penalty. He disputed whether he had gone off track so the engineering reiterated the point that the next one would be a penalty and Stroll got snotty with him. Then later he was given a penalty and disputed the whole thing again. Then he whinged about whether they should be saving the engine and then was delighted when they retired the car.

Really sounded like a guy who couldn’t control himself exceeding track limits but couldn’t accept responsibility.

pjohnson

Stroll is a solid enough mid-level racer. But he is a fùckin woejus qualifyer and doesnt seem able to rectify/improve it.

Man with broke phone

pjohnson wrote: »

Stroll is a solid enough mid-level racer. But he is a fùckin woejus qualifyer and doesnt seem able to rectify/improve it.

Team boss said yesterday they set up for race rather than qualifying but that may be stroll PR. They do usually say that about Perez though.

The fact he may have caused two crashes over the weekend would be more worrying for me.

weisses

cadaliac wrote: »

What equipment isn't the same? Can you be specific please?
I understand the support being different when the atmosphere is toxic but I fail to see what equipment would be different.

Probably anything to do with what would be on the Ferrari next year.

weisses

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Stroll’s ok. He’s developed from terrible to ok and could develop further. He would have been dropped under normal circumstances for being crap at the start.

But he’s not an endearing character at all. His whinging on the radio yesterday was terrible. He was told they had exceed track limits 3 times and the next one would be a penalty. He disputed whether he had gone off track so the engineering reiterated the point that the next one would be a penalty and Stroll got snotty with him. Then later he was given a penalty and disputed the whole thing again. Then he whinged about whether they should be saving the engine and then was delighted when they retired the car.

Really sounded like a guy who couldn’t control himself exceeding track limits but couldn’t accept responsibility.

Did you forget the moment he took out Norris in turn 1 ?

Stroll is a driver who has no business being in F1

El_Duderino 09

Man with broke phone wrote: »

This is absolutely astonishing.

Do you remember Vettel winning the championship? He has won 4 of them. He finished first in 53 Grand Prixs.

To suggest he isnt a good driver is rediculous.

What makes Max and Hamilton great drivers? Is it just a general feeling when you see them in the car? What are your metrics?

Do you think Vettel was bluffing it all the way to Ferrari then suddenly he was expected to drive the car himself and got found out?
...

I remember Vettel winning and he seems to have been much better back then. But things change over time. And Vettel isn’t so fast anymore. If Vettel is as fast as he was when he won those championships, then how do you rate LeClerc? He must be one of the fastest of all time in your estimation.

I rate Hamilton and max as the top tier of drivers based on the preponderance of the available evidence, past and present. New evidence is weighted more heavily than old evidence. So when trying to figure out how fast Vettel IS, his last 2 seasons are far more important than 2010-13.

Do you see how that works?

Man with broke phone

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

I remember Vettel winning and he seems to have been much better back then. But things change over time. And Vettel isn’t so fast anymore. If Vettel is as fast as he was when he won those championships, then how do you rate LeClerc? He must be one of the fastest of all time in your estimation.

I rate Hamilton and max as the top tier of drivers based on the preponderance of the available evidence, past and present. New evidence is weighted more heavily than old evidence. So when trying to figure out how fast Vettel IS, his last 2 seasons are far more important than 2010-13.

Do you see how that works?

I remember chatting to an english electrician who thought there was no problem with maclarens car, alonso he said just wasnt driving it fast enough because he was past it. Maybe this is another situation like that.

El_Duderino 09

Man with broke phone wrote: »

I remember chatting to an english electrician who thought there was no problem with maclarens car, alonso he said just wasnt driving it fast enough because he was past it. Maybe this is another situation like that.

Ok. only if you're casting yourself in the role of the electrician.

I think you're gone off the point for the obvious reasons - you don't like where the evidence likely leads. And the evidence suggests that Vettel isn't very fast right now.

Given how he has handled Vettel last year and particularly this year, how do you rate LeClerc?

Man with broke phone

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Ok. only if you're casting yourself in the role of the electrician.

I think you're gone off the point for the obvious reasons - you don't like where the evidence likely leads. And the evidence suggests that Vettel isn't very fast right now.

Given how he has handled Vettel last year and particularly this year, how do you rate LeClerc?

I believe he is the first choice driver in a pair who are bringing home the worst championship finishes of any Ferrari team I remember. He seems better at the moment than a teammate the team dont want.

I think I remember him having a couple of good racing moments/races.

When people call Perez and Vettel mediocre drivers Id say the Jury is very much out if he is or will ever be top tier.
He wont win a championship until the rule change anyway.

El_Duderino 09

Man with broke phone wrote: »

I believe he is the first choice driver in a pair who are bringing home the worst championship finishes of any Ferrari team I remember. He seems better at the moment than a teammate the team dont want.

I think I remember him having a couple of good racing moments/races.

When people call Perez and Vettel mediocre drivers Id say the Jury is very much out if he is or will ever be top tier.
He wont win a championship until the rule change anyway.

OK. Very vague, but i see you think Leclerc is faster than Vettel. I'd agree. When he's so much faster than Vettel (beat him last year and is on x4 Vettel's point so far this season) do you think he's much better than Vettel?

So where do you rate Vettel amongst the drivers based on performance (roughly speaking. I'm not expecting us to agree totally, I just want to know where you rank him against his peers)

Man with broke phone

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

OK. Very vague, but i see you think Leclerc is faster than Vettel. I'd agree. When he's so much faster than Vettel (beat him last year and is on x4 Vettel's point so far this season) do you think he's much better than Vettel?

So where do you rate Vettel amongst the drivers based on performance (roughly speaking. I'm not expecting us to agree totally, I just want to know where you rank him against his peers)

He is a 4 time world champion so I would rate him highly enough. I do firmly believe though that the majority of drivers with the cars set up right for them would be within a couple hundreds of a second of each other on 95 per cent of any given laps. I dont believe in a vacuum vettel is 400s of a second a lap slower than le clerc over 66 laps. That would make Le Clerc one of the best drivers of all time or Vettel one of the worse.

cadaliac

Vettle has lost speed. It happens.
It happened Schumacher.

This is it

LeClerc overachieving, Vettel underachieving with both in a pretty poor car in my opinion

Inquitus

This is it wrote: »

LeClerc overachieving, Vettel underachieving with both in a pretty poor car in my opinion

I would agree, seems a lot like the Red Bull Verstappen car issues, one driver can live with the cars bad handling, the other cannot, which is making both Vettel and Albon look very poor! I expect Vettel to deliver a lot more at Racing Point in 2021!

El_Duderino 09

Man with broke phone wrote: »

He is a 4 time world champion so I would rate him highly enough. I do firmly believe though that the majority of drivers with the cars set up right for them would be within a couple hundreds of a second of each other on 95 per cent of any given laps. I dont believe in a vacuum vettel is 400s of a second a lap slower than le clerc over 66 laps. That would make Le Clerc one of the best drivers of all time or Vettel one of the worse.

I think we agree he was a four time world champion and he was pretty good to achieve that. But the question isn't how fast he was, it's how fast he is now.

So where do you rate Vettel amongst the drivers based on performance (roughly speaking. I'm not expecting us to agree totally, I just want to know where you rank him against his peers)?

Man with broke phone

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

I think we agree he was a four time world champion and he was pretty good to achieve that. But the question isn't how fast he was, it's how fast he is now.

So where do you rate Vettel amongst the drivers based on performance (roughly speaking. I'm not expecting us to agree totally, I just want to know where you rank him against his peers)?

You said he was fine when he had an inferior teammate and that he crumbled when the pressure was on.

Thats what you said.

El_Duderino 09

Man with broke phone wrote: »

You said he was fine when he had an inferior teammate and that he crumbled when the pressure was on.

Thats what you said.

I know what I said, I've no idea why you posted that in response to the question i asked you. I asked you where do you rate Vettel amongst the drivers based on performance (roughly speaking. I'm not expecting us to agree totally, I just want to know where you rank him against his peers)?

El_Duderino 09

Inquitus wrote: »

I would agree, seems a lot like the Red Bull Verstappen car issues, one driver can live with the cars bad handling, the other cannot, which is making both Vettel and Albon look very poor! I expect Vettel to deliver a lot more at Racing Point in 2021!

Why do you think the car will be better for him at RP? ( I think we all agree the PR IS a better car than the Ferrari this year and most likely next year, but we're not talking about absolute speed, you're claiming the PR will suit him better)

afatbollix

Vettel lost his speed when he had kids.


Priorities have changed.

AMKC

afatbollix wrote: »

Vettel lost his speed when he had kids.


Priorities have changed.

That's it exactly. In F1 you need to be selfish and to not be afraid to push the limits and you can not do that if you have a wife and a young family. There is a very good piece over on Autocar about Jenson Button and he says that too.i hope to see Vettdl do better next year but if not and he gets beaten by his teammate again hdn maybe it will be time for him to hang up his helmet and retire.

muckwarrior

I think it's a combination of Vettel being off form, him never being good with a car that doesn't suit his style, and him never actually being quite as good as his record suggests.

When he was in a dominant car he managed to beat Weber; a decent driver, but hardly one of the greats. Even then there were periods where Weber had the upper hand, most notably when the blown diffuser effect was taken away.

He also managed to beat Kimi, who on the one hand you might say is a world champion, but on the other hand, got his arse kicked up and down the pitlane by Alonso.

In Ricciardo's debut season with Red Bull he beat Vettel fair and square. Then along came Le Clerc and did the same. I don't care how many Grand Prix or championship wins he has; I don't think Vettel is, or ever was, more than an above average driver.

El_Duderino 09

muckwarrior wrote: »

I think it's a combination of Vettel being off form, him never being good with a car that doesn't suit his style, and him never actually being quite as good as his record suggests.

When he was in a dominant car he managed to beat Weber; a decent driver, but hardly one of the greats. Even then there were periods where Weber had the upper hand, most notably when the blown diffuser effect was taken away.

He also managed to beat Kimi, who on the one hand you might say is a world champion, but on the other hand, got his arse kicked up and down the pitlane by Alonso.

In Ricciardo's debut season with Red Bull he beat Vettel fair and square. Then along came Le Clerc and did the same. I don't care how many Grand Prix or championship wins he has; I don't think Vettel is, or ever was, more than an above average driver.

He was a bit better than above average. He was the form guy who could pull out a half a tenth over the opposition of the day in quali. He won those champions and I think the criticism that he wasn’t a top overtaker, was valid.

But ultimately we don’t need to assign an overall pace for his hole career. He was a rookie and then he got experience and got faster. Then he was on great form and was a really tough competitor. Then he started being beaten by younger guys like D Ric and didn’t like it so he went to Ferrari where he had an old Kimi as a teammate and he was happy again and showed good form at times. Then he was leading the championship until the German GP in 2018 and he ballsed it up. Then he had a young LeClerc as a teammate and he hasn’t been fast last year or this year and he has been very accident prone.

The point is that he has changed over time and his form has come and gone and his overall pace has risen and then fallen. Right now he’s in terrible form and his overall pace and strength as a competitor has nosedived.

I can only argue his speed based on the evidence on the track. If I analyse his pace and also consider how much I like him and how much I would like him to be fast, then he might be the best driver on the grid. But that’s just silly and I’ll stick to the evidence on the track.

kksaints

Vettel's performance next year will be very interesting. His form this season is very poor particularly qualifying but he wouldn't be the first driver to struggle for a while at Ferrari and then become good again once he leaves.

mickdw

weisses wrote: »

Probably anything to do with what would be on the Ferrari next year.

This i think is the crux of it.
Even if Ferrari are being fair minded in how they treat seb, any team will hold back tech that is going towards next year from the departing driver so its very much the case that his side of the garage will be left out in the cold.

Burkie1203

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

I think the criticism that he wasn’t a top overtaker, was valid.

Exact same could be said of Hamilton. In the most dominant car by a large margin he has had several skirmishes and copped penalties when it doesn't involve his subservient team mate

And when he had a team mate not afraid of him they touched plenty

jv2000

kksaints wrote: »

Vettel's performance next year will be very interesting. His form this season is very poor particularly qualifying but he wouldn't be the first driver to struggle for a while at Ferrari and then become good again once he leaves.

Next season will be very interesting. I agree with most of what has been said above about Vettel being slower but also I think a large part must be down to his mental state. He is at a team where he feels like he is no longer the priority (true) and that they have let him down over the last few seasons (that goes both ways in my opinion). He is phoning it in, simple as that. When your mind is not completely on the job then you coast to an extent and with such a tight midfield this year, then even 1 tenth of a second is going to make a massive difference.

El_Duderino 09

Burkie1203 wrote: »

Exact same could be said of Hamilton. In the most dominant car by a large margin he has had several skirmishes and copped penalties when it doesn't involve his subservient team mate

And when he had a team mate not afraid of him they touched plenty

The same criticism is not leveled at Hamilton because the evidence suggests he's an excellent overtaker. Nor has the same accusation been leveled at Ricciardo because he's an excellent overtaker (probably the best on the grid). Similarly, Max is an excellent overtaker. But Vettel has often struggled. He's not bad, but overtaking was probably the weak part of his game back when he was a very good driver. Now he has added weak parts to his game such as qualifying, spinning/crashing and overall loss of speed so it's not such a prevalent issue.

But suggesting Hamilton could be accused of being similarly poor at overtaking demonstrates the absurdity of the situation. Some people seem immune to reality.

vectra

All these damning comments about Vettel are a laugh,
You would swear to Jaysus he went to be one night and woke up not remembering how to race.

Not sure what all the praise about Hamilton is either, nobody saying he is a bad driver or anything, but in fairness he only has 2 drivers to beat. And one of those is his teammate that wouldn't be allowed to beat him. So that leaves one.

ELM327

vectra wrote: »

All these damning comments about Vettel are a laugh,
You would swear to Jaysus he went to be one night and woke up not remembering how to race.

Not sure what all the praise about Hamilton is either, nobody saying he is a bad driver or anything, but in fairness he only has 2 drivers to beat. And one of those is his teammate that wouldn't be allowed to beat him. So that leaves one.

+1
And that "one" is in vastly inferior machinery.


It's like putting usain bolt against the fattest guy in the office (myself for instance). Technically we are both humans but we are in vastly different machinery.