Formula 1 2021 - General Discussion Thread (Read 1st post rules)

Joeface

is it the current car or last years ?

What if he is stupid fast in it ( Grosjean was always good in Qualifying ) / could possibly turn heads back to him .
He would actually suit Williams kinda as a senior Driver .

eviltimeban

A nice story there, for Grosjean. I think most people wish him well, so it's good to see that happening.

Be funny if he got in the car and his pace was mega.

eviltimeban

Joeface wrote: »

is it the current car or last years ?

What if he is stupid fast in it ( Grosjean was always good in Qualifying ) / could possibly turn heads back to him .
He would actually suit Williams kinda as a senior Driver .

2019 car.

TheQ_Man

https://twitter.com/mercedesamgf1/status/1389865606145626112?s=21

TheQ_Man

https://twitter.com/mercedesamgf1/status/1389844311492136965?s=21

TheQ_Man

https://twitter.com/mercedesamgf1/status/1389841558816665600?s=21

TheQ_Man

https://twitter.com/rgrosjean/status/1389838232393764864?s=21

TheQ_Man

https://twitter.com/mercedesamgf1/status/1389837624517537792?s=21

El_Duderino 09

flazio wrote: »

He didn't ask, they offered. (Unless he was asking around from his hospital bed as the tweet offering the drive came while he was still in hospital)
Say what you want about their drivers, there's no denying Mercedes are an excellent human team and a nice place to work regardless of what you do in the team.

I'm pretty sure i heard he was ringing around to all the teams for a few test laps from the hospital bed. In the first few days he thought he might be able to race in the last race of the season, but it wasn't realistic given the burns on his hands. Then he switched to ending his F1 career with a few test laps in any car.

It's probably bad form that Haas didn't offer him a few laps at a young driver test or something similar. It's good PR for Merc to do it and they have the money.

AMKC

Has Romain still got burn or burn Mark's on his hand or hands? Looked to have in the video. Will that heal or can he not get a skin graft? Maybe he just wants to keep it as a reminder of what happened.

El_Duderino 09

AMKC wrote: »

Has Romain still got burn or burn Mark's on his hand or hands? Looked to have in the video. Will that heal or can he not get a skin graft? Maybe he just wants to keep it as a reminder of what happened.

Looking at the tweet two posts up, it seems like he still has the scars on his hands.

I'd say all that stuff like skinngraftung is started very quickly, probably in the days after the accident. I'd say his arse is raw from donating skin grafts to his hands. I doubt its a matter of wanting skin grafts or not. I'd say it's a medical decision to heal the skin rather than a cosmetic decision.

Frank Bullitt

FOr a man who was literally in the middle of a fireball last year, seeing him in a Merc is a nice touch.

muckwarrior

Call me a cynic, but I'm sure Mercedes knew that this 'gesture' would get them a tonne of positive media coverage.

El_Duderino 09

muckwarrior wrote: »

Call me a cynic, but I'm sure Mercedes knew that this 'gesture' would get them a tonne of positive media coverage.

Ah yeah, but sure, so what?

A team couldn't be naive to how things will be viewed from a marketing point of view, positively and negatively.

I think most people will be happy to see Grosjean getting the drive for his own sake. He wanted a drive to finish his career and he's getting one. It' snot a normal or reasonable expectation. Mercedes is doing him a favour.

It would be a bit rich for people to start deifying him. He was a dangerous driver who could be fast on his day but was much more likely to be in a crash than a great performance.

recyclebin

Red Bull have signed up another 5 of Mercedes engine team. Looks like the rich teams are just going to use the excess cash left over from the budget cap and spend it on engines for 2025!

mickdw

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Ah yeah, but sure, so what?

A team couldn't be naive to how things will be viewed from a marketing point of view, positively and negatively.

I think most people will be happy to see Grosjean getting the drive for his own sake. He wanted a drive to finish his career and he's getting one. It' snot a normal or reasonable expectation. Mercedes is doing him a favour.

It would be a bit rich for people to start deifying him. He was a dangerous driver who could be fast on his day but was much more likely to be in a crash than a great performance.

Ya he did some dangerous moves in the last couple of years and was lucky to get out of it alive in the end. Still a very very quick driver and knowing how competitive these guys are, he will be looking to break records in the mercedes sim.
He is getting a full day test too which is quite a gift from mercedes.
Bad form that haas couldnt offer this to him. It seems they have no old cars to hand as ferrari take the engines back but between themselves and ferrari, they could certainly have done something.

El_Duderino 09

mickdw wrote: »

Ya he did some dangerous moves in the last couple of years and was lucky to get out of it alive in the end. Still a very very quick driver and knowing how competitive these guys are, he will be looking to break records in the mercedes sim.
He is getting a full day test too which is quite a gift from mercedes.
Bad form that haas couldnt offer this to him. It seems they have no old cars to hand as ferrari take the engines back but between themselves and ferrari, they could certainly have done something.

Honestly I think its an exaggeration to say he was very very quick. He was about as good as KMag and nobody thinks he was a top driver. He was a middling driver who had an occasional good day in between lots of totally forgettable days and disastrous days.

Seems like a sound, likeable guy out of the car, but that's a separate question to how good he is as a driver.

waynescales1

Has any driver's career, in the history of F1, nosedived as sharply as Vettel's did after Hockenheim 2018. Leading the championship by 8 points, leading the race, Hamilton back in 4th. Ends up crashing out, handing the championship momentum to Hamilton, ultimately going on to win just 1 more race that season, finishing second overall. He won just 1 race in 2019, finishing 5th behind his rookie teammate in the end. Involved in numerous crashes/racing incidents in 2019-2020, his driving ability and racing instincts seem to have almost completely left him, to the point where in 2021 there's probably a handful of F2 drivers who would get around a track quicker than him.

Really sad to see for me, likeable character and a beast in his prime.

El_Duderino 09

waynescales1 wrote: »

Has any driver's career, in the history of F1, nosedived as sharply as Vettel's did after Hockenheim 2018. Leading the championship by 8 points, leading the race, Hamilton back in 4th. Ends up crashing out, handing the championship momentum to Hamilton, ultimately going on to win just 1 more race that season, finishing second overall. He won just 1 race in 2019, finishing 5th behind his rookie teammate in the end. Involved in numerous crashes/racing incidents in 2019-2020, his driving ability and racing instincts seem to have almost completely left him, to the point where in 2021 there's probably a handful of F2 drivers who would get around a track quicker than him.

Really sad to see for me, likeable character and a beast in his prime.

Plenty of people won't like that analysis, even though it's true. There are loads of excuses trotted out for him like he doesn't like the car (meaning he failed to adapt to the car) or he was treated so terribly by Ferrari that he couldn't be expected to perform well (even though Perez was treated terribly by AM last year and he performed pretty well and even got his maiden win).

There's no indication that he will even beat stroll this year let alone get an emphatic margin to show he's still a good driver. Even when stroll had a shocker in quali in Portugal and vetel had a good qualifying, he still only finished one place ahead of Stroll in the race. I wonder what the excuses will be if things continue? Doesn't like the car and treated badly by the team have already been done, so maybe they'll have to say Stroll is actually a top driver. Time will tell

Sad to see a driver go so badly off the boil. Likeable guy.

barryribs

Sure you were burying him after his first qualifying session or race weekend with AM. He finally has one trouble free friday and saturday and it's used as a stick to beat him with. You watched the race, you know that he was on a different strategy than Stroll, saying he only finished one position ahead of Stroll because of his driving is disingenuous. Whether it was pre-planned or not, the early stop didn't work.

T-Maxx

Seeing that we have a thread dedicated to Hamilton, and also one for Kimi, maybe we should have one for Vettel to keep all the Vettel bashing in one place?:pac:

El_Duderino 09

barryribs wrote: »

Sure you were burying him after his first qualifying session or race weekend with AM. He finally has one trouble free friday and saturday and it's used as a stick to beat him with. You watched the race, you know that he was on a different strategy than Stroll, saying he only finished one position ahead of Stroll because of his driving is disingenuous. Whether it was pre-planned or not, the early stop didn't work.

Who buried him after the first race with AM?

barryribs

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

That's not a fair comparison though, is it? Vettel is on a run of very poor form over the last 2-3 seasons and Alonso isn't. The race last week was unlucky for Vettel. He was doing a Perez-esque job of making the one stop strategy work, but then made a Vettel-esque balls up and ran into the back of anther car (and blamed them which appeared a bit desperate.

3 races into the new season and you are worried about the excuses people are going to be making for his driving. He's with a new team, with little to no preseason testing, made a horrendous mistake in his first race, team ballsed up his second race and the wrong strategy call was made in his third.

El_Duderino 09

barryribs wrote: »

3 races into the new season and you are worried about the excuses people are going to be making for his driving. He's with a new team, with little to no preseason testing, made a horrendous mistake in his first race, team ballsed up his second race and the wrong strategy call was made in his third.

I remember posting that after the first race. Did you find a post where someone "buried" Vettel after the first race? Maybe I should add "new team" and "AM ballsed up the strategy" to the list of excuses for this season. We'll see if they keep being trotted out if things continue.

It's not having a go at Vettel, it's just describing his performance over the last few years. If you don't like the accurate description of his performance because his performance hasn't been positive enough, then that's nobody's fault. Do you know what would have dispelled this whole narrative? If he hadn't kept crashing and spinning over the last few years, and if he hadn't been comprehensively beaten over the last two seasons by his relative rookie teammate.

The narrative that Vettel has gone of the boil isn't made up, it's just an accurate description of his recent form.

barryribs

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

I remember posting that after the first race. Did you find a post where someone "buried" Vettel after the first race? Maybe I should add "new team" and "AM ballsed up the strategy" to the list of excuses for this season. We'll see if they keep being trotted out if things continue.

It's not having a go at Vettel, it's just describing his performance over the last few years. If you don't like the accurate description of his performance because his performance hasn't been positive enough, then that's nobody's fault. Do you know what would have dispelled this whole narrative? If he hadn't kept crashing and spinning over the last few years, and if he hadn't been comprehensively beaten over the last two seasons by his relative rookie teammate.

The narrative that Vettel has gone of the boil isn't made up, it's just an accurate description of his recent form.

I didn't mean you actually dug a hole, placed him in it and then filled in the hole with him inside in it. Just go back and read your posts after Bahrain.



You seem fascinated with excuses around his driving and I'm not excusing anything he has done, because he has been horrendous most of the time since, specifically (like the previous post has mentioned) binning it in Hockenheim.

El_Duderino 09

barryribs wrote: »

I didn't mean you actually dug a hole, placed him in it and then filled in the hole with him inside in it. Just go back and read your posts after Bahrain.



You seem fascinated with excuses around his driving and I'm not excusing anything he has done, because he has been horrendous most of the time since, specifically (like the previous post has mentioned) binning it in Hockenheim.

I kbnow what I said. I said "Vettel is on a run of very poor form over the last 2-3 seasons [...]. The race last week [Bahrain] was unlucky for Vettel. He was doing a Perez-esque job of making the one stop strategy work, but then made a Vettel-esque balls up and ran into the back of anther car (and blamed them which appeared a bit desperate)".

That isn't burying him. I acknowledged that he was doing one thing well (the one stopper) and did something else terribly (running into the back of Ocon) and has been on poor form over the last 2-3 seasons. If you consider an accurate, balanced description of events to be burying him, then maybe you consider him buried by his own recent form, but i don't.

mickdw

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Honestly I think its an exaggeration to say he was very very quick. He was about as good as KMag and nobody thinks he was a top driver. He was a middling driver who had an occasional good day in between lots of totally forgettable days and disastrous days.

Seems like a sound, likeable guy out of the car, but that's a separate question to how good he is as a driver.

He showed well in the lotus. Some great performances. Personally i think KMag is underrated too. When the Haas was good and the wheels didnt fall off they had some good results.

Inquitus

Turkish GP in potential travel trouble:

https://www.bbc.com/sport/formula1/57032897

Next month's Turkish Grand Prix is under threat after the UK government put Turkey on its red travel list.

The race was added to the calendar last month after travel restrictions forced the cancellation of the Canadian GP.

UK transport secretary Grant Schapps said on Friday that red-list countries "should not be visited except in the most extreme circumstances".

F1 said it was "assessing the situation and will provide more details in the coming days".

The race is scheduled to take place between 11 and 13 June.

AMKC

Inquitus wrote: »

Turkish GP in potential travel trouble:

https://www.bbc.com/sport/formula1/57032897

Awe that would be a pity if we did not get that. I wonder what track is lined up to replace Turkey lol maybe Korea?

Jordan 199

AMKC wrote: »

Awe that would be a pity if we did not get that. I wonder what track is lined up to replace Turkey lol maybe Korea?

Korea. Mark Webber's car got very dirty there one year: