This weekend was terrible for F1 in my opinion.
There is something seriously wrong with the sport if a car can start P20 and just sail up to P5 so easily. All he had to do was stay out of trouble and sail by on the straights. In the actual race, he started P10 and was in P3 in just a few laps. If it wasn't for the safety cars I think he would have led in the 1st stint.
Even when he passed Max he was able to get a 10 second lead in something like 12 laps. Lando Norris admitted that there was no point even bothering trying to defend against him.
There is nothing stopping Mercedes from taking a new ICE in every race if they want. A grid penalty won't do much if you have 7 tenths advantage on a short track.
As fans we can only pray that this utter domination was a 1 off. Otherwise we'll quickly be back to Lewis on pole and cruising in the lead by 20 seconds while complaining about his tyres on the radio to try give us some drama.
Over here in Vancouver we have Formula E next year, really short circuit.
Dublin could do something around the docks over one of the bridges or something, the tracks they use are like parking stalls.
Eddie Jordan pushed for it at his pomp but its too expensive and the noise pollution is ridiculous
Can you imagine the reaction in this country if the government said they were going to throw €500m at hosting F1? Sinn Féin and the rest would have an absolute canary and all you'd hear would be "but what about the hospitals etc". Nobody wants that grief.
The banks would underwrite it. Safe as houses. 🤬
Again, who's going to underwrite it? It's usually covered by a city.
Formula E would be doable but it's Ireland. It would somehow cost 100 million.
Street circuit ala monte carlo ?
What I found interesting today was that the FIA Street keeping hold of Hamilton's rear wing and haven't returned it to Merc. They weren't pushing this at Toto in the pre-race show.
Are the FIA looking at the wing for its bendiness? Or am I reading too much into it?
Yeah; maybe. But Senna died in 1994. How is he still bringing in money to the Brazilian economy? Merchandise sales wouldn't even qualify as a drop in the ocean. Fair point re Germany.
One word, Senna. The money coming in from his legacy is what's keeping the Grand Prix going, otherwise it'd been dropped a long time ago. Remember Argentina? I mean if a country like Germany can't keep a Grand Prix on the calendar what hope would Ireland have.
If you've got a spare half a billion feel free to give it a go.
Brazil may not be the most prosperous country but it's massive and has levels of disparity and deprivation beyond anything most of us will ever experience. It also has incredible riches and rich people throughout the country.
When the track was built it cost very little back then. If you want to build a circuit from scratch you're talking about at least a few hundred million these days. Ireland has a tiny car culture compared to most of Europe and a small population and not a lot of people who would want to put money like that up. Even the fact that the race this year was called the Sao Paolo Grand Prix I wouldn't be surprised if the city was under-writing the risk of the event. Dublin doesn't even have a proper council and Mondello is in Kildare, can't imagine the county council giving them a blank cheque.
Hmm. Brazil (technically now, Sao Paolo) can manage to host a GP, and it is by no means a prosperous country. I'd just love to see a GP hosted here.
Massive undertaking. The track is about 3.5 km long while most F1 tracks are at least 5km .It's a kart track in comparison. And in order to break even, it would need to host a lot more events then just a Formula 1 weekend.
It's not financially viable.
Apparently theres been signs unveiled accidentally in China congratulating Zhou on being the first Chinese F1 driver.
What about upgrading Mondello? Bring it up to F1 standards.
Formula E would the most likely shout.
Mondello has never really been an F1 level of a facility. I think it's even fallen behind on what's acceptable to host a British Touring car race. Our best hope for a World class motorsport event is either Formula E race in the Phoenix Park, a World Rally event basically anywhere in the country or the FIA Gran Turismo World Championships in the National Convention Centre or similar venue.
Has there ever been an attempt to get a F1 Grand Prix in Ireland? To Mondello? Imagine the buzz.
Great result for the championship today! Keeps both championships wide open.
I was looking at the wrong gap but a difference of about half a second and he'd have had Ricciardo into turn 1 and be almost side-by-side with Verstappen into 4.
Tense stuff, looks like Hamilton's race for now.
^ Lads, can you keep the race discussion going on in the dedicated race thread thanks.
The DRS (particularly Hamilton's) is so powerful that if Hamilton attempts the undercut and gets into 1 or 2 cars of traffic it could actually help him. It's all very fine margins, if he comes out 2-2.5 seconds behind someone he'll pass them at the end of the lap and get all that DRS goodness. Kinda looking at the Ferraris, there's a nice gap between them that if he passed Sainz he'd then be passing Leclerc the next time around without losing time.
Hamilton gets it done and now has his sights set on Max.
Super by Perez!!!!
Go on Perez! :D
Anyone else think the Tsunoda/Stroll thing was all on Stroll? He turns in super late and Tsunoda was there for a while beforehand.
Hamilton gaining 0.4 down the straight without DRS and that was without a "good" run out of the last corner. Perez needs to be going slower through the middle sector.
I'd extend sprint points to the top 6 in the same allocation as the Grand Prix of the 90s. (10-6-4-3-2-1)
Not for me.
I'd prefer if they considered the sprint as the first part of the race. The quali should be considered quali and separate from the sprint. The sprint should be the first part of the race but with low fuel and one set of tyres so no strategy like overcurrent or undercut. No foreplay, just banging.
That way there would be 2 starts which is probably the most exciting part of any race. Low fuel battling for one stint and then have the full strategy race. Im fine with points for the sprint, but not married to it.
Here is an idea. Should Formula 1 have a mini championship whitin the championship if these sprint races are going to remain a thing?
I imagine Valtarri would be winning it this year if it was like that. What does every think?
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