2024 F1 General Discussion Thread

So Newey and Co build a good car for 2026 but not quite there. Alonso retires after end of 2026.

Stroll puts a youngster in the 2nd car for 2027 beside lance. The car is a masterpiece for 2027 and lance wins the championship as no 1 driver with help from team mate.

I don’t think there’s much to choose between Stroll and Perez. Stroll could be a capable second driver in a dominant car imo.

Have you forgotten that they were team mates for two years? There was plenty to choose between them.

Worth noting that Mclaren don't necessarily care about the WDC, the aim for the constructor is the constructors championship. If "papaya rules" is "free to race but dont crash into each other", then it maximises constructors points for the team.

They have a small chance of winning the WDC with lando, none with Piastri, but they have a large shot at the constructors.

I wonder is red bull one of those teams?

AM REPORTEDLY have been talking to Verstappen about a 2026 move

An obvious action taken multiple races too late.

Fascinating times at McLaren! Be interesting to see what sort of shape that priority takes. Presumably no more Monza type overtakes and allowing Lando to lead the 2 cars where appropriate. They must be hoping that Lando can be the dominant driver over the next few races to make this issue redundant.

Of course I wouldn’t be surprised if Oscar starts looking to drive the wheels off the car to make team orders difficult to implement. Should make for great entertainment regardless!

To be fair to myself, I can’t forget things I didn’t know in the first place. That was before I really started watching F1.

I can see that Mark Webber will always be in Oscar's ear about strategy and how to maximise winning/gaining positions, even against his teammate. And it is certainly possible that Webber is ensuring that the Papaya Rules are exploited for the benefit of Oscar. I think this is what was interesting about the first lap at Monza: Whoever is leading after Lap 1 gets preference, so that puts the emphasis on the driver ensuring they are ahead of their teammate by that stage. Oscar did not hold back on taking that place as soon as he could. But we know it hampered a 1-2 finish for McLaren (so not quite a 'team' approach by Oscar). I expect fireworks before the end of the year within McLaren, resulting from Lap 1 incidents!

Yeah it might be too late already. They're transitioning from not being a championship contender to championship contender in-season. So they're having to change the rules they set at the start of the season. In the past, mclaren would have been about prioritising the total team points rather than pushing for one driver to get maximum points over the other.

I presume they'll have a more formalised approach next year.

They have more long term faith in Oscar and don't want to alienate him?

F1 is setup that way on purpose. The money is in the constructors championship, McLaren built a car and have 2 drivers that are capable of delivering that. Considering how strong they’ve gotten mid season I’m sure that’s the priority.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure they want to find a way to get Lando a WDC too but primarily that’s Landos job to execute. If he continues to have poor starts or gets outpaced by Piastri, it doesn’t look great if they’re going to continually ask his teammate to back down so maybe he can get a WDC.

And it will ruin the idea that they have 2 number 1 drivers if they ask Piastri to sacrifice a third of his season. Wouldn’t be surprised to see RB/Aston sniffing around Piastri if they thought he was unhappy there.

I agree with what Buxton says, I’d love to see a title fight with a few races to go, but I don’t want to see one where one driver really isn’t performing and is only there because the other one is forced into team orders. I want to see Lando sort out his starts and have more dominant races like Zandvoort.

I could see Max at AM 100%, they are really making moves lately and the team they have assembled is quite impressive. He has a good relationship with Newey already, and is very popular with Honda. Could see him taking over from Alonso.