Plus their sweetheart 'buy all the things and become a Ferrari b-team in all but name' arrangement went down the pan when Ferrari decided Alfa-Sauber would be their b-team.
Apart from Williams I thought the overall spread was closer. Certainly the last 2 seasons the midfield itself was much closer. Closer is well and good but small mistakes are punished havily. Instead of loosing a few places you finish last. Not to mention a small impact will have large gains
The middle (McRenault to Haas) is closer than ever, but from the front 3 to the middle is bigger than ever, Williams are out in the woods playing racing cars by themselves. It shouldn't be that the top 3 are lapping everyone up to the top 6 about half the time.
It was only in three races (Hungary, Austria, Canada) out of 14 so far where no one outside the top 3 teams finished on the lead lap, everywhere else at least one managed to avoid being lapped (admittedly sometimes with significant safety car assistance). (so doesn't really sound like it got worse in the time since Mercedes became the dominant team)
Well then. I'd not seen fp3 times so colour me surprised to see ferrari stomping everyone in qualifying. Silly old finger floundering when it matters again though. The king is well and truly dead. Long live the king.
Tweet— Twitter API (@user) date i think if he does get the schumy equalling 7th he'll bail when the rules change.
Yep. He might want 1 year in the new cars, just for the craic, but really he's just there for the records now. I think if he thinks he can, he'll stay for 100 wins.
Well he's only 19 away from 100 and 10 way from Schumacher's record [91], so it's still technically doable this side of the 2021 rules change
Earlier in the season I would have thought it highly likely, but with redbull/verstappen and ferrari/leclerc pulling their socks up, I'm not so sure now. Even with the ridiculous amount of races they seem to be cramming into next year. I'd probably give him russia, Japan and Austin, that'd still leave 16 for the ton. Today's race is anyone's, Mexico will likely go the verstappen again (or a mclaren ), Brazil is anyone's guess, and ferrari are likely to be very strong in Abu Dhabi on those ginormous straights. Maybe he'll settle for an equal or better record of Schumacher, but next year will be tough, especially if ferrari don't cock it up. Could be a genuine 3 way battle.
FFS PEOPLE!!! (at the constant stream of safety cars). Ferrari just don't like leclerc do they? They really love to bend him over for a good rogering. Merc's strategy nowhere: hope the 'front 3' get held up by the long first stint crew, only to pull Hamilton in as soon as they get close to being held up. Strange calls.
Is it a testament to my waning interest that I forgot the race was on today, or am I just getting old and senile?
Bottas being told to drop pace by THREE SECONDS is a disgrace, esp given HAM has more or less wrapped up the WDC title. This wasn't even team orders for an on-track position swap or anything like that, just screwing one guy for a botched strategy with the second guy. Unreal. OTOH, Ferrari one-two after ages! FORZA FERRARI, grazie ragazzi, tutti frutti, etc etc
I think Merc have changed their focus to the 2020 car already, make things look closer than they are (10 wins from 15 races so far). Even so this wa a weekend Ferrari and Seb especially needed, he drove a blinder for a change. As for Hamilton quitting, I reckon he's looking forward to the 2021 ground effect cars. GF cars a legendary for being brutal, Hamilton seems to like cars that are brutal.
Was a rather tactical race, but for a change I'm happy Seb won. Hes been having a poor lack of form of late and yesterday he didn't put a foot wrong and was aggressive passing after the stops where Leclerc wasn't. Merc was all out of shape foxed by Ferrari beating them in Quali then trying to rely on traffic to get ahead when Hamilton was lapping so slowly they had to sacrifice Bottas. Couple of odd incidents the one that stands out being Russell and Grosjean, what was Grosjean thinking? The Russel was ahead (just) but had the inside line he could have tucked in but decided to stick it out and cause the Willams to clatter the wall. I don't see why HAAS have kept both drivers, they don't get on and Grosjean is quickly becoming the new Maldonado.
Am I the only one that found it weird that Seb's pit was perfectly timed, giving him some free air to run in behind stroll, and Ferrari not telling Leclerc about it (along with the slight confusion about whether to pit or not on Charles' side of the garage)? It's probably a tin-foil-hat moment, but it smells of politics to me.
...or you could look at it another way. Help Seb get a win boost to his confidence and hopefully fix what has become a rather lame duck in the team so they can start getting both drivers back on the podiums. A small sacrifice really, I don't necessarily agree with it but I can see the logic if that was their point.