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@Mr Jack right enough I’d forgotten that the Sainz and Verstappen camps have had some “tension” before!
Poll: Official 2024 Belgian Grand Prix Race Thread - Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps - Race 14/24
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Yeah it could be this. That is so broken.
Its another "f1 sucks" thing. Try and do something different and you can't.
I get there has to be a weight limit, but it sucks
Exclude tyres from the weight limit would fix it. Tyres are pirelli anyway.
He'd have been fine at any other track, well able to pick up enough rubber to make it work. It's only because they don't do a cool down lap at Spa. Weird circumstances.
That would make some sense, but it'd also be much more difficult to implement because right now they just drive the car onto some weighing scales. They'd have to remove/refit wheels and so to weigh the car without them. I think so long as the teams know what is what, the system is fair. Mercedes failed to consider the combination impact of Russell's long run and Spa's unusual return procedures.
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Soldato
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They seem to be struggling with overall balance since a certain someone went on gardening leave.
I'd echo this. I quite like him as a person. But he's taking up a seat that should be at worst filled by a decent driver.
I was glad he got the RBR drive.
He just has fallen to pieces this year unfortunately and has been given more time than most get
Do they really pick up that much rubber driving around?
If so this is even more ridiculous. For all the tech in f1.. Just remove the damn tyres.
Really spoilt the race for me. It was a bold call, it and GR did an amazing job at the end. He absolutely deserved the win.
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Its finally getting good.. Then we have a rule change. Great
Yep. Apparently the last set of upgrades they put on the car Newey had objected to saying they wouldn't work, but he was ignored. Go figure.
Soldato
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Oddly common behaviour if I’ve learned anything from all the episodes of Ramsey’s Kitchen Nightmares the wife watches.
I don't know what the numbers are, but they always remind drivers to do it, and the tyres always look absolutely plastered in rubbish they've picked up so I imagine that it's significant; ESPN report that it's as much as 2kg which would have been enough here.
Yeah, I agree he earned the win and I'm sad he lost it, although it didn't spoil things for me. I thought Lewis also deserved a win, so I'm not too sad with the eventual result. Ultimately though, I think that one race in.... however long I've been watching F1, I think? I don't ever recall this happening before?... is a good basis for changing long standing rules.
Soldato
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IIRC from the last time this idea was floated around, there's a couple of reasons they don't do this.
Firstly, the additional demand on the scrutineers. The weight of the tyres obviously changes as they wear, so you can't just subtract 4x fresh tyre's weight from the car's total weight at the end of the race. They would need to remove all the tyres from the car and then weigh the car. This will take a lot more time and effort and slow the post-race scrutineering process down even further. The teams can't do it as the cars are still in parc ferme until released by scrutineers, and the scrutineers don't have the manpower or facilities to do this for 20 cars in a timely enough manner to allow the teams to get the car back and packup and leave.
An alternative would be to just take the cars weight minus tyres *and* wheels, but this will then begin an arms race to produce the lightest possible wheels, and the fear was that it would lead to a lot more wheel failures as manufacturers were forced to push the envelope of using the least amount of material possible, with even less margin than they currently have. 'So make the wheels a minimum weight' - that just adds another item for the scrutineers to check, and means they have to remove all the tyres and wheels and we're back to problem #1
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It’s hard on George but the other teams and drivers weren’t underweight and managed to stick to the rules; doesn’t feel like something that we should change because of a single race.
I like Russell and think he gets a pretty tough reception considering he was a rookie alongside Albon and Norris who are both much more 'naturally' charismatic - but I'm not sure he can deserve a win if the car was found to be illegal.
It's unfortunate but who's to say that 1.5kg didn't make the difference each lap to make that strategy work for the one stop? Would that additional weight across 33 laps (essentially 50kg in total across that duration) be the difference?
At least we've got the next half of this season and then all of next season too! It'd be worst if the rules were changing after this year just as we get to a really close playing field between the top 4 teams!
Soldato
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Up until the very last part of the race, it was a bit of a snoozefest. GR holding on to first with the one stop strategy was what made it exciting for me. It was a good call, and he made it work. Given that it was for nothing, then the main exciting area is removed.
People keep complaining about the upcoming rule change, but they are mistaking what we are getting now in absolutely rubbish cars, for decent. Lets get good cars (which is not what the new rules are bringing unfortunately), then maybe they can settle down. Absolutely giant wastes of space, that dont suit a large number of tracks on the calendar. Change is needed.
People keep complaining about the upcoming rule change, but they are mistaking what we are getting now in absolutely rubbish cars, for decent. Lets get good cars (which is not what the new rules are bringing unfortunately), then maybe they can settle down. Absolutely giant wastes of space, that dont suit a large number of tracks on the calendar. Change is needed.
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That certain person designed the same car and would have been part of pre-season upgrade strategy. So I'm not convinced by that theory.
It is more likely to do with the loss of testing due to the budget cap penalty, which has now ended.
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I don't think its Newey related, well it might be, in that the most recent upgrades (which you assume he was involved in) didn't work as expected and the car got downgraded to an older spec.
Doubt him leaving has caused the sudden (ish) downturn in form though
Doubt him leaving has caused the sudden (ish) downturn in form though
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Something to also bear in mind:
If George and Lewis were at the front end in a championship battle, I think they would have pitted George, based on past policy at Mercedes.
When they were dominating, I remember a few times drivers wanted to go off the cuff, and Merc nipped it in the bud.
A few things worked in Georges favour yesterday (Until he was weighed
)
None of the top 5 realised he was a threat, until he was.
Merc also probably thought his tyres would drop off, but he was not finishing any higher than 5th if he pitted. So why not.
As for why the teams got it so wrong, I presume its simply a lack of data.
The re-surfacing of the track probably forced a more cautious approach from the teams due to previous years data becoming less relevant.
The huge tyre deg they were expecting never materialised. Evident as early as Verstappen`s first stop.
If George and Lewis were at the front end in a championship battle, I think they would have pitted George, based on past policy at Mercedes.
When they were dominating, I remember a few times drivers wanted to go off the cuff, and Merc nipped it in the bud.
A few things worked in Georges favour yesterday (Until he was weighed
)None of the top 5 realised he was a threat, until he was.
Merc also probably thought his tyres would drop off, but he was not finishing any higher than 5th if he pitted. So why not.
As for why the teams got it so wrong, I presume its simply a lack of data.
The re-surfacing of the track probably forced a more cautious approach from the teams due to previous years data becoming less relevant.
The huge tyre deg they were expecting never materialised. Evident as early as Verstappen`s first stop.
Soldato
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Admittedly there wasn't much in the way of racing, but the fact that you couldn't tell with any decent certainty who would win from the end of lap 1 was great. I think they even said in commentary that this race had 6 different leaders. I can't think of another race in the last 10 years where that's happened. Possibly even 20 years.
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