Alex Albon joins Max Verstappen at Red Bull

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So they finally did it: https://redbullracing.redbull.com/article/alex-joins-team

Redbull have been in a rough spot after they let Ricciardo get away, it's now obvious to everyone that Redbull didn't have a quality driver to replace him until this year.

I hope they give Albon time, he doesn't need to beat Max just be somewhere in the same ballpark. With a championship as close as this Redbull need every point and Pierre just wasn't getting it done - he was between 0.5 - 1s per lap slower than Max in both the race and qualifying.
 
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Should have been Kvyat, he's doing well after his setbacks of the past few years.

Struggling to understand the Red Bull driver strategy these days though, it's just chewing through young hopefuls
 
Fair play to RB, they already know what Kvyat is capable of and want to throw Albon in the deep end to see if he can float. Get their driver choice right for 2020.
 
Quartz said:
Gasly's performance has been ghastly. He should be right up there with Max but he's not.
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How do you mean? Vettel is a capable driver and older and more experienced, don't know much about Leclerc, so points wise Gasly is doing about as well as could be expected. While he has had a couple of bad races he wouldn't really be anywhere significantly higher with more consistent performance unless he was capable of beating Vettel.
 
In f1 at a top team you've either got it or you haven't. Anything else is pointless.
That's why I never understand pay drivers, you may as well just burn money.
 
I hope Alex gets a fair chance but I suspect he will struggle. Max is clearly ahead of most in that car, this could be the death of Albon’s F1 career.
 
MissChief said:
I hope Alex gets a fair chance but I suspect he will struggle. Max is clearly ahead of most in that car, this could be the death of Albon’s F1 career.
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While he isn't quite LH's level - I might actually watch the rest of this season if somehow Max had the car and management behind him LH has - it would certainly make for some more edge of seat races.
 
Not really surprised. They know what Kvyat can do and have data now on Albon to make a comparison.

Albon won’t be expected to beat Verstappen, but he will be expected to compete with Bottas and the Ferraris. If he does that then he’ll have given a good account of himself and vindicated Red Bull’s decision.

Every time they do this though, a little piece of Torro Rosso dies. I know they’re a feeder team and support the main team, but having no say and independence over their drivers seems wrong. It will impact their performance. They get little good out of the relationship - it is mostly one way.
 
Albon doesn't have to reach max levels (he's new) but he must outdo gastley by some margin. Without any other info that shouldn't be difficult.

Actually a really interesting scenario for us.
Would would throw a spanner in the mix is if gastley out performs the torpedo
 
I think it should've been Kvyat over Albon only because Albon's experience level. But hopefully he does well.

I''m actually interested to see how this battle goes now. Was Gasly just awful or has Max become a racing god. If He's close to max Gasly is gonna look even worse
 
413x said:
Albon doesn't have to reach max levels (he's new) but he must outdo gastley by some margin. Without any other info that shouldn't be difficult.

Actually a really interesting scenario for us.
Would would throw a spanner in the mix is if gastley out performs the torpedo
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Albon’s job is to be rear gunner to Verstappen which requires him to be able to lap within a tenth or two of the Number 1 driver. Something that Gasly has not managed on a Sunday.
 
Mr Jack said:
If I was Kvyat, I'd be quietly seething right now. He's miles ahead of Albon in the standings.

Good luck, Albon, you're going to need it.
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I dont think kvyat is out of the running for 2020 if Albon does badly and he beats Gasly in a similar fashion to Max then I think they would be left with no choice but to promote him
 
Good decision to evaluate and see how he steps up before deciding if him or DK will partner next year at RBR. Albon had a good second half of last year in F2, and although outscored by DK this year so far, his 3rd place in Germany accounted for a big chunk of those points.
 
Rroff said:
How do you mean? Vettel is a capable driver and older and more experienced, don't know much about Leclerc, so points wise Gasly is doing about as well as could be expected. While he has had a couple of bad races he wouldn't really be anywhere significantly higher with more consistent performance unless he was capable of beating Vettel.
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I think the issue with Gasly is that, in the WDC he is about where you would expect 6th place. He's in a top 3 team that have an advantage over the rest of the field so I don't think it is an unreasonable expectation that he would, on average, come 6th in races. Where Gasly is failing though is total points. He is only just scrapping 6th place, beating out Sainz in a McLaren by 5 points. He has ~1/3 of the points of Verstappen. LeClerc is a little bit of an unknown but with a similar level of experience yet LeClerc has just over 2x the amount of points.

Assuming the 6th place on average which, as above, I don't think is unreasonable to expect. A bad race or problems with the car then yeah he could finish lower than 6th but he should be there to capitalise when it is Merc or Ferrari having problems to finish 4th or 5th. The points then would average out to around 6th place. 6th place award 8 points, 12 races in = 96 points. Gasly has 63.

RBR should be challenging Ferrari in the constructers and the fact they aren't is mostly due to Gasly. There was no way that was going to stand for long and I think half a season is long enough to prove he currently isn't up to the job. Whether Albon is though? that is an unknown but it gives RBR data of him in a car equal to Verstappen to see quite how good he is. Plus I can't see him being worse than Gasly so RBR have nothing to lose by making the switch.
 
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