-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
Formula 1 2017 Season |OT| Japanese Horror Story - Sundays on Sky
- Thread starter Ark
- Start date
- Status
nekkid
It doesn't matter who we are, what matters is our plan.
I'd rather be able to hear the wheels screeching and carbon banging amongst the engine sound, personally.
JadedWriter
Member
I'm pretty sure Nico was liked well enough by the team since he was actually there at Silverstone in the team paddock. I also think Hamilton and Rosberg were quite frankly getting sick of racing each other, way too much history there is my assumption. That and it soured whatever friendship they used to have, which makes me wonder if they talk to each other now.
I personally love the exhaust notes of the 80's B spec Rally cars. Those things just sound ferocious.
For what it's worth, I greatly appreciated being able to watch the F1 race yesterday without ear protection, because the GP3 and F2 races required it.
Mohonky
Member
Pointless, the idea is to develop with technology.
sems4arsenal
Member
Horner made a decent point regarding this. With the future being electric and cars driving themselves, surely F1 must now deviate from road tech.
Which is pointless given how nobody gives a shit about the tech, nobody understands why grid penalties drop down every week and outside of Mercedes both Honda and Renault only look bad due to failing engines. It's a PR nightmare that serves no purpose and it's not exactly convincing new suppliers to enter the sport due to the investment needed with no guarantee of returns.
---
Qualification duels:
Code:
Mercedes Lewis Hamilton 6-4 Valtteri Bottas
Red Bull Daniel Ricciardo 4-6 Max Verstappen
Ferrari Sebastian Vettel 7-3 Kimi Raikkonen
Force India Sergio Perez 9-1 Esteban Ocon
Williams Felipe Massa 9-1 Lance Stroll
McLaren Fernando Alonso 8-1 Stoffel Vandoorne
Toro Rosso Carlos Sainz 5-5 Daniil Kvyat
Haas F1 Team Kevin Magnussen 4-6 Romain Grosjean
Renault Nico Hülkenberg 10-0 Jolyon Palmer
Sauber Pascal Wehrlein 6-2 Marcus EricssonPetrol isn't going anywhere, if anything its being developed more now than at any time in the last 50 years. Just Snivelus doing his usual to get his own way, a simple cheap v8 like he won with many times.
Sadly for him, none of the manufacturers are interested in something so pedestrian. They want hybrid tech and turbos and stuff because it is going to drive business for them off track. It really wont be long before you can't buy a petrol only car any more.
Psychotext
Member
Disaster or no disaster Ferrari has no chance winning this Championship (i am talking drivers, constructors isnt even up for discussion).
Only way for them to win is i dont know, casting some type of black magic on Hamilton (or even Botas) and have them wreck their cars on every race.
Mercedes is simply on top and their qualifying pace is off limits for Ferrari... they are even comfortable enough, as to go on and warn their rivals that they are now unlocking the car's true pace.
So yeah, I am a Ferrari fan, but the dream seems still distant. Call me pessimist all you want, you know it that they simply cannot match Mercedes/Hamilton/Botas combination.
Better luck in 2018 i guess....
Only way for them to win is i dont know, casting some type of black magic on Hamilton (or even Botas) and have them wreck their cars on every race.
Mercedes is simply on top and their qualifying pace is off limits for Ferrari... they are even comfortable enough, as to go on and warn their rivals that they are now unlocking the car's true pace.
So yeah, I am a Ferrari fan, but the dream seems still distant. Call me pessimist all you want, you know it that they simply cannot match Mercedes/Hamilton/Botas combination.
Better luck in 2018 i guess....
dl77
Member
Yup. Volvo have already said that from 2019 all of their cars will be either electric or hybrid.
Vettel needs a 2007 McLaren type situation. Strings of bad luck and an in-team battle.
If Bottas actually smells blood for a potential championship, he might "transform".
Also, to emulate 2007 controversy, I wouldn't be in the least surprised if someone pops the lid off the quali mode secret. It's so utterly incomprehensible to the other engine manufacturers that there pretty much has to be something suspicious going on, they just got away with it (and that's all that really matters)
JadedWriter
Member
Hasn't the quali mode thing been a question since 2014? I'm going to assume whatever they do is legal, but the other manufacturers don't know how to implement it without exploding their engines.
dl77
Member
Bottas is a good driver but there's no way you can compare him to Hamilton or Alonso. Let's be honest Bottas has won when Hamilton has had a bad weekend. When Hamilton's at his best he creams him. Look at Silverstone, nearly 6/10ths ahead of his nearest rival and nearly 8/10ths ahead of Bottas!
Bad weekends can happen quite often, and then you get 2016.
Remember, Rosberg was also one swapped technical issue in the last race away from winning the 2014 championship despite only having half the wins (even without the double points)
So Merc wins a race so this is what must happen for the rest of the reason?
- Valtteri Bottas: 91
- Daniel Ricciardo: 80
- Lewis Hamilton: 78
- Sebastian Vettel: 73
Since Monaco.
You recon Mercedes just "won a race"?
Cause i am counting 6 +80% of qualifying + a huge margin in constructor points...
I am sorry but maybe you should be a bit more realistic here.
Mercedes can only lose this if they are extremely unlucky and Ferrari extremely lucky. Both must happen.
And they wont.
I'll gladly eat crow though being a ferrari supporter...
Momentum has been turning for a few races now. Mercs look primed to dominate the second half of the season unless Ferrari makes a leap.
JadedWriter
Member
When will they use the Toyota wind tunnel?
Psychotext
Member
...and given they just introduced an engine upgrade which seemed to do very little, that looks unlikely.
I only remember reading that it has a slight boost for qualifying.
And they did beat Bottas in that.
Hamilton just killed it in Q3.
JadedWriter
Member
Bottas didn't exactly help himself in qualifying though. Would he still have gotten beat if he messed up his second lap?
Psychotext
Member
Killing it might be worth a couple of tenths. It's not worth half a second.
DarkJediKnight
Member
Not going to happen. Back in the 80s and 90s, turbos were for sports cars with horrible fuel economy and reliability.
Now you see 4 cylinder turbos into SUVs and Honda civics with fantastic reliability and fuel economy.
If anything, F1 will eventually move to 4 cylinder turbos. I don't care what engine they use, but I want high revving squeal as it drives by. You should be able to hear a F1 car 3 corners away.
dl77
Member
None of that disproves my statement though?
In that time Hamilton has won two races to Bottas's one. It should have been three but missed out on another victory due to a faulty head restraint and also had a 5 place gearbox penalty in Austria.
You put Rosberg in the same category as Vettel, Hamilton and Alonso too since he won a WDC?
If Ferrari can't keep up in the development war then I seriously hope that Bottas can take the fight to Lewis to keep this season mildly interesting. I reckon he has what it takes. Everything so far has been a learning step for him, ways to get experience of a championship winning car, race wins and poles under his belt.
Bottas is better than a lot of people give him credit for and his results speak for themselves.
People discredit him for not being on the same pace as Hamilton after four days of pre-season testing in a new team. Fact is he is the best performing over the past two months. Impressive.
I guess Bottas grid penalty did not count?
GrizzleBoy
Banned
Shhhhh.
Don't ANALYZE the numbers, just LOOK at them.
That's why it's fact that Button did better at McLaren than Hamilton, despite numerous issues in the 2012 season that Hamilton could've won without a spontaneously combusting car. The points are higher for button, therefore he was better. Fact.
Right then, can we analyze how Bottas went from one lap down to everyone in Baku to 2nd on the finish line?
Give Bottas some credits, the guy is brilliantly driving after being unexpectedly thrusted into a completely new team. Everyone underestimated him and yet here he is performing like a goddamn champ.
Give Bottas some credits, the guy is brilliantly driving after being unexpectedly thrusted into a completely new team. Everyone underestimated him and yet here he is performing like a goddamn champ.
adamantypants
Member
Damn. This past weekend even Vandoorne got one over his teammate; Fernando Fucking Alonso.
JadedWriter
Member
Funny enough Button could barely drive the 2012 car after the had to do something with the nose for regulations reasons. Wasn't he lapped in Canada, which sent Whitmarsh into Defcon 1?
I actually like Bottas, he's very...low key? yet he's been highly effective. Doesn't even whine while getting onto the podium which Rosberg was prone too. "I hate finishing behind this guy," shut up Rosberg...
Although Bottas is kind of quiet, I am really enjoying the threat that he is to the rest of the field. He's a really good driver.
KillerMan91
Member
Bottas is driving his first season at Mercedes and is 4 to 6 in qualifying battles against one of the best qualifiers ever driven in F1, has two wins, two poles and even during ''bad'' weekends usually takes the maximum points that he can get. Without his engine failure in Barcelona he would be only few points away from Hamilton. I really don't know what some of you guys expected but hardly anyone expected him to drive so well before start of the season considering it's his first year at Mercedes and Hamilton is one of the all time greats.
adamantypants
Member
The TV coverage is kind of a detriment to Bottas' skill. He carves his way up the field but you wouldn't know it unless you're watching the grid positions; I feel like he's never on camera. Meanwhile this past weekend, there was a good 3-4 laps of pure Hamilton in the middle even though he was like 10 seconds ahead of everyone else with nothing going on behind or ahead of him. Granted it's the British GP, but Brits aren't the only ones watching the feed.
Most of this can be explained by experience in the car. Verstappen was almost consistently .4s behind Ricciardo all last season in qualifying and look at them now. Hamilton has been setting up cars with his engineers in this team for years now, it will take Bottas and his engineers a while to anticipate set-ups. And even then he isn't exactly being completely destroyed most days.
Doesn't take anything away from Lewis stellar laps. He put the entire field on notice with those.
Well the safety car gave him the lap back. And other top teams have shown you can go from the back of the pack to a decent points place - if youre driving a Ferrari, Mercedes or red bull.
Jezbollah
Member
Hmm.
From my last count, there's two Brits in the field this year. One broke down before the race started. And I don't remember seeing much of Hamilton as he flew off in the lead.
Your point doesnt really hold.
OriginofHysteria
Banned
Idk I saw a lot of Max/Vettel, Ricc, Force India battles, etc. more than Hamilton. Granted this was the CNBC feed. Bottas though I didn't notice until he was chasing Raikkonen so yeah.
DHC-Shannow
Member
Bottas at the moment looks like the perfect driver for the team - he might not reach the highs of Hamilton but also won't sink to the lows. He rarely makes mistakes and isn't a political schemer. Fast but solid and dependable, in a lot of ways like Kimi is for Ferrari but more driven / capable of getting a win. I can't see any way they don't extend his contract.
FrankCanada97
Roughly the size of a baaaaaarge
Felix Rosenqvist is going to test for Ganassi in IndyCar again. He's been everywhere after winning Formula 3 in 2015. Doing stints in DTM, Formula E, Blancpain, Indy Lights and Super Formula. The Ganassi team was very impressed with his testing last year. I hope he gets an IndyCar seat, would love to see him racing around my neck of the woods.
Renault team boss dismisses the rumors about Palmer's replacement. And looks like guy has a sense of humor
Elvin Atombender
Member
He was also in this years Le Mans in an LMP2-car. He had a rare weekend off a couple of months ago so he went back to Sweden and won two races in the Scandinavian Porsche Carrera Cup-series.
He is quick in anything and deserves a seat in a bigger series.
- Status