Yes Piastri schooled Leclerc today. When he went for the lead Leclerc left the door totally open at turn 1 but when the roles were reversed Piastri parked it on the inside every time and gave Leclerc no chance. Brilliant stuff.

 

Sainz vs Perez looked clumsy as hell but I seem to recall they only showed the Sainz onboard on the feed and not Perez and I've not been able to find his onboard since so need to see how much he was angling his car to the right if at all.

 

Also I've still not seen why Norris got hit with yellow flags during Q1 yesterday, who or what caused these yellow flags?

Edited September 15, 2024Sep 15 by Dobbo

Yes Piastri schooled Leclerc today. When he went for the lead Leclerc left the door totally open at turn 1 but when the roles were reversed Piastri parked it on the inside every time and gave Leclerc no chance. Brilliant stuff.

 

Sainz vs Perez looked clumsy as hell but I seem to recall they only showed the Sainz onboard on the feed and not Perez and I've not been able to find his onboard since so need to see how much he was angling his car to the right if at all.

 

Also I've still not seen why Norris got hit with yellow flags during Q1 yesterday, who or what caused these yellow flags?

Ocon.

 

He hit the wall and was driving slowly back to the pit. It shoould only have been a white flag

A record that may not be broken happened today, Ollie Bearman scoring in the points for two different teams in his first two races of his career.

A record that may not be broken happened today, Ollie Bearman scoring in the points for two different teams in his first two races of his career.

 

He definitely proved himself to be worthy of an F1 seat. He was outpaced in the race by Nico (think at one point he was a second a lap slower on the same tyres) but was a lot closer than K-Mag has been. Even finishing 13th (where he'd been without Sainz/Perez/Nico's issues) would have been a great showing

 

And awesome to see Colapinto doing so well - obliterating anything Sargeant did!

A record that may not be broken happened today, Ollie Bearman scoring in the points for two different teams in his first two races of his career.

I can definitely see that being matched at least.

 

I'm pretty sure it's only not been done before because they never used to give half the grid points

McLaren on course for their first constructors title since 1998. Not bad at all considering they were the worst car on the grid after round 1 of last season.

today half of the sports news outlets and papers have the same joke: an Oscar for Piastri :D

McLaren on course for their first constructors title since 1998. Not bad at all considering they were the worst car on the grid after round 1 of last season.

 

Yep they’ve really turned it around well. Now have the best car with two of the best drivers. Red bull looked screwed for the foreseeable future.

Don't write Red Bull off just yet. Perez was strong enough to finish in 2nd on Sunday and after Singapore most of the circuits have traditionally suited their cars

So this is a pivotal weekend. Red Bull didn’t win this race even last year and struggle on this circuit. The ideal place for Norris to cut into the gap in a big way. If he doesn’t manage it then it begins to look a little improbable. I’m hoping a Norris win with Max 5th or even lower than that

McLaren have confirmed they will not run their 'controversial' mini DRS flexi-wing on the cars again this year. This comes as the FIA were expected to ban it however, since we're passed the point of its greatest benefit (Monaz, Baku etc) it shouldn't really bother them too much.

 

In other news Mohammed Ben Sulayem has suggested the FIA will be cracking down on the broadcasting of driver's swearing on the radio and other instances. Verstappen has been ordered to do some 'public work' due to his use of the f-word during yesterdays press conference.

 

The swearing thing really bugs me. We're talking about an individual in a high pressure, high risk situation, sat alone in his car with only his engineer to communicate with, letting off the occasional swear word, and someone else choosing to broadcast it to the world (and it censored anyway), yet they're taking issue with the drivers as much as anyone else. Let's face it mosy people in that situation would be swearing as some point. Secondly, you can turn on almost any Premier League and hear the players swearing and maybe 30,000 people questioning the referee's self pleasuring habits on any weekend.

The grief the driver's are getting for the odd swear word is ludicrous. Swearing it the press conference I get the issue, as you know you're on screen but Verstappen was directly quoting himself in repsonse to a question asked. A simple please mind your language should be enough.

 

It's also worth remembering that a lot of foreign drivers learn English when they arrive hear and much of it is picked up from the mechanics and team personnel which leads to swearing being among the earliest words learned and therefore second nature.

 

 

 

As for the race this weekend, so far Red Bull appear to have no grip, Mercedes no pace and Norris and Leclerc are over half a second faster than anyone else so it looks to be between them.

Saw that earlier and don’t understand the point. Was anyone really bothered by the swearing? Such a jobsworth type of interference.

Suyalem is an absolute clown.

Absolute disasterclass from Ferrari and Piastri once again miles off Lando in quali. Great effort from Max in the 4th best car.

Max did great and the luck was again against Lando but he did what he had to do too. Shaping up for an intriguing race

I've tried but I can't see any way in which Lando was unlucky. He wa spotentially on a decent lap when Sainz crashed but others were more impacted by that (particularly Verstappen) and with over 8 mins to go it was unlikely to have been a significantly fast lap anyway. Did I miss something else

Very underwhelming race. Glad Lando won but all a bit procession. Daniel Riccardo stole a point from him at the end to leave F1 with a fastest lap for some reason

That race made Monaco seem like a thriller by comparison.

 

Red Bull would have sent an order to RB for Ricciardo to do that to steal a point from Lando, nothing to do with it being his last race imo. Just a convenient subplot.

 

 

This is the official line - 'RB team principal Laurent Mekies claimed they arranged Ricciardo’s fastest lap bid because he may not drive for them again after this weekend. “Given this may have been Daniel’s last race, we wanted to give him the chance to savour it and go out with the fastest lap,” he said.'

 

 

 

It does however mean that Ricciardo holds the circuit's lap record, so there is that

Not that much of a spectacle compared to Baku from the highlights so far.