And Lawson out-qualifies Tsunoda

Time to promote Hadjar!

haha they should switch pilots on a race/weekly basis :D

Max is the best driver by a mile

Todays pole was like a lightning from a clear sky. Almost unbelievable.

5 hours ago, Herbs said:

And Lawson out-qualifies Tsunoda

To be fair to Yuki, he only drove the car for the first time yesterday and had been pretty close to Max in every session until Q2 where he made a slight mistake in one corner costing him his best lap. This is despite him having set the car up with a lot more downforce and therefore having much less straight line speed (eyes on the Sunday conditions no doubt).

We'll never know what Liam would have done in the Red Bull here (and he does at least know Suzuka) but Yuki at least got more out of it overall so far than Lawson did in his two races.

Looking at Tsunoda's times that actually were representative and ignoring Verstappen's stunning pole lap I would have expected him to put it somewhere around 8/9th given an error free run, at the 14th position he will line up in is marked improvement for the 2nd Red Bull. He's been consistently half a second of Max's time all weekend whereas Lawson was almost always double that.

Pretty much every driver found five tenths on their Q1 time for their final run. Had Tsunoda done the same and not made the error he'd have qualified around 6th.

Whilst his grid position is a fascinating quirk of fate, I wouldn't take it as representative of his speed in the car tomorrow.

He was a bit unlucky and deserved better judging by his Q1

Yet another one that got away for McLaren then! Max had their number all race.

Also 4 different winners in the first 4 races! Serving 2012 vibes.

Not the greatest race but Max managed that to perfection.

The pit exit from Norris/Verstappen was probably the most exciting part.

Not much movement in the whole field - Tsunoda getting driver of the day on Sky Sports is the most ridiculous thing…..(at least he wasn’t anywhere near last though!)

1 hour ago, Dobbo said:

Also 4 different winners in the first 4 races! Serving 2012 vibes.

we've only had 3 races, haven't we?

bit boring race, only exciting bit was Alonso at the start and the Verstappen-Norris incident

but Norris was kinda childish and silly with his protests/tantrum

I'm counting the China Sprint in there 😛

Hopefully Ferrari get some upgrades and Leclerc gets in on the action. Norris to me lacks something. Killer instinct

Monaco in Japan.

Kimi Antonelli is the first driver to score points in his first 3 F1 GPs since Lewis Hamilton in 2007.

He 1000% future world champion material which is exciting as Italy haven't had one since Ascari!

I agree Antonelli looks to be a future contender for the title but I wouldn't place too much stock in the points in first three races stat. It sounds impressive but reliability is so good these days that pretty much any driver starting their career one of the top 4 teams should be able to do this if they can keep it clean. Antonelli is the first driver I can think of to start his rookie year in a top car since Lewis Hamilton, so it's not a surprise to see him as the last driver to do it.

The key thing is right there, keeping it clean. Something which no other rookie thus far has managed. And yes he did make that one mistake in Melbourne but it was a "Verstappen mistake" as in one that causes no big drama and barely loses any time/positions.

Your last sentence did get me thinking. Obviously you had Magnussen who got a P2 on debut when McLaren were good at the start of 2014 but that's it which shows a) how rare it is to debut in a top half car and b) how there's only really been 1 or 2 'top' cars every single season for the last 12 at least.

On 07/04/2025 at 09:44, Dobbo said:

He 1000% future world champion material which is exciting as Italy haven't had one since Ascari!

It's a shame that Andretti doesn't count, really. He was born in Italy and officially an Italian until 1965 when he became a US citizen at the age of 25.

Mind you he really threw himself into being as American as possible from his teen years.

12 minutes ago, Dobbo said:

The key thing is right there, keeping it clean. Something which no other rookie thus far has managed. And yes he did make that one mistake in Melbourne but it was a "Verstappen mistake" as in one that causes no big drama and barely loses any time/positions.

Your last sentence did get me thinking. Obviously you had Magnussen who got a P2 on debut when McLaren were good at the start of 2014 but that's it which shows a) how rare it is to debut in a top half car and b) how there's only really been 1 or 2 'top' cars every single season for the last 12 at least.

Keeping it clean is the key you're right but there have been plenty of rookies do that - Russell, Leclerc, Norris and Bearman all spring to mind but none had a car that was comfortably a top 10 finisher. Antonelli is in a very rare position of having that in his debut year.

Magnussen is a good shout too but if we're honest that McLaren had no right to finish 2nd and 3rd in Australia that year and wouldn't have done had others not suffered issues. Arguably the fifth best car that year so points for finishing were never certain.