Grand Prix Rejects

So, the first two practice sessions for the new season have been run this morning...and although it's early days so far it looks like Mercedes are the team to beat. After half a decade of this stuff, I'm so enthusiastic for yet more of it.

The real talking point though is just how hopeless Williams seem to be. It's worrying similar to the final days of Brabham and the original Team Lotus, miles off the pace in a car cobbled together at the last minute. Whatever Paddy Lowe was trying to achieve with his design philosophy over the last couple of seasons, trying to emulate Manor in 2015 was probably not the intended result. At least Manor had a viable excuse for being so far off the pace that year, Williams don't even have that!

McLaren don't look much better either...

So I've just looked at the results from the practice sessions - my goodness, it does look a bit like Mercedes were sandbagging. Let's just hope Ferrari have been doing likewise, but haven't showed their card yet.

I'm happy that the other drivers don't appear to be too off the pace in these sessions, meaning the Renaults and... Räikkönen? Räikkönen 6th in both sessions? That bodes well for Alfa, if it's genuine.

And my goodness, I understand a bit better now what people have been saying about Williams. Consistently at least 3.5s off the pace, this appears already to be a year to forget for them.

The best you can say about Williams is that they are much more likely to make the 107% rule than MasterCard Lola and more likely to qualify than Pacific in the latter half of 1994. Beyond that... I have nothing. As a Williams fan, I can only hope for a race with as much attrition as the 1996 Monaco Grand Prix, with Robert Kubica fulfilling Panis's role, and George Russell following in David Coulthard's wheeltracks.

EDIT: potential candidate for ROTR if Mercedes don't win in Oz. Potential ROTY if things really go pear-shaped for Mercedes.

Absolutely agreed on the shirt. it's solid-gold asking for fate to step in and say "actually..." Already worthy of Reject of the Race nomination.

I kinda missed the announcement but it seems Racing Point have rebagded their Mercedes engines to "BWT Mercedes" engines. Racint Point - BWT Mercedes, now that's a mouthful.

This wrote:I kinda missed the announcement but it seems Racing Point have rebagded their Mercedes engines to "BWT Mercedes" engines. Racint Point - BWT Mercedes, now that's a mouthful.

You'd hate cycling....

Norris out-performed my expectations and Sainz under-performed.

Gasly will have to learn to be more assertive in tyre strategy decisions.

Otherwise back to business as usual...

That Mercedes looked really edgy. Both drivers looked like they could lose it at any moment, especially on the bumps.

UncreativeUsername37 wrote:

This wrote:I kinda missed the announcement but it seems Racing Point have rebagded their Mercedes engines to "BWT Mercedes" engines. Racint Point - BWT Mercedes, now that's a mouthful.

You'd hate cycling....

I'm just glad we haven't ended up with BMW Alfa Romeo Ferrari...

To quote the F1 youtube comments:

"Is that a safety car out during qualifying? No... just a Williams."

At least they passed 107%.

IceG wrote: and Sainz under-performed.

My apologies to Carlos, just watched an interview where he explained that he was yellow-flagged due to Kubica's puncture...

Looks like Kubica said his mistake was due to him actually finding for the first time some hint of pace within the car, which led to him actually pushing too far on that corner...

Please please please don't let this season be boring.

I'm up! I'm awake! And because of a change to my shifts at work I get to watch the season opener live in the comfort of my own home for the first time in many years!

Love a new season. Let's go!

Certainly didn't expect that for the opener! Valtteri wasting a seat at Mercedes, eh? Hearing the line "I want 26 points!", from Bottas before he proceeded to get them, is a really great sign that this might not be a one-sided title fight as some have feared.

A race which sadly never really caught fire - although at least it was Bottas who won rather than Hamilton, which provided a bit of variety. Hamilton's lack of pace compared to his team mate was very unusual and a bit of a mystery, although he seemed confident in the post-race interview that he knew what the issue was. Ferrari being nowhere was also a surprise, with Vettel also being given something to think about by his team-mate. Red Bull will be pretty happy with their first race under Honda power, I think.

Is there some sort of curse on Australian drivers in Melbourne, though? Webber mostly had appalling luck there, and Ricciardo has carried that on. Maybe Alan Jones needs to urinate in all four corners of Albert Park to lift an ancient curse or something.

Poor old Williams look to be in for a very long, hard season at the back. It'll be a miserable 2019 for them unless some sort of chaotic wet race gifts them a few points somewhere.

It was quite fun to see how the fastest lap created a bit of interest at the end. I hope that continues to liven up the conclusions of fairly dull races!

Hamilton apparently had floor damage, which might explain his lack of pace compared to Bottas after he pitted.

I calculated an estimate for the race pace of each driver in the race today if anyone's interested. The calculation imagines each driver setting each lap with no fuel onboard, in other words, each lap time is fuel-adjusted.

The extra point for the fastest lap seemed to interest the drivers a bit towards the end of the race. Could add a bit of spice to some of the more dreary ends of races on the calendar.

[quote="Paul Hayes"]A race which sadly never really caught fire /quote]

Carlos Sainz would like to disagree with you.

However, I agree. Australia on average hasn't always had the greatest races in its history since the move to Melbourne in 1996. Season openers barring 1997, 1999 and 2002 are usually quite quiet affairs where the teams don't want the drivers to take the risks of the car failing and not getting early points on the door. That is why I suspect Ferrari ordered their drivers to hold station.

I know its only been one race but the pecking order looks about the same from last year with Maybe Haas leapfrogging Alfa Romeo (RIP Sauber).

Barahin hopefully will be a better race however if Mercedes continue to show this pace ahead of Red Bull and Ferrari we may (I say May) be looking at a two-driver battle. Aka 2014-2016

I'll join the disappointment that Ferrari were a long way off the lead Mercedes...and Red Bull couldnt do much either.
Hopefully its just a one-off....
Kubica looked a bit rusty overall - glanced the pit wall, glanced the barrier in quallie, and hit Gasly at turn 1 ..surely he'll do better next time.
I quite enjoyed the difficulties they had in trying to pass- DRS didnt make an easy drive-by as I feared it would, and nor did the tyres go off so much that it was easy to just outdrag/outbrake I particularly enjoyed Kvyat making a proper lunge and Giovinazzi's defence .
Meanwhile Pierre Gasly has learned that your strategy options as a Red Bull number 2 are pretty sub-optimal

In amongst all the goodwill for Valtteri Bottas, and the wailing and gnashing of teeth for Ferrari being slightly off the pace, Williams being the new Minardi and Daniel Ricciardo's race being run before the first corner, there's something that's flown under the radar...

Charles Leclerc unrejectified himself.

Admittedly, that was absolutely expected unless he fell off the track, but I'm surprised that it hasn't been mentioned. Isn't that one of the primary functions of this forum?

dinizintheoven wrote:In amongst all the goodwill for Valtteri Bottas, and the wailing and gnashing of teeth for Ferrari being slightly off the pace, Williams being the new Minardi and Daniel Ricciardo's race being run before the first corner, there's something that's flown under the radar...

Charles Leclerc unrejectified himself.

Admittedly, that was absolutely expected unless he fell off the track, but I'm surprised that it hasn't been mentioned. Isn't that one of the primary functions of this forum?

He nearly binned it a couple of times though

Albert Park's an absolutely garbage track, isn't it? It's entertaining when you've got variables like wet weather, but it's not wide enough for cars to race close to each other - especially post-2016 where the cars are now two metres wide.

So you're left to rely on lunges into turn three that, by and large, don't work because the line's so easy to cover off - which makes Verstappen's pass on Vettel into the first corner that little bit special.

But, first impressions are that the new ruleset's been helpful in letting the cars get a little closer to each other - just like the train from seventh to 11th in the second half of the race.

What's massively interesting is how much faster the cars are this year with the new ruleset, especially when technical directors up and down the grid were concerned that they'd lost around two seconds during the off-season following the changes to the front wing.

That's why the bargeboards are so complex this year, and that's where a lot of the time has come from. Ultimately, it's a bit of a surprise.

Ataxia wrote:Albert Park's an absolutely garbage track, isn't it? It's entertaining when you've got variables like wet weather, but it's not wide enough for cars to race close to each other - especially post-2016 where the cars are now two metres wide.

What's massively interesting is how much faster the cars are this year with the new ruleset, especially when technical directors up and down the grid were concerned that they'd lost around two seconds during the off-season following the changes to the front wing.
.

I'm not a fan of Albert Park ('garbage' might be a bit strong for me), it's a bit samey , and there's not much heavy braking to test your ability to keep it stable, rotate the car and control the traction away from the corner ( and help give an overtaking opportunity) . If you're ok in medium speed corners - you'll be fine round Albert Park.

And as Ataxia says - the track isnt helped by the speed of the cars which has increased over last year, incredibly. They dont need to slow down so much for corners now that the wide cars have lower top speeds but faster corner speeds, and the corners are faster to drive round and floor it on exit, making overtaking harder. And that's in addition to the width and length of the cars. For Albert Park it means those medium speed corners seem fairly straightforward, and the fast chicane is also more comfortable on exit than before.

I do think that these faster cars ( in corners) which are longer and are back to 2m wide are making some corners less relevant, more straightforward, and offer less chance for overtaking.
Commentators said Albert Park's pit lane was a bit narrow ...cars couldnt get out the garage easily . But it looked pretty wide to me- its just the cars are so long

Ataxia wrote:Albert Park's an absolutely garbage track, isn't it? It's entertaining when you've got variables like wet weather, but it's not wide enough for cars to race close to each other - especially post-2016 where the cars are now two metres wide.

So you're left to rely on lunges into turn three that, by and large, don't work because the line's so easy to cover off - which makes Verstappen's pass on Vettel into the first corner that little bit special.

But, first impressions are that the new ruleset's been helpful in letting the cars get a little closer to each other - just like the train from seventh to 11th in the second half of the race.

What's massively interesting is how much faster the cars are this year with the new ruleset, especially when technical directors up and down the grid were concerned that they'd lost around two seconds during the off-season following the changes to the front wing.

That's why the bargeboards are so complex this year, and that's where a lot of the time has come from. Ultimately, it's a bit of a surprise.

Incidentally, there has been some speculation over what might have been happening with Ferrari and some people wondering if there was something wrong with Ferrari's engine.

There was some onboard footage from the Ferrari's and Sauber's where there seemed to be occasional dips in the engine revs whilst the drivers were on full throttle - and, in one instance, leading to Vettel immediately getting on the radio to ask the team to check the engine (that was not long before Verstappen passed Vettel).

There also seemed to be a number of complaints over the radio from all of the Ferrari powered drivers about the energy recovery systems "clipping", and those odd dips in the engine revs might have been a sign that the car was switching into recharging mode quite early on the straights.

There were also a few comments about Vettel and Leclerc seemingly going slower in the speed traps towards the end of the race, and radio transmissions that seemed to suggest that both drivers were using quite conservative engine modes during much of that race.

If there are possible problems, it might explain why Verstappen found it comparatively easy to pass Vettel into Turn 1 - it is possible that Ferrari might have been nursing a potential issue with their power unit (there were a few rumours, which were initially dismissed at the time, that Ferrari were having a few reliability issues in testing, and in particular with losses of pressure in the oil system).