2019 Barcelona GP Pre-Race discussion

http://www.espn.co.uk/f1/story/_/id/26639422/will-bottas-hamilton-rivalry-turn-sour

 

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https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/143095/vettel-not-driving-my-best-with-unnatural-ferrari

Sebastian Vettel is aware he is not "driving at my best" at the start of the 2019 Formula 1 season because the way his Ferrari is responding on-track feels "unnatural".

Ferrari has struggled to translate its pre-season pace into results and in the races where it has been more competitive, Bahrain and Azerbaijan, Vettel has not been as fast as new team-mate Charles Leclerc.

Vettel has two third-place finishes in the last two grands prix and is ahead of Leclerc in the championship, but believes Ferrari must find more performance to fight Mercedes and unlock more pace in himself.

"We need stronger pace, simple as that," said Vettel. "We need to be faster.

"It seems that for us it's more of a conscious effort to get the car in the right window, whereas maybe for them it seems to click a little bit easier.

"Especially a place like [Baku], you need the confidence in the car.

"I'm not there yet. I can feel that I'm not driving at my best because simply the car does not answer or does not respond the way I like.

"And then I think it's unnatural. I think everybody's been there."

Vettel's peaks are not as impressive as Leclerc's so far this season.

The five-point gap in the championship is partly explained by Leclerc being restricted by team orders in Australia and China.

Leclerc has also claimed Ferrari's only pole of the season, in Bahrain, where Vettel qualified only second and spun in the race while Leclerc was denied a commanding win by an electronics problem.

"At the moment I'm not so unhappy with the car," said Leclerc when asked by Autosport if he shared his team-mate's discomfort with the SF90.

"We maybe need to work a little bit on our race. I think in qualifying the car felt amazing, in the race I have a little bit more balance problems.

"But these are small issues and I'm pretty sure if we work on it we'll get over it."

Despite his happiness in qualifying, Leclerc only has a qualifying average of 4.75 after his crash in Q2 in Baku.

 

That's a weird comment from Vettel. I recall during pre season testing, how confident he sounded. Now he sounds so off. Ferrari are in deep deep pile of **** now, now, as far as i'm concerned. I don't see them turning this around.

 

Difficult to see Ferrari digging themselves out of this yet.

 

My guess is that Vettel will see the end of his contract, and him and Ferrari will split amicably at the end of 2020.
I think Ferrari is already looking for options to replace him, and Vettel will simply retire.
To me, his problem is not that he has run out of talent, but of enthusiasm.

 

Agree on the enthusiasm, and he could very well retire at the end of 2019 if he ends up being relegated to #2 driver.

 

Breaking his contract would be costly, IMO.

 

Nico did it, and his salary was not near what Vettel is making.

 

I don't know the penalty clause in Vettel's contract, but he may think twice before breaking it.
Damon Hill said that he drove his last year without his heart being in it, because Eddie Jordan refused let him go.
He had to pay so much back if he left before his contract ended, that he decided to stay.
His last year was terrible, he had no interest in racing anymore.

 

I think this is true of almost every driver. It isn't age related decline in ability that makes them uncompetitive, it's just diminished desire to exert oneself 100%.

 

Ferrari would have to make that decision as well, live with a driver who may not be in it to garner points or get a head start on a new driver prior to the new rule changes.

 

It’s a SINGLE TEAM championship at this point.

 

That cannot be understated. Four of Hamilton's WDCs have been in the era of the Two Car Championship. What ********!

 

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Agreed. He was happy in test

 

Agreed but his lack of talent is driving the loss of enthusiasm??? A bit exposed he is I think

 

I feel the unhappiness he feels and raikkonen felt are because of the organization of Ferrari more than the car.

 

The team is sans Arrive now. That was the issue per his complaints etc in the press. The issue is Charles to me and nothing else. They built a fast car again. Strat might be problem but not mngr personality???

 

Or overstated . . . duh

 

Strategy is a MAJOR problem at Ferrari.
They still manage to lose when they have the best car.
It's crazy !

 

I really don’t understand what they were thinking in terms of not bringing in LeClerc for tires sooner in Baku. Basic math was screaming that they needed to go ahead and get fresh tires, and the virtual safety car after the pit stop made things worse.

 

The FIA has introduced a raft of changes to the clutch management in Formula 1's 2020 technical regulations, increasing the difficulty for the drivers at the race start. -- https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/143098/f1-clutch-rules-changed-to-put-emphasis-on-drivers

Along with making pull-type paddle-activated clutches mandatory for each driver, the clutch signals used by the standard ECU will also be heavily monitored by the FIA to limit any advantageous mapping.

Should a team wish to use two clutch paddles on the steering wheel, each paddle must now be identical in form, motion and mapping.

Drivers may be asked to demonstrate that both paddles work identically.

Furthermore, the paddle must work linearly with the clutch - meaning that the drivers' actions must be wholly representative of the engagement of the clutch.

Article 9.2.1, section F in the technical regulations states that: "To ensure that the signals used by the FIA ECU are representative of the driver's actions, each competitor is required to demonstrate that the paddle percentage calculated by the ECU does not deviate by more than +/-5% from the physical position of the operating device measured as a percentage over its entire usable range."

This ensures greater responsibility is placed on the driver at the race start and means that there is the potential for greater variation off the line.

 

There where many greta drivers that for some reason lost a lot of competitiveness from one year to the other. Just take a look at Kimi, in his Mclaren day he was arguably the fastest driver out there, and solid as a rock, after he went to Ferrari i feel he started to loose a bit of speed every year, even when he was champion ...of course he was so good he managed to remain competitive, but no longer that amazing driver...plenty of other cases, Alboreto for example, after 85 when he was as good if not better than Prost, he was never the same, Arnoux, once one of the fastest drivers out there,after 83 he went into decline...perhaps same is happening to Seb..​

 

Ok maybe Arrivabene had a personality problem. It now seems in retrospect him being the problem was exaggerated and made the fall guy for a team that doesn’t really want to fix the blatantly obvious issues. The team doesn’t manage both cars well. They only serve one car and could care less about sacrificing LeClerc’s race to the detriment of the team in order to make sure he doesn’t embarrass Seb.