Normally this place delivers. Don’t want to miss Checo’s last podium and the inevitable locust swarm during a Williams pitstop.
I hope so but I am not optimistic, unless MB screws up the race , they look poised for another 1-2 finish .
Nothing out of the ordinary here. Would you call it another ferrari fire drill or the 3 stooges of management strikes again? Sleep in and attend a local gun show tomorrow. Check results here and see if viewing on delay is worth while.
You are correct. If Leclerc kept it on the track pole was definitely not guaranteed anymore when Mercedes laced up their boots. Leclerc has had some time in hand over Vettel, perhaps around the 3 tenths but not definitely. I ****ing hate mercedes with their pointless lies. And the commentators for going along with it 5 years straight.
More Gasly issues......(BTW, he says he will have to race the car flat out from start to finish) Image Unavailable, Please Login Then a team rep has to report. He already starts at the back. Image Unavailable, Please Login
When will the powers that be realize that Mercedes’ strategy is to sandbag every practice. My guess is that they dial the car down in areas they know they will be strong and focus on the weak areas. Ferrari confident they have the strong car for qually take the rest of the day off-while Toto is back in the lab figuring it out. It’s gotten to be ridiculous every time I read that Lewis is “struggling “ with the car only to securely beat the Ferraris the next day. I think Ferrari should adopt the same strategy but maybe they already do.....
Merc are miles ahead of Ferrari...blew the doors open with pole and P2, on tires that were further worn and not to temp, on the last lap in P3, they are sandbagging to keep it interesting that is all...Season is done for Ferrari I have all the data I need to know based on what I just witnessed
Í doubt that Ferrari is fooled by that in the same way the spectators are. I doubt that Ferrari ever thinks after Fridays practice that they have it in their bag...They still try to do their best but it simply is not enough.
Can't you see it's psychological warfare? Mercedes leads Ferrari to a sense of false security by letting them do some showboating in testing and in practice, giving the illusion they are ahead. Ferrari is happy, and the tifosi rejoyce, taking things at face value, and think the Mercs are beaten this time. Most of the time, the Mercs have some in reserve to use when it really matters, like their "party mode". Then, when things get serious, they suddenly pull the carpet from Under Ferrari's feet by letting their drivers go "all-balls-out" to shoot for pole. The result demoralises Ferrari, and send them head-scratching wondering where they have gone wrong. It's a cat and mouse game. It's not lies, it's intoxication and fake news. Mercedes plays with the Italian mindset, but they are always thinking ahead.
it just pisses me off. Sky there with their entire team of experts, supposedly our eyes and ears trackside....all of them act ''amazed'' and stunned when Mercedes ''pull it out of the hat'', as if it was some sort of last second eureka moment. They should know better. When you're trackside it's so easy to see which car is sandbagging and which car is not. They don't give us true information. Of course if they say ''Mercedes is fast as usual, just focusing on race pace and still are mighty'', they risk everyone turning off. Frankly I'm at least happy that Bottas is there fighting this weekend but the Mercedes show is sickening. Even Ferrari rolled over in 2004 and agreed to a rule change.
Have you all thought maybe Ferrari is doing the same except on qualifying day so on race day they can pull one out of the hat!!
https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/143008/verstappen-says-tows-are-now-deciding-pole-fights Max Verstappen says Formula 1's high-drag 2019 cars have made slipstreaming a "critical" element of qualifying. The Red Bull had topped the Q2 session at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix and had provisionally been on the front row towards the end of Q3, before he slipped down to fourth in the end. But he reckons the key element that decided the final order was who got the better tow rather than who produced the best lap - something he thinks does not reward the best drivers. "I never really thought I was going to fight for pole position, but around this track it's so dependent on slipstreams as well, that you can be first or fourth," said Verstappen when asked by Autosport what he had expected after his Q2 pace. "It's a bit of a shame really that round here you can't just do a lap on your own and smash it, because there'll be one guy who might be a little bit slower but catches a tow and that's easily four or five tenths here. "Out of Turn 2 you gain a tenth. Then up to the castle uphill you gain a tenth, and then another three at least on the main straight if you are just following behind. "The cars are so draggy this year that that's actually really critical at the moment." One way for Verstappen to have guaranteed himself a tow would have been to get team-mate Pierre Gasly to give him a slipstream, with the Frenchman having to start from the pitlane anyway because of his missed weighbridge sanction from Friday practice. But Gasly said in the end Red Bull decided not to adopt such a tactic because it would have forced him to start on used tyres. "That was not really in the discussion, because of course if I would have been in Q3 I would have had to start with a used set, and we started already from the pitlane, which is painful enough," he said. "We had a discussion for Q2 but Max was already fast enough so we didn't have really any point to go out." Having failed to get a tow on his final effort in Q3, Verstappen thinks the fact he ended up only 0.574 seconds adrift of poleman Valtteri Bottas is hugely encouraging in terms of what it means about the pace of his Red Bull-Honda. "I was on my own, so compared to my own lap time already I lost three and a half tenths, just purely because you are not in that tunnelling effect of all the cars," he said. "We have a good car to race with. "The cars ahead basically they did the lap time just on the tow, so on pure pace, we are good. "I think we're close to Ferrari and Mercedes and it will just depend on tyre warm-up and tyre life during the race as well. At the end of the day that will make the difference."
http://www.espn.co.uk/f1/story/_/id/26618662/mercedes-explains-unusual-q3-qualifying-tactics-unexpected-advantage-ferrari
Ferrari keeps handing Mercedes the advantage; this time it's on Charles Leclerc http://www.espn.co.uk/f1/story/_/id/26618045/ferrari-keeps-handing-mercedes-advantage-charles-leclerc
Tires left Image Unavailable, Please Login also [AMuS] Qualifying Analysis: Vettel was missing the slipstream. Mercedes engineers: "With a slipstream, Vettel would have beaten us for pole today. A slipstream makes up five tenths here. Especially when several cars drive in one train." Main points of the AMuS article •Merc has bet on the slipstream which had the bigger effect than a perfect outlap or the driving in clean air. Ferrari bet wrong. •Low asphalt temperature helped Mercedes more and the tyres worked perfectly. SF90 had difficulties in that aspect
With a start like that, they might as well change some parts and do more testing, since the penalty will be negated.
So was missing the weigh bridge somehow related? BTW- I've been out all day since watching the Qualifying sadness. Managed to forget it all...time to light up a cigar and tell Tales of Brave Ulysses or something until tomorrow. Dammit, let's see some magnificent Ferrari magic!!