FORMULA 1 HEINEKEN GRANDE PREMIO DE SAO PAULO 2021 - Sao Paulo - RACE.. ▄▀▄▀▄▀ SPOILERS▄▀▄▀▄▀

Does F1 still have a 107% Qualy rule?

 

https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/10-things-we-learned-from-2021s-brazilian-grand-prix/6784919/

10 things we learned from 2021's Brazilian Grand Prix
By: Autosport Staff
Nov 15, 2021, 10:24 AM
Lewis Hamilton produced a memorable comeback victory in Formula 1's Brazilian Grand Prix after his exclusion from qualifying in Interlagos, denting the momentum of championship leader Max Verstappen. Autosport picks out the key talking points from a weekend in which a team boss's future was the subject of discussion while one drivers' heroics again kept his squad in the hunt for a top-five constructors' championship finish
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Interlagos has hosted its fair share of Formula 1 classics through the years, but Sunday’s Brazilian Grand Prix was one that will live long in the memory.

It proved to be a dramatic weekend both on and off the track, but it was Lewis Hamilton who took victory to cut Max Verstappen’s lead at top of the drivers’ championship down to 14 points.

Hamilton did it the hard way, recovering from a qualifying exclusion on Friday that left him last on the grid for the sprint race before fighting his way up the order, capping off his recovery with another spirited wheel-to-wheel battle against Verstappen.

It stoked the fire not only between the two world championship rivals, but also between their respective Mercedes and Red Bull squads as F1’s top teams renewed their political rivalry.

Here are 10 things we learned from the 2021 Brazilian Grand Prix.

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Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes, 1st position, celebrates on the podium with his trophy

Photo by: Steve Etherington / Motorsport Images

1. Interlagos was one of Hamilton’s greatest F1 victories (Luke Smith)
Hamilton has always thrived in the face of adversity, but the fashion in which he fought back in Brazil last weekend surely makes this one of his greatest F1 victories.

The pace of his Mercedes was undeniably a cut above that of Verstappen’s Red Bull. But to have passed every single car in the field - and some of them twice, thanks to the five-place grid penalty applied for the grand prix for taking a fresh engine - in the space of two days is an astonishing achievement, no matter what way you look at it.

Hamilton planned his moves wisely, meaning he avoided getting caught up in any incidents or drama that may have unfolded. He was particularly sensible when passing the two Red Bulls, backing out of a possible move around the outside of Verstappen at Turn 4 before completing the overtake one lap later, having learned a lesson from being forced off-track earlier (which we will get to later).

PLUS: How a Mercedes "Achilles' heel" cost Verstappen in Hamilton's Interlagos masterclass

Hamilton could have easily let the setbacks throughout the weekend weigh heavy on his shoulders. Instead, as he has such a tendency to do, he channelled it into giving himself more to fight for, making it one of the best of his 101 grand prix wins.

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Hamilton breezed through the pack from last on the sprint race grid to finish fifth

Photo by: Jerry Andre / Motorsport Images

2. Mercedes’ straightline pace advantage has piqued Red Bull’s interest (LS)
The key swing between Red Bull and Mercedes at Interlagos was the straightline speed advantage that Hamilton - armed with his new engine - enjoyed.

It made Turn 1 an easy spot for Hamilton to get his overtakes done, with the additional help of DRS allowing him to enjoy a speed advantage of over 25km/h against other cars before hitting the brakes.

All weekend long, though, Red Bull had been expressing intrigue in how Mercedes was achieving such a huge top speed. Technical chief Adrian Newey met with the FIA to discuss the Mercedes rear wing earlier in the weekend, while Verstappen’s fine-inducing touches on Hamilton’s rear wing in parc ferme was motivated by a desire to see “how much the rear wing was flexing at that point”.

Red Bull boss Christian Horner said the pace difference was something for Red Bull to try and understand, but that the team would “keep an eye” on Mercedes’ rear wing amid its “mind-boggling” speed.

Should Hamilton and Mercedes be able to carry the pace over to the final three races, it could be a decisive swing in the title race if Red Bull cannot respond.

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Wolff was outspoken in his criticism of decisions that went against his team in Brazil

Photo by: Steve Etherington / Motorsport Images

3. The political drama is far from over in F1 this year (LS)
Toto Wolff said after Sunday’s race in Brazil that “diplomacy has ended” following a fraught weekend that saw Mercedes spend as much time in the stewards’ room as it did with cars on-track.

Mercedes called the decision to exclude Hamilton from qualifying “harsh”, noting how damaged parts can typically be fixed under parc ferme conditions - something Red Bull has done with its rear wing at the last three races - and that it didn’t have the chance to analyse the damage because the part was impounded.

Red Bull, predictably, saw it differently, saying that it was a black-and-white binary case of a part either complying with the technical checks or not.

Wolff made clear that Mercedes would now be keeping an even more eagle eye on its rivals in the event of any breaches.

“If the modus operandi is different now, you maybe need to look at others also with a more strict eye and severe eye,” he said on Saturday before making reference to Red Bull’s recent parc ferme wing changes on Sunday.

After all of the back-and-forth between Mercedes and Red Bull earlier this year over flexi-wings and the Hamilton/Verstappen clashes, this looks set to be the final round of fireworks to close out the season.

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Verstappen's forceful defence against Hamilton at Turn 4 wasn't investigated

Photo by: Charles Coates / Motorsport Images

4. Verstappen pushed the limit - and crossed a line - in his Turn 4 defence (Tom Howard)
In a weekend not short of flash points, the biggest of Sunday’s race centred around Verstappen’s robust defence while battling Hamilton at Turn 4.

In the eyes of television commentators, Mercedes and a swathe of fans, Verstappen had crossed the line and was lucky to avoid a penalty for running himself and Hamilton wide onto the run off at Turn 4 while defending Hamilton’s attempted pass around the outside.

Curiously, it didn’t warrant an investigation by the stewards as race director Michael Masi took a “let them race” approach - despite admitting after the race that the incident almost warranted a black and white flag, which seems somewhat of a contradiction.

The decision not to award a penalty, described as “laughable” by Mercedes boss Wolff, was taken without race control seeing onboard vision which could determine if Verstappen had attempted to make the corner. Verstappen blamed his Turn 4 wash out on worn tyres.

A warning was issued to Verstappen for weaving in his defence on the straight towards Turn 4, outlining the robust nature of his defensive driving, but the call was again baffling when no investigation was called for the earlier near miss.

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Perez wasn't willing to try a risky pass on Sainz in the sprint and potentially lose valuable track position for the Grand Prix from contact

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

5. Fans remain unconvinced despite F1’s best sprint yet (LS)
The third and final sprint race of the 2021 season offered far more action than either Silverstone or Monza - but much of that was because of Hamilton’s charge, not the format itself.

The fact this was a sprint weekend certainly helped Hamilton’s recovery (even if critics could argue it also denied the full fightback coming in the race), and he proved that it is possible to have the kind of flat-out overtake-fest that F1 so dearly want the sprints to be.

But that all depends on cars being out of position. Sergio Perez spent most of the sprint race lurking just behind Carlos Sainz Jr, but admitted afterwards he did not feel he could take a risk to make a pass as he would in the race because there is too much to lose.

F1 certainly has tweaks to make to the format as it looks to expand it to more races next year, but the ‘success’ of Saturday shouldn’t be taken as an overwhelming win for the format as a whole. If anything, Hamilton’s fight through the field lends greater strength to the argument that - whisper it - reverse grids would provide the kind of Saturday excitement desired, albeit artificially.

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Following the stewards' ruling against Verstappen, Vettel would be advised not to continue inspecting rivals' machines in parc ferme

Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

6. ‘Inspector Seb’ is now sadly a thing of the past (Megan White)
His antics in parc ferme have an entire Subreddit dedicated to them, but Inspector Seb - Sebastian Vettel’s post-session, car-snooping alter-ego - may be no more after this weekend’s controversy.

Whether it’s checking out Hamilton and Perez’s cars after qualifying in Monaco this year, or peering under the Mercedes’ front wing at the Russian GP in 2019, Vettel has long been famed for investigating other cars.

But Verstappen’s €50,000 fine for touching Hamilton’s wing prompted the FIA to say it would be strictly policing such moves in future, spelling the end for everyone’s favourite meme.

Vettel himself even joked about it over his radio, telling his Aston Martin engineers that he was “going to touch Hamilton's rear wing” after the sprint race, to which they responded: “Don't you dare! Very expensive”.

Ever the joker, the four-time world champion replied: “I'm joking! I'll try the front wing, maybe it's €25,000…”

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Gasly kept the Alpines at bay to keep AlphaTauri in the hunt

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

7. Gasly is keeping AlphaTauri’s P5 hopes alive single-handed (Haydn Cobb)
With Yuki Tsunoda enduring a tough learning curve in his rookie F1 campaign, it has been left to Pierre Gasly to lead the AlphaTauri charge against Alpine for fifth place in the constructors’ standings.

For the second race in a row, both teams leave the circuit on equal points - Alpine ahead on countback thanks to Esteban Ocon’s Hungarian GP win - but in truth it is Gasly’s one-man siege which has the upper hand with three races to go.

The AlphaTauri package has been able to challenge even the likes of Ferrari and McLaren in recent races, Gasly once again proving that fact by qualifying as ‘best of the rest’ behind the Mercedes and Red Bull drivers at Interlagos.

PLUS: Brazilian Grand Prix Driver Ratings

While the sprint didn’t quite follow suit, with Gasly dropping to eighth on the road which became seventh on the grid for the grand prix following Hamilton’s grid penalty, the Frenchman held his own by finishing seventh to match the points haul of the two Alpines.

Gasly was particularly impressive fighting tag-team duo Fernando Alonso and Ocon, with both Alpines opting for an aggressive one-stop strategy to gain track position on the AlphaTauri driver, before slipstreaming each other with DRS in an attempt to keep Gasly at bay.

But the 2020 Italian GP winner assessed the situation, adjusted his attacking lines and made light work of passing both Alpines on consecutive laps.

As Yuki Tsunoda continues to trip over himself or his rivals, his latest faux pas coming in contacting Lance Stroll, AlphaTauri will be desperate for Gasly to maintain his current form over the final three races to finish off a stunning one-versus-two win.

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Mazepin gave emotional interview after another Q1 elimination

Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images

8. Mazepin’s emotion highlighted his rookie challenge (HC)
It’s often hard to feel sympathetic to Nikita Mazepin. The son of a Russian billionaire, he's a Formula 1 driver with an indifferent record on the track and an even worse reputation away from it.

Plenty of regret and repentance came from Mazepin amid the fallout from a video, posted to his own social media account, of him grabbing a friends' breast. It made him F1’s new villain before even making his race debut, and crashing at the third corner of his Bahrain bow hardly helped matters.

Since then the 22-year-old has made progress, albeit in a woefully underdeveloped and hard to handle Haas VF-21, but has continually been at war with team-mate Mick Schumacher while also becoming a nuisance by simply getting in the way of his rivals.

The pressures of his rookie year in the F1 spotlight, exacerbated by a recent Mexican nightclub incident, finally told at the Brazilian GP as his usually steely outward appearance cracked. Mazepin was visibly emotional in front of the media after another tough qualifying in last place, the revealing moment showing him first and foremost as a human being.

It is true that Mazepin has been given a much harsher treatment by fans and onlookers compared to his fellow rookies Schumacher and Tsunoda, who have also made their fair share of mistakes this season. But, while most of it is justified, it doesn’t detract from the fact Mazepin is still trying his best and finding his way in the brutal life of an F1 driver. He isn’t the first nor will he be the last to experience it, but it might act as a turning point for him.

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Delays in freight arriving at the circuit from Mexico meant a long night to be ready for action on Friday

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

9. This triple-header has been F1’s toughest to date (MW)
It’s been a long few weeks in F1. Beginning in Mexico, before travelling to Brazil and heading onto Qatar, teams will have covered over 12,000 miles by the end of next weekend's inaugural race in the Gulf state neighbouring Bahrain.

Drivers themselves have criticised the gruelling schedule, with Gasly describing it as “brutal,” while Alonso said it was “on the limit” for teams. They of course will have kind flights in first class and the best hotels possible, a luxury not afforded to many of their colleagues who burn the midnight oil to get the team from race to race.

Freight delays ahead of the Sao Paulo Grand Prix didn’t help matters, with the late arrival of cars forcing teams to work into the night to ensure they were prepared in time for Friday's FP1 session. And it doesn’t look set to get any easier next year, with a record 23-race calendar planned.

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Szafnauer faced questions over a move to Alpine

Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

10. Intrigue remains over Szafnauer’s Aston Martin future (TH)
The future of Aston Martin team principal Otmar Szafnauer remains a hot topic as news of shock switch to Alpine broke over the weekend.

Szafnauer attempted to brush off the story first on social media before then facing a barrage of questions from the media, but he came across like an awkward politician not willing to directly answer a question.

While he tried to deflect questions, his strongest reply was "I've been at the team for 12 years, I have no intention of leaving.”

When directly asked to rule out a move to Alpine in the future, his reply was telling: "I learned a long, long time ago that predicting the future is an impossibility. And if I could do that, I would be in Vegas now."

The old saying ‘there is no smoke without fire’ appears to apply here. Time will tell if he indeed makes the switch from green to blue, as Alpine looks to restructure for 2022.

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Szafnauer maintained that he was staying at Aston, but his answers weren't convincing

Photo by: FIA Pool

 

Masi cant decide what socks to wear much less a penalty that lacked Max internal forward view LOL

4. Verstappen pushed the limit - and crossed a line - in his Turn 4 defence (Tom Howard)
In a weekend not short of flash points, the biggest of Sunday’s race centred around Verstappen’s robust defence while battling Hamilton at Turn 4.

In the eyes of television commentators, Mercedes and a swathe of fans, Verstappen had crossed the line and was lucky to avoid a penalty for running himself and Hamilton wide onto the run off at Turn 4 while defending Hamilton’s attempted pass around the outside.

Curiously, it didn’t warrant an investigation by the stewards as race director Michael Masi took a “let them race” approach - despite admitting after the race that the incident almost warranted a black and white flag, which seems somewhat of a contradiction.

The decision not to award a penalty, described as “laughable” by Mercedes boss Wolff, was taken without race control seeing onboard vision which could determine if Verstappen had attempted to make the corner. Verstappen blamed his Turn 4 wash out on worn tyres.

A warning was issued to Verstappen for weaving in his defence on the straight towards Turn 4, outlining the robust nature of his defensive driving, but the call was again baffling when no investigation was called for the earlier near miss.

 

Seems some people have forgotten what racing used to be (should be) like and want rules for every little incident, especially when 'their' driver (or the driver they dislike) is involved.

 

Correct, since 2014; BTW thanks to Schumacher's development while in the MB team. A LOT of people seem [Or choose] to forget that......

 

Well... he LOOKS Brazilian, and has Brazilian tastes; so I believe nothing will happen to LH44.

 

The car is legal, just not 100% "rules compliant"

 

No one has removed the engine and can say with any certainty what the status of the pressures are anywhere in that PU.

Audi was also buying Mclaren a few hours ago. No italian has an idea at all. They have well worded speculation. Not proof of any substantial nature.

RedBull have protested zero. When they do maybe someone will confiscate a motor and show us. We know zero.

Whats the starting unit Turbo pressure and cylinder pressure. Whats the final to bring the delta. They do not know any specifics.

If its legal then RedBull and Honda are tuning their software to do the same right now.............at some point the cost cap has to be part of this.

Here is an opinion of a commentator in the Italian Motorsport link you posted - More than one thinks the writer is using a bit of 'freedom' lol

"I would like to point out that at the ST the speed is lower than at the finish line because you are preparing to set up turn 1. It's a speed dictated by the impetuosity with which you face the aforementioned turn...And who had to dare more than anyone else to recover a situation otherwise irrecoverable,if not Hamilton? Ergo ... given the fact that he probably had, for obvious reasons, the best engine of the gp, the value is the result of having taken his foot off the accelerator later than all, to brake later than all or almost all.
Not for nothing, at the finish line, his speed was "normalized" and the reference is very credible because almost everyone, apart from Bottas, used the DRS:
-first on the finish line Norris (right Ezio???) 347.3, second Raikkonen 340.4 (thanks to a single-seater born to straighten all the curves, as it was said in a commercial of the Giulietta, but not the last of Alfa...) third Hamilton with 340.3.
It would be appreciated more objectivity 'and weighing of the elements, when writing an article."

In fact Bottas and Sainz, who had the lowest speed at the finish line, were the ones who, as chance would have it, maintained that speed at the ST, evidently compatible with the approach to turn 1. Hamilton, on the other hand, had the best speed at the ST because he was able to record an excellent value at the finish line, but also because he had to overtake and rely on a rather desperate comeback: where better to delay braking than at an overtaking point? On the other hand, no one forced Norris to take excessive risks, so from first on the track to the finish line Lando was 8th in the ST, but it is on the finish line that one can draw up a classification of the U.P. not on the approach to a curve, with the speed decreasing...
Not for nothing, if we want to make the tare to the performance, we have to base ourselves on Bottas who never had DRS. What do we deduce?
That at the SP the differential between the best and Valtteri is +36, at the finish +43, at the first intermediate +36.
So, according to this article, since the various Hamilton, Norris and company all had DRS, given that the ST is 90 meters from turn one and the first intermediate 168 from 4, the best engine on track was that of ....
Norris!!!

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

 

I would have thought that all engines used had to meet the same standards. In this case Mercedes seems to have put in Lewis' car for use in the last four races, an engine that doesn't have to meet the same specs as those used at the beginning of the season. It does smell of preferential treatment toward Lewis...not by Mercedes but by the FIA.

 

If SF actually produced a engine based on the mercedes principal then it would start much further up the grid rather than scrabbling around up to 1 sec behind the leaders. Push the limits and suffer the consequences, they have nothing to lose except 3rd to Mclaren - improvement cannot be made by being tiptoeing around the track to walkaway with 3rd spot.
Best
Tony.

 

They can change engine maps race by race (but not within a weekend), so given this engine only has to last 1/3 what a normal one does, they can run hotter engine modes. I'm sure all the hardware is the same, but what you're likely seeing is a full weekend of the old 'party mode' for this weekend knowing Lewis would have a 5 place grid drop, and will be closer to normal for the next weekend, but holding a bit in reserve for the final weekend or two.

 

Ok. So when you have a credible source, let us know.

 

And then some complain if Ferrari enters in panic mode, overreacts, crazy Italians, blah, blah. Right now they´ve their hands full trying to recover from their worst season in 40 years with a half-frozen car while preparing the most radical rule change in decades. And they´re the most improved team of the season, so I see the glass half full.

The new engine will be for next year.

 

+1 feeling good overall about Ferrari effort for next year.

 

'Not trying to push your buttons,but, if Bottas had a new engine in Texas, and the engine he used in Brazil had only one race on it, what did he use in Mexico?

Agreed......

 

You're right on that.

But an engine that eats itself to this amount, and then labelled as ''reliability update''...and doing exactly the opposite...it's not correct. Not just against spirit of the rules, but as far as I can tell, against rules full stop. I mean by Mercs own wording they are sacrificing reliability for power, so how can it be a reliability update? ICE engine was frozen at start of the season.

 

It has to be said: the margin on which the steering wheel would move now is many times less than with the DAS system of 2020. Still, it raises the question of what's going on? Mercedes responds to GPblog: "It’s either an optical illusion or some play in the steering column - which can happen as they age - and is not a desirable characteristic. The steering system is homologated since start of season so has been the same all year. Any further interpretation than this is, as previously mentioned, conspiracy theories."

 

This has probably been answered already, but why was this race named for Sao Paolo instead of for Brazil?

 

I suspect Mercedes is pulling out all the stops and running LH’s in full qualifying mode (i.e. giving it “full beans”) during the race. Perhaps they’ll do an ICE change for each of the remaining three races and just take the requisite five-place grid penalty each weekend . . .

 

Red Bulls engine degrades less than the Merc, by Honda's own reckoning fitting a brand new engine will only gain .1 per lap...so unless they can also tune their engine to degrade like crazy and do the same (which I doubt), Mercedes can simply use one of these engines every other race and go ballistic. The speed difference is enormous.

 

They can't run the engine at on quali power, otherwise they would run out of fuel and drain the battery.

 

As far as the ICE itself is concerned, they can throw as much turbo boost at it, and run it as lean as it will survive, so long as it burns no more than a rate of 100 Liters/Hour of fuel at any given moment in time.

 

Is F1 for sissies or racers? Max was on the inside, so he is allowed to brake later. He crossed Hamilton's ideal trajectory and it is completely legal. Tough race but fair.

 

Agreed. In turkey Lewis pushed Perez into the pitlane, Nothing happened there either,

 

If its legal certainly an option. I still wonder how the cost cap factors into this situation.............