Bahrain GP

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B10BRW
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Bahrain GP

Post by B10BRW » Sun Mar 20, 2022 8:56 pm

I have not been able to stop smiling since the 54th lap of the Bahrain GP. :dance :D :D :D
The old saying "Cheats never prosper" could never been truer.

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Re: Bahrain GP

Post by Wellsy » Mon Mar 21, 2022 10:28 am

Karma certainly visited that race. Not sure about the cheat part Max didn't do anything wrong last season, but I know what you mean. Awesome to see the Ferraris at the front again. Even if I'm not a massive fan of Ferraris and the standing they have held in F1 over the years they should be a player. Charles and Max for a few laps duking it out was good to see.
Also looks like the cars can race a bit closer this year and DRS is not as big an effect which I think is a good thing.

Interesting to see where the season goes and how quickly Merc can close the gap.

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Re: Bahrain GP

Post by music » Tue Mar 22, 2022 7:33 am

B10BRW. "The old saying "Cheats never prosper" could never been truer."

I've left it a day but still take exception to that comment. I'll not indulge in a biased or blinkered debate other than to take you back to Silverstone and hope you didn't also laugh at that incident. I raced for many years and you simply do not poke your nose up the inside at Copse, taken almost flat with a full tank and tyres not yet properly in, on the first lap of a two hour race. It was a desperate and dangerous lunge on the wrong line that was only ever going to end up with Max in the barriers at 190mph. Lewis admitted on air that it had to be then or never and had the temerity to blame Max saying "he should have given me more room". Max was very lucky not to have been seriously injured but Lewis even luckier to have got away with a ludicrously lenient 10 second stop and go penalty for causing the accident on his way to a tainted win. Horner called it dirty driving and I agree. Lewis knew exactly what he was doing. A lesser favoured back marker doing the same could well have been handed a race suspension. A novice in a junior formula would likely get dropped from the team.

Rubbing salt into the wound, Lewis should have had a DNF. The race was red flagged to allow marshals to repair the barriers even though they were in no danger 100 yards from the track with the cars running slowly behind the safety car. After the race, Andy Shovlin (Mercedes trackside engineering director) admitted that bringing the cars into the pits allowed them to spot contact damage on Lewis's car which they'd been unable to detect while out on track enabling them to change some parts which would otherwise have have failed leading to a DNF.

For the record, and with just four anomalies, Max finished either 1st or 2nd in every grand prix last year - winning 10 of the 22 races to Lewis's 8, Lewis having had just one DNF. Of those four anomalies Max was punted off at Silverstone (25 probable points lost); finished 9th in Hungary after Valteri (grid P2) speared Lando under braking at the first corner, firing him into Checo and Max thus putting Lando and Checo out and leaving Max to nurse a badly damaged car home to 9th place; Baku saw Max's left rear explode on the main straight whilst leading with three laps to go (another 25 points lost); and then came Monza's Variante del Rettifilo at which both drivers went out and which I'll call a six and half a dozen affair but with Lewis having squeezed Max on to the grass on corner entry and again claiming Max didn't give him enough room at the second apex. I believe those results show Max to be a worthy champion.

I believe we need to keep both eyes and mind wide open and be very careful of what we put in print. Wikipedia, on Lewis's race winning margins, are happy to go with this: "... while the narrowest margin was at the 2016 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, where he won by 0.439 seconds over Rosberg as he slowed in an unsuccessful attempt to allow other drivers to catch and pass his teammate in one last attempt to win that year's title." Is that honest racing? I do not accuse Lewis or Mercedes of cheating in 2021 and acknowledge that was quite a spritely engine from Brazil onwards but it's worth noting that the likes of Senna, Prost, Schumy and others together with Ferrari, McLaren, Renault, et al, have in the past all been proven to have gone to whatever lengths they thought they could get away with in order to win on track and in the garage, inside or outside the rules, and, when found guilty, consequently penalised to varying degrees - and Mercedes are no strangers to such happenings.

As an F1 fan you'll not need reminding that in 2007 the McLaren-Mercedes team, with Lewis and Fernando on board, were fined the unprecedented sum of US$100 million, stripped of all points gained and thrown out of the Constructors Championship for being in possession of 780 pages of Ferrari technical documentation. "However, in what appears to be a decision aimed at preserving one of the most exciting drivers’ championships in years, the WMSC ruled that McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso would be allowed to keep their points and compete for the title." So Lewis and Fernando, whilst knowing full well what was going on inside the team and providing evidence to the WMSC in exchange for immunity, were quite happy to have race in dodgy motors in order to win. Fortunately for the sport (or what's been left of it), Kimi Raikkonen and Ferrari came from behind to win the title at the last race of the season by 1 point from Lewis and Fernando tied for second place, them having alternated the championship lead from the second race of the season onwards. Had Lewis not had a gearbox problem and finished 7th it's likely he would have won the title and probably claimed everything was fair and above board and he an honest world champion. A bit of real Karma there, eh Wellsy, but still a lash up by the FIA in that the points deducted from McLaren-Mercedes were not redistributed correctly to the teams who'd been cheated. https://www.ft.com/content/91b299a4-623 ... 00779fd2ac

As for Abu Dhabi, to which I presume your comment was in reference, I find it most regrettable (but not surprising) that the FIA should again bring itself into disrepute by sacking Michael Masi as part of the deal demanded by Lewis and Mercedes to drop their protest and not take the FIA to the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne. This is the same man who, following Max's tyre blow out in Baku, red flagged the race with Checo leading Lewis by some distance. Mercedes praised Masi for then deciding on a standing restart for a two lap sprint to the flag. Let them race was the call and Toto Wolff agreed. With Checo P1 and Lewis P2, both got away cleanly but Lewis overcooked it with a wild dive up the inside at the first corner (deja vu?) and a run down the escape road to drop to the very back of the remaining field. No complaints from Mercedes or Lewis that time in Baku with Max out of the race and a chance to have stolen the win, and neither would there have been any complaint in Abu Dhabi if the situation had been reversed. Mercedes chose not to bring Lewis in for fresh tyres when Max did but as always they seem willing to blame anyone but themselves. And fancy taking a QC with them to that last race. Hmm.. I've supported and respected Lewis's talents from his earlier days but certain things have changed of late. Lewis and Mercedes are already on that list of greatest drivers and teams and deservedly so but history has shown that the greatest modern era winners are often also the worst losers.

I really hope that's the end of last season now as we look forward to what lies ahead. I echo all Wellsy's thoughts and the next three races will show who's gone in the right direction with the 2022 cars and which drivers have grasped the challenge. Great to see Kevin Magnussen and Haas up there in 5th, George Russell in 4th with a fastest lap just 7/100ths shy of Lewis's, Tsunoda and Zhou earning their first points and Albon showing Lafiti how it's done. Having your favourite driver is a bit like being a football fan I suppose where your man / your team can do no wrong to the exclusion of all others and should the worst happen - well it's the ref's fault anyway. Enjoy the fun and games. Max and Red Bull will always be tough to beat. I mean no offence whatsoever to anyone; just trying to find a balance.

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https://www.grandprix.com/news/f1-denie ... -show.html

https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/the-b ... e/6552372/
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Charles
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Re: Bahrain GP

Post by Charles » Tue Mar 22, 2022 9:55 am

Clearly some polarised positions being taken.

What I think is interesting is that last year was a significant turning point for F1. Sometimes you have to be careful what you wish for as, by opening up comms between teams and the Race Director for all to hear in the spirit of increasing audience interest, resulted in the airing of a lot of dirty laundry in public. Both Mercedes and Red Bull took full advantage of this and the existing regulations - sometimes, in my opinion, going too far!

It appears that, over the closed season, the FIA have realised that less is more in terms of keeping some comms private as well as reviewing certain aspects of racing that all the drivers have been seeking clarity on. In particular, this centres on overtaking and leaving space - something that both Lewis and Max were guilty of throughout the season - and I hope that it is now easier for the stewards to rule on "racing incidents" more consistently for all concerned.

As for the protagonists, they were both overly aggressive at times - perhaps egging each other on to win the prize - but then it is a competitive sport and winning is the aim. In all sport, opportunities are taken to stretch the rules as far as they can go and last season something snapped.

Let's hope for more exciting racing with clean overtakes and respect for others when doing so - that's why I love racing and come back every year for more.
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