Meacon Keaton Posted March 18, 2023 Report Share Posted March 18, 2023 Today was a good example of why I hate seeing all of the moronic "WILL REDBULLZ WIN EVRY RACE?!" "news" articles. They won't win every race. Because shit happens. We've seen Max win from back there before, but I'm holding out hope either Checo or Alonso pull far enough ahead to hold onto it, though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris2K Posted March 19, 2023 Report Share Posted March 19, 2023 I'm assuming Red Bull were on the phone about Alonso before the lights had even gone out. God knows what possible advantage he could get from being even further off the racing line. At least he got to lead a few laps. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Twist Posted March 19, 2023 Report Share Posted March 19, 2023 At a loss as to why they’ve called a safety car for that. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meacon Keaton Posted March 19, 2023 Report Share Posted March 19, 2023 Lance gonna Lance Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gazz Posted March 19, 2023 Report Share Posted March 19, 2023 1 hour ago, Twist said: At a loss as to why they’ve called a safety car for that. Apparently they didn't have enough trackside cameras to know exactly where Stroll was, so they had err on the side of caution. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris2K Posted March 19, 2023 Report Share Posted March 19, 2023 Alonso loses his podium after getting an additional 10 seconds for the team touching the car before the five second penalty was over (most likely putting the rear jack in). Russell goes P3 instead. No excuse whatsoever for Aston Martin considering Ocon got the same penalty last week for Alpine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meacon Keaton Posted March 19, 2023 Report Share Posted March 19, 2023 There was more than half of the race left when Alonso served that penalty. The fact that a second penalty wasn't issued until after the conclusion of the race is ridiculous. They slapped Ocon with the follow up penalty like a lap or two after in the previous race. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slogger Posted March 19, 2023 Report Share Posted March 19, 2023 Alonso gets to keep his podium after all 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin Lineker Posted March 20, 2023 Author Admin Report Share Posted March 20, 2023 Justice prevails in Saudi Arabia! Huzzah!! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Lusophone Posted March 20, 2023 Report Share Posted March 20, 2023 8 hours ago, Lineker said: Justice prevails in Saudi Arabia! Huzzah!! For perhaps the first time in that country's history. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin Lineker Posted March 20, 2023 Author Admin Report Share Posted March 20, 2023 That was the joke! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris2K Posted March 20, 2023 Report Share Posted March 20, 2023 Everyone seems to agree that both penalties were a bit overboard, the starting position one because it didn't get him any advantage (and all the drivers are saying they can't see far enough out of the cockpit to judge properly), and that there was an agreement in place about what constitutes "working on the car" which is why the second penalty got removed. Hopefully they can sort this out before Australia because these rules seem way too open to interpretation right now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin Lineker Posted March 24, 2023 Author Admin Report Share Posted March 24, 2023 Quote Technical director James Key has left McLaren after a difficult couple of seasons and been replaced by a new design-office structure at the team. Key's role has been split into three separate technical director positions under team principal Andrea Stella. David Sanchez joins from Ferrari to lead car concept and performance. He is joined by two internal promotions - Peter Prodromou on aerodynamics and Neil Houldley on engineering and design. All three will operate with the job title of technical director in charge of their own area of expertise. Sanchez will start work on 1 January 2024 after completing his "gardening leave" from Ferrari. The changes, which the team emphasised had been worked on for months, come after McLaren slipped from fourth to fifth in the constructors' championship in 2022, and a dispiriting start to the new season. The team admitted they had missed their targets over the winter, having failed to spot a development direction early enough, and are last in the constructors' championship after two races having suffered both below-par performance and poor reliability. McLaren are hopeful upgrades scheduled to be introduced from the fourth race of the season will return them to a more competitive position. Stella said: "Looking ahead, I am determined and fully focused on leading McLaren back to the front of the field. "Since taking on the team principal role, I have been given the mandate to take a strategic approach to ensure the team is set on a long-term foundation, for us to build on over the years. "This new structure provides clarity and effectiveness within the team's technical department and puts us in a strong position to maximise performance, including optimising the new infrastructure upgrades we have coming in 2023." McLaren Racing chief executive officer Zak Brown said: "It has been clear to me for some time that our technical development has not moved at a quick enough pace to match our ambition of returning to the front of the grid. "I'm pleased that, having completed a full review with Andrea, we are now able to implement the restructure required to set the wheels in motion to turn this around. "These strategic changes ensure the long-term success of the team and are necessary to see McLaren get back to winning ways. "We have everything coming into place now with our people and infrastructure and alongside an exciting driver line-up, I'm determined to see McLaren get back to where we should be." Prodromou as technical director, aerodynamics, will be supported by Giuseppe Pesce, who has been promoted to director, aerodynamics and chief of staff. Piers Thynne has been promoted from operations director to chief operating officer with the aim of supporting Stella in "innovating and elevating the standards at McLaren". The restructure has been introduced shortly before key infrastructure projects at McLaren are due for completion. These include the team's own wind tunnel, which is expected to be running by the summer. For more than a decade, McLaren have been using a third-party wind tunnel in Germany, creating both cost and logistical issues. Analysis - Why has this happened? The roots of this restructure at McLaren go back to last season, when bosses began to have concerns the team was not developing at the rate intended. McLaren have ambitions of returning to the front of the grid. But after a positive 2021 season, in which the team won a race for the first time in nine years, progress stalled in 2022. Last year, F1 introduced new regulations that were intended to close up the field and promote closer racing, but McLaren's lap-time deficit to the front doubled and the team dropped a place in the constructors' championship, losing out in the fight for fourth to Alpine. That was partly because Daniel Ricciardo had a difficult season, scoring just over a quarter of the points of team-mate Lando Norris, leading to his contract being terminated a year early. But Brown also began to feel he was not seeing the technical progress he had wanted or expected. Brown recognised the success of the 2021 car was - because of the unique circumstances around the Covid-19 pandemic and teams using the same cars for two years - essentially a product of work done in 2019, when the technical leadership of the team was very different. The 2019 season started with Pat Fry as McLaren's technical director, Stella as performance director, Prodromou as head of aerodynamics and former Indycar star Gil de Ferran, who left the team last year after a couple of seasons focusing on their US racing plans, still in place as sporting director. Key joined just after the start of the 2019 season and Fry left for Alpine in the summer of that year. Through 2020 and 2021, McLaren repeatedly expressed confidence in their technical leadership structure, but the results in 2022 led Brown to question whether things were going in the right direction. Towards the end of last season, team principal Andreas Seidl, who joined in May 2019, was approached by both Ferrari and Audi, and chose to accept the offer from the German company to lead their F1 project when it starts in 2026. Rather than force Seidl to stick to his contract and stay until the end of 2025, Brown decided to let him leave for Alfa Romeo/Sauber, where he is heading up the team's transition into Audi as chief executive officer, and take the opportunity to make major changes at McLaren. The first of those was the promotion of Stella to team principal as a replacement for Seidl. The restructure announced on Thursday centres on the capture from Ferrari of Sanchez, who has been at Maranello for a decade and was their head of vehicle concept. In that role, he was key in the team's effective response to major regulations changes for both the 2017 and 2022 seasons, both of which they started with a fully competitive car. More recruitment is in the pipeline and McLaren believe they have course-corrected and are now back on target with their ambitions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin Lineker Posted March 25, 2023 Author Admin Report Share Posted March 25, 2023 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin Lineker Posted March 31, 2023 Author Admin Report Share Posted March 31, 2023 Quote The three-times Formula One champion Nelson Piquet must pay 5m reals (£780k) in moral damages for racist and homophobic comments about Lewis Hamilton, a Brazilian court ruled on Friday. In an interview in November 2021, Piquet used a Portuguese racial slur in reference to the seven-times world champion when commenting on Hamilton’s crash with Max Verstappen at the British Grand Prix. Hamilton called for action to change “archaic mindsets” after footage of the interview surfaced last June. Piquet apologised and said his comments had been mistranslated. In another clip that surfaced later, Piquet used racist and homophobic language against Hamilton in a podcast interview when describing how Hamilton missed out on the 2016 championship to Nico Rosberg. Hamilton, who was awarded honorary Brazilian citizenship last June, is the sport’s only Black driver. The charges were brought by four human rights groups, including Brazil’s National LGBT+ Alliance, which wanted Piquet to pay 10m reals. Judge Pedro Matos de Arruda said the amount of compensation was decided on “so that, as a society, we can some day be free from the pernicious acts that are racism and homophobia”. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris2K Posted April 2, 2023 Report Share Posted April 2, 2023 Well that was an opening lap to keep me awake. Max complaining about being overtaken reinforces why I can't seem to get behind him, as if he wouldn't do the exact same thing. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Twist Posted April 2, 2023 Report Share Posted April 2, 2023 Well George Russell got utterly boned by that red flag. Feels reasonable under the circumstances that they should reset the order to the order at the time the safety car was called for. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris2K Posted April 2, 2023 Report Share Posted April 2, 2023 This feels so unfair to George and the rule needs changing. Either they need to stop the free tyre change at a red flag, make the red flag decision much faster, or set the positions back to how they were when the safety car was put out. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Twist Posted April 2, 2023 Report Share Posted April 2, 2023 Kudos to George’s response though. Imagine the complaining if that happened to Max or Lewis. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Twist Posted April 2, 2023 Report Share Posted April 2, 2023 Well that was a fun 10 laps, might go back to bed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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