Formula One - 2018

somehow I picked Lewis 3rd place finish , I think he would have loved to sew it up today but was not going to chance it and crash or be "pushed"  and maybe hurt, 

I still want the Red Bull shirt !

Ferrari has placed all it’s money on the wrong horse, so to speak.

In reply to Streetwiseguy :

Yea, I wish they would get that straight.  This race was 8 more points than Vettel, he got 2.  Which means that Vettel has to out score Hamilton 75-6 to win.  So Lewis needs 7th or better ONCE in the next three races and he wins it all (assuming Seb wins ever single remaining race).  If Seb doesn't win every race, the Lewis is champ.  So three straight wins AND no better than 7th once.  Which is possible, but incredibly unlikely.

racerfink said:

Ferrari has placed all it’s money on the wrong horse, so to speak.

I don't know about that, but it's cool to see Kimi can still do it.

Ian F said:

racerfink said:

Ferrari has placed all it’s money on the wrong horse, so to speak.

I don't know about that, but it's cool to see Kimi can still do it.

Makes me wonder what the outcome would have been if Kimi was the primary driver!    He did not get his nickname for being a spoiled brat.

In reply to bentwrench :

Merc is by far the best all around team, winning 4 championships consecutively with 2 different drivers. They can confidently make mid-season changes to the car and just dominate, Ferrari just can't figure that out. Ferrari is grasping for straws, hence why they are moving up Leclerc. I thought that Ferrari could sneak in a championship like Mika did during the Schumi domination, but I am not sure if that is even possible. Merc has pulled a modern day Ferrari dominance and Ross Brawn created both lolz. 

IT's funny, I spend a fair amount of time over on the FerrariChat F1 section as there are some really knowledgeable people there, but man do some of those guys hate Lewis with an irrational amount of bile.  I swear Lewis could win from the back of the grid in this years Williams and there would still be a three page debate about the fact he only won because he cheated, got team orders, disobeyed track limits, had a druid curse Seb whatever. But does anyone really doubt that if Lewis had been Seb's team mate this year in identical Ferrari's, that he would not have won the WDC? I don't recall (memory is not infallible) any actual true mistakes from Lewis this year. Canada, a track he normally excels at he was mysteriously off that pace all weekend, but he still brought it home to fourth and a handy 10 points rather than throwing himself at the scenery. His on track performance has been exemplary. When he or the car weren't the fastest cobo out there he still brought strong points home. He avoided collisions with other people and simply did the better job all year. He 'poor' results this year have been a 4th and a 5th. He's only non finish was Austria where both Merc's had fuel pressure issues. He's just been the better driver all year. Contrast that with the long list of self inflicted errors Seb has had going back to Azerbaijan?

But Kimi, F.Yeah.  Great race.  I was bricking it when they kept him out under the VSC, but they played it right in the end.  One has to wonder how the championship would have worked out if he hadn't been the sacrificial lamb to Seb's points chase earlier in the season.  I feel that there would have been at least one more win, and certainly there would have been more podiums.  I don't doubt he's past his prime, but while he may be >< behind Seb in raw pace he's miles ahead in consistency and 'don't F it up' ability than seb.

I've just realized that Kimi is 'only' 55 points behind Seb compared to Seb's 70 point deficit to Lewis.  With 75 points still in the offing Kimi would have to outscore Seb by just over 18 points per race to beat Seb. It's not going to happen, but I think it shows how poor Seb's full season performance has been in comparison to someone, who while deeply loved from all sides, is in truth past his prime.

I've always been more of a Hamilton fan and thought Vettel was a bit overrated and just in a better car.  Knowing that, I admit my view is probably biased.  But, I've watched the race interviews over this past year and compared Vettel's reactions to Hamilton's.  Most accuse Hamilton of being egotistical, but he always compliments his team, always compliments the fans, and seems to focus more on the team effort. Vettel on the other hand either talks about his race and the things he did right, or complains about the other drivers and the team's poor decisions.  I'm trying not to be biased in that opinion, but wonder if others have seen the same.

I don't think Hamilton is perfect and think he was a bit of a prat in his earlier years, but seems more mature these days.

I don't think Kimi is past his prime, as much as he's a more seasoned driver and knows his place (second fiddle to Seb) and how to focus on exactly what he needs to do.  I'd bet that if Ferrari put him as number one, he'd be battling with Lewis right now, if not winning, because he wouldn't have gotten into as many issues and just put his head down and gotten it done.

-Rob

There was a really good interview with Hamilton during FP2 - he obviously had nothing to do due to the rain, so he gave some pretty considered answers to questions about mental prep and dealing with adversity. If you've got the EPSN app, you can rewatch it. Plus there's some hilarious side discussion about armadillos by baffled British commentators.

I'd always felt that Vettel won because of the car and wasn't as strong a driver as his record would indicate - his failure to come to grips with the hybrid Red Bull in the first year certainly showed that he wasn't as quick to adapt as Hamilton and Ricciardo. It wasn't until last year that he really started to show how he had difficulty in dealing with pressure, as he had to really fight for a title. It's been mentioned before in this thread that Red Bull seems to have a fairly poisonous atmosphere, and you can see how Vettel still has that mindset in interviews and on the radio.

I'm not sure Kimi would be in the hunt for the title, he seems to not quite have the extra edge when he really needs it. Kimi vs Bottas, both unleashed, would be probably pretty evenly matched. But there's no denying Kimi's consistency.

In reply to Adrian_Thompson :

Lewis is one of the best pure talented F1 drivers, but you can't just decide that he is going to win a WDC in anycar because he is Lewis. Otherwise Alonso and Kimi would have won a WDC every year in Ferrari. (1) Lewis has been beaten in the same car by Nico (2) Bottas is a joke and will never challenge him. He is looking less like Barrichelo and more like Heikki Kovalainen every race (3) You don't win 4 WDC back 2 back titles by luck, Merc can be knocked of until they change the rules and the people behind the scenes. Ferrari still making mistakes on pitstops and Austin was one of the few times where they made the correct guess on the tire strategy. The ferrari team of today is not the one that won Schumi all those titles. I am not sure what happens to Vettel after the Holiday, it's like his mind is still on vacation.

Atleast you will be able to test your hypothesis on Kimi of how good of a driver he is trying to score points with a Sauber. Imagine they will give him better equipment to beat HAAS.

Weren't we going on and on about how bad Mercedes was at strategy not all that long ago? But we've always been at war with Eurasia...

Lewis was beaten by Nico...once. Mechanical problems played a part and Nico didn't exactly walk away with the title.  I think Lewis learned a lot mentally from that season and it's why he's been so strong when behind this year. Again, check that interview I mentioned. It's quite likely that Nico couldn't do it again even if he hadn't left the sport.

Bottas impressed when he was at Williams. He realizes that he put himself in the support role this year by failing to be competitive at the beginning of the season. It'll be interesting to see what he does at the beginning of 2019, I suspect he's going to come out of the gate fighting hard. Then we'll see if he can take the fight to Lewis.

In reply to Keith Tanner :

I think Mercedes did make a mistake in pit strategy, again.  The mistakes are getting far, far fewer, but, oddly, it had to do with pitting under a VSC.  Turns out that he should not have pitted....  I think if he followed Kimi, he could have either played an undercut on him after a few laps, as they could have put him into the right gap- which they were being made pretty progressively.  Instead, he had to fight to get behind Kimi, and then get held up for 8 or so seconds, chew up his tires, and then they did not attempt to pit him to stay ahead of Max.

In an interview I saw of Lewis- he actually put the mistakes back to the wrong tire in Q2- more giving Ferrari and Kimi the bonus point for a great choice than anything else.  

But I think they should have just followed Kimi, and done the modern aero pass.

trigun7469 said:

The ferrari team of today is not the one that won Schumi all those titles.

Indeed.  They fired Schumacher in favor of Kimi in 2006, Jean Todt and Ross Brawn left shortly thereafter (the owners wanted Italians in charge) and the team has never recovered that form.

I think the VSC tire change wasn't really a mistake, just a bit of a waste of effort.  The mistake was in trusting the tire to go 44 laps with zero data from practice, and a pound and a half more pressure.  When Lewis caught and couldn't pass, they should have forgotten about running to the end, and gone for the undercut.  Had Lewis come in when he couldn't pass, and forced Kimi to change tires, while he still had the gap to Max, he could have undercut and gotten the lead.  

Hindsight is great.  Easy to make good choices with all the info.

I just jumped in here so I don't know exactly what all has been said, but to me it's no fun to have one or two completely dominant teams that win every thing every time. So even though the same teams won yet again,  although not in the typical order, the last few laps of the USGP were maybe the best laps of the whole 2018 season. Still I would love to see a new face on the top step. Having said that, congrats to Kimi.   

In reply to Streetwiseguy :

On TV, everyone else thought that Ferrari made the mistake- but the mistake was to think that changing your strategy when the tire wear was a HUGE question was a good idea.  When you have an unknown like that, most of the time, the best choice is to just do what everyone else is doing.  That choice is where Mercedes lost 2nd and perhaps the win.

Yes, hindsight is awesome, but I still am unsure why, live, they chose to do the opposite.

Feedyurhed said:

I just jumped in here so I don't know exactly what all has been said, but to me it's no fun to have one or two completely dominant teams that win every thing every time. So even though the same teams won yet again,  although not in the typical order, the last few laps of the USGP were maybe the best laps of the whole 2018 season. Still I would love to see a new face on the top step. Having said that, congrats to Kimi.   

On that note- here's an interesting Forbes article about Haas and the much smaller budget they are spending to be in the top 10- https://www.forbes.com/sites/csylt/2018/09/25/how-haas-designs-a-competitive-f1-car-for-30-million/#7a2eee8f7c52

Pretty interesting, and I would hope that others follow this model a little more- that way teams with more budget can spend more money on the value parts.  Given the speed difference between Red Bull and Renault- it's pretty obvious that the most money should be spent on aero.  Instead of building your own autoclave to bake your own tub.

Feedyurhed said:

I just jumped in here so I don't know exactly what all has been said, but to me it's no fun to have one or two completely dominant teams that win every thing every time. So even though the same teams won yet again,  although not in the typical order, the last few laps of the USGP were maybe the best laps of the whole 2018 season. Still I would love to see a new face on the top step. Having said that, congrats to Kimi.   

The commentators have taken Formula 1.5 (or the "B championship") to heart, and were even discussing what the trophy should be during some of the practice broadcasts. In case nobody's guessed, I like to put practice/quali on in the background while I'm working in the shop because there's nothing worth looking at but the conversation is more interesting than any other sports radio could be.

One or two completely dominant teams is more common in F1 than the rose tinted glasses would have us believe.

In reply to alfadriver :

As it progressed, I went from, Brilliant move, to Well, it's tough to pass here even with a much better tire to  Lewis should pit for Supers while he has the gap to Max to Holy E36 M3, no way he makes it to the end on those tires to Max can't hold him off on the new ones to ...

All in all, it was fun to watch.

alfadriver said:

Pretty interesting, and I would hope that others follow this model a little more- that way teams with more budget can spend more money on the value parts.  Given the speed difference between Red Bull and Renault- it's pretty obvious that the most money should be spent on aero.  Instead of building your own autoclave to bake your own tub.

I also wonder if there's something about the Red Bull chassis that's hard on the Renault engine, like packaging constraints on cooling. Seems to me they have a higher incidence of failures than the factory team does. I haven't dug into the data to confirm.

Keith Tanner said:

alfadriver said:

Pretty interesting, and I would hope that others follow this model a little more- that way teams with more budget can spend more money on the value parts.  Given the speed difference between Red Bull and Renault- it's pretty obvious that the most money should be spent on aero.  Instead of building your own autoclave to bake your own tub.

I also wonder if there's something about the Red Bull chassis that's hard on the Renault engine, like packaging constraints on cooling. Seems to me they have a higher incidence of failures than the factory team does. I haven't dug into the data to confirm.

That would make sense- but they are SO much faster than the Renault, it's not even funny.  Or it at least seems worth the risk.  Moreso, if Haas got a huge amount of new money, they should spend it all on aero research and development, as it sure seems as if that's what is really separating the teams.

It's a good point. Renault is the only manufacturer not in the top three teams, and Red Bull is the only customer team that is. I wonder what the relative budget of each is?

In reply to Keith Tanner :

I am not discounting Lewis one bit I have watched him since his GP2 days, but Nico beat him fair and square and kept the racing close while at Mercedes. Bottas is not even close to Nico's talent and doesn't have the alpha male instinct to beat Lewis. The facts back it up. 2 things we will never see, (1) Nico coming back to the sport to defend his title (2) Lewis taking a garbage team and car to a WDC. This team was built by the best. The last two championships without Nico at Mercedes are like watching a 0-78 football game. So if the score becomes 7-78, due to a mistake, we still know who is going to win. The 2018 season hasn't been a battle for the constructors or driver championship since July. The separation of speed between Ferrar/Mercedes vs. everybody else is ridiculous, I imagine the other teams are already been working on 2019 cars. Kimi going to Sauber, Daniel going to Renault, and Leclerc going to Ferrari will be the most exciting story lines, but I can't imagine they are going to change the projected outcome.

^Well, to be fair, when has anyone taken a garbage team and car to a WDC? 

Of course you need a good car to win a championship, otherwise you'll be beaten by someone else who's just as good but has a better car. Some drivers can help lift the team to greatness, some can't. Schumi apparently could. Alonso and Vettel cannot, they seem to be poisonous. Maybe Lewis can. I was just looking at stats - Lewis has never finished lower than 5th in the WDC, so he's got something going on.

I've spoken to some of the Mercedes race engineers. Apparently there is a big difference in how much Hamilton and Nico can (could) do in the cockpit. You could give Lewis all sorts of tasks to do, while Nico had to be managed a bit more carefully. Hamilton has a lot of spare processing power upstairs, which is probably why he often seems to be racing on a different level mentally than many others, looking at the race and the season overall while racing one of the most complex cars on earth at max speed.

Anyone who doesn't understand why Mercedes would team order Bottas has forgotten how many times Nico and Hamilton took each other out. And I still think that Nico benefited from some reliability in Lewis' car to win that WDC. Lewis had at least one DNF from an engine failure, and there was only a 5 point difference.