Formula One - 2016

[MiniDave]

China.

Two interesting developments, Hamster gets a 5 grid spot penalty for changing his transmichigan after the last race cause they "thought" it might not last this race due to a bearing damaged in the first lap incident with Bottas......after the poor stars he's gotten the last two races, if he has another one this weekend he'll be fighting back from last place again, or at least deep in the field. He's also having some interesting problems staying on track.

Ferrari seem to have the pace again this weekend, but we have seen how MBZ can turn up the wick for qually (I thought they weren't supposed to be able to do that?) I think this could be a breakout race for the Kimster......

Haas is having severe rear brake issues, I'll be surprised if both cars make it to the end of the race.....

Alonso is back on track this weekend, I expect the McHondas to finish in the 10 -12th place area or so.....

[MiniDave]

China - Qualifying

A fascinating qually session this time - back to the old format - the Hamster has engine problems so he'll start from the back, which will actually make the race more interesting as he charges thru the field. The real surprise wasn't that the Ferrari was challenging for the top spot, but that Ricciardo's Red Bull is right there with them!

Once the smoke cleared and the dust settled, Kimi blew the last few corners of his fast lap and finished third, Rosberg was on top and Ricci racer was in second! It's been a long time since a Red Bull was on the front row and it's clear Renault Tag Heuer has done wonders with their engine compared to last year. On top of that they're supposed to have a substantial bump in power by mid season, point being it might be Red Bull's Ricciardo challenging for the championship too this season. And wouldn't it be fun to see 3 or 4 or even 5 drivers well in contention come the end of the season?

One other interesting point, Rosbug will start on soft tires while everyone else in the top 10 will start on supersofts - opinion is those will only last about 5 laps before they have to be changed while Ross can simply motor on.....the hope is that those on super softs can get the jump on Nico at the start and pull enough lead, but I'm not sure that can happen in such few laps. This also plays into the Hamster's hands as he can even potentially run a 2 or even one stop race.

[Jims5543]

Missed all the action this weekend.  Did catch the Summary on Axis, looked like an exciting race with lots of bedlam.... for everyone but Nico who finished a solid 40 second ahead of Vettel. Which is sobering, I really do not think any team has a chance of catching the Silver Arrows.

Red Bull was very racy this past weekend. They also have an update coming that may give Ferrari a lot of problems.

Daniil vs. Seb vs. Kimi  - Looking at the in car and replays, I cannot help but think Kimi messed up on that one. He over cooked the corner worse than Seb and gave him no room, it all happens so fast it is easy to damn one driver when in actuality it was just racing, just sucks when 2 cars from the same team collide.

As usual, summary here:

http://blog.axisofoversteer.com/2016/04/2016-chinese-gp-executive-summary.html

[MtyMous]

I'll probably be going to the races in Austin this year with the wife.... with rain insurance.

[Jims5543]

As I said F1 will not get any of my Money until Bernie is gone and they reach out to their fans and make the sport more fan friendly. I am happy stealing my F1, I will not even click on the official F1 website anymore.

F Bernie.

[Jims5543]

[Jims5543]

Lol so true!!!

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[Jims5543]

Trying this a different way.

[Jims5543]

Looking at todays Qualifying results, I am happy. Ferrari are only about tow tenths off Mercedes. Far cry from the beginning of the season when they were over half a second and Vettel conceded he made a decent mistake in Qualifying so they are right there with Mercedes and RBR are right there with Ferrari.

Should be a fun race tomorrow. 

The start should be interesting, Vettel has pulled off some rocket starts earlier this season, I hope the Nico vs. Lewis pressure tomorrow causes some opportunity for Seb and Dan to get out in front of them.

I am not sure if I will be around for the race tomorrow, may be on the beach (F you Bernie, I wanted to go to Montreal this year will you die already!!) so I will just check twitter, Axis, GP247 and PF1 tomorrow when I get home.

I am sure it will be a fun race. Ferrari's turbo upgrade and RBR engine upgrades seem to be working.

[MiniDave]

Well the race could have gone to Vettel, had his strategists been a little smarter.....he sure got a killer start again!

Still it was a fun race, Rosbug's late pass on Verstappen in the last corner was opportunistic to say the least, kudo's to Max for keeping his cool and driving for the finish.

On to the next one.....

[Jims5543]

I really do not like Hamilton, and after Sunday, this run my team mate off the tack carp is getting old.

I watched about half the race n TV in a Bar, then moved on, was not impressed with Ferraris stupid strategy, stopping 11 laps into the race without need. All they had to do for the entire race was cover Lewis and they had a n easy win, they had the pace to stay in front but not to catch the mercs. Such stupidity.

Unknown track this weekend should be interesting.  I am in Orlando for the weekend so I will try to catch the race Sunday morning in the hotel room. I think it starts at 7. So I can at least catch the start.  BTW - which sucks because I have grown used to the Sky TV coverage and it is 100X better the NBC is.  If I have Univision I may watch that Sunday.

[Bart Smith]

I have to say that this season has been great. The only race I missed was Monaco because it was on regular TV and I did not DVR it. I was wondering how many of you think Bernie had his mother in law kidnapped to distract from his bad management and the race stewards changing, ignoring, screwing with the rules?   

[Jims5543]

Mercedes have won every race except one, and that was only because Lewis and Nico took each other out of the race.

I did not even bother last weekend. I read about it. Sunday evening.

The only thing I find myself rooting for, which sucks, is for the Mercedes guys to take each other out so we can actually enjoy a race where someone else wins.

Glad Max got a win, the kid is good.  There are quite a few that are really good on the grind but we will never see them win until someone figures out how to make Mercedes power.

I am hoping after the break someone, be it Ferrari or Red Bull or even Force India, can bring an upgrade to the track that will actually challenge the silver arrows.

It is staggering how dominant the Mercedes is this season and the last two seasons.

[Jims5543]

This is me this season.

[MiniDave]

I'm hoping that Redbull gets that 47 hp bump over the summer break, couple that with the fact that Hammy will be facing grid penalties due to his engine and other parts failure and things could get interesting in the second half - I hope so at least.

[Vikram]

I used to be a huge fan of f1, I'd watch it religiously with my dad.
I've stopped because of the domination. It's not like it's the first time it's happened. Red Bull dominated for years, but it's not like Mercedes. With red bull, they didn't seem unstoppable.
It's just boring now, not to mention I dislike Hamilton. And those v6s

[Jims5543]

I used to be a huge fan of f1, I'd watch it religiously with my dad.
I've stopped because of the domination. It's not like it's the first time it's happened. Red Bull dominated for years, but it's not like Mercedes. With red bull, they didn't seem unstoppable.
It's just boring now, not to mention I dislike Hamilton. And those v6s

At the end of last season I was discussing on another car forum with friends this domination, and after going back and tallying up, we have not seen domination like this since the Ferrari years.

Long post, I cut and past the findings I came up with on another forum and here it is:


Schumacher years:

1999  Was a Mika year not schumacher but put it here so you can see.
Wins - 9 out of 16   (9/16)
1/2 finishes 3 out of 16   (3/16)

2000
Wins - 9/17
1/2 - 5/17
Rubens had 1 win so 10/18 Ferrari wins

2001
Wins - 9/17
1/2 - 4/17
Rubens had no wins

2002
Wins - 11/17
1/2 - 8/17
Rubens had 4 wins so 15/18 Ferrari wins

2003
Wins - 6/16
1/2 - 0/16
Rubens had 2 wins so 8/18 Ferrari wins

2004
Wins - 13/18
1/2 - 8/18
Rubens had 2 wins so 15/18 Ferrari wins

Vettel Years:

2010
Wins - 5/19
1/2 - 1/19
Mark had 4 wins 9/19 RBR Wins

2011
Wins - 11/19
1/2 - 6/19
Mark had 1 win so 12/19 RBR wins

2012
Wins - 5/20
1/2 - 1/20
Mark Webber had 2 wins so 7/20 for RBR

2013
Wins - 14/19
1/2 - 4/19
Mark had no wins so RBR had 14/19 wins

Hamilton Years

2014
Wins - 11/19
1/2 - 11/19
Notable Rosberg  took 5 wins making Mercedes wins 16/19

2015
wins - 10/19
1/2 - 11/19
Notable Rosberg  took 6 wins making Mercedes wins 16/19

Looking it over Ferrari had 2 very dominant years, where they won all but 3 races 2002 and 2004.

There was never a season that dominant for RBR the best they did was win all but 5 races in 2013 and Vettel won all of them Mark could not even muster a win nor was he in second much. Car or driver?

Then we have the Mercedes years all but 3 wins 2 seasons in a row and as many or more 1/2 finishes as wins.  Predictions are more of the same this year. <--- that was typed before the season began.  Looks like we can expect all but one race win goes to Mercedes.

[MiniDave]

It could go that way but like I wrote - the combination of Red Bull getting a substantial power bump and Hammy getting some grid spot penalties means we could see some interesting fights in the second part of the season.

Remember how they used to do it? On team member would be the rabbit, the second would hold everyone else up so the rabbit could build a lead? used to be common as heck in the past when there was a clear #1 and #2 driver.

[Jims5543]

It could go that way but like I wrote - the combination of Red Bull getting a substantial power bump and Hammy getting some grid spot penalties means we could see some interesting fights in the second part of the season.

Remember how they used to do it? On team member would be the rabbit, the second would hold everyone else up so the rabbit could build a lead? used to be common as heck in the past when there was a clear #1 and #2 driver.

Yes, Fishi did it for Alonso a lot as did Massa and Barachello for Schumacher. Weber could never get far enough up the grid to help Vettel, and when he did there was usually a spat between them. Mark was a hardly an ideal #2 driver.

The interesting thing with Mercedes is they are letting the 2 fight it out.

I also do not think Red Bull, even with another power bump will really be able to attack Mercedes. Lewis told a sobering story of his day this past Sunday in an interview, he said he  TURNED DOWN his engine for most of the race until they said Hammer time, then he turned it up, opened up an comfortable gap and  then turned it back down. That is not good news, as they seem to have plenty in reserve.

I hope Red Bull can challenge I really do I love the Honey Badger and Mad Max,  I think they are a lethal combo, and I have always been a Ferrari fan so I would love to see either of those two teams or even Haas (LOL) get up on the top step this season.

The realist in me thinks that is a pipe dream.

[Bart Smith]

Todays race was great. So much stuff going on and lots of battles late in the race. Someones got to say it, GO HAAS!

[Jims5543]

Mad Max has been the best #2 driver Dan Ric could ever dream for. I tuned into the Sky broadcast on Kodi about 1/2 way into the race and could not understand how the Ferraris were so car back, Max was even further back and Alonso was running 5th!!!

Then I watched the recap at the end of the race and it was all clear, Max made a Kamikaze (I am sure some will disagree) move on the 1st turn , over cooked left no room for anyone including himself and caused a Ferrari nightmare.

Amazing that Hamilton could hit the podium from dead last, Max and Magnussen helped that a lot, and remarkable that Nico was able to walk away like his did, I really had hoped the rest had finally caught up and they only have in qualifying not in the race. The fact that Nico was so far in front and Hamilton could get to 3rd is a testimony as to how damn fast the Mercs are.

The green room was interesting not sure NBC shows that, Sky shows it in its entirety, a lot of bad blood between Nico and Lewis, you can see the tension while they are waiting to go out on the podium.

Weber drinking from the shoe is the highlight all weekend for me.

Kimi is not too pleased with Mad Max, and rightfully so, he is making some dangerous moves, he keeps overshooting corners and pushing people off track, ironically Nico was crucified for doing the same, Max seems to get a pass.

Love we have another race next holiday weekend and its Monza!!

[MiniDave]

The troll is finally leaving????

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/formula-1/2017/01/18/bernieecclestone-eased-aside-liberty-head-f1-ownership/

[John Gervais]

I haven't watched Formula un for many years, but I have to see this as a good thing.  Maybe CVC should have asserted themselves and taken some control away from Bernie sooner.  I hope that Liberty simplifies the game and makes it more interesting.  I wonder, though, how would a race in LA be received by the environmentalists...

I hope the racing becomes more competitive and less political; maybe I'd watch one on occasion.

[BruceK]

The troll is finally leaving????

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/formula-1/2017/01/18/bernieecclestone-eased-aside-liberty-head-f1-ownership/

Can it really be true?   I've only been waiting for Bernie to hit the highway for about 25 years now.   

I won't miss him one bit. 

[MiniDave]

This just in.......

Maldonado is in talks with KV Racing to drive an Indy car next season........lookout walls!