The Formula One Topic

[Diesel Power]

Other than 1000s of jobs worldwide and the enjoyment of millions. Not to mention all the contributions to road safety.
If you don't like it. Don't watch it.

[Chrill]

Other than 1000s of jobs worldwide and the enjoyment of millions. Not to mention all the contributions to road safety.
If you don't like it. Don't watch it.

Say what now?

[Diesel Power]

Was replying to a post just slating F1 which seems to have disappeared. Strange....

[Chrill]

Was replying to a post just slating F1 which seems to have disappeared. Strange....

That was most likely a spammer, in which case the post was removed by a moderator!

---

Russian GP tomorrow, and Leclerc keeps on delivering. Fourth pole position in a row, which makes him the first Ferrari driver to achieve that since Schumacher himself did it back in 2001. Pretty nice company for the young Monégasque.

[Pyoro]

Time sure flies.

Hülkenberg is out of F1. Toro Rosso will be renamed. Renault might leave in 2021, who knows; McLaren goes back to Mercedes. Vettel sort of recovered, but has bad luck. Albon is allowed to stay at RB. Hamilton and MGP are World Champions again. And so on and so on.
...
There were some good races this season after Ferrari got their act together a bit, but overall it was forgettable. Hoping for a better next year ^^;

[Chrill]

With the coronavirus delaying the start of the F1 season, the calendar may end up looking something like this assuming it is possible to get underway by Mid-June. This calendar includes 18 races, which is still a pretty large number, and includes several triple headers where they would likely have to run two-day weekends (practice on Saturday, quali+race on Sunday).


Cancelled - Australia, Spain, Monaco, Canada

Dutch GP - 21 June (rescheduled from 3 May)
French GP - 28 June

Austrian GP - 5 July
British GP - 19 July

Hungarian GP - 2 August
Azerbaijan GP - 9 August (rescheduled from 7 June)
Russian GP - 16 August (rescheduled from 27 September)

Belgian GP - 30 August
Italian GP - 6 September

Singapore GP - 20 September
Vietnamese GP - 27 September (rescheduled from 5 April)
Chinese GP - 4 October (rescheduled from 19 April)

Japanese GP - 18 October (rescheduled from 11 October)
United States GP - 25 October
Mexico City GP - 1 November

Brazilian GP - 15 November
Bahrain GP - 22 November (rescheduled from 22 March)
Abu Dhabi GP - 29 November

[Chrill]

Sebastian Vettel confirms that he is leaving Ferrari at the end of this season. Most reports claim that he will be replaced by Carlos Sainz who in turn will be replaced at McLaren by Daniel Ricciardo. Vettel may retire, join Mercedes, Renault, or who knows what!

Here's a collection of confirmations and rumours about who will drive where next season.

Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 Team:
5. Sebastian Vettel (link)
44. Lewis Hamilton
63. George Russell
77. Valtteri Bottas

Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow:
16. Charles Leclerc (link)
55. Carlos Sainz (link)
5. Sebastian Vettel (link)

Red Bull Racing:
33. Max Verstappen (link)
23. Alexander Albon

McLaren F1 Team:
4. Lando Norris (link)
3. Daniel Ricciardo (link)
5. Sebastian Vettel (link)
55. Carlos Sainz

Renault DP World F1 Team:
31. Esteban Ocon (link)
3. Daniel Ricciardo
5. Sebastian Vettel (link)

Aston Martin F1 Team:
11. Sergio Perez (link)
18. Lance Stroll

Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda:
10. Pierre Gasly
26. Daniil Kvyat
?. Jüri Vips (link)
?. Yuki Tsunoda (link)

Alfa Romeo Racing ORLEN:
7. Kimi Räikkönen
99. Antonio Giovinazzi

Haas F1 Team:
8. Romain Grosjean
20. Kevin Magnussen

ROKiT Williams Racing:
63. George Russell (link)
6. Nicolas Latifi

[Diesel Power]

Hopefully we'll get some racing soon. Riccardo going to Mclaren is a good move. I think his driving style will suit the car. Be nice to see the team near the top again. No idea what Vettle will do. Be a shame to lose him altogether.

[Chrill]

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/2020 ... e/4800251/

We have an official calendar! With 8 races, this calendar on its own would ensure that the 2020 season is officially a sanctioned championship. 8 races is what is required in order to be able to crown a champion.

Code: Select all

Date 		Venue
July 5 		Red Bull Ring, Austria
July 12 	Red Bull Ring, Austria
July 19 	Hungaroring, Hungary
August 2 	Silverstone, Britain
August 9 	Silverstone, Britain
August 16 	Barcelona, Spain
August 30 	Spa, Belgium
September 6 	Monza, Italy

Double-headers at Red Bull Ring and Silverstone (rounds 1-2 and 4-5 respectively). Hungaroring inbetween. Also confirmed are Barcelona, Spa, and Monza. No word yet on Barcelona and Spa, although the first five as well as Monza have confirmed no spectators.

The 2nd Austrian GP will officially be known as Formula 1 Pirelli Grosser Preis der Steiermark (as opposed to the Rolex-sponsored first race, which is the Grosser Preis von Osterreich).
The 2nd British GP will be named Emirates Formula 1 70th Anniversary Grand Prix

Also, this technically moves the Hungarian GP closer in time as it was intended to be hosted on August 2nd.

[Diesel Power]

Can't wait for it all to start again!
2 GPs at Silverstone, awesome!
It's great that some of the old tracks survived. Spa, Monza, Barcelona. Some of the best tracks of the year. Shame my favourite (Baku) got canned. I'll have to wait till next year...

[Transportman]

Don't forget, this weekend the racing starts again.

[Chrill]

Very excited to be back racing! It's definitely a two-way tie if pre-season was anything to go by, and Ferrari will hold their updates back to Hungary (race 3). Verstappen v Hamilton, then.

Regardless of how long this season ends up being, getting a jump start is more important than ever. 8 races confirmed, we're probably looking at 13-16 races in total this year if we're lucky.

Rumours place a race at Mugello (Italy) and Portimao (Portugal) which would be exciting, two new circuits for the F1 series.

[Pyoro]

I fear Hamilton will simply run away in this (and from there, with next year too). I seriously doubt RB is quite there; maybe in a race or two, but probably not over the entire season. And, yeah, Ferrari seems to be in Nowhereland ... might enjoy some battles with Racing Point I guess ^^

[Chrill]

Yeah, it's stunning how Mercedes keep improving from the front instead of others catching them. The 2021 regs, albeit very similar to 2020, does limit what you can do with the floor in a bid to reduce downforce. Rake heavy cars like Red Bull and virtually all except Mercedes (and Racing Point) will benefit from that, so it could bring the field closer. But I definitely see Hamilton securing a 7th and 8th title in these two seasons.

Bottas in pole for today's race, perhaps a Finnish world champion in the making? I'd be thrilled for that to happen.

[Pyoro]

So ...

MGP have proven themselves to be a tiny bit vulnerable in one specific area, but their pace advantage if anything seems to be more worrisome than I expected. Lewis ... also clearly the much faster driver in race pace again. With MGP management seemingly willing to neutralize racing (probably after first pit stops) this season should turn very boring at the front.

Red Bull with Max are definitely chasing but they are just again not quite there, and reliability and crashes are a big NO-NO in a short season like this ...

Ferrari. Whoaaaaa. Even worse than thought. On pace I think behind both Racing Point and McLaren, possibly even behind Renault. They got lucky this weekend, and LeClerc drove a great race. Vettel embarrassing, but some of his onboards made the car look practically undrivable.

Racing Point I don't think have yet quite the handle on the car they have. This gives McLaren a good chance. Renault seems okay, bit of bad luck this weekend, but for a team that wants to win a WCC at some point it's again not enough.Your customer team shouldn't be ahead of you.

The Alpha and Alfas battle out the lower midfield places; Alfa does seem a bit better in race pace than in quali. Haas and Williams at the bottom of the field.

Naturally there will be some variation with tracks, weather, upgrades and so on but this is what it looks like to me right now.

[Chrill]

We never got to see Hamilton's true pace, but that's also the case for Bottas. He was never challenged on the road, and he always pulled a gap after SC to keep Hamilton out of DRS. The second race may teach us some more about who the faster Merc is. Perhaps they'll get on top of the sensor issues too.

[Pyoro]

So Alonso is definitely back next year and there's rumors that tomorrow there'll be something else, supposedly even bigger, that'll be announced 2020 ... what a year ...

[Pilot]

So, with an announcement today that Imola and Portimau are on the calendar, I'm excited for the "new" tracks to F1. The Nurburgring will also be returning.

I'm curious to see how teams cope with little past data on tracks like these two and Mugello, and new tracks are always fun to see.

[Nawdic]

Here's to hoping for an F1 race round the Nordschleife

[Chrill]

I mean, F1 stopped racing there in the 70s and kept racing at Nurburgring until the early 2010s. So no, no Nordschleife.

Still, this season is shaping up to have a very interesting calendar, at least. Imola (new end to the lap), Portimao, and Mugello will be welcome additions. Nurburgring brings a familiar circuit, but one we like!