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Watching Uppity on Netflix, documentary about Willy T Ribbs, first top level black driver back in the 70s. I'd never heard of him, he drove in a wide range of series and did well everywhere despite predictable depressing racism, did some F1 testing for Bernie Ecclestone and only didn't get a seat because their Italian sponsor wanted an Italian (ie white?) driver. Really interesting documentary, most of the time I was rooting for him but it's clear he could be a bit of an asshole when he wanted to haha.
I'm a little late for the Alonso circle-jerk, but I wanted to point out what I feel is one of his most impressive accomplishments.
In 2007, as a 2 time WDC in the absolute prime of his career, he was almost able to match Lewis Hamilton in his rookie season.
Holding a prodigious talent like Hamilton to a virtual tie, including actually beating him in some races, really does show just how good Alonso was.
In 2007, as a 2 time WDC in the absolute prime of his career, he was almost able to match Lewis Hamilton in his rookie season.
Holding a prodigious talent like Hamilton to a virtual tie, including actually beating him in some races, really does show just how good Alonso was.
I'm a little late for the Alonso circle-jerk, but I wanted to point out what I feel is one of his most impressive accomplishments.
In 2007, as a 2 time WDC in the absolute prime of his career, he was almost able to match Lewis Hamilton in his rookie season.
Holding a prodigious talent like Hamilton to a virtual tie, including actually beating him in some races, really does show just how good Alonso was.
Those first 9 races for Lewis were just incredible fun. Outrageous overtakes, aggression and speed. 9 podiums in his first 9 races.
After years of watching Button do his best to get on a podium (although to be fair I loved Button+Sato at BAR), it was nice to finally have a Brit fighting for wins and the championship again.
Also China 2007 still pisses me off to this day. I wonder if Lewis still dwells on it.
I don't even view that race as 100% his fault since McLaren's strategists left him on tires with no tread. Dude probably legit has tire PTSD for this very reason.
Easily one of the stupidest and most frustrating things I have ever watched happen live, and I work in IT.
Your driver needs 4 fucking points to win the WDC. You get 4 points for finishing 5th.
The only real competition are the two Ferraris, and your other car. Everyone else is a minute behind. As long as you execute the bare minimum as a team and have your driver finish the race, he will be WDC.
Your driver is leading the race on worn Inters. Really worn Inters. Everyone else is pitting, but your strategy says you should stay out until lap 31. Do you:
A) Act super conservatively, pit him a few laps earlier than planned. It's not the optimal strategy, but he'll finish on the podium.
B) Try to stretch to the plan, but pit at the first sign of trouble. Like, I dunno, running wide, or losing several seconds a lap.
C) Stick to the fucking plan. Fuck the tyres. Fuck the changing conditions. What the fuck is "canvas" any way? Fuck that. Lap 31 or death!
If you chose C, congratulations! You are now qualified to work for the strategy department at McLaren in 2007.
Yeah, dude has to rant about tires constantly during a race because of McLaren, it's the only thing that makes sense. The most recent Monaco race probably had him reliving China 2007.
Was it already known at that point that Alonso would leave McLaren? Wouldn't be surprised if McLaren would've made bad decisions for Hamilton to keep Alonso happy but if Alonso was already leaving anyway that wouldn't make much sense
Fair enough.. Can't believe how long McLaren was shit team management-wise
Their last chance was 2012. Hamilton was supposed to be the WDC that year, but Mclaren Mclaren'd and hard.
Those who are just venturing into F1 or have not been around between 2007-2008, I absolutely recommend you to watch those seasons or at least recaps because for different reasons they were two of the most intense, most memorable seasons ever, with some of my all-time favourite races.
2007 was an incredible head-to-head battle between Ferrari and McLaren who'd swap each other in being the fastest car by a little bit nearly every weekend. There was a fierce intrateam battle in McLaren between the veteran Alonso and the rookie Hamilton which resulted in various escalations (Hungary being the most notable one), a battle which made the team lose a lot of ground when their car started to become more often superior. The McLaren meltdown was further amplified by the fact that an ex-Ferrari employee gave hundreds of pages of confidential material to the rival team, data they initially denied having used but that turned out to be one of the key points of McLaren's year-wide strategy. They walked away with a constructors ban and the biggest fine the sport has ever seen, but controversially they were still allowed to fight for the drivers title and their 2008 campaign was unaffected.
While things at Ferrari were more peaceful, they were dealing with the aftermath of Schumacher's retirement by brining in Kimi Raikkonen, who narrowly missed out on two titles already and was ready to make up for that. Massa was no bad driver either however, and up until 2-3 races from the end he was totally in the title fight as well. We therefore had an incredible last 2 races where 3 drivers fought for the title, which was decided in the most unreal way possible, with people having to keep out the calculators to understand who's gonna win in which permutation of results. It was not a season of many individually godlike races, in fact it was terrible in terms of on-track overtakes compared to the following years. This memorable title fight, BMW being a great third peer, a dramatic Canadian grand prix, Vettel's debut and a couple rainy races made it, however, a classic.
2008 was different, but it still continued the fierce battle between Ferrari and McLaren, with a title decided in the most epic final race Formula 1 has ever seen, in which the fate of the title changed multiple times in the last couple laps. Alonso went back to Renault which was nowhere near as competitive as the top 2 teams, but where he still managed to get some impressive results (albeit one shadowed by the crashgate in which Piquet Jr. purposefully crashed into the wall to warrant a safety car right when Alonso was pitting). The intrateam battle at Ferrari continued, whereas McLaren signed Kovalainen who really was no match for Hamilton. This year had Ferrari have a slightly faster car for most of the season, albeit it was close, but the traction control ban, the frequent rainy races and a generally chaotic season meant that no race was a cakewalk.
We had some spectacular mechanical failures ruining certain wins. Multiple memorable rainy races like Monaco, Silverstone and the finale in Brazil - or, how can we forget, what looked like a straightforward race in Spa that turned into absolute mayhem in the last 3 laps due to an intensifying rain which changed the leader more than once, even after the chequered flag. With Ferrari and McLaren throwing away a lot of points, BMW became more and more of a credible threat, with Kubica even claiming a win and staying in the title fight until nearly the end of the season. But saying all this doesn't even cover the complexities of this surreal season, in which both the Ferrari and the McLaren drivers and teams made so many shocking errors that make last years' McLaren, recent Ferrari or Haas look like peak Mercedes or Brawn-era Ferrari in comparison. A messy start in Japan with half the field going off and crashes everywhere, enormous pit stop screw-ups, lots of unforced errors. 2007 had some of the most stable cars in the history of the sport due to incredible amounts of electronic help, when they banned most of that in 2008 it greatly impacted the spectacle of individual races.
They were the last two seasons of a weird era, one in which every year felt drastically different in terms of power race, general rules and narratives. The sport had a lot of issues back then too, and the lack of overtakings in 2007 was an enormous one. But unlike now, titles were hard-fought, the performance levels would vary between one weekend and another among the top 2 teams at the very least, and there was all kinds of drama that drastically altered both titles' fate. Looking at the current era of Formula 1, we only had 2 seasons in which the final race of the season was the title decider, and in hindsight neither race was particularly exciting after, by the way, two far less exciting seasons where the main drama was just the intrateam Mercedes battles. If you want to see how the last balls-to-the-wall rivalry looked like between two historic F1 teams, look no further than 2007 and 2008.
2007 was an incredible head-to-head battle between Ferrari and McLaren who'd swap each other in being the fastest car by a little bit nearly every weekend. There was a fierce intrateam battle in McLaren between the veteran Alonso and the rookie Hamilton which resulted in various escalations (Hungary being the most notable one), a battle which made the team lose a lot of ground when their car started to become more often superior. The McLaren meltdown was further amplified by the fact that an ex-Ferrari employee gave hundreds of pages of confidential material to the rival team, data they initially denied having used but that turned out to be one of the key points of McLaren's year-wide strategy. They walked away with a constructors ban and the biggest fine the sport has ever seen, but controversially they were still allowed to fight for the drivers title and their 2008 campaign was unaffected.
While things at Ferrari were more peaceful, they were dealing with the aftermath of Schumacher's retirement by brining in Kimi Raikkonen, who narrowly missed out on two titles already and was ready to make up for that. Massa was no bad driver either however, and up until 2-3 races from the end he was totally in the title fight as well. We therefore had an incredible last 2 races where 3 drivers fought for the title, which was decided in the most unreal way possible, with people having to keep out the calculators to understand who's gonna win in which permutation of results. It was not a season of many individually godlike races, in fact it was terrible in terms of on-track overtakes compared to the following years. This memorable title fight, BMW being a great third peer, a dramatic Canadian grand prix, Vettel's debut and a couple rainy races made it, however, a classic.
2008 was different, but it still continued the fierce battle between Ferrari and McLaren, with a title decided in the most epic final race Formula 1 has ever seen, in which the fate of the title changed multiple times in the last couple laps. Alonso went back to Renault which was nowhere near as competitive as the top 2 teams, but where he still managed to get some impressive results (albeit one shadowed by the crashgate in which Piquet Jr. purposefully crashed into the wall to warrant a safety car right when Alonso was pitting). The intrateam battle at Ferrari continued, whereas McLaren signed Kovalainen who really was no match for Hamilton. This year had Ferrari have a slightly faster car for most of the season, albeit it was close, but the traction control ban, the frequent rainy races and a generally chaotic season meant that no race was a cakewalk.
We had some spectacular mechanical failures ruining certain wins. Multiple memorable rainy races like Monaco, Silverstone and the finale in Brazil - or, how can we forget, what looked like a straightforward race in Spa that turned into absolute mayhem in the last 3 laps due to an intensifying rain which changed the leader more than once, even after the chequered flag. With Ferrari and McLaren throwing away a lot of points, BMW became more and more of a credible threat, with Kubica even claiming a win and staying in the title fight until nearly the end of the season. But saying all this doesn't even cover the complexities of this surreal season, in which both the Ferrari and the McLaren drivers and teams made so many shocking errors that make last years' McLaren, recent Ferrari or Haas look like peak Mercedes or Brawn-era Ferrari in comparison. A messy start in Japan with half the field going off and crashes everywhere, enormous pit stop screw-ups, lots of unforced errors. 2007 had some of the most stable cars in the history of the sport due to incredible amounts of electronic help, when they banned most of that in 2008 it greatly impacted the spectacle of individual races.
They were the last two seasons of a weird era, one in which every year felt drastically different in terms of power race, general rules and narratives. The sport had a lot of issues back then too, and the lack of overtakings in 2007 was an enormous one. But unlike now, titles were hard-fought, the performance levels would vary between one weekend and another among the top 2 teams at the very least, and there was all kinds of drama that drastically altered both titles' fate. Looking at the current era of Formula 1, we only had 2 seasons in which the final race of the season was the title decider, and in hindsight neither race was particularly exciting after, by the way, two far less exciting seasons where the main drama was just the intrateam Mercedes battles. If you want to see how the last balls-to-the-wall rivalry looked like between two historic F1 teams, look no further than 2007 and 2008.
So later today we should be able to find out what happens with the China GP. The race is certainly not happening in April as the 4th round, but seemingly there's talks about moving Abu Dhabi back a few weeks and have the season finale in China. That would honestly be the most spectacular option: in case the title is still not decided by the final event, you'd have an exciting venue to play it out as opposed to the horrible Abu Dhabi track.
Don't know if it's accurate because it's coming from a number of different sites rather than Ferrari but it sounds like they've stuck with the same front nose led concept as last year. That means that they'll have a driveable car from the off but end up sacrificing development work and downforce through the season.
If that's accurate I wonder why they'd do that, unless they have a lot of confidence that their engine is by far the class of the field?
If that's accurate I wonder why they'd do that, unless they have a lot of confidence that their engine is by far the class of the field?
With a big rule change next year and a new budget cap kicking in, I don't expect any team to revolutionize their cars too much as most of the tech will be thrown out the window after November. Assuming that is true (I've only read more general considerations about the car not being particularly revolutionized, bar a couple additions like a better gearbox and the horns), I expect similar decisions by most other teams as well, unless their 2019 car was a complete failure.
I don't know if the SF 1000 will be fast but is pretty clear from the work they have done that is gonna have way more DWF than the SF 90.
New RB.
I think from the photos the vast majority of work they've done is around the packaging of the car at the rear, and around the airflow into and around the sidepods.
The more you look at it, and get beyond the colour and basic shape, they've put a lot of effort into this car.
The more you look at it, and get beyond the colour and basic shape, they've put a lot of effort into this car.
There was a lot of work under the hood. They shortened the gearbox, worked on the front end suspensions, didn't upgrade the engine in terms of performance but more so for more effective fuel usage and better reliability, and the sim data suggests they've made enormous gains on slower tracks while sacrificing a bit of top speed on the faster ones.
From the outside it's not exactly revolutionary, nor it should be. The most visible change on Mercedes is gonna be the extra colour, but they're also gonna be consolidating a lot rather than revolutionizing again.
OT but Glickenhaus just revealed their Le Mans hypercar challenger:
I was thinking Horns or little wings...if you stood the car nose up they would look like folded angel wings.
After all "Redbull gives you wings"
Alot more differences than I was expecting....lets hope that Honda Powwwaaaaaa is ready for action.
Why would they remove the CH GP?
The virus isnt spreading through the digiverse.....so they could have it as was originally scheduled.
Or they could put it in the postponed spot during the campaign.
Only realistically should be completely unaffected.
But removing it entirely?....Why?
OT but Glickenhaus just revealed their Le Mans hypercar challenger:
Wow, that looks great.
OT but Glickenhaus just revealed their Le Mans hypercar challenger:
That website....WTF!
What year is this!
I am really looking forward to the Hypercar series.
I think these cars are ones to watch going forward. Some of the concepts look like things that could easily be converted to road going version.....DO IT, and let the Nurburgring record keep dropping.
Toyotas Concept for a hypercar needs to be an entrant....and a road going car as well.
We all saw that coming probably. Wonder if they will be able to make it later or not at all for this season.
I mean, if it ends up being cancelled, and the annual F1 game wants to reflect the year it's set in, then they might remove it to match reality?
Get serious.
The games have cars from the 1970s and cars from 2010s....they didnt race last year.
So why would they delete a track just cuz of the Corona virus this late in development.
Dont worry about the track getting deleted....it will still make it...cutting content will just cause unnecessary outrage from fans.
He's got a point though: it's possible it will not be in career mode because, by all means, they did not have a Chinese GP this year, certainly not as the 4th race. The track won't be "deleted" and will almost certainly be available in all other modes, but it's possible they erase it or move it from the regular season.
....but you don't drive a 1970s car during the F1 2019 campaign. I'm not saying they will cut the GP from the entire game, but from the 2020 campaign.
After a quick google, apparently Bahrain was removed from the 2011 game when the circuit wasn't approved for that year. So might happen!
That top right picture looks like they lifted the Mustang's brake lights. These hypercars look amazing.That website....WTF!
What year is this!
I am really looking forward to the Hypercar series.
I think these cars are ones to watch going forward. Some of the concepts look like things that could easily be converted to road going version.....DO IT, and let the Nurburgring record keep dropping.
Toyotas Concept for a hypercar needs to be an entrant....and a road going car as well.
Looks like they've got Merc's trick rear wheel steering suspension - I remember reading they poached some of their engineers last year?
They would probably have the teams vote on any plans to move it later and they would probably veto it.
RB nose looks like an anteater snout. Is it redirecting air somewhere or is that going straight to the cockpit?
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