This season is the most exciting in years. I’ll hand it to Verstappen, he has driven really well this year. He hasn’t delivered a masterclass yet, but solid consistency has been his strong point in 2021. We’ve seen less of the hubris from previous years too, which points to an improved mindset.
I thought Hamilton was going to stroll away with it this year. Verstappen has broken the 600 laps led barrier.
The other thing is for Red Bull, it's not just this season.
In 2013 they had it all - a competitive engine, the best aerodynamicist in an aero-dominated formula, and a star young driver. They'd come into a tough sport, done everything right, invested in key people and reaped their rewards, making the grandees of the sport swallow their previous dismissive jibes about soft drink companies.
And then overnight the rules changed and it was taken away from them. They weren't even in the same race as the hybrid Mercs. Could they get Renault to build a competitive engine? Fat chance, even getting to the end of a race was a tall order, the French company seemingly content to continually under-invest and under-perform.
A few years later, their young driver programme yielded a true WC-class driver, and their patient investment in Honda rewarded them with a competitive engine. Then the 2021 aero regs unexpectedly favoured high-rake cars, tipping the balance and bringing the championships into Red Bull's grasp once more. At last, the chance to return to the winners circle and satisfy Helmut and Red Bull's demands for success.
There's no particular reason to expect the current competitive situation to extend into next year. Honda are amid their phased withdrawal from the sport, and the highly-prescriptive aero regs are designed to curtail the impact of Newey's genius tricks. Plus, Merc are going back to a two-star-driver lineup rather than having one driver as a backup.
Spoiler:
This could be Red Bull's best chance in a decade, it certainly looked like until about a week ago. So seeing Lewis start to put together the implausible run of back-to-back victories that would end in him lifting the crown yet again, must be quite awful for Red Bull to behold.
On other notes; the yawning gap between the lead two and the rest shows up again how far Lewis and Max are ahead of their respective team-mates, and how far their cars are ahead of the rest of the pack. Max's penalty definitely robbed us of a battle into turn one, although I think Merc had the edge today. Nice to see Alonso on the podium, he deserves it and good to see him showing he's still got it, even if his car hasn't.
I don't understand why Merc left Bottas out so long. Sure, one-stop is a great strategy but 57 divided by two is 28.5, not 33. And given you're changing onto harder tyres supporting a reduced fuel load, if anything you'd choose to stop before halfway, not after. 28 laps on the soft followed by 29 on the hard would've put him on the podium rather than into the gravel. I'm sure he'd dropped out of Max's pit window by that time too, so little to gain by leaving him out.
Conversely I don't see why RB put Perez onto a two stop unless he was struggling - seemed the perfect opportunity to use his strength of tyre conservation to run long and stop once as Bottas tried, given he was coming from halfway back.
So two strange calls, to me.
I don't think the championship is over. According to my 'three quarters' model, there are now two races left and Lewis has to win both, down from three last week, so I see his chance as increasing from 42% to 56%. Remember it only takes one Merc engine issue, one collision, one penalty, one poor qualifying or one circuit layout where the RB is a tad quicker, for Max to strike back and seize the crown. But it does look like it's plausible for Lewis to continue to execute well and finish the job.
I think penalty nor poor qualifying will hurt Ham, he just needs to be perfectly reliable and not crash out to win every race.
If it really comes down to the last race, I suppose we could expect Max to crash into Ham?
Anyway, those 2 are really performing at a different level… or perhaps their teammates weren’t really racing for wins, but to just attempt to strategically screw others up?
This season is the most exciting in years. I’ll hand it to Verstappen, he has driven really well this year. He hasn’t delivered a masterclass yet, but solid consistency has been his strong point in 2021. We’ve seen less of the hubris from previous years too, which points to an improved mindset.
I thought Hamilton was going to stroll away with it this year. Verstappen has broken the 600 laps led barrier.
Right there with you. It seemed to me that Max started out as a hotlapper with no racecraft but that's changed a lot over the past few years.
Glad to see you guys slowly turning around now that he's sort of 'leading' in the points...
Personally, I thought his talent should be very obvious from the beginning. He certainly won a race fairly quickly. Yeah, that could be luck..., but he also pushed out a fast teammate... who previously pushed out a multichamp teammate himself!
However, to be fair, Hamilton was pretty awesome in his rookie year. He didn't have the benefit of trying out F1 cars in a jr McLaren team... and he actually had a multichamp as teammate in his rookie year and he pushed that guy out of the team!
So I think Ham is probably the better racer, but he's older and suffering from long covid now... so it'll be hard to say if we put those 2 in the same team, which one would be pushed down to 2nd place...
Glad to see you guys slowly turning around now that he's sort of 'leading' in the points...
I'm not. The guy is talented, he is still an hotlapper, mostly.
And I still believe he is a Rosberg or a Button: one hit championship if he manages to win one.
Button was handed his championship on engineering. He only had to beat his teammate. I'd place Max well ahead of him (but behind Rosberg).
Yeah, even if you're handed a superior car, you still need to beat your teammate. Button has also managed to not get blown away by Lewis Hamilton..., but I'd place Rosberg ahead of Button simply because at least Rosberg has beaten Ham once!
Anyway, I personally doubt Rosberg in this year's RB Honda will be able to once again lead the championship over Ham...
Yep, I'd rate Max pretty much over every modern F-1 driver so far, except Ham... I think it'll be really interesting to see Ham and Max in the same car... I'd still put money on Max only because he's younger and doesn't have long covid for now... If all things being equal, including age, then I think Hamilton should be faster than Max...
Last edited by Crazed_Insanity; November 22nd, 2021 at 01:45 PM.
'You guys' being one post from me highlighting that he has improved.
Good data set.
You and swervo would be 'guys', no?
Anyway, it appears Blerpa ain't one of the 'guys' even if Max wins the WDC this time..., so few more years to go to change Blerpa's mind then...
I think the main reason why I like Max is because he's the type who'd either win or at least way ahead of his teammate or just crash out... Not a lot of racers can manage that consistently.
I think Michael Andretti was that kind of racer, but nobody in F1 respected him... so crashing out with him became pretty frequent. (of course I think Andretti not be focused, paired with Senna in a lousy car certainly didn't help anything.) I think one of the reasons why Max is now finishing more races is probably because he has gain more 'respect' or others are just more scared of him due to his reputation... like Ham was scared off course in Brazil...
Love him or hate him, Max has single handedly made F1 more interesting. Without Max, Ham would've easily clinched the championship with a limpy engine by now... maybe Ricciardo in a RB would be in a similar position as Max? But i guess we'll never know... I really really wish he didn't bail on RB. Wasted so many precious years...
Last edited by Crazed_Insanity; November 22nd, 2021 at 02:05 PM.
Originally Posted by samoht
If all things being equal, including age, then I think Hamilton should be faster than Max...
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