F1 2021

[Rare White Ape]

Yep the track is a god damn Mickey Mouse shitfight, with two key sections designed to give 50,000 ticket holders a slightly longer look at some cars weaving awkwardly through tight chicanes, at the expense of millions of fans being given the chance for some overtaking or seeing the cars being worked at high speed.

[JoeW]

That whole section looks like it was designed solely for the podium celebration and after party.

[FaultyMario]

Forget about the Peraltada, check out turns 8-13. I mean, if the notoriously unsafe ChampCars could, why can't the binnacle of motorsports?

[Crazed_Insanity]

Did the drivers complain about those chicanes? If they're good for the spectators who paid muchos dineros, so be it.

Anyway, so do you guys think Bottas intentionally left the door opened for Max on the outside? I guess it does look like a rather poor defensive move for Bottas...; however, maybe he just didn't want to give up his lead to Hamilton at 1st so he steadily moved inside, but then realized too late that he's sandwiched and decided to get out of this 3 wide battle?

Whatever he was thinking, I guess it's moves such as that that caused such a speedy driver to not be a champ? If he could just crash out with Max, Mercedes might want to renew his contract. Or since he didn't get renewed, it does seem like he just didn't try very hard. I wish he had a better start... I was really rooting for him to win a few more races before he leaves Mercedes...

Hamilton not topping the charts in any of the practices and qualifying is kinda indicative that he's not or unable to give his 100% for some reason...

[FaultyMario]

To be clear, I do not care about the Foro Sol section, if that is needed for the promoter to make coin, so be it. The problems are in the rest of the lap. AHR was never an "overtakes" circuit, it was like Montecarlo, in a way, drivers had to bring their A-game or lose concentration and rhythm, and that was particularly true from the exit of the Solana complex (T7) thru the 3 increasing radius esses (T8-T13).

I don't exactly know why Tilke always used decreasing radius corners and almost-right-angle corners, but I'm confident it was because of commercial reasons, of how the train of cars would appear under certain camera angles. Bernie knew they had created processional races and He just wanted some smoke and mirrors for TV.

As for Hamilton not being 100%, that's a rubbish claim, RB always had the fastest car around here but they screwed up on Q3. He drove a great race and forced RB to fiddle with Perez's stints, I believe both RBs could have undercut Hamilton if they tried.

[JoeW]

On Bottas I think he just tapped the brakes just a smidge early to allow Hamilton underneath. He probably didn’t expect Max to go around because Max was slightly behind right up until the brake point.

I think it’s shitty that Toto and Hamilton are throwing him under the bus for basically trying to give Hamilton the place.

[Crazed_Insanity]

Yeah, without extending him a contract, it's easy to throw him under the bus now. Still, an ideal #2 would've tried harder to block Max, who's right behind him... both mercedes should've moved toward the cleaner outside part of the track more, side by side, and then just let Hamilton to deal with Max coming from behind...

If only Bottas had a better start, maybe he could've won the race.

Anyway, without considering RBs, to see Bottas outperform Hamilton in FP1, FP2 and qualifying, isn't it clear that the #1 championship contender isn't pushing his Mercedes as close to 100% as his #2 teammate? Must be long Covid or something else distracting him or holding him back...

[Rare White Ape]

If I was to fix the circuit, I’d do this:

Keep turn 1 where it is but straighten the path out and eliminate 2&3.

At turn 4 get rid of the fish-hooky part and do what they are doing at Abu Dhabi; just a single right hand turn to create a passing zone.

Keep the esses onto the back stretch.

I can see why they can’t use the oval for the final corner (as fixing that requires moving a highway) so in the baseball stadium simply turn right then left and open it up and make it wider to promote some position swapping at the end of a lap. Think of the geometry of the esses at Campus in Spa but with a longer run-up and about two meters wider.

[Crazed_Insanity]

Although it's just FP1, it's still nice to finally see Hamilton back on top. However, he's gonna be penalized for 5 positions for a new engine... so I guess perhaps engine was the reason why I thought he wasn't 100%?

They have a sprint race this weekend too. So Hamilton could get that extra 3pts if he wins prior to his penalty? Anyway, hope to see some more close battles between Hamilton and Max... hope they make this title fight all the way to the final race!

[Crazed_Insanity]

Okay, engine or not, looks like Hamilton's back, top of the 'pre-qualifying' too! Just too bad he won't be starting on pole due to penalties...

It'll be funny if they collide during sprint race and then we see both Hamilton and Max starting from the back on Sunday.