@themightyant Watching the re-run is probably the sensible thing to do but I'm foolishly going to go for the live watch. I'll probably go back to sleep for a bit after the race.
I'll take a pot shot at predicting the season then too
1. NOR
2. VER
3. PIA
4. LEC
5. RUS
6. HAM
7. SAI
8. TSU
9. ALB
10. LAW
11. ANT
12. ALO
13. GAS
14. HAD
15. DOO
16. STR
17. BOR
18. BEA
19. HLK
20. OCO
I imagine I'll completely change my mind after the first race. The final 5 places were probably the most variable as I think they might struggle for a handful of points between them.
As for Constructors I'll go
1. McLaren
2. Ferrari
3. Red Bull
4. Mercedes
5. Williams
6. VCarb
7. Alpine
8. Aston
9. Haas
10. Stake
I changed my mind between 5 & 6 a lot, they could be very close.
We'll have to see if we do better than Matt & Tommy at the end of the season. I should probably get to bed now for my early wake up.
Driver of the day for me Kimi Antonelli. When 4 of the 6 rookies all crashed out and the other finished dead last, finishing 4th is seriously impressive. Anyone finishing that race deserves respect but hats off to Kimi.
Lando and Piastri already scrapping it out and already one loser, Piastri recovering to 9th in his home race. Max as usual right there maximising his opportunities and pushing Lando right to the finish line despite being well off the pace in the middle of the race. But well done Lando for holding on and not making too many errors.
Didn’t really see Russell but a podiums a great finish. Albon looked impressive too and earned 5th on merit. Stroll and Hulkenberg capitalised well on mistakes ahead especially…
Ferrari! Another season another set of strategic mistakes, everyone else pitting for inters them gambling and losing out. I do wonder if they could have stayed on slicks while the track dried out behind the safety car over 4 or 5 laps. Either way by pitting later anyway they dropped from what could gave been 5th, 6th or 7th to 8th and 10th. They don’t seem to learn.
@BearsEatBeets Nice set of predictions. We are almost identical on Constructors and drivers are similar near the top with a few swaps. Obviously you’ve put Lando world champion which is probably the smart bet, I’m gambling on Lando and Oscar hijacking each other and Max capitalising. We’ve both put Ferrari higher than they looked in that race, and ahead of Mercedes who quietly just looked solid, but it’s only one race, it’s a long season. Glad F1 is back.
@themightyant Not a great amount of overtaking but thankfully eventful enough to entertaining that early in the morning. One exceptional overtake from Piastri on Lewis on the final lap for 9th though, especially considering the conditions.
Yeah Antonelli did a great job. It seems his late penalty has been overturned and he been put back in fourth so managed to finished right behind his more experienced teammate despite starting from 16th. Russell continuing his knack for sitting behind the main leaders and picking up a podium when someone has a mistake.
All so chaotic though so I'm not going to read anything into trying to judge where exactly teams/drivers are other than McLaren obviously still have a well balanced car and maybe I overestimated Haas because of their late form last season.
I wrote my predictions quite late so didn't really realise how similar they were (especially the constructors). Funny how we called two teams different things because they keep making silly changes to the names, although I notice I got them wrong. Could have sworn they dropped the Sauber name ages ago!
Just rechecking the results and bet nobody had Ferrari coming out of the first race 7th in the constructors and slightly surprised to realise Mercedes are tying with McLaren for 1st.
I went back to sleep after the race for a bit but my body clock is so messed up it doesn't know what it's doing 😁. Hopefully I stay awake for the Indian Wells Final tonight.
Great to have F1 back and straight into race 2 next weekend. Although another early one, the sprint race is the only silly time but might have to do it again as not sure there would be time to see a rewatch before watching qualifying live a few hours later.
@BearsEatBeets I had to double check the team names, it’s the only reason I knew what they were
They didn’t seem to show the Piastri / Hamilton overtake in real time, despite the fact you could see him closing in on the time sheet. In fact I was really disappointed with Sky’s coverage in general they seemed to miss a whole load of eventful things. E.g. There was a point in the middle of the race where Leclerc was 5th, Hamilton was 8th and in heartbeat Hamilton was 3rd Leclerc was 5th. I know a lot was going on as it was around the time Piastri went off and people pitted but did Leclerc spin? Lots of things seemed missing in their coverage. Never saw Antonelli’s unsafe release either before it was overturned. And lots of other small things
@themightyant I think the Piastri/Hamilton overtake must have been happening as Norris and Verstappen were crossing the finishing line so can understand them not showing that bit live. The broadcast director did seem to miss quite a lot you're right, they only switched to Norris and Piastri in the gravel just as they were nearly out. Although to be fair in those conditions it must be very hard to know where something might happen. I do remember seeing the Leclerc spin (on replay). The 3 cars behind were right in close when he spun after a turn so they got past immediately. He stayed on track though, just a 180 which he corrected after they passed.
As much as I tolerate Sky, as it's often the only way to see a lot of sport, I'm fairly sure what we see during a race is in the control of the FIA/Liberty Media at each event. Some countries seem to have a better crew than others.
A Liverpool win in a few minutes and one for Draper tonight and it will be a great day for sport. Hopefully I haven't jinxed them by typing that 😬
Wow! I didn’t have Lewis out qualifying Charles in Week 2, and I definitely didn’t have a Ferrari beating both McLarens. Hopefully they are competitive over the longer term, McLaren have looked a bit ominously good.
Max doing what Max does, whereas Liam being dead last will hurt. Where the hell is the Red Bull (without Max)?
Oscar there or there abouts. Lando making mistakes, if he wants to be world champion he needs to make fewer of those. Consistency is king.
George and Kimi slotting in about where we think they are. Yuki, Alex and Lance rounding out the top 10.
Fun sprint qualifying. Bring on the Sprint, Quali and Race.
Hi @breakneck nice to see you join the chat. Will be interesting to see how the RB develops, or doesn't, without Newey.
Agreed on Lando, he has to step it up if he wants to be world champion, needs more consistency, we've already seen several mistakes in just 2 weeks. Piastri obviously made a bigger mistake last week, seeing Lando misjudge a corner and not only misjudging it behind him but then getting greedy, keeping his foot down hoping to capitalise on Lando's error and ending up in an even worse position, but usually Piastri is very solid.
This is what separates the top drivers from the rest for me. Consistency. Currently Max just almost never makes major mistakes and is almost always there or there abouts in qualifying and the race. He's a beast. Relatedly while it's obviously just one sprint qualifying but I am amused at all the pundits and commentators who were writing off Hamilton, nice to see him pull that out the bag, might be life in the old dog yet. Looking forward to turn 1
Do you want to make a season prediction like @BearsEatBeets and I did above? Obviously you now have a little more actual race data than us, but would be interesting to see how it evolves over the season, and probably how wrong we all were. lol.
Russell's comment that the McLarens have a bigger advantage than the Red Bull's ever did is looking a bit silly right now. Still they were doing fine until everyone moved on to the softs for Q3. Yes some mistakes from Lando on his runs but I still wouldn't be surprised if he gets the real Pole tomorrow and gains a few places in the Sprint.
Good to see the Ferraris much improved though, I still believe we should be in for a fairly competitive season. Liam having a poor first race was unfortunate but to be dead last for the Sprint looks really bad. He'll need to figure it out for main qualifying.
Looking forward to the Sprint just not the timing. I'll probably get up for it then try and go back to sleep for a couple of hours before the main qualifying.
EDIT: @themightyant you must have been typing about the same time I was. Reminded me I didn't really comment on Hamilton on Pole. Great to see and found his radio quite amusing when he didn't quite believe his engineer he told him he had pole.
@BearsEatBeets Agreed McLaren got their SQ3 strategy wrong but I still expect them to have the race pace, and agree George's comment always looked silly from the start. Though McLaren were a lot faster in the wet last week, seeing Piastri charge back and even do that move round the outside on the last lap showed how much faster and how much more grip they had. But it's almost impossible to take much from that race, those conditions, they didn't look to have a wider gap than Red Bull ever had at all the other times. (Everyone, bar Mclaren fans, is praying he's wrong at least!)
Practice they all seemed to be trading P1 and they times just kept tumbling, whoever was last seemed fastest and every now and again a Williams or a Racing Bulls would jump towards the top. I didn't see much evidence Mclaren were THAT much faster than anyone else, only that they consistently up there. Time will tell I guess.
It's 3am and 7am start times right? I got them both wrong this morning, had a nap between, but had ages to wait in between.
@themightyant Did you get up for the practice session? I'll almost always get up at silly times for qualifying and racing but never for practice, I don't always watch that when it's on at a reasonable time. Yes 3 and 7 though. I'm planning a 2:30am wake up to catch a bit of the build up to the Sprint, then probably see a little of the after race celebration/discussions then can afford 2 hours nap and still be up for about another half hour of build up to quali.
I'll watch it all from bed though 😄
@BearsEatBeets I wasn't going to but having fallen asleep on the couch quite early last night (I blame Road 96 which isn't a very good game, lol) I woke up there and went to bed at 2am. But then found I couldn't get back to sleep so I stayed awake for it, I did think it started at 3am though, but that was just the coverage, but by then I was committed.
I'll be up for Sprint and Quali though so chat then, probably won't watch much build up. Yes from bed!
@themightyant I wonder if we're back on for some Hamilton/Verstappen tussles in the first few corners. I'll probably catch you here bright and early then.
Oh yes and @breakneck, good to have someone else chipping in. I was beginning to consider renaming the thread 'BearsEatBeets & Themightyrant occasionally discuss F1 when they can remember to do so'.
@BearsEatBeets yes pretty dopey here too. I’m surprised Lando can’t carve through the field. Wondering if the car is fast in clean air but not as good chasing, or did he have contact?
Lewis did a solid job holding Max off and now the Max v Oscar squabble is giving him some breathing room.
Mercedes / George still off the pace and 5 secs behind. Charles not able to close in on George. Not a lot of overtaking at the front.
@themightyant yeah not quite as much action as I was hoping but still some good racing.
The deg really played a big role. A little surprised how hard Lando found it to get back up but think it was coming back near the end. One more lap and think he would have got another place.
@BearsEatBeets agreed. Both Ferraris were fastest cars at the end. Could be very interesting. But it shows once again how important qualifying and clean air is. Looking forward to it.
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