Formula One

[pete]

There is normally more Lee way on the first lap,

[C8RKH]

Funny when Verstappen was knocking people off track etc it was all OK.  As I said, I'm biased but it seems that he doesn't like a taste of his own medicine but he does like to dish it out.

Lewis has in several races backed off and given it to Max, but when you're fighting for the championship this is what happens, champions still want to win.

Anyway, looking forward to the next one now.

[LotusLeftLotusRight]

I don’t think any penalty handed out to the driver of a car that has put another out of the race has ever helped the “victim”, so not sure what point Max is making.

Proper sour grapes from Horner too in his post race Sky interview: hopefully he’ll feel embarrassed if he watches that back after a good night’s sleep.

[scotty435]

5 hours ago, pete said:

Marko out of order wanting Hamilton banned

Well said Pete, could not agree more 👍

[C8RKH]

24 minutes ago, LotusLeftLotusRight said:

Proper sour grapes from Horner too in his post race Sky interview

I used to really like Horner but to be honest since the Vettel days where they won everything, and things got a little harder he really has turned into a bit of a cry baby whinging little muppet.  But honestly, remember some of Max's dumb moves and how his constant weaving in the braking zone and other shit, that regularly put other drivers at risk, was just put down to his talent and desire to win? In fact Horner et al went to all sorts of lengths to defend the indefensible. But now, their driver can do no wrong and anyone who fights as hard as Max, but against max, needs to be banned. It's disrespectful to be honest and two faced in the extreme!

Hamilton has a long history of being a respectful/fair driver. Does Max? Damn, if I recall Max even said something like he has no respect for the other drivers and doesn't give a shot what they think. Maybe Lewis should adopt that attitude too?

[Neal H]

I think Hamilton decided to lay down a marker that he’s not always going to back down when Max turns in on him. About time!
 

Max has built a reputation on being uncompromising - you win some, you lose some. Brush yourself down and move onto the next one. 

[pete]

Absolutely certain if the roles had been reversed  Verstappen would have done the same and I am sure the orange army would have reacted the same way as ours did. Be interested to see the orange army reaction to Hamilton when they go to Zandervoot

[Redwing]

Christian Horner obviously ordered Perez in for a late tyre change in order to enable him to set the fastest lap and deny Hamilton that extra point.  In doing this, he sacrificed at least one point for the Red Bull team in the Constructors Championship. 

In F1 it's all about the points. I shall laugh if this petulant gesture comes back to bite Horner in the *rse.

[EldonZ]

What I saw was two drivers not giving much quarter. Hamilton was playing the long game when the season started. He is behind so his strategy was not working. He has allowed his competition to play the more aggressive card and take advantage of the results. Now he decides that he needs to be more aggressive, as his competition, and when two drivers are going to be aggressive, what we saw is what is going to happen. The results are one wrecks, both wrecks or neither. Looking at the race, I would put Lewis at 51% and Max at 49%. Why? Because the over taking driver has the responsibility to make the pass without causing a collision. Max has been driving with very aggressive tactics so he should not be complaining. Sooner or later, how you drive is going to come back and haunt you. Was it an unsafe place to pass? Really! These guys are claimed to be the best and should be able to do things the normal drivers cannot. Lewis proved that it is a viable passing zone because he passed for the lead of the race with the same maneuver. I also believe that it was noted that another driver pulled off the same move in the same corner.

My 2 cents,
Eldon

[Inversed]

7 hours ago, Redwing said:

Christian Horner obviously ordered Perez in for a late tyre change in order to enable him to set the fastest lap and deny Hamilton that extra point.  In doing this, he sacrificed at least one point for the Red Bull team in the Constructors Championship. 

Yeah, but Red Bull getting one point is the same as Mercedes not getting a point in terms of constructors championship. He prettymuch just traded his point for one point less of Hamilton in Ham/Ver battle for championship. It didn't change Mercedes/RB score at all.

[LotusFella]

4 hours ago, EldonZ said:

What I saw was two drivers not giving much quarter. Hamilton was playing the long game when the season started. He is behind so his strategy was not working. He has allowed his competition to play the more aggressive card and take advantage of the results. Now he decides that he needs to be more aggressive, as his competition, and when two drivers are going to be aggressive, what we saw is what is going to happen. The results are one wrecks, both wrecks or neither. Looking at the race, I would put Lewis at 51% and Max at 49%. Why? Because the over taking driver has the responsibility to make the pass without causing a collision. Max has been driving with very aggressive tactics so he should not be complaining. Sooner or later, how you drive is going to come back and haunt you. Was it an unsafe place to pass? Really! These guys are claimed to be the best and should be able to do things the normal drivers cannot. Lewis proved that it is a viable passing zone because he passed for the lead of the race with the same maneuver. I also believe that it was noted that another driver pulled off the same move in the same corner.

My 2 cents,
Eldon

I would say 50/50

[910Esprit]

The irony is that if Max Verstappen met a clone of himself on a racetrack, he would crash out every race.   Had the 2 cars had been 10mm apart, the opening lap would have been lauded as one of the greats of the modern age....    

Edited July 19, 2021 by 910Esprit

[Chillidoggy]

For me, the plain fact of the matter is that Hamster got a penalty, not Max.

[910Esprit]

I dont think anyone has said he was blameless, but maybe the system is slightly flawed, as generally there are no penalties when drivers successfully take evasive action to avoid aggressive driving?

Its interesting that the driver with the most to gain (Charles Leclerc) thought it was a racing incident (as did some other neutral drivers).

Edited July 19, 2021 by 910Esprit

[Chillidoggy]

Well to be fair, Leclerc has also been accused of aggressive driving, and the F1 past is littered with examples. Montoya springs to mind as one such, Senna another. I just happen to think that debating these post-race incidents are worthless, as the referee’s decision is always final. Or the race stewards in this case. As for the system being flawed, that’s something for the F1 mandarins to decide.

[Bravo73]

2 hours ago, Chillidoggy said:

For me, the plain fact of the matter is that Hamster got a penalty, not Max.

There wasn’t much point penalising him once his car was buried in the barrier. That was penalty enough. 

[DaKa]

The race adjudicator likely also considered the first few bends leading up to the crash when Max should have given way. 2 bends earlier (left-hander) when Lewis was forced to brake on the outside as Max careered into his part of the track.

If Max had of done the same as Lewis on the right-hander, then he would have avoided the racing incident. Hopefully this will teach Max to be more respectful and less reckless on track.

Max's style reminds me of Harry King in the Porsche cup, at some point someone on the track will also not give way, but when it happens, I can't imagine that Mr King would then be whingeing about it with his team manager.   

[Chillidoggy]

1 hour ago, Bravo73 said:

There wasn’t much point penalising him once his car was buried in the barrier. That was penalty enough. 

Agreed.

However, race stewards still penalise drivers who came off worse in incidents. If the perpetrator subsequently crashes, or retires, then a next-race grid penalty gets applied.

[pete]

Don't understand why the penalty wasn't decided before the race restarted,had ample time

[C8RKH]

22 hours ago, Neal H said:

I think Hamilton decided to lay down a marker that he’s not always going to back down when Max turns in on him. About time!

100% agree with you.

[C8RKH]

17 hours ago, EldonZ said:

Max has been driving with very aggressive tactics so he should not be complaining. Sooner or later, how you drive is going to come back and haunt you

100% agree with you. Max has had it all his own way for two long, arguably making it easier for Hamilton as Max wrecks himself or his car. Hamilton is putting his elbows out the same Max has done time and time again.  Horner is becoming a bit of a joke really. Not sure if he shouldn't try singing as a career change to be honest.

[C8RKH]

So firstly, very good news that Max is released from the hospital Sunday and he is OK. Well, I say OK, but I am sure he is in an awful lot of pain right now and of course I wish him a full and speedy recovery, for sure.

I was intrigued by these quotes from Horner on one of the GP websites

"I saw Toto, who was lobbying the stewards, which I heard he was going to do," said Horner.

"So I went to make sure our view was represented because I don’t think it’s right that team principals should go and lobby the stewards. They should be locked away so they are not influenced.

"For me, that was unacceptable that he had gone up there to lobby them, so I wanted to make sure there was a balanced opinion given rather than put pressure on the stewards to give them a menial sentence.

 

I am right in thinking it was Horner who got on the radio first to the Race Director effectively do what footballers do when they crowd the ref to try to get a red card for an opposing player? Then we had another Red Bull senior on the Radio painting doom and gloom and suggesting Hamilton should be DQ'd.  I do believe it was in response to these radio messages that Wolf then got on the radio to Massi and was "told" by him to go to the stewards!

Also, this ( https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=1669538896768251 ) is the best "analysis" I have seen, and at 2:14 on this video you see how Max really aggressively turns in to squeeze Lewis (and yes, Max knew he was there!) and this was to me a significant factor in the crash.  Yes Lewis was partly to blame, but to me, so was Max who yet again shows he is not willing to compromise one tiny bit and as so often in the past that has cost him a finish and a lot of points. Given this was the first lap, and it was not a huge contact between the cars I find the penalty to Lewis to be possibly harsh, but for Red Bull to call it amateurish and to demand he is suspended is quite frankly disrespectful and unsportsmanlike conduct in my very unworthy opinion. All Max had to do was to open his steering and he would have avoided Lewis who did not really have anywhere to go given the tight angle he was approaching the corner. 

If the cars positions were reversed and Lewis was on the outside I am convinced Lewis would have backed out to fight later (and let's not forget turn 1 where Verstappen again was super aggressive going off track to retain P1 ) - also, I would argue when Hamilton got level on the straight, on the INSIDE of Max, it was at that point Hamilton's corner as per picture below. Max just kept his foot in and refused to yield and turned in aggressively to cut Lewis off. Max just does not know when to back off and part of the problem is when he came on the scene he did this stuff all the time, usually without penalty, and drivers just gave him a wide berth as they knew he would be gung-ho. The pictures below clearly show that Lewis was far enough alongside to have the track position and that was I believe the point that Toto was trying to make to COUNTER the aggressive stance of Red Bull.

 

[TdM]

I agree C8. Racing incident. Both could have avoided, I think it was important for Lewis not to yield here though. As per the end of the video you posted, he has, time and again yielded to Max to avoid accidents as the more mature driver. Unfortunately, you can't do that and fight a World Championship from behind, especially against someone who will just assume you are going to yield.

You need to set a marker down and say, if you do that, there will be contact. Hamilton was alongside as they approached the corner. The folks who say it was front to rear wheel contact proves it was Hamilton's fault don't realise that a driver trying to be more sensible and slowing down is the one who will end up looking more at fault. Max obviously saw Hamilton, waited for him to lift (which he did slightly) and then tried to chop across to make him lift more/brake and give himself space, it didn't work. Live by the sword etc..

[C8RKH]

1 hour ago, TdM said:

a driver trying to be more sensible and slowing down is the one who will end up looking more at fault.

It's exactly this, also given the much tighter angle to the corner (not to mention colder 1st lap tyres) Hamilton needs to slow or he just will not turn in anyway.

Again, as an armchair expert it's easy after to the effect to comment on what was happening to someone else, at 200mph in real time.  But again, Max had a super wider run off arear to use and as he had already gone off track to keep P1 at least once on this lap he could have done it again. He just refused to lift and concede he had lost the corner.  I always thought that if you were alongside, on the inside, braking into/entering the corner then you have the racing line and can "open" your steering out to push the outside driver wider. let's be ho0nest, Max does that all the time. The more I see it, the more I look at, the more I think it was actually 51% Max and 49% Hamilton but they couldn't give Max the penalty given his heavy crash!

I think the more Red Bull look at this the more "sheepish" they might be about how they reacted. i can understand in the heat of the moment, but the analysis IS showing they were not 100% correct with the judgement here.

[C8RKH]

Really sad day if this is true.

https://www.gpblog.com/en/news/89636/red-bull-hires-lawyer-to-investigate-action-against-hamilton.html

I wonder if every other driver who has been crashed into and driven off track by Max will now ask their teams to review each incident and the action taken?

I think if there was a prize for poorest loser in F1, Red Bulkl would be in P1 now alongside their constructors and WDC P1's.  So sad to see it coming to this, IF, it is true.