The F1 thread

[Maturin]

Schumacher won without the best car, Hamilton has never done so.

His first championship win in 2008 was against a Ferrari that was at least as good as his McLaren.

He's had at least one race win in every year he's competed, even when his car wasn't competetive (his middle McLaren years and his first year at Mercedes).

The only time a team mate has beaten him across a year (in 15 years of F1) was when Rosberg played endless dirty tricks against him (Hamilton wasn't blameless, but Rosberg was even worse than Verstappen this year).

If Masi hadn't invented new rules, Hamilton would have won this year against a Red Bull that performed better than his Mercedes for most of the year.


Sorry, I can't agree with your assessment of Hamilton. As good as Schumacher was, if both drivers competed on their best day in equal cars, I'd have to back Hamilton. He's like Roger Federer: no matter what the situation is, he's the one person you never rule out.

Yeah, I think Snowy needs to perhaps take another look at that simple maths.

It's not a strong argument. Plus, in most of Schumacher's title wins he was guaranteed no1 driver. Lewis gave up loads of wins to teammates over the years that Schumacher never had to. Rosberg & Bottas were given the freedom to win over 30 races against him, plus many other races where they finished ahead of him. Because they had real pace and were allowed to compete for the most part.

I actually think in real terms Lewis is even further ahead of Schumacher than the stats show when weighing everything up.

[Snowy]

All fair comments and food for thought - I am sure there is a rose-tint (rosso corsa tint maybe) to my views, having sat through the 27 year title drought that Schuey brought to such a thunderous end, probably more so given what happened with the skiing accident.

The old 'if both raced in equal cars' scenario is always an entertaining one - I would back Michael every day but we will never know.

To these eyes, he is the GOAT rather than Hamilton. That said though, Lewis' grace in the face of having been robbed and shafted last season was something to behold, and could be his defining moment of character for me.

[Wrathbone]

It'll be interesting to see what the outcome of the FIA's Abu Dhabi inquiry is, not least because it will probably be the deciding factor in whether Hamilton stays or goes. I don't see how they can keep Masi, considering how he's been almost universally criticised or condemned for his actions. Aside from that, I think it's a toss up as to whether they double down on the "entertainment first" ethos that Liberty seem to be pushing or whether they stand firm that F1 is a sport and must therefore act in the spirit of sportsmanship and adherence to regulations first and foremost.

[Raid]

First of the (real) 2022 cars has been revealed:



It's definitely a looker, although I'm really not sure what's going on with the sidepod intakes. It's just a shame that it's adorned with the logo of the world's worst polluter.

Red Bull and Haas have both supposedly had their car launches, but the car was very obviously just one of the FIA show cars with their new livery on it. I suppose there wasn't much point doing that for Aston Martin as the new car has a filming day tomorrow.

[Snowy]

Looks nice. I just hope that the redesign achieves the goal of reducing turbulence and enabling slipstreaming. I would dearly love to see the end of artificial nonsense like DRS to say nothing of having cars able to close in on their rivals rather than having to back off due to the lack of downforce and excess of heat.

[Rossell]

[Raid]

It's not bad, but it's not as nice as the Gulf livery from last year's Monaco GP. I can't decide whether I prefer it to the regular livery either. It has too many black stripes on it from certain angles.

[DjchunKfunK]

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2022/ ... s-hamilton

Most sports have terrible governance but F1 often takes the cake and this is another example of that.

[Wrathbone]

I can only take silence as confirmation that they've concluded Hamilton should have been champion. I expect it'll be easy enough to piece together the details of their findings from whatever happens now (hopefully starting with the removal of Masi).

[Raid]

That wouldn't surprise me at all. Literally everyone bar Red Bull and Masi knew it was the wrong decision.

[eny]

Breaking news:


The Netherlands won WW2




source: Max fans...

[eny]

FIA might be finished anyway. Even with its 1% stake in F1 after the 2001 EU agreement, its meddling with the 2021 championship is a conflict of interest that raises anti-trust concerns.

[Raid]

Woof. It's amazing how much better Ferraris look without the white parts in the livery. Weirdly shaped sidepods though; they're much wider than most of the other teams', but then they dip down in the middle



And Masi's out!
https://www.racefans.net/2022/02/17/fia ... dhabi-row/

I know they're never going to confirm what the Abu Dhabi investigation found, but given this timing it's difficult to believe it was anything other than "The championship was shafted, it was Masi's fault."

[Wrathbone]

About time.

This nugget is probably going to be controversial in practice:

"Firstly, to assess the race director and the decision making process, a virtual race control room will be created,” he explained. “Like the video assistant referee, VAR and football. It will be positioned in one of the FIA offices as a back-up outside the circuit. In real-time connection with the FIA F1 race director it will help to apply the sporting regulations using the most modern technological tools."

Race direction requires some amount of intelligent application of the rules for it to remain as fair in sporting terms as is possible. Masi's problem was an uneven application of the rules due to team pressures, and of course the championship was determined by him inventing rules on the spot. If you add VAR-style rulings into the mix, that potentially makes things so cut and dried that nuanced application of the rules becomes impossible. It's definitely useful for certain things, like track limits, but is it to be used in anything that requires a judgement call such as responsibility for an overtake collision? Is it solely to be used at the discretion of Race Control, and if so do we get to see what data it's giving them? Do teams get a say in whether it's used in a judgement, or do they get a certain number of demands per race? Lots of questions hanging over this.

[Raid]

I'm fascinated to know why they think a backup, remote race control room is necessary given that I can't recall there ever being a decision made because they'd had a power cut or loss of data connection at race control. Just what did that review dig up? Did Masi go insane from the pressure of Horner and Wolff, lock himself in the control room with a bottle of vodka and that's why the rulebook went out the window? Did Masi meet up with Latifi in the control room and plan to throw the race? Was there just too much cocaine in there?

As far as the public were concerned, they needed to prevent teams having a direct line to the race director, that's it.