1045 replies to this topic

[messy]

I don’t think they’re deliberately holding back to keep people interested - I don’t think they care enough about ‘the show’ for that. They’re Red Bull, they want to win a lot and aren’t there to make friends. I think *over one lap* this car is probably still the fastest, but the gap isn’t huge. The race today will show whether that slight one-lap advantage is multiplied by five over a race distance, like it was last year. All signs from testing point to it being very, very similar to 2023 don’t they? So in a way starting where they do is perfect for them. Max can lead from the front and compare his pace to Ferrari and Merc behind, Perez can try out the DRS and see whether he can waltz through to P2.

[TheFish]

I don’t think they’re deliberately holding back to keep people interested - I don’t think they care enough about ‘the show’ for that. They’re Red Bull, they want to win a lot and aren’t there to make friends. I think *over one lap* this car is probably still the fastest, but the gap isn’t huge. The race today will show whether that slight one-lap advantage is multiplied by five over a race distance, like it was last year. All signs from testing point to it being very, very similar to 2023 don’t they? So in a way starting where they do is perfect for them. Max can lead from the front and compare his pace to Ferrari and Merc behind, Perez can try out the DRS and see whether he can waltz through to P2.

They won most races last season by about 20 seconds without having to push.

 

Max is good enough to win in a car that isn't dominant, but last season he barely had to show that. The fact it was dominant on Saturdays doesn't mean it wasn't completely dominant on Sundays.

[MissingApex]

They won most races last season by about 20 seconds without having to push.

Max is good enough to win in a car that isn't dominant, but last season he barely had to show that. The fact it was dominant on Saturdays doesn't mean it wasn't completely dominant on Sundays.

Max also won in cars that were third best.

I truly believe that there are only two or three drivers who could put the RB20 on pole yesterday, the difference between other cars isn’t that big, at least not in qualifying.

[Kao18]

Yes, the fact that they have an second tier driver in that seat also gives that impression.

I mean, if you look at the 2020 Merc in Bottas' hands, it was only worthy of a couple wins, right?

If you take out Lewis from the results the 2020 Merc would still have won 7 out of 17 races, if you take out Max from the result the 2023 RB would only have won 6 out of 22 races. Thats 41% vs 27%. Also lets not forget Mercs qualifying ‘party mode’ in those years.

I think its pretty obvious which car was more dominant.

Edited by Kao18, 02 March 2024 - 08:20.

[PitViperRacing]

Yes, the fact that they have an second tier driver in that seat also gives that impression.

I mean, if you look at the 2020 Merc in Bottas' hands, it was only worthy of a couple wins, right?

I think without hamilton bottas would have won like 50% of races tbh

[CharlesWinstone]

Just one year to go!

And than Lewis may proof himself against the best qualifier in the field in probably a pig (to use your words) of a car. Anyway i you are have a ball next year.

[Kao18]

I don’t think they’re deliberately holding back to keep people interested - I don’t think they care enough about ‘the show’ for that. They’re Red Bull, they want to win a lot and aren’t there to make friends. I think *over one lap* this car is probably still the fastest, but the gap isn’t huge. The race today will show whether that slight one-lap advantage is multiplied by five over a race distance, like it was last year. All signs from testing point to it being very, very similar to 2023 don’t they? So in a way starting where they do is perfect for them. Max can lead from the front and compare his pace to Ferrari and Merc behind, Perez can try out the DRS and see whether he can waltz through to P2.

Leclerc set the fastest lap of quali in Q2 and admitted not getting his lap together when it mattered, I think over one lap Ferrari are at least as quick as RB (and possibly McLaren can be included as well).

[Countersteer]

All that proves is that Red Bull is way better at hiding its pace and turning down engines than Merc ever was. Verstappen knows he can't get ahead by too much too quickly, or people will get bored. His team knows this too.

“Turning down engines” is simply not a thing anymore in 2024.

The difference in grunt between Honda, Mercedes and Ferrari is negligible. This would easily be detected on telemetry, if Red Bull were running noticeably down on power.

[P123]

Max is clearly the best performer in the sport the past few years, and an all time great, so I'm not really understanding the insecurity of needing the extra comfort blanket of wonderment at what he can do based off the performance of the second car.  A car which finished an easy second in the WDC despite it going missing for almost half the races.  It was dominant.  When it's a word that has been used in spite by the same posters over the past few years, then perhaps it explains the need to run away from it as much as possible when the shoe now fits.

 

Nobody would put the performance of the '92 Williams relative to Patrese, the '97 Williams relative to Frentzen, '98 McLaren to Coulthard, the Ferrari, Red Bull Merc to Irvine, Webber or Bottas, etc.

[thefinalapex]

Both Hamilton and Verstappen are great drivers that need a good car to win, no need to put one or the other down or get in a pissing contest or who would win more in car A or B. Just enjoy that the field is as close as it is and we have so many great drivers on the grid capable of winning.

[JeePee]

Max is clearly the best performer in the sport the past few years, and an all time great, so I'm not really understanding the insecurity of needing the extra comfort blanket of wonderment at what he can do based off the performance of the second car. A car which finished an easy second in the WDC despite it going missing for almost half the races. It was dominant. When it's a word that has been used in spite by the same posters over the past few years, then perhaps it explains the need to run away from it as much as possible when the shoe now fits.

Nobody would put the performance of the '92 Williams relative to Patrese, the '97 Williams relative to Frentzen, '98 McLaren to Coulthard, the Ferrari, Red Bull Merc to Irvine, Webber or Bottas, etc.

Us Max fans do not mind calling the RB19 a very good, or the best car of 2023. What gets us is 'the most dominant car ever', which simply isn't true.

The reason Max had the most dominant seasons last year is because of Max, and because Hamilton couldn't be bothered to nail it every weekend in 2014 till 2020 in cars that were so SO much quicker than the current Red Bull.

We're hearing 'dominant' already this year, but only because Leclerc in his quicker Ferrari couldn't get his lap together when it matters.

Perez qualified in the top 3 only ONCE in the last 18 races. Stroll and Seargant would have done more than that in the 2014-2020 mercs.

[P123]

Us Max fans do not mind calling the RB19 a very good, or the best car of 2023. What gets us is 'the most dominant car ever', which simply isn't true.

The reason Max had the most dominant seasons last year is because of Max, and because Hamilton couldn't be bothered to nail it every weekend in 2014 till 2020 in cars that were so SO much quicker than the current Red Bull.

We're hearing 'dominant' already this year, but only because Leclerc in his quicker Ferrari couldn't get his lap together when it matters.

Perez qualified in the top 3 only ONCE in the last 18 races. Stroll and Seargant would have done more than that in the 2014-2020 mercs.

 

Well..... maybe, but debatable. Embedding your post with blanket statements and exaggerations is what isn't really needed.  

[PayasYouRace]

Us Max fans do not mind calling the RB19 a very good, or the best car of 2023. What gets us is 'the most dominant car ever', which simply isn't true.

The reason Max had the most dominant seasons last year is because of Max, and because Hamilton couldn't be bothered to nail it every weekend in 2014 till 2020 in cars that were so SO much quicker than the current Red Bull.

We're hearing 'dominant' already this year, but only because Leclerc in his quicker Ferrari couldn't get his lap together when it matters.

Perez qualified in the top 3 only ONCE in the last 18 races. Stroll and Seargant would have done more than that in the 2014-2020 mercs.

Sorry, Hamilton “couldn’t be bothered”? 

 

Imagine saying that about any multiple world champion.

[Risil]

"most dominant car ever" doesn't say very much, you should dismiss it for the meaningless hyperbole that it is

[PitViperRacing]

Well..... maybe, but debatable. Embedding your post with blanket statements and exaggerations is what isn't really needed.

Pot meet kettle

[Ali623]

Tyres and strategies:

 

 

[PayasYouRace]

Anyone got a race thread in the works?

[MastaKink]

I don't think the RB was the most dominant either but it wasn't just Max that might be giving it that impression to some or making it feel worse, it's also the added reliability too. The Merc era also felt worse than the Seb era RB's because of this and it's got even worse now with even fewer failures.

 

Seb and Mark's RB's had KERS and alternator's detonating just about as often as they were putting up half a second to their nearest rivals and this obviously helped release some frustrations from non RB fans and broke up the monotony more than the last few years with cars that don't have that big an advantage..

[TheAviator]

RB19 in Max hands was one of the most dominant combos of all time, however Perez, who is a good driver, no doubt about it, looked at sea.

You cannot tell me Perez would not win WDC with 14-15-16-19-20 Merc.

Those cars had at minimum 1s inherent advantage over rest of the field.

[TheFish]

RB19 in Max hands was one of the most dominant combos of all time, however Perez, who is a good driver, no doubt about it, looked at sea.

You cannot tell me Perez would not win WDC with 14-15-16-19-20 Merc.

Those cars had at minimum 1s inherent advantage over rest of the field.

He literally finished 2nd in that car. There's no way Perez would have won a WDC in 14, 15, 16, 19 or 20 because he'd have had a teammate of Rosberg, Hamilton or Bottas.

 

How good does a car have to be for Perez to beat Hamilton, Alonso and Leclerc?

[TheFish]

Tyres and strategies:

 

 

How **** are the mediums? Why are most of the predictions only soft and hards?

[TheAviator]

He literally finished 2nd in that car. There's no way Perez would have won a WDC in 14, 15, 16, 19 or 20 because he'd have had a teammate of Rosberg, Hamilton or Bottas.

How good does a car have to be for Perez to beat Hamilton, Alonso and Leclerc?

Yes, 2nd, with half the points.

[Coral]

RB19 in Max hands was one of the most dominant combos of all time, however Perez, who is a good driver, no doubt about it, looked at sea.

You cannot tell me Perez would not win WDC with 14-15-16-19-20 Merc.

Those cars had at minimum 1s inherent advantage over rest of the field.

Well I'll tell you that Perez would not have won the WDC in that Merc, because he would have had no chance. Perez is mediocre, he was fired by McLaren after only one year. He is over-rated because of the half-decent season he had with Sauber in 2012, and he only got the McLaren seat because Ferrari knew he wasn't much cop and didn't want him. 

 

The fact that Perez performed very poorly in many of the races in 2023 yet still finished second in the WDC tells me everything I need to know about how good the Red Bull is.

[Primo]

So Newey just keeps on designing crapwagons, and they have to cling on to Max because otherwise they'd be shown up as pretty average?

I think we humans are getting broken, everything is just black  or white with no nuances in between.

[Primo]

Well I'll tell you that Perez would not have won the WDC in that Merc, because he would have had no chance. 

Not against Hamilton, but what if his team mate would have been Bottas?

[TheFish]

Not against Hamilton, but what if his team mate would have been Bottas?

I doubt it. Bottas was always quick but rubbish at racing. Perez has never been that quick but good at taking opportunities when they arose.

 

It's also completely hypothetical as no top team would want Bottas and Perez as their lineup.

[garoidb]

I doubt it. Bottas was always quick but rubbish at racing. Perez has never been that quick but good at taking opportunities when they arose.

 

It's also completely hypothetical as no top team would want Bottas and Perez as their lineup.

 

When teams are dominant enough, they don't have to prioritise maximising their driver line-up, and they often don't. The premise here is that they would win anyway. 

[F1 Mike]

Had a dream last night that the race was on a Saturday. Woke up early this morning and it feels very odd that the race is actually indeed today. My usual Saturday routine is in disarray

[garoidb]

Well I'll tell you that Perez would not have won the WDC in that Merc, because he would have had no chance. Perez is mediocre, he was fired by McLaren after only one year. He is over-rated because of the half-decent season he had with Sauber in 2012, and he only got the McLaren seat because Ferrari knew he wasn't much cop and didn't want him. 

 

The fact that Perez performed very poorly in many of the races in 2023 yet still finished second in the WDC tells me everything I need to know about how good the Red Bull is.

 

Thinking that Perez performed particularly poorly contains an inherent assumption about how good the Red Bull was.

Edited by garoidb, 02 March 2024 - 11:27.

[TheFish]

When teams are dominant enough, they don't have to prioritise maximising their driver line-up, and they often don't.

The last 4 dominant teams have had Schumacher, Vettel, Hamilton and Verstappen as their lead drivers.

 

You'd have to go back to 90s Wiliams to have a team that you could have a chat about it, but even they went from Mansell to Prost to Senna before having Hill/Coulthard/Villeneuve and would have had Schumacher if they could have.

[NewMrMe]

Another thing that helped Perez finished second last year is that there wasn't one team that was consistently best of the race. Both Mercedes and Ferrari had some strong races but also had too many off days. Aston Martin started the season strong but faded. McLaren started poorly but were very good in the second half. Everyone else kept taking points from each other.

[Archaean]

Thinking that Perez performed particularly poorly contains an inherent assumption that how good the Red Bull was.

Bingo. Perez, who before his RedBull days was easily rated a top 10 driver, was seen by most people as the worst or second worst driver last year. Same for Albon and Gasly, highly rated talents who suddenly became Latifi calibre when up against Max. It's much more likely they were still as good, but up against the best driver who makes a good car look 'the most dominant'.

[garoidb]

The last 4 dominant teams have had Schumacher, Vettel, Hamilton and Verstappen as their lead drivers.

 

You'd have to go back to 90s Wiliams to have a team that you could have a chat about it, but even they went from Mansell to Prost to Senna before having Hill/Coulthard/Villeneuve and would have had Schumacher if they could have.

 

All of these team kept stable driver line-ups through their dominant years, apart from an unexpected retirement. Even then, getting the best possible replacement was not the priority. They didn't risk driver changes until the dominance was fading. That tells me it was not a priority. 

 

Williams also were conservative when dominant in the 1990s. They tried to keep Mansell alongside Prost and, I would wager, wanted Prost to stay alongside Senna (even though they knew he wouldn't). Most of the driver changes were forced on them, apart from the Hill departure which was down to 1995 underperformance (i.e. non-dominance). 

[Goron3]

All that proves is that Red Bull is way better at hiding its pace and turning down engines than Merc ever was. Verstappen knows he can't get ahead by too much too quickly, or people will get bored. His team knows this too.

Some people even believed they were in trouble yesterday xD

On the other hand, it took Mercedes a while to fully accept that they were indeed quickest. And even longer to understand and start playing that same "look! I'm not even that fast" game.

Turning down engines would show up on the GPS traces, and there's zero evidence to show that's the case. If anything they are really competitive on the straights.

Also - if they turned the engines down they'd get disqualified. The engine mode rule forces all teams and their customers to run in the same mode. The exception is once there is a red flag during a race, or if there is a reliability reason.

[TheFish]

Bingo. Perez, who before his RedBull days was easily rated a top 10 driver, was seen by most people as the worst or second worst driver last year. Same for Albon and Gasly, highly rated talents who suddenly became Latifi calibre when up against Max. It's much more likely they were still as good, but up against the best driver who makes a good car look 'the most dominant'.

Gasly wasn't even picked by Toro Rosso after winning GP2 - that's how little RBR rated him.

 

Albon has never won a single seater title. He signed for a Formula E team after his F2 season because he wasn't highly rated and didn't think he had a chance of an F1 drive until Toro Rosso changed their mind.

 

Perez was dropped, perhaps a little harshly, and had no team interested in him until Red Bull came in late in the day.

 

None of these driver have ever been that highly rated. It's clear that Max is an elite driver, probably the best on the grid now, but that doesn't mean we need to inflate stuff by saying his teammates are all highly rated or that the 2023 car wasn't dominant. It was clearly dominant, Max clearly made it an almost perfect season.

[TheFish]

All of these team kept stable driver line-ups through their dominant years, apart from an unexpected retirement. Even then, getting the best possible replacement was not the priority. They didn't risk driver changes until the dominance was fading. That tells me it was not a priority. 

 

Williams also were conservative when dominant in the 1990s. They tried to keep Mansell alongside Prost and, I would wager, wanted Prost to stay alongside Senna (even though they knew he wouldn't). Most of the driver changes were forced on them, apart from the Hill departure which was down to 1995 underperformance (i.e. non-dominance). 

So what are these examples of dominant teams not maximising their lineup? You said dominant teams 'often don't'

[TheAviator]

Only reason why Merc was hiding their performance was due to token system which kept others at safe distance, they had 50-60hp+ on Ferrari and Renault in 2014, that amounts to 1+ second just from engine itself, so you can imagine what kind of an advantage they had. I remember when they turned it on in Bahrain 2014 after SC and had like 2s+ advantage on next best car, two different formulas. Not even close to 2023 or what 2024 looks like its gonna play out...

Nowadays all engines apart from Renault are under 10hp, therefore they have nothing to "turn down", they are running them at full pelt during qualifying, unlike Merc in 2014 and 2016 which was absolutely brutal domination (ok Ferrari was some 25-30hp behind in 2015-2016, but thats still miles of).

Again, Merc domination years were something else due to their biggest competitor (RB) being clipped with 0.5s-1s deficit for like 6 seasons...

Edited by TheAviator, 02 March 2024 - 11:37.

[Thursday]

We haven't even had the first race of the season and already this forum has already descended into the my favourite is better than your favourite arguments. 

Can we just accept that we have 18 of the best drivers in the world on the grid and enjoy the racing

[garoidb]

So what are these examples of dominant teams not maximising their lineup? You said dominant teams 'often don't'

 

Having Bottas at Mercedes was not a maximised line-up. Vettel at Red Bull enjoyed a privileged position in that they would never have considered replacing him, or partnering him,  with someone like Hamilton or Alonso during his dominance. You might ask - why would they? But that is my point. This line of discussion is about whether Perez and Bottas could have been the line-up for a top (dominant for the purpose of my point) team. If they were already winning everything, what impetus would there have been to change or improve the line-up? To reward some other driver people think is better?

Edited by garoidb, 02 March 2024 - 12:06.

[Risil]

Amusing hearing Nico Rosberg of all people talk about warm-up lap techniques on Sky right now

[mclara]

Bingo. Perez, who before his RedBull days was easily rated a top 10 driver, was seen by most people as the worst or second worst driver last year. Same for Albon and Gasly, highly rated talents who suddenly became Latifi calibre when up against Max. It's much more likely they were still as good, but up against the best driver who makes a good car look 'the most dominant'.

No matter how good Max is, the second driver in the RB still should make it into Q3 without problems with that car.

If people think that Perez didn’t underperform they must have very low standards 

[Konsta]

Not against Hamilton, but what if his team mate would have been Bottas?

Bottas is way better than Checo in just about every respect. So no.

[dia6olo]

Max also won in cars that were third best.

I truly believe that there are only two or three drivers who could put the RB20 on pole yesterday, the difference between other cars isn’t that big, at least not in qualifying.

I don't think anyone wins in a car that's third best without (A) the two better cars having incompetent drivers/strategists (B) Luck with weather conditions or © Favourable incidents/safety cars, not even Max unless the difference between the best and 3rd best car are very small.

Max is clearly a step above most drivers but he would not have won in 2023 had he been driving any of the other cars with another competent driver in the RB19.

[ARTGP]

Amusing hearing Nico Rosberg of all people talk about warm-up lap techniques on Sky right now

 

What is the backstory here?  

Edited by ARTGP, 02 March 2024 - 14:21.

[jcbc3]

Race thread: https://forums.autos...ay-race-thread/

[Risil]

What is the backstory here?

Didn't they come up with a rule specifically to stop Rosberg's engineer talking him through everything he had to do on the parade lap? Have I misremembered?