Hamilton expects unpredictable starts from Spa

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In the round-up: Lewis Hamilton expects the new restrictions on starting procedures will lead to more unpredictable starts from the next round of the championship.

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Lewis Hamilton worried Mercedes could get left behind by start changes (The Guardian)

"'The formation start was good, the second one wasn’t,' he said, adding that he expected similar from Spa onwards. 'I imagine there’s going to be a lot of that.'"

Prost 'frustrated' by fan reception to new F1 engines (Motorsport)

"Maybe people expect something very different from F1. At the end of the day, they don’t really care about the chassis, or about outright pace. They want battles on track, because they want it to be interesting; it’s a real drivers’ championship."

Renault to decide on Lotus takeover this week, says Ecclestone (Fox Sports)

"If you took a team over you'd be entitled (to a historic team payment), except that they are a manufacturer so we are looking after them a bit differently."

Honda ran with ‘no limitations’ in Hungary (F1i)

"There were no limitations, no restrictions and it was very good. It was a good deployment program, very good, and also very good harvesting. So the energy use was at full power, which is very good."

Sainz frustrated by reliability, disappointed by strategy (Crash)

"I'm a bit disappointed with the way that we planned the pit-stops. One time we had to undercut the Williams, when I was stuck behind him, and we didn't do it, (but) the cars behind me, both Fernando and Max, did."

Formula 1: Renault boss hits back at 'high maintenance' Red Bull (BBC)

"It is a difficult job to be an engine supplier, in particular to a team that has been so competitive and that is so high maintenance as Red Bull."

Ferrari take a break on Kimi Raikkonen speculation (Sky)

"It's been far away from a disaster like last year even with all the issues, problems and mistakes."

Emotional break well-timed - Manor (Autosport)

"The factory shutdown has come at a good time to give everyone time with their families, and a little time to reflect and to remember the good times because it was a very, very difficult weekend."

F1's Jules Bianchi tribute was beautiful - but should they have held it so close to the Hungarian GP? (The Mirror)

"I was rattled, distracted and emotional. If I was like this, I wondered, what must it be like to be a Grand Prix driver in these circumstances?"

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Comment of the day

Did observing a minute’s silence for Jules Bianchi before the start of Sunday’s race affect some of the drivers?

So many drivers were involved in incidents or mishaps in the Hungary race. Both Mercedes drivers, both Red Bull drivers, both Williams drivers, Verstappen, both Lotus drivers, and Perez were all involved in accidents, mishaps, or made mistakes in some way or another. I can’t help but wonder if it had something to do with the pre-race Bianchi tribute.

Usually, drivers are doing all they can on the grid to focus for the upcoming race, trying to keep away any kind of distraction. I think the reminder of Bianchi really affected most, if not all of the drivers during the race.
@Polo

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On this day in F1

Ayrton Senna reasserted himself in the 1990 championship battle by winning the German Grand Prix 25 years ago today. He had to pass Alessandro Nannini after the Benetton driver elected not to make a pit stop. Fourth place for Alain Prost behind Gerhard Berger put Senna back in the lead of the points standings.

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123 comments on “Hamilton expects unpredictable starts from Spa”

  1. Am I reading this wrong, or is this supposed to mean that this is all that Honda engine has to give?
    Because, if that’s the case, McLaren might as well just tell everyone not expect any decent result in the next 2 or 3 years…

    1. For the time being yes. It just means they aren’t running it in reduced mode for fear it will grenade itself. Now they’ve got it reliable they can start tweaking the power from it and optimising energy deployment and harvesting. They’re basically where they needed to be in winter testing.

      The good news is they still have tokens this year, plus there will be next years tokens, and power can be found without them anyway by tuning the systems.

    2. That’s how I understood it. But @philipgb raised a good point. They still have tokens left.

      However now, their pace of development will definitely be much slower than what it was till now. Like Ferrari developed their engine during the winter break, Honda will need at least 2 such mega-development periods now to reach the front.

    3. ColdFly F1 (@)
      29th July 2015, 9:37

      No, it means it is just the start! @brace
      The article mentioned that this is the first time they ran at full ERS/Energy Harvesting. Now they have to start (complete) the work on engine mapping to optimise drivability.
      As mentioned above (@philipgb, @sumedhvidwans) there are still tokens left, and basically they are basically running 1.5 years behind. You might recall the improvements other manufacturers have made within a season on drivability without the use of tokens!

    4. I agree. At the start of the season, when they were running a detuned engine at around 80% power, they were 2.5-3 seconds off Merc’s lap. Now when they are running their current spec at full power, they are still 2-2.2 secs a lap behind Mercs. While I agree that they can tune their PU, that will at the most bring a few tenths of a lap to their performance.

      Honda has the same number of tokens as other PU manufacturers, so I dont see them really closing the gap much due to any advantage.

      Honestly, it’s hard to say how much is down to the PU and how much to the chassis. Mclaren should be ashamed of themselves if they don’t have a chassis that is just a few tenths off Mercedes. Honda’s compact PU design was supposed to give the car designer great freedom in aero work for the car, and considering how poor the PU really is, the least Mclaren could do was capitalise with a class act chassis.

      If you ask me, I don’t see Honda closing the gap to Ferrari or Mercedes until there is another revolutionary PU regulation change… and it’s questionable whether Mclaren will design a chassis to ever make up that deficit anytime soon.

      So yes, I would agree with you and say that this is pretty depressing news from the Mclaren garage. No WDCs or WCCs for them till then end of this decade.

      1. At least they have the opportunity to test ideas throughout the rest of the season.

        They ran at full harvesting reliably for the first time so they have, at least, a foundation to start trying to build up. It’s pretty hard to develop an engine that blows up every time it’s ran hard.

        Hard to see Honda catching the pack quickly, though. Although this is good news, it does show how far behind they are.

  2. If that is indeed full power, either the pu is dire, or the chassis is. Neither is good news, we have been led to believe the chassis is good. Then again, mclaren had a good engine before and were slow… So who knows.

    1. pastaman (@)
      29th July 2015, 14:28

      Nothing is dire except for your outlook.

      1. And the actual state that Mclaren is in

  3. Sounds like Bernie is buttering Renault up for a “comeback”. As much as I would like another factory team, I have serious doubt that Carlos Ghosn will go for it. He has been know to be a remarkably shrewd operator, and the only way he will buy in is if Bernie comes up with guarantees on future earnings.

    If they do decided to bite the proverbial bullet, I wonder if they would enter as Renault F1. Any chance they could enter as Nissan? Or maybe even Infiniti? I suspect the latter will cut ties with whatever remains of Red Bull?

    1. @jaymenon10 Seems like it would be Renault from 2017, a bit like when they bought Benetton in the early 00s, run it for a year or so and then rebrand it when ready to give the team a push up the order (and hence receive that historical payment from Bernie, to match Ferrari, RBR, Mercedes, McLaren, Williams). This could be mega news for Grosjean!

      1. PS. This gives Red Bull time to get their engine plans sorted. In house? or with VW?

        As shown with Honda, starting now they’d still need another 6 months lead time for 2017, unless they get it right first time, as Honda didn’t, having to restart. @philipgb

    2. The way I read it is: I have offered Renault incentives to come in and save another team from leaving the sport.

  4. Sainz has every right to be frustrated. I’m sure any driver who has to retire due to mechanical failure for the 3rd consecutive race would find that frustrating.

    And while the 4th place from Max would be great for the team, it wouldn’t be great personally for Carlos as Max is his main competition and a 13 point gap probably could’ve been a much shorter gap, maybe a 4 point gap if he had finished the race and behind Alonso in 6th place. Even 6th place can do a whole world of good when you put it lile that

    1. That article is toned down. All early news show he was very angry about STR favoritism to Max.
      I think overall in 2015 first half, Sainz was better driver than Max. But frustration not gonna help him.

      1. @ruliemaulana couldn’t agree more. Max is just 17 year old sensation while Carlos is true talent

        1. @ruliemaulana I kinda like seeing this black and white mentality, so common in the internet. It’s not possible for both to be talented drivers, mandatorily the one we don’t support has to be just a fad :)

          1. Nah. Both are talented. Max had ‘the raw’ talent and Sainz is ‘the thinker’. It’s always a Senna and a Prost in every team :)

          2. ColdFly F1 (@)
            29th July 2015, 9:47

            @ruliemaulana – good one.
            Max has already been compared to Senna; and now Chilli to Prost!
            Both talented, but in a different way.

      2. Agree with you that Sainz is pretty clearly getting somewhat second hand treatment as Red Bull favour the “star” driver just that little bit @ruliemaulana. And while the points suddenly say Verstappen is in front by a lot due to the 4th place, IMO so far Sainz has done a better job this year.
        On the other hand, Sainz should be doing a better job because he is the more experienced racer.

        1. How on earth can you say Sainz has done a better job then Verstappen? Verstappen, a 17 year old rookie with 1 season F3 experience against a F3.5 champion with 5 years of experience…and Verstappen who is 13 points ahead of his teammate. And it would be much more if Verstappen didnt have the problems in China and Australia.

          Sainz has much more to prove then Max and while Sainz is good in Qualifying..Max is a much better racer.

          The advantage Carlos had on Max with his experience in qualifying is getting smaller and smaller. Sainz does not attack on the grid…instead he is driving like a grey mouse. Verstappen always goes for the points and never stops attacking.

          Max has got twice the talent Sainz has. Verstappen will be world champion within 2/3 years.

        2. @bascb

          I disagree entirely. In Australia, Malaysia, China, Monaco and Hungary Max was clearly faster. Sainz was only clearly faster in Bahrein.

          Max has made more mistakes but has also suffered about the same amount of reliability issues and poor pitstops as Sainz.

          At the end of it all Max has lost a greater amount of points through all that than Sainz. Realistically, without problems for either of them, Sainz would already have been behind by some 10 points before the Hungarian GP.
          For me, the current tally, is a reasonable reflection of the difference between the two. Just that, without problems, Sainz would probably have had some 20+ points and Max 30+.

          In the end there isn’t a lot between them but Max looks just that bit more special. And I’m not talking about his pace for his age or his 1.5 season of single seater experience. It’s the way he conducts himself during a race. His spacial awareness, his aggressiveness without carelesness, his confidence on the brakes when he makes an overtake. Sainz looks really good as well but he’s not as much of a racer as Max imo.

          1. I fully agree..nothing more to add

          2. I clearly remember Sainz was also better in Spain.

      3. Early interview on Sky, Sainz talk too freely about media special treatment on Max noting that he had to show better result to recognized. I’m afraid Sainz had been consider too much technical & non technical issue.
        Let’s hope he keep his focus. Start talking in harsh way will make him Webber 2.0
        @mattypf1 @bascb

        1. Vettel was clearly a hell of a lot faster than Webber, that’s not been the case with STR drivers, but I get what you are saying….

    2. @mattypf1 STR reliability has been shocking this year. 3 DNF in a row is something that belongs 20 years ago. When at the beginning of the year it became clear that STR is quite a quick car, indeed quicker than RBR in some cases I wondered what is the downside? Now it’s apparent. They’ve lost quite a few points already due to unreliability

      Carlos also questioned the team’s strategy which is a valid point from his point of view as it seemed to undermine him. However the team wanted them both past Massa so it was what’s necessary from their point of view

      1. Why valid? Check this website and look at the laptimes between those young guns,

        Verstappen clearly faster over the whole race

        http://en.mclarenf-1.com/index.php?page=chart&gp=946&graf=3&dr1=Max%20Verstappen&dr2=Carlos%20Sainz%20Jr.

        Carlos should drive faster instead of talking faster

        1. You forgot to add “Alonso” to the mix. Sainz was stuck behind Alonso.

          1. Carlos was behind Alonso? Verstappen was behind Alonso and he passed him…..thats the difference

  5. Renault powered RB and TR were up to 14 kmh (!!!!!) slower than mercs and 10 kmh slower than ferraris coming into sector 1 speed trap, which is simply comical for something like a 200-300m straight. And wait for it….. HONDA was faster. Yep, you read that right.
    https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CKwx9JeWEAADUf-.jpg:large
    Red bull’s performance in hungary was due to their chassis and had nothing to do with renault suddenly being better.
    Renault should just shut up. They deserve every bit of flak they’re getting this year, and more. Much more.
    Their PU is also more fuel consuming, heavier and massively unreliable. How can you expect RB not to lose their minds over this nightmare? I hope renault do in fact join the grid next year taking over lotus, hence leaving RB to take merc engines and kill renault factory cars.

    1. For the sake of fairness, RBR was probably using a high downforce set-up, going by the cornering speed of Ricciardo when he was dueling Rosberg duel.

      I do agree though that it’s clear that the Renault PU is the weak link of what seems to be a very good car, so yes, they should step their game up.

    2. you forgot to mention that they also ask more money for the engines, although its possible that RBR have insisted on a cut on the price by now.
      As for the speeds, are you sure you are reading that right? The only place where the RBR and STR cars are that far behind is on the main straight (where McLaren is only marginally faster) but as RBR have a higher DF its only natural that their top speed is lower just because of their setups

    3. You don’t know what you’re talking about. Any engine can be top of the speed charts if they get rid of all their downforce.

      1. @john-h, It’s Hungary, all teams run near maximum downforce. Not to say that all seems run equal downforce and/or drag, but it’s as fair a comparison you’d get.

        1. @me4me good point, but i think they run full downforce at a lot of circuits, monaco being the obvious one, but also places like barcelona and abu dhabi. the bit you can’t compare is the drag coefficient, certainly not between different engines.

          i predict monza will be fun to watch the red bulls and the mclarens – take the wings off completely?? or set up a drafting pact….we can but dream

        2. @me4me

          It’s Hungary, all teams run near maximum downforce. Not to say that all seems run equal downforce and/or drag, but it’s as fair a comparison you’d get

          “As fair as you get” doesn’t mean fair enough to determine the Honda PU is better than the Renault PU. Just because we don’t have a reliable way of measuring PU power it does not mean that the unreliable ways are accurate.

      2. As if people didn’t as much DF as possible in hungary. Oh man..

    4. ColdFly F1 (@)
      29th July 2015, 10:19

      Who cares about top speed (even Bernie hasn’t mentioned a trophy for that!). It’s all a bout a chassis/engine/set-up combination which gets you fastest around the track.
      If you check your data you’ll see that lower top-speeds can still result in faster sector times!! @juzh

      1. Yeah, who cares about top speed hahahah. If you’re just a few clicks down on someone it means you’ve just lost a lot of time troughout entire straight. Let alone 14 clicks in just a 200-300 meters. Do you even know how much of a deficit you must have to be that much slower in such a short amount of time. And 300 is not even that high to have any meaningful drag effect.

        1. You realize best top speed doesn’t equal fastest sector times at all?

          1. It doesn’t, but it contributes. duuuh?

        2. During 2010 – 2013, both Mercs and Ferraris had higher top speeds than the RedBulls. Didn’t turn out that bad though for Vettel and RedBull

          1. Renault V8 had 10 times less power deficit than what their V6T has. RB’s lower top speeds in those year were a concious decision made on their part. As of 2014 they have no choice but to be slow because that’s all they can do with that PU.

        3. Red Bull was just as fast as Ferrari in Hungary, if not faster. So, doesn’t really matter there.

          1. It still matters. Like what are you thinking anyway? Why not just run a for eco boost if it doesnt matter at all.

  6. Chris (@tophercheese21)
    29th July 2015, 2:23

    This new race start restrictions could well be the best thing to happen to Formula One in a long time. Silverstone and Hungary were both fantastic races mainly because the race start shook things up.

    1. Agreed. I can’t wait to see how certain drivers fair (*cough* LH & NR) without their nannies in place. Should be interesting

      1. *fare

      2. What, you think every other driver on the grid isn’t given 101 instructions on their start procedures before a race?

        1. Read the transcripts. It’s always LH & NR asking “so what are his bias settings again” and “when does he put the power down in turn 5” etc. Nanni-ville. I never hear SV begging for info on his teammate (or vice versa). I’m just saying it’ll be refreshing to let the drivers actually work it out for themselves – particularly the ones with extra-large umbilical cords.

          1. What you’ve just ‘quoted’ was racing instructions, which is something entirely different. Also, we don’t get to hear the half of what is said over the radios from all the other drivers.

        2. Oh so they ask continually during the race, but are quiet as mice for the start? My point stands

          1. If you seriously think that the mercs are the only ones that rely on their team to perform the best start you are clearly delusional. Just because you don’t hear all of the conversation between all of the other teams doesn’t mean that they don’t happen. We’ll see in the next race I bet you that everyone has worse starts than normal due to not being coaxed

    2. I think it will be total lottery.

    3. … or we might have a safety car on lap 1 for the next 9 races. Mercedes, in theory, had a software issue in Austria, and was attempting a Spa-style start at Hungary (and blew it).

      Chances are, you’re going to see a lot of cars going into anti-stall at the start, which is insanely dangerous for the cars behind them.

      1. They were not “attempting a Spa-style start at Hungary (and blew it).”
        They made some practice starts for Spa in practice sessions, not at the race.

        They had a supposed software problem or something else since Hamilton botched the start in Spain. Since then they have been saying we fixed the issue, only for a new one to materialize the next time Hamilton is slow off the grid. Now there are “multiple issues”.

        1. It didn’t look like they had any start issues in Hungary, not if you compare them to the non-Ferrari cars. It was more a case of Ferrari getting a great start rather than Mercedes having a bad one.

          1. I agree with that. Ferrari launch wasn’t even THAT great either. More like Vettel went aggressive and made room for Raikkonen too. But Hamilton was slower than Rosberg anyway, don’t know what would have happened without Vettel.

  7. I wonder how much the new starts will change the game. We saw in Hungary that Rosberg had no answer to Vettel’s pace in clean air, I wonder how it will play out in Spa/next tracks. Also, Hamilton has been making mistakes after being passed at the start, two races in row (!)

    I’m not holding my breath, but maybe, if Ferrari manages to upgrade the engine and chassis correctly during the summer break, we may have a very interesting second half. Big “if”, but who knows.

    1. Rosberg was on the worse side of the grid. Just look how the other guys in the even starting positions fared.

      1. @bascb I’m talking race pace here. Once Vettel was in clean air, Rosberg was nowhere, not even after the SC eliminated the gap.

      2. Rosberg had a better start then Hamilton from dirty side. But none of them had Vettel’s start. But more than the launch the immediate aftermath was impressive from Ferrari drivers. It was a bit different from Williams monstrous launch imo.

    2. jack Overill
      29th July 2015, 9:37

      They are not allowed to do anything over the summer break, the factories shut down

      1. It’s the first time I’ve heard this. Do you happen to have a source for that?

      2. Never mind, I checked. The factory shutdown only lasts two weeks, not the entire summer break, and things like data analysis and planning are not limited by it. So my original point stands.

        1. “if Ferrari manages to upgrade the engine and chassis correctly during the summer break”

          No it doesn’t. Let it go.

          1. @tonybananas

            No it doesn’t.

            Masterful argumentation there bro xD

          2. What is “it”?

    3. With the 4 engine limit, Ferrari just finished off their second power unit. They’ll have to get 9 races out of the next two units, so if they’ve been working on a new engine far enough in advance to get FIA approval on it by Spa, then yeah, they could have a new PU for the next few races. Otherwise, it probably won’t be until around Sochi that we see them increase HP.

      1. They used 3 ICUs til now. This one in Hungary was a pre-Canada spec from what I’ve heard. They might use this one in Singapore too.

  8. On McLaren-Honda, if that’s indeed the engine at full power, then they have bigger issues than I thought. Sure, fifth place yada yada, they had a lot of luck. And it was not a problem-free weekend, with Button having ERS problems in Q1 (can’t remember if Alonso’s problem was also PU-related, too lazy to check).

    Sure, they have tokens, but they are still way behind.

    1. Oh, “no restrictions” when talking about the ERS. No word on the PU as a whole.

    2. Button’s ERS Problem was a faulty cable and Fernando’s issue a faulty connector I think Albert. Both build quality isses.

      1. That’s little solace. Quality build issues are more dangerous depending on how much strain you put on the motor (i.e. how much power you use).

      2. Unfortunately for Mclaren that’s the tune down there these days and has been for a few years. Honda isn’t going to save them. I’m not sure if there is a personnel issue, team moral issue or lack on knowledge but they as a team have been scraping the garage floor since there last world championship. Ron hasn’t saved them, Eric hasn’t saved them, Honda has tried ( I don’t know where the problem lies there but it’s a joke ) and Fernado I believe is not far from broken. Build mistakes are human errors and human errors are bound to happen when your focus is elsewhere.

        1. Indeed @funkyf1. Its a show of the team being in great stress to get forward, but lacking that bit of focus to get there.

          1. @bascb You say it so much better than I do :)

        2. I’ve said this before, but I think it has a lot to do with the MTC and the working environment there. It’s so soulless, its bound to depress the staff over time to the point where mistakes start being made. We saw it from 2010 onwards pretty much, silly quality control issues happening.

          Imagine Ron looking over you in case you get mud on the tiles. I couldn’t concentrate on my job in that environment! People are not robots.

          Anyway, maybe someone from MTC can correct my false assumptions!?

          1. @john-h I would be very careful with making such blunt assumptions as that. While I have no idea what the atmosphere in the MTC is, I can assure that a whole lot of engineers would give everything to work there.
            Additionally, reliability issues is not something exclusive to McLaren, see Renault, heh.

          2. MTC is a world class engineering facility and the first rule of reliability is absolute cleanliness which apparently you have transmogrified into “soullessness”. What would you have, dancing girls, trapeze artists and a sawdust floor?

          3. I’ve been lucky enough to visit the MTC 3 times . The working enviroment looked pretty calm and relaxed from what i saw, somewhere i’d like to work. All the staff that we spoke to seemed to like working there.

        3. McLaren’s fall does seem to coincide with their increasing focus on road cars doesn’t it, perhaps they’ve been taking engineers away from the F1 side to develop and design the road cars. McLaren are in close battle with both Porsche and Ferrari (just to name a few) in the hypercar market and they may be desperate to lead the pack.

  9. I hope the starts will be less predictable. F1’s problems come from optimisation. On a regular weekend without any external influences you have the fastest car in front, with a good start it can utilise the free air and optimum strategy and is therefore unbeatable.
    When random elements like rain, SCs, bad starts, human error or troubles in qualifying disrupt the ideal weekend then we usually see better races.

    1. How strange that the car that qualifyed as the fastest happens to also be the fastest car.

      1. Problem is cars are qualifying more than drivers. There is such a gap in general that drivers make little difference. That wasn’t the case couple of years ago.

        1. I’m not sure the half second gap between Lewis and Nico supports this view…

          1. They don’t always have half a second, they have had less than 3 tenths on average which is less than the difference between Mercedes and Ferrari.
            The fact that being 3tenths off doesn’t make much difference actually supports what I’m saying.
            So, it became very interesting when Rosberg was 5tenths off and RedBull-Ferrari was so close here.

  10. A good thing that would come out from Renault buying Team Enstone (aka Lotus) is that they will drop using the Lotus name, which for me has become comical, in particular as not even Lotus Cars sponsors them anymore, if my understanding is correct!
    I can see them actually using Team Enstone for 2016, maybe 2017 and then when they are back at top level (if they can) switch back to Renault F1…
    The team has been using the moniker Team Enstone in many tweets recently…

  11. My understanding is that starts won’t be really dependent of the drivers again. It looks like it will be totally random. Not sure I really want that.

    1. Me too, seems a bit DRS-ish to me.

      1. I’d take this over DRS any day.

    2. Are they not the ones pressing the gas? Having a fine feeling for the car and finding the exact points and traction, positioning your car to the best… Hardly sounds like a lottery.

      1. … with a two-stage clutch and more torque than the tires can handle, and only allowing the driver to set the bite-point *once* as they leave the pitlane for the formation lap– In essence, you have to dial in the clutch while sitting in the pit lane, to match the condition of the grid.

        These aren’t like the clutch in your car, with a nice long pull allowing you to finesse the clutch– it’s a finger operated trigger with a very short throw.

        It’s going to be a lottery.

        1. I think you guys are missing the point. A lottery is something where everybody has equal chance at the prize. With this new rule everyone can still have perfect starts, it just requires more from the driver to make that perfect start instead of a computer saying ‘yeah it should be good’. Lottery is out of your control, this is absolutely not.

          1. Booya!

  12. I’m not really expecting the starts to be any different because all thats changing is there not able to change the clutch settings once they leave they garage.
    We saw after qualifying in Hungary that Lewis was doing the bite point in parc-ferme before getting out the car, So its just moved the procedure rather than eliminated it.

    The only concern I have is that if it is going to have a big effect are we going to have situations where a driver leaves the garage to go to the grid, Discover’s the settings are wrong & then has to sit on the grid knowing he’s going to get a really bad start & that there’s nothing he can do to change it.
    That sort of situation would be silly & potentially dangerous & if that sort of situation causes a slow start/stall that results in a big accident that results in injury then its not going to look very good.

    Maybe they should have some sort of thing where if a team can prove that the pre-race settings are going to cause a dangerously bad start or something that they can go to some backup settings to avoid situations where they can see a car has a high change of stalling or getting away exceptionally badly.

    1. That essentially means “lottery” to me.

  13. I pray that Renault do return! That would be incredibly good for F1 in my view. And if they do, I really want to see the 2010 livery back on the grid!

    1. I wanna see Alonso racing for them again. I’m sure team Renault would be miles ahead of the Mclaren Honda

      1. Renault –> McLaren –> Renault –> Ferrari –> McLaren –> Renault

        @todfod I agree, that would be quite something to be honest!

      2. @todfod He’d also be able to rigs races again to win ;P

  14. I was looking at these stats: https://www.racefans.net/2015-f1-season/statistics/race-data/
    There is the last part on “Position change on lap one”.
    Is Massa’s first lap problem in Bahrain included in the negatives column?

  15. I’m looking forward to the new starts, let the drivers do it instead of the engineers in the pits. It’ll be a lot more interesting seeing who can get off the line and hopefully produce better racing as in Hungary.

  16. Hamilton honestly should pay no attention to start issues. At the end of the day, however he starts, he is very likely to win. His car is faster than all others and Rosberg gets confused and shaky, or just slow, when he is ahead of Hamilton. Hamilton needs to focus on his race craft now, because he almost threw away his whole race at BOTH Silverstone and Hungaroring by freaking out and running off the road when he was behind a slower car. Even if he could not pass Massa or the Ferraris on track, he would easily get them on the undercut. I’m thinking he is now so not used to having to race people than his passing skills have become rusty and he has become impatient.

    1. Hamilton’s lunge at Massa when the SC came in at Silverstone was worth going for, he was perfectly positioned to give it a try – as a spectator that’s EXACTLY what I want to see, the best drivers taking chances. Rather than drivers trundling around in formation………..

      If a driver is prepared to take the bigger risks they potentially get the bigger rewards – look at Rosberg he could potentially have won on Sunday if he’d switched to the Option tyres, instead…..P8.

    2. He cant do an undercut on Vettel if hes 20-30secs behind him when its time to pit.

      1. You never know with the Mercedes.

  17. Currently the worst starters are Hamilton and Ricciardo.

    1. Kind of a skewed statistic for Hamilton as he has started 8 / 7 races from pole and can’t gain positions.

      1. 8 / 9 that is.

      2. Meeeh… He didn’t really have very good starts anyway…. He can be let off the hook, but he has an almost 50% pole to win conversion rate. That’s not so good.

  18. This is a very good track.

  19. With an average age of 25 years 1 month and 16 days, the podium at the Hungarian GP was the 12th youngest ever!
    And the oldest guy was Sebastian Vettel! To think Vettel is the “oldest”, still sounds absurd…
    And the youngest ever podium was 2008 Italian GP!

    1. I noticed he’s starting to actually look old too, he’s definitely not the little kid of the paddock any more.

      1. I cannot decide. Sometimes he looks like dad. Sometimes I look at him and he’s still that little kid.
        Doesn’t really happen with other ex-youngest-ever drivers though.
        Maybe because I’m so close to his age, and I still remember the first practice session in Turkey’06, and I sure don’t feel “old”, so he cannot be old either.
        Maybe because when someone says youngest ever, it still means Sebastian Vettel.

  20. I saw here questioned but no one has answered. What’s the longest streak for a national anthem?

  21. The onboard footage of Senna lapping Warrick (at around 9:30) is exquisite. Indeed, the cars and the track shown are truly beautiful, and I hope that the modern monochrome liveries are soon to realize this and change in recognition. Even the Layton House livery seems like a piece of daring design all these years later. The minimalism of the Ferrari is also a breath of fresh air. Don’t even get me started on the superiority of the commentary. Am I the only one who misses F1archives?

    1. Also, J Herbert’s expression reminds me of J Cope back from an adventure; An indescribable escapade.

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