McLaren “two weeks behind” 2018 schedule

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In the round-up: McLaren say they are running behind schedule with their development programme for next season following their change of engine supplier.

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Comment of the day

Raikkonen must have thought…
…that this had a familiar feeling

That crash last weekend reminded @JackySteeg of another:

Not really a stat, but i notice a big similarlity between the first corner crash from this weekend and the first corner crash in Hockenheim 2003.

Ralf Schumacher drifted across the track like Vettel, Barrichello was squeezed like Verstappen, and a quick starting Raikkonen played an identical role in both incidents.

I also remember a huge fuss and wild rumours that Schumacher was almost given a grid penalty for the next race for causing the crash, which was totally unheard of back then. How times change…
@JackySteeg

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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96 comments on “McLaren “two weeks behind” 2018 schedule”

  1. I wonder when motorsport.com will buy this site?
    They just regurgitate all the same news on all their sites.

    1. Umm they norm have it up first and a lot of their stuff is taken from autosport. Not to make an issue but true

      1. Motorsport Network now own Autosport.com

        1. They need to sort their forums out. Worst on the net.

  2. @keithcollantine:
    Yesterday’s round-up didn’t include a comments section (as far as I could see). Was that intentional?

    1. I hadn’t even noticed there was a round up yesterday, so thanks.

      1. It was very, very, late, much later than usual although still time-stamped as posted at 0.0.01 am as usual. I hope these delays are caused by good rather than bad things happening at chez Keith.

    2. Did you see the Toto second driver comment? He said he wasn’t backing Hamilton as it would upset the second driver – well he kind of said it in that statement! Maybe the comments were disabled as it would have been 2 pages of Totos mishap!

      1. I wondered if it was because Sean Bratches, Liberty Media’s Managing Director of Commercial Operations had noticed there was a decline in race viewers.
        I think it was yesterday that I heard the Dallas Cowboys were the world’s most expensive team, and it got me wondering why it wasn’t an F1 team like Ferrari? I’m sure there are lots of reasons, but I can’t help but suspect less race viewers means F1 teams are less valuable.

        1. Yes.

          As value declines, changes will happen.

        2. The Ferarri brand is worth a lot more then the cowboys. NFL is highly profitable and so you can make a lot of money from merchandise and tv contracts, which go to the club directly. The structure, cost and income of f1 makes it hard to get profit on the f1 side. And one might argue that’s not the point anyway.

    3. @drycrust and Nase: Sorry about that there was a technical fault with the round-up yesterday which was why it didn’t appear on time and comments were disabled.

      @hohum Don’t worry, all is well chez Keith :-)

      1. @keithcollantine
        Alright, thanks for the info and good to know! :-)

      2. @keithcollantine Thanks for fixing the problem.

  3. @JackySteeg

    I also remember a huge fuss and wild rumours that Schumacher was almost given a grid penalty for the next race for causing the crash, which was totally unheard of back then. How times change…

    Was there anything official about these those rumours? All I know is that Ralf Schumacher wasn’t punished, which means the same incident was treated identically between 2003 and 2017.
    Or was that comment “How times change” about the fact that grid penalties were unheard of back then?

    1. nase, it was more than just a rumour of a grid penalty – Ralf was originally given a 10 place grid penalty for the Hungarian GP. Williams then formally appealed against that decision: although the FIA still held Ralf to be guilty, they reduced the severity of the penalty from a grid drop to a fine after that hearing. http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns11664.html

  4. I guess Hamilton can’t do anything without someone being completely outraged.

    1. Haha it does seem so. Maybe they wanted to give the farmers guardian some news time and attention by putting his name on an article, same as with PETA.

    2. It would be in order to set the record straight if he is mistaken about the benefits and risks of veganism. But they responded with Ad Hominem attacks. Probably because in a simple way he is right: if you aren’t comfortable killing animals you shouldn’t eat them.

      Silly though to be simplifying the environmental impact of feeding ourselves to a meat vs veggie argument.

      I just hope he doesn’t need the fish to keep himself fit. Wouldn’t want the title to be decided by a few lbs of mackerel.

      1. There’s a flaw in your logic: you excluded the scenario of paying someone who is comfortable killing animals (or who at least needs the money more than they need to not be uncomfortable) to kill the animals you eat. Best of both worlds :-)

    3. Veganism (& vegetarianism) aren’t just about the treatment of animals. There are many health considerations brought out by the process & preparation of food, something the modern sports person tends to be pretty focused on.

      The article even quotes Hamilton saying the main reason he’s doing it, but chooses to attack based on the throwaway comment about cattle farming producing more environmental gasses than motor & air travel. Oh wait, that has a scientific basis too!

      1. All this talk about beef made me hungry…I think I will go ahead and double my order of double Whopper-With-Cheese…..

  5. Regarding COTD, No rumor about it Ralf WAS handed a 10 place grid penalty by the Hockenheim stewards. However Williams put in an appeal & while the FIA upheld the stewards original view that Ralf was more at fault they reduced the penalty to a $50,000 fine.

    It was there belief that while Ralf was more responsible it was not an intentional act & had been caused due to him been unaware Kimi had got alongside Rubens due to the blind spot in the mirrors & that his retirement from that race & points lost was penalty enough.

    At some point after that it was also declared that the stewards would be more lenient for incidents at the start & 1st corner & with the cars bunched together during that time things tend to be a lot less clear cut compared to when the field gets more spread out in later laps.

  6. Didn’t saw this mentioned over the weekend – the fact Vettel didn’t choose to (or was told by Ferrari is what I think as it would be mentally demotivating) say that one word ”sorry” to Max is not a issue of pure sportsmanship. It is far more important then that.

    Look at it this way: It does not seem smart for Vettel to not apologize particularly to him. You never know what happens to the Mercedes engine or a rain qualifying in Suzuka and suddenly, same grid – ready to equal in the WDC – don’t think Max is not going to interfere and Max is not gonna get disciplined like when Vettel went to Horner after Kvyat in Sochi. I already predicted that especially in the rain Vettel would just go all-risk on Verstappen Sunday because of their history, and it happened, so it’s possible.

    Do people remember the 2005 season? When because of the sheer domination along with all the incidents nearly every guy (but Montoya) that beat Schumi was praised and immediately got the (deserved) sympathy-factor? This draws comparison to Alonso (who became very ironically the youngest F1 world champion) and Kimi who could’ve won half the season’s races. Same thing Vettel is building up here.
    Vettel seems to be losing the championship and potential future ones based on bipolar moments on track and now off track as well by not doing this.

    1. Why do you call his on-track rage bipolar? I have a bipolar daughter. She never displays irrational anger. Please stop using bipolar as a synonym for out of control.

      1. Bipolar can refer either medically to a psychiatric illness or relating to anything characterized by having two poles or extremes. In this case I don’t think there was any suggestion that Vettel is prone to manic or depressive phases, just that he can at times appear to be incredibly level headed and at others completely loses his cool.

        1. Bipolar in the medical term defines the swing between depression and mania. To automatically associate either with violent episodes in either state harms the discussion.

          1. Apart from the fact you need to have seen Vettel in Baku in person to understand the ridiculous amount of very friendly conversation that he switches with just plain uncontrolled rage during a weekend…

            If you search this term you get this as first definition;
            bipolar
            bʌɪˈpəʊlə/
            adjective
            adjective: bipolar; adjective: bi-polar

            1.
            having or relating to two poles or extremities.
            “a sharply bipolar division of affluent and underclass”

            I’m not in psychiatry, and people shouldn’t be offended by every word that may relate to relatives because of course I meant the other definition, which does exist.
            But anyway I made my point. Including Baku, guy lost the championship on pure driver-errors. Most, if not all tracks, favour Mercedes and he is making VER his own enemy, by apologizing to only his friend Lewis.

    2. It’s not that I was offended, I just think there is enough stigma with mental health problems that keeps people from getting the help they need, and that kind of comment adds to it. I’ve also seen teams that are good one game and bad the next described as schizophrenic. It’s hard on people who have those conditions.

  7. Well, this is great news.

    Lewis vegan? Mind blown. For some time I experimented with vegan food while preparing to beat my 10k runnig record. I found it benefited me quite a lot, my body simply felt lighter, my muscles more rested… And record was indeed broken. Now eating a more standard diet, I cannot get near that time anymore.

    Sure farmers can call him a hypocrite, for enviromental reasons. I bet his jet is not running on biodisel, but in realllity meat industry is a major contributor to enviromental destruction.

    Him going vegan might give us more encouragement to seek performance and health benefits of a vegan diet.

    And if he wins WDC, more naysayers will be proven wrong, potentially leading to more vegans and a net benefit.

    1. I’ve heard a few criticisms of his reasons for going vegan. It doesn’t look great him claiming he wants to help the planet while owning a private jet.

      But while a move to veganism won’t offset his environmental impact on a personal level, be is in a position to inspire others and have a larger impact than any individual choices can make.

      1. His comments contained the words ‘worse than our flights and cars’ I’m sure he is well aware of other factors. Truth is the Human population is out of control coupled with Western eating habbits he’s not wrong.

        1. Worse than our flights, as in you or me maybe taking a couple of commercial flights a year. But I doubt worse than taking a private jet to every race weekend and on his multiple jolly’s round the world a year.

      2. @philipgb He doesn’t explicitly mention wanting to save the planet, only that he watched a TV programme where there was a statistic that cattle farming contributes to 20-30% of global warming figures via methane production. His main reason for going vegan was as a result of seeing what goes into food production, even for what is sold as ‘raw meat’ these days.

        I guess he’s lucky he’s in a position where he has enough time and money (and no kids to feed) that means a vegan lifestyle is do-able.

    2. @jureo
      What time did you get on your 10K run mate?
      Do you cycle & swim as well? (My business partner does- I just think he doesn’t like the family LOL)
      I hope it compared to JB as from all accounts Jenson runs at near world class pace (but not great on the other two LOL).

      I set a goal of 8 reps at 1.5 times my bodyweight for a bench press (most think 1 x bodyweight is ok) So at around 22 years I benched 120kg 8 times at just under 80kg. Not bad. Now at 40 that ratio has come down somewhat LOL
      Both were on a full meat diet so I assume age was the main factor :) I am having some fun here!

      If Lewis was to go vegan all power to him, who cares his motives (but save the world and I have a leer jet not his best option) but really he is certainly the most influencing guy in F1 now (and maybe ever as now social media is the norm) – us F1F’s see him in New York dressed like a tool and laugh, but he is promoting F1 better than the next guy (disclaimer- he is still dressed like a tool LOL).

  8. I don´t care if Vettle has not said sorry, somebody has to be the villain is F1 and it might as well be him.

    We have not had a proper villain since Schumacher, Maldonado did ok as a stand in but well, you know.

    So be it.

    I wish Jos Verstappen would just go away, his comments mean nothing. Let Max fight his own battles please, he seems more than capable of doing so

    1. SV has nothing to apologize for. It was a normal racing move and a racing incident. It is only the concept that LH was starting 5th that has people suggesting SV risked too much. Yet the vast majority of the time, a moving over off the line at the start by the pole sitter is so normal it barely gets a mention. And SV would not have been thinking after quali, and right up until the race start, that all he had to do was win and LH would finish 5th and there’d be a big points differential on the day. No, his first task would have been to deal with Max who has shown himself to be amazing in the wet, and who said after quali he could only hope to do something on the first lap if he was to have any chance of winning the race. There’s no way SV was going to be able to go conservative…and what?…leave Max room?…assume LH was going to finish 5th? That’s just not reality.

  9. I’m baffled by the fact that people keep saying Verstappen “had the steering wheel completely straight” and that he “held a straight line”. It’s just ignoring reality. Look at the replays, track shots and cockpit cameras. He clearly steers to the left into Kimi.

    It was a racing incident, initiated by Vettel’s move and bad judgement on Verstappen’s part. If anyone could have avoid it, it was Max by driving straight.

    1. Sundar Srinivas Harish
      20th September 2017, 7:37

      If Max had continued on a straight line, he would’ve still been caught in the crash. The only we he could’ve avoided being hit by both Vettel and Kimi was by braking, and someone from the back of the grid would’ve surely rear-ended him. The three of them were out of the race the moment Vettel steered to the left.

      1. Would’ve or wouldn’t have. As I said before, worst case scenario: Max gets hit by Vettel and it’s clearly Vettel’s fault. Best case scenario: Vettel yields and the accident doesn’t happen. There was no one behind Max, so breaking or just lifting wouldn’t hurt, but in my opinion it wasn’t necessary, just keeping the car straight would have been enough.

        Max’s and Kimi’s wheels interlocked by a half tyre width. There was more than enough of space between Verstappen and Vettel the that moment. Certainly more than a full tyre width, so I don’t think Vettel would have crashed into Max. He used the space provided by Verstappen, unaware of Raikkonen’s position.

        I don’t think the three of them were out of the race the moment Vettel steered to the left. I think Max made a bad decision in a little time he had.

    2. Nonsense. I’ve watched the videos again and then again under your advice. Max twitched the wheel in reaction to being sandwiched.

      What next, claim he should have braked when he realised Kimi had more momentum and Vettel was heading his way?

      1. Max twitched the wheel left and drove into Kimi. Vettel had no intention of hitting him, he wanted to cut across. We don’t know if Verstappen reacted to being sandwiched, or did he try to close the door on Raikkonen, we’re not in his head. We know however, that he was aware of both Ferraris, so in my opinion any way you cut it, it was a bad decision. I don’t think he had to brake. Just keep the car straight.

        1. @maroonjack are you still going on about this? You claim not to be a Vettel or Ferrari fan yet have invested an essay’s worth of counter-argument over multiple stories. The fact is, people have their opinion, many do not agree with you, and you cannot change a thing about it. Opinions OR the outcome, just move on mate.

          1. I see Max as a driver with great potential, but he’s making a lot of mistakes and people justify him all the time. I want people to recognize his errors and I want him to recognize them. I don’t want him to be the next Maldonado, yet when people keep excusing his Mad Max moves, that’s what he’s destined to become.

        2. “Vettel had no intention of hitting him, he wanted to cut across. ”

          Just let that quote marinate.

          No one wants to hit anyone… (except Vettel in Baku). But when you’re cutting across the track, you’re risking hitting someone. He may not have meant it, but at the very least there is a lot of blame that needs to be apportioned to him.

          1. I disagree. Other than the fact that he should be blamed for being one of the drivers on the track, it was a racing incident. This woulda, coulda, shoulda forgets that his move over from the start happens pretty much every race, and SV could not have played conservative. I think a lot of the conversation has assumed that LH was actually going to finish 5th and therefore SV ‘risked too much.’ How exactly should SV have ‘risked less?’ Without the perfect vision hindsight brings that is. Not moved over? Left Max more room? Does that sound like what pole sitters do off the start line? Would leaving Max room guarantee SV no contact? No incident? Has Max ever collided with another car? Or if left room would Max have become a big problem for SV in he first corner or two? I can play woulda, coulda, shoulda in SV’s favour all day long. But I think it is safe to say the seconds before the incident, sitting on the line, SV was not thinking Max was going to be a pushover, nor that he was guaranteed 25 points that day, nor that LH was guaranteed to finish fifth, and therefore he should not ‘risk too much’. Like he could just put in 90% of the effort and it would all work out perfectly for him. Let the others put in 100%. Leave room for them. It’ll be fine.

  10. ”the Qingming Festival, also known as Tomb-Sweeping Day, when people visit the graves of their ancestors. This is a three-day holiday from April 5-7”

    – If a reason like this is why the Chinese don’t want to keep their provisional date then why were they okay to be close to this particular national holiday this year? And furthermore, an even better alternative would be to put the Chinese GP to April 22, so that it would form back-to-back with the Azerbaijan GP as travelling from Shanghai to Baku would be easier jet lag-wise than travelling from Bahrain to Shanghai. The same applies to Japan and Russia: They should switch dates as well to lessen the impact of the jet lag as east-to-west travelling is easier jet lag-wise than west-to-east travelling., i.e., the Japanese GP to September 30th and the Russian GP to October 7th. These two suggested changes are the ones that should be made to next season’s race calendar at the very least.

  11. It’s going to be interesting come the end of season to play the what if game. What if Vettel had conceded 1st to Verstappen and finished 2nd? Would he have won the championship?

    I doubt he would in that scenario, I think he needed the win at Singapore and Hamilton to finish off the podium to have any hope.

    Once the season is complete and we can do the maths, I don’t think this crash will be the reason he didn’t win if we suppose he settled for 2nd while Hamilton finished 4th. I suspect that scenario still sees Hamilton winning.

    1. Seeing how slow Ricciardo was on race day and by his own account that was not because of the gearbox issue, but simply because the wet and colder temperatures didn’t suit their setup, I would say Vettel would have still had a good chance of winning that race. Raikkonen would have been behind to possibly hold up Verstappen after a pit stop or force them to pit early by going for the undercut.

      Ferrari would have had a ton of options to benefit from their better performance and get Vettel back in front of Verstappen.

      Either way, your scenario still means a 30 points swing in favor of Hamilton. Vettel would be 2 points ahead instead of 28 behind. So only if Hamilton wins the WDC by more than 30 points indeed it might not have mattered.

      Which is possible, but on the other hand, you see the panic that Vettel displayed. That’s from being under too much pressure. Drivers make that kind of rookie mistakes when they are not under control of their emotions and that happens when they “need” to win that race. Vettel will probably “need” to win every one of the remaining races. Knowing he probably can’t win them all anyway unless Ferrari comes with a major update to overcome the loss of their oil burning system since Baku.

  12. Hamilton the vegan – my thoughts:

    Taking the world’s populationg into consideration, very few people race cars for a living or, indeed, as a hobby. However, 4.81 million people follow Hamilton’s twitter account. If some of those people follow Hamilton into veganism, well that’s not a bad thing, is it. Ridiculing Hamilton’s dietary choice because he contributes more than his fair share to polluting the planet due to his career and lifestyle is, I think, missing the point.

    1. Exactly. He is a role model. He can do some good with his platform in ways others cannot. Does he polute a lot? In grand scheme of things probably having 1% of his followers going vegan would offset his own polluting and provide a net benefit.

      1. Good points. My thoughts exactly.

    2. @shimks

      Most people being critical of him aren’t doing so from an unbiased position. They’re either defending their own interests in the case of farmers, or their own choices in the case of your average Jo meat eater.

      Attacking that he is a race car driver is a flaky argument. As you rightly point out it’s not a widespread activity that has a measurable impact on the environment and in fact is leading towards efficient technologies that likely has a net environmental benefit.

      But his flying a private jet is harder to defend. I’m not an environmental scientist, but how does Hamilton’s environmental footprint from that choice compare with my choice to eat meat?

      Personally, until the science on the matter of plant-based diets is solid, I’m not willing to chance cutting animal products from my diet based upon ideological propaganda pieces What the Health which is I assume what Hamilton has watched.

      1. @philipgb I don’t think a single person’s jet-setting habits in any way conflate with a single person’s eating habits.

        Measuring the world-wide environmental impact of air travel as a whole next to world-wide intensive cattle farming should be do-able, though.

        1. @optimaximal

          You can conflate anything with the right metric. Greenhouse gases for instance, that’s measurable both from a per flight perspective and per kilogramme of meat consumed. I don’t know the metrics though.

          If his choice of convenience and luxury for a private flight is more destructive than mine or other meat eaters choice of consuming meat, which is debatable if it’s a luxury. Then while it doesn’t undermine it being a valid change for him to make sacrificing meat, it doesn’t make those of us who still eat meat any worse.

          1. @philipgb I don’t think he intended it to be anything more than a declaration of his intent with regards to his body, because that’s what he’s in control of.

    3. Thing is, I don’t think there’s any reliable data to show one way or another whether going onto an exclusively plant based diet is beneficial or detrimental to human health in the long run. Personally I think that on Hamilton’s part this maybe a celebrity fad thing, but not that I can really know. I also think that rather than foregoing animal products entirely, and meat especially, eating less of it and of better quality would be a boost to people’s health and could tremendously cut down on all the side effects of production.

      But yeah, criticising that based on the fact that he’s a racing driver is silly.

    4. Following Hamilton on Twitter by so many people, causes so much energy use that it is bad for the planet. He should stop Twitter.

  13. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoRlpqIwiqs

    Interesting angle of the first lap incident in Singapore.

    1. That was actually how I saw it when I saw it live – for the first time.
      After watching countless videos you start to lose that initial feel and everything becomes over-analyzed and ralativized.
      But my first impression, while watching it live, was that Raikkonen again made a mess and misjudged his position relative to Verstappen. He moved to cut in front of Verstappen before he was actually in front of him, thus clipping his wheel and putting the whole carnage in motion.
      Vettel on the other hand was heading towards a disaster himself by expecting scare Max into submission, because I think that wouldn’t work either, with or without Kimi.

      All in all, my first impression was that Kimi triggered the incident by cutting in front of Max before he actually managed to overtake him.

      1. It’s quite clear from that footage that Raikkonen went perfectly straight until Max tried to brake out of the accident and touched Raikkonen’s rear wheel. Obviously that spun Raikkonen to the right.

        Verstappen also went mostly straight but moved to the right slightly to get away from Vettel who dove to the left much to fast (and too far) so that Max had nowhere to go.

        Max and Raikkonen did nothing wrong. Vettel apparently didn’t do enough wrong to receive a penalty, but he was clearly the instigator of the whole thing. You can’t expect the opposition to just stand on the brakes when a car ends up next to them. They generally do their braking in the aptly named braking zone just ahead of he corner.

  14. Well it shows again that Vettel isnt really that good as 4 titles make us believe. He is fast, but not great when in traffic. Most of his wins come from pole. On an empty track he is always fast. Put some cars around him and he is not amongst the best out there

    1. Good luck with that. Modern F1 fans tend to measure drivers on stats, so Vettel is the best this decade based on stats, 4-2 over Lewis. Of course if the media and Hamilton fans stopped going on about totals and stats then we could weigh things up differently. Mansell for example would of been 3 times world champion without awful luck and 5 times with the luck some other drivers get, yet he is overlooked when talking about greats. His stats are bad as his DNF rate was horrendous.

      1. 4 – 2 ? What stat is that supposed to be?

        1. 4 championships to 2 this decade (2010-2019) compared to Lewis, as he said…

        2. Yeah but if you look at the last five years… Then Vettel is a loser… Anyway, you can prove anything you want with statistics..

      2. I agree. Let’s put stats aside: All drivers are good otherwise they wouldnt be in F1 (ok, some with some financial help ;-). But a clear distinction can be seen between drivers that are just fast on a clear track and those that are also fast in traffic. Its an additional skill set they need to master. Bottas for instance is not good while in traffic. He admitted it in Baku last year. Same goes for Rosberg. I deem Vettel on this list as well

    2. Most of Senna’s wins came from pole (29/42), I hardly think that’s a reason to judge if a driver is good or not.

      1. I agree. Sorry for referring to stats. What I mean is that Vettel is not best in class when it comes to being in traffic

  15. So I managed to stay off all news sites and managed to watch the race unspoilt last night only.

    My take on the first corner crash:

    – Racing incident
    – Contrary to most, I would put most blame on Raikkonnen. He was the car that was furthest behind of the three so he should have seen that Verstappen was squeezed by Vettel. Kimi still had ample room on the left to move a bit further to the left to give Verstappen some space – instead, he moved slightly to the right and drove into Verstappen. I think he thought he may have been past Verstappen already.
    – Vettel was entitled to squeeze Verstappen – after all, he was ahead and left a space of more than two-cars-widths to the left of his car. It was still a stupid decision as it was very risky.
    – Verstappen pretty much blameless. He could have backed out of the move by lifting earlier, but I don’t think he expected Raikkonnen to move to the right into him.

    1. The short version is that both Ferrari drivers tried to intimidate Max by going for a squeeze (very common place) without realising the other Ferrari drivver was doing the same, Vettel to the extreme.

    2. he moved slightly to the right and drove into Verstappen. I think he thought he may have been past Verstappen already.

      That was my impression as well.

      The short version is that both Ferrari drivers tried to intimidate Max by going for a squeeze

      True as well.

    3. Exactly how you I it.

      Vettel did a Schumacher, trying to squeeze out Verstappen.

      Now normal drivers would back off, but that boy knows no fear or backing off… then Kimi joined the party… We all knew it was not gonna end good that then.

      All a good racing incident, but disastrous results for Vettel potentially. Now he has to win around 4-5 of the remaining races in order to have a good chance at the title… that or Hamilton needs to have a serious issue.

    4. Contrary to most, I would put most blame on Raikkonnen, because I don’t like Raikkonen. No other reason.
      Vettel was entitled to squeeze Verstappen, because I like Vettel.
      Verstappen was blameless, because I like Verstappen even more than I like Vettel.

      Fixed that for you.

      1. You couldn’t be more wrong!

      2. I like vettel but he’s a bloody idiot.

  16. While I thought the actual Tweet re: hypothetical points if Hamilton had retired in Spain was a little inflammatory @keithcollantine, I did chuckle at the fact that Bottas himself liked it!

    How about if Bottas had suffered the headrest issue at Baku then?

    1. It’s interesting that Keith posted that because, out of Hamilton, Vettel and Bottas, it is Hamilton who is yet to have a DNF. He has had his share of bad luck, these things tend to even out so a DNF in the coming races could blow the title race wide open.

      1. these things tend to even out so a DNF in the coming races could blow the title race wide open.

        @geemac tell that to Rosberg. He blew the whole reliability equalisation thing out of the water last year.

        Or maybe Lewis is due a 100% reliable year for having the least reliable Mercedes engined car on the grid last year?

        Either way, Malaysia will bring back some unpleasant memories that’s for sure.

        And Vettel only has a DNF due to his own actions, I don’t think that registers on the mechanical karmic scale. ;)

    2. By my calculations that would put Hamilton 43 pts clear at the top. (+ 15 points for finishing 1st instead of 5th)

  17. The event mentioned in the COTD is not quite the same though. Ralf Schumacher is moving towards the racing line. Which should rightfully be his since he is ahead. Vettel dove to the opposite site of the track to push another competitor off while still on the straight.

    1. ‘To push another competitor off…’ or, more realistically, to force him to back off by claiming the real estate, you know, like racers do, like WDC level drivers have been doing all along, like Max or anybody else would have done, and like drivers are applauded for especially by that driver’s fans.

  18. Boullier on McLaren being delayed by engine switch ““It just means we are increasing the workload to make sure we can recover, and once we recover we will go back to the standard way to work and we have a different process today about work, because next year’s car, despite the change of power unit, it’s an evolution so there will be no revolutions. That doesn’t change the way we work.”

    Anyone else think Boullier has swallowed the Ronspeak Dictionary?

    1. I plugged it into Google Translate and it came out in Chinese.

    2. Nah. With Ronspeak you generally need to pay a visit to dictionary.com at some stage. This is just poorly articulated.

  19. What media outlet has Zak Brown bought now?

  20. Will there be need to re-schedule the Mexican GP?

    1. @faulty No, why would there be? What makes you think so?

      1. Because devastating intraplate earthquake?

        https://www.razon.com.mx/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/DKG7quiVoAA8GHc.jpg
        http://www.nitu.mx/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/AICM-sismo-520×330.jpg

        Images above are from an access ramp to the Mexico City Airport, which is really close to the GP venue.

  21. While no one has said it, I guess Scuderia Toro Rosso’s change to the Honda engine will have compromised their time line on their 2018 car as well.
    It was interesting to see Craig Scarborough mentioned the shape of the McLaren car will need to be changed to accommodate the Renault engine.

    1. A point that Scarborough mentioned that hasn’t had much attention, but could become important, is the lack of important information from the FIA regarding Halo. From the way Scarborough spoke it seems the Halo is still in the prototype stage, so the exact shape, construction, aerodynamic effect, and weight are still unknown. While Force India are the only ones who have complained publicly, it is sounding like there is a lot of uncertainty regarding Halo.
      For Halo to provide the maximum amount of protection to drivers while providing the least impediment to car performance then it needs the application of thought and time. I can’t but help think compromises in safety will occur, which aren’t in anyone’s interest.

      1. @drycrust I wouldn’t be surprised if the Halo is delayed another year. What their logic is here I have no idea, sitting on their hands it seems.

  22. I don’t understand the commentary about this race start at all. The same tv commentators who are saying Vettel had a brain fade, or pulled across “too aggressively” have spent years watching the pole sitter not only cut a swathe across the track, but actually *point* their car at an angle in the starting box so they were able to do it more easily. Must be something different about this particular bit of swathe-cutting.

    As for verstappen being stuck with nowhere to go… He could see two Ferraris in front of him. He could have braked.

  23. Mclaren building in excuses already. 2 weeks?? Really.

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