Girts

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  • #381346
    Girts
    Participant

    Personally, I have no problem with such opinion articles on F1’s official website (more have appeared since then).

    A couple of years ago I visited that website only when I was really bored and wanted to read some press releases. It was pretty useless as results, race reports and quotes could be found on a lot of other websites, such as F1F/RF, which also provided analysis, comments, gossip, etc. While fans sometimes rightly blame media for spreading unfounded rumours or trying to grab attention with click-bait headlines, it is also true that not many would want to read only plain quotes or emotionless race reviews. F1 is well aware of that and is simply trying to make the website more attractive.

    They are obviously in a delicate situation. For instance, it is unlikely that Will Buxton will ever post articles that criticise Vietnam Grand Prix deal or argue that F1’s ticket prices are ridiculously high. They generally cannot afford being negative. They must be very careful when pointing the finger at someone or defending them. It is really challenging for them to make content that would be attractive yet not offensive or contradictory to their business strategy. That is why I applaud their efforts.

    #376350
    Girts
    Participant

    I think this is a good time to resurrect this discussion (once again).

    So who will be the next new F1 race winner – Pierre Gasly, Charles Leclerc or …?

    #357445
    Girts
    Participant

    Also, Timo Glock and Nico Rosberg are going to be their new experts, replacing Niki Lauda.

    #354637
    Girts
    Participant

    Well, it took only six years to find the answer to the question. Brendon Hartley has unexpectedly got his chance at the age of 27.

    Richie Stanaway and Mitch Evans have not made it to F1. Stanaway has become a sportscar driver, just like his compatriot Earl Bamber. Evans is currently racing in Formula E.

    Are there any other young Kiwi racing drivers on the horizon?

    #347691
    Girts
    Participant

    Actually I enjoy being on this website and discussing F1 between the races or during the seasonal breaks. This is a good time to reflect on different issues and do careful analysis; the race weeks are often more about first impressions and emotional reactions.

    #347690
    Girts
    Participant

    This is completely unnecessary and will only further enrage those fans, who loathe the halo. It is good that the FIA / F1 have been doing some explanatory work but they should also admit that this device does not look perfect, that aesthetics do matter in F1 and promise that they will keep trying to find alternative solutions. Other opinions should be respected, F1’s official YouTube channel should not be the modern version of a Communist Party leaflet.

    #347689
    Girts
    Participant

    Well, it is not di Grassi’s fault that Buemi skipped one of the season’s events so I believe that his maths is pretty much irrelevant here. But I also think that winning a championship where one of the title contenders skips races to participate in another championship would not mean much to me. This is not really about di Grassi or Buemi, the situation just confirms that Chase Carey is right by saying that at the moment Formula E is “a combination of a street party for fans and sponsors and auto companies”.

    #341781
    Girts
    Participant

    Surprise, surprise – the name of the 107th F1 race winner is Valtteri Bottas.

    Now all the current top teams have only race winners in their driver line-ups. Taking that into account, there are several possible ways we could try to guess the name of the next winner:

    1) Look at the teams that realistically cannot fight for race victories at the moment but seriously plan to do so in the future – McLaren (Vandoorne), Renault (Hulkenberg, Palmer) and possibly Williams (Stroll). Out of those, Hulkenberg and Vandoorne are probably the most likely contenders.

    2) Try to guess future driver changes. It is not too hard to imagine Sainz, Grosjean, Perez, Ocon or Wehrlein driving for a top team in the foreseeable future.

    3) Promising young drivers, who might make their F1 debut soon – any ideas?

    #341543
    Girts
    Participant

    Well, I started watching diving last year and I have not noticed such discussions at all. Then again, you can probably not compare diving with F1 in this regard. F1 is just so incredibly big, its fanbase is humongous. Countless blogs and other websites are dedicated to the sport, news and new articles seem to appear every minute. There are not many diving fans, who would be ready to spend hours discussing if Tom Daley should have got 8s or rather 9s for that dive, whereas F1 folks will go to any lengths to prove that Hamilton did not deserve that penalty or that Alonso would beat Vettel if they were driving for the same team.

    That goes for the rules as well. There are just so many dedicated fans (or F1 pundits, for that matter) who dig really deep so it makes sense that they discuss everything F1-related, including the rules. In fact, I do not think it is a bad thing as long as we stay pragmatic and do not ask for a revolution after every Russian GP.

    #341511
    Girts
    Participant

    Latvian commentators hype up the action a lot. One of them starts screaming every time there is a battle for 15th place or when the gap between 4th and 5th place starts decreasing. So during today’s final laps it was like listening to the commentary of the 2012 Brazilian Grand Prix. That is probably too much for my taste. Also, I believe that commentators should openly admit that a race is boring if that is very obviously the case.

    Nevertheless, I think that they should normally be positive and encourage the viewers to keep watching, which means that hyping up might be necessary now and then. I would not want to see new potential fans leaving and never coming back just because they accidentally switched the F1 channel on and it sounded “meh”.

    Generally, I believe that good commentators should be like @KeithCollantine is on this website – serious and telling it “as it is” but also staying positive, affording the occasional joke and posting things like “caption competitions” :)

    #334306
    Girts
    Participant

    Well, I’m not sure there is a bookie, who would take bets on Bottas now…

    Anyway, Vandoorne would be my second choice.

    #320690
    Girts
    Participant

    At the moment, only three teams (Ferrari, Mercedes and Red Bull) are capable of winning a race, everything else would be seen as a huge sensation. Right now it looks like all of them might retain the current driver line-ups for the next year although anything could still happen. McLaren and Renault are also expected to win races over the upcoming years. I will be surprised if Vandoorne does not end up at McLaren in 2017 and it would make sense for Renault to replace Palmer with Ocon, too. So these two could get their hands on winning equipment quite soon. For sure, there are too many ifs and buts so most probably I will be wrong. However, given the current situation & actual expectations, I am saying that Stoffel Vandoorne will be the 107th GP winner.

    #320043
    Girts
    Participant

    These predictions have not been easy. When Daniel Ricciardo won his first race almost two years ago, Max Verstappen was just a Formula 3 driver. Right now, it is also very hard to predict the 107th Grand Prix winner. Still, let’s take a look at some of the candidates.

    Romain Grosjean: 10 podiums so far. Not many doubt his ability to win a race but he most probably would need to move to Ferrari’s ‘A team’ to be able to do that.

    Valtteri Bottas: 8 podiums. Williams have only the fourth best car at the moment so I do not see it happening this year. Does any top team still have an eye on him? Or can Williams build another strong car for 2017?

    Kevin Magnussen: 1 podium. Renault aim to win again but it is going to take time. Will Magnussen still be there by then? Or will another driver (Esteban Ocon?) have the honour of winning the first race for the ‘new’ Renault team?

    Stoffel Vandoorne: A very exciting prospect. If McLaren sign him as a race driver and finally manage to build a competitive car (with a competitive Honda engine) again, then it might happen as soon as next year.

    Carlos Sainz Jr: Will he ever make it to Red Bull?

    What do you guys think?

    #319719
    Girts
    Participant

    I support the FIA’s decision. I also cannot go back to the high school that I graduated from in 2002 and start attending lessons and taking exams there again. Of course, the motorsport ladder is a bit different from conventional education systems but this still does not feel right.

    Moreover, I have never been a fan of one-off appearances like these even if they are good for ‘the show’. I do not want to see Grosjean at a NASCAR race either. I believe that it kind of degrades the series if some guy arrives there with no intention to stay and score as many points as possible. ‘I felt kinda bored so I thought I’d just come here and burn some rubber, ya know…’ Do it properly, do at least one full season or do not do it at all.

    #313272
    Girts
    Participant

    You should keep it, there is no doubt about it. Firstly, we have a driver of the weekend poll, which is a slightly different and probably better concept. Secondly, we can look at a lot of data and analyse the performance of every driver before voting. Thirdly, F1 Fanatic generally tends to be much more sensible than F1 when doing something so we should keep doing this to be able to use it as a case in point (“Watch and learn!”) :)

Viewing 15 posts - 1 through 15 (of 677 total)