I remember Seb arguing with his engineers back when he was at Ferrari. This team kills drivers. They took a prime Alonso and turned him into a mid table driver, (we can now again see how good he is once he gets what he wants), they did the same to a prime Seb, and they will do it to Charles. Ferrari isn't a great team anymore. They are a clown team run by people whose egos are too big. We saw this with Merc this past year when they refused to admit that their concept was wrong. Just imagine a team doing that for 16 years straight now.
You are so right, it hurts. We tend to think they must be smart. And they probably are. But is not the smart people at Ferrari who's making the decisions, sadly. Poor Charles, poor Carlos. I think they feel very alone in there.
Not sure how relevant Mercs situation is with Ferrari's. Toto is the team principle and co-owner of the team with Mercedes (33% stake by each) so I don't see the same high-level interference we assume is happening at Ferrari. Aston can do w/e it wants since Stroll owns the whole deal and sells portions off as necessary to sponsors/investors. Oracle Red Bull racing's CEO is Horner so *he* would be the high-level interference if there was any... we seem to see the worst flexibility out of teams that have principles that are neither owners nor part of the high-level structure that makes up the team's ownership... and Ferrari's pedigree means we see this inflexibility worse than any other team.
There is a difference however, Vettel and Alonso were already pre-established drivers with championship success, Charles Leclerc doesn't have championship success and he may try to move on from Ferrari sooner rather than later in order to try and get that success.
The man himself has been saying he was staying at Mercedes. It didn't matter what was going on at Ferrari. I don't even know why people were even entertaining anything different. I guess, like he said, they were bored and needed something to talk about 🤦♀️
@@lalalittle3900 yeah, anyone who thought he was actually goin to Ferrari is bonkers. Ferrari would need to offer him 100mil a year and a blow job from Beyonce...
I remember when I first started watching F1, there was refueling and a bunch of different strategies going on, and sitting with the timing board trying to work it all out was weirdly fun. So I kinda enjoyed it from that perspective
I rewatched monaco 2008 recently and remembered how confusing races were back in the day. Especially those fuel strategies where people would be driving at different speeds because of different fuel loads. Remember how Mclaren fucked up brazil 2007 with their shit fuel strategy and having to do an extra stop
God I hated so much the old F1 time board where it only showed the gap between pilots on the bottom of the screen 5 drivers at a time and you had to wait 1 minute to see the gap between the drivers you're interested in
34:44 They pitted Bottas early to test the hard tires for Zhou knowing that Bottas had zero hope for points. And luckily that strategy worked. Also at some point during Zhou's 2nd stint, Zhou's TR instructed him to stop saving tires and that's when Zhou's lap time significantly improved (more than 0.5s a lap I believe). The team must have gained more knowledge about tire deg thanks to Botta's extra laps.
The cars aren’t just more reliable, they’re also closer to each other. 25 years ago, in Barcelona, Hakkinen got P1 in quali. He was 0.7 seconds ahead of DC in second and 1.5 seconds ahead of Schumi in 3rd! Rn people are moaning if the top 5 isn’t within 1 second.
You can't compare absolute numbers, if the average laptime was a lot slower, naturally the gap would also be bigger. If you want to measure how close the field is best to calculate in percentages.
@@florisbackx1744 Alright then, Schumachers time was 1.9% slower than Hakkinens was (80.262 seconds * x = 81.785 seconds x = 1.019 (which is 101.9%, or 1.9% slower). Verstappens pole time this weekend was 72.272 seconds, if you multiply that by 1.019, or add 1.9% (72.272 * 1.019), you get 73.645 seconds, which is only about four hundredths faster than Piastris time for tenth place. So even with percentages the field is quite a bit closer, when looking at these examples alone
Quali gaps in Q1 have been around 1 second all season from Redbull to whoever is the worse car. Monaco Quali had about 3-5 drivers would could’ve been pole.
I think Merc looked so good in this race because Aston and Ferrari seem to have taken a step back. We'll need to see a few more races before we can know for sure.
idk if theyve stepped back. i think on a track that ate up tires, ferrari were gonna suffer automatically. and this being a front limited track challenges the weak side of the AM
@@ddogwr83 But even at Australia Mercedes were Barley faster than Aston, Aston should've been 2nd fastest on paper. Mercedes just blitzed by them this race.
Youre also comparing a car with major upgrades size race 1 (Merc) vs a car that does not and has been stagnant in development since race 1 (AM) vs a totally incompetent team that is its worst enemy (SF)
Does nobody remember the '21 Russian GP when Alonso practiced flying through the run-off area right before a race started, then once the race started, he did just that?
I thought of that as soon as they brought it up. I think Alonso later said in an interview or something that he did it because he knew that the fia would be more lenient on the first lap and let him get away with the move.
I am from Barbados and I a new F1 fan your show is the best most informative I absolutely love the energy and info here keep up the good work guys u have a new fan
After this race, i hope they keep Rosberg away as presenter. During post-race interviews, he started asking stupid question to Toto (and Toto was visibly annoyed), then Natalie burned Nico: "He is not your boss anymore, you don't have to suck up to him!". It gotten so awkward the camera was panning away to keep Rosberg out of the frame for a bit.
@@joshsmith7521it seems like WTF1 has already given up on “replacing” Matt and Tommy with the new personalities and have instead just gone with pure faceless content production.
Just discovered this podcast. What gem of a channel. Information instead of the usual fandom, speculation and intrigue of e.g. Sky and Missed Apex Podcast. Thank you
Like the idea but it might get a bit difficult to read though. My tv's not massive and the current graphics aren't the most visible from the other side of the room.
Alonso just chilling at the end, could have easily passed Stroll but instead he's waving to the crowd, correcting his engineer on the final positions...goated
I'm going to put this in every recap video until it get's implemented: We need a graphic while you're recapping your Thursday predictions showing your current scores. Make this a valid competition between you two!
32:21 I’ve said it a thousand times and I’ll continue to say it. To have closer championships, points need to go as follows: 25,21,18,15,12,10,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1
It's nice to see that Mercedes is back somewhat but personally I'd put caution on being too confident about their comeback. Brazil 2022 and Austrailia 2023 were once seen as supposed turning points for Mercedes. Yet after both those races the team just went back to the same state they were before. And I'd argue more that Brazil 2022 likely did more harm than good because it probably fooled the team into thinking they already have a winning package. 2 races this season, meanwhile, is hardly a good sample size for knowing how good the upgrades are. I'd give it until Hungary to see whether or not Mercedes can now be more competitive.
Exactly. But they seem happy both with the car and each other (calling each other “bro”) so that can only mean they’re confident it won’t be a one-off in Spain.
I think one of the reason why people are more excited this time is that Mercedes even during those races in the past were quite vocal about not being able to figure out what was wrong with the car. And the fact that this new concept of their car is as fast if not faster than the car they worked on for 1.5 years gives people hope that maybe in 2024 we will have a title fight again.
@@gameofender4463 Confidence is good, but remember that they were also confident that their previous concept would work and it didn't pan out that way.
@@nanashiamaterasu8155 Don't know Red Bull still has plenty of pace in hand, and won't do much for this years car anymore and put more focus on next year. They still have 1,5 years in development advantage. I'd love to see it but I doubt it will happen, plus there's still Ferrari and Aston Martin who are possibly still ahead of Mercedes.
I totally agree with Tommy on the apparent lack of trust in the Ferrari garage regarding strategy. It was weird for me to hear him vocalizing my exact thoughts in real time.
To be fair, the second stint Charles did on hards was much better than the first, he said it himself in the post race interview. He probably didn’t want the hard because of the first experience. Engineers have access to much more data then drivers, call should be on them plus it’s not like it was a mistake to do the hard.
4:12. This is UNFORTUNATELY what the season is bringing… ‘other comments such as ‘sadly, Max wins…’ I am an engineer, and I have to say, I feel disappointed that you are literally bemoaning what Formula 1 is all about. This is a constructor’s series. It began in order to create competition that drove innovation, was tested on the race track, and the winning components found their way into the cars you and I drive every day. It is not boring. What you are witnessing is Perfection. The goal of F1 is the perfect marriage of the perfect driver with the perfect car. When that happens, we are witnessing greatness. We are witnessing greatness right now. I find nothing contrary about that. It is not RBR or Max’ job to create the environment where there is greater competition at the front…the onus is on the other teams for that. People who think like you don’t cRe for the engineering greatness of F1 and just want run of the mill, 20 year old design stock cars where all variables are whittled down to maximize racing only…well there is a series for you and it’s called Indy. Appreciate this greatness. Enjoy watching teams innovate as they attempt to reach the standard set by the greatest driver and greatest car on the grid…Mercedes is showing that potential right now. Enjoy the races not one by one but as a whole. Perhaps my comments are more appreciated by those in STEM fields. But you ‘true’ Formula 1 fans? Why don’t you ACT like it instead of bemoaning your own sport, and that goes for you too, Matt and Tommy.
i think she doesn't want to work with toxic people that hate specifically a team (merc) she is though more into the merc family with her love for mcclaren
Very good point, I cant actually recall any other ream wihere drivers regularly argue strategy mid race. Sainz especially is always getting heated with his engineer over their wonky decisions.
I like the 2 stops, but if that becomes the norm they need to keep the tire-age numbers up on the screen the whole time. It was hard to keep track of who is where.
17:59...Thank you Thomas for the "rant" (angry Tommy makes me 😊). 0.00001% chance! There's always talk during the race between teams & drivers about who they're actually racing...Lando should have been protecting against Stroll's move above trying to retake the position back from Hamilton. ***Lap 1 Shenanigans*** Russell Barcelona 2023 = Alonso Sochi 2021
About 15 laps I texted a mate to say this race would be really interesting with the strategy variations if Max didn’t exist. Perez was terrible. Until the final stint showed no pace vs the Mercs Russell was cheeky but last year we lauded Alonso when he asked about a similar loop hole and then practiced it flat out before doing it lap 1. Until they make real deterrent they should all do it
I do not think the answer would be mandatory two-stop races. As soon as the optimal strategy is found most will go for that. The thing that works is when they do not all go for the same strategy. Stopping only once is not in itself the issue. It would likely be most exciting if not all stop the same amount of times. It may need more variables than just the tires, though. This aspect worked better in the days when refuelling was allowed - but just reintroducing that would not be a good idea for many reasons.
They’ll do well at front limited tracks but blow it at the real limited ones. It wasn’t the upgrades either because they were in shape to the same thing in Australia.
Thanks for answering my question! Had to make it as controversial as possible to get the best results from the both of you, haha 🧐 Keep it up you guys!
Regarding the first ~9 minutes and first question, I 100% agree with Tommy's take that (especially considering this was at Barcelona) the use of all three tires/deg-required-2-stops created an excellent baseline for future F1 races being **at-least** interesting. If it wasn't **exciting** that's not the fault of F1, but the rest of the teams/drivers not being near the level of RB/Max.
Would it be worth increasing the race distance by 10-15% to increase the likely hood of pitstops and reliability will become more of a problem once we reach the 12th/13th round
Make these V6 engines rev to 18,000 RPM and that will solve the reliability question. The reasons the V10' and V8's weren't so reliable was because they revved so high. But yes, I'm also not the biggest fan of every race there is no reliability issues. On the plus side, the V6's will sound better too
There was a lot of mechanical issues in the v6 era, just look at Red Bulls last year first 3 races and the whole season alpine especially Alonso always had some issues with his car
Mandatory 2 stop is just fine, but mandatory all 3 tires is really not a good idea. We'll have the same thing as here in Spain, and especially like in Hungary 2022 where teams will be forced to use a tire that is literally unsafe because it's too hard and not hot enough on track to get grip on it. That's just for the hard tire as well, we could also potentially have this happen with soft tires with those overheating and that causing uncessary danger as well. Not to mention, that completely takes away half he strategy because every team will pit for the same 3 tires in different order, instead of higher variances with soft, medium, soft, or medium, hard, medium, etc.
4:12. This is UNFORTUNATELY what the season is bringing… ‘other comments such as ‘sadly, Max wins…’ I agree with your statement. I am an engineer, and I have to say, I feel disappointed that they are literally bemoaning what Formula 1 is all about. This is a constructor’s series. It began in order to create competition that drove innovation, was tested on the race track, and the winning components found their way into the cars you and I drive every day. It is not boring. What you are witnessing is Perfection. The goal of F1 is the perfect marriage of the perfect driver with the perfect car. When that happens, we are witnessing greatness. We are witnessing greatness right now. I find nothing contrary about that. It is not RBR or Max’ job to create the environment where there is greater competition at the front…the onus is on the other teams for that. People who think like you don’t cRe for the engineering greatness of F1 and just want run of the mill, 20 year old design stock cars where all variables are whittled down to maximize racing only…well there is a series for you and it’s called Indy. Appreciate this greatness. Enjoy watching teams innovate as they attempt to reach the standard set by the greatest driver and greatest car on the grid…Mercedes is showing that potential right now. Enjoy the races not one by one but as a whole. Perhaps my comments are more appreciated by those in STEM fields. But you ‘true’ Formula 1 fans? Why don’t you ACT like it instead of bemoaning your own sport, and that goes for you too, Matt and Tommy.
@@mamavswild Thing is any claim to any sort of technical whatever goes out the window when F1 changes rules to appease a team. Like raising the cars after Mercedes whined about porpoising. Which also makes harder for the cars to stay close together. And teams clearly don't want cars to be able to follow, which just makes passing less likely.
For me when they killed refueling they killed strategy. Forced two stops would also be artificial and not very entertaining. I think having a choice between doing a one stop and doing faster laps but two stops is really what made the pre 2010 era entertaining. Like having force india qualify well in 2009 because they took less fuel into qualifying created so much buzz. It was so good and they need to bring it back. Keep the fuel flow limit but eliminate the 110 kg total limit and let drivers go back to the schumi approach of doing a race full of qualifying laps and just killing tires with no regard for the well being of that rubber. That's formula 1.
I watched the race at weekend and listened to several pods. Everyone excited about Mercedes but everyone all with short memories. Recall how good their car was on this track last year? Russle Podium. Cant believe not a single pundit mentioned it.
Too anyone who doesnt think the mandatory 2 stop with 3 compounds wont work. Watch the gran turismo world finals races from multiple years now. It may be "sim" racing but every race comes down to a grandstand finish with multiple cars on alternate strategies converging
Imo, I liked Miami more than Spain. The multiple pitstops made it hard to follow what's actually going on and the overtakes weren't really better. Drivers on different strategies are nice when there's a catch up game like Pérez on Russel at the end, but mostly results in easy overtakes. Quali was spicy tho.
What if they use 4 components in stead of 3 for the weekend? If they use the C2 C3 C4 then add the C1 or the C5. Giving teams more flexibility in making there pitstop strategy.
as an utter red bull hater, red bull have the best car, #1 driver, best management, best strategist, best pit crew, shit probably even the best lemon water or whatever. can they be beat? of course. can they be beat more often than not over a 20+ race season?? oh god no and i don’t see that changing anytime soon.
Implementing all mandatory tyres seems a bit too artificial for me, however I do agree that tyres should have higher degradation and there should be a greater difference in performance between the compounds, to cause different strategies. I feel if all tyres are mandatory, there will be a clear best strategy that everyone will follow.
10:46 starting from the pitlane aggravates the fact that they have awful tyre management because he had all this free air to do clean laps and manage tyres!
Matt did jinx the changes to the track making it an exciting race. I feel like the drs was activated too far down the straight so the cars were already at near top speed when being activated.
@@ghoulishchutoyhe was soft, also Hamilton wasn't pushing either. Hamilton also backed off about 4 seconds in the last 2/3 laps. He lost time behind stroll and Sainz after he got hit by Norris. I agree that Max probably had more in the tank than Lewis did, but it probably comes out to about 20/25 seconds when you account for everything. Remember we have seen the Bulls true pace in Baku. Are the Mercs gonna be racing the Bulls anytime soon, no. Is it a great step forward, yes
Pre 2007 spanish GP were still run faster than the 2023 Spanish GP: 2004 Michael Schumacher Ferrari 66 laps 1:27:32.841 2005 Kimi Räikkönen McLaren-Mercedes 66 laps 1:27:16.830 2006 Fernando Alonso Renault 66 1:26:21.759 2023 Max Verstappen Red Bull Racing-Honda RBPT 66 laps 1:27:57.940 Pre 2007 race cars are 3-4 seconds slower in Qualifying, but still faster in the race!
@@joshuasenior4370 what about the cars in race trim now are just useless: overweight, managing tyres, managing fuel, managing ers charge and deployment. That's why we see no errors, they are not pushing at all now. Only managing. Back then it was qualifying lap after qualifying lap. No lift and coast. Plus the tyre war made them last so much longer
This race was one safety car or weather change from being the best of the year. We already had a mixed starting lineup, drivers going through the field, tire strategy, George Russell meme, it was still a good watch.
Just a thought. Seems like the budget cap is preventing drivers from sending it on the attack. It seems as though they’re so afraid of wrecking the car and running up the operation cost that they’re missing out on racing.
I agree with the point about Ferrari drivers being to nice and needing to be more assertive. I forget the exact race in 2022 where there was a safety car and Carlos was assertive with his race engineer regarding the gap to LeClerc in front for the restart. Tuned out he got it right and effectively got LeClerc the win! Ferrari really need to listen to the drivers more!
'Are Mercedes back?' I love how that always comes up after a decent performance. I mean look at Austrailia, great performance there but that's it. Similar, Barcelona is a mid-highspeed circuit, which plays to the weakness of Aston Martin, making Mercedes look great
😂"For Spain..." Reminds me of my buddy at University, Pirlo was his favorite italian midfielder of the late 2000s. Someone told him that's worth as much as saying Gonorrhea is his favorite STD and they ended up fighting each other over Andrea Pirlo's first name😂 Good times
I think we need to remember that was a good race not because there were two stops, but because the drivers needed to stop twice. I think the difference between the two is meaningful and I don’t think a mandatory two stop would result in the same outcome. Pirelli needs to make better tires that don’t last an entire race. I don’t know how we are even in this position. That’s just soo far off what the target tire should be
There should be a permanent visual showing the number of pit stops made (Next to the timing visual). Not just a brief display of them. We could easily work out true race positions easily.
Everyone was loving what Alonso did because he told us his plan a few days before he did it. He cut the corner because he wanted to expose how inconsistent the FIA was with cutting corners/gaining advantage on the 1st lap... The best part is that he got away with it. Since then, they started penalising them much more for that, except when there's a British driver in question.
@@Zachary_McLaren prove me wrong then, by all means... Find an example where a British driver got penalized equally as others for doing the exact same thing... I'll wait.
@@Ennui. That's not how that works, you're making the claim that there's a bias so you have to prove it. And just so you know, one or two cherry picked examples doesn't count as proof.
@@Zachary_McLaren 2016 Mexico GP... 2 identical incidents of corner cutting (just on different laps), Verstappen got penalised, Hamilton didn't... Hamilton deserved a penalty way more than Verstappen did. If the FIA wasn't biased, both would get penalised. Don't worry, I'll give you more examples if this doesn't satisfy you.
I don't support a mandatory 2 stop strategy. It will make strategy more predictable since you can pit a 2nd time knowing very well the driver you're competing with will have to pit too. It's better when teams are cautious because they don't know if a competitor is going for a one-stop or a 2 stop.
On the Lecerc point of starting the race on hards and changing soon thereafter, didn't ferrari decide not to test the hards in FP since they thought the hards to be similar to experimental Pirerlli which was mandatory? I thought they were the only team that did so...
Leclerc said on Post Race Show that he had no grip at the first stint. That's why he pit early. And at the end of the race the same compound deliver a much better grip and performance. Nothing makes sense at Ferrari this year...
allot of people are asking is mercedes back but look at last year we said the same thing. It would be good but im not convinced they will be as good in Canada. There is a possibility for a repeat of last year
No, I do not think Merc is back just track related, and Ferarri and Alonso had an off day. Alonso said they will crush the opposition from Canada onwards
We need tyres on hard that go max 20 laps, middle 15 laps and soft 10 laps. Ferrari is back in the 80s and early 90s. Maybe we need a bop style like Hyper Cars in WEC have. Mercedes was already strong last year in spain. We must wait the next races. The Red Bull with Vettel was not so dominant like Mercedes or now Verstappen.
You know I do think F1 may need to consider changing its scoring system. For the majority of seasons since the current system was introduced in 2010, we have seen one sided whitewashes. Vettel in 2011 and 2013, Hamilton in 2015, 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020, and Max in 2022 and now this season. The current system pretty much requires everyone to focus exclusively on who finishes first because the amount of points you get for finishing 1st is so much larger than all the other positions. Red Bull got more points for finishing 1st and 4th than Mercedes got for finishing 2nd and 3rd, when it probably should be the other way round. The gap between finishing 1st and 3rd is larger than the gap between finish 3rd and 7th. It very much allows the GP winners to run away with the title very easily. The title fight is already over, and we are only a third of the way through the season.
For once, I disagree with the first half of ferrari strategy blunder. I believe they wanted leclerc to go long. But the first hard stint was so bad that they have to pit him so early. Proven by Leclerc stating how strange he also felt that it was so difficult on the first hard stint, but not at all on the second hard stint. Also, what Russel did was very similar, I think, to what Alonso did in Sochi 2021. Just overtake into the braking zone, take the escape road, and send it around and rejoin ahead. If anything, I think that's an absolute chad move there.
I think the big issue with Ferrari strategy is that they are too rigid and unwilling to change it, regardless of race conditions. Their simulations/computers said it was A, so they stick with A, even if it makes no sense and clearly their simulations don't account for what actually happens during a race. I found that last year, they gambled too many times on what others would do, or a safety car, instead of running their race and reacting to events as they happen (IF.. they happen).
Before everyone jumps on the train saying that M-B is back, pay close attention to their tire strategy. They ran Soft/Medium/Soft. They never ran hard tires so it made them look faster than they may actually be. Unlike Verstappen who ran Hards in the mid stint and still finished about 24sec. clear of Hamilton.
Many people found this race boring which is weird. I believe that this Instagram reels, TikTok and other vertical video format has decreased our attention span so much that people can’t pay attention for long enough unless there is constant action throughout the race. I mean we have more exciting races than before but because we can’t concentrate on the race for long enough before we get bored and distracted. Probably also because there was not even a single yellow flag. I found this Spanish gp really exciting even as an alonso fan, he was not really on pace this weekend but 107 overtakes and literally 20 different strategies? Who does not want that?
