2023 Bahrain Grand Prix - Sakhir, March 03 - 05

[Sieper]

Great race by Alonso. Showed his quality and ability to adapt to condtions. He knew just how to place the car and he he was able to get it to rotate. The overtake on Lewis and the battle with Sainz. It seems he drives with a little understeer. Both times when he lost the front during the battles he was leaning on the front.
Alonso can try to keep getting podiums and hope that rbr and ferrari have a melt down. He can be a part of the championship fight.

Sainz was worst driver today. He always seems not able to swim in the deep end with the big boys. Always struggling to drive at the same pace like the other front runners and damaging the tyres. He needs a dominant car to be champion. On the other hand very dissapointing for Charles who wss pushing to at least stay within 10 seconds of Max.

At redbull i wonder ehy Pereze was put on a different strategy. I feel he could have been able to challenge Max on the same. But I guess Redbull arent interested in any internal battles.

Great debut by Sargeant. Piastri.. hmm he's okay. Remains to be seen if he was worth the drama last year. Gasly is proving really good insurance for Alpine. They really needed his quality.

Bottas also raced well. He should consifer changing teams after his contract is up. He needs a quicker car.

Stroll could be challenging Alonso once his wrists are well and he gets some more seat time. He put in a respectable performance given the circumstances of his accident.

Both RBs ran S S H right?

I think Max was SHS and Perez was SSH?

No. SSH both. Max’ second tire was shown wrong on the television.

[fourmula1]

The ironic thing now is that the cost cap is working right against what it was supposed to achieve. It would only work on the assumption that all teams started out in 2022 within a couple of tenths of each other. Now when the RB concept is the proven winner, they have a 2 year development advantage which no one will be able to catch up to with limited resources. Had the 2021 regulations been kept, we would have had at least 3 teams within 2 tenths of each other both last year and this year, and amazing seasons for years to come.

Hats off to Newey though, he is a true master of his craft. That car will win all races this year, and easily so. But it’s going to be incredibly boring since there won’t even be a team mate fight at the top.

It does seem this way. Cant spend to catch up, tighter technical restrictions so no clever tricks, engines are all about the same.

[Cs98]

Last year they completely exhausted the patience of their fans and they cannot and should not believe they can ask for more patience.

Then they must have some really poor fans, given how much success they've given them. Spoiled brats you might call those kinds of fans.

[Sieper]

The ironic thing now is that the cost cap is working right against what it was supposed to achieve. It would only work on the assumption that all teams started out in 2022 within a couple of tenths of each other. Now when the RB concept is the proven winner, they have a 2 year development advantage which no one will be able to catch up to with limited resources. Had the 2021 regulations been kept, we would have had at least 3 teams within 2 tenths of each other both last year and this year, and amazing seasons for years to come.

Hats off to Newey though, he is a true master of his craft. That car will win all races this year, and easily so. But it’s going to be incredibly boring since there won’t even be a team mate fight at the top.

I think it is working. The whole field was within 1,2 second in the qualy. There were times were Mercedes was in front of that to even the second best team (by more even). We see a customer team challenging the 3 works teams at the top. That would never have happened in the last decade.

[Cs98]

The whole field is close? Alonso 25sec down on the bulls, owkay

Firstly, I meant Qualifying pace of course.
Secondly, that whole race picture got distorted by Leclerc's retirement and Alonso's struggles early on. Quite likely the gaps will not be that huge come next race.

Max pulled 10s on leclerc in 1 stint and chilled the rest of the race. The gaps are unlikely to be this big next race sure but the gap today was only as small as 25s because RB lifted foot off the throttle when things were settled. In the budget cap, lowering stress on components and risk of mistakes is essential and that's why we're not seeing huge gaps imo.

Also if you look at the laptimes, max also drove stint 1 as well to a delta when he was pulling a lead out on leclerc. So we likely never saw RB's true pace. Ideally you would be more gentle at the start and then push the tyres more later on.

The gaps from RB to the field were flattering for the others.. not the other way around

This is a high deg circuit though. At lower deg circuits AMR/RB advantage in that department will be nerfed and Ferrari's pure pace will be more advantageous

It's also a traction dependent circuit, which seems to play to the strengths of the RB and AM. Jeddah is very different.

[Cs98]

The ironic thing now is that the cost cap is working right against what it was supposed to achieve. It would only work on the assumption that all teams started out in 2022 within a couple of tenths of each other. Now when the RB concept is the proven winner, they have a 2 year development advantage which no one will be able to catch up to with limited resources. Had the 2021 regulations been kept, we would have had at least 3 teams within 2 tenths of each other both last year and this year, and amazing seasons for years to come.

Hats off to Newey though, he is a true master of his craft. That car will win all races this year, and easily so. But it’s going to be incredibly boring since there won’t even be a team mate fight at the top.

I think it is working. The whole field was within 1,2 second in the qualy. There were times were Mercedes was in front of that to even the second best team (by more even). We see a customer team challenging the 3 works teams at the top. That would never have happened in the last decade.

AM is proof that catching up is possible. The issue I'm seeing is not that the regulations don't allow for catching up, they do, that's what ATR was designed to do. The real issue is that Mercedes have crapped the bed, again. They have some of the best resources available, more ATR than RB, and they design a piece of ---.

[Big Tea]

It was the same at the end of 'the Ferrari years' (tm). All the best people were in the same place and all the other teams did their level best to get them, because they were the best.

At some point the same is going to happen to Red Bull. Possibly when Newie retires, or the word id he is going to retire. It may be more spread now that there is a cost cap, but engineers move for 2 things, money or glory (OK then interest ) and moving from a dominant team to a team that looks like they can topple them would interest most people.
It has always been so in F1 and always will be.

[Tvetovnato]

The ironic thing now is that the cost cap is working right against what it was supposed to achieve. It would only work on the assumption that all teams started out in 2022 within a couple of tenths of each other. Now when the RB concept is the proven winner, they have a 2 year development advantage which no one will be able to catch up to with limited resources. Had the 2021 regulations been kept, we would have had at least 3 teams within 2 tenths of each other both last year and this year, and amazing seasons for years to come.

Hats off to Newey though, he is a true master of his craft. That car will win all races this year, and easily so. But it’s going to be incredibly boring since there won’t even be a team mate fight at the top.

I think it is working. The whole field was within 1,2 second in the qualy. There were times were Mercedes was in front of that to even the second best team (by more even). We see a customer team challenging the 3 works teams at the top. That would never have happened in the last decade.

Quali was a bit up and down though, and it seemed like teams were still finding their feet, especially RB. Max was not too happy and still got pole. In the coming few races the gap will increase. RB had no challenge whatsoever in the race, and still wonder where all their testing pace went. Last season was somewhat close in the first half, but now that concepts have been tested and we see what was the best, there will be no chance for any team to properly catch up. Alonso will take some podiums, so good effort by AM, but that will still be in no mans land come the end of the races.

[johnny comelately]

The Liberty/ F1 goal of marketing this to USA and more of the world will fall flat on its face if they cannot produce racing.

[AR3-GP]

Boring.

Controversial claim: I only saw it live during the broadcast but my impression was that Alonso was oddly slow during his contact with Stroll. Sure, Lance is mostly to blame for it but I don´t think it was 100% his fault, Fernando needs to start better next time around

He slowed surrendering the position to Hamilton who had the inside and then he tried to change his line out of turn4 to get a better run. That slight change of direction contributed to the contact a bit but If you see the on board from lance, you will see that his dive into the corner seemed a bit risky and opportunistic. I must agree though that the change of line Alonso did out of turn4, didn't help. But i understand why he did it. He did get a better run out of turn 4 than Hamilton and it would be interesting to see how that played out if there was no contact.

It reminds me of Russell hitting Sainz in T1 at COTA (US gp) last year.

[Chuckjr]

Awesome race thanks to Fred. He will save the season from becoming monotonous. Keep in mind Fallows has said the AMR is getting massive updates and will be a different car by end of year. They obviously are building on a good concept and will find lots of time. I don’t think they challenge for the title this year, but I do think Fred will fight for wins. Yes, plural. Tire deg on the AMR is insane good and Fred seems to love the car. These are all good signs of more to come from AMR.

Red Bull has done a great job and deserve their position. Congrats to them. Max will likely win the title.

Macca is over Zac’s head. Problems are bigger than he can wrap his mind around. His ideas and plan are not working because the job is bigger than he is — and that’s saying something. Williams 2.0.

Ferrari is an embarrassment and imo the biggest disappointment, save Macca. They still haven’t resolved their power unit problems obviously, and their race pace and tire deg is poor. Even with their supposed engine boost, they are no match for RB and slipping into the mouth of AMR. Sainz (and Lewis) got their asses handed to them by Fred today. Beat downs commencing. Shaall is next in line, then on to Checo.

Drag on the Merc was so bad Lewis couldn’t pass Sainz — even with DRS. Wow. Those rear tires are still boat anchors and their tire deg is as bad as Ferrari. Merc is no match for AMR. Even Stroll could keep Russell behind. Fred was just pacing Lewis — biding his time to strike. Fish in a barrel. Bring on Jedda...it’s just getting good ladies and gents.

Nailed it:
viewtopic.php?p=1116194#p1116194

Fred was indeed ready to kick Merc’s ass, and that’s exactly what he did today.

[zeph]

The ironic thing now is that the cost cap is working right against what it was supposed to achieve. It would only work on the assumption that all teams started out in 2022 within a couple of tenths of each other. Now when the RB concept is the proven winner, they have a 2 year development advantage which no one will be able to catch up to with limited resources. Had the 2021 regulations been kept, we would have had at least 3 teams within 2 tenths of each other both last year and this year, and amazing seasons for years to come.

Hats off to Newey though, he is a true master of his craft. That car will win all races this year, and easily so. But it’s going to be incredibly boring since there won’t even be a team mate fight at the top.

I think it is working. The whole field was within 1,2 second in the qualy. There were times were Mercedes was in front of that to even the second best team (by more even). We see a customer team challenging the 3 works teams at the top. That would never have happened in the last decade.

This, emphatically.

AM performance today makes the case for the cost cap. But it’s only a single race, and I feel like Mercedes under-delivered a bit while Alonso had the knife between his teeth. Without Leclerc’s misfortune, I doubt he would have made it to the podium.

I’ve been waiting for his third title ever since ‘07, and I don’t think it’ll happen anymore, but I’ll take what I can get! YEAY!

[Bisonas]

Controversial claim: I only saw it live during the broadcast but my impression was that Alonso was oddly slow during his contact with Stroll. Sure, Lance is mostly to blame for it but I don´t think it was 100% his fault, Fernando needs to start better next time around

He slowed surrendering the position to Hamilton who had the inside and then he tried to change his line out of turn4 to get a better run. That slight change of direction contributed to the contact a bit but If you see the on board from lance, you will see that his dive into the corner seemed a bit risky and opportunistic. I must agree though that the change of line Alonso did out of turn4, didn't help. But i understand why he did it. He did get a better run out of turn 4 than Hamilton and it would be interesting to see how that played out if there was no contact.

It reminds me of Russell hitting Sainz in T1 at COTA (US gp) last year.

Yes the 2 incidents are similar, but Russells dive at Cota IMO was a much bigger mistake than strolls. Russell dived into the corner with such speed that he would probably touch Sainz even if sainz have stayed behind Verstappen on the exit of T1. Sainz changing line just made things worst for him (he spun), but it was 100% Russell to blame. Russell couldn't turn the car and he wasn't in complete control of the car at that point. I don't think stroll dived in such a manner today. He was the one that should have avoided it yea, but he would have made the corner if Alonso didn't change the line, and fair to him, he did tried to avoid it when he realized what Alonso was about to do. You can see that from the onboard. It was more of a racing incident today and bad timing IMO. I would say 70/30 Stroll fault yes, but more on the racing incident side than on causing a collision side. But on Live TV it looked really bad for stroll and very clumsy in did.

[CHT]

RBR's dominant display of speed and reliability can only be bad news for their rivals. Having established such a big gap at the front, the RBR should be able to seal both championships despite their budget cap penalty.

Aston Martin podium finish and strong display using Merc PU will put more pressure on Merc team as they struggle with their zero sidepod concepts. Hamilton may have to wait for a long while before Merc can give him a championship-winning car.

For 2023, I think this will be a battle between AM and Merc to finish 3rd (or Alonso vs Hamilton)

[Big Tea]

Like the W11 with everyone elses hands tied behind their backs because of cost cap!

I dont like the cost cap idea since it cripples competition.

There needs to be a better way.

To me, if there is a cost cap, the construction rules do not need to be so tight, as it was supposedly to save costs.
With things so closely regulated any tiny edge is going to be enormously expensive, and there is no way an enterprising team can grab an edge by doing something different or unexpected because it is ruled out.

As long as the cost cap is met, why are al the restrictions needed?


I agree some are for safety or to be 'green', but there is no wriggle room with or without spare cash and geniuses engineers and designers. it is like Lego, you use what's in the box, you can not add anything