2017 Mexico Grand Prix - Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez, 27-29 October

[DFX]

Where can I find the speed trap chart?

[Zynerji]

Where was he gonna go? I felt it was a "wrong place, wrong time" thing when I saw it..

[godlameroso]

By the way im impressed by Hartley. Actually was looking more steady than Kvyat.
Sainz and Hulk should have happened a lot time ago.

Agreed!

[drunkf1fan]

I like gloating so I'll just leave this here

Wrote this back in July 20th:

The final 9 races of the season will either suit the Mercedes or the Ferrari.

Hungary: Ferrari
Spa: Mercedes
Monza: Mercedes
Malaysia: Ferrari, lots of high speed corners and not very long straights.
Singapore: Ferrari
Suzuka: Mercedes
COTA: Toss up
Mexico: Toss up(high altitude means low drag, and lots of low and mid speed corners suit Ferrari)
Brazil: Mercedes
Abu Dhabi: Ferrari, despite the two long straights, sector 3 is where you gain or lose the most time, and Ferrari have been very good at mid speed 90 degree corners as evidenced in Sochi.

Surely it's only gloating if you actually got it right? Otherwise it just highlights that you haven't got a clue what you are in about.

Quite aside from that, everyone called most of these the same way, this wasn't some magic or difficult thing. where did Ferrari do well compared to Merc at some stage in the last couple years, Malaysia, Singapore,... what massive calls to just go the same way.

Anyone could have called most of those before the start of the season based on design philosophy of the cars.

More over, it's wrong, because RBR have made such a big jump Singapore, Malaysia, Japan and Cota were all faster for RBR than Ferrari and I suspect the same with race pace is likely to be true here with Max ahead of Vettel. Cota not being called for Merc also rather silly, the car is near enough perfect for Cota and Hamilton. He was cruising and on a very sub optimal strategy, saving engine life and still ended up 10 seconds clear.

Singapore FP2 showed RBR a huge step ahead of Ferrari, just because they lack qualifying pace doesn't change who the race favours. Malaysia and Cota you have similar situations, Vettel starting from the back or Max near the back, Vettel was closer to the front after 3 laps in Malaysia yet ended up 30+ seconds behind Max where as in Cota Max ended up only 2 seconds behind Vettel and on a fairly unoptimal strategy tire wise, he probably lost 5-8 seconds at least from being on the first set too long, the second set far too short and the last set a little too long.

Outside of qualifying the fight at which track favours which car is now between Red Bull and Mercedes... tracks where Merc can't get the tires working end up almost default Ferrari poles because Ferrari can turn their tires on better than anyone, but that is probably one of the reasons their race pace isn't there, think Merc and their poles in 2013(but no where near that level).

[iotar__]

How was Verstappen not affecting Bottas's lap ?

You see now why they put in motion martyrdom routine after a deserved penalty - so FIA marketing driven manipulators would be afraid to give them the next one.

[turbof1]

How was Verstappen not affecting Bottas's lap ?

You see now why they put in motion martyrdom routine after a deserved penalty - so FIA marketing driven manipulators would be afraid to give them the next one.

Maybe you shoud read the actual FIA report before making that comment...

[Sieper]

Could have given it, but it was just a unlucky thing to happen, second run merc timed it much better.

[Manoah2u]

Seriously impressive stuff from Verstappen, had he had that Ferrari Vettel was driving he would have been p1 by half a second.
Also very impressive p1 run from Vettel.
What happened to Mercedes? What happened to Ricciardo?

Very impressive run from Alonso, that MCL chassis is pretty potent, but i think nobody can deny the Honda is purring like a kitten now by despite it's power defecit.
VanDoorne once again being overwhelmingly disappointing.

Very curious for race day tomorrow.

Vettel and Verstappen on the front row, this is gonna be epic. Hamilton close behind, he was toying with Vettel last race but it seems the Merc is nowhere here.
Not important, he just needs to finish what, 5th? and he's the champ.

Ocon out for hunting blood it seems, he could really trash the party and make things interesting.

How high are chances for a Safety car here?

I'm really hoping for 2 stops, 1 stops are just darn boring.

[Schuttelberg]

Say what you want about Seb.. His passion for F1 just always shines through in such moments!

[ferkan]

Seriously impressive stuff from Verstappen, had he had that Ferrari Vettel was driving he would have been p1 by half a second.
Also very impressive p1 run from Vettel.
What happened to Mercedes? What happened to Ricciardo?

Very impressive run from Alonso, that MCL chassis is pretty potent, but i think nobody can deny the Honda is purring like a kitten now by despite it's power defecit.
VanDoorne once again being overwhelmingly disappointing.

Very curious for race day tomorrow.

Vettel and Verstappen on the front row, this is gonna be epic. Hamilton close behind, he was toying with Vettel last race but it seems the Merc is nowhere here.
Not important, he just needs to finish what, 5th? and he's the champ.

Ocon out for hunting blood it seems, he could really trash the party and make things interesting.

How high are chances for a Safety car here?

I'm really hoping for 2 stops, 1 stops are just darn boring.

Lol no. Like in Singapore, that RB actually looked better and more stable then Ferrari. You could see Seb actually being on absolute limit and nearly losing it in turn 6.

Hamiltons last few poles looked almighty, but his car never looked even slightly ragged when taking pole while Sebs lap in Singapore and Mexico really looked on edge.

[Sieper]

Seb is also willing to go there. That will also go wrong for him Sometimes. And indeed has already gone wrong this season.

looking forward to the race, absolutely expect Hamilton to still be there.

[Phil]

What happened to Ricciardo?

Didnt Max get the new engine that Ricciardo didnt? AFAIK, Renault could only supply one and Max got it in Austin?

[godlameroso]

Singapore FP2 showed RBR a huge step ahead of Ferrari, just because they lack qualifying pace doesn't change who the race favours. Malaysia and Cota you have similar situations, Vettel starting from the back or Max near the back, Vettel was closer to the front after 3 laps in Malaysia yet ended up 30+ seconds behind Max where as in Cota Max ended up only 2 seconds behind Vettel and on a fairly unoptimal strategy tire wise, he probably lost 5-8 seconds at least from being on the first set too long, the second set far too short and the last set a little too long.

Sorry that's total rubbish, Vettel was stuck in traffic, it's a lot harder to pass in Malaysia than at COTA, there were far more overtakes in U.S. than Malaysia. Furthermore Vettel had no practice sessions so he was going into the race blind as far as strategy.

[drunkf1fan]

Blind on strategy? Pretty much every race is the same strategy, Max's strategy wasn't close to optimum, Vettel in Malaysia one stopped....ooooo, the difficulty of that. Max looked like he was going to one stop but at some point they thought Max on fresh tires at the end would have a far easier time passing Vettel, Bottas and Kimi while if he stayed out he'd have an advantage but smaller and would be difficult. Pretty much everyone starts on a one stop these days then if the situation arises that you can make a second stop and try and be fast at the end you do it. That is true for almost every race this season... and a lot of last season.

As for harder to pass, he didn't struggle to pass anyone except Alonso...... who he got stuck behind for ages. Partially strategy, partially that Ferrari are never very fast on the harder tires, Verstappen went on a softer compound for the start of the race precisely so he would be less likely to get stuck in traffic but if you go back and watch Vettel was using a horrible line out of the final corner.

You have Alonso going wide to get early on the power and chase down the Haas, which if he had any other engine he'd have passed at the first attempt, while Vettel used the 'optimum lap time' line onto the straights, but compromised his exit and didn't take advantage of his tire life to get on the power early and get after Alonso.

No one struggled to hard to make passes, Vettel didn't struggle with anyone except Alonso who was driving better than Vettel and everyone else Vettel faced, that was the difference. But ultimately he lost a lot of time unable to pass Alonso and that itself is indicative of the pace he had... or lack of it. Verstappen was able to pass people and not get stuck precisely because he had maybe even the fastest race pace of anyone. Vettel couldn't pass Alonso, in a Mclaren, with that crappy Honda engine precisely because his race pace simply wasn't that good.

[Webber2011]

Where can I find the speed trap chart?

Here you go mate.

https://www.fia.com/events/fia-formula- ... rmation-36