Bottas not being able to pass a Red Bull, did not stop him from being able to follow it closely. Instead, it had more to do with the way Max defended (which eventually led to a penalty).F1Krof wrote: ↑09 Sep 2018, 19:04And all this assumption based on just a (freakishly unique) race, with Vettel out of the race on lap 1. Oh, what do you make of Bottas not being able to pass a Red Bull on a most power hungry track? Did his car have the supposedly 'suspicious' performance.GrandAxe wrote: ↑08 Sep 2018, 16:39Mercedes did have better traction (and tyre management) than Ferrari at Monza. It was obvious during the race and I'm sure I've seen an article or two that mentioned it since then (can't recall by who unfortunately).
In Q3, the drastic turn around in their performance in sectors where they were meant to be poor was really suspicious, it was like they'd been sandbagging.
In the race, their ability to keep up with Ferrari points to two possibilities; the first, that they've might have caught up in the engine race and the second, that their aero (and/or suspension?) upgrade has given them more speed.
Whatever the case, Mercs ability to follow closely points to a possible revision of aero strategy away from a car that's optimised to drive away at the front to one that can do a close chase without understeering and destroying its tyres.
My belief is that nothing's changed. Monza just being a unique track that's all. Next week today we'll be probably talking about how poorly the Merc's handle the tires and how their rake philosophy is all poor and all that. Cheers.
Neither did the fact of Bottas being stuck behind Max mean that his cars traction and tyre handling were poor, or that his car did not have speed competitive to a Ferrari's, or that the W09 was suddenly faster in sectors where (compered to Ferrari) it had both been predicted to be poor and had indeed been poor all through practise to Q2.
The exact reverse of every item above was observed at Monza, but, nevermind, lets happily ignore observations from each race, since each they are all unique (and so, must all be freakish).
