2018 Singapore Grand Prix - Marina Bay, 14-16 September

[Ringleheim]

As a Ferrari fan, I wish Ferrari would fire Vettel and sign Freddy Alonso to a 1 year deal with possibility of extension if terms are met.

Alonso would be a consistently more competitive driver for Ferrari than Vettel and give them a better chance to win the drivers' and constructors' championships next year.

Vettel has done a good job of losing the championship this year all by himself.

Hell, I wish Ferrari replaced Vettel with Ricciardo! He had the better of Vettel when they were both at Red Bull and he'd have the better of him at Ferrari too.

I'm in a bad mood! I realized after the race today that the championship is over, Hamilton wins.

[siskue2005]

As a Ferrari fan, I wish Ferrari would fire Vettel and sign Freddy Alonso to a 1 year deal with possibility of extension if terms are met.

Alonso would be a consistently more competitive driver for Ferrari than Vettel and give them a better chance to win the drivers' and constructors' championships next year.

Vettel has done a good job of losing the championship this year all by himself.

Hell, I wish Ferrari replaced Vettel with Ricciardo! He had the better of Vettel when they were both at Red Bull and he'd have the better of him at Ferrari too.

I'm in a bad mood! I realized after the race today that the championship is over, Hamilton wins.

I agree with Alonso given the Ferrari but not with Ricardo at ferrari as his stock has really gone down.
All teammates have gone slower in the race....all the no1 have been miles faster....so if we consider the race order i.e Merc, RBR and Ferrari no1 in that order then the no. 2s should be Bottas, Ricardo and Kimi....but Ricardo as the last in the top cars.

So it could be Ricardo or Vettel underperforming which respect to their counter parts

They already could have signed Riccardo but they didn't...he is slower in comparison to Max

[iotar__]

Just like last year but with a better car Ferrari lost this season six races before the end. My advice: hire better drivers. [Just about lost, let's wait a bit to stick a fork .]

Ocon is as clueless as ever in wheel to wheel. Corners only work like that in his head, did he expect Perez to disappear or move against laws of physics? What a loss to F1 it will be.

100% pushing borefest, not even a chance for SC since there's no racing. Except for the rubbish type - slower drivers benefitting from better tyres by accident not by design.

Stooge nr 2s of the top three were pushed out of the way, my god those gaps, these geniuses...

[Vasconia]

Just like last year but with a better car Ferrari lost this season six races before the end. My advice: hire better drivers. [Just about lost, let's wait a bit to stick a fork .]

Ocon is as clueless as ever in wheel to wheel. Corners only work like that in his head, did he expect Perez to disappear or move against laws of physics? What a loss to F1 it will be.

100% pushing borefest, not even a chance for SC since there's no racing. Except for the rubbish type - slower drivers benefitting from better tyres by accident not by design.

Stooge nr 2s of the top three were pushed out of the way, my god those gaps, these geniuses...

Well, this weekend I wouldn´t blame the drivers. It was the team the only one to blame with this strategy.

Furthermore, theoretically this track belongs to the Scuderia but its performance has been quite poor. I can understand that perhaps they had problems to head up the tyres during Q3. But during the race we saw that Vettel had not pace to follow Lewis who was clearly faster. Something hasn´t worked in the car and the team should investigate it.

[Vasconia]

Lewis doing mind games with Vettel/Ferrari. Just after 2 laps when he reported issues with HS tyres Vettel went into the pits trying to do a undercut. There was a big bogus from Lewis bearing in mind Ricci was doing 27 laps on those tyres with no issue whatsoever ...

I thought he said just the opposite. Anyway, who cares? Lewis was clearly faster so there was no way to make an undercut. It was a desperate try by Ferrari and it obviously dind´t work. There was no chance to win the race under normal conditions so he should have put the soft tyres.

[dans79]

I can understand that perhaps they had problems to head up the tyres during Q3. But during the race we saw that Vettel had not pace to follow Lewis who was clearly faster. Something hasn´t worked in the car and the team should investigate it.

It seems more like Mercedes finally understands how to get their car to work the tires properly across the entire spectrum of use cases!

[Vasconia]

I can understand that perhaps they had problems to head up the tyres during Q3. But during the race we saw that Vettel had not pace to follow Lewis who was clearly faster. Something hasn´t worked in the car and the team should investigate it.

It seems more like Mercedes finally understands how to get their car to work the tires properly across the entire spectrum of use cases!

It could be as their race pace seems to be stronger than ever. Anyway, its strange that Ferrari had those problems to extract the (theoretical) potential from the car.

[Sierra117]

Ferrari were fine. Perhaps the tyres were being problematic but it doesn't seem to be as big of a factor for them except in Quali. Definitely having a longer wheelbase is a new thing to deal with. However, James Allison said after the race how they spent the last 12 months working on this specific low-speed traction issue for Singapore. So it's not that Ferrari suddenly went bad, it's as dans79 said, the Merc that has improved over its deficiencies.

[Wynters]

They already could have signed Riccardo but they didn't...he is slower in comparison to Max

As I understand it, Ricciardo has basically been exiled by Red Bull so that the knowledge he takes over to Renault is as limited as possible. It's no surprise that, with no competition for their WCC, Ricciardo isn't doing well. Effectively, Red Bull has one car/driver and an unwelcome guest.

That shouldn't take away from Verstappen's performances vs Ricciardo before the latter signed, however.

From the race, good to see that deliberately driving into someone is punished by a drive through. Makes you wonder what it would take for a stop-go penalty or worse? Ocon, you could perhaps argue was accidental or that Perez thought it was wheel-to-wheel face so wouldn't result in much damage (I think it's a weak argument though). Sirotkin was a clear 'manners' move that backfired. Combined with last year, it shows a really nasty/stupid side to Perez. He has absolutely no compunction about putting people into the wall, whether it's at a low-speed circuit, like Singapore, or Belgium. Sadly, neither the FIA nor the team seem to have too much of a problem with it.

Other than that, great drives from Hamilton, Verstappen and Alonso. A shame Kimi and Ricciardo couldn't get close enough to battle Bottas for 4th too.

[NathanOlder]

Just like last year but with a better car Ferrari lost this season six races before the end. My advice: hire better drivers. [Just about lost, let's wait a bit to stick a fork .]

Ocon is as clueless as ever in wheel to wheel. Corners only work like that in his head, did he expect Perez to disappear or move against laws of physics? What a loss to F1 it will be.

100% pushing borefest, not even a chance for SC since there's no racing. Except for the rubbish type - slower drivers benefitting from better tyres by accident not by design.

Stooge nr 2s of the top three were pushed out of the way, my god those gaps, these geniuses...

Well, this weekend I wouldn´t blame the drivers. It was the team the only one to blame with this strategy.

Furthermore, theoretically this track belongs to the Scuderia but its performance has been quite poor. I can understand that perhaps they had problems to head up the tyres during Q3. But during the race we saw that Vettel had not pace to follow Lewis who was clearly faster. Something hasn´t worked in the car and the team should investigate it.

The bag of dry ice disappears, and so does the performance! (joking)

[Vasconia]

The bag of dry ice disappears, and so does the performance! (joking)

Who knows mate, who knows...

[timbo]

It looks like this year it is even harder to keep up the pace with the car in front.
Qualifying position, first lap and pit stop performance all cost extremely high.
If one misses out on any one out of those it is extremely hard to compensate.

[maxxer]

wish Martin Bundle could be replaced! Tired of him saying "for good measure". It's so annoying that anyone I hear say it just sounds like a fool with no vocabulary. If you've got nothing to say don't say anything. His commentating is so stale and irrelevant, I'd rather just listen to pit and driver radio.

Yes totally agree , guess this should be in the other topic, but the sky commenting has become so cliche , all of them now call the gas pedal or throttle pedal "the loud pedal" just because grandpa Brundle calls it that.

And the other guy Simon Lazenby he always looks drunk or high after the race

[drunkf1fan]

They already could have signed Riccardo but they didn't...he is slower in comparison to Max

As I understand it, Ricciardo has basically been exiled by Red Bull so that the knowledge he takes over to Renault is as limited as possible. It's no surprise that, with no competition for their WCC, Ricciardo isn't doing well. Effectively, Red Bull has one car/driver and an unwelcome guest.

That shouldn't take away from Verstappen's performances vs Ricciardo before the latter signed, however.

Ricciardo had a particularly poor qualifying session, nothing else. He hasn't been exiled from Red Bull, he's only being excluded from meetings talking about anything to do with next years car. SO if they speak with Honda, Max sits in, Ricciardo doesn't. If they were to have a meeting about updates drivers want, do they want more front end, do they want stiffer suspension, do they want changes on the steering wheel, etc, again Max is in those meetings and maybe Gasly too, but not Ricciardo.

Ricciardo is excluded from absolutely nothing when it comes to normal day to day business when it comes to getting the best out of this year's car.

Verstappen has been outperforming him fairly significantly most of the season in terms of actual pace. Results and pace don't always go together though.

Was is Austria when Ricciardo had his little qualifying freak out, Verstappen took a step forward and that probably helped change Ricciardo to sign for Renault. In terms of race pace Verstappen established a gap in the first stint then for a while Ricciardo matched his pace after the pitstop but Ricciardo was blistering and using up his tires while Verstappen was nursing his. Ricciardo just can't match Verstappen and unless Verstappen is busy making a silly mistake then Ricciardo just isn't on his level.

I also said at the time the qualifying thing was less about qualifying itself, it was an attempt (and in my mind amateur) to force the team to back Ricciardo, force Verstappen to take the back seat and treat him as the senior driver. Shortly after that he gave up and signed with Renault. Some of the performance could certainly be down to him caring less about results, but I don't think there is any sign the team isn't backing him.

[Phil]

I wonder if Perez is being a bit overly harshly criticised for the incident with Ocon. Ocon put himself in a potentially dangerous position. Perez was already on the "outside" relative to the Haas (I think Romain) and in that left hander, Perezs eyes and focus was always going to be to the left because that is where the track was headed. Already being on the outside to the Haas (albeit ahead), I am sure he must have been rather conscious about what was happening there. Ocon, who was behind, saw a gap and went for it, but at the same time put himself in a potentially dangerous and vulnerable position. To some extent, yes, he did get sufficiently alongside to be noticed, but I still think Perez was genuinely not looking there.

Even so, the touch and contact was minimal. It was also the rear tires that hit, so there is a possibility that there was minor traction loss (oversteering on Perez's car) that then caused the hit that sent Ocon into the wall. Unfortunate, but I would blame Ocon for it. Fairplay for him for trying it and 9 times out of 10, it would have turned out to be a brilliant move, but the point remains, as an overtaker, it was an IMO opportunistic move, a gamble that sadly didn't work out by the smallest of margins. He put his car there. On lap 1, when there is chaos happening all around you.

These moves are always at a certain risk.