2021 British Grand Prix - Silverstone, July 16 - 18

[nzjrs]

I have to say I don't like the way F1 is going. It is so hyped up in the media that fans or even casual watchers can not just accept an incident an let it go.
You go to a boxing match and watch two guys thump each other and discuss it in a friendly manner after, or a rugby game where players are routinely mashed, but get back into it and have a beer with the opposing fans.

I really hope that it does not go as cricket began to at one time and take on football tribalism 100% for or 100% against no middle ground not ended when the whistle blows.*

* This with apologies to the majority of football fans who are fine, but the minority get the publicity.

Yeah, intensity is a bit too high these days. People can no longer decouple from things and everyone is too invested in their identity.

We see this first hand on the forum, heck even PZ rage-quit this place.

This would not have happened a few years ago watching it together at the pub. The atomisation of everyone accelerated by pandemic times and social media has not been healthy.

[Just_a_fan]

I have to say I don't like the way F1 is going. It is so hyped up in the media that fans or even casual watchers can not just accept an incident an let it go.
You go to a boxing match and watch two guys thump each other and discuss it in a friendly manner after, or a rugby game where players are routinely mashed, but get back into it and have a beer with the opposing fans.

I really hope that it does not go as cricket began to at one time and take on football tribalism 100% for or 100% against no middle ground not ended when the whistle blows.*

* This with apologies to the majority of football fans who are fine, but the minority get the publicity.

Imo, its because far to many of the younger fans have never participated in sports of any type. Participation in sports has been trending down significantly over the last 2 and a half decades or so. To many kids play nothing but video games now, and thus don't have a proper grasp on reality, sportsmanship, or what it's like to make split second decisions with major consequences.

Add in the extreme polarization effect of social media, and you get what we have today!

In the context of this race incident, it's pure tribalism looking for an emotional outlet. Max's fans feel aggrieved and have no outlet for that other than to make sweeping statements about everything from Hamilton's character to the character of a whole nation. So there's some lashing out happening. And then there was the simple racism from one or two now-banned contributors.

Had the incident been between Max and anyone else e.g. Leclerc, there would have been a lot of "wtf happened there?" comments but not nearly as much of the emotion. It's because it involved Max's only competitor this year that it is so emotive. I can guarantee that had it been someone taking out Hamilton there would have been a lot of smug comments from those same people. That's just the way it goes.

Nothing wrong with an emotional response. It just needs to be contextualised. And that means remembering that none of this matters a jot to anyone here. Sure, people are emotionally involved, but unless someone has bet their house on Max winning the title, none of it matters.

I had this same conversation in the pub with some England fans after the Euro final. Had to calm a few down and talk them through the fact that it doesn't matter. It's just a game of football. To see the emotion/hate drain from their expressions as they figured it out was quite something. They then wandered off disconsolate but no longer an emotional hand grenade.

Yes, we all want "our man", "out team", or whatever to win. But it doesn't actually matter. It has no bearing on our lives other than our own emotional response to it. and that's down to us and no one else.

[Andres125sx]

IMO the crash was a racing incident where Lewis is more responsible, but Max pushing Lewis to the wall before the corner didn´t help either, as he probably collected some dirt into his tires wich reduced his grip, and trying to keep position at the outside in a high speed corner didn´t help either

All in all, I think the 10 seconds penalty is ok, he get a penalty but not too harsh. Max can´t be considered faultless here. When a car gets your inside and next corners is a high speed corner, 95% of driver will concede the position, and that´s for a reason. Being extremelly aggresive is ok, but when things goes south you can´t be too surprised, this is the risk and the reason most drivers would have let Lewis pass instead of trying to keep position at the outside of a high speed corner

[wogx]

And what with "The driver in front dictates the racing line"? LH wasn't in line with Max in that corner, Max had left a lot of space on the inside, but Lewis wasn't even near to the apex. I remember some discussions after the Lando/Sergio incident in Austria.

[nzjrs]

Had the incident been between Max and anyone else e.g. Leclerc, there would have been a lot of "wtf happened there?" comments but not nearly as much of the emotion. It's because it involved Max's only competitor this year that it is so emotive. I can guarantee that had it been someone taking out Hamilton there would have been a lot of smug comments from those same people. That's just the way it goes.

The comparison to the Euros is instructive wrt. the underdog status of England / RB.

Fan response is always going to be asymmetric because in both cases those teams have been losing for all recent memory. The only thing longer than MB complete domination of this F1 era is the England football losing streak!

[Just_a_fan]

Had the incident been between Max and anyone else e.g. Leclerc, there would have been a lot of "wtf happened there?" comments but not nearly as much of the emotion. It's because it involved Max's only competitor this year that it is so emotive. I can guarantee that had it been someone taking out Hamilton there would have been a lot of smug comments from those same people. That's just the way it goes.

The comparison to the Euros is instructive wrt. the underdog status of England / RB.

Fan response is always going to be asymmetric because in both cases those teams have been losing for all recent memory. The only thing longer than MB complete domination of this F1 era is the England football losing streak!

And there's a long list of reasons why the England team haven't won a tournament in a long time. Much of it is out of the control of the team.

[dans79]

Max can´t be considered faultless here. When a car gets your inside and next corners is a high speed corner, 95% of driver will concede the position, and that´s for a reason. Being extremelly aggresive is ok, but when things goes south you can´t be too surprised, this is the risk and the reason most drivers would have let Lewis pass instead of trying to keep position at the outside of a high speed corner

I was surprised max didn't go further left at the last moment, so he could take a wider and thus faster line. He would have had substantially more speed than Lewis, and would have passed him on exit or part way down the strait.

[Just_a_fan]

And what with "The driver in front dictates the racing line"? LH wasn't in line with Max in that corner, Max had left a lot of space on the inside, but Lewis wasn't even near to the apex. I remember some discussions after the Lando/Sergio incident in Austria.

The impact occurred before the apex, but the space to the inside of Hamilton was the reason the stewards gave the penalty. If he'd been on the inside white line, I think the stewards would have said "no blame". By such small margins does the game play.

[Just_a_fan]

Max can´t be considered faultless here. When a car gets your inside and next corners is a high speed corner, 95% of driver will concede the position, and that´s for a reason. Being extremelly aggresive is ok, but when things goes south you can´t be too surprised, this is the risk and the reason most drivers would have let Lewis pass instead of trying to keep position at the outside of a high speed corner

I was surprised max didn't go further left at the last moment, so he could take a wider and thus faster line. He would have had substantially more speed than Lewis, and would have passed him on exit or part way down the strait.

Long game, short game. Max was trying to win that corner. To stamp his authority on Hamilton. He wasn't thinking about the race, just that moment. Sadly for him, his opponent decided not to yield this one time in the way he had only 20 seconds before. It's a life lesson for Max. What does he take away from it? Hopefully he'll think a bit about how best to beat Hamilton. Sadly, I fear he'll walk back in to Horner's office today and be fed the lines that Horner was giving out about how terrible it all was, and he'll learn nothing.

[dans79]

Sadly, I fear he'll walk back in to Horner's office today and be fed the lines that Horner was giving out about how terrible it all was, and he'll learn nothing.

This is what I expect as well, though I believe Marko is worse about it than Horner. They did the same thing to Vettel back in the day. I don't think Vettel really outgrew that mindset till late 2018 or early 2019.

[Andres125sx]

Hamilton himself in two quotes during the post press conference and take note of the order and thought process in quote 1; https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/arti ... nYFtQ.html

"I was pretty far up alongside him (Max) 1. but I then could see he wasn't going to back-out and 2. we went into the corner and 3. then we collided"

Then talking about the same move on Leclerc who he was also alongside and saying "At one point I backed out, just to make sure we didn't come together"

This wasn't a both of them were expecting the other to concede incident, this was Lewis fully knowing that Max wouldn't back off and still keeping his line. After the touch, he still ran wide on that corner, meaning that he was always ending up in Max's car, his trajectary was never one that was making that corner cleanly

There is a difference between expecting the other driver to back down and knowing he won't and still keeping your line

And now he has an extra 25 points, a win, millions of dollars worth of damage done to RB in a cost cap year, most likely penalties incoming for Max having to take an extra engine and gearbox and a rival who has had to be hospitalised after a 51G crash

It also puts his reactions after the race completely into context. Because Lewis knew there would be a crash, he wasn't guilty about it happening. He expected the crash, didn't feel bad that Max then crashed out, could celebrate his win fully. Never gave Max any care or consideration in his interview after the race or in any further interviews up until the point he was told he was in the hospital. Then he says, of course you never want things like this to happen....

How can you say, you never want things like this to happen after not changing your line when you knew there would be a crash otherwise?

People may be outraged at me saying this stuff but I am literally using Lewis's own words, so I may not be the person you want to be mad at

If you want to constructively discuss where I am wrong here, please do because I am soley basing this of what Hamilton has said and how he acted after the race

TDLR: Lewis intentionally crashed with Max to send a message that he wouldn't be pushed around any more

Last phrase is BS, no driver will intentionally crash at a 300km/h corner.

About the rest I can more or less agree, but you could say the same in the opposite way...

"I was pretty far up alongside him (Max) 1. but I then could see he wasn't going to back-out and 2. we went into the corner and 3. then we collided"

This wasn't a both of them were expecting the other to concede incident, this was Lewis fully knowing that Max wouldn't back off and still keeping his line.
[...]
There is a difference between expecting the other driver to back down and knowing he won't and still keeping your line

Switch Lewis and Max names here, and it will be equally true. When a car put alongside yours at the inside of next corner because he´s faster at the straight, you know he won´t back down but Max still kept his line and didn´t concede position. There´s a reason some drivers are considered smart because of conceding position when the risk is too high. Perez showed it past GP, going to the gravel is better than colliding even if you don´t need to. Max is more aggressive than smart and that have consequences from time to time


I think Lewis was at fault because he went too long, but it´s also a racing incident where both drivers were very aggresive and at some extent both collaborated to the outcome.

Fair and balanced penalty IMO

[wogx]

A comment from the past

[El Scorchio]

I fear he'll walk back in to Horner's office today and be fed the lines that Horner was giving out about how terrible it all was, and he'll learn nothing.

This for me is what's worrying. I'm very much hoping what Horner and Marko said yesterday was just politicking to get or maximise any penalty for Hamilton, but behind closed doors they will surely have a more measured and less emotive view of it. It would be incredibly irresponsible and dangerous to inflame the situation in Verstappen's mind even more and risk an actual premeditated 'revenge' move in another race. I'm sure he's too sensible to consider that, though, and he must know the FIA would throw the book at him, especially after the strong rhetoric of yesterday coming from his team.

[dans79]

A comment from the past
https://www.wykop.pl/cdn/c3201142/comme ... CwqIYx.jpg

Did you even watch the incident being referred to in your quote?

Vettel had a significant left front lock up into turn one, and ran into the back of Bottas.

That incident is so different to what happened yesterday it's laughable!

[Wouter]

Waking up thinking 'did that really happen?'

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E6ou37nWQAA ... ame=medium

Seriously, and listening to the onboard radio people here saying Max was just fine getting out of the car himself.
Adrenaline will keep you up for a bit but it is going to hurt for days afterwards. He should have follow up check ups for his lungs, ribs, and head.

Alonso after he was given the green light to leave the track after his massive crash in Australia.

"To summarise a little, last week [in Australia] I was okay Sunday - some knee pain but not big things. I had the green light to leave the track and everything was okay," Alonso explained in Thursday’s official FIA press conference in Bahrain.

"On Monday I had a bit of overall pain, nothing too serious. Then I flew back, arrived in Spain and the pain was a little more, so we did a proper check and I had a small pneumothorax [collapse] on the lung.

"We took advice from the doctors to relax at home and repeat the scan last Monday - the pneumothorax is gone more or less but I had some rib fractures. And because F1 is a very unique position in the car, and with the g-forces, there was a risk the fractures could move into the lung.

"It’s not like broken leg or arm where you can deal with the pain; it’s the chest where there are organs, so we cannot do much more."

Yes, I remember that from Alonso. I was very concerned about him at the time.
Now I am too about Max.
They should have kept him in the hospital overnight and than check him again in Monaco and keep an eye on him.
He can get multiple internal bleedings or other things with the force of 51G.