2021 Belgian Grand Prix - Spa-Francorchamps, Aug 27 - 29

[DChemTech]

There's a difference between being happy with something, and accepting something.
Noone is happy with how things went, but some accept this is the way it is.

[Sieper]

This is quite foggy if you ask me. And keep in mind F1 always adjusts the cameras to brighten the image and reduce noise as needed.

https://today.in-24.com/sport/content/u ... b115ad.jpg

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E99i3OrX0AApMsG.jpg

I was actually at the track. It was interesting to see on the trackside monitors how much worse it looked on camera. Just to give an indication, standing at Bruxelles you could see the cars down at bus stop. I guess that is about 2 km distance.

Not that I am questioning the decision not to run. That should be the call by the drivers, and I trust them to make a fair judgement.

But if they are not able to run under these conditions then F1 has to urgently look at visibility in relation to car design. Because F3 was able to start in worse conditions this weekend.

Otherwise F1 cannot afford putting tracks like Silverstone, Hockenheim, Spa, A1, Etc on the calendar. Because this was no monsoon. It was a typical Northern European drizzle. Persistent and annoying, but in no way exceptional.

Morning or early afternoon races should be explored & they should also look @ good quality lights in some of these tracks ! Visibility issues should be explored otherwise you will never have those amazing wet races where legends are made of. Also, the 3 hour & 2 hour rule should both be scrapped. Canada 2011 was a legendary race & we need more of those while ensuring safety of the drivers !

Spa is just a place where the spray / mist can hang in between the hills/trees. Plus, there are a few places (Raidillon notably) where there is no room (with current lay out) for improvement to track safety (there is a steep downhill to the right) and for that reason I think the stewards did not dare. (W series, caio collet in F3, Lando in qualy, Hubert 2 years ago). We could have raced and it might have been epic (at 15:30) but it for sure woudl have meant crashes and potentially very bad ones.

[Sieper]

That makes no sense, there is a reason why the two lap, half points rule exists. Forget the entertainment of the fans portion of the side for a moment and think about the logistics of the championship, the work done by the teams to prepare for the race and the drivers having qualified. All of that for nothing? That would be the biggest shame and farce to teams who are competing. Qualifying is the measure that actually previews what a race outcome should be on pure one lap pace. If a race can only be a few laps and under 1/3 distance, well, qualifying pace without the toe and drs sets your order. Same way FP3 serves as qualifying if it cannot be held.

There are a few more aspects to it, there was a driver with a grid penalty for taking 5 cars out of the previous race. Should that (lenient) penalty also be just brushed under the carpet. At least now he has served it.

If any of the drivers (like Perez and stroll’s team with the wing) made a mistake in these slow laps they lost the points even.

No, the most sensible thing is just to have the penalties served the next race instead, when there actually IS a race.

I truly don’t understand how anyone can be happy with this whole thing, no matter who you support. Mindblowing.

did you get the impression I am happy with the outcome? Or are you just bashing me for the sake of it?

[NathanOlder]

There was 2 days of practice and qualifying very complicated. It is part of the whole race WE

Exactly. The rules could, and should have been more clear on what happens procedurally when there is no opportunity to race. But let's be honest, this was a rather unique situation - and rules are often written in hindsight.

That there was no race, doesn't mean no points should be awarded. There still was a team effort in the days prior in which some drivers/teams stood out, for which they deserve to be rewarded. Now it feels unsatisfactory that the procedure was made up on the fly and the whole thing was a big mess, sure, but still, points are in place. Russell/Williams in particular took a gamble and won, for which they should be credited.

And yeah, it's mostly Hamilton fans that complain now, whereas Verstappen fans are largely silent. Logically, they benefitted. I have no doubts it would be the other way around had their positions been swapped. But for once, luck (and Stewards decisions) fell in Verstappen's favor rather than Hamilton's. Soit.

No points to the FIA/stewards for execution, but in the end the decision to essentially give points on qualifying merits is, in my view, the right one (even though in this case there were even some mutations to that, as Sieper pointed out). Let's hope next time it's just known upfront that that's how it will be.

Was it Verstappen that benefitted, he was the one out in front, with no spray. The rest was in even more danger. He could have gained 25 points also.

Really??? come on man. I don't recall anyone winning and scoring points without racing at all. The guy who took the most points was the luckiest. None of them raced. Max did the same job as Mazepin, yet Max got 12.5 more points than Mazepin.

[NathanOlder]

Exactly. The rules could, and should have been more clear on what happens procedurally when there is no opportunity to race. But let's be honest, this was a rather unique situation - and rules are often written in hindsight.

That there was no race, doesn't mean no points should be awarded. There still was a team effort in the days prior in which some drivers/teams stood out, for which they deserve to be rewarded. Now it feels unsatisfactory that the procedure was made up on the fly and the whole thing was a big mess, sure, but still, points are in place. Russell/Williams in particular took a gamble and won, for which they should be credited.

And yeah, it's mostly Hamilton fans that complain now, whereas Verstappen fans are largely silent. Logically, they benefitted. I have no doubts it would be the other way around had their positions been swapped. But for once, luck (and Stewards decisions) fell in Verstappen's favor rather than Hamilton's. Soit.

No points to the FIA/stewards for execution, but in the end the decision to essentially give points on qualifying merits is, in my view, the right one (even though in this case there were even some mutations to that, as Sieper pointed out). Let's hope next time it's just known upfront that that's how it will be.

Was it Verstappen that benefitted, he was the one out in front, with no spray. The rest was in even more danger. He could have gained 25 points also.

True true. Maybe I'm just so used to Verstappen being boned out by a Mercedes or random tire blowout that I see him crossing the line in a good position as a win already
But yeah, one could also view the damage limitation as luck once again falling Hamilton's way. Anyway, main point, I do think it's fair points were awarded, even if the way in which it happened deserves little praise.

You guys are hilarious, so yesterday it was Lewis getting lucky? He lost 5 points to his rival without any racing. If you see that as luck falling Hamiltons way then I totally understand why you see Lewis as the luckiest driver on the grid.

[NathanOlder]

That makes no sense, there is a reason why the two lap, half points rule exists. Forget the entertainment of the fans portion of the side for a moment and think about the logistics of the championship, the work done by the teams to prepare for the race and the drivers having qualified. All of that for nothing? That would be the biggest shame and farce to teams who are competing. Qualifying is the measure that actually previews what a race outcome should be on pure one lap pace. If a race can only be a few laps and under 1/3 distance, well, qualifying pace without the toe and drs sets your order. Same way FP3 serves as qualifying if it cannot be held.

There are a few more aspects to it, there was a driver with a grid penalty for taking 5 cars out of the previous race. Should that (lenient) penalty also be just brushed under the carpet. At least now he has served it.

If any of the drivers (like Perez and stroll’s team with the wing) made a mistake in these slow laps they lost the points even.

No, the most sensible thing is just to have the penalties served the next race instead, when there actually IS a race.

I truly don’t understand how anyone can be happy with this whole thing, no matter who you support. Mindblowing.

I also think the penalties should carry over, but only if points hadn't been given out. With points being given out, Bottas lost points because of his penalty. So he has been penalised.

[maxxer]

I was actually at the track. It was interesting to see on the trackside monitors how much worse it looked on camera. Just to give an indication, standing at Bruxelles you could see the cars down at bus stop. I guess that is about 2 km distance.

Not that I am questioning the decision not to run. That should be the call by the drivers, and I trust them to make a fair judgement.

But if they are not able to run under these conditions then F1 has to urgently look at visibility in relation to car design. Because F3 was able to start in worse conditions this weekend.

Otherwise F1 cannot afford putting tracks like Silverstone, Hockenheim, Spa, A1, Etc on the calendar. Because this was no monsoon. It was a typical Northern European drizzle. Persistent and annoying, but in no way exceptional.

Morning or early afternoon races should be explored & they should also look @ good quality lights in some of these tracks ! Visibility issues should be explored otherwise you will never have those amazing wet races where legends are made of. Also, the 3 hour & 2 hour rule should both be scrapped. Canada 2011 was a legendary race & we need more of those while ensuring safety of the drivers !

Spa is just a place where the spray / mist can hang in between the hills/trees. Plus, there are a few places (Raidillon notably) where there is no room (with current lay out) for improvement to track safety (there is a steep downhill to the right) and for that reason I think the stewards did not dare. (W series, caio collet in F3, Lando in qualy, Hubert 2 years ago). We could have raced and it might have been epic (at 15:30) but it for sure woudl have meant crashes and potentially very bad ones.

Yes thats the problem at spa the spray doesnt go anywhere if you look at Brazil in wet , you can still see but here it was just becoming a dense fog behind the safety car even

[graham.reeds]

Did any of the support races run?

[Sieper]

Was it Verstappen that benefitted, he was the one out in front, with no spray. The rest was in even more danger. He could have gained 25 points also.

True true. Maybe I'm just so used to Verstappen being boned out by a Mercedes or random tire blowout that I see him crossing the line in a good position as a win already
But yeah, one could also view the damage limitation as luck once again falling Hamilton's way. Anyway, main point, I do think it's fair points were awarded, even if the way in which it happened deserves little praise.

You guys are hilarious, so yesterday it was Lewis getting lucky? He lost 5 points to his rival without any racing. If you see that as luck falling Hamiltons way then I totally understand why you see Lewis as the luckiest driver on the grid.

It is you who is hilarious. You want to twist words and if you want to describe this, with Max being o pole on merit, with max having fresh inters left and with max the only one with no visibility impact as lucky for not having raced I beg to differ. In fact, it are always the Hamilton brigade who feel entitled to dish out with calling people names. Forum admins don’t do anything to stop this.

[DChemTech]

You guys are hilarious, so yesterday it was Lewis getting lucky? He lost 5 points to his rival without any racing. If you see that as luck falling Hamiltons way then I totally understand why you see Lewis as the luckiest driver on the grid.

Come on, I did not say that. I said that yesterday was mostly luck falling in Max's direction for once - and that there are certain perspectives in which Lewis is lucky too. The world isn't completely black-and-white.

[Edax]

I was actually at the track. It was interesting to see on the trackside monitors how much worse it looked on camera. Just to give an indication, standing at Bruxelles you could see the cars down at bus stop. I guess that is about 2 km distance.

Not that I am questioning the decision not to run. That should be the call by the drivers, and I trust them to make a fair judgement.

But if they are not able to run under these conditions then F1 has to urgently look at visibility in relation to car design. Because F3 was able to start in worse conditions this weekend.

Otherwise F1 cannot afford putting tracks like Silverstone, Hockenheim, Spa, A1, Etc on the calendar. Because this was no monsoon. It was a typical Northern European drizzle. Persistent and annoying, but in no way exceptional.

Morning or early afternoon races should be explored & they should also look @ good quality lights in some of these tracks ! Visibility issues should be explored otherwise you will never have those amazing wet races where legends are made of. Also, the 3 hour & 2 hour rule should both be scrapped. Canada 2011 was a legendary race & we need more of those while ensuring safety of the drivers !

Spa is just a place where the spray / mist can hang in between the hills/trees. Plus, there are a few places (Raidillon notably) where there is no room (with current lay out) for improvement to track safety (there is a steep downhill to the right) and for that reason I think the stewards did not dare. (W series, caio collet in F3, Lando in qualy, Hubert 2 years ago). We could have raced and it might have been epic (at 15:30) but it for sure woudl have meant crashes and potentially very bad ones.

There was a mild breeze to clear the spray, so that also did’t seem to be the issue.

On the track layout and dangers you are right of course, but no visibility would be bad on all tracks I guess.

One thing I noticed is that the current cars with skinny wings and diffuser restrictions don’t seem to kick up the water nearly as high as they used to or as the other open wheel series. Most of the water does not even seem to clear the height of the rear wing (or visor level for that matter). I am starting to wonder if the ever increasing reliance on the floor to create low drag downforce is not at the root of these reported visibility issues.

[Sieper]

Could very well be, that’ll make it worse next year? Or not as the floor is sealed easier, less winglets etc.

[Sieper]

You guys are hilarious, so yesterday it was Lewis getting lucky? He lost 5 points to his rival without any racing. If you see that as luck falling Hamiltons way then I totally understand why you see Lewis as the luckiest driver on the grid.

Come on, I did not say that. I said that yesterday was mostly luck falling in Max's direction for once - and that there are certain perspectives in which Lewis is lucky too. The world isn't completely black-and-white.

Don’t go on the defense. Nathan has no right to always use such words. Let him explain himself.

[NathanOlder]

You guys are hilarious, so yesterday it was Lewis getting lucky? He lost 5 points to his rival without any racing. If you see that as luck falling Hamiltons way then I totally understand why you see Lewis as the luckiest driver on the grid.

Come on, I did not say that. I said that yesterday was mostly luck falling in Max's direction for once - and that there are certain perspectives in which Lewis is lucky too. The world isn't completely black-and-white.

Don’t go on the defense. Nathan has no right to always use such words. Let him explain himself.

He said

"But yeah, one could also view the damage limitation as luck once again falling Hamilton's way."

This not saying Hamilton got lucky?

[Shrieker]

Will they reimburse the tickets ? This will be a worse travesty than indy '05, if they don't.