RIC didn’t pit either so staying on hards for track position was ok plan. Pitting LEC early, putting him to the back just to run the rest of the race on one set of tires would have left him exposed. And for what, a 11th place. They had no pace. Let’s see what happens next year. Sainz will be a good addition to the team as will a decent engine.
You DO UNDERSTAND that @tisofi12 is [playfully, I hope] trolling ...... We have to take the good with the bad here in FerrariChat
Alberto Antonini former Scuderia member and journalist at formulapassion wrote tonight that the next PU will be an improvement for sure but not the huge step we are all waiting for ..
100% correct assessment. And remember that MB has been working on 2022 wayyyyyyyy before 2020; so please do not be surprised when MB keeps crushing the competition when the "new dawn" arrives in 2022.
"You can see that everybody has weaknesses, and we weren't on our A game this weekend," Wolff said. "That's simply a fact. Red Bull won fair and square. You can see that Albon also had a very good race, so they have a very good race car, and shows that when their car is in the right place, both drivers do a really good job. "Probably Albon's pace was quicker than us by the end. They could have been well ahead, and even worse for us. "We're leaving this race with a slap on the wrist. It wasn't a great weekend for us. It was a car that has never let us down all year, maybe apart from this last weekend." Wolff explained that both Bottas and Hamilton were forced to manage their tyres after the safety car forced an early switch to the hard compound tyre that Mercedes was uncertain would make it to the end. "Him and Lewis were looking after the tyres a lot, because it was not clear the hard would last until the end, and there was more pace in both of them,"Wolff said. "You can see at the end, we saw through sector one, that our car wasn't simply turning around five and six, and the last sector wasn't great. "We just simply had an understeery car all day today. We had a car that is good on Friday, but not good on Saturday. We tried both directions, weakened the rear, none of that helped. "I think somehow we didn't get it right." https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/154178/abu-dhabi-defeat-slap-on-the-wrist--mercedes
Would have been a more interesting race had Mercedes not turned their engines down. Them doing so also ruined Strolls chances unfortunately. On this day, Red Bull had the superior car. And I would not be surprised at all if Hamiltons performance suffered from his Covid infection. It just seems odd that he didn't beat Bottas but then again Bottas needed this result to finish 2nd in the standings, didn't he?
Tire management is not all racing should be lol. I think F1 does too much of it and not enough racing. Maybe the next series of Pirelli tires will allow more racing and less 'management'!
Huh? You lost me on that one. That was a serious post by me, no tongue in cheek or anything. I do believe this was an awesome F1 season. I loved all the new/old tracks and there was some real good racing with some good scraping. I wasn't trying to stoke any fire, I really meant that. And Liberty did pull that off despite all the nay sayers on here as in the press (Ecclestone, Benoit, Wiesinger etc).
I think he was Autosprint editor, no? In any case we know by now to never believe (most of) anything that comes from Italian press and certainly these fringe websites competing for clicks. Personally, I think Ferrari will have a decent engine next year, also better integrated into the car because I expect they will re-distribute the engine externals and accessories, which they didn’t have time to do after the technical directive issued last year. This should get them more in line with others with more compact side pods (at the cost of fatter section behind roll structure) and so help reduce the drag penalty they’ve been carrying this year. They’ve already shown with their aero upgrades that they identified some issues, targeted and corrected them, so there’s some hope that they can at least fight at the front next year, if not outright fight for wins every race.
And, a Brit in pole position to run Ferrari—success is guaranteed! https://europe.autonews.com/automakers/fiat-chryslers-manley-pole-position-ferrari-ceo-job-paper-says
Wine with a screw top, wine in a box is still better than no wine. At least it didn't turn into vinegar.
Agreed. He may not have braked himself, but he sure as hell let the engine wind down and do it for him.
This season was ****. Full stop. Both championships decided before the first race, empty grandstands, repeated tracks, drivers missing races because of COVID, the BS with Racing Point, Pirelli tyres failing as usual... You can't say that this season was good. Having said that, Liberty managed to put a championship together, there were some crazy races and the mid pack was tight. It was a bad season, but it was the best season possible given the circumstances. The big problem now is that, as the new regulations were delayed, 2021 will be a "transitional" season, with frozen cars, similar results and that no team will care about as they'll have their hands full with the new cars.