Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

2023 Formula 1 Season thread

Glideslope said:
While I can't agree with all your points on Lewis, I do agree with a few. I also sense that confusion with Lewis you mentioned. He is at a point in his career, IMO, where he really doesn't understand what Mercedes issues are. I don't think any of us do other than IMO, it's a downforce/balance design issue.
Click to expand...
I don’t think the Mercedes issues are in one key area as they’ve struggled as a 3k+ person outfit to understand the issues. It seems whatever they change, it either just about works or is seriously out of balance on the car. The PR from the team is Lewis has been working tirelessly to understand it along with George, but they are no engineers. Drivers can only describe how the car feels and give feedback as to how they want the car to feel, it’s down to the engineers and designers to translate that into a workable package. Hopefully the reappointment of James Allison helps for next season in regards to technical direction, but personally I think there is too much ground to make up. When you think teams will spend £1M for a tenth of a second, Red Bull are five times quicker than that per lap. LeClerc admits the other teams feel ‘hopeless’ at the moment.

I don’t think Lewis has lost focus, I just think he comes across as downbeat in interviews because he’s frustrated and standing in front of a microphone is part of the job and something no driver wants to do at the end of a poor race. They just give the basic PR responses just to get out of there. Some here have made comment about Lewis’ age, but in this era I don’t see this as an issue yet. He’s 3 years younger than Fernando and cars are much easier to drive than 30 years ago when Mansell was wrestling his car to a championship at 39 years of age. Lewis is in great personal shape, perhaps in better shape than some drivers 15 years younger than him. He may walk away if the car doesn’t improve soon and nobody could blame him for that, life is too short and he’s got nothing left to prove in F1 really. He hasn’t got to get back to the front to validate his previous championships, he’s in the sport because he still feels he can win.
 
  • Like
Reactions: CWallace
When Mercedes were dominating I don’t believe they had the best aero package. Just an okay package and an excellent engine. Because of the speed difference they had options with how much wing they could run etc.
I think that’s their issue. They don’t have a good engine. And they don’t have a good aero package. Each direction they try is like three steps forward, one step backwards.
At the same time a lot of other teams are taking four or five steps forward.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Populus
To be fair, Mercedes was only good due to Ross Brawn who was always able to extract the maximum out of rule changes and then dominate.

He did the same with Brawn GP without any money at all (which is how Red Bull was able to out develop Brawn GP so quickly) and Ross Brawn repeated the same with the Mercedes era after a major rule change. Without Ross Brawn, there would not have been a Mercedes era.

Atleast Red Bull still has Andrian Newey, so I have more confident in Red Bull being dominate than Mercedes returning to their old form.
 
Apple fanboy said:
When Mercedes were dominating I don’t believe they had the best aero package. Just an okay package and an excellent engine. Because of the speed difference they had options with how much wing they could run etc.
I think that’s their issue. They don’t have a good engine. And they don’t have a good aero package. Each direction they try is like three steps forward, one step backwards.
At the same time a lot of other teams are taking four or five steps forward.
Click to expand...

I disagree. Ferrari had a way better engine. The engine of Ferrari was so good, the Ferrari could pull away from the Mercedes while the Mercedes had DRS + slipstream.
 
Zest28 said:
To be fair, Mercedes was only good due to Ross Brawn who was always able to extract the maximum out of rule changes and then dominate.

He did the same with Brawn GP without any money at all (which is how Red Bull was able to out develop Brawn GP so quickly) and Ross Brawn repeated the same with the Mercedes era after a major rule change. Without Ross Brawn, there would not have been a Mercedes era.

Atleast Red Bull still has Andrian Newey, so I have more confident in Red Bull being dominate than Mercedes returning to their old form.
Click to expand...
There are quite a few things in your post that are factually incorrect IMO. Ross Brawn was acting Team Principle alongside Nick Fry initially at Mercedes and was not leading technical direction at the team. The likes of Paddy Lowe and James Allison were key people who gave the Mercedes design(s) their edge. Brawn retired before the 2014 F1 season, so before the hybrid era where they started a succession of winning.

Not sure where you got the idea that Brawn GP were successfull without 'any money at all'? Honda pumped over $500M into the development of that car before bailing out of the sport and Ross Brawn bought the team and negotiated a Mercedes engine contract as he knew what they had. Sure it was a bit of a DIY job on fitting the new power plant into the car and that was an amazing feat, but Brawn was not key in regards to the technical characteristics of the car. He'd long moved into a management role by then.

Brawn did an amazing job hiring the right people which created the success that followed. Like Schumacher in the 90's, he poached Lewis who was the fastest driver in the sport at the time and made sure the best technical guys from McLaren, Ferrari and Honda came together. He is a man of great success and a thoroughly unpleasant bloke by many accounts.
 
  • Like
Reactions: pachyderm, CWallace and Glideslope
Apple fanboy said:
When Mercedes were dominating I don’t believe they had the best aero package. Just an okay package and an excellent engine. Because of the speed difference they had options with how much wing they could run etc.
I think that’s their issue. They don’t have a good engine. And they don’t have a good aero package. Each direction they try is like three steps forward, one step backwards.
At the same time a lot of other teams are taking four or five steps forward.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure I agree. The Mercedes has pace when they get the setup correct. Lewis has the largest tire deg issues with the rears which to me seems more chassis relates than the PU.

I remember back in 2021 when the Fuel went from 5.75% Bio-Components to 10% Ethanol. IMO at least, it seemed the AMG PU wasn't as happy with the 10%. There were allot of comments on the F1 forums.

So, your point on the engine could be close.
 
The trouble with cramming in more and more races is you are ensuring that current successful drivers (Max) will be top of the most successful drivers ever lists, because they simply have more possible wins each season.
 
  • Like
Reactions: CWallace and pachyderm
Apple fanboy said:
The trouble with cramming in more and more races is you are ensuring that current successful drivers (Max) will be top of the most successful drivers ever lists, because they simply have more possible wins each season.
Click to expand...

Fair point, but just the fact that drivers can have longer careers did much the same. I remember when Senna was killed, people said nobody would ever match his 65 poles (scored over 10 years of active driving) and yet Michael Schumacher scored 68 and Lewis Hamilton smashed it with 103 as both had longer active careers (admittedly with top teams).
 
  • Like
Reactions: Glideslope
CWallace said:
Fair point, but just the fact that drivers can have longer careers did much the same. I remember when Senna was killed, people said nobody would ever match his 65 poles (scored over 10 years of active driving) and yet Michael Schumacher scored 68 and Lewis Hamilton smashed it with 103 as both had longer active careers (admittedly with top teams).
Click to expand...
Also a contributing factor for sure.
There are only so many weekends I can give up to watch F1 tbh. The highlights help. But it’s basically half the weekends a year. That’s a big commitment as a fan let alone a mechanic!
 
  • Like
Reactions: CWallace
Apple fanboy said:
Also a contributing factor for sure.
There are only so many weekends I can give up to watch F1 tbh. The highlights help. But it’s basically half the weekends a year. That’s a big commitment as a fan let alone a mechanic!
Click to expand...

It’s the sort of industry you work in when young and get out of in your early 30’s I’d say. A couple of my friends from school went to F1 teams after graduating from Warwick university. They both work in the car industry now as travelling around the world for most of the year is difficult once you aim to settle down. I did a short internship with TWR during college, but it wasn’t a lifestyle I ultimately wanted. Like you, I barely have time to watch every highlights show throughout the season either. Easier to justify these days though with other commitments at weekends and the fact F1 isn’t exactly thrilling.
 
  • Like
Reactions: pachyderm
The-Real-Deal82 said:
It’s the sort of industry you work in when young and get out of in your early 30’s I’d say. A couple of my friends from school went to F1 teams after graduating from Warwick university. They both work in the car industry now as travelling around the world for most of the year is difficult once you aim to settle down. I did a short internship with TWR during college, but it wasn’t a lifestyle I ultimately wanted. Like you, I barely have time to watch every highlights show throughout the season either. Easier to justify these days though with other commitments at weekends and the fact F1 isn’t exactly thrilling.
Click to expand...
We had one member on here who worked for RBR for awhile... that wasn't you was it @The-Real-Deal82 ?
 
pachyderm said:
We had one member on here who worked for RBR for awhile... that wasn't you was it @The-Real-Deal82 ?
Click to expand...
He designed the costumes!
1688674790994.png
 
  • Haha
  • Like
Reactions: The-Real-Deal82 and pachyderm
The-Real-Deal82 said:
It’s the sort of industry you work in when young and get out of in your early 30’s I’d say.
Click to expand...
Reminds of the space race in the 1960's. I once read that the average age of engineers working for NASA during the Apollo program was 26. I imagine that the pressure experienced by them was similar to what F1 engineers experience.
 
  • Like
Reactions: The-Real-Deal82
So you'll see Brad Pitt if you go to the UK race this weekend. Seems very confusing, they seem to be using real life stages for films more now, like how apparently they are training some to make a film in space, as in the ISS in space for real.
Guess green screen can't beat that authenticity feel?

Hopefully it'll be a good race, think Max will stomp home with it as it's a fast track and the RB is a rocket with him driving. But where will Alonso and Lewis come....?
 
Glideslope said:
Man, Albon is on fire in P1/P2. So nice to see Williams up there.......
Click to expand...

Yeah Williams seems to favor a low-downforce setup so when they can open it up, it's fast. Should be a bullet at Monza.

Sainz looked good in FP2, but LeClerc stuck in the garage with an electrical issue all session was not helpful, I am sure...
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: pachyderm and Glideslope
CWallace said:
Yeah Williams seems to favor a low-downforce setup so when they can open it up, it's fast. Should be a bullet at Monza.

Sainz looked good in FP2, but LeClerc stuck in the garage with an electrical issue all session was not helpful, I am sure...
Click to expand...

Carlos looked good in race setup in P1 as well. Charles was a shame. Wonder what changes they made. Given Ferrari’s season someone probably reversed a connection somewhere.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back