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

Zest28 said:
Charles makes too many mistakes under pressure to be honest. It's better to get Alonso in that Red Bull. Even at 41 years old, I'm sure he will do a better job then Charles in that #2 Red Bull.

Lewis would be the best choice obviously, but there is no way in hell Max, Marko and Christian will allow Lewis to drive a Red Bull.
Click to expand...
I think part of it is Charles trying to overdrive the Ferrari. When it works, he looks unstoppable, but when he goes over the edge he ends up calling himself stupid. Max did similar things back when Red Bull weren't consistent enough to always compete for wins. Having a package that always delivers can help a driver take fewer risks.
 
Evidently the city of Madrid has secured a Grand Prix in the coming years. It will be held on a temporary street circuit around the IFEMA exhibition grounds out near the airport.

President Macron is also officially backing a return of the French Grand Prix, possibly run on the streets of Nice.

And Nyck DeVries claimed in an article for La Gazzetta dello Sport that he had signed a multi-year deal with Alpha Tauri and had been promised Perez's seat at Red Bull for the 2025 season (Perez's current contract is for 2023 and 2024).
 
CWallace said:
Evidently the city of Madrid has secured a Grand Prix in the coming years. It will be held on a temporary street circuit around the IFEMA exhibition grounds out near the airport.

President Macron is also officially backing a return of the French Grand Prix, possibly run on the streets of Nice.
Click to expand...
Not a huge fan of street circuits personally but at least these are in Europe and not in some desert car park for once. We definitely need a race in France as it seems strange considering how much history that country has given to the sport in the past.

CWallace said:
And Nyck DeVries claimed in an article for La Gazzetta dello Sport that he had signed a multi-year deal with Alpha Tauri and had been promised Perez's seat at Red Bull for the 2025 season (Perez's current contract is for 2023 and 2024).
Click to expand...
I’d imagine Nyck is about to come into rather a lot of money now then if that contract has been broken.
 
  • Like
Reactions: pachyderm
The-Real-Deal82 said:
I’d imagine Nyck is about to come into rather a lot of money now then if that contract has been broken.
Click to expand...
Unless the contract stipulates that he must achieve a certain rate of performance throughout the season. This is probably when a court steps in, who is to blame for the drop in performance, the driver or the car. If it's the driver, breach of contract over performance therefore sacked. If it's the car, no breach of contract, unfair dismissal, driver get's millions in compensation.
 
  • Like
Reactions: pachyderm
laptech said:
Unless the contract stipulates that he must achieve a certain rate of performance throughout the season. This is probably when a court steps in, who is to blame for the drop in performance, the driver or the car. If it's the driver, breach of contract over performance therefore sacked. If it's the car, no breach of contract, unfair dismissal, driver get's millions in compensation.
Click to expand...
There would still be a pay-off of some form even if he has underperformed as this wouldn't classify as gross misconduct. Then again it is an Italian based team so who knows where he stands? I think if it goes to court, I'd be highlighting Marko's public condemnation of him as a reason. I can't think of another personality in F1 who openly criticises their own drivers and staff as it is utterly unprofessional. I'm aware he is thought of as a thoroughly unpleasant chap below the top brass of Red Bull and have no idea why he is still affiliated with the brand now Dietrich is gone.
 
  • Like
Reactions: pachyderm
Alpha Tauri lost Gasly and Tsunoda is not as good as Gasly, so DeVries was probably hired as the "next Gasly".

So it is likely there is some kind of performance clause in DeVries his contract.
 
  • Like
Reactions: pachyderm
Keep on sacking drivers and someone somewhere will eventually be saying 'maybe it's not the drivers that are the problem'.
 
laptech said:
Keep on sacking drivers and someone somewhere will eventually be saying 'maybe it's not the drivers that are the problem'.
Click to expand...

Gasly had many top 5 finishes including a few podiums and a race win. Gasly did so good, Red Bull didn't want to promote him back to Red Bull, as Gasly would be the "face" of Alpha Tauri and help promote the brand.

Which is ofcourse why Gasly left as Gasly his goal was to get back in the Red Bull car. He didn't get fired or sacked.

DeVries simply isn't good enough for Red Bull. He should be beating Tsunoda if he was the "next big star".

Red Bull should have gone after this new guy at Mclaren (I forgot his name). But he is the F3 and F2 champion and he can keep up with Norris no problem. And Norris is no joke.
 
  • Like
Reactions: pachyderm
Zest28 said:
Red Bull should have gone after this new guy at Mclaren (I forgot his name). But he is the F3 and F2 champion and he can keep up with Norris no problem. And Norris is no joke.
Click to expand...
Red Bull did go after Piastri apparently with Horner publicly saying 'he would suit the Red Bull brand', but most likely money and safer assurances were made by McLaren at the time.
 
  • Like
Reactions: pachyderm
Zest28 said:
Charles makes too many mistakes under pressure to be honest. It's better to get Alonso in that Red Bull. Even at 41 years old, I'm sure he will do a better job then Charles in that #2 Red Bull.

Lewis would be the best choice obviously, but there is no way in hell Max, Marko and Christian will allow Lewis to drive a Red Bull.
Click to expand...
Exactly.
 
McLaren looked fast in the twisty bits at Silverstone so fingers crossed.

Williams seems to be designed around very low downforce to generate top-end speed so I expect them to struggle mightily. Come Monza, however...
 
CWallace said:
The reason I believe Ford is providing mostly technical support is because their previous F1 and CART engines were designed by Cosworth and I cannot see much of anything from their FR9 NASCAR engine as being suitable for use in an F1 powerplant.
Click to expand...
From the original press release of the Ford-Redbull partnership:
Ford will provide expertise in areas including battery cell and electric motor technology as well as power unit control software and analytics
Click to expand...
 
  • Haha
Reactions: pachyderm
The-Real-Deal82 said:
There is hope for the rest of the grid then seeing how unreliable Ford’s consumer hybrids are lol. In all seriousness though, this is a hell of a gamble for RedBull, and no guarantee they’ll get it right.
Click to expand...
Let’s hope they make a big development mistake with the engine as you know Adrian Newey won’t!
 
According to Marko, DeVries was fired because Daniel was insanely fast during a test session. In a few laps, Daniel was so fast, he would have put that Red Bull on the front row of the grid (and thus doing a better job then Perez).

Now that is nothing special when driving such a rocketship like a Red Bull, but it impressed Marko enough to get rid of DeVries, considering that DeVries is 28 years old already.

Daniel has demonstrated his talent in the past many times, by beating Max and Vettel in the same car. So if Daniel can back to his old prime, I can see him being promoted to Red Bull in 2025 to replace Perez.

But I suspect he will have some "startup" problems as he has very little experience with these 2023 cars.
 
  • Like
Reactions: pachyderm
Zest28 said:
According to Marko, DeVries was fired because Daniel was insanely fast during a test session. In a few laps, Daniel was so fast, he would have put that Red Bull on the front row of the grid (and thus doing a better job then Perez).

Now that is nothing special when driving such a rocketship like a Red Bull, but it impressed Marko enough to get rid of DeVries, considering that DeVries is 28 years old already.

Daniel has demonstrated his talent in the past many times, by beating Max and Vettel in the same car. So if Daniel can back to his old prime, I can see him being promoted to Red Bull in 2025 to replace Perez.

But I suspect he will have some "startup" problems as he has very little experience with these 2023 cars.
Click to expand...
If he had startup problems he ordinarily wouldn’t make it to next season if there’s another driver in the lineup. Problem is though there probably isn’t a replacement.
 
sunapple said:
If he had startup problems he ordinarily wouldn’t make it to next season if there’s another driver in the lineup. Problem is though there probably isn’t a replacement.
Click to expand...

I think the goal is to replace Perez by Daniel. If Daniel does a good job, he will get promoted. If not, Perez will be replaced by someone else.

Hiring a new 21 year old driver is a bit of risk as we don't know if he can be up there with the likes of Max and Vettel. With Daniel we know he can as he has beaten Max and Vettel in the same car before.

So I believe Marko will give Daniel 2023 and 2024 to show himself if he can get back to his old self.
 
  • Like
Reactions: pachyderm
I think Daniel's long-term future hinges on whether Alpha Tauri is sold or not.

Red Bull has a deep driver development pool and right now they can start them off in the AT and then move promising candidates to Red Bull Racing. If AT goes away, then those drivers have only RBR to go to and I do not see Marko denying a very talented development driver a drive in favor of Daniel.

Alpha Tauri definitely needs development and Daniel is hopefully the driver to do so. My hope is that Red Bull is willing to keep Alpha Tauri in the family if Daniel makes the car and team competitive through the 2024 season. In such a scenario, they could then promote him to replace Perez in 2025 and then have one or two seats in AT to promote F2 and F3 drivers from the driver development program (since Honda will be gone and so will Yuki's seat if he is not performing).
 
  • Like
Reactions: pachyderm
The-Real-Deal82 said:
He’s not really an engine engineer though and his expertise lay in aerodynamics and flow. I certainly hope he’s designed the engine to be honest
Click to expand...

I was watching a recent interview with Adrian on the RB19 development. I was surprised somewhat to listen to him explain how his main focus was the suspension. While he worked closely with the Team Aerodynamicists his primary goal was to create a suspension that allowed the Aero to keep the RB19 ride height as low as possible. My impression was the Rear Suspension is the RB19's Secret Sauce.
 
The-Real-Deal82 said:
There is hope for the rest of the grid then seeing how unreliable Ford’s consumer hybrids are lol. In all seriousness though, this is a hell of a gamble for RedBull, and no guarantee they’ll get it right.
Click to expand...

Ford is not expected to be profitable until 2026. Personally I think this will be a disaster for RBR.

Very much looking forward to the AMR-Honda in 2026. It's going to be a strong PU. Hopefully the chassis will be up to it.
 
  • Like
Reactions: The-Real-Deal82 and zagato27
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