Some good points, but it's clearly not all down to just the MBZ PU, otherwise Williams & the team formerly known as Force India would surely be more competitive.

Obviously, more power isn't the only answer.

quote:

Originally posted by P250UA5:
Some good points, but it's clearly not all down to just the MBZ PU, otherwise Williams & the team formerly known as Force India would surely be more competitive.

Obviously, more power isn't the only answer.

Yep, well Merc has some mighty resources, no? The Merc package is a bunch of integrated systems.

Red Bull has long shown that races can be won without overwhelming power. FWIW others may have Merc power -- supposedly customer engines are what the factory uses -- but who knows more about those power units than Merc?

I agree, the PU is only a piece of the whole package & the folks at Williams seem to be running more competitive with F2 sadly.

I'm just having a hard time imagining the team agreeing to engineer the results, much less convincing the 2 championship leaders to go along with it.

They're both in it for the championship, Hamilton has a lead, but those can quickly evaporate & Bottas is trying to make that maiden championship his.

I'm admittedly a Mercedes and Bottas fan, and may be a bit biased, but I think I'd have the same opinion if it were another team dominating & this result coming about.

quote:

Originally posted by P250UA5:
I think I'd have the same opinion if it were another team dominating & this result coming about.

It was much worst during the years when Ferrari and Schumacher were winning everything.

Schumacher wasn't above running his own teammate off the track at the start of races to be first into Turn 1

I got back into F1 seriously in 2014, with the intro of the new regs, coincidentally.

I've read about those years & some of the controversy, but didn't witness it 'live'.

There have been many years when one team dominated. Often with a greater margin than the Mercedes has today.
Williams, McLaren, Ferrari, Lotus have all had years when the others were racing for scraps. The only difference is that today's cars are much more reliable.

https://www.motorsportmagazine...1s-most-dominant-car

quote:

Originally posted by TMats:
Really enjoyed this race. I also think it would have been criminal for the stewards to have changed the outcome. Glad they didn’t.

Max drove a WHOPPER of a race...

quote:

Originally posted by 220-9er:
There have been many years when one team dominated. Often with a greater margin than the Mercedes has today.
Williams, McLaren, Ferrari, Lotus have all had years when the others were racing for scraps. The only difference is that today's cars are much more reliable.

https://www.motorsportmagazine...1s-most-dominant-car

I mentioned McLaren 1988 where they won all but 1 race.
Didn't get a response when I asked if that was a boring season/era. A different era for sure, but some real parallels to the current circumstances.

quote:

Originally posted by P250UA5:
..some real parallels to the current circumstances.

One big difference is how much more extensively F1 has been marketed today. I can't speak to Mac's 1988 dominance and tv ratings then, the series is seeing a consistent erosion of viewers over the last few years. With millions able to watch now and F1's world wide venues, that adds up to a huge number no longer watching.

quote:

Originally posted by 220-9er:
The only difference is that today's cars are much more reliable.

Not only more reliable...I remember a Monoco GP where there were only 6 cars running at the end, they only awarded points down to 6th place, Graham Hill won that one...but also a lot safer. Back then every crash could easily result in the death of a driver.

The increased safety has also lead to the current glut of worthy drivers waiting on the fringes of F1. Without the constant death of race drivers, there aren't as many available seats

No refueling has really led to the boring races. There were 1,2,3,4 stops in the same race. The 3 and 4 stoppers were flying around light, while the 1 stoppers trudged around heavy leading to divergent strategies.

quote:

Originally posted by Ripley:

quote:

Originally posted by P250UA5:
..some real parallels to the current circumstances.

One big difference is how much more extensively F1 has been marketed today. I can't speak to Mac's 1988 dominance and tv ratings then, the series is seeing a consistent erosion of viewers over the last few years. With millions able to watch now and F1's world wide venues, that adds up to a huge number no longer watching.

I was a regular F1 watcher in the 80's early 90's,

I remember hearing and reading about Prost and maybe one or 2 others talk about safety, and how it needed to improve,
then the changes after Senna died made the sport less interesting,

combine that with no refuel, the Shumaker dominance with (I think) Benneton, and also F1 coverage getting moved from one station to the next, time changes etc etc and I just stopped watching,

Latest F1 News:

McLaren retaining Sainz & Norris for 2020
https://www.formula1.com/en/la...qQODoGVsiXGI2oc.html

Silverstone locked into 5 year extension on F1 calendar
https://www.formula1.com/en/la...F6TBe2S3P7Bbrc7.html

Can't find a decent link, but the video of Grosjean crashing in pit lane is epic.

The crew looks just thrilled, I say!

eta (until F1 takes this down):




Link to original video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_J1Qh7MD5Y

At the start of his F1 career Grosjean looked like he was going to be fast but would have to stop the over-driving and unforced errors to become worthy of a good seat.
Then he seemed to be making progress and getting some good results.
Now he seems to be doing pretty much everything wrong. He's not especially fast, makes constant errors, and whines all the time.

A good pole, IMO, not sure where the red car's pace went today.

No spoilers for those who recorded the British GP and haven’t watched yet. I’ll just say, this was the most entertaining race I’ve watched in two years—from the start, lots of action.

Agreed so far, I paused after the first few pit stops & will finish it up tonight.
Some flashbacks to Bahrain 2014 with the lead swaps the first few laps.

Wow. Definitely best race of the year so far. Good hard racing all around. Max got lucky IMO, could've gone much worse.

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The outside pass by Leclerc was the pass of the year and nice clean racing by both drivers.

Not sure if I was just mis-seeing it, but from the onboards, the Renaults seem to be geared longer.
A few shots from RIC showing him in 7th where I could've sworn some of the front-runners were in 8th

Edit: Watching Bottas' pole lap, he's in 8th going into Copse & Ricciardo was running in 7th in a few of the onboards.
Granted, Bottas was on quali light fuel load, and Ric was mid-race load.

Not sure if the regulation changed, but when I got back into watching F1 in 2014, I recall something about teams only being able to change gear ratios a limited (2, 3?) times per season.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: P250UA5,