Good news for Sauber though. Getting current spec motors is a huge gain for them for next year. I will be curious to see how they stack up against HAAS with a competitive powerplant for the year. Now we know why Monisha got the sack I suppose.
Seems everyone is ditching their current projects for Formula E at this point. Much as Porsche would be welcomed to F1 again (wonder if Mac is salivating at the prospect?) they are the smallest in the VAP group and readily admit the strain it puts on them to do a project like F1 while being involved in other things. Unless a TAG type deal comes along again I doubt they would make the jump.
That said Aston claimed almost identical hardships not half a year ago and then comes out of the strat group meeting all grins and giggles. Their ties to Merc and Cosworth may have something to do with their renewed enthusiasm or it may just be that they actually turned a profit for a few quarters and are dumbfounded with the unknown money and are looking to dump it somewhere
So the big question becomes what happens to Honda? Is Merc's sabre rattling a RedBullyian ploy to frighten them into a more aggressive development process? Does the Sauber deal open up a doorway for the much speculated Mac/Scud combo or does it in effect torpedo those rumors once and for all. Again the SCUD has limited resources after all and was loathe to provide current spec motors so running 4 teams powerplants might be a bit of a stretch. Can Mac really renegotiate a deal with Merc? Ronbo's gone so the atmosphere is a lot less contentious so perhaps. A Renault partnership only puts them in the bottom of the midfield at best so it continues their woes and makes them sponsor repellent .
The thing that is sticking in my mind is Hasegawa's statement that their dyno testing was at the root of their problems as the g loads could not be simulated and therefore race strain was an unknown quantity. How can every other engine builder be able to do that and you cannot? it is just becoming more unbelievable that a company of that pedigree completely fell down on the job on this one given what is at stake.
Yeah what was the point in competing with old Ferrari engines? I guess they had no choice at the time.
Would feel odd with a Ferrari engine in a McLaren. Wonder if it wouldn´t lead to a lot of trust issues about what engines is supplied
But why not they tried the Mercedes engine before and didn´t manage to build a good chassi around it.
With Honda they are sure to get number one factory support which in the end is what you need to really compete. But can understand if patience is running dry.
Renault would be fun but then hard to compete against Red Bull. Best chassi builders in the business.
And yet the rumour mill is now rife with a potential Torro Rosso Honda partnership in the offing. I would give not one molecule of credence to that one were it not for Sainz, out of the blue desperation to be shot of that team
Good to see Mac making some progress though. Alonso was best of the rest today, but still a full minute behind the top 3 teams.
I've defended Max before, but he had a shocker today. ****in sore loser, as Ric concisely put it! Admittedly Vettel was slowing things down at the front, but the fact Max got so close even with a 10 second penalty suggests he and Ric would have been mixing it up if he hadn't taken out his teammate so early on.
This move was nothing compared to his moving under braking though. I have no idea why they gave 10 seconds for that. I expected 5 seconds. No further action rather then 10 seconds seeing how they refereed so far and all about letting them race. To drift wide when you have the inner is not an uncommon misstake. Actually it´s kind of practise to try and push the other car off track but that is after the apex. But that is deliberate and fair game apparently. I didn´t see any deliberate move just locking of brakes and poor judgement so he got a bit killed by the judges there. Clear penalty but nothing out of the ordinary.
I don´t think much would have changed except for a longer train behind Vettel. The fact Alonso could get fastest lap over a Max Verstappen with free air don´t suggest Max pace was all that great. Max was hunting free when Vettel was doing turtle pace.
Poor judgement is key though - I wasn't implying he deliberately ran into Ric, I know he locked up and wasn't in control at that point, but as Ric suggested, it was his over-exuberance at trying to win the place back immediately that caused him to lose control. Steward's penalty was proportionate in my view.
Ricciardo is not really an unbiased source of information here. He would probably ask for a race ban in the moment
But seriously racing is being on the limit then it´s easy to do misstakes. He had the right to be there on the inner so it wasn´t that super optimistic. Sure had he not lost a few places before he may been more defensive but still why 10 seconds. I don´t get it looking at previous accidents that just gave 5 seconds this season.
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