2019 Singapore Grand Prix
- Thread starter Steve Jackson
- Start date
Well this is a first @Steve Jackson, I was expecting to see some kind of interesting opening context to this thread to read about for the race this weekend and was greeted by that, I can only assume you got out the wrong side of the bed this morning or something píssed you off.
If someone said to me that Seb would qualify 3rd after Friday, I would have naturally assumed it he would have been behind Mad Max and Hamilton - but well just where did Ferrari find this pace around here.
Not complaining as at least we've got another potential good race in store ie via strategy battle (providing SC/VSC's don't interfere), though still expecting Hamilton & Merc to have the faster race car once again, I guess we'll see.
As for qualy yeah after the first Q3's yeah I was cautiously optimistic Seb would get pole, but it wasn't meant to be as Leclerc pulled out a worldie, though even if Leclerc didn't Seb was pipped by Hamilton as well so 3rd in the end just 2 tenths off isn't a disaster, anyway Seb gets to start from the clean side of the grid so I hope he can get ahead of Hamilton at the start.
Lastly as a interesting subplot, saw Danny Ric get dq'ed from qualy, he will start from last - he'll need a bit of luck to get in the points I would have thought or some great strategy move.
Not complaining as at least we've got another potential good race in store ie via strategy battle (providing SC/VSC's don't interfere), though still expecting Hamilton & Merc to have the faster race car once again, I guess we'll see.
As for qualy yeah after the first Q3's yeah I was cautiously optimistic Seb would get pole, but it wasn't meant to be as Leclerc pulled out a worldie, though even if Leclerc didn't Seb was pipped by Hamilton as well so 3rd in the end just 2 tenths off isn't a disaster, anyway Seb gets to start from the clean side of the grid so I hope he can get ahead of Hamilton at the start.
Lastly as a interesting subplot, saw Danny Ric get dq'ed from qualy, he will start from last - he'll need a bit of luck to get in the points I would have thought or some great strategy move.
Even when Vettel brings his A game over a lap, the kid still aces him. I think he said he was over the limit three times on the lap and it held together. Senna-esque.
I just can't get try-hard's first corner out of my mind from 2017. All will be revealed.
I just can't get try-hard's first corner out of my mind from 2017. All will be revealed.
I predict leclerc will take Hamilton out and show us he's a dirty driver. I haven't seen this side to him yet but just got the feeling it's there. This is not because of what he did to Hamilton as I thought that was borderline fairish. I don't know what it is just got a feeling his gonna take someone out, probably Hamilton
They were 1-3 and ended up 1-2 so you have to say it was a good strategy obviously Leclerc wont be happy but for the team it was the right thing to do.
They could've pitted Leclerc into the same gap that they put Vettel into. They're still favouring Vettel, maybe they feel the need to rebuild him. Leclerc is ahead in the championship by 5 points even though they've just gifted Seb a 14 point swing.
With the upper hand at a lot of the remaining tracks, Verstappen (obviously NOT Bottas after today's message from the pitwall) could take points off Hamilton. Who knows, if Albon finds his feet as he is appearing to, maybe he could too. Might be the difference in the end.
I don't think they were trying to favour Vettel I think they just got caught out by how big the undercut is so they pitted Vettel the lap before leclerc to give him a chance to undercut Hamilton thinking that Leclerc who was about 3 seconds ahead of Vettel could pit the next lap and stay in the lead ahead of Vettel and they would be 1-2 it worked out except the undercut was bigger than expected so Vettel ended up in the lead. But lets not forget that once he was ahead Vettel did a much better job of getting through the traffic and would have probably won by quite a margin without the safety cars.
Well this didn't happen lol, but we did get a glimpse of how selfish leclerc can be. Could barely raise a smile. I mean come on mate you beasted the last 2 races and now your team has it's first 1,2. Glad to see Vettel get this one tbh, he is a nice guy but his driving has been shite for a long time so hopefully this gives him a boost cos he is a decent driver when he's hungry. Back to picking on grosjean for now lol
Well with my earlier post, I only had a couple spare minutes just after the race so thought I'd jokingly take a leaf out of @Erti147's post race 'hahahaha' book.
(LC just incase in your in a hurry a reply to you is at the bottom of this post)
Anyway as for the race, yeah obviously Seb getting the first stop and undercut to jump Leclerc shouldn't really happen but circumstances played out that turned it into a race defining moment.
My thoughts pretty much sort of echo @iJokeri22 earlier post on this, when Ferrari pitted Seb I was 100% sure there focus was to try jump Hamilton and in turn to force Merc's hand to pit next lap like Leclerc, but they wouldn't have factored that Seb could jump Leclerc as well.
As when Seb pitted he was about 3.4 behind Leclerc and he also had a 3 sec stop to Leclerc's 2.4, so Seb made up over 4 seconds on his outlap alone, it was very surprising the undercut was that strong though equally you could praise Seb for putting in a outlap like that.
However once Seb took the net lead he didn't look back, he scythed his way past the few drivers that hadn't pitted, (will add the pass on Gasly was a bit aggressive but it was ruthless and controlled) and built up a 5/6 second lead just before the SC came out, Seb then had 3 flawless SC restarts, great pace and didn't put a foot wrong all race to earn the win - of course I'm very happy. (for a change lol)
With Leclerc's radio messages during the race, I don't have a problem with it and I think anyone in those circumstances would have been unhappy with how the race played out, maybe he shouldn't have done multiple radio messages about it, but he's a young hungry driver who's had his first taste of victory and won the last 2 and wants to naturally keep winning now.
Though I would query what Merc where doing strategy wise as they were in the pitlane when Seb and Mad Max pitted, if they actually bring Hamilton in instead of doing their standard fake dummy stop then Hamilton wins the race, its as simple as that.
I mean you could criticise the Ferrari strategists and say there favouring Seb all you want, but whether you like it or not from a team perspective they executed perfectly as neither driver can challenge/are a threat for the WDC now, the Merc strategists where the real villains of this masterpiece today with that radio message to Bottas underlining this - that radio message by James spoke volumes essentially saying, 'sorry Bottas your not allowed to get ahead of your championship rival despite being 2nd in the championship and 63 points behind.' (before the race)
The WDC is basically over (if you honestly think that Mad Max/Leclerc still have a chance your either mad or extremely optimistic) the only driver that still has a very small chance of catching Hamilton is Bottas, and Merc through their own incompetence today had to stop Bottas from jumping Hamilton, to be fair with the strategy they gave Hamilton I guess it was the right thing to do but from a racing perspective...
(LC just incase in your in a hurry a reply to you is at the bottom of this post)
Anyway as for the race, yeah obviously Seb getting the first stop and undercut to jump Leclerc shouldn't really happen but circumstances played out that turned it into a race defining moment.
My thoughts pretty much sort of echo @iJokeri22 earlier post on this, when Ferrari pitted Seb I was 100% sure there focus was to try jump Hamilton and in turn to force Merc's hand to pit next lap like Leclerc, but they wouldn't have factored that Seb could jump Leclerc as well.
As when Seb pitted he was about 3.4 behind Leclerc and he also had a 3 sec stop to Leclerc's 2.4, so Seb made up over 4 seconds on his outlap alone, it was very surprising the undercut was that strong though equally you could praise Seb for putting in a outlap like that.
However once Seb took the net lead he didn't look back, he scythed his way past the few drivers that hadn't pitted, (will add the pass on Gasly was a bit aggressive but it was ruthless and controlled) and built up a 5/6 second lead just before the SC came out, Seb then had 3 flawless SC restarts, great pace and didn't put a foot wrong all race to earn the win - of course I'm very happy. (for a change lol)
With Leclerc's radio messages during the race, I don't have a problem with it and I think anyone in those circumstances would have been unhappy with how the race played out, maybe he shouldn't have done multiple radio messages about it, but he's a young hungry driver who's had his first taste of victory and won the last 2 and wants to naturally keep winning now.
The thing is Steve with the undercut and those pitstops is they still wanted to stretch the first stint a bit more and were playing cat and mouse, but it is clear they could have pitted the top 2 and came out in clean air but they choose not too, however Ferrari see Red Bull in the pitlane as well and have to cover Mad Max off so they pit Seb and it works out perfectly and gets Ferrari the 1-2 in the end and the rest is history.
Though I would query what Merc where doing strategy wise as they were in the pitlane when Seb and Mad Max pitted, if they actually bring Hamilton in instead of doing their standard fake dummy stop then Hamilton wins the race, its as simple as that.
I mean you could criticise the Ferrari strategists and say there favouring Seb all you want, but whether you like it or not from a team perspective they executed perfectly as neither driver can challenge/are a threat for the WDC now, the Merc strategists where the real villains of this masterpiece today with that radio message to Bottas underlining this - that radio message by James spoke volumes essentially saying, 'sorry Bottas your not allowed to get ahead of your championship rival despite being 2nd in the championship and 63 points behind.' (before the race)
The WDC is basically over (if you honestly think that Mad Max/Leclerc still have a chance your either mad or extremely optimistic
) the only driver that still has a very small chance of catching Hamilton is Bottas, and Merc through their own incompetence today had to stop Bottas from jumping Hamilton, to be fair with the strategy they gave Hamilton I guess it was the right thing to do but from a racing perspective...I've said it before and I'll say it again all top drivers are selfish to a degree at times, they have to be.
Are you suggesting he ate a snickers before the race LC?
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So pretty much exactly what I said earlier normally a 2 second undercut would be considered big so for it to be double that just caught them out.
Regardless of how it happened though I'm glad Vettel won we need him back on form and racing at the front with Hamilton, Verstappen and Leclerc we just need to pray that next season they all get more equal cars and we can have a 4 way title fight.
Regardless of how it happened though I'm glad Vettel won we need him back on form and racing at the front with Hamilton, Verstappen and Leclerc we just need to pray that next season they all get more equal cars and we can have a 4 way title fight.
Very long post @Wobbuffet it just takes a DNF or a PU penalty for Hamilton and it changes completely.
@Wobbuffet I don't think Hamilton would of won it easily if he pitted with seb n max. I think with no drs Hamilton probably get jumped down the straight in sector 1. Mercedes really do need a better tactician tho, might apply for it myself. I'm always against 9 out of 10 of there calls. I mean there was an obvious gap for about 4-5 laps for any of the drivers in the top 6 to put and get clean air. Mercedes always get caught napping. Surprised Horner didn't bring albon in early