2020 F1 challenge R1 Austria 5 July; discussion thread

Can't wait, its as a weekend should be. Off to the pub on Saturday and then the afternoon on the Sofa on Sunday watching F1, trying to rid myself of my hangover.

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Highlights on C4 with the programme starting at 6:30 in the evening so expect race to start at 7ish just after dinner which is fine for me.

TBH I've almost totally lost interest in F1 over the past 6 months. I hope that it's a good race and stimulates my appetite for F1 again

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I followed qualy via Autosport and the live timing feed, which gives some interesting insights - no visuals obviously, but every split in real time. A couple of things stood out. Lando's final lap in Q3 was mighty - he was the only driver in the field to string his fastest three sectors together for a 'perfect' lap. Secondly, the Racing Point teammates. I was expecting the speed of the 'pink Mercedes' to show Lance Stroll up immediately. He isn't useless by any means, but is probably the slowest F1 driver over a single lap. Yet he managed to beat Perez in Q1 and made it into Q3, ending up just a tenth and a half adrift. The stats show that although he was slower, he was more consistent over a lap than Perez, who set faster individual sectors but, for whatever reason, struggled to string them together in the same lap. Perez's ideal lap (his fastest three sectors added together) was a full 0.198 seconds faster than his actual best lap, worse than all bar Kvyat (0.247). By comparison, Stroll's fastest three sectors would have put him just 0.036 seconds up, which is right at the sharp end.

Red Bull protesting anything they can, as usual (DAS on Saturday despite the FIA having made it clear it was legal for 2020 some weeks ago) and a grid penalty being imposed just a few hours before the race starts.... back to racing taking place in courtrooms and stewards' office instead of on the track. this is one of the things that sickens me about the "sport". At least RBR got their "karma" in the race with 2 DNFs although I feel sorry for Albon and Verstappen

Norris did an amazing job on that last lap. As soon as he knew he was close to being within 5s of Hamilton he went straight into qualifying mode. A 5s penalty so close to the end having just had a safety car was a tad harsh because it was a racing incident and handing out punishments for that sort of thing will just discourage the wheel to wheel driving the sport needs to keep fans interested. Also impressed with how Le Clerk quietly worked his up to the podium. Rumours are already starting to circulate that Vettel wont last the whole season in the second Ferarri.

I was disappointed by RB's attitude to getting Hamilton a grid penalty. The stewards hadn't given him because to be fair his view of the one yellow flag was obscured by the dust Bottas kicked up and then the next marshal had a green flag. But for Red Bull to find another camera angle and go snitching was a bit underhand and smacked of sour grapes at not being fast enough on track.

Both last year's collision and Sunday's between Albon and Hamilton were, in my opinion, caused because of Albon's impatience. He needs to learn to wait and pick his time and place because he would have got past and could have waited to do it down the straight with DRS after a faster corner exit.

I enjoyed the race and was really pleased for Lando Norris. Given the fragility of the Mercedes gearbox and Redbull's electrics there will be some frantic work taking place this week.

Le Clerc is deffo the real deal along with Verstappen. I really hope George Russell gets a decent seat as by all accounts he's no slouch.

It was good to see the drivers being given the option on how they respond to BLM. You'd expect Kimi to always go his own way but was brave of Le Clerc for example to put himself out there.

Ocon didn't really shine, next week will be important if hes to get out of Ricciardos shadow.

I can't blame Albon for the crash, yes he put his car at risk but in a Red Bull you've got to make your passes the hard way as breezing past a Merc even on straight isn't a guaranteed. Soft tyres have a window of a few laps so had to get on with it. It was a superb pass until Hamilton nerfed him.

"....It was a superb pass until Hamilton nerfed him".

Hamilton did not 'nerf' Albon, his steering input did not change, he had to get round the corner and there was nowhere to go'

Albon should have used DRS on the straight and avoided the collision entirely. Essentially Albon caused the collision but Hamilton got the penalty which is another way of saying that the stewarding decisions are entirely farcical in their inconsistency. Hamilton and Rosberg at the same corner and the same circumstances?

Perhaps it wasn't wise to accuse everyone he works for of being racists. I expect he'll be getting a lot of this sort of decision this season and his paranoia will only grow stronger. His job is to drive a car, not make other drivers genuflect on the grid.

"It did. He steered out (to the left) and into Albon". That was not on the coverage of the incident, both DC and MW pointed out the steering angle staying where it was throughout the corner.

The BLM thing has far more traction than it deserves though and it is unlikely to change in the short/medium term sadly. I quite agree with Racing's comment about all live's matter. Much more like it imho.

Absolutely. I think with Vettel, regardless of how much downforce the car has, he just isn’t at one with these hybrid cars under braking. The cars are slightly squirmier now with the greater amount of energy being put through the back axle, and as the downforce bleeds off he struggles with the slight rear-instability that has been a characteristic since 2014. Note how many wobbles Vettel has had whilst braking into slow corners. With the lack of Ferrari’s straight-line speed, Leclerc had to do his passing on the brakes, not just rely on flat-out DRS overtaking. His move on Perez was just fabulous, aggressive but fair and he didn’t escort Perez off the track. I think Leclerc learnt a lot from being mugged in turn 3 by Verstappen last year, he won’t be leaving the door open again.

With the Hamilton and Albon collision, it was technically Hamilton’s fault. Hamilton should have given more space to the car on the outside. It was Albon’s right to be there. However, in reality putting yourself on the outside off a corner lined with gravel just isn’t smart. Its deceptively tight is turn 4, it drops away quite suddenly and it’s not so much that Hamilton steers into Albon, he just didn’t do all he could to avoid the collision, the car will naturally understeer slightly wide exiting turn 4, especially because Hamilton had to take an acute entry into the corner by defending. I think Albon’s pace would have been rapid; both Merc’s were on old and hard tyres, they were going to be defenceless with DRS.

The use of the Safety Car for stricken cars was interesting. No double-waved yellow or even VSC, they issued full Safety Car periods for stopped cars. It was very NASCAR-esque. It made the strategy interesting, we wouldn't have seen a lot of the passing we saw without the Safety Car periods.