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F1 is finally back to 2015 qualifying rules thanks to teams requesting it after seeing another disaster run and much disappointed qualifying session in Bahrain. It is believed that this will remain in effect for the rest of the season.
No news yet if Alonso will return to his cockpit but I believe he will.
Looking forward to another great race from Shanghai.
Drivers
Championship Points
Nico Rosberg 50 Lewis Hamilton 33 Daniel Ricciardo 24 Kimi Raikkonen 18 Romain Grosjean 18 Sebastian Vettel 15 Felipe Massa 14 Max Verstappen 9 Nico Hulkenberg 6 Daniil Kvyat 6 Valtteri Bottas 6 Carlos Sainz 2 Stoffel Vandoorne 1 Kevin Magnussen 0 Jolyon Palmer 0 Marcus Ericsson 0 Sergio Perez 0 Pascal Wehrlein 0 Felipe Nasr 0 Jenson Button 0 Rio Haryanto 0 Estaban Gutierrez 0 Fernando Alonso 0
Constructors
Championship Points
Mercedes 83 Ferrari 33 RBR 30 Williams 20 Haas 18 Toro Rosso 11 Force India 6 Mclaren 1 Renault 0 Sauber 0 Manor 0
Needs more cowbell
I love seeing Grosjean/Haas up there! Hopefully the torrid start to the season continues this weekend.
2017 X5 ///MOriginally Posted by Ryan M3
2019 X3 XDrive 30i
2003 C4S
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Absolutely agree with m3fuz. Chinese race must be interesting because of freakish weather in Shanghai. I’ve read an interview with Alonso. He says that he intends to participate in the race. Let’s wish him a good luck! I believe he will return too!
Last edited by Bittersweet007; 04-12-2016 at 04:16 PM.
OFC Scallywag
I hope Vandoorne races again instead of Alonso. He might not get another chance for years and he deserves a seat.
Weather forecast says light rain on Friday and Saturday with clear skies on Sunday. Could make for an interesting race if the teams cannot test or quali in the dry. With the long fast corners I doubt the Super Softs will last 10 laps so I'm expecting a lot of pit stops which nearly always makes the races interesting.
One of the longest straights on the calendar with the cars pulling almost 6Gs under braking into turn turn 14.
It should be a good race.
OFC Scallywag
update:
Alonso gets provisional clearance to compete in China
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Also:
Hamilton is getting a 5 place grid penalty due to changing his gearbox.
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Well done! No doubt Vandoorne is a fine fellow, but as for me, I am cheering for Alonso. Hope he will undergo a further test.
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Yeah, he will do the first practice session and then will undergo a quick medical check up before they allow him to do anything else.
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anyone watching FP1, Massa, Magnussen had tire blowouts and the track had a red flag to clean debris. looks like Pirelli did a michelin move and the tires are exploding or deflating without warning or puncture.....
e30 325i, the mighty 4 door granma mobile....Gone
e39 528i, 4 door sports tank
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Pirelli mandating higher tire pressures, 23/21.5 f/r, "cold". Drivers complaining of no grip, no feel, sliding.
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"It's not the people who vote that count, it's the people who count the votes."
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Kimi during FP2:
Last edited by MagneZium; 04-15-2016 at 11:53 AM.
BMWs are fun in the snow too...
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
OFC Scallywag
Yeah, about to start watching FP1 and 2 but IIRC in Melbourne this year Kimi said pretty much the same thing when he was out doing a run on the mediums.
Said it was a waste of time.
He really doesn't like the long run tire tests but he always gets the harder compound to test while Seb gets the softer.
I dont is what!!
Really hope the Ferrari's are able to get something good out of this weekend! RoGro also complaining that Pirelli have asked to use high tire pressures, and that during the Michelin era the pressures were not high, they are almost 5 to7 PSi higher than what Michelin used to advise and in the raise they gain another 2 to 3 PSi....almost all drivers are complaining about the cars floating with a lack of grip!
May be Pirelli are worried that regular pressures might chew up tires as this track is known to cause graining specially on the left tires....may be to reduce that they are advising high pressures, OR they have found something that is bugging them and hence advising higher pressures!
OFC Scallywag
Watching FP2 now and Kimi was on the softs when he complained after 14 laps. Seb was doing the long runs on the medium. So they did swap the tire compounds per driver.
But wow, the NBC coverage is painful. Their pronunciation of Boat-ass. Making vroom vroom noises when they have nothing to say. Writing on the screen in their yellow marker to show where the steering wheel is. urgh
I dont is what!!
To say they are PATHETIC is shameful, they are that bad! That old fart mentioned something this morning and i was like WHAAAT (cant remember what it was) but yeah they lack details, knowledge, they dont recognize driver helmets, its a joke. I normally watch NBC broadcast on mute with commentary from Sky F1 and switch to Sky video feed when NBC goes on a break!
I have a feeling Haas might just have 1 glory year this year, as regulations are changing next year. I REALLY hope they are able to keep up with their upward curve, would be great for F1 in the states! Also very sad that none of the major channels, including ESPN dont even give 2 cents about Haas F1 and dont even cover them in SportsCentre!
I mean come on guys, this is your home team, give it some love!
OFC Scallywag
I hope they don't change the rules. Haas was very clever in the way they've built the team. Others can do it to since it's now a tried and tested startup with good (comparatively) results. These rules and Haas shows that it is possible to enter F1 and make a good showing.
The other teams who've tried building everything by themselves are mostly gone or currently under financial duress. HRT, USGP, Lotus, Caterham, and now Sauber and Force India with pretty serious financial woes.
If anything, Haas working within the rules, have proved that you don't need to go it alone until you're ready.
Having said that I really don't want to see customer cars in F1 so I wouldn't mind if they tweaked the rules a bit (re: wind tunnel testing etc) - but there's no need for a massive overhaul.
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Well, SportsCentre is on TSN in Canada so I'm not sure why they would care that much about an American team
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Hamilton out of the car in quali.
Looking like Rosberg will be world champion.
- - - Updated - - -
Addition: Ricciardo behind Rosberg. Assuming no drama at the start he has a nice buffer behind him, medium tires, and the others around him will have to lap soon on their softs.
Then again it might rain tomorrow so everything is still possible?
BMWs are fun in the snow too...
OFC Scallywag
Interesting quali.
Turn 14 caught both Kimi and Seb out.
Lewis' car has an ERS issue. Must be a strange issue because they had an oscilloscope connected together with a laptop. Lewis starts last.
Hulk's going to get a grid penalty for the lost wheel.
How Ricciardo got that lap is incredible. Renault (TagHeuer) obviously doing much better.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
You're calling it with 19 races to go?
2x iSketch champion
With this recent streak of bad luck maybe we'll get to see 2011 Lewis again.
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Quick question. Is the race at 2am eastern time or 3am?
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2am eastern
e30 325i, the mighty 4 door granma mobile....Gone
e39 528i, 4 door sports tank
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I'm expressing what the situation strongly looks like. 'Calling it' achieves nothing.
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About the first corner incident: I agree that Kvyat was a bit over-optimistic as at the end of the move did drift almost to the edge of the track with barely enough room for another car anymore at all (if Vettel had survived that far). He came from pretty far back and comparing to the speed of everyone else on the track, he was massively faster entering that part of the corner. Then again, its hard to determine if it was a suicidal dive-bomb or a legit move. After all he was far enough alongside Vettel to argue that Vettel should just leave him enough room and all Kvyat has to do is leave enough room for Vettel. I don't know what the rules say about leaving room for two cars if there are that many that you're actually passing...
Vettel had basically no choice to do anything except steer into either Kvyat or Räikkönen (after he had left the door wide open, then again he probably determined it to be impossible for anyone to dive-bomb from as far back as the nearest car was). In hindsight he should've just kept his line and hit Kvyat, but then Kvyat would've gone sideways in front of him and Kimi or even jumped, possibly taking them all out of the race.
So maybe in the end it's Räikkönen who is to blame if we need to find who caused that racing incident. He should've kept from tightening his line to get back further to the inside as he didn't have room to do so. He was 'coming back into the corner' after drifting wide as much as Vettel steered into him as he dodged Kvyat. But it's understandable that Kimi had no way of seeing both Vettel and Kvyat appearing from way back and knowing that Vettel would have to take a wide line so there's no room for Kimi to tighten the line.
BTW some commentators said that the whole thing started from Kimi locking up and coming up with reasons why his brakes would lock up (due to them being cold etc.) but I think it's clear that he just reacted to Rosberg tightening his line to the inside and he had to hit the anchors so his wing doesn't hit the rear of Rosberg.
Anyway, great drive (after that) from Vettel, Kimi, Daniel, and also in a boring way from Rosberg too. Too bad that the Oligarch-supported Russian is even in the sport but that's F1, and he drove well I guess.
Williams just isn't a fast car, period. They're barely at the front of the mid-field teams and I don't see them rising up higher without serious improvements to the car.
Hoping for a solid race for the Ferraris next time, I want to see what they can do against the Mercs! Probably still can't beat them without everything going 100% and masterful tactics, but they'll be close now? Actually, I still think the Mercs can just drop them behind at the pit stops and drive so solid that they'd get a 1-2. Even if Ferrari would be closer behind, they'd still be behind with no chance of passing.
Last edited by MagneZium; 04-17-2016 at 06:00 AM.
BMWs are fun in the snow too...
I dont is what!!
- Feels like a missed opportunity for the Ferrari's, lets see where they can go on a normal race
- Vettel vs Kvyat was a racing incident - it was good to see their reaction and conversation post race. Vettel was upset and out-spoken and Kvyat, I guess could care less and he seemed to be glad to be on the podium, good for him!
- I thought McLaren sounded optimistic when they did not make into Q3 - kind of expected more from them
- Hamilton's car must have sustained damage as his pace was no where in closing stages
- The Red Bull chassis - looks to be the class of the field, in slow speed corners especially they are able to lay the traction down very quickly and smoothly
- Not sure how Hass F1 suddenly dropped may be the post race investigation will report something we dont know
Was a normal race, F1 2016 is definitely one of the more interesting seasons for a while, since I can remember, good racing, competetive teams, good quality and depth of drivers in the field as well
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