In the constructor’s championship, Williams is now arguably 11th out of a total of 10 teams.
Not much else to say about the race, chaos on the first lap because it’s a parade once cars get any sort of distance (other than a top-6 car getting shuffled back by grid penalties)
The rain came one day early, qualifying Q3 was good though and Ferrari botched it again for Kimi.
Luckily there was lots to talk about from the summer break. Not sure if the casual fan would’ve even noticed the drama around Force India. Poor Ocon totally lost out in the musical chairs, and too tall for the McLaren… And apparently RB will be the only team to run Renault’s spec C engine on Ricciardo’s car, so effectively they’ll be doing Renault a big favour by testing and debugging the new parts even though they’ve fallen out and moving to Honda next year, strange.
I hope I haven’t killed this thread… Quite an exciting race at Monza. At the beginning of the season I was hoping for Ferrari/Vettel to win the championships, not because I’m a fan of them in particular, but just for the variety and to stop Merc’s dominance. But wow, that was an amateurish mistake by Vettel. My hat’s off to Hamilton, he’s done a solid job all season and fully deserves a fifth title.
I think Lewis deserves a full 50% for that first lap incident. There really was no way he was going to pull that off. Lucky they both weren’t out.
But I’m heavily biased.
Ridiculous. Hamilton was simply overtaking and left much more than a car’s width. Vettel just under-steered into him.
Has Vettel tried to blame Hamilton?
By amateurish mistake, I meant what Vettel did before the chicane, not during. From the overhead shot of the incident, on the approach to the corner he pulls left leaving the door wide open for Hamilton to get alongside him. He should’ve stayed behind Kimi who took a defensive line in the middle of the track, then Hamilton would’ve had much less of a chance to try a pass. In a post-race interview Vettel said he wanted to attack Kimi, which makes no sense, why take such a risk when you know Kimi will give you the position later on. And up and down the paddock, everyone’s talking about “unforced error.”
It was the right move and perfectly executed. It was not without risk but what move ever is?
Vettel was well beaten into that corner and was given all the room he needed to avoid a collision, Lewis was ahead and had taken the racing line.
I think Hamilton is driving as well as he ever has and finding a way to win in a car that is not the quickest.
He is massively quick over one lap, extracts great speed on the long runs and, possibly most impressively, his decision making and patience means he is happy (or at least realistic) to play the percentage game (see his battle with Raikkonen).
I have completely lost interest in this season. I didn’t even watch Monza and that’s usually a must-see. I kept it on my DVR for a few days and finally deleted it. Remains to be seen whether I watch Singapore this weekend or not. I don’t know what it is, I just haven’t wanted to watch.
Me too. But I watch. :dubious: Maybe missed a race or two in the last 35 years. It’s like a bad habit at this point.
With the near inevitable Hamilton championship, the announcement of Kimi getting the Shit-Can, I just can’t get too exited any more. At least we have Suzuka to look forward to.
I’m going to the Air Races tomorrow. Singapore can wait till evening. All I can add is Thank God for DVR!
You missed a really good race.
It’s a real fight between Hamilton and Vettel.
He’s going to Sauber.
If you haven’t paid any attention to Singapore so far then I can say that you missed an epic qualifying drive from Hamilton.
It was something very special indeed. 0.7 faster than his team-mate and 0.3/0.6 faster than the Red Bulls and Ferrari’s that were slated to be much faster than the Merc here.
Looking at the grid it played out much as one expected apart from one anomaly, The guy on pole.
I confess that the Lewis and Max front row sets things up nicely, rather looking forward to that first corner.
I think you’re downplaying Verstappen’s performance. That too was special. The pundits were expecting a Ferrari 1-2. But Hamilton’s pole lap was a blinder.
Yeah, Hamilton hit every corner in that lap (and it was fun to hear how elated he was, talking about the first “perfect lap” in his career)… but he was only three tenths up on Verstappen. Pretty much all in the first sector where the renault was about 20km/h slower than the Ferrari and Mercedes (in Q1 and Q2 the difference was only 12km/h). Both very good and about the same difference with their team mates.
Should be an interesting race. Overtaking almost impossible, but the hyper soft tires will be done in about 7 or 8 laps, so at least 2 pit stops and Q1 and Q2 showed that the differences between the compounds is fairly big. Then we have the 100% safety car rate from the past races… and it being the physically toughest race of the year, the three top teams split up. Could be a great race!
Oh Verstappen’s was a great lap, no doubt but the expectation I was hearing was that it was going to be RB/Ferrari with Merc the third fastest. As it was in Monaco. Hamilton’s lap was a lot further above expectations than Verstappen’s was.
i.e. RB being ahead of the Ferrari was not a surprise, Merc being ahead of both of them certainly was.
Not a thrilling race (not sure Singapore ever really is despite the fireworks) but that was a pretty emphatic win on pure speed alone and this was never a track supposed to suit Mercedes.
Hamilton now 40 points ahead with 6 races left. That’s a pretty hefty lead given the patterns of previous years and you have to say, if he gives another couple of seasons of this quality and a competitive car he’s going to somewhere near Schumacher’s 91 wins (he’s on 69 now)
A DNF for Hamilton will change everything, as will a penalty parts change.
true, and absolutely possible but as it stands the chances of either situation are no more likely for Hamilton than Vettel.
In fact, having a sizeable lead means that Vettel will have to take greater risks as, unless disaster strikes, he has to keep beating Hamilton. Settling for a safe second place with less risks is perfectly fine for Lewis. In fact. If he finished second in each race until the end of the season Vettel would have to win all six.
It is unlikely that Hamilton would want to do that, he is a racer of the highest order but I think his decision-making regarding risk/reward is at a career high and if he assess that it’s the right thing to do, he’ll do it.
Vettel does not really have that luxury and, this is key, Hamilton is likely to always present an on-track obstacle to a Vettel victory. They are going to be occupying the same piece of track on many occasions but Hamilton can position himself so that Vettel has to pull a “shit or bust” move. If it takes both of them out there is only going to be one loser.
Yes I’m sold. Hamilton’s at the top of his game right now, and Mercedes has done a fantastic job fixing the problems with their car. I’m going to sit back and enjoy the ride to Hamilton’s fifth championship, and how many in a row is that now for Merc? Bottas though, is a wasted space on the second car. What was he on about demanding blue flags when he was miles away from the lapped car (can’t remember who it was)?! Put Ocon in there.
Ferrari’s tripping over themselves, awful strategy to pit Vettel and put him behind Perez, and Vettel’s past his prime, looking forward to Leclec next year. Sirotkin vs Perez was hilarious… then Hulk takes one lap to pass Sirotkin, haha. Overall fun race to watch in the midfield.
The best moment of the weekend goes to Kimi again at the Thursday press conference. Q: “And you’re still passionate about racing? The fire…” KR: “No, I’m not actually. Just by pure head games for you guys I happened to sign and I’m going to spend two years there just not being happy.”
I love Kimi’s style.
The race in Suzuka today was fun. Vettel came unstuck with Verstappen trying the same trick that caused him such trouble at Monza.
The championship is Hamilton’s to lose.