All-purpose open-wheel (F1, IRL) racing thread

Still can't believe Zhou just walked away from that. Insane. Also, that was a super fun race today, and the crowd roar when Lewis passed Leclerc was sick. And Sainz basically saying, fuck you, I'm winning this, stop making me the No. 2 guy? Awesome. Good for Carlos.

 

Disagree on a couple of thoughts here...

This was an absolutely freakish accident in terms of testing the safety setup... and it worked.

Even though it's lap one they're going damn close to full speed at the point of the accident. Zhou flips immediately.. which means he's not scrubbing off nearly as much speed as he would if all four tires were down. That carried him through the gravel much faster, maximizing the air when he suddenly caught and rolled over. The timing was amazing in the way it vaulted him over the tires.

Having said all of that... if he's right side up he loses more speed and probably doesn't flip. Even when he did flip he didn't travel that far and never actually reached the bottom level of the grandstand, which is about 30 feet high.

In short, I'm not sure you can put the spectators there at greater risk than they were today... and the safety system worked.

George called it a puncture but the tire was entirely ripped off the car. Even Toto said there was no way that car was making it around to the pit. I get George's frustration and his instincts to help were absolutely admirable... but the "no assistance" thing is a hard and fast rule, and he wasn't getting out without assistance anyway.

 

Ferrari's call at the end where they wanted Sainz to back up the other cars... they just have no clue at all. None. I'm glad he had the sense to say no.

When they decided to leave LeClerc out during the last safety car his chance of winning evaporated. Nothing on the restart was going to fix that.

Really happy for Carlos. That has to be a huge weight off his shoulders.

 

Who was it that flew upside down in turn one at Albert Park like 10 years ago? My mind jumped to that wreck right away.

 

I think that was Alonso. Definitely similar.

 

I am such a sucker for a No. 2 car winning. Give me Sainz and Checo every week.

(I realize that if it were "every week," it wouldn't be a No. 2 car anymore...)

Obviously, outside of the crash, what a fun race.

 

I think one of my favorite things to do these days - as evidenced by right fucking now - is watching the F1 race on DVR while having drink(s).

Cheers.

 

Today's news about CGR exercising Palou's option for 2023, then Palou saying WTF on Twitter, followed minutes later by McLaren welcoming Palou to the organization in 2023, followed by CGR saying Palou is indeed under contract through 2023 was...interesting, to say the least.

 

I'm curious to see where this goes.

I may be completely wrong about this.... but it seems like McLaren and Palou are claiming Ganassi can't exercise his option because McLaren has both an IndyCar and F1 team, and Palou will be able to test for F1, and the option is not enforceable if he's in another series. That kind of smells like bullshit to me unless they are really going to put Palou in Ricciardo's seat in 2023, and I don't see that happening.

 

Prompting this, I'm sure ...

 

Colton Herta tests for McLaren. @PCLoadLetter, do you think he's a better candidate right now than Palou?

IndyCar's Herta has F1 ambition after McLaren test

 

It's kind of hard to judge who the better driver is right now -- I think Palou is a little more polished and Herta seems like he has a higher ceiling. Palou won the title last year, so it's hard not to give him an edge there.

In the big picture I think McLaren would much rather give the seat to Herta if they think he can handle it. He's three years younger than Palou and he's American, and McLaren really seems to be going hard for the American market. It's one reason I have a hard time believing McLaren would put Palou in the seat next year -- Herta and Ricciardo are both at the end of their contracts at the end of next season, so they could make that move seamlessly then. I don't see them putting Palou in the seat for just a year.