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The 2019 F1 season.

I like SV, have met him a few times and he is a genuinely witty, warm and charming personality. Take a look at his tribute speech to Charlie Whiting to get a feel for the sort of person he is. On track though I think he may be reaching the end of his very successful career as if he isn't going to be top dog at Ferrari where can he go? RB is Verstappen focused and Hamilton has reiterated he won't be leaving the sport any time soon so you would assume he will stay at Merc. I can't see him driving in the midfield a la Kimi so perhaps he needs to look at Mika Hakkinen who knew when his time was up and gracefully retired. Hanging around to get trounced by CLC isn't going to do him any good. His only hope is that the 2021 cars suit his driving style better so that may be what he is clinging to..... the question is will Ferrari continue to pay a big salary to a number 2 driver until then?
 
How was Hamilton able to catch Le Clerc towards the end? I watched the race on Channel 4 but because I was on the phone to a mate about work stuff, I had the sound on mute and only glanced over now and again so I didn't really follow what was happening. It was obvious from early on that he had the pace to get close to Vettel and it seemed pit-stop strategy helped him complete the overtake. Was the same pit-stop the reason why he gained so much on Le Clerc who seemed practically uncatchable at the start of the race not to mention unbeatable on Saturday?
 
How was Hamilton able to catch Le Clerc towards the end? I watched the race on Channel 4 but because I was on the phone to a mate about work stuff, I had the sound on mute and only glanced over now and again so I didn't really follow what was happening. It was obvious from early on that he had the pace to get close to Vettel and it seemed pit-stop strategy helped him complete the overtake. Was the same pit-stop the reason why he gained so much on Le Clerc who seemed practically uncatchable at the start of the race not to mention unbeatable on Saturday?


Essentially the Ferrari had huge single lap pace but at the cost of taking lots or life out of the tyres. They also have very high top speed and relatively slippy aero that allowed them to make up chunks of time on the straights. The Merc had much better pace in the middle sector but not enough to compensate for the time taken out of them in sectors 1 and 3. That was in qualifying.

In the race, eating up the tyres was a bigger concern for Ferrari as they could not sustain their pace for long without losing even more time in sector 2 due to the shagged out tyres. VET seemed to suffer more that LEC in this but even LEC was in more or less permanent tyre management for the whole race.

Ham got past VET because he harried him so hard on better tyres (6 laps younger) forcing VET to use his battery up in sector 3 so he could not hold him off in the following sector 1. Without that as we saw in previous laps the Ferrari even without DRS was quicker than the Merc with DRS.

By the last 10 laps HAM and LEC had similar life out of their tyres but the Merc was looking after them better so HAM could push hard right to the end whilst LEC was nursing and if VET had not kept HAM at bay for so long he probably would have succumbed to HAM.

There is a case for saying that HAM should have pitted around 2 laps earlier and he would have been even closer to VET and LEC but hindsight etc.
 
Essentially the Ferrari had huge single lap pace but at the cost of taking lots or life out of the tyres. They also have very high top speed and relatively slippy aero that allowed them to make up chunks of time on the straights. The Merc had much better pace in the middle sector but not enough to compensate for the time taken out of them in sectors 1 and 3. That was in qualifying.

In the race, eating up the tyres was a bigger concern for Ferrari as they could not sustain their pace for long without losing even more time in sector 2 due to the shagged out tyres. VET seemed to suffer more that LEC in this but even LEC was in more or less permanent tyre management for the whole race.

Ham got past VET because he harried him so hard on better tyres (6 laps younger) forcing VET to use his battery up in sector 3 so he could not hold him off in the following sector 1. Without that as we saw in previous laps the Ferrari even without DRS was quicker than the Merc with DRS.

By the last 10 laps HAM and LEC had similar life out of their tyres but the Merc was looking after them better so HAM could push hard right to the end whilst LEC was nursing and if VET had not kept HAM at bay for so long he probably would have succumbed to HAM.

There is a case for saying that HAM should have pitted around 2 laps earlier and he would have been even closer to VET and LEC but hindsight etc.

Add in the lost laps behind the SC too - that helped Ferrari out with tyre life. I'm a big Hamilton fan but I didn't mind seeing CLC pick up his first win, especially in the circumstances. He seems a really nice guy too. Some good young drivers coming through now. Need to see a few of them in more competitive machinery and fighting for race wins. Maybe In a season or two, we'll get that. Strange to think of Lewis as the older driver now. Think he'll enjoy fighting the new kids on the block for the next few years before he packs up.
 
Hamilton was telling the pits that his rear tyres weren’t too good a few laps before the end, so putting earlier might have been asking too much. Close stuff, love it.
 
Hamilton was telling the pits that his rear tyres weren’t too good a few laps before the end, so putting earlier might have been asking too much. Close stuff, love it.

I don't read too much in the comms to pits, especially with Lewis. He's often complaining about this or that and then goes on crazy pace charge. I think they're designed to catch the opposition off guard. Or he's just very good at driving on worn tyres... ;)
 
Verstappen and Gasly starting from the back of the Monza grid, too many lumps of donk used this year.

Bummer.
 
Verstappen and Gasly starting from the back of the Monza grid, too many lumps of donk used this year.

Bummer.

Makes sense as the Honda engine won't be a match for the Ferrari or the Merc at a power circuit like Monza yet at the next race in Singapore the Red Bull should do very well hence better they arrive there with two Spec 4 engines and able to fight for the win!
 
Verstappen and Gasly starting from the back of the Monza grid, too many lumps of donk used this year.

Bummer.

Monza is the circuit where you take engine penalties as seemingly no matter how shaken up the grid is, in a dry race, it will end in the order it probably should have been in. I.e. cars traditionally stack up based on performance.
 
That take off crash was incredible - thankfully, the track was sorted before F1 Qualifying began!

And what the hell was that in Q3??? Incredible for a whole different set of reasons!
 


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