F1 2024: Bahrain pre season testing (21-23 feb)

[M5Rick]

Checo's car repaired and with track drain cover glued down its back to testing as he starts to creep closer to Sainz's time.

[M5Rick]

An early seat change as Checo is out of the car wearing his cap but it could be for adjustments, or rather getting it ready quicker for MAX.
* No it's still the Mexican as he heads out again.

[M5Rick]

Norris is out of the testing as the clutch on his McLaren packs up and by the time the parts are replaced its not worth him going out again.

[Killed by Death]

Originally Posted by M5Rick

Unlucky Checo has run over a drain cover and the GE force lifted the cover possibly damaging the floor causing a red flag. Charlies car needed a new floor when he did the same yesterday.

Really wish they would just go back to grass or sand. It's self policing.

[M5Rick]

Originally Posted by Killed by Death

Really wish they would just go back to grass or sand. It's self policing.

Costing Ferrari all these punctured floors all going back to the big one in Las Vegas, like the way Fred covers it up with a laugh..'its only money'.
He's done his job bagging LEW heheh

[M5Rick]

MAX is on long runs shod with hards seing how the car behaves with cars in front of him, one side of the car is covered in 'flow-vis'.
..and as fast as I say it he goes onto mediums, the RB tyre change jocks can change those wheels faster than I can say Jack Robinson.

[OG Shark]

Well if you’re a fan of competitive racing that was a pretty ominous 3 days for you…

[///M Power-Belgium]

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[M5Rick]

Originally Posted by ///M Power-Belgium

.

RUS tried to take the FL today from Chas but just failed, he couldn't chance it with a banzai lap on softs as he already walloped the 15 before into a barrier at their Silverstone try out.

[///M Power-Belgium]

Originally Posted by M5Rick

RUS tried to take the FL today from Chas but just failed, he couldn't chance it with a banzai lap on softs as he already walloped the 15 before into a barrier at their Silverstone try out.

[GuidoK]

It's still difficult to predict with these testing days how fast the cars really are.
I especially expect MERC to be faster than that they've shown.

And I expect RB to have incredible race pace with their radical new design. Most other cars are very nice RB19 copies though

But we'll see next week with the real season start

[///M Power-Belgium]

Originally Posted by M5Rick

RUS tried to take the FL today from Chas but just failed, he couldn't chance it with a banzai lap on softs as he already walloped the 15 before into a barrier at their Silverstone try out.

My F1 video is replaced by a FKN baseball video. WTF ?!?!

I think It's by the F1 CIP rights (Copyright Infringements Protection)!

[M5Rick]

Originally Posted by ///M Power-Belgium

My F1 video is replaced by a FKN baseball video. WTF ?!?!

I think It's by the F1 CIP rights (Copyright Infringements Protection)!

POS wolf again knowing him.

[andrewmr]

Originally Posted by MoeTE87

I personally think he is a great driver and only getting better but it also doesn't hurt when the Red Bull engineers are unbelievable at what they do!

There is no doubt he is great driver.

My point was the car makes a difference.

Red Bull was dominant 2010-2013 with Vettel taking the championship and Webber a few positions behind.

Mercedes started their dominance in 2014 with Hamilton and Rosberg taking the championship through 2020.

And now we are (potentially) moving into another Red Bull era.

So I think we are in agreement in that he is a great driver and that Red Bull is an equally great team.

I would like to see what he can do in a lesser capable car. To me, that's where legends are made.

[3798j]

... FOM says they're pleased with the existing teams...what a joke...and they call Formula 1 a sport. At least they allowed the second RedBull team to copy and become competitive.

[NickyC]

Originally Posted by OG Shark

Well if you’re a fan of competitive racing that was a pretty ominous 3 days for you…

Really bad.

HAAS just needs to get out. The experiment has failed.

[3798j]

F1's Testing Debrief graph of simulation qualifying pace shows just how un-competitive the series is.

[GuidoK]

Where were your complaints when MERC dominated the scene with their hundreds of millions of euro's?

Now at least everyone has the same budget, so anyone who stands out does so by superior intellectual performance, not endless developing budgets.
Maybe that's why MERC tumbled down the ladder and Hamilton hasn't managed to win a single race since 2 years.

And the higher you finish in a year, the less development time you get, so there is even a handicap system in place.
Not many sports have that.

Also, that graph shows that the majority (12 cars) of the field sits within 1% projected.

If we take a look at say...100m men's freestyle swimming on the last olympics, the results of swimmers that were within 1% in the 1st heats (so that is taken from all the athletes competing), was exactly the top11 (needless to say that was not the majority of all the participants...).
So that is very comparable when looking at how competative a competitors field is in a totally different sport.
And if we look at something like the javelin throw on the olympics, the differences are even much bigger (over 4% in the top 10)
So to me it's not clear how you come to the conclusion based on that graph how uncompetitive the series currenly is. Not compared to how it was and not how it compares to other sports.

[3798j]

This is about FOM's refusal to allow the entry of the FIA approved Andretti Global...nothing more (although it amazes how deeply and completely MB lives in your head). Meanwhile the horribly un-competitive teams don't even serve the purpose of developing up and coming young drivers. They put a poor product on the track (when you actually attend a GP you get to see just how out of place and slow these backmarkers are...it's laughable). F1 touts themselves as the pinnacle of racing but it's become a club of ten where performing well isn't necessary because the paycheck is guaranteed.

[GuidoK]

So just because Andretti is denied entry to F1 it suddenly became an uncompetitive series shown by the graph??

That makes absolutely no sense at all.
First of all, Andretti wouldn't have been a competitor this year in the first place, so that graph would be exactly the same.

And further more....andretti would just become another team somewhere in there. It would not change the the spread of the laptimes between the teams. (that is, if andretti is even able to compete...something that would still have to be proven...)
Haas or williams or sauber isn't suddenly going to perform better because andretti enters the field.
Your reasoning makes no sense at all.

However I do agree on that some teams and some drivers (team haas and logan sargeant notably) have very little added value to F1, but you find bottom feeders in every sport.
Whether or not Andretti would add more to the sport remains to be seen.
To me it's a bit ironic that the FOM refuses an all american team to F1 despite the FOM having such an urge to expand the sport in the USA. So if they don't even see an added value in them...
And I don't know how long you've been watching F1, but in the 80s and early 90's there were way more teams on the grid and differences were massive. They had to come up with the 1.07 rule and some teams couldn't even reach that bar!
And look how that now compares.

[3798j]

Not surprised you can't (or won't) follow.

[GuidoK]

That graph wouldn't have changed whether or not andretti gained entry to F1 in 2025 or 2026...
In this case.....there's nothing to follow....you're concluding things that aren't there.