NPR

fishfoodie wrote: Fri May 06, 2022 9:55 pm Another weekend where Sainz smashes his Ferrari, & puts himself & his crew under enormous pressure.

sturginho wrote: Fri May 06, 2022 10:41 pm

fishfoodie wrote: Fri May 06, 2022 9:55 pm Another weekend where Sainz smashes his Ferrari, & puts himself & his crew under enormous pressure.

I hope they remembered to put an escape clause in his new contract!

Guy Smiley wrote: Fri May 06, 2022 10:51 pm

sturginho wrote: Fri May 06, 2022 10:41 pm

fishfoodie wrote: Fri May 06, 2022 9:55 pm Another weekend where Sainz smashes his Ferrari, & puts himself & his crew under enormous pressure.

I hope they remembered to put an escape clause in his new contract!

You're being unfair and inaccurate. Sainz was taken out through no fault of his own last time out... that's just bad luck.

Likewise, today is the first day of practise at a brand new (street) circuit. Plenty of drivers are having issues with the surface. One corner has seen 4 cars off, two spins and a crash.

It seems to be the way of F1 that 'fans' leap to the latest sensation without any real consideration. It's bad luck for Sainz and he'll be feeling pressure as a result... without any need for help from the armchair experts.

The “racing will be bad” in Formula 1’s inaugural Miami Grand Prix, drivers have warned after the first day of on-track action at the Miami International Autodrome.

Spins and crashes were plentiful during the opening two practice sessions with Valtteri Bottas crashing his Alfa Romeo in FP1 and Carlos Sainz suffering another crash in his incident-strewn second year with Ferrari.

There’s little grip outside of the racing line on the freshly resurfaced Miami GP circuit, leading to warnings that the passing opportunities on Sunday could be poor.

Red Bull’s Sergio Perez, who spun twice in FP2, lamented the amount of grip offline and believes that will limit the quality of the racing.

“It’s really disappointing that there’s no grip off-line, racing will be bad because of that,” Perez said after FP2.

“As soon as you go off-line, there is no grip, it’s done. It’s sometimes wet on that side and sometimes off-line, it feels very gravelly so racing will be hard.”

Norris called the track “extremely tricky” and echoed Perez’s ire at the lack of grip off-line, something which will limit passing places.

“It’s very bumpy in some places, which we were not expecting,” Norris said.

“I think everyone was expecting it to be very smooth and beautiful. But it’s not.

“The surface is very tricky, you go off-line anywhere and it’s pretty much game over, you spin, you end up in the wall. It’s punishing. That’s why you’ve seen a lot of people ending up in the barriers.


“If you go off-line, it’s just terrible. I’m hoping they can do something a little bit better. I don’t know what.

“When they clean the track, it helps, like this morning there was a lot of marbles and stuff and as soon as you went off-line it was game over.

“In FP2 it started better but then as soon as there was a little bit of marbles, it was terrible. It’s not going to be great for racing.

“It’s like one line you’ve got to stick to and that’s it. It’s restricting, you can’t do many differences compared to other people, so it limits you a little bit.”


Seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton joked “you think that people in this day and age should be able to make a flat road relatively easy” in reference to the “big, big, big bumps in so many places” on the track.

“I don’t know if they will be able to grind that at night and improve it,” Hamilton said of the bumps.

“Otherwise the track’s quite nice to drive – except for the chicane. That might be the…I don’t want to put that quote out there actually so I’ll hold onto that…but it’s so tight.

“It reminds me of being in a B&Q car park when I was six-years-old in the go-kart going between cars.

“It’s a corner that maybe in future they can remove that one and it will improve the track.”

Prior to the weekend, AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda described the final part of the track – which includes the chicane Hamilton detests – as ‘a Formula E sector’.

fishfoodie wrote: Sun May 08, 2022 8:59 pm All of a sudden, on low fuel the Ferrari is rock solid, & the RB is pogoing away like a mad thing

fishfoodie wrote: Sun May 29, 2022 1:08 pm Fucking chaos from Race Control in Monaco

Biffer wrote: Sun May 29, 2022 2:00 pm James Hunt would have finished this race and been in bed with three women by now.

Dogbert wrote: Sun May 29, 2022 8:11 pm

Biffer wrote: Sun May 29, 2022 2:00 pm James Hunt would have finished this race and been in bed with three women by now.

James Hunt's first ever F1 race was in Monaco (1973 ) - His last ever F1 race was in Monaco 1979.

He failed to finish a single F1 Monaco GP ....

The reason he would have been in bed with three woman before any other driver would be because he stuffed the car into a barrier

Insane_Homer wrote: Mon May 30, 2022 6:03 am Monaco deserves its place on the calendar.
The delays were annoying, but race was entertaining.

Ferrari shat the bed good.

Great win for Cheko, Pato O'ward nearly made it a Mexican double in the Indy 500, pipped by former F1 driver, swede, Marcus Ericsson.

interestingly, without the RB team orders 1-2 switch last week, Cheko would be 1 point behind Max in the Championship.


Greatest race of them all, the 24 Hours of Le Mans, in 2 weeks time

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 7:31 pm The Kiwis will be completely apoplectic with envy!

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 7:52 pm Hey look I hooked one in less than 19 minutes!

Grandpa wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 8:24 pm

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 7:52 pm Hey look I hooked one in less than 19 minutes!

Well I'm jealous.. and I don't even live in NZ any more

Grandpa wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 8:24 pm

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 7:52 pm Hey look I hooked one in less than 19 minutes!

Well I'm jealous.. and I don't even live in NZ any more

Guy Smiley wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 8:36 pm

Grandpa wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 8:24 pm

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 7:52 pm Hey look I hooked one in less than 19 minutes!

Well I'm jealous.. and I don't even live in NZ any more

There's nowhere NZ could host a GP unless yet another street circuit was created. We haven't really been into hosting large scale motorsport since... before the mists of time rolled in.

F1 under its current ownership is doing a lot of

talking

about new circuits or reviving old ones. The rush to get Americans on board means there will be 3 GPs on mainland USA this year in an overcrowded calendar that has many talking about the need to trim it down, which means either all of these mooted 'new' GPs won't really happen, or some traditional circuits will be ditched.

Good luck getting rid of Spa and Monaco.

Kyalami has had a lot of money spent on it to bring it up to required standard. As usual, there's a lot of talk coming out of Africa about a deal being done but it's hard to see how it's going to fit while the only real reason to add it would be to boast a race on every continent.

Remains to be seen. For mine, I'm glad NZ has nothing to do with it... aside from the Flying Kiwi adorning one of the most famous and iconic names and teams in the sport.

I imagine the Saffas must look at that and...

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 8:29 pm

Grandpa wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 8:24 pm

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 7:52 pm Hey look I hooked one in less than 19 minutes!

Well I'm jealous.. and I don't even live in NZ any more

I was well jealous that LOTR was filmed in NZ with an NZ director. I was a leading member of the Tolkien society at school. Tolkien was born in Bloemfontein after all.

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 9:07 pm There's absolute massive support for and rabid interest in F1 amongst South Africans of every type. I don't think people realize just how significant it is in Africa that there is a black F1 champion driver. That and we're completely desperate for any type of foreign investment to kickstart economic growth here.

Grandpa wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 9:15 pm

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 9:07 pm There's absolute massive support for and rabid interest in F1 amongst South Africans of every type. I don't think people realize just how significant it is in Africa that there is a black F1 champion driver. That and we're completely desperate for any type of foreign investment to kickstart economic growth here.

I wonder if Lewis attracts support from the American black community as well?

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 9:23 pm

Grandpa wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 9:15 pm

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 9:07 pm There's absolute massive support for and rabid interest in F1 amongst South Africans of every type. I don't think people realize just how significant it is in Africa that there is a black F1 champion driver. That and we're completely desperate for any type of foreign investment to kickstart economic growth here.

I wonder if Lewis attracts support from the American black community as well?

That's exactly what I'm talking about. I watch rugby, soccer and F1 in a pub with black South Africans, black Zimbos, Malawians, Congolese and immigrants from all over the continent. They are hugely proud of Africans and people of African heritage who excel in the soccer, F1, basketball etc. Hamilton is a massive hero for them.

Grandpa wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 9:15 pm

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 9:07 pm There's absolute massive support for and rabid interest in F1 amongst South Africans of every type. I don't think people realize just how significant it is in Africa that there is a black F1 champion driver. That and we're completely desperate for any type of foreign investment to kickstart economic growth here.

I wonder if Lewis attracts support from the American black community as well?

Mr Bungle wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 10:06 pm

Grandpa wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 9:15 pm

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 9:07 pm There's absolute massive support for and rabid interest in F1 amongst South Africans of every type. I don't think people realize just how significant it is in Africa that there is a black F1 champion driver. That and we're completely desperate for any type of foreign investment to kickstart economic growth here.

I wonder if Lewis attracts support from the American black community as well?

Lewis lives in New York for part of the year. He's also close to the Williams sisters, Lebron amongst others.

I just hope they don't cram the calendar with yet more races. i think the number they have now in the year is enough.

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 9:23 pm

Grandpa wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 9:15 pm

FalseBayFC wrote: Mon Jun 13, 2022 9:07 pm There's absolute massive support for and rabid interest in F1 amongst South Africans of every type. I don't think people realize just how significant it is in Africa that there is a black F1 champion driver. That and we're completely desperate for any type of foreign investment to kickstart economic growth here.

I wonder if Lewis attracts support from the American black community as well?

That's exactly what I'm talking about. I watch rugby, soccer and F1 in a pub with black South Africans, black Zimbos, Malawians, Congolese and immigrants from all over the continent. They are hugely proud of Africans and people of African heritage who excel in the soccer, F1, basketball etc. Hamilton is a massive hero for them.