F1 2023 season

Chinese Grand Prix is officially cancelled again.

Dutch Grand Prix has extended until 2025

Jeff Navarro wrote:Dutch Grand Prix has extended until 2025

Hell of a long race that!!

Oakdene wrote:

Jeff Navarro wrote:Dutch Grand Prix has extended until 2025

Hell of a long race that!!

Might need to bring back refuelling.

Jost Capito quits Williams

Frederic Vasseur leaves Alfa Romeo-Sauber.

Vasseur announced as new Ferrari team principal.

Seidl ditching McLaren for Audi shows that the Woking base team are just Williams 2.0.
McLaren either teams up with a manufacturer or remains irrelevant.
Makes Norris’ decision to sign that long term deal, with no break clauses, even more ridiculous.

Jeff Navarro wrote:Seidl ditching McLaren for Audi shows that the Woking base team are just Williams 2.0.
McLaren either teams up with a manufacturer or remains irrelevant.
Makes Norris’ decision to sign that long term deal, with no break clauses, even more ridiculous.

I think this is a simplistic point of view. Seidl had already agreed with management to move at the end of next season and it was brought forward after the departure of Vasseur. Seidl had connections within Audi and them going hard after him was an open secret. None of this should have been a surprise to anyone and it seems McLaren are happy with their internal promotion to principal.

Lewis Hamilton will reportedly sign a new 2 year deal with Mercedes worth $120m to take him up to your end of 2025.
He’s also set to sign a 10 year ambassadorial role with Mercedes parent company worth $250m.

RB using Ford engines from 2026

Fernando seeing the AM stop on its first lap.

No real dramas from the first morning beyond that

First session of preseason testing down - probabl not worth reading too much into the times, although given there are no radical rule changes for this season perhaps unsurprising that RB topped the timing sheet. MOst teams probably just happy to get through the laps. Ferrari with most at 72, with half the teams managing oer 65 laps. AM with the weakest start, losing an hour to a mechanical and only completing 40 laps, but even that is a far cry from the first year of the hybrids, where there were teams in single figures of laps after the first day...

Issues for Merc today with Russell's car, hydraulic failure it sounds like

Headline times in testing are notoriously nonsense but the Red Bull looks ominously comfortable and fast.

Mercedes supposedly has a b spec car which they’ll introduce at Imola if this small side pod thing still doesn’t work.
Basically a Red Bull copy from what I’ve heard lol

Jeff Navarro wrote:Mercedes supposedly has a b spec car which they’ll introduce at Imola if this small side pod thing still doesn’t work.
Basically a Red Bull copy from what I’ve heard lol

Last year in testing Mercedes were saying they had a problem with porpoising. This year in testing they are saying, or at least Russell has been quoted as saying that they are having difficulty finding the right balance - which presumably means they can't find the correct "optimization". Whether it is a failure to get the right optimization or whether the car is just slow after optimization is to be determined.

Meanwhile McLaren Zak Brown said: "We know we set some some goals for development, which we didn't hit. We felt it was better to be honest about that."

RB seem fairly confident they're still the team to beat. Then Ferrari ahead of Mercedes. AM have made the biggest step supposedly

Seeing as most teams have copied the RB18, they are all chasing their tails…
RB19 seems a really good car, with the best driver.
Red Bull will be eager to repeat 2022 level of domination as so to avoid issues for 2024 with the wind tunnel penalty.

AlphaTauri seems to be at crossroads. Red Bull looking to move the team to the UK. If that doesn’t materialise, the team could be sold off.

Merc at least saying the porpoising isn't an issue this year. Just can't get the car set up to actually be fast and consistent...

Of course we will know much more by next week, when the cars are run in anger for the first time. Testing suggests Aston Martin may be the best of the rest (after RB, Ferrari and Merc), but there's definintely a large component of wiat and see in that one.

Lando Norris reportedly wants out from the hapless McLaren team. Shows how silly he was signing such a long deal with no break clause.

Spanish GP has removed the silly chicane at the end of the lap. Should make overtaking easier.

Jeff Navarro wrote:Mercedes supposedly has a b spec car which they’ll introduce at Imola if this small side pod thing still doesn’t work.
Basically a Red Bull copy from what I’ve heard lol

Mike Elliott categorically denied Mercedes had a red bull clone in the works. Says little side pods is still the best way to beat red bull.

Merc must think they are onto something with the minimal sidepods design, otherwise it would have been jettisoned for this year's car. Must offer some potential aero advantage that so far they haven't been able to exploit because of the difficulties they've had in getting the ride quality / driveability issues sorted. After all, it's not as though a top F1 engineering team would intentionally design an inferior car.

I think ultimately Mercedes are trapped by the same concept that led to their domination of the first hybrid era.

Ultimately you have to commit to a concept before you ever get to put it on a track. As it turns out in year 1, RB had a much better concept, with the Ferrari also superior before they had to turn the engines down for reliability.

The conundrum ultimately is, following RB will always leave you a year behind RB. That's fine generally for smaller teams who aren't measured by contending for titles but for Ferrari and Mercedes it's not going to fly. So they're stuck hoping there's a lot of hidden potential in their designs that can be unlocked

In 2014 Mercedes rocked up with the best engine design by a mile and it catapulted them to dominance.

With the cost cap, just copying for RB18, one year after the fact is pointless. All the development work they did with the little side pods would be wasted and they’d still be behind Red Bull.

Maybe 2023 won’t be any different, but Red Bull’s wind tunnel penalty will give the others hope in 2024.

Lance having a picnic at T1 while two cars come down the straight side by side...

FP2 seems to be confirming the thoughts from testing that Aston have made a significant step forward - Alonso currently top of the charts head of the two RBs, with Stroll also well inside the top 10. Yes, it's still only FP2, but given the time of day, it's the best chance to run quali simulations, so the sandbagging will be less than normal, and it's reasonable to reckon that AM are at least in the mix with Ferrari and Merc, even if it's likely RB will be quicker tomorrow

Might be some hero runs going on but it's promising.

Probably a fair bit of sandbagging when a Haas is up there too.

Lance complaining about his injured hands so Drugovich might be back tomorrow

I did notice Hulkenberg's Haas up there, and yes suspect that's a bit of a hero run, but the Aston has been consistently towards the top of the charts - OK, I doubt very much it is in the RB class, but be interesting to see where it sits amongst the best of the rest.

Lance was having to take his hand off the steering wheel down the straight to relieve the pain so not sure how he's gonna race

McLaren are in talking with Red Bull over an engine deal in 2026.

Rumour is stroll only passed the mandatory cockpit escape test on the second attempt. Watching the footage of him taking T1 in practice, and needing to be helped out of the car I can't see how he can seriously be allowed to race

I greatly fear another Red Bull yawn fest. Some will be happy with that but not me. It just kills the sport having such a one-sided season.

Ferrari rear wing is dangerous. Bits falling off and flexing all over your place.

CaledonianCraig wrote:I greatly fear another Red Bull yawn fest. Some will be happy with that but not me. It just kills the sport having such a one-sided season.

With the cost cap this could be a Verstappen period of domination

Red Bull lockout by a decent margin but not as much as feared. Alonso beating the Mercs confirms AM have made a major step forward.

Must be pretty galling for Sainz to look faster all weekend then LeClerc dials it up for 2 laps in Q2/Q3

Toto saying the mercedes concept is effectively dead ended

So Mercedes’ Imola update package is worth ‘at best 0.2sec’
Seeing that Wolff want this update regardless, but most of the other Mercedes hierarchy wants to abandon the W14 totally. And hope to get it together for 2024.

It's quite a warm day here in Bahrain.....but should cool a little for the start. Just trying to get my hands on Paddock tickets so I can at least have a few beers. If not, it will be with the masses and a diet coke!

Enjoy the race gentlemen........I'm hoping for an early dink for Max so he can't finish.

Might not be much competition up front but Lewis and Nando going at it in similar cars should be fun

This is rubbish and as such I won’t be watching this anymore. Enjoy the season guys.

So much for the improved Ferrari reliability

GSC wrote:Might not be much competition up front but Lewis and Nando going at it in similar cars should be fun

The battle behind Red Bull looks pretty tight between Merc/Ferrari/Aston and some good midfield tussles too

Well that was ominous. Very much a Sunday drive up front

Just thought I’d add LeClerc says the Ferrari car is way too slow and no chance to beat Red Bull.
Russell says Red Bull will win all 23 races…
Some solid dooming, but I won’t be watching so I don’t care.

With Saturday Qualifying it looked like the field had closed up and I was looking forward to a season where possibly four teams might be in the mix to challenge for race wins and possibly even challenge Red Bull Verstappen for the drivers championship.   However today's race indicates that the race pace of the Red Bull to the rest of the field has widened compared to last year.  

Obviously probably a bit too soon to make such season predictions based on one race but Red Bull's Verstappen looked imperious.  For a time Leclerc looked like he might hold out for second but then he had some sort of electrical issue with the car.   McLaren had major problems.  Ocon's race turned into a clown show.  Alonso and Stroll were probably the highlights of the race for those looking for something "different".  Hamilton I think will finish ahead of Russell this season.  A credible p8 finish for Bottas and alfa romeo. Gasly did well to finish p9 after starting at the back of the field.   Albon - Williams managed to get a point and Sargeant was the best of the rookies.  Zhou of alfa romeo took an extra pit stop for softs to deny Gasly and Alpine of the fastest lap and an extra point. Norris was the last of those that finished the race but had 6 pit stops which might be a record.

Absolute snoozfest. Complete waste of my Sunday morning.

Incidentally, my wife and I were thinking of going to the Montreal race, but we won't be looking for tickets any time soon after today's display. I'd rather shell out in a season where the result might be in some kind of doubt.

Well I wasn't going to go with the Belgium on pole but I decided against it....(and no paddock tickets).

Bahrain is normally a good eventful race, but if this is an indication of the season, I might knock it on the head.

We really need something from Mercedes or this is going to a long season.