2017 Formula 1 Gran Premio de Espana PirelliFormula 1

[Nessy]

What I'm really curious about was whether a one stop strategy for Mercedes was ever in the cards. It might've been for Bottas -and him blocking Vettel also helped Hamilton down the road - but now we'll never know. The mediums looked awful out there so I doubt it ever was.

Without the VCS, I'd say Hamilton closes the gap but making the pass happen would've been quite difficult.

I myself, doubt that it would ever have been a one stopper.

I think Lewis may have been able to close the gap a bit more to Vettel, had the VSC not been implemented. Probably to the point of forcing Vettel to stop first. Then maybe Mercedes would have brought Lewis in and stuck him on the softs, whilst Vettel was on the mediums. I think this would have probably made it a big ask for Lewis to take back the lead, but not out of the realms of possibility. I'd like to think he could have still done something.

 

[LMSCorvetteGT2]

In a nutshell: VSC situation, HAM pitted on the right time and then BOT slowed down so VET lost a lot of time. Then VET had to pit and changed to mediums and HAM was on softs. Couple of blue flags for the slower cars and VET lost in total about 8 seconds. DRS and HAM flew by on his better soft tires.

You forgot the crushing of VET's spirit after such.

 

[BrainsBush]

You forgot the crushing of VET's spirit after such.

that comment: Vettel was breezing more steam in his helmet then Bottas engine after the failure.

 

[Jimlaad43]

Somebody didn't get the "Is this Racing or Ping Pong?" memo

 

[OutlawQuadrnt]

Somebody didn't get the "Is this Racing or Ping Pong?" memo

This duo are the most likely to pull off Ping Pong without cutting a tire or breaking a suspension part.

 

[Peter.]

Best Spanish GP since 2012. The strategy battle was exciting and there was actually a lot of on-track action.

A few tidbits:
-Ferrari blew 2 titles for Alonso through poor strategy, they're trying very hsrd to make it 3. They made 2 big mistakes today, bringing him out behind Bottas and Ricxiard, and not bringing him in under the VSC.

-Alonso was probably never finishing 7th or higher today, but he still got screwed by the turn 1 incident. After that he never had the power to do any passing around here.

-Ricciardo got literally zero coverage, strange.

- @LMSCorvetteGT2 I eat my words about Force India. Best of the rest status retained.

-Wehrlein was DOTD for me, easily. Sauber has no right scoring points.

-Vandoorne's lack of pace and failure to live up to the hype continues.

-Feel like me and a friend could hop into the Williams or Renault and do better than Palmer or Stroll. Stroll finished behind his teammate who had a puncture on lap 1. Palmer literally just raced himself at the back. Stroll is a teenager at least, but what is Palmer's excuse?

 

[niky]

In a nutshell: VSC situation, HAM pitted on the right time and then BOT slowed down so VET lost a lot of time. Then VET had to pit and changed to mediums and HAM was on softs. Couple of blue flags for the slower cars and VET lost in total about 8 seconds. DRS and HAM flew by on his better soft tires.

Vettel was already in the lead by several seconds before the VSC.

What happened was Lewis pitted right at the edge of the VSC, whereas Ferrari were unwilling to gamble, as no one knew how long it would be in effect. (They went racing, in fact right as Lewis was coming out)

While the VSC preserves gaps, cars under the VSC are still going slower than usual. A car entering the pits doesn't have to go any slower than the pit lane limit.

So: Lewis pits, Seb is crawling around the track. Then some blue flags, though those should not have cost him more than one or two seconds. Seb pits AFTER the VSC, Lewis is flying around the circuit. Six second gap (by Seb's reckoning) completely gone.

 

[RACECAR]

Not to sound whiny or anything, but I'm just confounded by this in the News Page:

It was carnage at the start. Never mind Vettel out-dragging Hamilton into turn one! Valtteri Bottas, Kimi Raikkonen and Max Verstappen entered turn one in a three-wide formation. Bottas, up the inside, tapped Raikkonen into Verstappen, thus breaking both drivers’ suspensions. Karma caught up with Bottas though as his engine failed on lap 39

How was that Karma? All Bottas saw was Raikonnen on his outside, hardly his fault that Verstappen stuck his car in a position that wasn't gonna work like your average online random in a public Lobby does. What was he supposed to do, disappear? Just comes off abit bias the way that is worded.

 

[Betty blue]

Yeah, that's my take on the first lap collision also .Verstappen had no reason to try to go from the outside "of the two" knowing that the gap was always going to close, as Bottas was committed to the inside and had nowhere else to go while Raikkonen was sandwiched between the two.

In a different subject, why on earth are stroll & Palmer are on the grid?

 

[LMSCorvetteGT2]

Not to sound whiny or anything, but I'm just confounded by this in the News Page:



How was that Karma? All Bottas saw was Raikonnen on his outside, hardly his fault that Verstappen stuck his car in a position that wasn't gonna work like your average online random in a public Lobby does. What was he supposed to do, disappear? Just comes off abit bias the way that is worded.

That seems to be the layman's take on F1 racing, one car should just disappear or "go invisible" for a moment so they don't actually collide. People have no clue and usually write that trite, cause they have a personal bias already.

 

[Haitauer]

Kimi is the driver of the day.

 

[LMSCorvetteGT2]

That kid is pretty cool here's an interview with him.

 

[RX-7_FD3S]

That kid is pretty cool here's an interview with him.

His mom sound very pushy (I speak french fluently). I kinda dislike her. She was always asking him to watch the camera and says specific things during Ted's Inteview.

Probably the week-end of their life for that french family.

Other than that I liked the GP, there was quite a few things happening and some overtakes too.

The biggest lesson of this week-end for me is that Ferrari used to understand the tyres better than Mercedes prior to this GP but it's not the case anymore. I dont think RBR gonna catch up.

En route pour Monaco. I dont expect any overtake with the wider car. Qualification gonna be awesome as always tho. I can see Ferrari having the edge in Monaco with their shorter wheel base car.

 

[ScottPuss20]

YAY! A PODIUM FOR RICCIARDO!

 

[prisonermonkeys]

Vandoorne's lack of pace and failure to live up to the hype continues

Vandoorne is tough to judge because he's saddled with a pig of a car. He turns reasonable enough lap times relative to Alonso, who was definitely buoyed by the home field advantage.

Compare that to Palmer and Hülkenberg, and the big difference is that Palmer has twenty-six Grands Prix to his name compared to Vandoorne's six. Palmer gets stuck behind the McLarens in a car that should be in the midfield; Vandoorne trundles around in a car that seems incapable of points even in a race of attrition. He deserves the benefit of the doubt for now, at least until Honda can build an engine that isn't held together with rubber bands, chewing gum and crossed fingers.

 

[Robin]

His mom sound very pushy (I speak french fluently). I kinda dislike her. She was always asking him to watch the camera and says specific things during Ted's Inteview.

Probably the week-end of their life for that french family.

Everyone is pretty fame hungry these days, pushy parents trying to make their children 'happen'. I wouldn't be surprised if within days he has a Twitter and Instagram account and is doing the daytime TV circuit off the back of this 5 minutes of fame. It can't just be a nice thing that happened, it's always got to be milked to death!

 

[zed300]

Looks like Alonso might have been allowed to wind the knob to the right a little for the last 10 laps or so.
Even if he was on a fresh/ish set of softs, he never really let go of the back of Vettel's Ferrari.
It looked all over the rest of the midpack chassis.
Speaking of chassis, the Sauber showed of what is a good build. Monaco could bring another points haul for them.

 

[EDK]

Why does Renault keep Palmer? 9 places behind Hülkenberg and miles away from any points. 2nd last from the cars finishing the race and he could only gain 2 places in this whole race, despite 3 cars crashing out in front of him.

Hopefully this gets addressed soon. He is just not F1 Material.

I think another thing that's become clearer as the season has gone on is that the drivers are making more of a difference than in the last generation of cars. And that was a big part of the reason for the rule changes, so in that sense I believe the changes are proving to be successful.

I base my comments on both qualifying and race outcomes becoming less predictable, with the cars making their way out of Q1 and Q2 often NOT simply being a reflection of car pace with drivers from the same team being knocked out at each level.

Last year same race, this was the qualifying result.

https://www.formula1.com/en/champio...ce-results/2016-spain-results/qualifying.html

Then here it is for this year -

https://www.formula1.com/en/results.html/2017/races/963/spain/qualifying.html

Both Hass were knocked out in Q2 this year, and the Saubers were in grid order. But look at how much more mixed up it is, with 5 different teams having one car knocked out in Q1, and two drivers whose team mates could not get out of Q1 making it all the way to Q3!

Last year, just 2 of the 11 teams had their drivers separated by more than two positions, and 5 of the teams had drivers directly in line with one another.

 

[Michelin Man]

Recently caught up with the GP after missing it Sunday, and I must say what a great race it was to watch. Would definitely agree it's one of the best in recent years (2016 aside).

-Was great to watch the battle between Vettel and Hamilton continue, hard, but fair racing, well earned by Lewis it'd seem.

-Also, great result for the Force India's, whilst luck played it's part somewhat with the retirements, pace-wise, they seemed very solid all race. Should be interesting to see how they go in Monaco.

-Finally, feel kind of sorry for Fernando, seems he was a bit of a victim after the first lap/first corner shenanigans, but at least one Mclaren finished this time, so hooray I guess . Plus I don't think he'll mind too much with Indy next.

 

[TheElbows]

Interesting race.

I was oddly happy to see how comparatively sloppy a lot of drivers were during the race (a lot more cars sliding, a lot more "imperfect" lines through corners, etc.). The silly accident on turn one was simple math - three cars can't go side by side through the corner.

I was happy to see Hamilton win, simply because I think that a streak of 2-3 bad races would have ruined the championship competition - it's too early to see anyone grab that big of a lead. I don't want to see Vettel or Hamilton get on a losing streak and fall apart, robbing us of a possible genuine championship fight.

Nice of Kimi to cheer up that kid. I think the team of the race for me was Force India - mentioned perhaps once in the US TV coverage. They are, by far, the best of the mid-field teams. Glad to see them quietly stealing loads of points.

Terrible strategy from Ferrari unfortunately. If they had an inkling of not catching Hamilton they should have pitted for new tires and just swung for the fences. They first mentioned it on the radio with 16-17 laps left (i.e. tough, but plausible to catch Lewis like that).

 

[H20HYBRID_GT]

That seems to be the layman's take on F1 racing, one car should just disappear or "go invisible" for a moment so they don't actually collide. People have no clue and usually write that trite, cause they have a personal bias already.

Yup, I mean I totally dislike Verstappen so when I see him crashing I immediately think it's his fault and to be fair - in the live footage it looked like his fault - but in the replay one could clearly see it was Raikonnen who drove into him (I didn't see Bottas pushing Kimi, but obviously that's what happened). Verstappen actually could have avoided the accident if he wasn't so close to Kimi though, he was just like - why was he there? Could have given more room. But it still wasn't his fault as he definitely couldn't anticipate someone pushing Kimi into him.



I thought it was a boring race and kinda feel robbed for a more exciting race by Ferrari's terrible strategy once again.

Similarly to the Stroll / Palmer comment, I think you could easily replace Arrividerci with me and I'd make better calls and get Vettel a few more well deserved wins.

 

[LMSCorvetteGT2]

Yup, I mean I totally dislike Verstappen so when I see him crashing I immediately think it's his fault and to be fair - in the live footage it looked like his fault - but in the replay one could clearly see it was Raikonnen who drove into him (I didn't see Bottas pushing Kimi, but obviously that's what happened). Verstappen actually could have avoided the accident if he wasn't so close to Kimi though, he was just like - why was he there? Could have given more room. But it still wasn't his fault as he definitely couldn't anticipate someone pushing Kimi into him.

I mean where was Bottas to go? He's on the inside of it all and has a car pinching down on him. He tried to get out of it and wasn't able to in time.

 

[TheElbows]

Honestly I'd pin it on Verstappen, but only because he was the outside of a three car sandwich which wasn't ever going to fit in the corner...meaning he had the most opportunity to back off or run wide. Realistically that screamed "racing incident" to me, but one that didn't have to happen. Bottas had nowhere to go, and Raikonnen being in the middle didn't have much choice, etc.

 

[H20HYBRID_GT]

Honestly I'd pin it on Verstappen, but only because he was the outside of a three car sandwich which wasn't ever going to fit in the corner...meaning he had the most opportunity to back off or run wide. Realistically that screamed "racing incident" to me, but one that didn't have to happen. Bottas had nowhere to go, and Raikonnen being in the middle didn't have much choice, etc.

That's how I see it, too.

 

[daan]

This is why we have racing incidents that are no one's fault, and that was one of them.