Nope.

 

I think a lot of people are surprised they both got reprimands instead of actual penalties- Vettel's move at Baki was quite a bit more obvious but those weren't exactly "accidents" !! In Charles' case I'm more surprised as I wouldn't expect that from him.

Would have thought they'd at least bring grid penalties...

 

I've been saying this for a while. Verstappen is flattering the car. Perez may not one of the best drivers, but he is not as bad as Verstappen is making him look.

Verstappen to Mercedes may be the smart move after all.

 

Where are all the detractors who says it’s the car? Once again Max showing why he’s the difference in a car that isn’t the fastest on track. He just wins.

Kind of disappointed that with the upgrades Ferrari brought this weekend they could only manage a 5 & 6 place finish. Perhaps with 1 more lap Charles would have passed George.

I guess the accusations of sabotage against Lewis have fallen moot now? Congratulations to the Greatest of all time 😂 for finding the podium after a 12 race dry spell. Get in there Lewis!! 😂

 

Good race! Great opening laps.

Screwy hard tire strategy for GR and CS...

 

Yeah surprised to see that at the end. GR will be upset.

Rarely do you see all 3 tires being used at the same time in a race....and was pretty widespread. i/e not just a random single hard tire being used....

 

Agreed. A lot of teams further down the order did it and finished on hards due to nothing left to lose and the people around them were on hards, so there’s that.

But clearly, up front, that was not the preferred strategy option. I saw where Ruth did a wonderful analysis that predicted GR’s struggles before he even realized himself that he was in trouble. Also, that if LH had gone to hards for the final stint, he would have finished behind GR.

 

I enjoyed the race and the various team strategies. It would have been nice to see a battle between Norris and Verstappen in the final laps, but it wasn’t meant to be. The opening lap was tough for Norris.

I was a bit surprised at the ineffectiveness of the VCARB upgrades. They were slow today.

 

Really surprised at that strategy given other teams had tried them on first and didn't go well. If I were George I would be livid.

 

Lando needs to practice his starts as once again he allowed someone to jump him when he had the pole position. Perhaps it’s the car just doesn’t have the initial mechanical grip versus the Red Bull, as at this level there’s no way the reaction times between the drivers is significant.

I wonder if McLaren had decided to leave Lando out on the medium whether he could have pulled this off with a ‘one stopper’? Certainly the ‘Hard’ wasn’t the tyre to be on. A real shame Norris lost so much time being held up by Russell and lost an additional loss of at least a second during his first pit stop.

Perez again showing he doesn’t deserve to be in what is still arguably the fastest car, (along with the McLaren) on the grid. A Russell; Norris, etc. in a Red Bull gives Max who is marginally still the best driver on the grid a real battle.

Ferrari appears to be slipping behind the Mercs although it could also be the quality of the Merc drivers versus LeClerc and Sainz.

Aston seems to have totally lost the plot; a shame as it would be good for the drama to see Alonso actually being able to contest for a podium.

Driver of the day: Norris.

Pass of the day: Lewis passing Sainz.

YMMV.

 

Forgot to mention that it was nice to hear strategy from Bernie as she’s been missing from the grid for several races. Surprised Danika was in Spain. Karun is okay, but would like some more of Nico Rosberg’s unfiltered commentary. He’s grown on me.

 

It isn't a reaction time issue. The rules for getting these cars off the line was changed a few years back. Nailing a perfect start is not easy. Drivers blow starts all the time, as the rule change intended.

This track also has one of the longest distances to the first corner. So Lando's small bobble became costly, more costly than at another circuit.

 

Would I jinx it to say that this year is shaping up to be really entertaining considering at the start of the year we all thought it would be a Max and Red Bull runaway? 4 different people on pole from 4 different teams in the past 4 races with the last 2 being a dead heat to the thousands of a second and yesterday's qualifying at 2 hundreds of a second! The 30 second gap that used to be behind Max is no longer reality and it's not a forgone conclusion he will win (although he does seem to win more often than not).

 

Well, now the sabotage has been made public, Mercedes had to stop it!

 

The RB20 is not “arguably” the fastest car. The McLaren is certainly faster and the Mercedes is probably as fast. The difference is Verstappen. Max should be driver of the day as he won a race he should not have won. Norris should not be driver of the day as he lost a race he should have won.