Formula 1 2020 - General Discussion Thread (See MOD warning on first post)

Harika

jv2000 wrote: »

I think most teams assume they will never need to use their reserve driver. This year has really caught them out.

Let's face it, Stoffel has same qualifications as Russell. But Mercedes is clearly putting their bet on Russell for a future cockpit with them.
Stoffel will have to be clear to himself that he is out of F1 and his future is formula e, GT or Touring Car.

pjohnson

Tbf I think Russell actually is Mercedes official reserve, just leased out to Williams. Giovinazzi is actually Ferrari's reserve. Aitken is Williams reserve.

So reserves are earning their keep this weeekend.

Harika

Schumacher confirmation at Haas, now all I want is Illott to win F2 championship

PsychoPete

Will be nice to see that name back in F1

https://twitter.com/F1/status/1334044805022756864?s=19

Harika

https://twitter.com/RachelBrookesTV/status/1334047635674705920
I love the Norris Sainz banter

Infoanon

eviltimeban wrote: »

I don't get the point of a reserve driver now.

Surprised by Russell move potentially for the next two races - reserve drivers are losing out because of recent race and new tyres experience apparently

recyclebin

Not sure how Aitken has got the reserve role at Williams. I presume it's for money reasons. His results in GP2 are only average at best.

artanevilla

Huge pressure on Bottas now. Will be very interesting to watch.

eviltimeban

Harika wrote: »

Let's face it, Stoffel has same qualifications as Russell. But Mercedes is clearly putting their bet on Russell for a future cockpit with them.
Stoffel will have to be clear to himself that he is out of F1 and his future is formula e, GT or Touring Car.

Unless it's because Stoffel wouldn't have had enough time to quarantine after arriving in Bahrain. Or he didn't have enough track time? I mean, it's not like they have anything to lose - they've won everything already. Races are just testing sessions for them at this stage.

pjohnson

eviltimeban wrote: »

Unless it's because Stoffel wouldn't have had enough time to quarantine after arriving in Bahrain. Or he didn't have enough track time? I mean, it's not like they have anything to lose - they've won everything already. Races are just testing sessions for them at this stage.

Bahrain is strict BUT he just would have passed multiple tests as Formula E testing was this weekend and only ended yesterday so he likely wouldn't have had an issue.

H3llR4iser

Well, this makes no sense whatsoever. Unless the rumors of Lewis thinking about moving on to different activities at the end of the season have a bit of truth to them, and the team are taking the opportunity for a trial.

GarIT

H3llR4iser wrote: »

Well, this makes no sense whatsoever. Unless the rumors of Lewis thinking about moving on to different activities at the end of the season have a bit of truth to them, and the team are taking the opportunity for a trial.

It makes absolutely perfect sense. It's possibly the only logical solution.

klose

Should make the weekend very interesting, three drivers in cars they wouldn't be too familiar with, bottas with pressure on him now both with Russell in the merc and verstappen chasing him down for 2nd in the drivers.

GarIT

eviltimeban wrote: »

Unless it's because Stoffel wouldn't have had enough time to quarantine after arriving in Bahrain. Or he didn't have enough track time? I mean, it's not like they have anything to lose - they've won everything already. Races are just testing sessions for them at this stage.

They just didn't want him. He's not talented enough and doesn't have the potential to be an F1 driver.

quokula

GarIT wrote: »

They just didn't want him. He's not talented enough and doesn't have the potential to be an F1 driver.

That's going a bit far - he'd potentially be a very decent driver and he was just unfortunate he never got a chance in anything other than a backmarker McLaren with Alonso for a team-mate. He's certainly a far better driver than Bottas if you look at the whole of his career.

With that said, he's been out of F1 for a few years so it would be a big ask to jump in at a moments notice, so Russell is a far better choice.

Joeface

2 Races left and Williams still chasing a single point this season and their best chance based of securing even one is with Russell behind the wheel and they give him up for one Race . It seems poor in a competition sense that Williams loose their driver . As has been pointed out Mercedes have secured both championships, they didn't need to hamper another team just for this race. With Covid in place Drivers should not really been moving teams , and as Covid has been in the Mercedes camp for a few weeks now this makes even less sense. If Vandoorne is a Test and Simulator driver for Mercedes that's who should be in place .

To me it makes a little bit of mockery of the "competition" and also Why all the fuss earlier over Williams not confirming Russell seat for next season straight way. if they have to give him up any time Mercedes have a problem.

Faugheen

First time a Mercedes junior driver has raced for the full works team.

quokula

Joeface wrote: »

2 Races left and Williams still chasing a single point this season and their best chance based of securing even one is with Russell behind the wheel and they give him up for one Race . It seems poor in a competition sense that Williams loose their driver . As has been pointed out Mercedes have secured both championships, they didn't need to hamper another team just for this race. With Covid in place Drivers should not really been moving teams , and as Covid has been in the Mercedes camp for a few weeks now this makes even less sense. If Vandoorne is a Test and Simulator driver for Mercedes that's who should be in place .

To me it makes a little bit of mockery of the "competition" and also Why all the fuss earlier over Williams not confirming Russell seat for next season straight way. if they have to give him up any time Mercedes have a problem.

Russell has scored zero points this season and is technically behind Latifi (also on 0) in the championship because his best finish is actually lower.

That car doesn't stand a chance of scoring 3 points without absolute chaos occurring, in which case there's just as much chance of a different driver doing it.

It would make a bigger mockery of the competition to put a driver that's several years out of practice in the fastest car on the grid. Russell has always been a Mercedes driver, Williams need any help they can get in terms of support and discounted engines, so it's easy to see why they'd oblige.

GarIT

Joeface wrote: »

2 Races left and Williams still chasing a single point this season and their best chance based of securing even one is with Russell behind the wheel and they give him up for one Race . It seems poor in a competition sense that Williams loose their driver . As has been pointed out Mercedes have secured both championships, they didn't need to hamper another team just for this race. With Covid in place Drivers should not really been moving teams , and as Covid has been in the Mercedes camp for a few weeks now this makes even less sense. If Vandoorne is a Test and Simulator driver for Mercedes that's who should be in place .

To me it makes a little bit of mockery of the "competition" and also Why all the fuss earlier over Williams not confirming Russell seat for next season straight way. if they have to give him up any time Mercedes have a problem.

A point won't do much for Williams. They would need at least 4 to beat HAAS. It's hard to say what's better for them the publicity from a point or their driver not finishing last and the extra publicity, and double.extra publicity if it's realised they have a future star or at.least race winner. Payments from Mercedes and Aitken would definitely sweeten the deal.

Mercedes need to keep Bottas' morale up, secure second for him and to do that someone who could take point off Verstappen or be used as a roadblock would be helpful. They also want to trial who they plan to be their next driver.

Top Dog

If by some miracle Russell is leading Bottas in the closing stages of the race, does anyone think team orders will be employed to help Bottas in his fight for 2nd overall?

ELM327

GarIT wrote: »

A point won't do much for Williams. They would need at least 4 to beat HAAS. It's hard to say what's better for them the publicity from a point or their driver not finishing last and the extra publicity, and double.extra publicity if it's realised they have a future star or at.least race winner. Payments from Mercedes and Aitken would definitely sweeten the deal.

Mercedes need to keep Bottas' morale up, secure second for him and to do that someone who could take point off Verstappen or be used as a roadblock would be helpful. They also want to trial who they plan to be their next driver.

hopefully russell beats him!

El_Duderino 09

H3llR4iser wrote: »

Well, this makes no sense whatsoever. Unless the rumors of Lewis thinking about moving on to different activities at the end of the season have a bit of truth to them, and the team are taking the opportunity for a trial.

Lewis doesn’t have to be moving on for this to make sense. They want to know how good he is and they usually have to rely on proxy data from how they think he’s performing in the Williams. But now they have the opportunity to gather first hand data from him driving their own car.

He’s clearly their first choice for a long term team leader. So why not gather some good data on him in live action over the course of a weekend?

El_Duderino 09

Top Dog wrote: »

If by some miracle Russell is leading Bottas in the closing stages of the race, does anyone think team orders will be employed to help Bottas in his fight for 2nd overall?

No. Why would they do that? More likely they’d just tell them not to race.

Unless they’ve set 1-2 in the championship as a team goal and will actually fail to meet their goals for the season unless Bottas comes second, then I can’t even see any reason to consider it.

billybonkers

GarIT wrote: »

A point won't do much for Williams. They would need at least 4 to beat HAAS. It's hard to say what's better for them the publicity from a point or their driver not finishing last and the extra publicity, and double.extra publicity if it's realised they have a future star or at.least race winner. Payments from Mercedes and Aitken would definitely sweeten the deal.

Mercedes need to keep Bottas' morale up, secure second for him and to do that someone who could take point off Verstappen or be used as a roadblock would be helpful. They also want to trial who they plan to be their next driver.

IF they finish on 0 points they get less money than if they finish on 1

Top Dog

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

No. Why would they do that? More likely they’d just tell them not to race.

Because they've asked Bottas to move over in the past to help Hamilton in his charge for the championship? Team orders do exist, so it wouldn't be beyond them to have some contingency plan in place.

Don't get me wrong, I don't really think the situation will arise. I hope George gets a strong top 10 finish, I'll be delighted for him if he can creak the top 5, but I think it's a huge ask or expectation to think he'll end up on the podium.

I'm just curious as to people's thoughts on it given how much analysis is done these days with the various scenarios.

pjohnson

George be happy to get points. He was in danger of beating Badoers record if he had stayed with Williams until end of 21. Think Russell is at 40 races without a point while Badoer's record is 50 iirc.

afatbollix

Top Dog wrote: »

If by some miracle Russell is leading Bottas in the closing stages of the race, does anyone think team orders will be employed to help Bottas in his fight for 2nd overall?

Yes, they will, I'm sure Russell in his contract will have this in it.

But I'm sure there will be a sweetener for doing it, most times it's money but I'm sure merc won't forget what happened for contracts for 2022.

Happens alot in WRC these days as some teams have extra drivers for different rounds.

jv2000

Top Dog wrote: »

Don't get me wrong, I don't really think the situation will arise. I hope George gets a strong top 10 finish, I'll be delighted for him if he can creak the top 5, but I think it's a huge ask or expectation to think he'll end up on the podium.

I disagree here to an extent. Mercedes are looking for a star. Otherwise they are just as well off using Vandoorne. We saw how Max performed in his first Red Bull race. Sure Max is an exceptional talent but Merc have built up Russel to be a star of the future and possible world champion. The expectation here has to be a win or at least a top 2 finish. This whole experiment could be very damaging for Russell if he does not impress.... Hopefully he does not bin it behind the safety car!

AMKC

If Russel were to do really well and win the race surely then that could put pressure on both Mercedes and Lewis.
Why would Mercedes bother to resign Hamilton when they could sign Russel for less to do the same job?
I wonder is Lewis worried about that having signed a new deal yet with Mercedes. Might be a mistake waiting so long.
Of course I doubt that scenery will happen but it could.

GarIT

billybonkers wrote: »

IF they finish on 0 points they get less money than if they finish on 1

I didn't know there was any money for points, thought it was just position.