F1 2022 thread - see post 1 for rules

El_Duderino 09

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118632087#Comment_118632087

They all do that anyway, of their own accord, don't they? Why did they make a sport with a huge public profile, just to do their own R&D? Sounds like a big distraction from developing road cars. Sure they have made some advances for road cars, but why spend billions building F1 cars if what they actually want to do is develop road car technology?

AMKC

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118632076#Comment_118632076

Eh racing.

El_Duderino 09

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118632155#Comment_118632155

Oh right. That's a nice worldview.

mickdw

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118631775#Comment_118631775

I hope Ricciardo can be right up there this year. I still don't know if he had a real issue with the car and putting it on the limit or whether he just found Norris too quick.

I will be cheering both McLarens this year but would like to see Ricciardo finish ahead.

Right now though I'd bet on Norris being ahead. His old boss Trevor Carlin rated him as the absolute real deal.

If his advantage over Ricciardo carries over to this season, you would have to say he is the outright quickest man on the grid even ahead of max and leclerc and Hamilton.

El_Duderino 09

They're not going to make the findings from the investigation into the finale last year, public. Fair enough. It's gone on long enough, need tonputbitbto bed now move on.

They will make the changes resulting from the fi dings public, but kotbthenfindings themselves. It would be pretty embarrassing to make the findings public so best to just move on.

Jordan 199

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118630426#Comment_118630426

I see that Duracell sponsored Forti in 1995. You can see the name at the base of the sidepod:

You will have to zoom in on the image to see it better by clicking on it.

Frank Bullitt

So this is also on the McLaren site...You can see it here:

https://www.mclaren.com/racing/2022/car-launch/mclaren-unveils-2022-formula-1-indycar-and-extreme-e-contenders/

flazio

That livery is a "virtual" livery for their e-sports team, Shadow.

quokula

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118632323#Comment_118632323

I read an interview with Ricciardo somewhere where he talked a lot about the effect of the pandemic and Australia's particularly robust restrictions while he was abroad meant he went nearly two years without seeing his friends and family and was having a very difficult time - I'd imagine something like that would be tough mentally, on top of adjusting to a new team and trying to come back from the confidence blow of a poor start to the season. Every driver moving to a new team struggled early on (remember that they carried the 2020 cars over to 2021 with minor modifications so embedded drivers had a huge advantage in knowing the car), even top tier guys like Alonso and Vettel took some time to adjust, but Daniel never quite seemed to get his confidence fully back aside from the race at Monza.

I do rate Lando but no way do I think the gap between them is as big as it looked last year. I'd expect Daniel to have a better season this time out, especially as it's a brand new car to both of them.

quokula

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118632180#Comment_118632180

F1 was always about racing. Enzo Ferrari, Frank Williams, Ken Tyrrell, even our own Eddie Jordan. They were there to race. Finding sponsors was a necessary evil to pay the bills, but it wasn't the reason they were there. Ferrari only decided to make production cars to help fund the racing team.

The road it's gone down in recent years is of course all about marketing, with corporations like Mercedes only in it to sell cars and absolutely happy to wield their power and influence to force through rule changes like the hybrid formula that were indisputably worse for racing but better for marketing. Even the likes of McLaren and Williams are run by money men these days.

But that doesn't mean F1 has to be / should be / can only be about marketing and it's certainly completely untrue to say the entire sport is only made up as a gimmick to sell cars. I'd be happy to see the back of manufacturers and their politics in the sport, for most of golden years of F1 Ferrari were the only manufacturer team on the grid (and as mentioned, they only started selling cars to fund the racing team)

El_Duderino 09

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118633772#Comment_118633772

Yeah I think you can say Ric had an uncharacteristically poor season. Thus year will determine if it was a one-off or if he's gone off the boil.

Alonso struggled but adapted petty well in the end. Vettel has been struggling to adapt since midway through 2018. He's not really top tier anymore without reference to performances from years and years ago. Recent performance is middling to average. If he's the same again this year, he's just an average driver, who was once top tier

kksaints

I always veer towards Ricciardo been overrated somewhat. He's capable of some great drives but there's a lot of mediocre performances also. Personally I'd never see him as a world champion.

ricimaki

Alfa Romeo are testing their car at Ferrari's private Fiorano track, with a camo livery.

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/alfa-romeos-2022-f1-car-revealed-in-fiorano-shakedown/8192729/

Sidepod inlets are a lot bigger than the others seen so far...

bennyx_o

2022 Williams;

Very barren looking with little in the way of sponsors

AT looks like a very small front wing set up. Wide high air intakes too.

Williams looks very generic. Front wing has no detail at all.

bennyx_o

More Williams pics

namloc1980

It's the FIA show car. Well have to wait to see the actual Williams car on track.

Screenshot_20220215-132623_Twitter.jpg

Screenshot_20220215-132700_Twitter.jpg

namloc1980

Of the 6 car launches so far only Aston, McLaren and AlphaTauri have shown their actual (early) versions of their 2022 cars.

Red Bull and Williams showed the FIA show car with a paint job and Haas only launched renders of the FIA car with their paint job.

namloc1980

The Alfa Romeo spotted on track:

flazio

I was sort of hoping that Williams would go with a gold nose and a black body with the Duracell sponsorship but no such luck.

Andrew76

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118634881#Comment_118634881

That would have been interesting at least. The different shades of blue just look crap imo.

flazio

It's tidier then last year I'll give it that but overall, pretty bland.

recyclebin

Shake down!

recyclebin

recyclebin

Very indycar look from the front

Burkie1203

For all the talk over winter about regs having tight margins, we are seeing some big differences

Frank Bullitt

Serious Prost/Simtek vibes from that. Love it. And the paint is not matte, praise the most high!

Hijpo

Maybe it's just the paint but it looks like the williams has more of a rounded shape to the nose where as the rest look flat.

namloc1980

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118635898#Comment_118635898

Which is great! Aston Martin still the only one so far with the extensive radiator louvres on the body of the car.

Edit: actually looks like the Alfa also has the louvres

dulpit

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118636011#Comment_118636011

Funny, I heard on a podcast the other day (might have been the WTF1 one?) that matte paint weighs less than gloss, which is why everyone was shifting to it. And it appearently makes the sponsors easier to read.

Nice car the Williams...

Frank Bullitt

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118636227#Comment_118636227

I had heard that too, RB did it a while back for that reason. I do prefer a glossy paint job though.

flazio

Sao Paulo being one of the sprints, so close to the end of the season means we could have a World Champion crowned on a Saturday for possibly the first time ever. 🤔

Cool_CM

Suppose it had to happen at some stage, but kind of sad that Williams won't have the Senna logo on their car anymore.

https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/williams-explains-decision-to-remove-senna-s-logo-from-2022-f1-car/8196658/

Frank Bullitt

El_Duderino 09

Gary Anderson reckons the Williams makes no great sense. The front and rear ends don't mat h up as far as he can tell.

The launch car was just a generic render but the car on track was probably real and that's the one Anderson was talking about. Williams reckon it's a 5 year project to get back to the front.

Id be putting money on Williams taking a step back to the back of the grid this year again. Considering they have had the best engine this whole time, they're a bit of a disgrace.

eviltimeban

It looks cool though. Pity more cars aren't glossy.

El_Duderino 09

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118639201#Comment_118639201

The Williams looks cool. I think it looks a bit like the 1994 version with the rounded nose.

Vicxas

New season of Drive to Survive is out on the 11th of March

ricimaki

Looks like a Red Bull logo on Albon's helmet in the Williams. Is he still a Red Bull driver (or at least sponsored by them)? I presumed that would have ended this year.

El_Duderino 09

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118639993#Comment_118639993

I think it was very opaque. Mercedes wanted him to sever ties with red bull before signing for williams and driving their engine and using their gearbox and whatever else williams get from Mercedes. I think he did notionally sever ties with red bull, an F1 promise.

I'd be pretty sure red bull will have the option to hire him as a reserve driver or to replace perez if albon is above average this year, and bring all that knowledge back to red bull with him

flazio

As I recall, Carlos Sainz had a Red Bull helmet when he was driving for Renault as he was on loan to them.

First Horner gets his spare driver into Mercedes-Benz's unofficial junior team, then he buys a factory tour at auction, he'll either have moved to the Mercedes-Benz team to replace Wolff, or be running Merc engines in the Red Bulls in 5 years time.

duploelabs

Ferrari leaked

Burkie1203

Bybit sponsoring red bull, rumoured to be $30m/year

Oracle deal is $500m over 5 years

According to planetf1 anyway

Burkie1203

All the cars look very different from each other, there is a lot of major differences

Ferrari have the same vents on the sidepods that AM and RB have

Frank Bullitt

So the 2022 cars are stunners. I am excited for this season now.

Jordan 199

The Ferrari looks great in red and black.

AMKC

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118642008#Comment_118642008

Can not wait to see them all beside each other and racing each other out on the tracks. Be nice to see some different cars for once.

Frank Bullitt

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118642058#Comment_118642058

I read that RB are doing a shakedown at Silverstone today, with a camo livery. I am searching frantically for it.

muckwarrior

If the cars were about 10-20% smaller they'd rival early 90s cars aesthetically.

Andrew76

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118641933#Comment_118641933

Bybit worth $150m over 3 years according to this https://racingnews365.com/red-bull-secure-lucrative-new-crypto-sponsorship-deal - nice lump of change either way!

That Ferrari is lovely - sidepods look different to what we've seen so far too?