F1 2022-Round 12: France

Ferrari pit wall team

Ah lads this is ridiculous. Ferrari are the most strategically inept team ever.

Russell trying to convince himself there.

Not fair on the Chuckle Brothers!

Charles saying it was a mistake.

Big time get the head down and drive the car if you wanna get past otherwise shut it

Despite the best efforts of his pit wall Sainz may still be on for a podium here.

Safety car here might suit Sainz.

Wonder were they both ok with the Delta. A bit strange

Season is as good as done, max has one hand on the WDC and red bull on the WCC, Merc will steal second from Ferrari. And yet again Ferrari gonna Ferrari this race, next race and for the rest of the season.

Best example was a few weeks back, I think he started towards the back, and then had worked himself up to P4/5, pushed too much and then he shipped a load of positions. Max has really matured.

I think LeClerc is honest enough. Admits to it being his fault, if it was the car he'd have said. He knows himself that it's not good enough. Crazy considering the pressure he withstood earlier from Max to bin in when he's clear

Not the best race in the end, I thought the new cars would shine at Paul Ricard as they could follow more closely through the long corners but it never really happened. I don't think many people will miss the circuit when it's gone, as seems increasingly likely.

Another great job from Max for the victory. He put Leclerc under relentless pressure, the team made an aggressive call for the undercut, he did exactly what he needed to do to make the undercut work by overtaking Norris immediately, and then when Leclerc had to push to the maximum to try and keep a gap for the pitstop he made a mistake. People keep talking like he just inherited victory but without the pressure he put on Ferrari it wouldn't have happened, Leclerc himself admitted the mistake was because he had to keep pushing so hard.

Had Leclerc not crashed out, it looks very much like he'd have come out of his pitstop behind Max but with tyres a few laps fresher so it could have been a very interesting race. Such a big shame we didn't get to see that play out. A shame for the championship too of course, it's hard to imagine him making a big enough comeback to genuinely fight for the title at this stage, though you'd have to say Ferrari do still have the fastest car. Their strategists continue to be absolute clowns though. That nonsense with Sainz just left me speechless. I'm used to them being pretty terrible when it comes to strategy but that must have been a new low. He could have scored a podium today without the team screwing him over.

Yeah a right loveable rogue.

How that time we all chuckled seeing him slap bottas on the head after wiping him out.

Even if they were always going to have to put Sainz, they handled it awfully. What's the benefit of fighting for position with your engineer in your ear and then just pit anyway?

Mercedes isn't as good a car as ferrari or red bull, but I'm reminded of what Christian Horner said earlier in the season - he'd prefer a fast unreliable car rather than a slow reliable one. Mercedes is slow but reliable, constantly picking up points.

Championships are both surely done now though, right?

They have reliability this year it seems and it has them in relative touch, but on their own really in third.

Other than that the Mercs are the best of the rest and they know it, they had earmarked this track as one they would be strong at and were perplexed at their times through the sessions.

In saying that though many thought this track would be great for overtaking under the new regulations (2nd highest number of overtakes last year) and we didn't have much exciting racing really.