2024 F1 General Discussion Thread

I think the blame lies more with Sky Sports on their tabloid esque coverage of this whole thing.

Ah yeah that's all true. To be fair, I haven't seen a huge drop-off in Hamilton this year. He looks to be still on it. He scored a third more points than Russell last year.

In the Schumacher days, they had a German driver and an English team boss. You can see how the Italian-Anglo-German team leadership would add to each other. Hamilton might bring a bit of rigour the Italians need. He might want to start with their pitstops and strategy, but that's another story.

English team boss? Jean Todt is as French as they come. You mean Brawn? He was never boss at Ferrari.

I’ve seen mistakes from Hamilton. Spa and Singapore in 2022, and Qatar this year, coupled with poorer performances, and I know the car wasn’t up to snuff but still, he is a 7x WC.

He is bound to not be his best, it’ll depend how far off he is when lands at Ferrari

Ah, a mistake or a poor weekend isn't the point. He always made mistakes. Max made mistake this year. He was solid and stuffed Russell's over the season.

Yes, Todt was team principle. What position was brawn? Designer? Whatever his title, he was important. The Italians need bit of Anglo discipline and cool headedness to stop them collapsing into and orgy of back-stabbing and cries of 'etc tu, Brute?'

Hamilton only lost to Russell in 2022 because of the mess up that Mercedes made of that car and all the testing and experimenting they needed.

You put Hamilton into a car that could win a championship and he'll be competing. Same goes for Alonso. I don't think you could say the same for late stage Kimi or Vettel...

Andrea Stella, the team principal at McLaren, is Italian. Nationality is a poor indicator of performance potential.

Spa 2022, Singapore 2022, Italy 2023 and Qatar 2023 stand out as errors that he just wouldn’t have made before. Couple with some really drab performances (“but it’s the car”) over those years as well, it very much points at going off the boil.

Russell, as I’ve said already, had the worse luck with reliability in 2023. If you add it up over the 2 years in general they are really close, Hamilton shades it over one lap.

It’s not exactly an insult to say a driver approaching his 40’s has gone past his best.

Well they were the best new team to do well in there first couple of years recently when they came into F1 in 2015.

Its rather stupid what your man said here do. If he had of been cleverer about it he could have said we will be last at some races and maybe do better at others. Maybe he is just being brutally honest and too honest at that but maybe that is his way of seeing and doing things.

Would have been much better to say we will be competitive in the midfield in some races but maybe not the first one as it will not suit our car.

Sure. Sure. And Ferrari is staffed by mainly Italians and is immerse in Italian culture. They're consistently probably worst value for moneybteam on the grid. With the best of facilities make above average cars. With top drivers on top dollar they sometimes even compete for wins. They have consistently poor organisation, in-race strategy, pit stops and have an arse covering and back stabbing culture that means they make terrible decisions. Mercedes talks about their 'no blame culture' where they don't care who made the mistake, they need to identify the cause of the mistake so they don't make it again. Ferrari has a 'no fault culture' where they pretend problems don't exist and keep making them because admitting to making a mistake reaults in being blame, backstabbing and firings. Last years pit strategy was farcical and they flat out said there wasn't a problem.

There was a period in recent history when they actually for their act together and they had leadership from around the world. For whatever reason, they consistently fail to live up to their potential.

Well Lewis has spoken for the first time since it all started.

The point of Haas, and any other back marker, is that they provide 2 extra seats on the grid. Even if a team is shite, they can still be a good proving ground for drivers. We've seen that many times in the past. That said, Haas aren't the best example of a team giving up and coming talent a chance... Actually, you're right. They are a bit pointless now that I think of it.

I think there’s plenty to suggest the elder statesmen were some of the best performers on the grid after Verstappen. Hamilton and Alonso had varying performances from the cars, anything from the second best car to the 4th for the most part but turned in generally very good performances over the season.

I guess the bar is very high for them. For comparison, some people would say Sainz had an amazing season and while I think it was very good with a great win, he still managed butcher a significant points lead over leclerc who also had more DNFs.

Hopefully it’s all a good sign that Hamilton and Alonso have a few good years still to go.

Does not necessarily mean that Albon will accept it do. If Albon goes there he will be a number 2 driver. If he were to go to Mercedes he has the chance to be a number 1 driver as the number 1 driver is leaving there. I think Mercedes would be the better option for him.

How does the move benefit Ferrari, is it just PR? I don't think Hamilton is much better than Sainz, and surely they're paying him more?