The 2022 Formula 1 World Championship Thread

[Maell]

Still shouldn't be as much as Santander, Uralkali, to name a few shall bring. There is a reason why Jumbo is only featured very small on Verstappen's helmet.

What i meant is not that he is spending big now, but that he might have spent to get Max up to the point of getting a seat in a top team.

[MCMLXXXII]

What i meant is not that he is spending big now, but that he might have spent to get Max up to the point of getting a seat in a top team.

Before there were any "really big" investments necessary, Max was already picked up by Red Bull. While I do agree that there are too many paid drivers, real talents are going to end up in F1 anyway. Both Anthony Hamilton and Jos Verstappen invested a lot in their sons early racing careers but that's nothing compared what those paid drivers have to bring their entire career.
Both Lewis and Max were picked up when they were really young by McLaren and Red Bull respectively.

[Ayirasi]

Ehhh, and I hoped, that it would be Piasri. F1 is strange thing. Sometimes it's not enough to be F2 champion in order to get to F1. It's the same thing, that happened with Hill, who was mediocre driver in junior championships, but became F1 champion then. Sad thing.

Yeah, I thought HAAS would stick to younger talent, but now I'm looking forward to seeing how Mick stacks up against an experienced and aggressive teammate.

[MCMLXXXII]

Another pre season testing, another weekend of Mercedes sandbagging.
Piastri added to McLaren reserve driver pool.
Good choice, his only chance of driving for Alpine is if Alonso retires since they only have two seats.

[MCMLXXXII]

Imagine claiming you've stopped developing last years car in April and then being out qualified by an Haas and an Alfa Romeo.

Imagine being so cocky that you didn't show up in Barcelona with your real car so you only have 3 effective testing days in Bahrain.

[Vestig3]

Well this looks promising, if the Ferrari engines are really as good as they seem to be its good that the engine development is frozen till 2026 and would mean that ferrari has the strongest engine for the coming years.

[MCMLXXXII]

Well this looks promising, if the Ferrari engines are really as good as they seem to be its good that the engine development is frozen till 2026 and would mean that ferrari has the strongest engine for the coming years.

Good to see Ferrari back where they belong. Haas is also looking good.
Ferrari's pitcrew also behaving un-Italian, as in calm.

[Ayirasi]

Haas and Alfa were huge surprises in qualifying.

Pretty disappointed with how far down the McLarens are starting, but first race and all that.

edit: Flawless Leclerc win. Congrats.

RedBulls crapping out was a shocker.

HAAS points!

[Northern Goblin]

My god, how long has it been since we had a Ferrari 1/2.

And not a Red Bull in sight, fantastic day.

[Xanjori]

Good race, nice season opener. Red Bulls dying was funny.

[Bigbazz]

Mclaren is a mystery, they go from really fast to having reliability issues and then no pace. Nice to see Ferrari win, I think I'm on board for a Ferrari driver champion this year.

[Vestig3]

That mclaren stands where they are is super suprising to me but then again their car doesn’t look at super radical as I expected it to look but that haas and alpha romeo beat them is a even more suprising.

Charles, great restart good race and calm race
Redbull didnt test full race length during the winter test and Ferrari and Mercedes did so they got some work to do.

Great race from Magnussen, i think he deserved that driver of the day as much as leclerc seeing what meterial he has to work with.

[Maell]

Mclaren apparently had some problems with porpoising and brake cooling. On the the skyf1 broadcast they quoted a aston marting team member saying that to solve the porpoising in their car they had to raise ride height and lost about 1sec per lap, dunno if the fix for the mclaren was that severe. And most likely those struggling with aero problems will take a few races to find a decent fix.

[Espo]

Really nice race from Leclerc. He was playing a bit of 4D chess with Max in slowing up on the 1st DRS zone to let Max by (and cook his brakes and tires) only to position himself to make a run at the very next DRS zone and take the lead back. I was surprised Max kept falling for that one, as it tends to be a common tactic with back-to-back DRS zones with 2 relatively close cars.

Great to see Ferrari back again. After all they've dealt with the last few years, and people questioning Binotto at times--it has to feel like a bit of validation for his long-term vision (but it's still early). It had to be hard to sit there the last few years, trust their process, and keep the eye on the prize of this year--but so far, so good.

Tough race for Red Bull--whether or not you're a fan of them, that's a crappy way to end the race.

RIP to teams running Mercedes' engines--they were all at the bottom of the grid except the factory team. I know Toto claims it's aero issues, but it's a bit suspicious that all of the teams running their engines are struggling (on top of the rumors that they had issues with the new E10 requirements). Granted--it sounds like the FIA may be OK with engine updates (despite the freeze) if it's for reliability or bringing a lagging engine up to the rest of the pack. But if they can keep salvaging races like yesterday, and fix their issues, we could have a 3 way fight--which would be really awesome to see. Leclerc vs Max vs Lewis is something I'd love to see in relatively close cars.

[Unforgivenn]

https://twitter.com/NoContextMerc/st...2-Y0WHWew&s=19

Rofl

[Kallisto]

Hamilton fails to get through Qualifying Phase 1

[Northern Goblin]

Fuck this track.

It was dangerous last year, it's no better this year.

Glad to hear Schumacher's conscious and should be ok.

[Ayirasi]

Latifi's crash looked like it hurt, but damn... Mick's was nasty. Glad they're OK.

Congrats to Perez and the Ferraris.

Shocked to see Lewis so far down.

Track can eat a dick.

[Bigbazz]

I like the track but it's a death trap, the speed at which they go between those walls is just crazy. Maybe they shouldn't be going there while there is a war on either, all the #ukraine stuff to cancel Russian GP but they will go to warzones with less mainstream coverage if the money is right.

Happy to see Perez get his first pole, nice to see a genuine close battle between two teams and the prospect of Mercedes getting in the mix when they fix their issues, should be a great season.

[MCMLXXXII]

What a race. Again. This season is going to be better then the last one.