MorrisF1

Well, that was a dramatic race. Unlike last week, when a bet failed due to clear misfortune, this was an evident misjudgement on my part. The Ferraris had been very close to reaching Q3 yet their qualifying performance vanished. Obviously a red bet, bit baffled by the total lack of pace. Off the line Bottas left the handbrake on and slumped to 6 th , Perez climbing to 3 rd . Vettel slid down the order, Leclerc improved. All that was overshadowed by Grosjean hitting the barriers and his car bursting into a ball of flames. The impact was such it literally tore the car into two halves. Despite it all, the Frenchman, aided by very prompt arrival of medical staff, was able to leap from the inferno and appears, at this stage, to have suffered only minor burns and possibly a broken rib. For the third time this year we had a race halted due to a red flag. Seems rather more than usual. The hour or so off allowed drivers to mend broken bits, handy for front wings for a couple of chaps, and s...

There were no major upsets in qualifying but one or two cars ended up outside of expected positions, which may offer some intrigue for the race tomorrow. Q1 was eminently predictable with both Haas, both Alfa Romeos, and Latifi all failing to progress. Q2 had an early surprise. Before anyone could put in a lap time, but after almost everyone had taken much life out of their medium tyres (AlphaTauri alone were on the red soft tyres), Sainz’s rear wheel went on strike and he found himself spun around and his car unable to move. Cue the red flag, just for a little while. This put the Spaniard down to 15 th with lower possible if he takes a penalty. Also eliminated were both Ferraris, Vettel ahead of Leclerc (miraculous how the German has suddenly become competitive when Binotto isn’t attending races…), the oddly slow Stroll, and Russell. In the first runs of Q3 Verstappen split the Mercedes, Hamilton leading, but this did not last. The Briton duly took his 432 nd career pole, with...

Just a quick reminder ahead of time that whilst we have two races at this venue the circuit layouts will be different from one race weekend to the next. That’s not to say there won’t be useful guidance for the next race from this one, but the circuits will not be identical. This is the first of three races on the bounce, so if a driver gets COVID-19 here they could miss out on a lot of points. In earth-shattering news, Hamilton led Bottas at the top of the first practice time sheet. Perez was next up, half a second down the road and two-hundredths ahead of Sainz, with Gasly in close contention and Verstappen a couple of tenths further back. Albon, Ocon, Stroll, and Ricciardo rounded out the top 10. Second practice had the same chap fastest but this time Verstappen was next, albeit a third of a second off Hamilton’s pace. Bottas was less than a tenth and Perez just over a tenth behind, with Ricciardo hot on the Mexican’s heels. Gasly, Norris, Stroll, Kvyat and Albon followed. Al...

Well. It’s hard to know where to start with that. The race was thoroughly entertaining, with drama throughout and a red sting in the tail near the end. Both bets were red, one a bit unluckily, but some longer term bets well-served by the result for various teams and drivers. The track was very wet. Everyone save the Williams began on wet tyres. Off the line it seemed the ‘dirty’ (even) side of the track was poorly served, except for Hamilton who made great progress off the line. The Racing Points retained their 1-2, with Verstappen losing half a dozen places before making up a couple because Ricciardo and Ocon collided, massively slowing the Aussie and spinning the Frenchman. Vettel charged up the order and Leclerc slid back down. Bottas also spun at the first corner, his debut of at least a quartet of gyrating misadventures. The Racing Points charged off, Verstappen tried to pass Vettel, and couldn’t, and calamity reigned as multiple drivers missed corners or had little off-tr...

Well, that grid is quite unexpected. Having ruined Perez’s result with a strategic failure, this time Racing Point benefited by Red Bull cocking up. Pole for Stroll! In Q1 it was very wet indeed. So wet, in fact, that it was red flagged for quite a while. Both Grosjean and Latifi ended up beaching their cars. Double waved yellows for Latifi annoyed Magnussen who felt his competitors didn’t slow down.  Unsurprisingly, we lost both Williams, both Haas, and Kvyat, whom I believe spun on what would’ve been his fastest lap. We were still pretty much in wet tyre territory for the second part of qualifying, which featured a potential blocking by Sainz on Perez (this is being referred to the stewards). I was a bit surprised Gasly was slowest of them all, with both McLarens and both Ferraris out. Q3 went a bit differently. Verstappen had been literally seconds ahead of everyone else. He and the others went out on inters… except for Racing Point. And Perez was just two-tenths off Verst...

Excitingly, a Saudi Arabian night race is now set for November next year. One waits with bated breath for the moral prognostications from the sport to find out if political opinions are something for the US, or if they apply to Saudi Arabia too (and China, Russia, etc). Mind you, plenty of lawyers, journalists, and teachers have been imprisoned in Turkey as well. That’ll be it for the politics this weekend, but I felt it’d be remiss not to mention the hypocritical bullshit of the sport. The full 2021 calendar, currently is set to be: Australia, Bahrain, China, TBC, Spain, Monaco, Azerbaijan, Canada, France, Austria, UK, Hungary, Belgium, Netherlands, Italy, Russia, Singapore, Japan, USA, Mexico, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi. That’s 23 in total with Vietnam perhaps being nixed. Turkey’s actually a pretty good circuit, and until the Circuit of the Americas was the best modern track, probably. Russell will be starting from the back due to grid penalties for taking new bits. ...

Not a classic, but it did have its moments. One bet failed, one succeeded (just), so green overall. Off the line Hamilton was slow and Verstappen fast, with the Dutchman taking the Briton’s place. Gasly came close, but that was as good as his race got as he very early on had to retire for safety reasons, which is a tremendous shame given how well he’s been driving all weekend. The top three cruised away from the field who were relatively close, but passing, even with DRS, was very difficult. Perez, naturally, ran longer his rivals Ricciardo, Leclerc, Albon, and Kvyat. This paid dividends when they emerged behind Magnussen, who had spun early on, and were held up long enough for the Mexican, who started on medium tyres, to pit and emerge ahead of them. Once other late stoppers such as Raikkonen, Vettel, and Latifi pitted, Perez was 4 th , 8s ahead of Ricciardo. At the sharp end, Verstappen and Bottas pitted, the Finn coming out ahead, despite damage to his car from the second lap....

And so to qualifying. Would it be dramatically unpredictable? Would Mercedes dominate the front row?   Q3 went more or less to script, with both Alfa Romeos, Latifi, and both Haas exiting at this stage. Russell got out with relative ease and multiple drivers, including Bottas, Albon, and Raikkonen, had lap times deleted for exceeding track limits. Q2 had some more surprises. Initially the Mercedes, Ferraris, and Red Bulls all went out on medium tyres. But things starting going wrong for most of the drivers. Verstappen’s car lost power (turned out to be a wonky spark plug) and he had to box whilst the mechanics frantically attempted to mend the problem. Vettel was too slow, and Leclerc wasn’t exactly safe either (I believe both had to swap onto the soft tyres and that still wasn’t enough for the German). Albon, meanwhile, continued his bad habit of getting laps deleted for exceeding track limits. After it all shook out, Perez ended up 11 th , which isn’t a bad spot given project...