Out of all the drama at Spielberg Austria the thing I found most remarkable and impressive that Ferrari were apolitical and allowed Kimi to drive to his potential. He had been so strong in Quali, and his start was supreme. He deserved to finish on track ahead of Vettel. The Channel 4 pundits were discussing when rather than if Ferrari would "swap the drivers" as if it was just a matter of fact thing like swapping tyres. One of them had been stronger and deserved to prevail. I was sitting there thinking "if they do this I will be totally pissed off". To my great surprise and delight, they didn't. Kimi was allowed to race. Well done Ferrari. Thank you for letting these guys race.
I was also surprised, expecting it to happen as Vettel started to close. But very happy that he was allowed to take 2nd and do the fastest lap and new lap record on what must have been seriously deteriorated tyres, having done 56 laps or so. Good race and a great track to drive in rF2 !
I have always liked the various sim versions of Red Bull Ring for racing. But I was shocked, Shocked I tell you, when I found Herman Tilke also had a hand in the rebuilding of the Red Bull Ring. It is a classic natural track in so many ways unlike most of his 'other' F1 tracks.
Maybe Tilke had more free hands back then than today with all the safety regulations etc. But frankly back in the 90's drivers also complained that the Tilke variant was nothing like the old Österreichring.
Saw once a interview with him (or was brazilian narrators talking about him) and it was said that most things people complain about his tracks are out of his control as the track owner asks him to do something that can also receive motorbikes, and they all want to have more active days on tracks so all of them ask for this
It was the first track he worked on. But his hands are always tied becuase he has to work to a massive rule book from the FIA and FIM as well as work with the land owners to cram it all in (especially Sochi and the Hockenheim redesign). First corner has to be X, runoff has to be Y. Paddock has to be Z Istanbul, Malaysia and COTA he got right. With COTA he used Google Earth's 3D or something like that to design the start finish straight.
At hokeniem it pissed me off to no end when Ferrari told Kimi to let Vettel by,amd merc to telling bottas to let Hamilton by. I can understand it why,but personally I feel like bottas gifted Hamilton that win,bottas got his tyres switched on better,and would have overtaken Lewis,it would have been good to see if he could stay ahead
They never told Bottas to move over though. But I can understand why they told him to stay behind- A one two in front of Mercedes' top chiefs and on a track like that if they binned it they'd have egg on their face. Difference is, Merc did it in the best interests of the team. Ferrari did it in the best interests of one driver.
Like I said I understand why,but it’s just shit to watch for fans They should put a cap of dev budget sort the payouts so it’s more evenly spread and only allow one car per team,maybe that would bring more teams in and we wouldn’t get as much of this team orders nonsense
Mosely tried budget caps at least twice and twice they were blocked. Guess who blocked them. Plus F1 is a team sport. Sometimes teams need to protect what they've got.
Liberty Media is trying for a 2021 budget cap of $150m for teams and expenses not including driver salaries. This is a professional media company and do not spend money without getting what they want finally (with compromise). The present day out of control $700m-$1Billion budget with 1000-1500 personnel of Mercedes and Ferrari for two cars is unacceptable in todays world. The average age of a F1 viewer now is 50-75 and LM want to bring back the youth, there should be more promotional events happening in the near future with Max Verstappen, Charles LeClerc and the like. Could get real interesting to watch how a multinational media company will undertake to rebuild the F1 experience. https://www.bbc.com/sport/formula1/43671432 Hockenheim was shortened due to : "All the overtaking moves that took place during the race were in the chicanes of the forest sector, meaning hardly any spectators saw most of the best action." Bernie E did not like this. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hockenheimring
The problem is that if these older people didnt manage to get their kids into the sport bacj then it will be nearly impossible for race directors to make it happen. On the plus side their audience is still big so it's time to try stuff like budget caps, better now than wait the series fall too much. NASCAR will also have to try this, the stages were already a begining but I guess they'll have to make them shorter if they want people to keep the focus on the race.
All the people I know that are into F1 are in their late twenties. I think the reason people are thinking it's boring and switching off is because too many people are on a nostalgia high from the 80s and 90s. Even then, most races were processional, you had one, sometimes two teams on the top step but the only thing that spiced it up was that the unreliability was off. Now with F1 being more active on social media and showing clips of that time, people have watched two or three of those and assumed every race back then was like Baku this year. They weren't. Then they've watched twenty minutes of last year's Indy 500 and assumed that the cars have to be as close as they are there. That can't happen in a series like F1 where every car is unique to that team. Budget caps will bring the grid closer, but if there's no caps on salary then your James Allisons, Aldo Costas and so on are going to be paid megabucks by the top teams so the big teams will still be at the front. Just the gaps will come down a smidge.
You cant put a cap on salaries lol and even if you did these guys would not leave the top teams, this makes no sense. Budget cap actually allow the smaller teams to try to capitalize better and then offer better salaries for other people not from top teams because that would be a waste of time to even try, unless one of these guys want to challenge themselves trying to beat his ex team they aren't leaving