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Dear Reader,
 
Congratulations on your recent appointment as the Senior Consultant for the Rapid Optimisation and Transformation Upon Monaco (SCROTUM).
 
Following the widely criticised 2018 FIA Formula 1 Grand Prix, your first task is to come up with the blue-print for the required changes to the event in order that the same criticisms will not be levied against the 2019 event.
 
I look forward to your suggestions ( - both sensible and not!)
 
Price Albie

---

I know I’ve mentioned it once or twice before, but after a fleeting comment I made yesterday, I’ve been giving it some more thought….
 
In advance: Pirelli nominate 3 tyres, spread across all compounds.
 
Thursday: FP1 & 2 remain unchanged.
 
Saturday Morning: FP3 - Fastest lap determines the running order in all following sessions, fastest last.
Saturday Lunchtime: TT1 (Time Trial 1) - Each driver given 2 flying laps on the hardest compound tyre. The fastest of the two times is recorded. (To minimise dead-track time, the second driver is released for his out-lap once the first has begun his second flying lap.)
 
Sunday Lunchtime: TT2 - Each driver given 2 flying laps on the medium compound tyre. Fastest time added to Saturday’s ‘Hard’ time to create aggregate.
Sunday Afternoon: TT3 - 2 flying laps on the softest compound. Fastest of the two added to the aggregate time.
 
The winner is the driver with the lowest aggregate time. Full championship points are awarded.

---

 



No real surprises here, is there, even if these numbers were chosen months ago. Monaco was quite telling, and Merc know very well they should be on point for Canada.

Soooo... did anyone watch the Indy 500? The main reason I'm asking is because the new Indycar chassis was designed to make wheel to wheel racing easier. With less complex and wider front wings. Sound familiar? It should. The result? The exact opposite. I'm becoming more and more concerned that the engineers do not know what they're doing. Most of the seasoned Indy drivers said at the start of the season following another car is going to be harder, rubbish, said the engineers. The drivers were right. So when Lewis, Seb, Alonso, Danny and the Hulk all say F1 is going in the wrong direction, I believe them.

...I do not think so

I am so happy for his win today. He deserved it in every way imaginable a fantastic drive with a wounded car and payback for the debacle of two years ago.


I do not care what team or driver you follow you have to love and admire this guy. I seriously think Red Bull have picked the wrong driver to be their number one (and yes I am aware they say they dont have one) but I am sorry to say Max has taken many steps backwards this season, can he come back of course he can but to me Red Bull do have a number one driver his name is Daniel Ricciardo.

I'm asking the question because so far this season he's been far too error prone, and although there were mitigating circumstances in his FP3 crash today, he's not entirely blameless, and as Hill has said in FP3 if you're unsighted why not just abort the lap and play it safe? I have to say on reflection I agree with Hill. So here are his blunders so far this season:

Australia: Spinning in every FP session, running wide in Q1 and Q2, and being lucky not to pick up a grid penalty for a fairly blatant block on Grosjean (well blatant according to Grosjean, it was, but I just don't like the French twit). Then screwing up his race start and then spinning in Turn one later in the race.

Bahrain: Chopping Lewis unnecessarily and puncturing his rear tyre and having to retire from the race, I still lay all of the blame for that at his feet.

China: Again, spins and mistakes in FP, and just driving a little too erratically, attempting moves in places that were never going to work and ultimately crashing into Vettel in arguably the most brain dead display of his career.

Baku: Where to begin. Multiple dangerous double moves on his team mate, not only wrecking his race but Danny's as well, culminating in a very late double move in the braking zone that caused the crash between them. Should Danny have seen it coming? Yes, because Verstappen is not beyond cheating in defending a position... but... Max shouldn't have done it.

Barcelona: Had a clean race then drove into Stroll... I actually blame Stroll for this one, but again, he found himself in the wars.

Monaco: Well, we all saw it, almost a carbon copy of his 2016 Monaco crash. I still think Sainz unsighted him, but as Hill said, given it's FP3 and it doesn't matter why not just abort the lap and pit, and live to race another day?

A reported 200m investment into McLaren by Nidala (BVI) Limited.

https://www.crash.net/f1/news/896552/1/m...investment

How much of this will find it's way to the F1 team, we'll probably never know. A cash injection certainly wouldn't hurt, as win know, money wins in F1.

What might hurt is a push for Nicholas Latifi to get a driving seat.

I have not heard much about the future of the British GP for a while so I was pretty pleased over the last 24 hours to read that Liberty had considered moving the 2019 race (which is scheduled to be the last race under the current contract) to April so it would be the 1000th GP race.

Whilst it means nothing concrete for the races future, the possible intention to consider that move and the acknowledgement by Sean Bratches how iconic and important the British GP has been is at least encouraging.  It does not guarantee there will be a future as money talks in this day and age and probably also has the loudest voice but given the fan support and the fact most of the teams have bases in the UK I am very hopeful.

It does however reinforce my hatred of the Monaco GP. They pay nothing or next to nothing and let us be frank here its not a race its a procession of low speed cars. Iconic... says who? It really does little or nothing for F1 in my opinion it is the most boring event on the calendar.

Will I watch it, of course but man its a tough thing and it is only ever interetsing in my eyes if it rains!

I know this is from F2, but given the halo is in F1 it has some bearing on this sport as well. I watched the F2 feature race live intially I couldn't see what had happened, but during the replays it became clearer. Not sure it saved Makino's life, but give the car slid up and over his head, the halo certainly prevented his head been hit at least by the spinning rear tyres:

https://www.google.se/amp/s/www.motorspo...37417/amp/

Thoughts?

Always I hear about how much difference the aerodynamic design choices make. The cars get all those alien-curvy looking "frills and furbelows". The most fancy piece might be the front wing.
Well, in Spain Verstappen lost a fairly big piece of his fancy front wing. You should say that will have a huge impact on his drive abillity of the car, or at lost on the laptimes he can do. Fact is, it did not. The driver did not even went inside the pitbox, but did some adjustments via his steering wheel and managed to do just fine (kept a four time world champion with fresher wheels and faster car behind him for quite some rounds).

The question that comes up in my head, being not that technical myself; how important is that aerodynamic design really? Sure, it will make a difference, but how much? Is all those small ribly things neccessery? Example; did Ferrari really needed to change its mirrow?

Maybe a bit of an unnecessary thread, but what the hell.

I take it they will be testing on the thinner tread tyres?

Looks dry tomorrow, maybe some rain Wednesday. Might be a chance for Pirelli to do natural wet weather testing.