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Pit strategy has always been there, but you used to be able to tell the drivers were really wrestling with the cars and that they were on the limit. You really don't see that these days, especially at the front the cars are on rails and they're just running around to designated lap times that their engineers have prescribed in order to make the tyres last for just the right amount of time, something Mercedes' data analysts seem to have mastered better than any other (for example, Lewis' engineer got on the radio and correctly told him exactly what lap Verstappen would catch him on, before Verstappen had even completed his out lap) There's a certain one-sidedness to any battle involving Mercedes too. When they went for the undercut they came out behind a Ferrari, but immediately blasted past him on the straight with complete ease. When Verstappen caught Hamilton, even with much fresher tyres and DRS, his car simply didn't have the straight line speed to get anywhere near the Mercedes down the straights and into the heavy braking zones, forcing him to go for riskier overtakes in the twisty bits, something Albon has learned is near impossible against Lewis and his propensity to bump you off the road. I do think the pundits have massively overplayed the speed of the Red Bull. Crofty mentioned in passing during qualifying that Bottas has made it to Q3 for 50-something races in a row. Perez failed to manage one in a row, not having enough pace in the car to make the medium tyre work in the way that the two Mercs easily could. And of course then there was the total inconsistency with application of the rules. Mercedes spent half the race ignoring turn 4, but as soon as Red Bull realised this and started doing it themselves, suddenly the stewards decided it was no longer allowed. Without that inconsistency the undercut may not have worked in the first place and the outcome may have been different. All of that added up to an unsatisfying race, and I have doubts about Red Bull's ability to regularly fight for wins once Merc fix their teething problems with the new floor, so I suspect we're heading towards yet another season of more of the same. I did enjoy some of the racing further back though, like the three world champions giving it everything for something like 13th place, fighting in cars that actually were handfuls to control. Hope to see some more of that, maybe a little further forward if Alpine and Aston Martin get their act together. I do hope we see some of that Alonso magic again this year and he hasn't lost it. The thought of guys like him, Vettel and Ricciardo going wheel to wheel in cars that might be evenly matched on some circuits at least is pretty exciting. Edited by Robospud at 23:42:02 29-03-2021 |
#12878498, By Robospud Motorsport
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Robospud 169 posts
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