2019 Australian F1 Grandprix - Albert Park Melbourne

[N4D13]

Truth be told, I'd be extremely surprised if Bottas could beat Hamilton often. The Boss' poor performance might have been due to car damage alone or to one of his off days, which we know he has, but so far we haven't seen anything that suggests that Bottas can keep a high enough level to consistently equal Hamilton, let alone beat him. A single race in which Hamilton took pole and had some sort of justification for being slow in the race (car damage) is not by any means indicative of a change of trend.

[airshifter]

Hard to say where it will go. Lewis would be hard for just about anyone to beat in the last few years, and I think Bottas knew completely that he would be in solid #2 territory when he moved from Williams. But Nico figured it out and took a title in the same car as Lewis, and TBH I think Bottas has shown at least as much racecraft as Rosberg. Probably more really.

But after 2018, he probably had to think that if he doesn't up his game his seat is going to open up. For some that means they throw in the towel. For others, the biggest motivation they often have is fear of losing a good job.

[Nitrodaze]

Yep, that was painful to watch. Unless there is a valid reason for his severe lack of pace that should probably be his last race and Claire needs to call it.

Too harsh? I suppose even replacing him with Alonso or someone of that caliber wouldnt change anything so might as well leave him be.

I think there were two reasons why Kubica had a bad race, firstly, he lost his front wing at the start of the race. Hence, had to go into the pits to have them replaced like Ricciado. He also ran over Ricciado's front wig which may have caused floor damage. I am sure there were other chassis [aero] damage to his car.

[Nitrodaze]

To be fair, we all wanted Bottas to turn up this season and be competitive. He has started the season agressively with a brilliant show of pace and a win to go with it. I think that is great and good luck to him. I think he has made an error of judgement by his radio message which could be a seed for a bitter rivalry this season. I can see Hamilton and some people in the Mercedes garage would not have appreciated that message. I think winning in Mercedes is going to be personal for both drivers from now on. I just hope Bottas would be able to swallow the outcome of this feud.

[Nitrodaze]

I didn't see enough to suggest the new regulation improved overtaking. If anywhere was a good place to test the regulation, the street circuit of Albert Park would been such place. These are the sorts of tracks we were hoping to see the effects of the new regs manifest its self strongly. Unfortunately, the bigger DRS flaps did not produce the surge forward that one had hoped for. It was the reason why Gastly in a faster Redbull struggled to pass Kyvat in a slower Torro Rosso with similar Honda engines.

[The Black Knight]

I didn't see enough to suggest the new regulation improved overtaking. If anywhere was a good place to test the regulation, the street circuit of Albert Park would been such place. These are the sorts of tracks we were hoping to see the effects of the new regs manifest its self strongly. Unfortunately, the bigger DRS flaps did not produce the surge forward that one had hoped for. It was the reason why Gastly in a faster Redbull struggled to pass Kyvat in a slower Torro Rosso with similar Honda engines.

Ross Brawn appears to have felt it did. I can’t say I noticed any real overtaking difference either, except maybe for Max being anle to overtake Vettel but I don’t think that was due to the new rules.

[journeyman racer]

I read the comment on here, and I'm not sure what you guys are watching or how you view racing? N4D13's post is particularly interesting to me.

We haven't seen anything that suggests that Bottas can keep a high enough level to consistently equal Hamilton, let alone beat him?

First of all, there have numerous time in the past couple of years that Bottas has had the better of Hamilton. It's right to recognise if Bottas can carry that level of performance throughout the season, because he hasn't done it before. However there's no question Bottas is capable.

But what is so pitiful about N4D13's comment (And is typical of truefan and TBK) is they don't recognise what's different and how irrelevant their reasons to diminish Bottas' win and how irrelevant their reasons to justify Hamilton's lack of performance are.

Even if the damaged floor hadn't occured, it doesn't change the bottom line. Bottas is winning the race, and he's winning it purposefully. It's just he's winning the race the whole way by 3 secs instead of 20.

What is not recognise is that last weekend is the most assertive performance Bottas has had in his career (Even more so than the other races he's won or should've won). That would be the case even if Hamilton led into the first corner, led all the way and won. Why is this the case? Because if it occurred and Bottas finished second, he would've finished second right behind Hamilton. Not 8secs or 20secs behind Hamilton, right in there behind him.

But some of you are just so warped, that you actually get confused when you see something that doesn't fit in with your prejudiced views. Even if there was no cracked floor, some of you would've just moaned about something else(and looked stupid doing so). You would've said some BS like "It was the tyres" "MB gave Bottas the better strategy".

You get confused like a person who's just found out a relative/friend of theirs has been charged with a heinous crime. "Oh no, you're wrong. You must've confused him with someone else. It can't be them, they're a really good guy and they wouldn't do things like that."

Some fans are just hopeless.

[N4D13]

Some fans are just hopeless.

Hey, at least we agree on something!

[journeyman racer]

Hmmm. That post is as good as Bottas' performance last weekend.

[Nitrodaze]

Would it be fair to say all the top drivers except Verstapenn, under-performed at this race. Hamilton had a bad start, Vettel got overtaken by Verstapenn, Ricciado stuffed it on the first lap. The rookies were luke warm l felt. Though, Norris impressed but fell out of the top ten, Russell quietly out-qualified and finished ahead of his more experienced teammate. Gasly was poor at this race by his Torro Rosso standards even. Albon and Giovinazzi finished outside the points while their more experienced teammates were in the top ten positions.

I think Gasly in particular need to up his game or Redbull may well think he is not ready and put Kyvat in his seat.