Race 23 Lusail, Qatar Grand Prix

[airshifter]

Being that the Sprint kicks off in 20 minutes or so it's time to get a thread going!


Great track with a mix of medium and high speed corners, and the cars are looking good. Though the single practice session everyone was guessing, with long runs done on differing tires for some teams. But no huge shocks once the Sprint Qualifiction started, other than RB struggling more than some expected.

Sprint Qual results:

1	4	Lando Norris	McLaren Mercedes	1:21.356	1:21.231	1:21.012	16
2	63	George Russell	Mercedes	1:22.021	1:21.488	1:21.075	16
3	81	Oscar Piastri	McLaren Mercedes	1:22.218	1:21.548	1:21.171	16
4	55	Carlos Sainz	Ferrari	1:21.838	1:21.809	1:21.281	19
5	16	Charles Leclerc	Ferrari	1:22.156	1:21.818	1:21.308	18
6	1	Max Verstappen	Red Bull Racing Honda RBPT	1:22.033	1:21.784	1:21.315	21
7	44	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1:22.151	1:21.734	1:21.474	19
8	10	Pierre Gasly	Alpine Renault	1:22.586	1:22.352	1:21.978	19
9	27	Nico Hulkenberg	Haas Ferrari	1:22.569	1:22.318	1:22.088	15
10	30	Liam Lawson	RB Honda RBPT	1:22.705	1:22.393	1:22.577	20

Seven teams make it into the top 10. These new rules have really tightened things up!

[Used to be Starter]

Piastri made a great move to pass Russell in the sprint.

[Matthew]

I wonder how long can Checo holds on to his Red Bull seat with such performances.

[Tazio]

'troll

Sent from my Pixel 6 using Tapatalk

[sgr]

Karma's a bitch

[Matthew]

Congratulations to Zhou for winning his and his team's first points of the season.

[N. Jones]

I read that Ocon will leave Alpine to be replaced by Doohan for UAE.
That was a crazy race. They waited too long to do something about the mirror on the track.
Perez. What else can you say? smh.

[F1nKS]

Perez. What else can you say? smh.

He seems snake bit, but it hard to see him back with RBR next year. Max is not getting enough credit for what he did this year, or Perez under-achieved for the year.

[airshifter]

The Sprint seems like it was dull after watching the race. And the Sprint itself wasn't that bad.

RB makes big changes and show how on their game they are, even though the WDC is over and done. Using Checo to help figure out the problem, Max was back at the front for the race. Well, at least up until George moaned and made a mockery of how the FIA and stewarding are working these days. George gets more than adequate warning about where Max and Fernando are, grossly changes his warm up lap pace to charge up on Max, moans, and then procedes to slow down to as slow as Max was going. Max is penalized for driving too slow, even though telemetry shows the majority of those that made it to Q3 did so, and some more frequently. The first and only time the rule has been enforced.... so either change the rule or modify it to be more realistic. Drivers are slow all the time on out laps, and often in much worse circumstances.

But karma is a bitch George. Not only does Max get past on race start, but Lando punks him as well. Overall some great racing and moves on track all through the field, most of it triggered through turn 1 and the positions on track out of turn 1. Some really crap moves here and there as well, but at least the drivers were trying.

As for Lando and Lewis, both deserved penalties, but at some point the FIA needs to decide what penalties are appropriate. Both of these penalties were on the harsh side compared to most prior actions of the same degree, and it's just not right to have the luck of the draw involved beyond the circumstances of real safety. Interesting that Palmer made the point that the race intensity and physical side might have had impact on how very good drivers made rookie mistakes during the race that netted them penalties.

When all is said and done, Zhou brings home the first points for his team this year. That must have felt good for a driver with only a couple races left in a race seat.

Lewis is done, stick him with a fork. I think at this point he is so deep in his own head that it's impacting his race pace. And being that George has dominated him in qually this year that's not a good place to be.

Max showed a good bounce back once they figured the car out. It's a shame that Lando got the penalty, as it looked like it might be a shootout for the top of the podium in the last laps.

[sgr]

Princess Georgie got owned at the start. Max didn't mince his words in the press conference over the matter either.