2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

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IceG
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2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by IceG »

So team orders at the start for Ferrari? And will Leclerc obey them?

Was Grosjean under- or over-punished? I was expecting a five-place drop.

Red Bull don't look strong as a team.

What has gone wrong with Ricciardo and Renault?
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Rob Dylan
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by Rob Dylan »

Caught up with the qualifying highlights last night. My goodness, I'm impressed with Leclerc's immediate pace off the bat. Good luck to him today - him winning would make my weekend, and really rejuvenate my interest in this season.

I'm pretty shocked that Gasly was out yet again in Q2. If he ends up pointless when the race is over, he will have had one of the poorest starts to a 'front-running' team in recent memory for me.

But I feel sorry for Ricciardo almost as much. I'm really hoping he and Renault get their act together and at least pick up where teams like Red Bull start falling by the wayside. They really have promised and need to be the solid 4th team, and 3rd team if possible. They have a lot of head-scratching to do to get those results.
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dinizintheoven
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by dinizintheoven »

"Williams are the new Minardi..."

Right now, Williams are the new Caterham-Marussia-level team. Ignoring the 2010 race that used the long circuit and the 2011 event that never happened, I've compared the gaps with the 2012 Bahrain Grand Prix. That year, either Heikki Kovalainen was freakishly fast or Michael Schumacher, Pastor Maldonado and Jean-Éric Vergne were abnormally slow (traffic, maybe, it's seven years ago so it's not as if I'm likely to remember) - either way Heikki's Caterham was 2.4 seconds off Sebastian Vettel's pole time. Vitaly Petrov is probably a better comparison, being the first of the Caterhams not to have beaten any of the non-bottom-three teams; he was 3.4 seconds off the pole time, and 0.8 seconds behind Vergne. With those three backmarker teams, I always suspected that it was all very well having a race winner in one of them, but even if they'd managed to get Lewis Hamilton or Fernando Alonso to drive their cars, they'd still have been miles off the pace and pointless at the end of the season.

This year, George Russell was 3.9 seconds off the pole time, further away than Petrov was in 2012 - and 1.5 seconds off the back of the pack, which was more like 2010-spec Caterham with an underpowered Cosworth engine and a fragile Xtrac gearbox, than 2012 with bits of old Red Bull in it.

The event horizon has been crossed.
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by CarloSpace »

Rob Dylan wrote:I'm pretty shocked that Gasly was out yet again in Q2. If he ends up pointless when the race is over, he will have had one of the poorest starts to a 'front-running' team in recent memory for me.

If he continues like this it won't be soon until Red Bull have another driver 'crisis' on their hands.

Tongue-in-cheek prediction: Kvjat will driver for the main Red Bull team this year. Avatar bet anyone? :D
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by Londoner »

I bathplug hate this sport sometimes.
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by Aguvazk »

If Hamilton go to the casino and put a chip in the number 37, the ball will fall in the 37.
I'm not a serious person
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CarloSpace
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by CarloSpace »

First Elfyn Evans loses a comfortable win in Corsica earlier today on the last stage and now Leclerc loses a comfortable win in Bahrain... What next? Someone like Quartararo losing MotoGP race in Argentina on the last lap?

Entertaining race but Leclerc surely should have deserved the win.

I'm not going to even say anything about Renault. At least they give identical machine to their drivers :deletraz:
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Paul Hayes
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by Paul Hayes »

I can't remember the last time I was so disappointed by the result of a Grand Prix. Absolutely gutting for Leclerc - but if he keeps up this form I'm sure he'll have the chance again soon. I very much hope he does, anyway. He'd been particularly impressive not just from the manner he seemed so calm and in control in the lead, but the fact he'd had to battle back to it after losing those places at the start.

Bizarre synchronised retirements by the Renaults at the end, there. But I'm pleased it ended up keeping Leclerc a podium, at least.

Well done to Lando Norris too for his great drive into 6th place.
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dinizintheoven
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by dinizintheoven »

Five Live Sports Extra commentators said that Charles Leclerc's car problems reminded them of Damon Hill losing the win for Arrows in 1997.

I would say it reminds me more of 1993, when Damon lost two wins that should have been his, in the car that was the class of the field and with a multiple World Champion teammate, before he scored that first win at the third time of asking. And I've still never forgotten Murray Walker's reaction to the second of those last-minute losses.
James Allen, on his favourite F1 engine of all time:
"...the Life W12, I can't describe the noise to you, but imagine filling your dustbin with nuts and bolts, and then throwing it down the stairs, it was something akin to that!"
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mario
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by mario »

CarloSpace wrote:
Rob Dylan wrote:I'm pretty shocked that Gasly was out yet again in Q2. If he ends up pointless when the race is over, he will have had one of the poorest starts to a 'front-running' team in recent memory for me.

If he continues like this it won't be soon until Red Bull have another driver 'crisis' on their hands.

Tongue-in-cheek prediction: Kvjat will driver for the main Red Bull team this year. Avatar bet anyone? :D

I agree that Gasly is struggling right now, and Red Bull have never been particularly patient with their drivers - I too wouldn't be surprised if we see Gasly getting switched back to Toro Rosso.

However, I wouldn't rule out the possibility of seeing Albon get the nod ahead of Kvyat - they're probably more likely to go with the more experienced driver (Kvyat), but Albon's performance has been solid enough that he could be a credible alternative.

Paul Hayes wrote:I can't remember the last time I was so disappointed by the result of a Grand Prix. Absolutely gutting for Leclerc - but if he keeps up this form I'm sure he'll have the chance again soon. I very much hope he does, anyway. He'd been particularly impressive not just from the manner he seemed so calm and in control in the lead, but the fact he'd had to battle back to it after losing those places at the start.

Bizarre synchronised retirements by the Renaults at the end, there. But I'm pleased it ended up keeping Leclerc a podium, at least.

Well done to Lando Norris too for his great drive into 6th place.

It does look as if, provided the car holds together, it does have the potential to compete for victory, so it does seem likely that we will see Leclerc challenging for a victory again.

You're right about the composure that he showed at the start - he faced a pretty difficult challenge on the opening lap, but he did well to maintain his composure and then focussed on getting back into the lead of the race. The rather measured way that he ran his race, and the way that he then came to accept the MGU-H failure, is being rather sharply contrasted with the way that Vettel spun out whilst battling Hamilton (especially since Vettel basically lost control under acceleration in a way that does come across as rather amateurish).

It's still early days, of course, but moments like that are just going to keep on putting pressure back onto Vettel given that they look like a continuation of the mistakes that he was making last season - it's not the sort of start to the season he wanted or needed.
Martin Brundle, on watching a replay of Grosjean spinning:
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by Ataxia »

Aside, that was a phenomenal race. Action up and down the field you could hardly keep up with, cars racing closely together, it had everything. Sure, it didn't have the feel-good result; Leclerc hadn't put a foot wrong all weekend, but he's just proven that he's got such a brilliant mentality to go with it.

But that's racing. Hamilton was graceful in victory, Leclerc graceful in defeat.

Sometimes results go the way you want them to, sometimes they don't; there's so much to smile about beyond the top step of the podium.
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by yannicksamlad »

Properly exciting race, albeit hugely disappointed that Charles didnt win.
Gasly got the 'long' pitstop treatment at Red Bull having been ignored in quallie in Australia ( just kidding, and it was Kvyat's turn to miss his run quallie),so that pit delay shuffled him back some places, but the real issue was quallie. He was such a good qualifier in GP2 that his quallie performance here was disappointing. Seems Red Bull dont like the C3 tyre...

Is Daniel Ricciardo being shown up at Renault? Hulkenberg had an engine issue to stop him in quallie. Up to then he'd been faster ( again) , and in the race it was difficult to compare because of strategies, but Ricciardo wasnt really competitive..Dan even nerfed Nico when being passed .

And what happened at Haas- Kevin was basically going backwards from the start ..even before choosing what might have been the wrong strategy option. He did mention after quallie that race pace wasnt that good, but I really didnt expect what happened

George Russell seemed to be comfortably ahead in the Williams battle , after a bit of early swapping around as they pitted, but it seems they still have 'parts' issues.
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by Klon »

I can't help but draw an ounce of humour from the fact that F1's 999th race will be my last one. I guess humans can have overflow errors. :D

It is clear that, for whatever reason, the universe has decided to conspire to give a man who hardly has enough talent to justify more than one championship his sixth. This is unironically the biggest dissonance between skill and results in all of sports history. If I want to see assholes who don't deserve their success to succeed, I'll get invested in politics again. So yeah ... so long, F1, I had a fun ride. And yes, I'll probably get back to watching at some point like any other idiot that claims they are done with F1, but at the very least China I'll give a hard pass.
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by Ataxia »

Klon wrote:I can't help but draw an ounce of humour from the fact that F1's 999th race will be my last one. I guess humans can have overflow errors. :D

It is clear that, for whatever reason, the universe has decided to conspire to give a man who hardly has enough talent to justify more than one championship his sixth. This is unironically the biggest dissonance between skill and results in all of sports history. If I want to see assholes who don't deserve their success to succeed, I'll get invested in politics again. So yeah ... so long, F1, I had a fun ride. And yes, I'll probably get back to watching at some point like any other idiot that claims they are done with F1, but at the very least China I'll give a hard pass.


ok bye
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by Gertrand Bachot »

Klon wrote:I can't help but draw an ounce of humour from the fact that F1's 999th race will be my last one. I guess humans can have overflow errors. :D

It is clear that, for whatever reason, the universe has decided to conspire to give a man who hardly has enough talent to justify more than one championship his sixth. This is unironically the biggest dissonance between skill and results in all of sports history. If I want to see assholes who don't deserve their success to succeed, I'll get invested in politics again. So yeah ... so long, F1, I had a fun ride. And yes, I'll probably get back to watching at some point like any other idiot that claims they are done with F1, but at the very least China I'll give a hard pass.

You might want to take this with you as you go.
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by Wallio »

While I too find this seasons predetermined results insanely frustrating (LOLLEWISLOL) I don't feel anywhere near as strongly as Klon lol. Hamilton even showed some class and humanity after the race. An early Easter miracle to be sure.

In all seriousness my bigger gripe is with just how crap seemly all the teams are this year.

The Ferraris clearly have engine issues, so they were turned down in Melbourne and blew up in Bahrain reminds me of the piston issue they had in early V8 era. Red Bull can only be third at best, but only if they run a perfect race which they don't seem close to doing.

Then you have this "F1.5" stuff. Haas is a freaking clown show with no clue about what they are doing both in terms of strategy or actual pitwork, despite decent pace. Renault is a dumpster fire, and have hit Honda levels of reliability. McLaren has pace, bit has Renault engines. Racing Point is saddled with terrible drivers and a stupid logo, and the less said about Williams, the better.

The only bright spot is Alfa, sitting 4th in the points and looking genuinely punchy, plus they are there to pick up the pieces from the inevitable screw ups of the other teams. Pity they only have one driver capable of scoring.

So yeah, while the idea of another German blitz is disheartening, the well....rejectfulness of the rest of the grid is a new one. And I'm not sure I like it. It's better than the ultra-reliability days to be sure, but overall, I dunno.
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by You-Gee-Eee-Day »

I bet Pierre Gasly feels like the luckiest guy alive to be driving for Red Bull right now.

Any other team he might be worrying, but I mean it's not like Red Bull get rid of drivers very often. :deletraz:
:deletraz:

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Roses are Red
Violets are Blue
"Ferrari is faster"
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IceG
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by IceG »

The way Hamilton hunted down Vettel was very impressive, especially as Vettel supposedly had the faster car. And then he span under pressure - not what one expects from a four times World Champion. Leclerc looked more controlled and poised all weekend - and he overtook Vettel on merit. Hope that the one-cylinder failure was something like a spark plug and not a sign of something deeper. Bottas was the Bottas we have become used to.

Red Bull (or should we just call them Verstappen-Honda) look to be falling back. The loss of Ricciardo is obviously hurting them in the constructor's championship and they are clearly still learning the ways of the Honda-san. Gasly does not look up to the job. The value of the team is falling and Mateschitz will want out soon.

Mclaren and Alfa Romeo look solid even if Kimi is wiping the floor with Giovinazzi. I think Mclaren may challenge Red Bull next year.

Toro Rosso are doing what they are meant to do - test stuff for the A-team and keep some talent fresh for when Gasly is fired. Will Mateschitz dump them as well as Red Bull on Honda when he gets bored with losing?

Renault, Haas, Racing Point and Williams all look awful.

But it was a great race until the failures towards the end. The new aerodynamics rules might just have delivered closer racing and made DRS less important. And Honda have shown they can produce an engine, eventually.
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Re: 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix discussion thread

Post by Bleu »

Aguvazk wrote:If Hamilton go to the casino and put a chip in the number 37, the ball will fall in the 37.


https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5jvy40

It would probably be like this from 3:49 onwards.
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