Grand Prix Rejects

Post your ROTR nominations on this rather... weird Spanish Grand Prix!

(1) Ferrari - lost an engine, lost the race, lost the lead in the championship.

(2) Hamilton - giving up and going home after three laps. (Edit - and somehow he got DOTD!)

HM for Williams who, after their recent form, appeared not to turn up for this race.

Albon: What happened to him today? Clear last and thrashed by Latifi

Magnussen: I can’t stand Hamilton but that was a racing incident at best and he cost himself more.

Gasly: Anonymous and outperformed by Tsunoda. He was one of the drivers of the year in 2021 and I’m getting concerned now.

Sainz: This simply can’t continue. Ferrari need to make Leclerc number 1 driver. For a man nicknamed “The smooth operator” that’s 3 races out of the last 4 which haven’t gone smoothly and most of it has been by his own hand

1. Williams

Was that the promise of competitiveness just a fluke?

2. Magnussen

If gap, hit the other car on lap 1. Then go to the back of the field with the car you hit. Then finish 17th, 12 positions and two laps down on the driver you hit.

3. Sainz

How long until Ferrari start looking at the break clauses in Sainz' contract?

DHM: Leclerc's engine.

1 Ferrari (barring Charles Leclerc) total waste of time from them barring Charles who did nothing wrong. Sainz must be relieved that there doesn't seem to be anyone at the moment waiting in the wings who can take his seat. As for those engine issues... ffs.

2 Williams. No pace and nowhere all weekend.

Hm Hammy wanting to retire the car after 2 laps and then finishing 5th. Great team player folks.

Hm Red Bull Management. Perez is the bitch of that team and they don't even hide it.

Hm Danny Ric. Another points finish for Norris and nul points again.

Hm Gasly. See above.

Ferrari is the obvious choice here.

1. Alexander Albon - finished 40+ seconds behind Latifi with no apparent issue or some pitstop drama. True WTF performance.

2. Haas - Magnussen took himself out of contention after four corners and Schumacher tumbled down to 14th even behind the struggling Gasly. They are wasting prime points scoring chances and they are destined to fall behind in the development battle later on anyway.

HM: Pierry Gasly - another anonymous race where he gets beaten by Tsunoda who was supposed to be the driver under pressure this season.

1. Sainz: threw it off the track in the opening stages of the race, followed by disappointing pace after that, especially in the latter stages of the race. Hamilton was close to nearly a minute behind him after the clash with Magnussen, and yet would have ended up finishing ahead of Sainz had he not had to back off in the closing laps with that water leak issue - with the car he has, Sainz really shouldn't have been in that position. Similarly, given that Russell was having to back off quite a bit in the closing laps, Russell still finished more than 12 seconds ahead of Sainz - again, he really shouldn't have been that far behind Russell given those issues Russell had.

2. Leclerc's engine: whilst I can understand why some would give it to Ferrari as a whole, they didn't do anything that wrong with Sainz - his underperformance feels more of his own doing, rather than that of the wider team. If we are to criticise them for anything with Leclerc, it should be the reliability issues that hit him specifically.

3. Magnussen: the clash with Hamilton was a case of a bit of an ambitious move in the opening laps, compounded by then trying to turn in a little too early in the corner to try and squeeze Hamilton at a point where he arguably really didn't need to do so.

However, he really didn't manage to make any sort of recovery after that point - Haas's plan seems to have been to try a one stopper, which really didn't work, but also the pace that he had in qualifying was nowhere to be seen after that.

A dishonourable mention perhaps should go out to Ricciardo too - considering that Norris was not particularly well going into this race, for Ricciardo to then finish behind Norris and to have lost three places was not a great performance.

To some extent, I wonder if perhaps Haas as a whole could get a nomination for flattering to deceive so much in qualifying, only to then drift down the order in the race - Mick was rather lacking in pace too.

I also wonder what happened with Albon - he's listed as having made four pit stops, but I don't know if that was because of issues or because he burned through his tyres too quickly. Either way, he had a bit of a nightmare of a race compared to Latifi, and that's not something you hear being said often.

Ferrari: Again showing they just don't have what it takes to win championships. An almost certain win lost for Leclerc, along with yet another costly error by Sainz. After the disastrous start Red Bull had, the fact that they're leading now shows how bad Ferrari has been lately.

Ferrari save Leclerc has got to win this hands down for me.

I don't have a problem with Red Bull doing what they did - they're in a proper fight with Ferrari and possibly now Mercedes too, it's a no-brainer to "max"imise Verstappen's points. This was no Austria 2002. Ferrari need to do the same with Sainz.

1) Carlos Sainz: Leclerc's DNF was a reliability issue - can't fault him for losing the points here. But where was Sainz to pick up the pieces? He hasn't had a terribly impressive showing when his teammate is frequently competing for race victories.

2) Kevin Magnussen: Too ambitious too early on, scuppering his race. Hamilton at least managed to claw back fifth; Magnussen came second-to-last to an uninspiring Albon drive.

1. Ferrari - One driver can bonked, the other was like an Oddish against Pidgeotto.

2. Ricciardo - Dude said he was slow.

Gasly had damage since L1 which affected his race. Albon struggled bad on tires, really bad.

Haas for doing their best Toyota impression and only turning up on Saturday.

HM to Mercedes strategy for not even attempting to win the GP with Russell. They just let RBR dictate the race to them when it was clear Verstappen was struggling to overtake.

Turn 4: certainly an unusual thing to nominate, but it was the source of the main drama this Sunday. Sainz and Verstappen both binned it at the same corner due to an "errant gust of wind", and it was so crucial that it even briefly took George Russell into the race lead for a lap or two!

Commentator's Curse: Croft and Brundle say "we still have all 20 cars in this race" and about half a second later the camera shows Leclerc's Ferrari failing.

Otherwise I'm not sure anything major really deserves a nomination, bar the usual Ferrari because they can't help but throw away a solid championship lead with reliability problems and a #2 driver who is raelly becoming a liability.



HM: Hamilton's headspace: for a driver whose team is looking ever more competitive with each passing weekend, he seems very uninspired. Asking his team to retire a car that was capable of a solid 4th place from a minute behind is quite rejectful. We already know this, but Lewis really is just the worst team player ever - thankful to the best team and the best fans when he wins, but seems unable to stomach driving a car which, let's face it, is the third best on the grid right now and absolutely invincible from unreliability woes (see my IIDOTR vote).

HM: Haas: Magnussen threw away a result in a silly first-lap move, which was regrettable. But unlike Hamilton he may as well have retired for all the good staying out did. Mick was up to 6th at the beginning of the race, but either strategy or pace or both, he slid down the pack and got eaten up by basically everyone.

1. Ferrari