Hello! Yes, this could have been 20 short
videos and really played into the YouTube
algorithm but instead settle in for a long,
fast-paced look at F1 in 2018 - a year in
which :
Pirelli sang a rainbow! Getting a little bit
carried away with themselves, Pirelli threw
even more rubber compounds and colours at
the drivers. So many in fact that who could
even remember them all.
There was the Soft, of course. Then the Super
Soft. Then the Ultra Soft 64. No hang on,
that might be something else.
See it’s for exactly this reason that we’re
going back to three names and three colours
next year. Even though secretly the actual
compound softnesses are much more varied and
will be changing all the time. Not complicated
at all.
What else happened? Oh yes
Grid girls were banned - banned! - from the
sport. Men everywhere were outraged - who
would hold the drivers’ numbers now? Oh
wait-
But still, getting rid of grid girls would
mean a massive reduction in visible women
at grands prix. Everyone was going to have
to work extra hard to get more women into
the sport and- oh. Oh, we’re farming them
off to a segregated series, are we? I see.
Also:
Alonso retired! He was fed up of running around
at the back in a series where only a handful
of drivers have a chance at winning…
... so he moved to running around at the front
in a series where only a handful of drivers
have a chance at winning.
And:
Force India got disqualified from the championship!
We were forced to spend the back half of the
season haunted by the Ghost of Force India
Past who still managed to mop up more points
than almost half the paddock.
Better than the Ghost of Williams Present
who would - genuinely - still be last in the
standings even if you disqualified Force India
after every single race but Abu Dhabi / Brazil
/ USA
It’s fair to say that anticipation was high
going into 2018. Having shown themselves fully
capable of taking on Mercedes in 2017, Vettel
was confident of putting on an even stronger
challenge this season.
For the audience, that meant a King Kong vs
Godzilla-like duel between two four times
world champions going for a 5th - something
never before seen in the sport. We were expecting
a thrilling back-and-forth that would keep
us guessing all season long.
And did that happen? Well…. Let’s just
say I really hope you like the German National
Anthem
Further down the grid, McLaren had finally
given us their accurséd Honda power units.
As McLaren had made very clear: these engines
were the only thing holding them back. Now,
strapping on the proven race-winning Renault
engines to what they had described as the
‘best chassis on the grid’, they would
surely be rocketing back to the front of the
field!
We had some exciting rookies joining the field:
the supersonic, Francophonic, embryonic Pierre
Gasly and Charles Leclerc. It would be interesting
to see how they develop over the next couple
of years at their respective junior teams,
Toro Rosso and Sauber.
Hopefully they’ll eventually be able to
move up to a bigger team and make something
of their careers. Fingers crossed, eh? But
let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
There was also a lot of chat over whether
Kimi Raikkonen would retire at the end of
the year.
The oldest racer on the grid, Raikkonen seemed
like his best days were behind him and, perhaps
his motivations had shifted. His impenetrable
demeanour would keep us guessing for a lot
of the year, though he had the winter to get
through first...
Winter is a long, cold time for Formula One
fans. That wait for new cards to be launched
and testing to begin can feel practically
hibernatory.
But the F1 world never completely gets shut
down.
We had Kimi Raikkonen, for example, joining
Instagram and becoming an instant social super
star with such hits as:
- “I’m on fire”
- “This time I don’t know what I’m doing”,
and
- “Not sure if Finland or Spain”
Kimi’s Instagram would grow to be one of
the places to be over the year and - with
his biography coming out later in the year
- fans were delighted to get to see the Ice
Man at room temperature.
Meanwhile over at Lewis’s Instagram.
So, the reigning world champion got into a
little bit of trouble for deciding (for some
reason) to broadcast his discomfort with his
young nephew wearing a dress.
It was an ill-advised move and the public
discussion around what seemed at best to be
a bit mean and at worst to be ignorantly wading
into gender politics threw Lewis so much that
he quickly deleted the entire contents of
his Instagram and… rethought a few things.
He’d later appear on the front cover of
GQ in a kilt for… related reasons? Apparently?
[OUTSIDE]Perhaps Lewis had been indulging
in a heavy helping of Christmas Cheer through
the holiday period as earlier in the month
he’d even declared Alonso to be a potential
2018 title challenger with his McLaren Renault.
[CUT TO ARTICLE SCROLL HALF WAY THROUGH]
I won’t get ahead of myself here, but…
well - Lewis might have been off the mark
with this one. I mean we all hoped he’d
be right. We were all there with you Lewis
but… no.
The off-season also saw Formula One veteran,
Robert Kubica fighting for a race seat at
Williams.
The Pole hadn’t competed in F1 since a horrific
rallying accident injured his arm in 2011.
But recent single seater tests had showed
he seemed as talented as ever and ready to
compete again.
Remember now - this is the same driver that
Lewis Hamilton feared above all others.
Sadly, Williams ultimately chose Sirotkin
over kUbica for the race seat.
Claire Williams furiously defended his decision,
calling Sergey Sirotkin an exciting prospect
and much more than just a pay driver. We’ll
wait and see how that works out as the year
unfolds. I’m sure Sergey will be the next
star of the midfield after chat like that.
Force India also started making a lot of noise
about changing its name.
‘Force One’ was bandied about quite a
lot, despite the potentially confusing abbreviation,
but ultimately the Force India name stuck
for another season and that would almost certainly
be the last we’d hear about any changes
within Force India.
Really though, the winter was building to
what a lot of Formula One’s audience had
been long dreading…
In classic Formula One style, the controversy
was kicking off before the season had even
started.
The FIA has mandated the use of its new Halo,
a head protection device so strongly engineered
that it could withstand debris, tyres, whole
cars and even a double decker bus being thrown
at it.
In a sport weirdly designed to have the driver’s
head poking out of their protective monocoque,
the Halo was surely an absolute godsend.
Unfortunately, the aesthetic of the Halo did
not fit with the car at all. Instead of blending
seamlessly with the well-hewn aerodynamic
lines and curves of a 21st century racing
machine, it looked more like your mate Gary
had bolted on a bit of scaffolding and called
it a day.
→ Not just a sore thumb, but a sore thumb
sewn onto your forehead
Resistance came hard, not just from fans,
but from drivers and teams too.
Mercedes boss, Toto Wolff said he wanted to
take a chainsaw to it.
And good luck, Toto. Weren’t you listening
to how strong it was? Good way to ruin a perfectly
good chainsaw, Toto
Gasly managed to rip his suit on the thing
while hopped out of the cockpit and Kevin
Magnussen decried its ugliness, saying, ‘if
it looks shit, it is shit’.
This is where I’d silently linger on Kevin
Magnussen’s face in a moment of humorous
ironic editing, if only he wasn’t such a
handsome brute. You win this round Kevin.
The expected title challengers were more diplomatic.
Hamilton kerbed his initial distate after
learning just how powerful the device was,
and Vettel only spoke favourably of the Halo,
repeating the need for the sport to protect
its drivers.
The FIA, of course, knew that the moment a
car got launched into the face of another
driver after they hadn’t obligated the Halo
they would be sued into 2047 when, ironically,
all the drivers had been replaced by Replicants
who didn’t really care if their heads came
off.
As the season went on, the Halo found itself
tested a few times - by both Sauber drivers
and F2’s Tadasuke Makino.
While it’s not definitive that the Halo
was all that came between those drivers and
injury, they all walked away from their cars
glad that it was there, and opinions around
the paddock begrudgingly shifted towards its
favour.
As it happens, with all the talk of the Halo
ruining the sport, and fans lamenting how
the sport had ‘lost its way’, it pretty
much disappeared into the background after
a couple of races.
Particularly once the onboard cameras placed
directly behind it were removed, at least.
FOM even took advantage of the Halo, implementing
some clever t-cam augmented reality graphics
to complement the shape of the structure,
just another step along its quest to turn
the sport into a giant video game.
In the UK, this would be the last year of
regular, live, free-to-air F1 coverage, with
Sky Sports having exclusively hoovered up
all the live races bar Silverstone for the
next six years.
This meant we’d be seeing a lot less of
the excellent Channel 4 team, who had expertly
balanced the line between affable and professional,
expertise and character.
Meanwhile, over at Sky they tended to go in
a little bit hard with wacky sideshows and
spin off shows to the extent that they - more
than once - aired their novelty programming
instead of the increasingly popular live Formula
2 races.
It was a little worrying.
One thing we weren’t short of, though, was
Nico Rosberg, who very much needed us to remember
he was still about, despite retiring from
racing pretty early on in his career.
He was now clearly building up his new enterprise
as a media pundit and producer, first by appearing
on F1 broadcasts as an expert and guest presenter,
and then by spinning out his vlogging series
into a full blown podcast, Beyond Victory.
The pilot episode of the show was a curious
affair - and pretty impressively he managed
to bag a slightly bewildered Bernie Ecclestone
as his first interviewee.
This was still very much the Nico Rosberg
Show, though - rather than an interview show
it rang more like Nico Rosberg’s Vlog, with
guests. Which is fine and so very YouTube.
The most interesting thing I found watching
the chat with Bernie was that it lacked any
wide establishing shots that showed both of
them in the same room at the same time. Instead
it chose to cut back and forth between close
ups that made it look like Tom Tucker’s
interview with Dustin Hoffman in Family Guy.
Nico’s blending of new and old media should,
of course, be applauded in the backwards,
slow-reacting world of F1 and it will be interesting
to see how he can use his network and platform
to expand on this format.
Honestly, though: the most impressive part
of this whole venture is that he got Ecclestone
to talk coherently and without nonsense and
distraction for more than 45 seconds, though
he did talk positively about dictatorships
and Nico - of his own free will - suggested
the popular consensus is that Bernie is very
generous, kind and selfless; comparable even
to Nelson Mandela?
Personally, I’m looking forward to Fernando
Alonso’s vlog with special guest Ron Dennis.
At the season opener in Australia, it very
much looked like Mercedes had the upper hand,
performance wise - plus ca change and all
that.
But to the relief of many, the separation
in performance between the Mercedes, Ferrari
and Renault engines looked to have closed
up significantly over the winter.
In fact, looking at the performances across
the board, you’d be forgiven for thinking
Ferrari might well be the powerplant to have
in 2018, with Haas in particular placing themselves
very strongly on the grid.
As a package, though, Mercedes were certainly
ahead. Hamilton grabbed pole with ease and
Raikkonen got himself gridded up ahead of
Vettel. The titanic battle between the 4-times
world champions would have to deal with race-by-race
interlopers.
Everything I’ve said so far though… come
race day, none of it mattered. In fact, those
out placing easy bets would have found themselves
with very light pockets come Sunday afternoon.
See, Raikkonen outracing Vettel through Saturday
and Sunday accidentally handed the German
a huge advantage. Mercedes had Hamilton keeping
tabs on Raikkonen, his main rival for the
day. So when Kimi pitted, Lewis pitted to
cover him off, leaving Vettel - unhappy on
his tyres, inheriting the lead, temporarily.
Unfortunately for Mercedes during the short
window while Vettel was leading and yet to
pit, the wheels came off Haas’s race. Literally.
They didn’t screw the wheels onto either
of their cars properly, and Magnussen’s
hasty retirement spawned the Virtual Safety
Car, giving Vettel enough time to get in and
out of the pits without losing track position
to Hamilton. From there, he held the lead
to the end.
Hamilton had been gazumped. Vettel took a
win where he expected a third. A crucial opening
for his championship.
Australia also gave us a first opportunity
to see what F1’s new-ish owners, Liberty
had done with the place. Having moved in a
while ago and figured out where all the plugs
sockets and light switches are, Liberty Media
were now looking to make the place more their
own.
Stripping the old wallpaper, slapping on a
new lick of paint. That kind of thing. You
know, open all the doors and windows and let
out that old man musk.
It’s clear the new owners think of F1 as
an ‘asset’ to be monetised, which isn’t
necessarily a bad thing as the only best to
make something more profitable is to shape
it to be as enjoyable as possible. Sean Bratches,
the commercial director, described F1 under
Bernie as distinctly under-managed. So what
would Liberty do differently?
The first thing they introduced to the world
was a brand new logo, along with a suite of
new typefaces and style guides.
The new logo was… fine. As with all modern
designs, it erred on the side of plain so
it could be easily packaged and purposed around
all of their new branding. It did the job
that an organisation desperate to rubber stamp
its new identity needed.
Fans turned their noses up at it as first,
but as we all know:
Fans don’t like change!
Engines, Wings, Graphics, ITV, Sky, Tyre War,
No Tyre War, Engines Again, Qualifying, Qualifying,
Qualifying, Qualifying, Grid girls, Grid boys,
Pirelli, Halo
...and Liberty knows that. In fact, it’s
the fact that F1 fans are so notoriously averse
to change that probably allowed Liberty to
ignore all of their negative reactions to
the genuinely concerning stuff they’d start
to bring in through the year.
With the new logo comes in yet another package
of TV graphics, which is a shame as the last
set of on screen information was the clearest,
most attractive and contemporary design we’d
ever had.
Again, the Liberty stuff was fine, despite
a weird persuasion to putting red text on
a black background which reads fine on a big
HD television but looks fuzzy and illegible
on streams and other devices.
FOM continued to add features to the the TV
graphics through the year, including a new
love of throwing up stats to compliment what
was happening on screen. Hamilton got pole?
Oh, this was his 7th pole in Spain. Hulkenburg
came 11th? This is the 24th time he’s come
11th? Vandoorne is racing in Sochi? Well did
you know he’s ‘Sochi nice guy’?
Where the graphics starting to cross the line
into weird, distracting or even unsavoury
was the increased use of augmented reality
on the trackside cameras.
In some cases, where it actually displayed
race information, it seemed flashy for the
same of being flashy. This barrier-side message
that accompanied a Bottas radio chat looked
more at home on the Mario Kart Electrodome.
In most other cases it was used to display
cheesy messages, brand slogans (the less we
say about ‘Engineered Insanity’, the better),
and - worst of all - advertising. Most notably
for Heineken.
Not satisfied with banners and screens around
the track, Heineken actually managed to get
their red star logo prominently featured on
track via real time CGI.
Giant Heineken stars, hundreds of metres high,
towered over the track and grandstands as
the cars raced by underneath. They were hideous,
poorly rendered, distracting and extraordinarily
crass - much like Jacques Villeneuve.
Couple with the fact that in Canada, the actual
start lights themselves had been transformed
into Heineken stars and a lot of people were
worried about what might come next:
Fake Emirates planes flying over the circuit
constantly?
DHL delivery trucks outpacing the F1 cars
on track?
Turning the Singapore Flyer into a giant Rolex?
Oh wait, they did that already and it got
them into trouble.
And not content with fiddling with the visual,
Liberty also made moved to revolutionise our
audio experience too.
Most hilariously, they added an audible beeping
sound to accompany the start, lights, which
only made you think of one thing:
They also introduced their ‘Audio Up’
segments where the commentators were forced
to shut up so we at home could listen to the
purity of the sounds of the racing. Which…
I mean, the diminished sounds of hybrid F1
cars has been one of the most complained about
changes in recent years so why they’d want
to put that under a massive spotlight is beyond
me.
In the biggest of these audio shake ups, F1
actually brought in an official theme tune.
When the tune was first released, people were
skeptical of this Brian Tyler composition
for feeling a little bit bland and uninspired.
But in context, in the hype of the race build-up…
it was a bloody banger.
It’s clear Liberty are just getting started
and their plans to shake up how we see and
experience F1 will continue to build over
the net few years.
Can we expect more intrusive audio/visual
“enhancements” or are Liberty going to
do as they promised and really focus F1 back
towards the fans? Time, and a lot of patience
from the audience will tell. But they’ll
have to act decisively as the audience is
demonstrably eroding with the shift away from
free-to-air broadcasts.
Leaving Australia, it was clear that unusual,
serendipitous circumstances had clipped Mercedes
wings for a brief moment and leaving them
needing to reassert their advantage.
But it turned out that the race in Melbourne
was not the only joker in the pack. The next
three races would continue to throw bananas
onto the track and blue shell the mightiest
racers.
The next race in Bahrain saw Ferrari with
a severe upper hand, but Mercedes forced Ferrari
into a one stop after they’d chosen the
softer compound of tyres.
Vettel still took home the win, but Bottas
made him work for it all the way to the line.
A puncture kept Lewis Hamilton out of the
action, and - worse - a botched pitstop ending
in a broken leg for a Ferrari mechanic, sidelined
Raikkonen.
These opening flyaway races really did seem
to be about how badly teams and drivers could
throw away all their potential. Year on year,
we do see this kind of sleepy, waking-from-hibernation
act that ends up with mistake after mistake
after mistake.
This was good news for any smaller teams that
can keep it together, of course. After the
first two races, McLaren were third in the
championship, Sauber already had points on
the board and Gasly in the Toto Rosso Honda
had managed a fourth place!
I wonder if that will bode well for him at
Red Bull. Hm…
In China, Vettel and Ferrari were once again
out-strategised by Bottas’s team at Mercedes
- this time the Fin managed to pull off a
brilliant undercut and take the lead.
He looked set for an easy victory until a
late safety car allowed Red Bull to gamble
everything on the power of a fresh set of
softs. It worked a treat, with the duo carving
their way through a defenseless rabble of
drivers who were playing the game far too
conservatively.
Ricciardo stole the win, while Verstappen
made a hashtag of himself tripping unnecessarily
over Sebastian Vettel.
Three races and no wins for Mercedes.
If you were a chicken farmer a nd were hoping
you could finally get down to the business
of counting your eggs before they hatched,
then - to borrow a phrase from Lee McKenzie
- Baku would be another bitter disappointment.
There was the now-classic argy-bargy Azerbaijani
spate of drivers bonking each other and their
bodywork across the racetrack, but the two
Red Bulls taking each other out, Sebastian
Vettel losing control of his car at a Safety
Car restart to throw away an easy victory,
and momentary leader Valtteri Bottas ripping
a puncture ended up giving the victory to
an astonished Hamilton.
Miraculously, Hamilton had re-taken the lead
of the Driver’s Championship. But there
was so much of the year left to come.
The first four races of the season had been
pretty wild then, with chaos, strategy and
surprise feeding into unexpected results and
battles for wins coming right down to the
final laps. →
And then we got to Spain.
It was the first total dud of the year. Traffic
from end to end. And if people weren’t concerned
enough by the lack of action in Spain, Monaco
really set off the warning lights.
On the streets of Monte Carlo, with 50 laps
to go, Daniel Ricciardo, leading the race,
suffered an MGU-K failure. Complete, irreparable,
failure. 160 bhp gone for the rest of the
race - poof!
Here’s the thing though - it didn’t cost
him a single position. Ricciardo, with a huge
proportion of his engine power out of action,
was pretty much unchallenged by anyone behind
him. He was the tractor in the country lane.
I mean, Monaco, with its narrow streets and
claustrophobic barriers, is always a difficult
place to overtake. Sure. But this. This was
worrying.
Canada, usually a race fans look forward to
for its potential for close racing, accidents,
surprise winners and generally being a hotspot
for fun action, followed the same pattern.
Little opportunity for overtaking, drivers
having to back off early in the race to save
engines and tyres, strategies veering towards
the conservative.
And despite the excitement of Formula One
returning to its home nation, on a brand new
track to the sport, the French Grand Prix
was largely forgettable, save for the first
lap tangle between Vettel and Bottas and the
track’s runoff areas leaving those eye swirlies
behind long after the race had ended.
I mean, for me: just thinking about the French
Grand prix brings back the floaters.
This wasn’t a problem Formula One was going
to solve by distracting you with its pumping
theme tune and flashy new graphics. This was
embarrassing.
It’s hard to call your series the creme-de-la-creme
of racing if there isn’t any actual racing.
It didn’t help that Pirelli’s softening
up the compounds and throwing the extreme
‘hypersoft’ tyre into the mix in an attempt
to shift races back towards two-stop strategies,
just hadn’t worked.
Teams were just riding out the rubber as long
as they possibly could to avoid having to
take that extra stop and that meant conservation,
conservation, conservation.
This means no attacking, no racing, no squeezing
every last bit of performance out of the rubber.
Just like when I think about getting out of
bed on Monday morning - the teams had done
the calculations and it just wasn’t worth
the effort.
Even if a two stop strategy was faster on
paper, it would still come with the added
risk of having to perform more overtakes to
keep up the pace that was required to pull
it off. And in 2018, overtakes were not something
you’d bet even a packet of crisps on falling
your way.
So what happens next? Well, in 2019 Formula
One has brought in some rushed (but not completely
thoughtless) interim measures to tide us over
until what’s apparently the ‘real design
revolution’ coming in 2021.
These are focussed around aero changes, like
a much simplified front-wing, a deeper rear
wing, a boosted DRS flap and a general aero
tidying up that is hopes to clean up the air
behind the car and allow cars to get closer
to each other.
Very obvious ideas, really. Whereas, the most
recent set of rule changes have moved the
cars in exactly the opposite direction: making
the aero more complicated and the cars wider
in an effort to make the cars look faster
with the very obvious casualty to all this
being the annihilation of overtaking and close
racing.
It was clear to everyone vaguely engineering
minded that this is exactly what would happen,
but these changes went through anyway.
You know - why make the cars actually racey
when you can just make them look fast. Just
like, why should I actually where a full suit
in a studio when I can just fake it? Look
I’m not even wearing trousers!
Which is weird, because can you even tell
- just by looking - if a car is 4 seconds
faster than it was last year? Is that a thing
that gives you goosebumps? I’ll tell you
what’s much more conspicuous
For now, we just had to wait it out. And hope
that bizarre circumstances conspire to create
exciting race. As we saw in Silverstone…
Though the on-track action was… varied,
but too often uninspiring and muzzled by the
current spec of F1, the battle for the title
was the spiciest it had been in years.
Between Australia and Austria, the hands on
the trophy had changed four times with a double-retirement
from the Mercedes in Spielberg once again
handing the advantage to Sebastian Vettel.
We were now about to hit the home races of
Lewis and Sebastian with the British and German
Grands Prix. The pressure was on to give the
home fans exactly what they’d come to see.
But in both cases… results fell slightly
short of expectation.
In Britain, Hamilton took pole position but
lost the lead immediately off the line with
a poor getaway before being punted off track
and into last place by Kimi Raikkonen. This
left Bottas and Vettel to fight it out for
the lead.
Hamilton and Raikkonen made their way through
the field with much aplomb, with yet another
late safety car placing both Ferraris and
both Mercedes tantalisingly nose-to-tail at
the front of the pack.
The next few laps saw us feeling more tense
than a Glastonbury reveller trying to find
a portaloo at 2 in the morning. It was set
up beautifully.
Bottas was at the head of the race, but once
again he was on the most vulnerable strategy
- staying out on old tyres to hold position
left him unable to fight of the other three
cars.
Vettel took the win ahead of Hamilton with
the Brit having to duck out of the post-race
interviews for a few moments to compose himself.
He’d lost a sure win in front of what he’d
no doubt consider the best fans in motor racing.
Having wiped the smile from the faces of the
British crowd, could Vettel now wipe that
smile onto the German fans?
That sounds a bit gross doesn’t it. Kind
of reminds me of that weird Jared Leto joker
tattoo. Ugh. Anyway, no. No he couldn’t.
A slight bit of drizzle lasting just a few
laps was enough to throw off the grip levels
at Hockenheim and an uncharacteristic error
from Vettel threw him into the barrier from
the race lead.
Hamilton picked up the pieces and the lead
of the championship swung back for the 5th
time.
It was becoming clear at this point that Ferrari
had the strongest all-round package and, in
the eyes of many, it was their championship
to lose. But they had a real problem on their
hands in the shape of a Mercedes driver in
the form of his life. Valtteri Bottas.
If fate had twisted her thread in a slightly
different direction, the Scandi Man Candy
[SUIT IMAGE] could well have fought for this
championship - in fact, had Valtteri not seen
misfortune after misfortune through the early
season… well, That Would Be Enough to keep
him in the game.
But that’s not how luck works, and while
all drivers have their fair shake of the dice,
Bottas has been dealt a dodgy hand at the
slot machine with the ball always landing
on black.
In Australia, he crashed in qualifying, which
- OK - was a bit of a Burn of his own making
but after that… he seemed to be at right
place at the wrong time.
In Bahrain he out-strategised Vettel and forced
the German to nurse softer tyres for way longer
than he should have been able to. The win
was there for the taking - Bottas wasn’t
going to miss his shot - but Sebastian, on
raggedy tyres, Blew Us All Away.
In China, he had the win in his pocket, but
fate Said No To This: when a Safety Car was
deployed late in the race, Bottas chose to
run Non-Stop from the lead, while Ricciardo
gambled on a pit stop for fresh tyres, plucking
the win out from underneath him.
In Azerbaijan, the deck seemed to have shuffled
the race in his favour: safety cars, a huge
lock up from Vettel and a well-timed pit-stop
left Bottas in front with a handful of laps
to go.. Finally, Bottas was leading and on
the right strategy! Surely That Would Be Enough?
But no, a puncture took him out on the very
next lap.
What Came Next? He started on the front row
in France and was all set for at least a podium
before Vettel clumsily boffed him out at the
start. In Austria his car broke down before
he’d even got into his rhythm.
In Britain he once again led the race in the
closing stages but once again was on the weakest
set of tyres and had to watch, Helpless, as
not one, not two, but three rival cars eventually
got past and denied our man even a podium
for his efforts.
In Germany, Bottas was aggressive and overtook
Raikkonen to put him in prime position on
fresh tyres after Vettel crashed and brought
out yet another late safety car. He made a
bold attack on his team mate to try and take
the lead but the team told him to take a break.
Another attempt at victory lost.
By this point he was over 60 points behind
his own team-mate. But without a crash here,
a safety car there, one less puncture and
a slightly more robust car in Austria: Bottas
had the potential - the potential - to have
strung together five wins and a 38 pt lead
by Hungary. The man’s middle name isn’t
Viktor for nothing!
Now, that’s his ceiling of course - if everything
had gone right. I’m not saying it would
have happened, I’m just saying if the stars
had aligned and he’d been tossed a few more
bones… This could have been a Valtteri good
year indeed for Bottas. He could have shown
us the Best of Drives and Best of Winning.
But Hungary came, signalling the start of
the back end of the season and Hamilton needed
a Right Hand Man: a role Bottas dutifully
took on for the rest of the season. It looked
like, for another year at least, the Fin would
have to Wait for It.
Time will tell if he’ll ever be Satisfied.
Following Hungary, the teams packed up their
swimming cossies and took off on a summer
break, leaving us wondering what on earth
to do with our lives now.
The summer break is normally a quiet perioad
where basically nothing happens because the
teams are forced to take a two week shut down
so the staff can go home and their kids can
remember who mummy and daddy are…
And then Force India collapsed.
The team had been in money trouble for years,
the financial situation involving many dramatic
sub plots including the dissolution of an
entire airline and the alleged - ALLEGED - absconsion
of Vijay Mallya from over a billion dollars
in debt with a dozen Indian banks using the
mind-boggling technique of legging it overseas
and hiding.
That’s the thing with billionaires isn’t
it? They’re so smart. That’s how they
get rid and stay rich. Legging it overseas
and hiding. Amazing.
Anyway, it turns out we needn’t have worried,
because when we all returned, tanned and stressed
out from the summer break in Spa Francorchamps
for the Belgian Grand Prix we were delighted
to see a brand new team on the grid.
Oddly, this team looked exactly like Force
India. It’s name was Force India, too. The
drivers were Force India’s drivers, the
livery was Force India’s livery. But everyone
insisted this was a brand new team. Force
India was dead. Long live Force India.
Confused? So was everyone else.
It had been a tough start to the season for
Force India. After five years of improved
results in a row, including two solid fourth
places in the last two years, the team hadn’t
really been able to produce the same kind
of results in 2018.
Word had it that money troubles were holding
them back from the continual development needed
to keep them holding station as the best-of-the-rest.
And their position was valuable to sponsors.
Sponsors that kept the money coming in to
allow them to hold position. I mean, you see
how this spirals out of control pretty quickly.
Anyway, ultimately debts were due, the pressure
piled on and the team was forced into administration
- bizarrely by their own driver Sergio Perez.
Honestly, if Formula One doesn’t go up against
the Kardashians, Love Island and The Real
Housewives of what’s-its-face for a best
reality drama Emmy I’m gonna call foul.
Billionaires from across the lands all seemed
to have their eye on the team. Billionaires
love picking up a sports team. It’s like
Panini stickers for the rest of us - except
really shiny.
Some of us were half expecting Elon Musk to
pop his head over the guard rail and tell
us he’d built a new Force India out of LEGO
and bits of old submarine and he’d definitely
win every race if only they’d let him on
track.
But in the end, as we’d all been expecting
for a while, driver-dad Lawrence Stroll and
his team of investors bought up the team,
giving it the cash boost it needed to survive
and rocked up in Belgium as if nothing had
happened.
And - due to the complicated tangle of rules,
time constraints and diplomacy they had to
navigate, to pull this off they had to both
end Force India and make a new Force India
in one fell swoop.
So they were the same team but a new entry.
The cars were the same but they now had no
points. But they did have the same tally of
engines. But also, on paper, they’d never
been seen at a Grand Prix before. They were
the Guy Incognito of racing teams, except
this time, everyone was playing along.
The real icing on the cake is that “Force
India” did so well in their “first race”
that if they had carried on without having
to jump through all these loops that erased
their points, they’d have been 4th in the
championship after all! Such is life, I guess.
Force India had been something of a revelation
over the past few years, wielding hefty punches
while remaining a privateer team on the edge.
A lot of us were waiting for them to finally
break through to more regular podium finishes
and perhaps the odd win on a lucky day.
With Haas looking strong thanks to a tight
Ferrari partnership, McLaren now powered by
a race-winning Renault engine, and the works
Renault team on something of a steady renaissance,
it seemed like 2018 might be the year that
the midfield would close up to the big three
at the top.
After all, only three teams - Mercedes, Ferrari
and Red Bull - had even won a race since the
start of the hybrid era in 2014.
But if anything, 2018 was an exacerbation
of the problem. The midfield itself was tighter
and fightier than ever, sure. In fact, taking
out Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull would result
in a hell of an exciting championship - so
much so that the TV director often made sure
to focus on the regularly more exciting battles
happening further down the field.
But the gap between the top three and everyone
else was enormous.
Far too often, by the halfway point of the
race, the fastest contender of the midfield
teams was over a minute behind the slowest
of the top three.
It’s like in WEC where the LMP1-H cars are
technically in the same class as the LMP1
cars but… come on, now. We all have eyes
here.
There were even Twitter and Reddit groups
dedicated to watching the ‘best of the rest’
fight, known as Formula 1.5 at first by fans
and then by the media and even the drivers
themselves.
Hulkenberg, Perez, Magnussen, Renault and
Haas became firmly invested in being the ‘best
of the rest’ and claiming the fictitious
but fabulously ornate Formula 1.5 trophy
But is this all just a blip? Or will the divide
continue to grow in an ever expensive sport
where the rich get richer and the poor get
poorer, where success equals money and money
= success?
Claire Williams Martini of Williams Martini
Racing called the sport, ‘basically broken’
saying, ‘it's naive to believe that if you
just work hard you’ll be rewarded.’
‘The financial discrepancy compared to Mercedes,
Ferrari and Red Bull is just too big. It’s
impossible to keep up. And it’s sad.’
It is sad. Teams in the middle work just as
hard as teams at the top and all the get is
to fight for the scraps that fall from the
grown ups’’ table. Let’s not forget
that last decade the points only went down
to sixth place. Sixth place!
Zak Brown, head of McLaren described the whole
situation as a ‘ticking time bomb’ and
that F1 is far from being ‘too big to fail’.
With a potential budget cap on the horizon,
perhaps F1 will slap itself awake from this
fever dream before it sinks under its own
delusion and grandeur
We do have to wait until 2021 until anything
can happen, budget-wise but… there’s always
hope F1 teams will do the right thing for
the sport. Maybe. Hopefully. Ish.
Due to their incredible battles, the midfield
had been more focussed on than ever, despite
falling behind. And during the summer break
it helped give the season a whole new energy
as the driver market went absolutely bananas.
Change Places!
The driver market is normally quite placid
from year-to-year with a couple of expected
promotions, demotions and side-steps, but
this year
Change Places!
It all sort of kicked off at Red Bull where
- while they had secured a brand new engine
partner in Honda, they couldn’t deliver
Ricciardo. Daniel was off to Renault in a
move no one at the team even Newey ‘bout.
After years locked in a Red Bull junior contract,
Smiley Dan was three.
This left a gaping hole in the second seat
but the team were Milton Keyn to take their
time in picking a replacement and even though
they Verstappen to have the perfect driver
waiting in the wings at Toro Rosso, they weren’t
prepared to be backed into a Christian Horner.
And while they didn’t want their decision
making to appear rashly, they did of course
pick… Pierre Gasly
Meanwhile, though a certain Spanish world
champion had been Woking day and night to
turn his team into a competitive force, it
was all Fernando not for lack of trying. It
had been Alonso bering experience for everyone
involved but Fernando had been thinking, all
the time, he had to leave-a this place.
You’d think McLaren would want to bolster
down the driver they had left, but like UPS
they decided to plough on without a Vandoorne.
When looking for new pilots for 2019, McLaren
being a proud British team (of New Zealand
heritage and American ownership) really needed
that Lando Hope and Glory. There were a lot
of drivers on the market but the one thing
they couldn’t ig Norris the raw talent in
their young Formula 2 protege.
As for their other seat. Well, in the words
of Jennifer Aniston: ‘Here comes the Sainz’
With Force India under new management, Lance
Stroll decided in a truly shocking move that
the pink panthers were the team for him. He
felt the team had really grown a pere and
would be the place to take him father and
really put him on a pa with the strongest
of the mid field. He thought, there’s just
something about this team that pops. And it
seems Lance might see himself staying there
until he’s an old man.
This of course put a certain popular, talented
Frenchman at risk. In fact, the more time
that went on, the more it seemed the only
way to keep the driver carousel moving Esteban
Ocon from a seat next year. As a Merc apprentice,
no other team would touch him even if forced
to go toe-to-toe to Toto to totally explain
their hesitance, even if Mercedes Benz over
backwards to find him a drive.
It wasn’t looking good for Esteban, but
the fans were singing their prayers.
[OCON ALL YE FAITHFUL...] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z51apErmAuw
And yet the madness kept coming
[CHANGE PLACES!]
We were Mon-aghast when Ferrari said Maran’hello
to Charles Leclerc and fin [FIN SCREEN] to
the Fin.
This left Sauber to say ‘C’m’ere Raikkonen’,
and the rest of us to wonder Alfa Kimi’s
career will last.
All of this grand switcheroo happened by mid
September but after all that, still left nine
seats unconfirmed with many hoping someone
somewhere can Russell up a drive for their
favourite drivers: you’d think there Haas
to be somewhere for everyone but even if they
form an orderly Kubica, we Kvyat to see Wehr
the Lein will be drawn.
Though I think it’s clear no one will be
taking the Mick. Not this year.
Back on track, Ferrari were keen to turn the
advantage back to Sebastian Vettel, having
hit the summer break with a 24 point deficit
to Hamilton.
And boy did they!
After a hell of a first corner crash for the
midfield, Vettel out-dragged Hamilton up the
Kemmel straight to take the lead and from
there - he took off and never looked back.
It was a dominant win and Ferrari looked,
to all and sundry, to have the far stronger
package. Despite being behind in the points,
many tipped them to have the championship
in hand.
So they arrived at their home race in Italy
with a bit of a swagger in their step.
The Tifosi were wild with excitement and Ferrari
basked in their Marlboro-red glow, locking
out the front row to joyous applause.
It wasn’t Vettel on pole though. It was
everyone’s favourite chatterbox, Kimi Raikkonen,
who benefitted from his team mate’s slipstream
to grab an extra tenth or two he needed to
win that weird little tyre thing they give
to the pole sitters.
An aside - Hamilton has, like 70 pole positions.
Can you imagine if he got one of these tyres
every single time? He could run a taxi company
fleet of smart cars.
Anyway - Vettel was not-so-quietly annoyed
at starting behind the number 2 driver at
Ferrari so made plans to take the lead as
soon as possible on race day.
If Kimi was to play the wingman though, someone
must have forgotten to let him know. He defended
fairly robustly against Vettel on the opening
lap, allowing Hamilton to squeeze into play.
Both Hamilton and Vettel ended up fighting
over the same bit of track and the German
ended up worse off - spinning back to last
place.
This was the third first lap kerfuffle between
Merc and Ferrari this year. Their rivalry
was becoming a bit of a… spicy meat-a-ball?
But, for all the swearin, furious Italian
fans: at least Kimi was in the lead, right?
Well, yes - and to be honest, we were all
rooting for him to get that elusive win. But,
where Kimi had shrugged off his wingman role,
Valtteri Bottas grabbed it with both hands.
Mercedes extended his opening stint by a long
way - enough to allow Kimi to pit and then
get stuck behind his fellow Fin for so many
laps that his Medium tyres - expected to last
the rest of the race, burned and blistered.
By the end of the race, Kimi had nothing left
to fight with against Hamilton, who fought
his way past to victory.
The prancing horse was left with its tail
between its legs.
Bottas, meanwhile, recovered well from his
dogged wingmannery though, ending up fighting
with Verstappen for the last place on the
podium.
Max defended well… until he didn’t.
Which brings us to….
Spins in Australia while trying to catch one
Haas and escape another, managing to muck
up attacking and defending all in one go.
Runs Hamilton off the road in Bahrain, tripping
over the Mercedes front wing and getting a
puncture. Probably should have given a bit
more space this time.
You’d think Verstappen would have learned
from his tangle with Hamilton in Bahrain.
But no, he launches into a bit of a hasty
move and ends up running wide and losing a
place to Ricciardo. I’m sure that won’t
come back to bite him.
Still no lessons learned! Still in China,
he creams into Vettel, costing them both quite
a lot in a race he could have won. Oh dear,
oh dear.
He may be too aggressive at attacking sometimes
but at least he’s a robust and fair defend-
oh, whoops he’s taken out his team mate.
Running into the back of someone under the
Virtual Safety Car. That’s… that’s a
tricky one to pull off. But Max did it at
a Stroll in Spain.
Threatening to headbutt journalists. ...OK…!
Taking advantage…
Max’s father says ‘never again criticise
Max’s aggressive style.’. This would mean
so much more coming from someone who’s own
‘aggressive style’ hadn’t come into
question so often, wouldn’t it?
Stopping for Inters on a pretty dry track.
That’s some points down the drain.
At least Max is working through his anger
issues.
Pity from Pastor Maldonado.
Oh, Max. Monza is a pretty narrow track but
there’s still room for the two of you. That’s
a 5 second penalty right there.
OK, so you don’t like the penalty. I’m
sure that’ll be well received.
Squeezing on Vettel is a risky move. You got
lucky this time, Max. I’m still going to
‘ding’ you though, cause I’m enjoying
the power. Have another.
Moving onto Singapore, it still looked like
Ferrari had the strongest overall package
and the greatest chance of pulling this whole
championship challenge together.
Sure, Italy had slipped through their buttery
fingers but if practice and history were anything
to go by - Vettel had Singapore in the bag.
But no - despite being dominant through free
practice and the first two qualifying sessions,
and despite Singapore being traditionally
Mercedes’ Achilles heel, and despite Hamilton
putting in a Q3 lap that Vettel himself described
as ‘entirely beatable’, Vettel did not
get pole.
He didn’t even get to start on the front
row. Verstappen, of all people, had pulled
a sensational lap out of his bumbag to claim
P2 on the grid.
Vettel and Ferrari had melted through bad
timing and poor preparation - getting out
of rhythm and preparing poorly through their
outlaps.
The race was no better for them - Vettel was
handily beaten by both Hamilton and Verstappen
through lack of pace and a strange, vulnerable
strategy.
Like a teenager and their parents through
adolescence, the gap between Ferrari and the
top of the table widened depressingly further.
The reds may have had perhaps the best car
in hand, but they were giving themselves a
hell of a hill to climb...
Ah yes, Ferrari. We all imagine that Ferrari
is to F1 what ... Jeremy Clarkson is to Top
Gear. Sure the show could carry on without
him, but not without losing what many consider
a piece of its soul and - as such - a big
part of what made the whole show worth watching
and what held the whole band together. Even
if he was a massive arse.
Such is the view of many in F1 of Ferrari,
and the need for the sport to maintain commercial
viability has allowed Ferrari to increasingly
act out, in the old,
‘what are you gonna do? Fire me? Good luck,
my dad is the CEO.’ routine.
But let’s get real here: the idea what F1
is centred around Ferrari is totally whack!
The mythos they’ve built around themselves
are based almost entirely around the extraordinary
Godfather character of their founder, Il Commendatore,
Enzo Ferrari and just the fact that Ferrari
have been around since the beginning.
Mercedes, Red Bull, Sauber, McLaren and most
of the other players all evoke a large amount
of emotion - good, bad and ugly - and that
all stirs into the soap opera that is F1.
After all, for all their years in F1, Ferrari
have not spent a massive amount of that time
at the front but they’ve played themselves
into getting the most money, having most say
in the rules and consistently having the most
highly valued sponsorship space, even when
they flop around in the midfield.
Despite this, Ferrari have threatened to dump
the sport on its arse every time they’re
worried Mummy and Daddy won’t give them
enough presents.
Some of their most recent quit threats before
this year came in 2017, 2014, 2009, 2008,
2004… you get the idea. It’s all part
of a big song and dance that screams, ‘I’m
special’. But are they special, or is this
a quality they’ve curated of themselves?
In the last couple of years, they’ve started
to go dark with the media - restricting interviews,
holding fewer press conferences and generally
being incredibly coy with reporters about
anything. Another shroud of mystery to this
enigmatic team.
They’ve even moved towards reframing the
story of a race when the result turns against
them.
But rather than add to the mystique of the
brand, this aloof behaviour has tended more
to get right up people’s exhaust pipes as
the media becomes increasingly and vocally
annoyed with Ferrari’s lack of engagement
- a sentiment very much passed on to the audience.
The Scuderia constantly feeds the system that
paints them as the indispensable leads - the
Downey-Jr, the Streep, the Beyonce - by pretending
to quit and cutting off media access to increase
their minute-by-minute value like a Debeers
diamond. A lot of it is facade.
It’s all a bit like when Mercedes pretends
to pit to trick other teams into jumping the
gun on the stops. Do you want to take the
risk and not pit? Do you want to risk a Formula
1 without Ferrari? Do you?
The truth is of course, that Ferrari needs
F1 more than F1 needs Ferrari - but don’t
tell the Tifosi that.
Ferrari famously don’t advertise, instead
their road car sales come from overcompensation
issues and off the back of the Italian marque’s
exposure through its motor sport programmes
- the biggest by far being Formula 1.
And Ferrari wants us to believe that their
symbiotic relationships with F1 adds little
or no value to their brand, as if they’re
doing the sport a favour just by turning up
every other weekend. They threaten to quit,
but to where? No one else gives them the gilded
platform they have here.
It’d be like the Queen getting in a huff
and threatening to sack off the throne in
order to become the Mayor of Bromley. I’d
be like, ‘sure you do add a bit of a Maj-jazzle
to the place but you cost us millions of pounds.
Enjoy Bromley. It’s got a big TK Maxx.’
The next three races really consolidated Ferrari’s
losses into one manageable lump sum.
One thing’s for sure though and that’s
that Ferrari, for all their pomp and brashedness,
had thrown a championship position of strength
and assuredness right in the bin.
Look at Vettel’s points relative to Hamilton.
Around Hungary/Belgium we all thought that,
despite a points deficit, Vettel had it all
in hand to fight all the way. Ferrari looked
strong.
And then
In fact, Hamilton could have had it all wrapped
up in the USA if it wasn’t for an unusually
weak race from him in which he’d under driven
and Ferrari had outmanoeuvred him with Kimi
Raikkonen of all people.
Though maybe that serves him right for getting
the Russian GP win handed to him by Bottas
via some very popular team orders. This time,
he didn’t get to celebrate a championship
in America...
*So Vettel was all set to lose the championship
in Mexico after starting the year so strong.
Where did it all go wrong? Let’s see if
we can figure it out, shall we?
The simplest explanation is that Hamilton
made fewer mistakes, honestly.
The potency of the Ferrari and Mercedes packages
fluctuated somewhat over the year but Hamilton
genuinely grabbed the points he was able to
at almost every race.
*Meanwhile, Vettel was throwing away leads
from fairly early on for no good reason.
He got himself into tussles time and time
again through impatience and perhaps an overly
aggressive belief in how much of the track
he was owed. Most of the time he came off
worse.
He got that penalty in Austria for blocking
in qualifying and another in France for punting
Bottas into the Paul Ricard Fingerprint.
He should have got the pole to set up a win
in Singapore but let that slip away too.
It was as messy a year as his first one on
this planet and not one that seemed worthy,
upon reflection, of building towards a fifth
world championship.
Now, Hamilton got into scrapes too and was
not perfect. He took four races to get his
first win and even that was handed to him
by both Vettel and Bottas losing it.
He was involved in a crash wirth Raikkonen
in Britain though it’s debatable how many
points that would have cost him in the end.
And he had that win controversially handed
to him in Russia - a win no one thought he
actually deserved.
Even saying all this out loud, I’m worried
I’ll get labelled a Hamilton fan-boy but
he really did thread together a stronger,
more stable championship fight.
I find myself wondering ... where is the Vettel
of the early decade. The man who would find
a way to win no matter what. Untouchable on
good days and a fight to be reckoned with
on bad days? Was the raging bull now no more
a prancing horse?
Will Vettel get another chance at a championship?
Or will he find himself floating in the limbs
of near-success, his goals just out of reach.
Will he be forced to watch his rivals collect
the gold as younger stars start to take his
place? *Will he become the next… Fernando
Alonso?
Following over a decade of terrible career
decisions, Alonso decided that instead of
making one bad decision at a time, he should
hedge his bets by competing in basically every
premier racing series simultaneously.
See, Alonso, knowing he was among the greatest,
most legendary drivers motorsport had ever
seen was stuck with the problem that he couldn’t
actually prove it due to his lack of championships,
race wins, or pole positions.
And it was looking increasingly like he wouldn’t
make any headway stuck at McLaren, a team
that had tripped over itself so badly that
it was struggling to find its own arse to
kick.
Having burned his bridges elsewhere by being
- as the English say - ‘a complete ballache
to work with’, [BRUSH AWAY HEADLINE] Alonso
came up with a new plan:
Instead of building upwards - stacking championship
upon championship, win upon win, in an effort
to stand taller than anyone in F1 - he would
built outwards: winning titles and flagship
races across all of motorsport. The Indy 500,
Daytona, Le Mans, the WEC Championship - everything
was fair game to Alonso and his celebrity
kudos opened doors to pit garages around the
world.
It started with him sacking off the Monaco
Grand Prix last year to take on the Indy 500
and grab what would have been the second of
the three prestige wins required to earn the
legendary ‘Triple Crown’: the Monaco Grand
Prix, the Indy 500 and the Le Mans 24 hours.
He’d already bagged the first when he won
in Monaco in 2006 so in 2017 he decided to
abandon his unreliable Honda F1 car and instead
hop into an unreliable Honda IndyCar. He was
extremely competitive but the car broke down
before he made it to the line.
In January he tried his hand at the Daytona
24 Hours, driving an unreliable Ligier, whose
brakes failed. At 300 km/h. At night.
Not at all taking the hint, Alonso deciding
to take the path of extreme least resistance
by signing up for the WEC super season and
joining the works Toyota team, a team that
literally has no competition.
Some might say he’d earned a bit of an easy
ride after the hardships of the last 12 years
involving: joining a team that cheated and
lost all its points, then returning to a team
that then cheated and lost its management,
then joining a team on the downswing only
to then leave them as they hit an upswing
in order to return to that first team just
as it hit absolute rock bottom.
I’m pretty sure the only reason he stayed
at McLaren for so long was because the woman
at the job centre said it wouldn’t look
good on his CV if he was seen to be moving
around too much.
Alonso’s team have had incredible success
this season in WEC, as you’d expect. Even
when he was disqualified at Silverstone, it
was a win that got binned.
He’s well on his way to winning the title
with Toyota, and he’s already two of the
three wins needed for the triple crown.
This leaves a return to the Indy 500 an inevitability,
but why stop at three crowns when he could
barge his way, Thanos-like, across the motorsports
universe taking prestige victory after prestige
victory to feed that gaping void that can
never be filled.
And there’s currently only one driver chasing
him down for that prestigious collection of
motorsports crowns, and that - Juan Pablo
Montoya? Wow, OK.
Anyway, that’s -
The circus arrived in Mexico with Hamilton
having both hands, a foot and the tip of his
Little Lewis on the championship trophy.
He only had to score 5 points from the last
three races to claim the title, leaving Vettel
with very little margin for victory. Everyone
was expecting the drivers’ title race to
end here, and so it did.
But Hamilton didn’t take it with a bang.
In fact, his race, like the cure for smallpox,
was a bit off the boil.
The thin atmosphere shifted the balance of
power fully towards the Red Bulls, with the
Austrian team taking a one-two with Ricciardo
on pole. Daniel was so happy with grabbing
P1 in qualifying that he apparently upset
Max Verstappen. And you don’t want to upset
Max Verstappen.
But points only come on race day, and Max
snatched the lead immediately after Ricciardo
bogged down off the line and, after a great
fight through the race, ended up retiring.
For the 8th time. This year.
Hamilton and Vettel got to have their on track
scrap - and though Vettel easily pushed past
the Mercedes driver, it was ultimately fruitless
as a Diet Lilt with Hamilton winning the championship
at a canter from 4th place.
This gave Hamilton a 5th title and moved him
into a bracket shared only by Fangio and Schumacher.
No not that Schumacher [Ralf]. No not Joel
Schumacher, maker of Batman and Robin. Michael
Schumacher. GOD.
Meanwhile, while everyone was watching the
championship fight come to an end and Max
taking a glorious win, Alonso retired and
Williams just… “were there”, I guess.
You know, Down the back of the field somewhere.
Where, it seems, you’d expect Williams and
McLaren to be...
When I started watching F1, McLaren, Williams
and Ferrari were the absolute powerhouse trio
of Formula 1.
But, while Ferrari has had a fairly steady
run of being there or thereabouts in the last
20 years, Williams have scraped the bottom
of the lake all too often and McLaren, for
all its power and riches, have nosedived like
a clowning Dumbo in the last few years.
Neither team has won the constructors’ title
in two decades and they spent the last season
flopping about like wet bread.
McLaren have suffered from their partnership
with a struggling Honda engine in the hybrid
era. Not only was the engine pretty ghastly
but it also masked what turned out to be a
serious bit of wandering off course with their
chassis design.
They’ve had three different engines in the
hybrid era and failed to astound in astonish
with any of them, grabbing just two podiums
and precisely zero race wins.
McLaren pride themselves on being at the cutting
edge of racing technology but have yet to
use their enviable resources and ingenuity
to pull themselves out of the mud.
I spoke to a handsome chap named Freddo who
had only bad things to say about the team’s
management but I think it’ll be a few years
before we hear the full story of McLaren’s
darkest years.
Ron Dennis will be rolling in his grave. He’s
not dead but he’s so upset he went and dug
his own grave just to be able to roll in it.
That’s how bad things are.
Williams on the other hand flourished with
the advent of the hybrid era. They used the
super strong Mercedes power units to great
effect at first, coming 3rd overall in 2014
and 2015 after years of languishing about
in the lower midfield.
But then they dropped to 5th. And now they
finish 2018 dead last, behind all 9 teams,
one of which was only allowed points from
less than half the races. Not great for the
9 times champions.
Williams didn’t help themselves by running
only young rookie-ish drivers, though Claire
Williams was adamant they were more than drive-for-pay
pilots and were strong in their own right.
And Nigel Mansell was sure their inexperience
wouldn’t be a problem, saying “A Formula
1 car, until it is handed over to the driver
at a certain speed, drives itself now.”
So the question is: why didn’t it drive
itself faster, then?
Williams are an engineering team and don’t
have the mighty resources to throw at every
problem. Tight of wallet and old of fashion
they can use their cunning to take advantage
of big rule changes but then aren’t able
to keep up with the ferocious rate of development
seen further up the pitlane.
Perhaps Williams need to modernise and think
big or go the way of the other old-school
teams like Tyrell, Lotus, Arrows and the like.
Though, I guess Tyrell did eventually morph
into the current Mercedes team and I’ve
heard they’re doing alright.
A stronger midfield has made it even more
difficult for the old stalwarts to fight their
way back to the top. Their predicament should
strike fear into the Red Bulls and Mercedeses
of this world - anyone can fall, and no one
is going to pick you back up again.
I, for one, hope Williams and McLaren can
get themselves back in the fight soon. But
if not, it’s also been great to see other
people’s trophy cabinets get heavy.
McLaren and Williams obviously weren’t going
to turn things around in the last two races,
and with both titles already wrapped up you’d
be forgiven for thinking there’d be nothing
to write home about.
But you’d be wrong.
Brazil was just… Brazil. Just 100% Brazil,
you know? Absolutely no chill.
Quali was bonkers with a dozy Hamilton getting
in both Kimi and Sirotkin’s way - the latter
having to swerve onto the grass to dodge a
nasty accident.
There were no penalties for Lewis but a lot
of angry pointy fingers at his clumsy carelessness
to put it mildly. Was this the classic post-championship
Lewis sleepwalk? No one in power seemed to
care, to be honest.
The slightly rainy, but not quite rainy enough,
session had everyone a little bit stir crazy,
including Vettel who, in a hurry to get through
the weighbridge procedure nearly ran down
a scrutineer and broken the weighing scales,
earning himself a fine.
Clearly there’s something in the water in
Brazil that makes people make terrible decisions.
Now, Verstappen started the race in P5, talking
down any hope of fighting for anything close
to victory. But to much surprise he ended
up with some serious race-pace and - maybe
more importantly - some incredible tyre management.
Vettel fell back through the field with issues
while Max only ascended, ultimately talking
the lead and holding it confidently at arms
length from a struggling Hamilton.
But then Esteban Ocon went to unlap himself,
perhaps a little too aggressively and Verstappen
closed to the door on him …
***They both catapulted into a spin and Verstappen
lost the lead and the win. He was angry. Very
angry as these exclusive scenes from the Brazilian
paddock show.
The thing about Brazil is… it’s just wild.
Never expect a normal race weekend at Sao
Paulo. The same cannot be said about Abu Dhabi
- the host of this year’s finale.
Normally it’s a bit of a stale affair and
- as expected - there weren’t too many big
surprises. Though I guess Hulkenberg might
say otherwise!
In fact, the race turned out to be a microcosm,
a slice, a synecdoche of the season as a whole:
teams playing about with race strategies and
stretching the rubber beyond its expected
life; Vettel making a strong challenge for
the win but falling short; Alonso fighting
for no rewards and eventually just cutting
out parts of the track for giggles; Bottas
looking like he had plenty of potential but
ending up 5th after a saggy middle; and, in
the end, Lewis winning.
But more than anything this was a race of
goodbyes. Alonso, Ocon, Sirotkin, Ericsson,
Vandoorne and Hartley were all racing what
looked like their last races in F1 - likely
for good in most cases.
Raikkonen and Ricciardo said goodbye to their
long terms teams to take on a fresh challenge
in neighbouring garages. In fact, only 8 drivers
were set to stay put for 2019.
Despite all this, for the first time ever,
the drivers that raced in Abu Dhabi drove
every single race of the season. No swaps,
no substitutes, no drop outs. And every single
one of them scored points. A marvel in such
a chaotic year.
The biggest goodbye was of course for Fernando
Alonso who was flanked either side by fellow
champions Vettel and Hamilton through the
cool down lap. The trio performed a salute
of doughnuts for the crowd before Alonso parked
up his McLaren and walked away from it for
the last time.
2018 was over. The page was turning and the
ink drying on this chapter in history.
Oh, there’s so much more to say about 2019
but - oh my god, look at the time on this
video. We’re PAST THE HOUR MARK. And you’re
still here? Haha, you idiots.
But let’s run through some honourable mentions
we didn’t have time for,
Ricciardo retired eight times! His car broke
so often and he got so many technical penalties
that the failures literally broke him as a
human being. He got to the point where he
was screaming out loud in the pitlane and
punching holes in his motorhome instead of
smiling like a piano and drinking out of footwear.
Smiley Dan was dead and only the vicious honey
badger remained.
Grosjean, our favourite misunderstood Frenchman,
had a weird old 2018. Even though Haas were
in fighting form, Romain took nine whole races
to score a point. His dry run included crashing
into a wall all by himself under safety car
conditions while insisting Ericsson had crashed
into him. Ericsson, it turned out, was nowhere
near him.
It’s certainly worrying when drivers start
seeing swedes where there are none. A real
turnip for
Red Bull and Renault had a massive public
falling out.
It was all a bit embarrassing like when a
couple start arguing in the middle of a party.
Verstappen called them out over team radio
several times with very… precise language.
Charles Leclerc! Like Monaco, he’s rich,
one of a kind and all F1 can talk about.
Unlike Monaco he’s fast, exciting and doesn’t
judge you for driving a Skoda.
Pirelli made a big fuss about their rainbow
of tyres being both fun and giving them the
scope to match every race to competitive compounds.
But consensus seems to be that the rainbow
is confusing and the compound range ended
up being both too robust and too sensitive,
which is tricky.
So, Pirelli are going back to the drawing
board for next year with just three colours
of tyres to make things simpler. Plus they’ll
be reworking their current rubber compound
chemistry. Huh… weird. This rubber doesn’t
work!
And that’s about it for 2018. We’ve got
lots to look forward to in 2019 though with
Alonso and McLaren in the Indy 500, Renault’s
Renaissance, Vettel’s Vengeance, Simplified
aerodynamics, Red Bull Honda dominating the
season…? Well that’s that they’re suggesting
anyway. It’s going to be great.
Oh and we’ve just got time to look at all
the good F1 memes of 2018. . Well, that’s
everything then!
Enjoy the winter break.
