The Official 2018 Azerbaijan Grand Prix Thread **SPOILERS**

[Derek Smith]

BrettMRC said:

"so?"

So the point being illustrated is that MV is causing serious ripples and harming his own team and others.


However....I'd hate to lose him, his random acts of carnage are keeping everything a bit more interesting IMO.

Thanks for putting that together.

The post is interesting (I didn't quote it 'cause it's so big) but it makes a number of assumptions.

Firstly, nowadays if your auntie had balls she could still be your auntie. Get with it, man.

I can't help thinking that if the two RBs had not collided when they did, they would have collided later.

There would have been a pace car at some time in the last few laps. The organisers would have ensured that, as would the drivers.

It's a big leap of faith to assume that if A hadn't happened nothing else would either. But an interesting post and thanks for putting it up.

[DJFish]

I'm glad someone earlier in the thread suggested the race was worth a re-watch, I stupidly left the radio on whilst tidying my garage on Sunday afternoon so learned the result courtesy of the BBC, but I'm glad I finally got around to watching it the other morning.

[paua]

Derek said: "Firstly, nowadays if your auntie had balls she could still be your auntie"

That very nearly caused a mouthful of red wine to be sprayed all over my laptop. Well done.
It's now possible for 2 women to both be registered as the mother of their child in NZ.
Apologies for wandering off topic , as you were.

[BrettMRC]

I think the RB dynamic is interesting - reminds me of the LH/NR fights we saw...they all have the potential to be cringe inducing.

(Not as cringe inducing as being made to go to the factory and apologies...that has hints of being made to stand up in assembly for one indescretion or another! )

[Andy S15]

Gaz. said:

(Analysis snipped)

Really cool info, must have taken a while to put together. Crazy to think that max could have been second right now if he'd kept a sensible head.

[cjm]

I'm surprised neither of the redbulls tried to get back to the pits?

[swisstoni]

paua said:

Derek said: "Firstly, nowadays if your auntie had balls she could still be your auntie"

That very nearly caused a mouthful of red wine to be sprayed all over my laptop. Well done.

Red wine at 8:30am - well done to you Sir!

[paua]

swisstoni said:

paua said:

Derek said: "Firstly, nowadays if your auntie had balls she could still be your auntie"

That very nearly caused a mouthful of red wine to be sprayed all over my laptop. Well done.

Red wine at 8:30am - well done to you Sir!

It's after dinner pm on this side of the world, winter is fast approaching.

[thegreenhell]

cjm said:

I'm surprised neither of the redbulls tried to get back to the pits?

Maybe the team hit a remote engine kill switch at that point, to stop them from doing any more damage.

[Angpozzuto]

Gaz. said:

I hadn't worked out the actual points lost from Verstappen's actions and the impact he's had on his and RBs WCC positions. This is a bit 'if my auntie had bks..." and assumes everything else aside from Max hitting everything plays out as usual. Baku requires speculation of the last 12 laps obviously.

Oz: RBs started on the supersoft, planning to go long and change to the ultrasoft late in the race. Max spins out from 5th following KMag but he'd been driving like a loon anyway and pits early when RBR find a space to slot him in to. The VSC/SC cause a change to RBRs plans with Ricciardo and he pits for softs and rejoins in 4th. Given that Max was ahead of Dan when he spun I think it's safe to assume RB would have double stacked during the VSC/SC had his spin not happened. As a consequence of this:

WDC:

1st- Vettel 25pts
2nd- Hamilton 18pts
3rd- Raikkonen 15pts
4th- Verstappen 12pts
5th- Ricciardo 10pts
6th- Alonso 8pts
7th- Hulkenberg 6pts
8th- Bottas - 4pts
9th- VanDoorne 2pts
10th Sainze 1pt

WCC:

1st- Ferrari 40pts
2nd- Mercedes 22pts
3rd- Red Bull 22pts
4th- Mclaren 10pts
5th- Renault 7pts

Bahrain- Max stacked it in qualifying starting well down the grid, then in the race he DNFd after colliding with Hamilton. Had he had a clean Saturday there is a good chance he'd be 4th on the grid but it's academic anyway as even from 15th it is likely he would have finished 3rd or 4th had he not driven into Hamilton. To make the change smaller I'll assume 4th but 3rd would have genuinely been on the cards.

WDC
1st - Vettel 50pts
2nd - Hamilton 33pts
3rd- Verstappen 24pts
4th- Bottas 22pts
5th- Raikkonen 15pts
6th- Alonso 12pts
7th- Hulkenberg 12pts
8th- Ricciardo 10pts
9th- Gasly 10pts
10th -Magnussen 8 pts
11th- VanDoorne 4pts
12th- Sainz 1pt
13th- Ericsson 1pt

WCC:
1st- Ferrari 65pts
2nd- Mercedes 55pts
3rd- Red Bull 34pts
4th- Mclaren 16pts
5th- Renault 13pts
6th- Torro Rosso 10pts
7th- Haas 8pts
8th- Sauber 1pt

China

This one does make a few assumptions, Max was ahead of Daniel when he went off on lap 39 trying to pass Hamilton, and as DR hadn't managed to pass MV for the entirety of this race until this point, and didn't make a pass stick on MV in Baku aside from the lap before the pit stop I'll assume DR cannot pass MV in China. As DR was the eventual winner it isn't a massive leap to assume a 1-2 in Max's favour. Bottas would have been 3rd. Without Max spearing into the side of Vettel it is likely Seb would have finished 4th, Hamilton 5th and Raikkonen 6th. I'm assuming that neither Ferrari can pass either Merc as Kimi couldn't pass Bottas in the closing stages of the race on fresher tyres. Hulk 7th, Alonso 8th, Sainz stays 9th, KMag remains 10th.

WDC:

1st - Vettel 62pts
2nd - Vestappen 49pts
3rd- Hamilton- 43pts
4th- Bottas- 37pts
5th - Ricciardo 28pts
6th -Raikkonen 18pts
7th- Hulkenberg 18pts
8th- Alonso- 16pts
9th- Gasly - 10pts
10th- Magnussen 9pts
11th VanDoorne 4pts
12th-Sainz 3pts
13th- Ericsson 1pt

WCC:

1st- Ferrari 80pts
2nd -Mercedes 80pts
3rd- RedBul 77pts
4th- Renault 21pts
5th- Mclaren 20pts
6th- Torro Rosso 10pts
7th- Haas 9 pts
8th- Sauber 1pt

Baku.

This one obviously has the biggest assumptions to make as the RBR collision brought out the safety car which drastically changed the end of the race and had knock on consequences such as Groan hitting the wall under SC, Vettel locking up into T1 on the restart, KMag & Gasly rubbing under the restart which lead to Bottas puncture and Hamilton eventually winning. Another wonder is if Ricciardo would have made T1 or hit MV on turn in anyway. I'm rather undecided but it's only a two point swing either way for the WDC and the WCC remains unaffected for RBR. For everybody else it's proper Mystic Meg stuff and we could argue until FP1 in Spain and still not agree. Bottas was the only runner not to have pitted at the time of the RB collision.

I think it would be nailed on Vettel winning, I think Bottas would have passed Hamilton on fresh UltraSofts and LH would have finished 3rd, Verstappen 4th, Ricciardo 5th, Raikkonen 6th. As of the collision, Perez was 7th, Groan was 8th, Sainz 9th and Leclerc 10th. As they were strung out it's easier to assume they would finish in that order.

WDC:
1st- Vettel 87pts
2nd- Verstappen 61pts
3rd- Hamilton 58pts
4th-Bottas 55pts
5th- Ricciardo 38pts
6th-Raikkonen 26pts
7th-Hulkenberg 18pts
8th-Alonso 16pts
9th-Gasly - 10pts
10th- Magnussen 9pts
11th- Perez- 6pts
12th- Sainz- 5pts
13th - VanDoorne 4pts
14th- Grosjean 4pts
15th- Ericsson 1pt
16th- LeClerc 1pt

WCC:

1st- Ferrari 113
2nd-Mercedes 113
3rd- RedBull 99
4th- Renault 23
5th- Mclaren 22
6th- Haas 13
7th- Torro Rosso 10
8th- Force India 6
9th-Sauber 2

It's a bit 'butterfly effect' but just one man has made an enormous difference to both tables by driving like a prat. Feel free to pick this apart though. It is interesting to compare the real tables vs my auntie's bks tables, of note:

Vettel- 87 points in the AB table, and leading Verstappen by over a race win vs trailing Hamilton by 4 IRL.
Verstappen has really hurt himself 61 points on the AB table vs 18 IRL.
Bottas would also have 55pts on AB vs 40pts IRL.

Amazingly Ricciardo would only have one extra point if my auntie had testicles.

Winner of Max being a tit is Kimi, which seems fitting, 48pts IRL vs just 26pts AB.
Hamilton has also cleaned up and his 'granny on board' style has paid off big time, 70pts IRL vs 58pts on the AB table.

WCC- RBR obviously have lost loads of points, 44 of them, Merc are 3 points down. All of these are spread among the rest of the field with Mclaren, Renault and Force India collecting many of them.

Vettel would be running away with it this year, and Hamilton is right that it's a genuine 3 way fight between RBR, Ferrari and Merc teams but I think the big fight would be for 2nd place.

I reckon that's a reasonable set of assumptions there. Obviously there are a million different scenarios that could've happened but yours do seem very likely

[Dr Z]

E34-3.2 said:

I think that Max makes huge mistakes and hardly learn from it but what about Vettel?

His move on Bottas was terrible. He even mentioned that that he knew that his tires were cold, so how come he didn't wait for the next lap knowing that Ferrari have the upper hand on Mercedes at the moment?

Think about how you'd react if you were in a Merc sandwich knowing that it's possible for the lead Merc to back you up into the Merc behind, around the tight castle section/sector 2 so you'd be vulnerable to attack in sector 3 & 1 where you know the Mercs are quicker than you.

You'd want to get past the lead Merc asap and disappear into the distance.

Perhaps the slight miscalculation in that, is assuming that Bottas would play that kind of games.

/Just trying to offer another perspective

[HustleRussell]

I don't know how people can attack Vettel, as has already been pointed out everybody in here lambasted Bottas for not making a go of it in Bahrain. Vettel tried, failed and was magnanimous in failure- what's wrong with that?

Vettel's change in mindset since Baku last year strikes a stark contrast and I'm impressed with him again as I was in 2015.

[anonymous-user]

HustleRussell said:

I don't know how people can attack Vettel, as has already been pointed out everybody in here lambasted Bottas for not making a go of it in Bahrain. Vettel tried, failed and was magnanimous in failure- what's wrong with that?

Vettel's change in mindset since Baku last year strikes a stark contrast and I'm impressed with him again as I was in 2015.

You’re right. Nothing wrong, at least he tried.

[Vocal Minority]

Becasue Vettel is a favoured punch bag round these parts.

Double standards shouldn't obstruct a good old lambasting.

Nice effort Gaz - interesting thought exercise.

[kambites]

REALIST123 said:

You’re right. Nothing wrong, at least he tried.

It was a bit ham-fisted but I'm sure he felt it would be his only chance and decided it was worth the risk... the difference between first and second is bigger than the difference between second and fourth and almost as big as the points difference between second and fifth so you can see why he went for it.

[TheInternet]

HustleRussell said:

I don't know how people can attack Vettel, as has already been pointed out everybody in here lambasted Bottas for not making a go of it in Bahrain. Vettel tried, failed and was magnanimous in failure- what's wrong with that?

Vettel's change in mindset since Baku last year strikes a stark contrast and I'm impressed with him again as I was in 2015.

Not that I have attacked Vettel, but if I were to do so it would be to point out that his main championship rivals were all behind him and the move was not good on a risk/reward basis. It's not a very strong argument as has been pointed out above.

[Jabbah]

HustleRussell said:

I don't know how people can attack Vettel, as has already been pointed out everybody in here lambasted Bottas for not making a go of it in Bahrain. Vettel tried, failed and was magnanimous in failure- what's wrong with that?

Vettel's change in mindset since Baku last year strikes a stark contrast and I'm impressed with him again as I was in 2015.

The scenarios aren't the same IMO. Massive tyre disparity and last lap vs similar cold tyres / brakes and multiple laps left. The Ferraris were quicker in sector 2 than the Mercs so were in less danger of DRS and would more than likely have had DRS too. Any attempt by Bottas to back Vettel towards Hamilton would likely have put Bottas at higher risk and therefore unlikely to try. I don't think it was crazy to try but it was a high risk move and Vettel paid the price, something that potentially cost him in the fight for the WDC last year. Would people attack Vettel so much if there was only 1 lap left at the restart? I don't think so.

[VladD]

Jabbah said:

HustleRussell said:

I don't know how people can attack Vettel, as has already been pointed out everybody in here lambasted Bottas for not making a go of it in Bahrain. Vettel tried, failed and was magnanimous in failure- what's wrong with that?

Vettel's change in mindset since Baku last year strikes a stark contrast and I'm impressed with him again as I was in 2015.

The scenarios aren't the same IMO. Massive tyre disparity and last lap vs similar cold tyres / brakes and multiple laps left. The Ferraris were quicker in sector 2 than the Mercs so were in less danger of DRS and would more than likely have had DRS too. Any attempt by Bottas to back Vettel towards Hamilton would likely have put Bottas at higher risk and therefore unlikely to try. I don't think it was crazy to try but it was a high risk move and Vettel paid the price, something that potentially cost him in the fight for the WDC last year. Would people attack Vettel so much if there was only 1 lap left at the restart? I don't think so.

I think Vettel has the mindset this year that he needs to try and take every opportunity. I can see Merc sorting out their tyre issues in the next couple of races and having the best car for the second half of the season, so Vettel needs to make hay while the sun shines.

[Derek Smith]

I've rerun the Vettel locking up a few times and have a few observations.

I agree that he deserves a bonus point for having a go. That's what I like (liked?) about Hamilton. He was looking for a gap. He got a great tow, despite Bottas pulling off his, what is now normal, great restart. I thought initially that Vettel was too far back to challenge into the first corner but the Ferrari is fast.

It was, I think, an error on his behalf. He should have waited. Had he done so, I think the long straights would have given him the opportunity to pass without giving Hamilton a similar advantage.

Hamilton dropped back as soon as Vettel positioned for the pass. The move also blocked Raikk. If the two in front of him had had problems during the pass, he would have been in a position to take advantage. This is not him of old. Much more sensible driving and likely to keep him within striking distance for when Merc eventually get their tyre management going.

I miss Hamilton.

[Hungrymc]

Seb had to have a go there.

Lewis had got partially alongside on the outside but had to pull back into the double tow from Bottas and Seb. He only gives up on trying to pass Seb moments before Seb goes to the inside (Lewis also looked to the inside). I think if Seb had just sat behind Valtteri, he’d most likely have had Lewis alongside and past anyway.

The gap to Lewis looks pretty big by the time it all gets fractious, but that’s only because Lewis lifts a little early and Seb brakes far too late.

I like the cut of Seb’s jib at the moment, and I’ve no doubt we’ll see the fiery Lewis plenty this year as well.... Add DR and Max (for the random chaos) and we might be in for a special year. The only worry I have is that these cars all struggling in dirty air might make the bad circuits worse. We need some exciting tyre choices to make up for that.