Drive to Survive Season 3

[Leithen]

Half way through and enjoying it.

Wolff remains difficult to warm to, probably great fun though after a bottle of Jaegermeister each.

Horner still smug, but then he's in a difficult position.

Binotto treading deep st in the knowledge that eventually he's going under.

Otmar Szafnauer still has the best best name despite Gunther's best efforts. Don't fancy his job working for Stroll though, who does the badass billionaire schtick so well. Almost looks like he wears eye shadow though. Gomez?

Ricciardo has the look of someone who knows the jig's almost up.

Can't help but like Bottas. Same for Vettel. I'll start liking Leclerc more in about six years time after his Ferrari contract has ended.

Ferrari still the outsiders. They need to work harder at winding the rest of the paddock up though. So much mileage there. So much fun.

I suspect Zak is great fun. No Jaegermeister required.

[miniman]

Leithen said:

Ricciardo has the look of someone who knows the jig's almost up.

I thought he came across increasingly like a massive arse.

[CustardOnChips]

miniman said:

I thought he came across increasingly like a massive arse.

I've never particularly warmed to him and think hes slightly overrated. I think there is a lot of playing up to the cameras and he's cultivated himself a nice image. He reminds me a lot of Phil Mickelson. Smiles for the punters, but a bit of a dick.

[snowen250]

Through my job I've met Zak Brown a few times. Comes across exactly like he does in the show. Like a genuinely nice chap, a real enthusiast and someone who cares about both the brand he is entrusted to look after and the results they get. Seems a good egg. I think the Netflix portrayal accurately reflects him, at least in my interactions with him.

Simon

[DanielSan]

cgt2 said:

DanielSan said:

Stroll is building Aston Martin's brand by putting their name on an F1 team, part of that brand building is getting a 4x WC to drive the car. Vettel will always be infinitely more marketable to F1 fans around the world than Perez will be and infinitely more marketable to a car company purely because he's a 4x WC.
There's no way Stroll isn't serious about the F1 team or they wouldn't have had massive updates to the factory even before the Aston deal was announced, but he's also very serious about turning Aston into something a lot bigger than they are currently. I hope he achieves success with both to be honest. It would be nice to see the old Jordan/FI team being successful more consistently.

I hope you're right but every time I see the car I'm reminded of Jaguar. Apart from the colour, the MO was pretty much identical with Ford coming in, huge aspirations, world champs within three years etc etc etc. We all know what happened there and F1 is vastly more complicated and expensive now.

They've always been consistently the most efficient when it comes to performance per $/£ in the paddock, aslong as that efficency remains but with the freedom to expand on developments they're in the perfect place especially with the 'cost cap' that's now in place.

[HardtopManual]

CustardOnChips said:

I've never particularly warmed to him and think hes slightly overrated. I think there is a lot of playing up to the cameras and he's cultivated himself a nice image.

He was a breath of fresh air in 2014, but he's in his thirties now and still has a 12 year old boy's sense of humour.

He also clearly told Cyril A a pack of lies about his level of commitment to a long term project, when they took him on.

[ch37]

HardtopManual said:

He was a breath of fresh air in 2014, but he's in his thirties now and still has a 12 year old boy's sense of humour.

He also clearly told Cyril A a pack of lies about his level of commitment to a long term project, when they took him on.

There is an assumption that Lando and he will get on like a house on fire but I think that's a long, long way off the mark, if anything I think the opposite. Doesn't seem like much in common there apart from both being up for a bit of banter. Lando and Carlos are good friends away from the track (despite the angle Netflix weirdly tried to go for), along with Alex Albon and George Russell. I don't really get (at all) where the assumption that Daniel slots into that group comes from!

[mick987]

I thought Carlos came out of the program well, comes from a wealthy family but did not seem to have a sense of entitlement unlike Stroll who give the impression the world owes him a favour.

[honda_exige]

HardtopManual said:

He was a breath of fresh air in 2014, but he's in his thirties now and still has a 12 year old boy's sense of humour.

He also clearly told Cyril A a pack of lies about his level of commitment to a long term project, when they took him on.

Erm how would you know he told him a pack of lies? He signed a 2 year contract. That couldn't be more clear that it's I'll give you a couple of years and we'll see how we go. I mean Cyril has been sacked and it looks like Renault are close to losing interest so he's probably been proved correct. He's signed a 3yr McLaren deal on a lessor wage so that's a bigger commitment.

[kiseca]

CustardOnChips said:

miniman said:

I thought he came across increasingly like a massive arse.

I've never particularly warmed to him and think hes slightly overrated. I think there is a lot of playing up to the cameras and he's cultivated himself a nice image. He reminds me a lot of Phil Mickelson. Smiles for the punters, but a bit of a dick.

I don't think he's overrated, personally. I think he's one of the quickest and most consistent drivers on the grid. I'd only comfortably put Lewis and Max above him, and Max only because I've been convinced by others on PH that he's more consistent now than he was when they were teammates. Max is certainly no slower than he was so that extra experience and consistency would now give him the edge IMO.

I'm pretty sure Ricciardo is going to quickly establish himself over Lando as the team's best driver.

This season will give a bit more food for thought I suppose but I think unless he gets paired with another top driver in the next couple of years, we'll never know which of us two has called it correctly

As a person I must say I like the way he comes across on Netflix, He just seems like a guy who is a bit of fun, maybe could get a bit annoying, but I dunno. To me he seems like a nice and honest guy. Norris seems a lot nicer though. I don't think he's the next big thing in F1, more Button than Hamilton talent wise, but what a character! I'd like to see him do well more because of who he is than for what he does behind the wheel.

[ch37]

kiseca said:

Norris seems a lot nicer though. I don't think he's the next big thing in F1, more Button than Hamilton talent wise, but what a character! I'd like to see him do well more because of who he is than for what he does behind the wheel.

Episode 2 did hit home really nicely the drama of him getting within 5 seconds of Hamilton in Austria to get his first podium. Short of showing all of those laps with team radio (which has cropped up on this forum a few times) I thought it was conveyed really well, and exciting to watch.

[defblade]

Binged the whole lot over the weekend.

Probably down to covid, but it just didn't gel so well for me as the last 2; too many gaps, too much jumping back and forth between the same races.
Just hoping the racing will make up for this slight disappointment!

Oh, and I saw nothing to change my poor opinion of Horner - for most of the the other teams - drivers and TPs - it's "we did well" or "we underperformed today"... when Albon got a poor finish, from Horner it's "he had a st race". 100% toxic blame game, whilst smiling at the cameras saying "everyone here wants him to do well."

[kiseca]

ch37 said:

kiseca said:

Norris seems a lot nicer though. I don't think he's the next big thing in F1, more Button than Hamilton talent wise, but what a character! I'd like to see him do well more because of who he is than for what he does behind the wheel.

Episode 2 did hit home really nicely the drama of him getting within 5 seconds of Hamilton in Austria to get his first podium. Short of showing all of those laps with team radio (which has cropped up on this forum a few times) I thought it was conveyed really well, and exciting to watch.

Yes and he has his moments of genius too. He did really well that race. Would love to see him pull off races like that regularly as his experience grows.

[paulguitar]

ch37 said:

Worth a watch... https://youtu.be/2brvJ3OHUWE, I appreciate that doesn't fit the narrative though.

Also had a look back to the actual driver radio 'whilst Grosjean burns alive', Lewis immediately says "everyone ok?", then follows up with "is everyone ok?" again when no info is coming through. Remember he was ahead so wouldn't have seen much/anything compared to several other drivers at the time.

Lewis gives the impression of being obviously concerned when there is an incident to hear that the drivers involved are okay. There's not much point in trying to reason with people who see the whole of the sport (and in some cases life itself) through an anti-Hamilton prism though.


As far as season 3 goes, I've enjoyed it but been more frustrated this time by the silly sound-effects and in particular the clumsy audio editing. Having an engineer in the pits supposedly telling a driver on a qualifying lap that he has to 'push all the way to the line' is just insulting the audience.

[HardtopManual]

honda_exige said:

Erm how would you know he told him a pack of lies? He signed a 2 year contract. That couldn't be more clear that it's I'll give you a couple of years and we'll see how we go. I mean Cyril has been sacked and it looks like Renault are close to losing interest so he's probably been proved correct. He's signed a 3yr McLaren deal on a lessor wage so that's a bigger commitment.

There was an understanding that he would stick around if Renault made progress. They scored twice as many constructors' points in 2020 as they did in 2019, DR suffered far fewer retirements, just one IIRC, he got on the podium twice, and had a few 4th places.

You don't think that losing DR, who they had invested 50 million Euros in, was a big factor in Cyril getting the boot?

[TheDeuce]

HardtopManual said:

honda_exige said:

Erm how would you know he told him a pack of lies? He signed a 2 year contract. That couldn't be more clear that it's I'll give you a couple of years and we'll see how we go. I mean Cyril has been sacked and it looks like Renault are close to losing interest so he's probably been proved correct. He's signed a 3yr McLaren deal on a lessor wage so that's a bigger commitment.

There was an understanding that he would stick around if Renault made progress. They scored twice as many constructors' points in 2020 as they did in 2019, DR suffered far fewer retirements, just one IIRC, he got on the podium twice, and had a few 4th places.

You don't think that losing DR, who they had invested 50 million Euros in, was a big factor in Cyril getting the boot?

Hang on... Saying they scored twice as many points in 2020 as 2019 is a little disingenuous - 2019 was a let down for Renault and DR, and 2020 was simply slightly less st in terms of points. Surely the key factor is that they slipped back in terms of overall competitiveness. I doubt very much that the progress he was hoping for was to be overtaken routinely by a teenager in his teams customer car..

DR had to leave RB as he had zero chance of a title there, and any extremely remote chance of a title elsewhere was better than zero at RB. He went to Renault as he was offered mega-bucks, which he took as any sane person would. God alone knows why Cyril offered such a salary, it can only be that he really did believe that they would be more competitive than they turned out - I really can't understand why, he obviously knew how little they were investing in their 2019 car, and subsequently the 2020 car.

The bit that makes no sense is Cyril's decisions, and surprise surprise, he's the guy that is no longer in the paddock. My feeling regards DR is that he had nowhere particularly useful to go to for 2019 so he went to the place that would pay him daft £££. There's nothing dishonest about that, just common sense

[Leithen]

TheDeuce said:

God alone knows why Cyril offered such a salary, it can only be that he really did believe that they would be more competitive than they turned out - I really can't understand why, he obviously knew how little they were investing in their 2019 car, and subsequently the 2020 car.

How little?

[TheDeuce]

Leithen said:

TheDeuce said:

God alone knows why Cyril offered such a salary, it can only be that he really did believe that they would be more competitive than they turned out - I really can't understand why, he obviously knew how little they were investing in their 2019 car, and subsequently the 2020 car.

How little?

Well, both seasons the car was hardly evolved at all - and of course the same this season but that's somewhat excused by the fact it has to be the 'same' car etc.

In 19' and 20' the general consensus was that they'd done very little, and certainly less than any other team with realistic ambitions of climbing the order. It's as if Renault checked out of the battle to evolve in order to divert resource to the 2021 spec change a year earlier than their competitors - but as it's turned out the spec change is now delayed until 2022, so in all they'll have been out of the mix for three years by the time the new spec comes in. Hope they at least make it count in the end!

[Teddy Lop]

HardtopManual said:

There was an understanding that he would stick around if Renault made progress. They scored twice as many constructors' points in 2020 as they did in 2019, DR suffered far fewer retirements, just one IIRC, he got on the podium twice, and had a few 4th places.

You don't think that losing DR, who they had invested 50 million Euros in, was a big factor in Cyril getting the boot?

Danny joined a team in the ascendancy who did a u turn with constant questions about the parent companies willingness, and by the time the 2020 season was with us had already signed for McLaren. Ruthless? I guess so, so what? Its probably his last shot... This is F1, hello and welcome.

[Dashnine]

ch37 said:

The crew can't be with every team every race, I imagine there are agreements with teams made well in advance to follow them closely at a particular race, and this season more than ever COVID protocols would probably have thrown the idea of being a bit more dynamic/reactive out of the window.

Switching to in depth of coverage of Mercedes when there are a couple of days notice of George being in the car just isn't going to happen.

I also think some here are missing the point that this isn't a show for a forum full of people discussing technical details of F1, or hundreds of posts discussing Lewis' hair/fashion.

Will Buxton has a YT vid explaining how Netflix went about filming in 2020. They had a roaming paddock crew doing the eavesdropping, and two crews embedded with different teams each race weekend. The embedded teams, like the photographer assigned to each team have to wear the teams gear for the weekend so it’s clear they’re part of the team bubble that weekend. So if something happens in another team, like Russell and Mercedes or the Hulk super subs and they’re not embedded in the relevant team that weekend then there’s no coverage.