Lance Stroll

[HustleRussell]

Jacques Villeneuve, like myself, gave Stroll the benefit of the doubt as he was announced as Williams driver. Yes, it was common knowledge that Papa Stroll was paying an unprecedented (?) amount of money to put him there but Lance does at least have some racing achievements to his name even if they too were bought and paid for to an extent. Many people are still finding bits of egg up their nostrils having panned 'too young' Max Verstappen.

Being that Stroll scored his first points at the weekend, fellow Canadian Villeneuve's proclamation that Lance Stroll might be the worst rookie in F1 history is as curiously timed as it is scathing.

I too have changed my opinion. Lance is not ready for F1. It puts me on edge to see onboard video from his car- he looks exactly like a wide-eyed kid with far too much car under him, even if out of the car he is managing the disappointments and criticisms very professionally.

Papa Stroll's significant donation also ensured that Lance wouldn't be teamed with another young driver who would show him up so instead he is being shown up by out-of-retirement Felipe Massa.

I am still waiting for significant improvement from Lance for Williams' sake... but I will be astounded if he finds himself gainfully employed in the sport at any point?

[HustleRussell]

Called it in Friday testing over in the Azerbaijan Grand Prix thread;

HustleRussell said:

Stroll's Canada confidence boost has helped, he's only 7/10ths slower than Massa- and I presume Baku is new to him?

Mixed feelings about the race, I wanted Massa and the Force Indias in the race, once again we also lost Verstappen etc... but meanwhile, Lance Stroll managed to dodge all the carnage, keep it pointing in the right direction and bring it home for a podium.

I don't think a miracle has occurred but I think we can expect to see Stroll appearing in more Q3s and scoring more points from now on.

[HustleRussell]

Frimley111R said:

TBH Massa is outdoing Stroll and until he can be consistently faster why keep the new boy if he's not fast? Heck, Massa could be it F1 for years if he keeps beating his team mates. I bet JB would have out performed VanD too.

I like Massa but Stroll comfortably outqualified him in Baku and kept him honest in the race, I feel that we won't be seeing Massa embarrassing Stroll from now on in the same way he was before Canada.

[HustleRussell]

Frimley111R said:

CraigyMc said:

HustleRussell said:

I like Massa but Stroll comfortably outqualified him in Baku and kept him honest in the race, I feel that we won't be seeing Massa embarrassing Stroll from now on in the same way he was before Canada.

Based on one abnormal track (in that Baku has no fast corners or technical sections) and ignoring the previous seven outings to that?
I recon Stroll will be nowhere at SIlverstone. It'll be interesting to see how he does in Austria beforehand.

Indeed, and as for 'comfortably outqualified him in Baku' he was P8 and Massa was P9! You only have to go one race back to see what 'comfortably outqualified him' means (Massa P7, Stroll P17).

I had a look back over the results and you are both of course correct, I must’ve mis-remembered the qualifying times. A pivotal weekend for the Williams pair, Massa’s DNF swung the championship points advantage Stroll’s way where Massa should’ve scored 18 extra points were it not for his suspension failure.

I reckon there are a few factors influencing Stroll’s comments on Massa; the Strolls are probably trying to position Lance as de facto number one driver- Lance probably doesn’t want to appear as though he was dependent on Massa because in his mind he beat Massa over the season fair and square. Also obviously I’m speculating here but Massa probably didn’t give a fk particularly towards the end as he was once again heading towards redundancy, plus he may well harbour some level of resentment towards Lance for obvious reasons. He certainly became vocal about the strength of his contribution to the team and his prospective replacements at the time.

Massa has responded to Stroll’s comments on twitter apparently with some disbelief so I imagine Massa was helpful to Stroll in some way and Stroll’s comments are only half true and engineered with some political agenda.

I have to say that based on what I've heard from Stroll in the press he has all the arrogance of a future world champion if not the talent.