Lance Stroll, Williams, Monza, 2018

Stroll: Williams deserves Monza result after tough season

RaceFans Round-up

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In the round-up: Lance Stroll said Williams’ second foray into the points this year at Monza was deserved after the difficult season they have endured.

What they say

Stroll was speak before Romain Grosjean’s disqualification promoted him to ninth and team mate Sergey Sirotkin to 10th:

It was a great race, great weekend. yesterday we nailed it, today we nailed it.

It looked pretty straightforward, started 10th, finished 10th, but there’s a lot more to it. We’ve been really struggling all year and we’ve had a tough run but it feels really good to be back in the points.

The team deserves it and we definitely have to celebrate in style tonight.

Quotes: Dieter Rencken

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Comment of the day

Is Lando Norris the next big thing? Not everyone thinks so:

I am curious what did they find in Norris? I watched all F2 races this season, and I see no reason at all why I would sign Norris. I’d sign Russell no question asked.

Norris won a single race in F2. Other than that win, Norris never was even close to winning another race. Norris doesn’t know what to do in races, he can’t handle races well, he just destroys his tyres. I don’t see any racecraft from Norris as I saw him laps after laps after laps behind a slower racer when he was clearly faster. Norris has also made a few really stupid mistakes. I don’t see any speed from Norris, as he loses four qualifications in a row to his team mate Camara.

What I see is a blown out of proportion hype around Norris who didn’t achieve anything this year. And everyone seem to ignore Russell, who has four races less experience in F2 than Norris, yet he accomplished much more in F2 than his overhyped rival.
Sviat

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Keith Collantine
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47 comments on “Stroll: Williams deserves Monza result after tough season”

  1. I really hope that Claire trough a He…. heck of a party for the whole team. They deserve it.
    They may finish in last place (someone is going to do it …) but keep this up and there will be a few more points to brag about. Hope they can end the season on a high note.

    1. @rekibsn I agree. Somehow, we see teams like single entities, sometimes they look good, sometimes they look evil or bad or stupid or whatever. But along with some surely perfectible manager there are hundreds of people working hard, probably nights and weekends, at the factory or at the track. People at Williams or McLaren are also paying the price of working for companies with a big name and heritage that, somehow, are going through difficult times. I really hope that these two teams will return to fight for a win.

    2. @rekibsn I’d rather see her quit that job and make room for some fresh ideas. She can stay at Williams but in a different capacity. If her last name weren’t “Williams” she would have been terminated a while ago.

  2. “Hope they can end the season on a high note.” – Ditto.
    “. . . hope that Claire trough a He….” – Don’t understand.

    1. ‘Throws a heck of a party’. Throws it right through the English spelling bee festivities. ;-)

      1. lol…

    2. As someone who’s not a native English speaker I would guess that it was meant to be the past tense, aiming at “threw”. How I hated those irregular verbs when I had to memorize the list :-)..

      1. Nothing irregular about having a party following an unexpected success. Yes, the team deserves it.
        Know more of the spelling issues. Threw and through.

        We may all have expectations and thoughts on how teams, management, FIA etc. could or should be run. Yep, that is what this forum is here for.
        Some of the best “managers” and leaders are the ones that don’t necessarily do the work, but manage and coordinate those that do. Colin Chapman was a hands-on do-it himself sort of bloke. Sir Frank likely more of a coordinator and facilitator. Both amazing successes.
        Claire will be finding her own path, and something that we should all recognize, there is no one with more to loose than Claire Williams in all of this. Yes, I would give anything to have her position and role, but I’m not sure I would want to take on what she is up against. Great adversity builds great leaders.

  3. Interesting viewpoints in the motorsport article regarding Kimi as a #2 driver. In short, it seems like they’re claiming that Vettel needs more support as a driver than someone like Hamilton does. Since Seb is making mistakes under pressure, Kimi needs to be the man to ease pressure and play a role similar to what Bottas played at Monza.

    Honestly, I don’t think the points mentioned in the article actually justify why Kimi should be a number 2 driver for Ferrari. It actually provides more reasons to why Vettel shouldn’t be the person leading Ferraris charge.

    1. Well said @todfod; we tend to think Seb’s pace is higher than kimis’ but in the rain that seems questionable this year, and though Kimi has had problems getting it right in Q3, the reason we notice is that he was right on, if not faster than Seb until then. If he also needs lots of support, hmmm.

      One could say Kimi is the one who’s Ferrari’s latest champion, after all (and he got there by being there when others failed).

      1. @bosyber

        Agree. Also feel that if Ferrari are adopting a clear #1 driver policy, which includes – car is designed around one particular driver, all the best engineers/mechanics are given to one driver, the race strategy is always favoured for one particular driver, etc. … then they better make sure that the driver is significantly better than the #2 driver.

        In Vettel’s case, although his qualifying record is impressive, he just doesn’t seem any better than Kimi on Sundays. I would go as far as saying that Kimi’s race craft and maturity is way superior to Vettel’s. Alonso was clearly a few leagues above Massa and Raikonnen when he raced against them. They weren’t a match in qualifying.. they weren’t a match on race pace.. they weren’t a match on race craft.. they weren’t a match on consistency. It made sense to adopt a #1 driver approach during those years.

        If Ferrari really want to win a championship, their choices seem obvious – either stick with the #1 driver policy and hire a better #1 driver… or hire the 2 best possible drivers they can and keep them on equal terms (like they did in 2007.. ironically when Kimi them the last WDC)

        1. @todfod @bosyber
          I somehow agree, but you’re missing one important piece: Kimi is unable to win. I would never, ever count on him to win WDC because you need what, 8-9 first places to achieve that? Last Kimi’s win was in 2013. He never won in the hybrid era. We can joke on Ferrari screwing his strategy or him being unfortunate from time to time but zero wins in 5 years must mean something.

          My fear is that the reason we love Kimi is also what stopped him from winning more in recent years. His attitude. He doesn’t give a fu**. I can’t count how many races he clearly showed that he wasn’t going to fight.

          History showed that in normal conditions you can’t beat Hamilton on Mercedes. I always keep Rosberg’s year as a reference, he needed to go above and beyond, to the point that he retired from the sport after beating Lewis. I think Seb has almost what he needs, but not enough. I don’t see anyone else on the grid better than Seb to beat Lewis (probably Alonso, but he’s leaving). Also, I don’t think Seb is ready to change, that’s why he needs a wingman to help him. I’m fine with that, as a Ferrari fan all I want is to bring back the championships.

          After Monza, my fear is that this trend could go on indefinitely and that we need a change to break it. Granted, another season with this couple and we’ll be in the same situation: Seb will always make mistakes, Kimi will always be unable to constantly win and be a WDC contender, Lewis will always be almost perfect. My hope is that introducing Leclerc will lead to a) have for a couple of seasons a second driver who’s learning and growing without the pressure to be WDC and b) after a couple of years have a new first driver to replace Vettel.

          1. You are right.. even Bottas has his occasional win. Not winning in an Ferrari is simply bad.

          2. @m-bagattini

            I think you’ve misunderstood me. I’m not saying keep Kimi on equal terms with Seb would result in Kimi taking the championship. I don’t think that will happen. My point was if they want to keep a #1 driver approach then there should be someone much better than Vettel in that #1 seat.

            If they want to adopt a 2 driver approach (like in 2007), then they should go for the 2 best drivers they can find. I don’t think Kimi should be in that 2 driver approach.. as he just isn’t winning, but a Ricciardo/Vettel or Ricciardo/Alonso pairing on equal terms would be much more interesting.

        2. Agree, especially when you compare their records together, after all Kimi is the one bringing in victories in the last few years.

          Oh boy how I wish that was true, but you just have to look at the numbers to see how far fetched this is. You guys are saying too, Vettel has been dominating quali.

          Vettel is having the worst season since he joined Ferrari, probably his worst season overall (and still comfortably ahead of his teammate) this argument is just wishful thinking on your part @todfod. Alonso wouldn’t be able to do any better, but he would point his finger to the car.

          How things stand, probably Hamilton would be leading if he was in the Ferrari, comparing their momentum, and that Ferrari and Merceses are practically on the same pace, whith some tracks favouring one or the other.

          Not to forget as well that while Vettel has preferencial treatment, the support he gets is no way near the same as enjoyed by Alonso or Schumacher, even though that’s what the media keeps selling. Hell even Hamilton has had more help from Bottas

          1. @m-bagattini, @johnmilk “one could” doesn’t mean that one should – I more or less agree with what you are saying (got into a heated thread on twitter even about it, when after Spa Kimi fans were blaming the team for having him be hit and out bc. they screwed his quali – argued he did that himself plenty too and wouldn’t win again, lol@monza then …)

            I have read several people being surprised about Vettel’s mistakes (worse season in the sport etc.) but let’s not forget that in 2009, 2010, yes, he did suffer from unreliability too, but especially in the earlier parts of those seasons, he made quite a few racing mistakes (spearing Button in Spa, for example), which is why he didn’t win 2009 and only won 2010 in the final race. Sure, he was young, and we thought he had grown out of it, but he wasn’t flawless in 2014 either. So, let’s indeed hope that Leclerc proves an adequate addition to the team, capable of taking over the fight if the other driver isn’t there that day.

          2. @johnmilk

            Dude.. I think you’ve got me all wrong. I honestly don’t think Kimi is good enough to win WDCs anymore, and I wouldn’t count on him winning any more races even if Seb and him were racing on equal terms. I’m just evaluating Ferrari’s driver strategy. If you have a #1 driver approach.. then you better make sure that your #1 driver can really deliver. If they want a 2 driver approach then hire the two best drivers on the grid on equal terms. Kimi wouldn’t make the cut, but an Alonso / Ricciardo line up would be a whole lot more promising than Vettel / Raikonnen.

            In reply to some of your other comments –

            Vettel is having the worst season since he joined Ferrari, probably his worst season overall (and still comfortably ahead of his teammate) this argument is just wishful thinking on your part @todfod. Alonso wouldn’t be able to do any better, but he would point his finger to the car.

            Actually … Vettel was pretty bad in 2016 as well.. and nothing spectacular last year either. Come to think of it.. he was poor in 2014… fairly mediocre for most of 2012… 2010 as well. In short, maybe he isn’t the awesome as you think.

            Regarding whether Alonso would be doing better.. none of us can predict exactly what would happen. All we can do is look at how Alonso performed when he was with Ferrari, and how he stacked up against Kimi (the common benchmark) and compare that to how Vettel has fared in both areas. I think it’s fair to say that Alonso was far superior in his performances for Ferrari.. and far more convincing in his thrashing of Kimi than Vettel has ever been. I’d have to disagree with you and say that Alonso would 100% be performing better than Vettel in a Ferrari this year and most certainly leading the championship at this point in time.

            Not to forget as well that while Vettel has preferencial treatment, the support he gets is no way near the same as enjoyed by Alonso or Schumacher, even though that’s what the media keeps selling. Hell even Hamilton has had more help from Bottas

            Completely unfounded statement again. Do you know something we don’t?

          3. @todfod I forgot the advise I gave myself, and honestly just by looking at your profile picture it should be enough to remember me, but well I’ve already entered this mess, so better as well have some fun out of it

            2016 I don’t know what was so abysmal, apart from the Mexico meltdown. He was out-qualified by Kimi overall but clearly the best on Sunday. He was poor in 2014 that is a given. Mediocracy in 2012 and winning the championship says as much about his competition if you ask me, same for 2010.

            Also I don’t think he is awesome, my twisted mind doesn’t think any of them are awesome for some reason. He certainly is one of the best on the grid, if your eyes allow you to see it.

            I also don’t understand why Alonso’s near misses make him so great while for the other it is the other way around. Is it because of the constant “best lap of my life” “the most out of this car” kind of remarks? Maybe it is

            Regarding whether Alonso would be doing better.. none of us can predict exactly what would happen.

            I’d have to disagree with you and say that Alonso would 100% be performing better than Vettel in a Ferrari this year and most certainly leading the championship at this point in time.

            So you can predict?

            Completely unfounded statement again. Do you know something we don’t?

            I’ve been watching some F1 myself dude..

          4. and BTW Vettel/Ricciardo together at Ferrari that would’ve been great.
            Vettel/Alonso too, that would be even greater, considering how Kimoa can’t look at finger boy’s face. What about Vettel in a Kimoa hat? Oh joy

          5. @johnmilk

            2016 I don’t know what was so abysmal, apart from the Mexico meltdown. He was out-qualified by Kimi overall but clearly the best on Sunday.

            Let’s see… a driver who has a car designed around him.. best mechanics on his side.. and all the support you can ask for, gets out qualified by a washed up driver who gets a fraction of his support. I guess you’ve proven my point.

            I also don’t understand why Alonso’s near misses make him so great while for the other it is the other way around

            Sure.. maybe you don’t understand. Let me explain -> Alonso took the championship down to the last race in a car that was arguably the 3rd fastest (to maybe even 4th fastest car on the grid). Vettel in 2017 has had the fastest (or maybe 2nd fastest) car on the grid that year… yet he failed to even come close to winning the championship. Vettel also has he fastest car on the grid in 2018.. but is trailing a driver in the 2nd fastest car in the WDC.

            I’ve been watching some F1 myself dude..

            So have I buddy…

          6. source of those claims “trust me” right @todfod?

            I will get back to discussing other things with you, I feel better

        3. @todfod

          They weren’t a match in qualifying.. they weren’t a match on race pace.. they

          That doesn’t mean that Seb won’t be a match for Alonso in Qualy or in races. It depends on mainly on the car. It also show that amazing crystal talent Fernando Alonso has. He will look quick whatever the car he’s driving.
          If you go back to 2012, Fernando’s best season in F1, at the end of the season Massa began to out qualify him constantly which was due to the updates that Ferrari brought to the car which made it more driveable.

          At the beginning of the 2012 season where Ferrari’s engineers still couldn’t figure out how the airflow is behaving on the F2012, Fernando was already leading the championship which is astonishing.
          As for Kimi being nowhere near Alonso in qualy, that was down most to the pull rod suspension which didn’t gave him the feeling he needs for the front end. Once Ferrari began to modify the suspension geometry in 2016, suddenly he came alive and when finally they got rid of it in 2017 and returned to the push rod suspension he even went faster. As for the SF-71H, the front end is absolutely neutral, and Kimi, unlike Seb, likes that neutrality which enable him to have that chirurgical precision when attacking fast corners, no wonder he was faster than Vettel most of the times in the fast sectors only to screw it by making a mistake. If you see his pole at Monza, he got it in Parabolica. It’s true that Kimi have lost some speed, but when he got the car at his like he remains one of the fastest guys on the grid.

          The car was never designed around Vettel, otherwise Kimi would have been struggling since they have very different driving styles. Marchionne ,hope he RIP though, was very clear with that regard. The engineers have to produce the fastest possible car. Vettel after testing said that he likes the car to be “spot on on the brakes” and the SF71-H is not. I though it was slow but Mark Hughes explained in an article in Motorsport Magazine what “Spot on on the brakes” mean for Vettel. He concluded that he got what he wanted in the end of 2012 from RBR engineers, can Ferrari engineers do that. I cannot dig deep through Motorsport Magazine articles now since I’m at work. I’ll do it later.

          1. @tifoso1989

            Dude.. I really don’t know if all if Kimi’s performances are just down to push and pull rod suspension changes. There are so many other factors that go in to every season.. tyres.. aero.. etc.

            The car was never designed around Vettel, otherwise Kimi would have been struggling since they have very different driving styles.

            I’m just not buying this explanation. From Ferrari’s perspective it just doesn’t make sense to design a car that doesn’t suit their #1 driver.

          2. @todfod
            Please find below the explanation why Vettel was struggling by Mark Hughes :
            https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/opinion/f1/vettels-ferrari-struggles
            Like I said, Ferrari have changed a lot under Marchionne’s leadership. He asked the engineers to produce the fastest possible car. He have already publicly criticized Vettel when he was nervous in 2016 and he have already took the decision to promote Leclerc in Ferrari. N°1 drivers policy was last used by Montezemolo with Fernando Alonso.

          3. @tifoso1989

            Went through the article…

            So what is it about this new car that isn’t giving him the old one’s messages and resultant confidence? What is clear from watching out on track is that the SF71 loses out to the Mercedes W09 in both slow corners and fast.

            Unfortunately… I couldn’t agree with any of it.

        4. There is little value in analysis like this one. I really like how Hamilton drove at monza but it’s funny how when Rosberg beat Hamilton in 2016 there was no talk of mistakes under pressure and how it’s part of the reason why Hamilton lost.No it was just because he had car trouble.Double standard in my opinion.

    2. Good point yeah.

  4. Stroll was speak before Romain Grosjean’s disqualification

    Why have Sunday’s news in a Wednesday round-up?

    1. Stroll’s comments were made on the record before the DQ- Stroll was talking about the race as it finished before the DQ was announced.

  5. Solid analyses of how and where Ferrari’s weekend unravelled by Chandhok. It started with limiting themselves with tyre choice (only one set of softs for Seb), then they probably made a mistake in not having Kimi giving Seb a tow, then they could have let Kimi give Seb space at the first corner, then Seb made his mistake that left him at the back, and then Kimi had to push too hard on those fresh softs after the stop.

  6. Surprisingly poor article on the Motor Sport website.

    Firstly, Bottas is no Barrichello – he has often been free to race Hamilton; however, at Monza he was once again clearly slower than Hamilton, behind him in the race and out of contention for the championship. So the team made a practical decision. Ferrari also have often used Raikkonen as a number two driver by putting him onto sub-optimal strategies and I would argue that the status of Bottas and Raikkonen is not much different. While I imagine that most fans (myself included) would be happier if the phrase “team orders” disappeared from F1 vocabulary completely, it is not going to happen. Still, there is a huge difference between how the ‘inferior’ drivers used to be treated by their teams in the past and what Mercedes and Ferrari are doing now.

    Also, this one:

    After Kimi emerged whole seconds ahead of Lewis after his pitstop it seemed to be over – there was no way Lewis would have been able to close the gap even to get into DRS range whence he could launch an attack [on Raikkonen]

    I would not be so sure about it. Raikkonen was generally slower than Hamilton throughout the whole race, had older tyres and pushed too hard during the first laps after the pit stop so it is very likely that Hamilton would ultimately have caught and passed him anyway; Bottas simply made the job easier.

    1. While I imagine that most fans (myself included) would be happier if the phrase “team orders” disappeared from F1 vocabulary completely, it is not going to happen.

      They tried it once @girts but then realized that teams would give pre-race team orders, or blatantly ignore the rule as did Ferrari.

    2. Well said @girts, that article did have some questionable analysis, unlike the great article on Channel 4 by Chandok, who almost always impresses with what he says about the race.

  7. Lando needs to get his scales looked at if he thinks he weighs more than Ricciardo, Hamilton, Sainz and Grosjean – all of which have a good 3-4″ on him in height and considerably more muscle mass (going off pictures).

  8. I couldn’t agree more with Montezemolo, and I can also agree with Raikkonen concerning the topic of the Autosport-article although whether it’s entirely acceptable practice depends on the case.
    – BTW, regarding the ‘On this day in F1’ section: It’s still two more years until the next ‘circular’ anniversary of Jochen Rindt’s fatal crash. Yes, you pointed it out last November (in the round-up of the 14th day) that it isn’t a ‘hard rule’ when it comes to this particular topic, but still, I can’t really understand making exceptions with a few certain anniversaries that are neither ‘circular’ nor ‘five-year’ anniversaries. I can understand making a few exceptions here and there concerning something that has happened a year ago, but not really when it’s about a 3rd (Bianchi’s death), 7th (Kubica’s F1-career ending rally accident), or 48th (today’s round-up), etc., anniversary. Still, two more years until things that happened in 2015 will become a priority in the round-ups, and three till the next time 2011 stuff will hold that status again (with the last time being 2016, of course), etc.

    1. I would say anniversaries that are only a few years ago, like Bianchi’s death and even Kubika’s accident, should be quite reasonable. And with Kubica moreover because he’s at the Williams team as a third driver, it is pretty relevant I feel. For longer ago things, I guess you have a point.

  9. Re. COTD, the poster bears a bitterness towards Lando Norris that is difficult to understand, earlier in the year almost every article on F2 included a comment denigrating Norris by the poster.

    It feels extreme, and I can only surmise that the poster has at some point competed against Norris in junior series and lost out I can’t really understand the level of bitterness and ill-feeling that is expressed! It’s almost like the poster is trying to convince the rest of us of the veracity of his opinion when it has the opposite affect!

    For sure Norris is rough at the edges, but McLaren must have seen potential in his performance, I would posit they have more data available than the poster on which to make a decision.

    1. Agreed. What I’ve seen from this year’s F2 season is very strong racecraft from Norris in a team that didn’t even compete last year. Just cause ART has the same chassis doesn’t mean the cars are set-up in the same way. Anyone who has followed GP2 and F2 should understand this. No Carlin driver has ever won the title.

      Having said that, the qualifying pace of Sette-Camera has been surprisingly strong in comparison to Norris, but this is more of reflection on how fast Sergio is rather how poor Norris.

      The COTD poster also didn’t bother to follow the 24 hours of Daytona evidently, or didn’t even know Norris was entered in it.

    2. Probably caused by the hyping. If drivers are overhyped the reaction often is negative. In the case of Norris there’s a lot of this happening. So i can understand the frustration when you compare the actual results with the hype.
      They do not match.

      1. Time will tell if the hype was justified.

      2. Hype including from Norris himself, who says he rates Vandoorne as one of the best drivers in F1, but wants to learn from his mistakes. Which is placing himself fairly high, I guess. And that after kindly warning us not to expect a Hamilton-style start to his rookie season, which suggests he thought someone somewhere might be expecting similar.

  10. Kimi was already informed that he’s leaving Ferrari in the Italian GP weekend by John Elkann. They have a meeting together and the decision was communicated to him and the senior figures of the team. Arrivabene wasn’t in favour of replacing Raikkonen with Leclerc this year. Elkann has confirmed Marchionne’s decision (RIP) and Kimi was free to do his own race in Monza that’s why Vettel was already nervous when he lost the pole to Kimi.
    Arrivabene who is ,alongside Camilieri, a personal friend to Raikkonen couldn’t ask much more from him, that’s why he defended twice in turn 1/4 which is understandable but Vettel should have been more careful.
    This would sound like music in Lewis’s ears, he would know that Vettel will be racing Kimi, him and wingman Bottas, he can now apply much pressure on him in the last 7 races.

    1. Rubens Cheriballo
      5th September 2018, 18:00

      And your source is?

      1. I’ve a feeling @tifoso1989 isn’t going to spill the borlottis. However sounds perfectly plausible. Vettel’s recent comments on having to race three people for the rest of the season backs up the sentiment. Of course Ferrari can ‘downgrade’ Raikkonen’s possibilities of atually winning quite easily, the question is how much he’ll want to prove his worth in the rest of the season, or (really) help Vettel’s bid.

      2. @Rubens Cheriballo,@david-br
        In Italy there are some rumors that suggests this week Leclerc will be announced as a new Ferrari driver. The meeting between John Elkann and Raikkonen did already happened and the story was broken by Alberto Sabatini, former Autosprint director and a very respected journalist not only in Italy and he doesn’t luck sources inside Ferrari since he used to be the boss of the brilliant Alberto Antonini at Autosprint, the current Ferrari press officer.

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