Wolff admits worries over Bottas performance

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In the round-up: Mercedes executive director Toto Wolff admits concerns over the form of Valtteri Bottas.

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Today will be the final Malaysian Grand Prix for the foreseeable future. Kalun offers some local views on why.

As a Malaysian and an F1 fan, it is sad to see Malaysian Grand Prix leaving. There are not many F1 fans in Malaysia and many of the f1 fan you see in Sepang are there to support Petronas.

So, why do Malaysian Grand Prix fail miserably?
1. There is no proper public transport from Kuala Lumpur City to Sepang.
2. Sepang is too far from Kuala Lumpur City Centre.
3. Sepang is dead at night. I agree with Kimi Raikkonen. All He saw is the airport and the jungle. Nothing interesting.
4. The tickets are too expensive for middle class workers. May take up our two months salary.
5. Malaysians prefer Moto GP to F1 because it is cheaper, motorbikes can be easily bought and replicate, and better racing.
6. Malaysians are lacking motor racing fans. Mostly football fans. Just like Moto GP/motorcycle racing, football can be easily be replicated. Sports cars in Malaysia from all the brands currently racing in F1 are too expensive due to our tax structure.
7. No good after race entertainment.

The Singapore Grand Prix is doom to fail if the Singapore Grand Prix is situated far from the city centre and there is no entertainment after the race. South East Asian nation do not have proper racing fans. They just support who ever wins the championship or any company that has relation to the country (e.g. Petronas)
Kalun (@briankalun)

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On this day in F1

  • Jim Clark led Graham Hill in a Lotus one-two in the United States Grand Prix today in 1967

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10 comments on “Wolff admits worries over Bottas performance”

  1. Roth Man (@rdotquestionmark)
    1st October 2017, 0:13

    Hmm it looked like Max stayed nice and wide into the hairpin sorry Jolyon. I appreciate he was on racing line on the straight, which must have been frustrating but it certainly didn’t warrant the lock up, out braking himself and subsequent crash.

    1. You got it wrong.
      Max gave the impression he was staying wide, forcing Palmer to take the inside line, then Max turned, carrying very little speed, giving Palmer no chance.
      Palmer was on a fast lap hence had right of way.

      1. It certainly looked kind of odd…. Palmer just went on straight after locking his brakes… it looked like there was no corner at all. FIA decided both could have done different and it looked that way

  2. Guybrush Threepwood
    1st October 2017, 4:08

    I’ve been to the Melbourne, Malaysian and Silverstone GP’s, and as an avid F1 fan the Malaysian GP is the best by far. For any westerner or others with an average amount of cash you can hire a driver to drop you off and pick you up from the circuit into KL each day. It’s a good 45 minute or so trip but no waiting. Small crowds are also great at the track so there is minimal queuing and plenty of space. The circuit is just great though – lots of high speed corners and you can see half the track from one side of the main grandstand and the other half of the track from the other side of the main grandstand. Sure there could be more on and off-track action, but for around $US100 for a grandstand seat for 3 days you can’t complain.

    I’ll be very sad to see this track go, both as a spectator attending the race, and an at-home viewer. The opportunity to mix an F1 race at one of the greatest spectator tracks with a holiday in an inexpensive tropical destination will be missed.

  3. That last corner is very important if your wanna start a flyer. Because there is a long straight ahead. So basicly you cant say that Max wasnt on a flyer, cause he needed that corner. Palmer was a long way away and couldve easily followed Verstappen s line and get a tow onto the straight . There was no need for that silly outbreaking attempt.

  4. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
    1st October 2017, 10:05

    Well, this weekend, I think bottas does have a small excuse for some of his performance this. He was the only driver that couldn’t improve in Q3 over Q2. And both of his attempts looked decent with no obvious mistakes. I just think this “upgrade” that Mercedes has brought has been a massive failure. Since Mercedes usually have bigger step up in Q3 than the other teams and Bottas didn’t manage in 2 attempts explains something. Then when there was an interview on Channel 4 with Toto, when they asked him about the difference between Hamilton and he just looked awquard and uncomfortable. From what he said, you could just tell by his experssion that he wasn’t happy with how this upgrade had worked out. I think it was clear that the old setup worked better.

    Bottas had the best start of the top cars this race and managed to hold Ricciardo behind for longer than Hamilton held off Verstappen. By Bottas doing this, he cost Ricciardo about 10 seconds. I think this helped prevent ricciardo putting Hamilton under pressure. So in terms of team work, I still think Bottas is doing a good job. But the fact that within Half race distance, Hamilton was so far ahead and by the end, I think it was about 45 seconds, that is on average nearly a second per lap. Bottas often has a weaker stint in a race, but vertually always is fairly strong somehwhere. The fact that the gap was that huge behind Hamilton I think somehow proves that this setup has not worked at all. I think it is very unlikely that he will have beaten Hamilton, but I think he could have kept Ricciardo behind for much longer and possibly managed to finish 4th, or at leased much closer to Vettel than he did. I doubt a gap this big can just be to do with his performance. I don’t want to sound like I’m making excuses, but from Toto’s reactions on TV, it appears he’s more unhappy with the fact that what was meant to be an improvement hasn’t worked rather than issues with Bottas’s performance. but he just doesn’t want to admit this.

    1. @thegianthogweed Just need to point out that Hamilton didn’t really tried to keep Max behind. He already complaining about de-rates a lap before and the car itself without any de-rate isn’t performing better than the Red Bulls. Obviously championship standings also played a role. In the driver room before podium I think I heard Hamilton said to Ricciardo that he didn’t try to block Max. Of course this changed nothing of what you said about Bottas.

      1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
        1st October 2017, 11:11

        Yes, I guess it doesn’t. But if Hamilton could have possibly gone even faster and increased the time to almost a minute ahead of Bottas then I think there is even more evidence that this upgrade which should be better than Hamilton’s setup has gone the wrong way. Hamilton certainly made a good decision when he said he wanted to stay with the old setup. But it is good that Bottas has tested it and I think has shown that it isn’t worth using again. I very much doubt that all this amount of time can just be related to Bottas’s pace. We’ll just have to see if Mercedes admit to not getting things right. But as I said, I can somehow tell by Toto’s expression that he’s not happy with it. He’s probably just nervous that this is quite possibly as good as Mercedes can get now and Red Bull are closing in on them.

        1. @thegianthogweed Yes and no. Hamilton isn’t happy about his car setup either. The thing is, this year Merc is still a diva, and when it behaves like this, it seems no engineers in Mercedes can really explain. Bottas is definitely slower than Hamilton but I think Sepang and Singapore makes the gap looks bigger. About the upgrades, I think Toto expression is more about frustration that they can’t really sure if the upgrades working or not. McLaren also faced the same problem with Alonso updates seems to be working well in Friday but on Saturday and in the race it looks worse.

  5. Has “broke” become a somewhat acceptable alternative for the past tense of “brake”. I mean, when Grosjean says something like “He broke too late”, I don’t think about it too much. But when a Brit does it, I get confused.
    Is that a common colloquialism?

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