In the round-up: Haas team principal Guenther Steiner said the team had a ‘half perfect’ race after Romain Grosjean crashed on the first lap and Kevin Magnussen came in sixth.
What they say
It was a bittersweet race for Haas which saw one car retire on lap one and the other finish 36 seconds ahead of the rest of the midfield. Here’s what Steiner had to say:
I think it could’ve been a perfect race for us and it was only 50% perfect race. What I take confidence out of is how quick the car is.
Kevin was almost cruising because he knew he couldn’t get the front guys but he was well away from the back.
Quotes: Dieter Rencken
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Social media
Notable posts from Twitter, Instagram and more:
Great to see FanVision, ahem, #f1vision , #f1 and the new iteration of #f1tv all together again – feels like Groundhog Day for me. To the fans, remember these systems are all very complex to operate so be patient with the teams launching them. #formula1 @F1
— Marissa Pace (@Marissali) May 13, 2018
Seriously who have Liberty put in charge of the on screen info. It's an utter farce. @F1 #SpanishGP
— Simon Cass (@simon_cass) May 13, 2018
Verstappen's ability to keep the injured Red Bull ahead of the Ferrari is most impressive. It also suggests these contemporary complex front wing elements are, perhaps, overly complex?
— Steve Matchett (@MrSteveMatchett) May 13, 2018
Old team mates pic.twitter.com/Ev2r4P4RSq
— Craig Scarborough (@ScarbsTech) May 13, 2018
Lot of comments about Spanish & Catalan hymns played pre-race – to clarify: since 1st @f1 GP @Circuitcat_eng in 1991 both hymns have been played, but obviously more focus on the tradition this year.
— Fritz-Dieter Rencken (@RacingLines) May 13, 2018
Most remarkable of all this weekend, the wifi (at a bargain cost of only 60 euros for something that should be entirely free) just about held up with only the occasional wobble. So no refund this time. #F1 #SpanishGP
— Alan Baldwin (@alanbaldwinf1) May 13, 2018
Glad the #F1 stewards punished Grosjean for #SpanishGP crash. So dangerous to create a smokescreen like that – we’re very lucky the consequences weren’t much worse. Not sure I buy that his car would have gone that way whatever he did
— Glenn Freeman (@glenn_autosport) May 13, 2018
Away from Barcelona what an amazing occasion at #MonacoHistorique today with great names and cars of @F1 @markblundellf1 @patresewebsite @F1MikaHakkinen @karunchandhok Thierry Boutsen
John Watson
Eddie Irvine @Emanuele_Pirro Josh Hill @McLarenF1 @WilliamsRacing @ClassicLotus pic.twitter.com/p09YGJvlvP— Neil Wooding (@nellietellie) May 13, 2018
- Find more official F1 accounts to follow in the F1 Twitter Directory
Links
More motor racing links of interest:
F1 post-race press conference (FIA)
"I felt a bit more understeer in Turn Three and Nine, and maybe braking a bit deeper into hairpins but, yeah, it was not too bad to be honest. I opened a bit with some tools and all good. It was a little bit slower but I don’t think it affected me too much."
Wurz explains root cause of Williams 'crisis' (Motorsport)
"We lose downforce at the diffuser, at the floor. We had this problem a little bit last year, but it was only annoying. Now it's basically a stall."
NASCAR sale: a sinking ship? (Motorsport magazine)
"A change of ownership could well benefit NASCAR, especially given the France family’s divisive, closed-off leadership and PR moves – Brian France’s endorsement of Donald Trump in 2016 was divisive, especially after NASCAR second and third-tier competitions withdrew their 2015 award ceremonies from a Trump resort in Florida after he made derisory comments about Mexican immigrants."
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Comment of the day
Did Halo demonstrate its worth yesterday?
As someone firmly against the halo before the season started, I have to admit I think I was wrong.
I still worry about extraction time, but visually it could be worse and incidents like this one (and with Grosjean still doing his thing), I’m pleased Halo is on the cars.
@John-h
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On this day in F1
- On this day in 1988 Ayrton Senna put his McLaren on pole position at Monaco by a phenomenal 1.427 seconds ahead of team mate Alain Prost
PeterG
14th May 2018, 1:29
If nascar is sold to new owners i can only hope they get rid of the gimmicks and turn the series back into a racing series rather than an entertainment product masquerading as a racing series.
Turn it back onto a proper championship where the champion is determined based on who scored most points over a season and where races are actually races rather than a series of stages.
find a way of moving away from pack racing because that is frankly not only unnecessarily dangerous but boring to watch due to how drivers have less input than tracks where they actually have to work the brakes/throttle.
nascar without all the gimmicks and other nonsense could be a great series but as it is and as it continues to run it’s just a joke which is why its haemorrhaging fans since things like the chase & other gimmicks began to be introduced and why every new gimmick brought in to bring back fans has only resulted in more leaving!
F1 needs to learn from this, Gimmicks & artificial things brought in purely for entertainments sake don’t work & are nothing but a turn off!
pastaman (@)
14th May 2018, 12:42
They need to turn it into V8 Supercars
Jere (@jerejj)
14th May 2018, 3:19
I’m not really sure what Simon Cass is about, but in case he’s referring to the FOM TV graphics then I disagree with him as I didn’t find anything to be strange concerning them this race. Furthermore, I agree with the 2nd paragraph of the COTD.
Phylyp (@phylyp)
14th May 2018, 3:49
@jerejj – Re. Simon Cass’ tweet: I clicked through to his Twitter feed, and this tweet is apparently his concern:
I think this is a case of egg on his face, because he seems to be thinking this is wrong, when in fact what was displayed is perfectly correct. The FIA instruction is that a 1:20 lap at Spain should now be run at 1:52 (i.e. a 40% increase in lap time). He seems to be mixing up lap times and speeds, which are inversely proportional 🙂
Todfod (@todfod)
14th May 2018, 7:36
Yeah.. quite a brain fade tweet. But to be completely honest, the FIA should have just put up a msg saying decrease speed by 40%, it just seems mire intuitive than increase lap time.
Phylyp (@phylyp)
14th May 2018, 9:16
@todfod – that does make sense. However, I can see an argument for either approach. Your idea is good because it tells us what we naturally expect, which is: “slow down”. What was displayed more accurately reflects what the FIA instructs, which is that cars need to drive to a lap & sub-sector delta. Maybe they could just put a message: “Representative lap: 1:20.000, VSC target lap 1:52.000”.
Sonics (@sonicslv)
14th May 2018, 10:02
@todfod Decrease speed not only technically wrong but also very hard to oblige. A hairpin that you take in 100kmh now need to be in 60kph, on straight line that you reach 200kph now need maxed to 120kph? Increase in lap time is correct.
However, it does giving false perception for people who kinda lacking common sense or not think things thorough enough like the tweeter. Actually, who is that guy anyway and why his (erroneous) tweet worthy enough to mention in the round up?
@phylyp I think it’s better to scrap the representative lap and just go with “VSC, All cars must lapping above 1:52.000”. In my experience more numbers confuses more people :P Increasing lap time by 40% is still my pick though.
Todfod (@todfod)
14th May 2018, 12:07
@sonicslv
We’re not talking about hairpins though .. are we? We’re talking about decreasing your overall speed across different sectors by 40% so the overall lap time is 40% higher. I don’t know why there’s a need to get so technical about it. Decreasing speed is moire intuitive than saying increasing lap time. Increase is sometimes associated with a gain… which is what confused some users. Simple as that.
Sonics (@sonicslv)
14th May 2018, 13:37
@todfod Remember the goal of VSC is actually keeping the cars at (more or less) the same gap before and after the VSC period. This gap is already using time as measurements, so why not just alter the time variable to keep it much simpler? Consider we change the speed: Distance = Speed x Time, so if we reduce speed, we also need to manage the distance to get equal time result. This is much harder to do and police because as we know the car speed is not constant at every part of the circuit. Also each car has different acceleration and top speed which reducing them by 40% is not equalizer. They effectively still gaining (or removing) the gap at 60% speed. If we remove human error factor, a perfect 40% time increase will result in same gap before and after VSC, a 40% speed decrease will not.
Why (I) so technical about it? Because speed reduction is wrong. It’s not partial right, it’s actually fundamentally wrong to what the drivers are doing and how FIA policing them. IMO letting wrong things go because “people don’t get it” is ignorance and ignorance is very dangerous.
I agree.. but by using the correct phrase at least some confused people can try to seek the answer and getting a correct knowledge. Using more intuitive but incorrect phrase can make bigger confusion later (maybe a commentator says Mercedes has to slow more than Williams and you got another unneeded complain to deal with)
Phylyp (@phylyp)
14th May 2018, 13:53
@sonicslv – yep, showing just a single number makes sense. Maybe “VSC: All cars must lap 1:52.000 or slower”, to get that all important “slower” onto the screen.
Phylyp (@phylyp)
14th May 2018, 3:51
That said, I bet FOM will revise that graphic, as they have to cater to the widest possible audience, not just those with a grasp of basic English and math.
Jimmi Cynic (@jimmi-cynic)
14th May 2018, 4:23
@phylyp: 40% increase in Zing today! ;-)
Phylyp (@phylyp)
14th May 2018, 4:36
LOL @jimmi-cynic
Can you tell I’m feeling a tad uncharitable towards the world this Monday morning? ☺
Strontium (@strontium)
14th May 2018, 7:36
I found at least one thing wrong with it.
The graphic that displayed the grid order before the start of the race displayed
…2
1
…4
3
And so on
Phylyp (@phylyp)
14th May 2018, 9:12
@strontium – very true – it gave the impression for a moment that it was Bottas who qualified on pole. It looks like the reused the grid outline for another track, without paying heed to which side was the clean side of the track for this circuit.
Phylyp (@phylyp)
14th May 2018, 9:19
One needless graphic (in my opinion) is that towards the end of the race, they briefly replaced the lap counter on the top-left with a “11 km to go”, and I thought to myself – “Just what information does that give me, it’s so pointless”.
A needless effect is the sound effect they use for some graphics – most notably the one that has a chime sound for the fastest lap.
Apart from that, I do like the general signage used for yellow flag and red flag conditions, it is made very clear on the screen that they are in force.
Sonics (@sonicslv)
14th May 2018, 9:51
I don’t really notice another sound effect in graphics other than the fastest lap. Can you tell me what else (I really curious tbh). And for the fastest lap itself I think it’s because it’s also a new lap record. I don’t recall previous GP fastest lap has that sound effect. A lap record is substantial enough that I don’t mind the sound effect.
Phylyp (@phylyp)
14th May 2018, 10:21
You could be right that it is for the lap record, and not just fastest lap. I think it was being broken right from the get go, so I got that mixed up with the fastest lap.
LifeF1
14th May 2018, 15:52
once you set a lap record, every fastest lap after that is the new record though..
Sonics (@sonicslv)
14th May 2018, 16:47
@LifeF1 Yes, but normally you don’t set a lap record early in the race. The combination of faster F1 cars, resurfacing, and tires are what makes the record broken practically in the first laps after SC restart. Normally, if the record is broken at late in the race, the sound effect shouldn’t as distracting as in Spain.
Nico
14th May 2018, 9:11
Would love to see Kubica signed up by HAAS for next year! He’d be the perfect fit – smart, fast, dedicated and classy. And would certainly not be making stupid mistakes like Grosjean!
ECWDanSelby (@ecwdanselby)
14th May 2018, 10:50
That’s actually not a bad idea at all.
Nunu
14th May 2018, 16:10
Better see kvyat or Wehrlein there
Gary
14th May 2018, 12:32
I don’t know about the graphic, but I don’t think I can take a season of this Avengers super-hero music overlaid across Sky’s broadcast. I find it insulting as they (Liberty Media) reduce my once-favorite sport to an “entertainment and media Brand”.
Robbie (@robbie)
14th May 2018, 13:34
Great stuff from Max this weekend and nicely diplomatic in the post-race interview regarding DR’s radio com that he was faster at that stage, around lap 14. Max said he might have said the same thing in DR’s shoes, but I just found it so fun to continue to watch Max pull away, in answer, and never look back. Finished pretty much a full pit stop ahead of the ‘faster’ DR. Really great stuff, great answer to Baku. All DR could do was make himself feel better with some hot laps in the late stages when it didn’t affect anything. So glad nothing from the previous races has taken anything off of Max’s drive.
Robbie (@robbie)
14th May 2018, 13:35
Meant that as a stand-alone comment, not a response to Gary.
krxx
14th May 2018, 14:32
FBoy-alert
Robbie (@robbie)
14th May 2018, 14:46
Wonderful at my age to be called a boy ;)
Esploratore (@esploratore)
16th May 2018, 0:49
Yes, a decent race from verstappen, no mistakes, also no overtakes but not much he could do considering when he got close to raikkonen he had the problem and vettel ended up behind him and wasn’t able to catch up and bottas was too far ahead.
Hopefully monaco can be a track where red bull is finally at the level of both ferrari and mercedes, they keep saying they are being held back by the engine, so if they don’t improve there there’s no excuse, just like mclaren and their best chassis, only faster.
Sonics (@sonicslv)
14th May 2018, 14:42
The music actually grows on me. The intro is synced well and it does set the mood. Its not overused or too loud to be distracting too.
Ed
14th May 2018, 16:22
I find it amazing how Grosjean is not only wrecking the car most of the time, he is the only driver along with Sirotkin to still score a point.
Terrible season thus far. The first race was the only good one and there he was behind his team mate all the time.
Guess his work is done with the team. He helped them on the beginning, now they need to step up.