In the round-up: McLaren racing director Eric Boullier says the team will give its test driver Nyck de Vries more time to show what he can do in Formula Two.
What they say
De Vries is sixth in the F2 championship at the moment, 52 points behind McLaren’s other test driver Lando Norris, who leads the standings. Here#s what Boullier had to say about De Vries:
He’s been with us for a long time. He is doing first a job in the simulator, that’s part of his role linked to the Formula One team, and he’s one of the very few drivers we use over either a race weekend or between races to develop [our] simulation.
He’s in the [F2] team who won the championship last year, a team where he can deliver. I think he showed good pace but also a few mistakes. He should have more points than I guess he currently has in the standings. So I think we need to give him a little bit more time and see if he can deliver the pace he has.
Quotes: Dieter Rencken
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Social media
Notable posts from Twitter, Instagram and more:
Congratulations @fia ! You finished the job.. One of the most iconic corners in history have now been destroyed. #PorscheCorners pic.twitter.com/gmlcHhniio
— Laurens Vanthoor (@VanthoorLaurens) June 2, 2018
A race track, 4 wheels, 1 steering wheel, some friends = FUN 🤟🏎😁#r8g pic.twitter.com/kSBIf46tva
— Romain Grosjean (@RGrosjean) June 2, 2018
- Find more official F1 accounts to follow in the F1 Twitter Directory
Links
More motor racing links of interest:
Strongest hint yet that Hartley is on the Formula 1 chopping block (New Zealand Herald)
"'The situation around Brendon is not pleasing,' Marko told Speed Week. 'We will go through this in peace and see what we can do in the future.'"
"Vietnam may now be considered a middle income country, and no longer one of the poorest in the world, but it’s a questionable call for the government to sanction a flashy race with expensive cars when the World Bank has been financing investments in roads and transport, let alone to increase access to basic services like water and sanitation."
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Comment of the day
Charles Leclerc point out that some of his fans don’t understand he doesn’t have a winning car. Is that so unusual in sport?
I can think of some, albeit in a bit of a different way. In football (AKA soccer) for instance, there may be some great players who are scoring all the time, but they do not win the champions league because they are not playing for one of the few teams who are in that league.
In (road) cycling as well, there are some riders who are really fast, or great climbers, but they do not win the Tour de France because that is more of a team effort as well.
Or, in a different vain: a single employee in a 500+ employee company cannot beat the competition on her or his own. It’s a company effort and many different ‘gears’ of that machine need to work together.
These are my analogies that I use when someone asks me why driver X is not winning in F1.
Hans (@Hanswesterbeek)
Happy birthday!
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Fer no.65 (@fer-no65)
3rd June 2018, 2:23
I hope the people in Vietnam think well about their priorities and whether having an F1 race is good for them. Argentina was believed to be in serious negotiations to hold a race here, yet we lost the Dakar and the WTCR races due to economic reasons, as said by the authorities. Surely a place that has to borrow money from the IMF should be thinking of other priorities and not an F1 race…
kpcart
3rd June 2018, 9:09
F1 can bring lots of money into the local economy, just look at Melbourne.
Jeffrey (@jeffreyj)
3rd June 2018, 10:37
Isn’t the Melbourne GP making a $60m loss annually? Or were you sarcastic?
harold wilson (@bonbonjai)
3rd June 2018, 18:34
Fer no.65 (@fer-no65)
You are talking too much common sense. Vietnam joining the F1 circus, looks too much like Turkey, South Korea, and worse, India. You would think Liberty would learn from Bernie’s grab now method of running F1. If Vietnam get a race, the answer must be they have not learn at all.
Phylyp (@phylyp)
3rd June 2018, 3:30
Must resist… poking fun… at Grosjean in a kart!
Todfod (@todfod)
3rd June 2018, 17:32
Was thinking he got a Red bull style demotion..
fast
5th June 2018, 3:25
before you poke too much, watch his video on track… he’s an excellent kart driver.
Phylyp (@phylyp)
3rd June 2018, 3:33
Re. COTD @Hanswesterbeek
That actually defines the driver in an F1 team quite nicely!
Sally
3rd June 2018, 6:16
Vietnam needs to feed it’s people before feeding F1
ruliemaulana (@ruliemaulana)
3rd June 2018, 7:04
That’s whole Indonesian sponsor decal on Prema suit. Two Indonesian banks, Indonesian KFC and Indonesian Pepsi.
ruliemaulana (@ruliemaulana)
3rd June 2018, 7:07
…and of course, Pertamina. The Indonesian KFC & Pepsi franchise was belong to Sean’s father.
Jere (@jerejj)
3rd June 2018, 7:26
I couldn’t agree more with the COTD.
– Laurens Vanthoor’s tweet, though.
– I wish Hartley would get to keep his drive at STR until the end of the season at least, but at the same time, I could understand if he were to lose it during the season due to his performance so far this season, as in the end, the name of the game in F1, especially in the RB-camp, is ‘if you don’t perform then you’re out.’
anon
3rd June 2018, 8:15
@jerejj, it’s a bit stupid of him when you realise that he’s blaming the wrong people – it is the ACO that has pushed through those changes, not the FIA.
It’s also being pushed through because there have been a number of accidents at the Porsche Curves, such as Loic Duval crashing there in 2014 and having to withdraw from the race that year because he was too heavily concussed for it to be safe for him to race.
Knowing what those drivers are like, as are most of the fans, if they had done nothing and there had been a serious accident there this year, they would probably be screaming at the ACO that “they must do something” to make it safer. After all, drivers had been complaining that they were getting punctures from drivers who cut the inside of the Porsche Curves and dragged gravel across onto the track – so removing the gravel “ruins the circuit”, but leaving the gravel in place gets them criticised because it helps cause punctures.
ColdFly (@)
3rd June 2018, 9:06
Congratulations @vanthoorlaurens ! You finished the job.. The name of one of the most iconic corners in history has now been destroyed. #PorscheCurves
Sundar Srinivas Harish (@sundark)
3rd June 2018, 11:36
Their ‘if you don’t perform then you’re out’ approach had only worked in the past because each driver that came through their program was as good as, if not better than, the last (certain sophomore slumps notwithstanding). RB can’t afford to lose Hartley at this point because they literally have no one in their pipeline to replace him with. There isn’t even anyone in the current grid who would agree to replace him at Toro Rosso. Sainz probably might be strong-armed into doing so, but I doubt he would’ve left that kind of a loophole in their contract.
F1 frog (@f1frog)
3rd June 2018, 16:45
But when Brendon Hartley was signed for Toro Rosso at the US Grand Prix last year, nobody was expecting it at all, so they might choose another driver from a series such as WEC. Maybe Buemi, who I understand was their second choice last year after Hartley.
Theoddkiwi (@theoddkiwi)
4th June 2018, 2:53
It depends on what they actually hired him for, he is relatively old for a F1 rookie. So if they hired him to be reliable and help develop the car then it would seem to be pretty unfair to give him the flick because of his apparent performance deficit.
He has actually performed pretty well against Gasly, who is much younger and had more recent experience in open wheelers with two years running on the same Pirreli tyres.
Hartley was faster then him all weekend in Monaco except Quali where traffic was a big influence and had gotten up to 11th before being taken out. He out him qualified in China and Melbourne and finished ahead in 3 of the 6 races.
Both have had dramas, unreliability and crashes and with the two races they both got to the checked flag in, its one a piece.
fast
5th June 2018, 3:31
also, isn’t he also learning a lot of the tracks?
Hans (@hanswesterbeek)
3rd June 2018, 7:29
Hey, COTD, that’s nice! Thanks :-)
ColdFly (@)
3rd June 2018, 8:55
And deserved.
PS one can be the best F1 journalist, but if you don’t work for a top publication you won’t get the most clicks.
Zim
3rd June 2018, 12:14
While F1 can bring a loot of money to a city, you can guarantee it’s never going to get to those that need it most. The fat just get fatter.
Zim
3rd June 2018, 12:15
*lot. Or maybe ‘loot’ works too?
StefMeister (@stefmeister)
3rd June 2018, 12:30
I don’t really see how the Porsche curves have been ruined, Yes the barrier has been moved & some runoff added but the corner itself is (As far as i’m aware) exactly the same as it was before.
The new bit of runoff is something drivers should be nowhere near unless they have made a mistake & i’m not sure you will find many drivers that say having a bit of runoff isn’t preferable to smacking into a barrier & having what tended to be a massive accident.
https://d2d0b2rxqzh1q5.cloudfront.net/sv/1.67/dir/e59/image/e59d48cc7b839ec31bf673ec14be9afa.jpg
nase
3rd June 2018, 19:44
@stefmeister
In fact, there isn’t anything about his tweet that isn’t stupid. See anon’s comment for more reasons why.
Daniel (@db01)
3rd June 2018, 19:35
F2 has so much talent in it this year it’s unreal. Most of the top drivers would walk it any of the past few years
mfreire
4th June 2018, 0:35
F1 has no business being in Vietnam- but MotoGP? Now that wouldn’t be a bad idea. All they have to do is build a permanent circuit…
AliceD (@aliced)
4th June 2018, 9:11
Regarding quote of the day. For myself F1 is a race to see who can build the fastest car. The driver is secondary and not that important.