Sebastian Vettel, Ferrari, Hungaroring, 2019

Vettel hopes “very hot” race will bring Ferrari into contention

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In the round-up: Sebastian Vettel says Ferrari were “just not quick enough” on Saturday and need a change in the weather to be competitive on Sunday.

What they say

Vettel was asked if he expects a ‘difficult race’ on Sunday:

I hope it will be otherwise it could be boring. But we’ll see. Obviously we’ll start with the mediums. I hope that tomorrow is very hot and the tyres will suffer and at least that way we can try and do something.

Quotes: Dieter Rencken

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Comment of the day

Adam felt bad for Pierre Gasly as the gap between him and Max Verstappen widened again in Hungary:

I rather feel bad for the guy, sat there watching the inevitable celebrations of pole and knowing you weren’t capable of getting anywhere close as that must cripple his confidence as badly as seeing the gulf of time between him and Verstappen – let alone having seen him already take two race wins. I hope he’s got the strength to come back from the scale of defeat he’s had over this year as mentally this must take a severe toll on him.
Adam (@Rocketpanda)

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On this day in F1

  • 35 years ago today Alain Prost claimed pole position for the German Grand Prix at the Hockenheimring

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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19 comments on “Vettel hopes “very hot” race will bring Ferrari into contention”

  1. That’s pretty savage by Max. He didn’t need to do that.

    1. digitalrurouni
      4th August 2019, 6:27

      I don’t think he said anything unfair.

    2. I disagree in the sense that it wasn’t Max’s business so he shouldn’t have been asked the question, but someone did, so how is he supposed to respond? Let’s think about it: Where was Daniel today? If his car had 1000 hp on tap then he wouldn’t have dropped out at the end of Q1. As far as I can tell Max gave the only reasonable answer he could have, and he was absolutely correct (excuse the misquote): “if you’ve got it – flaunt it”. Tomorrow is the race and … well, I guess if Renault’s drivers are allowed access to the full 1000 hp then we can expect them both to get points finishes.
      I’m not meaning to sound disrespectful, but really if Honda, who are “the new boys on the block”, can get a pole position then surely Renault, with their 1000 hp claim and more race experience, should be close to the podium places. Unfortunately the best race result they’ve got so far this season is 6th place. Both Toro Rosso drivers have equalled or done better. If Gasly, who is generally considered as weaker and inferior to Max, can get a best finish of 4th this season, then that shows Honda, whatever their horsepower, are ahead of Renault. So maybe Renault need to upgrade their engine to the next spec.

      1. I think a bigger indication of Renaults lack of car pace is Mclaren…

        1. Or Red Bull until this season

      2. You seem to be labouring under the impression that the engine is the only thing about these cars? Why would you compare Gaslys best result to that of Renaults when it’s just plain common knowledge that Red Bull have a vastly superior car to Renault? You may as well go and compare Mercedes results to Haas and Ferrari to Williams whilst you’re at it.
        Out of interest, the only person that beat Ferrari in a speed trap in qualifying was actually Ricciardo set in Q1 at the S1 split.

    3. Yes, he didn’t need to, but it’s about time we had another driver who’s driving well in a good car doing some trash talking and stirring things up. Of course, said driver and team also need to back their words up with on-track performance, something both have done thus far (and they need to continue doing for such talk to be effective).

      For far too long we’ve had too much of politically correct “I respect him, he’s having a tough time” sort of talk, or blatantly building up the competition type of talk at the front of the field.

      I said “trash talk”, but this is the best sort of trash talk – polite, factual, yet throwing down an insult and a challenge. I’m sure there’s an element of Horner egging him on in this as well, seeing as Horner and Cyril’s relationship isn’t one where they exchange Christmas cards.

  2. Same here. I share the same sentiments as the COTD.

    1. My advice to Gasly is he needs to do more homework.

      1. if post on that article by anon is correct, it would help if he, being the less experienced driver, would get an experienced team of engineers to work with @drycrust – in other words, the management should give him the right teachers for his homework class. That is, assuming they actually want him to improve.

  3. Sounds like Renault is channeling their inner Ferrari.

    They’re saying Daniel could have backed off but wasn’t necessarily aware of the extent of the situation. Doesn’t that man they failed to tell him.

    That being said, this crawling round the last few corners and backing up has gotten to ridiculous levels this year.

    1. Sounds like Renault is channeling their inner Ferrari.

      @dbradock – LOL, I’ve got to use that phrase the next time I mess something up :)

    2. @dbradock you are channelling your inner bias.

  4. Max’s performances lead me to question the FIA’s lower age limit rules that they introduced solely because of him. Does anyone still doubt that he is a precocious talent and that getting him into an F1 car was definitely NOT a mistake? If/when the next Max shows up at 16, why should we wait an additional 2 years for him (or her) to start showing us their awesome abilities?

    1. Yes, the age was never really the issue I think @sebsronnie, it was made a scapegoat, but age, and maybe even previous experience (also see Kimi when he entered) do not really tell whether a driver is ready or not. There are sometimes clear signs a driver isn’t made out for F1 (maldonado had some clear issues in F2, for example), but with money involved that never really seems to stop them progressing.

    2. Because before Monaco last year Max still had a lot of growing up to do. Maybe if he’d been left in F2 for a little while longer he would’ve arrived in F1 as the championship contender he is now instead of the 16-year-old unexploded dynamite he was…The day an 18-year-old has a chance at winning the world championship is maybe the day they should look at reducing the age limits…

    3. Arguably letting him into an F1 car at 17 WAS a mistake – you may have noticed he had rather a lot of crashes in his first few seasons.

      Based on that I think the FIA would be within their rights to set an age limit of 21 as the youngest age to compete in F1 as that coincides with the age Max was when he stopped crashing.

      Obviously you will still get the likes of De Cesaris and Maldonado who won’t be prevented by age restrictions but still.

      1. @davidjwest there have been drivers older & with more experience who have had just as many incidents if not more than max did his 1st 1-2 years in f1.

        if they had held max back due to an age limit we would have missed out on all the exciting moments he’s given us, he wouldn’t have been in the red bull when he was, wouldn’t have had the success he has and therefore f1 wouldn’t have grown in popularity to the level it has in holland and maybe we wouldn’t be going to zandvoort next year.

        max came into f1 at the right time for him and us and was more than good enough for f1 from his 1st time in an f1 car.

  5. Words words words, why read it when you can watch Verstappen deliver the answer, to the accompaniment of chuckles from the assembled media: https://www.reddit.com/r/formuladank/comments/cluw09/rip_renault/

Comments are closed.