Tsunoda has “a lot of regrets” over Barcelona comments

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In the round-up: Yuki Tsunoda intends to make a fresh start at this weekend’s Monaco Grand Prix after a poor round in Spain.

In brief

Tsunoda “reset” to avoid repeat of Barcelona outburst

As well as dropping out in the first round of qualifying in Spain, Tsunoda apologised after implying he and team mate Pierre Gasly hadn’t been given equal equipment.

Speaking to media yesterday, Tsunoda admitted he was still holding regrets from the previous round, and intends to approach his Monaco debut with a new mindset.

“It’s a new track and, especially in Barcelona, I had a really difficult race week and I don’t want to do it again, [have] that kind of race week in the future. So I just have to reset.”

Tsunoda’s frustration during the last weekend also came across in his comment to the team on his radio. “Especially in qualifying and the radio, I feel really a lot of regrets in my mind,” he said. “Even now, I just don’t want to do it again and have to reset from there.”

Nent takes Dutch F1 TV rights from Ziggo

Nent – the Nordic Entertainment Group – has been chosen as Formula 1’s new broadcaster in the Netherlands, RaceFans understands. The $30 million deal will bring official streaming service F1 TV to its viewers. Current broadcaster Ziggo confirmed earlier this week its deal had not been renewed.

Jessica Hawkins signed as driver ambassador for Aston Martin

Jessica Hawkins, Aston Martin, 2021
Hawkins will race in W Series this year
W Series racer and stunt driver Jessica Hawkins has taken on a role with Aston Martin’s Formula 1 team as a ‘driver ambassador’. Sebastian Vettel welcomed her appointment, saying he hoped that Hawkins would provide new perspectives within the team.

“I think she will be busy racing in W Series but I think it’s a great addition and I think probably she can add something that we haven’t thought of,” he said. “Hopefully she gets some experience in our simulator as well. I think it’s always great to have somebody else’s opinion on everything that you do.”

The team’s statement indicated Hawkins’ role will initially focus on PR and marketing work involving its sponsors.

Hawkins aspired to be a racer in her early career but ran out of funding without making it far up the single seater ladder. She became a stunt driver for film and television and is known for setting the lawnmower world speed record by clocking 186kph (116mph) on an episode of Top Gear.

She revived her racing career when she qualified for the inaugural season of W Series. Placing 11th, she was able to continue to the second season of the all-female junior series and tested at Anglesey this week.

Dixon heads second day of Indy 500 practice

Scott Dixon, Ganassi, IndyCar, Indianapolis Motor Speedway, 2021
Dixon replaced Power at the top of the times
Scott Dixon was quickest on the second day of practice for the Indianapolis 500, setting a best average speed of 365.045kph (226.829mph).

Formula 2 qualifying groups decided for Monaco

Formula 2 returns for its second weekend of the season in Monte Carlo. The feeder series runs qualifying in two split groups in Monaco.

This has been done by the drivers numbers. In F2 drivers are assigned consecutive numbers arranged by team, meaning one representative of each team will appear in each 16-minute session.

Group one will consist of the odd-numbered drivers: Robert Shwartzman, Guanyu Zhou, Dan Ticktum, Liam Lawson, Christian Lundgaard, Richard Verschoor, Guillaume Samaia, Marcus Armstrong, Ralph Boschung, Alessio Deledda and Marino Sato.

Group two will consist of their even-numbered team mates: Oscar Piastri, Felipe Drugovich, Jehan Daruvala, Juri Vips, Theo Pouchaire, Lirim Zendeli, David Beckmann, Roy Nissany, Gianluca Petecof, Bent Viscaal and series returnee Jack Aitken.

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Comment of the day

Kieran has a suggestion to improve the Monaco Grand Prix that did prove extremely effective in Formula E‘s format – get rid of (mandatory) pit stops.

Tyre wear is always so low in Monaco that you’re guaranteed a one-stop race with everyone on the same strategy. The leader can afford to drive around slowly knowing they can’t be overtaken and anyone they come out behind after a stop is guaranteed to pit eventually (the same thing happened in Singapore).

If the mandatory pit stop is removed however, the leader can’t afford to stop as they could come out behind someone who is going to the end.

To make it even more difficult if only the C5 tyre was available for the weekend it forces the leaders onto a much slower strategy.

Drivers behind will take the gamble on the stop knowing they will be seconds per lap quicker towards the end of the race, the delta may be big enough to actually get some overtaking.
Kieran

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On this day in F1

  • 30 years ago today Jean-Marc Gounon won the Pau Grand Prix, the second round of the Formula 3000 championship, ahead of Christian Fittipaldi

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Hazel Southwell
Hazel is a motorsport and automotive journalist with a particular interest in hybrid systems, electrification, batteries and new fuel technologies....

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31 comments on “Tsunoda has “a lot of regrets” over Barcelona comments”

  1. CotD – removing pitstops altogether would truly be the end of having any reason to watch on Sunday.

    Little bit tired of Mazepin’s name only ever being published here with a direct negative association.
    Grow up and just let the guy be. This is no different to bullying.

    1. Given that he’s a privileged, rich, powerful and famous, I’d argue most of those criticising him are punching up, and that’s not bullying.

      1. Which F1 driver isn’t privileged, rich, powerful and famous?
        Bullying is bullying, regardless of who does it. Everyone is human.

        1. i’m fine with things as they are, thank you.

    2. Bullying would better describe Nikita’s antics in GP2 where he intentionally hit a board in Parc ferme, that flung itself towards a driver who beat him in the race. Maybe bullying, harassment, or internet shaming would also describe some of his rather despicable social media posts pre-F1 as well.

      What’s mentioned here is one F1 driver mentioning some factual information, of how he needs to be aware of Mazepin on the track considering he’s blocked and ruined plenty of drivers’ sessions or weekends so far. That’s really not bullying.

      1. ‘Bullying’ – in this case is seeking and publishing only comments of a negative nature without any balance whatsoever.
        I concede the authors of this site can do whatever they like – but it just comes off as unprofessional and amateur with such an imbalance in reporting.
        We are each free to dislike the guy as much as we wish, but there’s just no need to keep giving air to every negative comment about him.
        Look what happens when someone does that with Hamilton, for instance…

        1. petebaldwin (@)
          20th May 2021, 12:52

          I wouldn’t say it’s imbalanced – it may seem so as there haven’t been any positives to talk about IMO.

          Perhaps I’m wrong – tell me the positive things that we should be talking about regarding Mazepin’s F1 career so far.

          1. It depends a little on whether racefans asked the question I suppose. It does seem somewhat leading towards a negative comment about Mazespin. The tweet doesn’t say who asked the question.

        2. Same old, same old. In this website (by a different name then, F1Fanatics) there used to be a Compulsory Weekly (at least) Ferrari- and/or Alonso-Bashing Article, the famous CWAFABA. Seems it’s Nikita’s turn now for the guy people love to hate.

    3. It would help if Nikita was willing to do things that were directly positive, but so far, all we’ve had from him are negative actions, mixed in with just enough neutral actions that the FIA hasn’t removed his Superlicence.

      1. What could Mazepin do that would bring satisfaction? All the media about him has been negative, because as far as the media is concerned, his character is that of the villain. I’d bet that if he supported a children’s charity or something there would be endless complaints about virtue signalling or trying to cleanse his reputation. He can’t win either way.

        And he hasn’t lost his Superlicence simply because he hasn’t accumulated sufficient points to do so.
        And just a reminder, he hasn’t been convicted of breaking any laws, either.

        1. He has sort of accrued enough penalty points to face a ban, he was just lucky that he switched series so had his points cleared between last year and this year. If the points had carried over, as with drivers remaining in the same series between years, he would face a ban.

    4. @S I disagree with you on the first point.

      1. I exaggerated of course – but without strategy at Monaco, there is practically nothing to look forward to.
        No driver will push hard anymore, so they will never make serious mistakes that can threaten their track position. Conservation to the extreme is not exciting or interesting to watch or participate in.

  2. I doubt what COTD suggest would change anything. Even with all the delta in the world, you still need the driver ahead to make a mistake or something. And if the teams and drivers know already they are limited in terms of grip and durability, they’ll just drive even slower during the race to save rubber in the end

    1. @fer-no65 I was about to point out the same thing regarding delta. Monaco is an isolated case where overtaking on merit is nearly impossible no matter how big performance delta, so probably no impact on the outcome.

      1. Divebombing the chicane worked for Perez a few times in 2013, until Kimi called his bluff (and said afterwards he should be punched in the face). Perez at Monaco 2013 performed the most sennaesque drive I’ve seen in decades, and I mean certainly no compliment by that.

    2. @fer-no65 Yeah have to agree. Even a 3 second lap time delta isn’t enough to make a clean overtake in Monaco unless the leading driver is asleep or choosing not to defend, so track position will still trump everything. I expect what would happen is the leader would choose to go even slower from start to finish to ensure his soft tyres last to the end, and almost everyone would opt for the no-stop strategy while tip-toeing around. This would eliminate the only part of the race which has potential for some changes in position which is during the pit stop window, and also reduce driver errors because they’re all driving even further from the limit than they already do.

  3. I’m hoping for Tsunoda’s sake he has a clean and accident free weekend.

    He seems like he could develop into a fast driver but needs to just reign in the emotion and focus on getting the car around the track as quickly as is possible for a driver in his first F1 season.

    The car itself seems to be pretty good & I suspect if he stops overdriving it he could finish well in the points.

    1. Sergey Martyn
      20th May 2021, 7:57

      Time to call Kvyat?

      1. No, he’s off to the RAF.

  4. what if instead of having the Nouvelle chicane, drivers go along the JFK avenue (currently the escape road) and have a right left chicane further ahead, (little before Le Boticelli restaurant where there is already a usable road), to come on to the current race track.

    It will increase chances of overtaking into the new chicane, without coming too close to St. Devote on the other side.

    1. *left right chicane

    2. There’s nowhere near enough runoff area for those kinds of speeds there.

      Good idea, but they’d have to remove a bunch of trees along the waterfront to widen it all.
      Besides, you know how some people feel about the circuit and F1 in general. Can’t be changing anything. Oh no.

    3. @sumedh Too tight and no room for sufficient runoff.

  5. 14:20 and 14:44. F2 QLF couldn’t commence while FP1 is still on, LOL.

    COTD: Most likely no difference outcome-wise.

    1. @jerejj Maybe running different series’ sessions at the same time is the “format change” we’re looking for? F1 drivers in race trim trying to weave around F2 cars on cool-down laps. Bottas getting stuck behind one of the Carlin cars. Mazepin getting lapped by a Prema.

      Maybe they could bring back the FE cars at the same time, causing all sorts of drama as they dive for Attack Mode.

    2. I stand corrected. I visited the F2 website yesterday, and it showed the times above, which proved to be incorrect.

  6. @coldfly Ziggo is the biggest cable-tv/internet company in the Netherlands, which means that if you want cable, in quite a bit of the country they are the only choice; but like other cable companies, they have pay channels, including a sports channel. Now, F1 has been over the last few years, a non-paying part (I had access via my dutch mobile and their ziggo Go app) which is probably mainly due to Verstappen and them wanting to grow that market.

    I guess now someone gave Liberty a better offer (Ziggo is owned by Liberty too, so I suppose the previous deal was a default one?).

    1. Bye bye to him. He thinks I’m someone else, he was totally wrong all along.

  7. @coldfly F1 & NENT confirmed the F1TV Pro service will continue to be available for fans in the Netherlands.

Comments are closed.