In the round-up: Formula 2 rookie star Theo Pourchaire may miss the next round of the championship due to the injury he sustained in Baku.
In brief
Broken wrist casts doubt on Pourchaire’s Silverstone races
Theo Pourchaire has confirmed he underwent treatment on his broken wrist, sustained in a crash during the F2 feature race in BakuIn a social media update, Pourchaire said “Just wanted to tell you that I’m fine, yesterday as soon as the plane landed I went straight into a special clinic in Monaco. I have the left radius broken, it is really painful but it’s okay.”
The next F2 race is in six weeks’ time, at Silverstone. “I [will] have my arm immobilised for four weeks from now, I will give everything to be back soon.
“I don’t know yet if I will be driving in Silverstone but I will work hard and pray to be ready”
New Ferrari CEO is physicist credited with Apple and Nintendo tech
Ferrari has announced Louis Camilleri’s replacement as chief executive officer, following his retirement last year.
Incoming CEO Benedetto Vigna is a physicist who worked in the technology industry, developing sensor systems that powered developments such as iPhone screen rotation and the Nintendo Wii’s motion detection.
Gasly’s engine glitch hurt top speed – Tost
AlphaTauri team principal Franz Tost has shed more light Pierre Gasly’s power unit problem during the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.
“It cost him some top speed,” Tost confirmed. “We have to investigate what was the reason for this – he could not get out the maximum of what we normally have. This was also the reason why he couldn’t fight back against Vettel.”
St Pete Grand Prix renewed until at least 2026
IndyCar will continue to race at the St Petersburg street circuit for the next five years after agreeing a contract extension to keep the event on the calendar over the next five years.
St Petersburg mayor Rick Kriseman said “I am thrilled that the grand prix will be in the Sunshine City through 2026. I want to thank City Council for recognizing the importance of this race in St. Pete.
“I also want to thank Kim (Green) and Kevin (Savoree), and everyone at the grand prix for not only organising and promoting one of our city’s best events year after year, but for their dedication to our community.”
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Social media
Notable posts from Twitter, Instagram and more:
Heartache for @Max33Verstappen 💔 #F1 #AzerbaijanGP pic.twitter.com/8YVbvNu3cZ
— Clive Rose (@cliverose) June 6, 2021
- Find more official F1 accounts to follow in the F1 Twitter Directory
Links
Motor racing links of interest:
On the road again: Romain Grosjean thriving in IndyCar (Associated Press)
"'It is strange to be home watching it and not being part, knowing your friends are doing it. So we’ll see what the situation is and then family-wise what do we think of doing. Initially I said I did not want to do ovals, now I would like to try one and then see if I want to do more.'"
McLaren's reverse-direction prank on Ayrton Senna (V8 Sleuth)
"'He does two or three laps and comes back into this big apron, does a donut, turns it around and goes 'you funny f***ers' and gets back on the circuit and does three laps the right way!'"
Azerbaijan Grand Prix strategy debrief (McLaren)
"We didn’t want to commit to a long first stint with the hard tyre because it would mean we couldn’t take advantage of any race circumstances. We chose to start on the soft to get a bit of benefit for the start."
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Comment of the day
Carl Parker says drivers felt might be more prepared to obey the yellow flag rules if they wouldn’t risk losing places from slowing down:
It might be an idea to always extend the yellow flag zone to the following corner under all circumstances, even if the waved yellows go after the incident.
That way nobody should have to worry about getting overtaken after slowing.
Yes some may slow more than others but I don’t see much of a solution to that, other than immediately always having a VSC every time there’s a yellow on the track at all.
@Magicarl
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On this day in F1
- On this day in 2006 Lewis Hamilton won the first GP2 race of the British Grand Prix at Silverstone for ART
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Jay Menon (@jaymenon10)
10th June 2021, 2:30
I’m surprised that the Ferraro CEO news isn’t a bigger story. Its one of the top jobs in motoring, if not motorsport.
Its a very odd appointment. Why would Ferrari of all people appoint a semiconductor boffin to lead their company? Sure, there are some parallels between large scale semiconductor manufacturing and auto manufacturing, having worked in the former business previously, a lot of its practises and quality standards are based on the automotive sector. However, I really dont know what a person with a thesis in Quantum Physics will actually add as the CEO of Ferrari.
Yes, I am an armchair critic. I believe I am in my rights to say this makes no sense. If your goal is to add electric variants to your fleet in years to come, while simultaneously diluting your brand value (my opinion, tell me I’m wrong, I welcome it), am I missing the point as to why you would hire a boffin as your CEO? Perhaps CTO, which makes sense, as he may be able to strategize development going forward.
Perhaps @dieterrencken will soon shed light on all this. Perhaps I conflate the Racing arm with the automotive arm, but at Maranello, these are one and the same.
I’m not a tifoso, but Ferrari have been lacking strong leadership at all levels since the untimely passing of Sergio Marchionne. This just seems to be another appointment in line with that trajectory.
pastaman (@)
10th June 2021, 2:44
Admits?
Retired (@jeff1s)
10th June 2021, 5:58
The title is the exact opposite of what’s been said. Great journalism.
He says he’ll do everything to be ready, she says he admits doubt over participation. Must be fun at parties.
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
10th June 2021, 9:38
Perfectly clear there his participation is in doubt. The fact he’s going to do everything to be there doesn’t mean he will be. Nothing wrong with the headline at all.
jff
10th June 2021, 3:03
It might be the safest and fairest way forward to have a PVSC whenever there is a double waved yellow situation – a Partial Virtual Safety Car only in the affected sectors.
It could even help to see the physical SC less often, limiting the (IMO) annoying effect of closing up the field and unnecessary delays whenever there are lapped cars.
S
10th June 2021, 10:29
Closing up the field? That’s the second best effect of a real SC – after safety, obviously.
Never forget that F1 is only partially sport – the rest of it is business and entertainment.
Surely you want to be entertained?
jff
10th June 2021, 14:48
I want the sport to be presented in an entertaining way.
Though that certainly doesn’t include unnecessarily resetting the racing gaps even if all 26 letters suggest I’d like that.
But that’s just my PoV.
RandomMallard (@)
10th June 2021, 14:08
jff Yeah someone suggested this the other day, similar to how WEC use slow zones at Le Mans. I don’t think it would be as easy to scale it down to shorter circuits though. You could get some drivers have to slow down for a PVSC more than others, which only closes or opens gaps, the opposite of what you suggest you want. At least with a full SC everyone’s gap is closed so it’s fairer than only some gaps. I also think the risk of constantly having cars slowing down/speeding up as opposed to just a single time may lead to more incidents, e.g. Museology as an extreme example, or just drivers pushing to slow down as late as possible.
JimG (@jimg)
10th June 2021, 16:47
Closing up the field is a feature of a full safety car, giving the marshals a bigger gap between the tail and head of the pack in which to clear the track.
Kribana (@krichelle)
10th June 2021, 7:12
COTD: With regards to yellow flags, there is a video from Palmer showing that Tsunoda and Gasly did not slow down for yellow flags at the location of Verstappen’s crash after which Mclaren raised that to Masi, and then the latter I think responded by saying that in the next debrief, he would talk to the drivers about yellow flags, but I am not sure if he said that he would let them off for this particular race.
I think the next driver’s briefing in France may have some heated arguments, because not slowing for yellow flags is a crystal clear penalty…
Jere (@jerejj)
10th June 2021, 7:36
@krichelle Most drivers didn’t slow down a lot when approaching the crash location. The last drivers were the ones who responded to the greatest extent, although by that point, the yellow started even earlier than previously.
Jere (@jerejj)
10th June 2021, 7:48
@krichelle What video? He didn’t do that in his F1 TV Analysis for F1’s official YT account.
S
10th June 2021, 10:32
Here
RandomMallard (@)
10th June 2021, 14:09
@jerejj F1TV has an extended cut of Jolyon Palmer’s Analysis and Tech Talk every weekend.
anon
10th June 2021, 8:09
@jerejj the point is, Tsunoda and Gasly were not even trying to slow down – their throttle trace showed they remained at full power, suggesting they were accelerating through that zone, not decelerating. https://streamable.com/piuee5
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
10th June 2021, 11:16
@krichelle If drivers didn’t slow down and didn’t get a penalty, then merely telling them off in the next briefing is only useful if everyone failed to slow down. If even one driver did slow down and others didn’t, then failing to penalise those who carried on regardless penalises everyone who tries to obey the rule. All yelling at drivers in briefings will do is convince drivers they’re being directed by a hypocrite – and cement the idea that they must carry on at full speed through yellows (the opposite behaviour to the one required for safety).
I’ve been here before and that path ends in lawyers.
(If everyone broke the rule, penalising everyone would be redundant as everyone would stay in the same position, except that penalty points would be a potentially meaningful penalty to some… …if evidence appears that stewards are prepared to inflict a points-based ban rather than just have the potential for it in the books. Evidence not currently in place).
Kribana (@krichelle)
10th June 2021, 13:41
@alianora-la-canta @jerejj
Here is the video where Mclaren report it to Tsunoda: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dlW6CZpZjcU
Here is a link on youtube to Palmer’s analysis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XUSL0wNk3pY
How about let’s give everyone penalty points or grid penalties? I’d assume Hamilton and Perez could be excluded from this due to their proximity to the accident.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
11th June 2021, 10:00
@krichelle 1 person is not everyone. Mick Schumacher, for example, slowed down a lot, and that’s noted in the main article. For that matter, Lando Norris is not likely to have reported Yuki Tsunoda if he believed himself to also be taking liberties with the regulations, since a rule-breaker accusing another rule-breaker is apt to bring attention on their own breach.
While I don’t have footage from every single driver, I am sure some of the drivers met the regulations as actually exist in their totality (I explained in my post why “slow down and be prepared to stop” is not and cannot be the full story).
Penalising everyone who actually broke the rules would be an excellent idea. Unfortunately, Masi’s sweeping statement implies he either doesn’t know, or doesn’t care, who those people are.
BasCB (@bascb)
11th June 2021, 14:36
Hm, If I feel like it, I might have a look through F1TV replays of the in car footage and see whether I can get a bit of an overview of who slowed down, and who did not or hardly @alianora-la-canta, @krichelle.
But I do agree with you that if this goes through without any penalty we are back to the situation where any driver will just completely ignore waved yellows apart from maybe a token lifting of the throttle all the time.
The whole situation – late to even throw a SC, when it was pretty clear to me that a SC quickly followed by a red flag would have been the safest option for both incidents to allow every one to really trundle through there and then have them clean up the track.
Jere (@jerejj)
10th June 2021, 7:50
Extending a yellow flag zone past the earliest light panel following the crash site would be redundant.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
10th June 2021, 11:17
@jerejj Not if it prevents drivers from behaving as if breaking the point of a yellow flag is worthwhile. (Though I also have doubts that extending yellow flag zones will help, given that the problem is that ignoring yellow flag zones is currently rewarded).
Dave
10th June 2021, 8:38
Re Pourchaire: Might affect his hunt for the title race, but long-shot prediction – let’s give him some time to be eligible for an F1 seat. (If only Max didn’t debut too early in 2015 then superlicense points probably wouldn’t be there…)
Re Ferrari CEO: Would be interesting for a RacingLines article about the new CEO.
Re McLaren prank: It’s always nice to hear stories about Ayrton Senna, ranging from personality to pranks.
UNeedAFinn2Win (@uneedafinn2win)
10th June 2021, 18:55
BMW announced entry into the….yawn..LMP2 (IMSA LMDh ) 2023
Yay…