In the round-up: Sergio Perez says he doesn’t understand why Force India told its drivers to switch places.
What they say
I am very pleased with my performance today. I started 16th, standing here today P7, it’s a massive achievement, with Esteban P6.
I don’t know what happened with the decision, it’s something we’ll have to go back and see why I had to give back the position.
But anyway I’m very pleased for all the effort the team has done. Very happy we have out-scored Renaunt. We are just closing up the gap.
Quotes: Dieter Rencken
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Social media
Notable posts from Twitter, Instagram and more:
After this race, can we all agree to stop bitching and moaning when we have a few bad races in a row? That was brilliant.
— Nate Saunders (@natesaundersF1) July 1, 2018
Agh, that was really tough. Felt like I wasn’t pushing overly hard, or saving massively, just trying to do similar to yesterday managing the tyres and it spiralled. Couldn’t do anything by the end, struggled with traction, braking, everything 😑
— Lando Norris (@LandoNorris) July 1, 2018
Happy bloody birthday @danielricciardo! 🎂 🎉 #AustrianGP pic.twitter.com/vJs716jTXB
— Red Bull Racing (@redbullracing) July 1, 2018
- Find more official F1 accounts to follow in the F1 Twitter Directory
Links
More motor racing links of interest:
Doubt points in Alpine thriller (Force India)
"We kept our tyres going until the end and we also showed great teamwork with Checo as we swapped places to chase Magnussen."
Austrian Grand Prix Sunday (Renault)
"Nico’s retirement looks to be due to a turbo issue. We will have containment measures in the very near future."
Austrian Grand Prix (Williams)
"We were struggling with tyres, temperatures and everything and couldn't really do anything with our strategy today."
Tough Sunday in Spielberg (Mercedes)
Andrew Shovlin: "We weren't reliable enough, we didn't make the right strategy call, our starts weren't good enough and we didn't manage the tyres as well as we could have done."
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Comment of the day
Tim has some words of praise for someone who had a bad day yesterday:
I thought James Vowles taking accountability live on air took a lot of courage and was very impressive (of course would have been more impressive if he hadn’t needed to do so in the first place).
He knew Hamilton would have been fuming and did what he could to alleviate this in the heat of the moment to try and get him to refocus. That to me shows great professionalism despite how some people might see it as humiliating.
Tim (@Gusty)
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On this day in F1
- 40 years ago today Mario Andretti led another Lotus one-two in the French Grand Prix, extending his points lead over team mate Ronnie Peterson
Vettel fan 17 (@)
2nd July 2018, 0:30
+1 to the COTD. Not many people, let alone f1 team strategist, would be able to do something like that.
Rockie (@rockie)
2nd July 2018, 12:01
That CoTD was wrong, James coming on the radio must be the most ridiculous thing I have seen in F1 for a while, the strategist having to massage the drivers ego to get him racing.
How many times this season alone has Ferrari put Vettel on the wrong strategy or other teams they sort it out after the race.
For a driver to want to throw in the towel immediately defies logic.
petebaldwin (@)
2nd July 2018, 19:40
He doesn’t have many but it’s a weakness of Hamilton’s. When things go wrong and he finds himself behind mid-race, he seems to lose some of his fight.
I think it was clever to have him speak on the radio and calm Hamilton down – they know their driver’s weaknesses and are doing what they can to mitigate them.
Rick Lopez (@viscountviktor)
2nd July 2018, 1:06
Would be hell to work with Hamilton. Have to suck up to him all the time. Whiny.
TheBullWhipper (@thebullwhipper)
2nd July 2018, 4:24
The team shafted him, I think that entitles you to be slightly annoyed in a situation like that
Matteo (@m-bagattini)
2nd July 2018, 10:19
@thebullwhipper you win and lose together. Hamilton is an amazing driver and rarely makes mistakes: but he’s the first to point the finger at his team when something doesn’t work.
K
2nd July 2018, 4:54
Agreed, everyone would have known they messed up already and having him carry on like they are all only there for his benefit was embarassing. Typically cringeworthy in truth.
anon
2nd July 2018, 8:30
@viscountviktor, you will find that pretty much every single driver on the grid has ranted at their engineers, and Hamilton’s complaints were rather tame compared to some.
After all, when he was driving for Sauber a few years ago, there was one race where Hulkenberg just started ranting at the team about how bad the car was, whilst Vettel’s famous foul mouthed rant on the radio a few years ago at Whiting is well known too, as are his frequent complaints about backmarkers. Alonso’s frequent verbal outbursts over the radio, from his “GP2 engine” comments to some of his scathing comments about his fellow drivers on the radio, are frequently played out on the TV broadcasts, whilst Kimi’s been rather more fiery in the cockpit and not been adverse at shouting at his engineers when he’s felt that he’s been screwed over too. Even your listed favourite, Massa, was well known for being rather grumpy and vocal on the radio when he was upset and being rather more bellicose than he might have appeared outside of the cockpit.
Some historical figures were even worse – Frentzen might have had a reputation out of the cockpit for being an easy going man, but his mechanics have said that, inside the cockpit, he could be incredibly abusive – to the point where, in one Monaco GP, the mechanics suspected that Frentzen was so angry with the team that he either lost control because he was more focussed on shouting abuse at his team rather than driving, or that he even deliberately crashed out of the race just to spite his team.
Jere (@jerejj)
2nd July 2018, 8:44
@anon I couldn’t agree more with you.
Matteo (@m-bagattini)
2nd July 2018, 10:23
@jerejj / anon: it is true, but we should consider that ranting against your team or ranting with your team are two different things. “Come on these backmarkers need to move” is different, even when filled with f-words, from “You made a mistake and now I’m fourth”.
Phylyp (@phylyp)
2nd July 2018, 8:57
You don’t come to and survive in F1 without being an alpha. I think rants are a part of that win at any cost attitude they need.
Champagne
3rd July 2018, 9:51
Please, none of these overgrown boys who’ve been brought up with bags of cash in a bubble are anywhere near being alpha!
prelvu (@prelvu)
2nd July 2018, 3:52
Ricardo’s B-day
Even the Cake candles don’t work.
NewVerstappenFan (@jureo)
2nd July 2018, 5:46
COTD +1, in a world where dodging responsibility is the norm, James did well to get it done.
Ju88sy (@)
2nd July 2018, 7:13
@jureo Nicely put, along with COTD, rather than humiliation it achieves the exact opposite requiring courage and inner strength to publicly accept responsibility. It diffused the situation, allowing the team to move on. A pertinent lesson for us individually and for society!
NewVerstappenFan (@jureo)
2nd July 2018, 11:14
Offcorse drivers are total spoiled brats. Enter Hamitlon emo-raging over the team mistake. It is easy to judge him on his behavior.
But most drivers tend to be spoiled brats especially really good ones like Hamilton, emotions running high while the helmet is down.
Tim (@gusty)
2nd July 2018, 7:55
Woo I think that was my first or maybe second time commenting here and I got COTD… Thanks :-)
Phylyp (@phylyp)
2nd July 2018, 8:58
Very well-deserved COTD, and a mature take on the situation, @gusty
Keep the good comments coming!
ColdFly (@)
2nd July 2018, 8:01
What we all missed due to the ‘not pitting’ drama is that the VSC worked wonders.
They keep the VSC lit as shortly as possible and rush the stranded car away; I think it was just over a lap this time (< 2minutes).
This is so much better than a mechanical SC which they keep on for up to 5 laps even for a minor incident (driving out, collecting cars, unlapping cars, 'SC in this lap').
MacLeod (@macleod)
2nd July 2018, 8:14
But i rather see a fixed speed like a pits one so noone can get advantage. But they are short which i like.
Jere (@jerejj)
2nd July 2018, 8:46
I agree with both the COTD as well as Nate Saunders concerning his tweet.
Todfod (@todfod)
2nd July 2018, 12:26
Don’t know why Perez is acting so disillusioned with the team order. I remember they asked Ocon to let Perez through (probably because Perez on SS was capable of chasing down the car in front). After he failed to do so, they reversed positions again. Seems fairly standard. Maybe Perez should have raced Ocon for the position if he wanted to finish in front.
Tango (@tango)
2nd July 2018, 12:43
YEah I’m a bit surprised. He can’t pretend he passed Ocon so easily on his own…
Pire
2nd July 2018, 21:03
I think Perez would pass Ocon without the team order, he was lapping faster than Esteban, and after the team order he gained at leasts 5.5 secs. to Esteban, is not that Ocon was right behind his wing.
XAVI
3rd July 2018, 1:53
I too believe it is normal Team orders and no harm in switching back. F1 website has an article on Force I and they are actually pleased on the strategy and how drivers understood and behaved, so I don’t know from where Checo’s comments were picked up.
And I also agree with Pire Checo was faster than Ocon. In fact I do believe that prior to the pass Ocon hit on the brakes earlier and hard to make it obvious it was a Team order and not a natural race pass, even though he would’ve been passed that or the next lap easily with or without Team orders.
Either way it looks embarrassing that your Team mate has to wait for you 6 seconds almost at the start/finish line for you to pass him and finish ahead.
All in all a good result for the Team and it was nice to see that they didn’t clash this time.
Mark (@blueruck)
2nd July 2018, 15:10
I love the post race comments by readers, I can’t believe so & so is being a cry baby. These same folks get mad when Grandma is slow off the light and would likely loose their cookies if their boss at work did something stupid and cost them a bonus.
Give the drivers a break, they are mentally on a knife edge of extreme performance and I think the majority of their reactions are quite calm compared to how most people would react in a similar scenario. If I had been Hamilton it would have been a lot more unhappy.