Topic: Motosport General discussion tread --- Formula1, MotoGP, WTCC, ETCC, DTM..... - page 126. (Read 143774 times)

Norris has been doing great drives in his previous race. It'll take some time for him to be aggressive and take those early spots like what Max is trying to do to get that huge gap between him and P2. I think McLaren's recent upgrade with the car is good enough to beat Red Bull in a fine day, although that remains to be seen of course. But based on what we're seeing on the previous races, I think McLaren has a pretty good shot in snatching P1 against Verstappen every now and then. At least the competition isn't as boring as it was before.

Mclaren seems like the only one who can catch him for the time being but that's not even that easy, it takes time for them to get used to the car they have, it is not easy to improve the car and expect the driver to be good right away, their car is even better than what we have seen so far, but the drivers will get to feel it and get used to it a bit.

I think they have a chance to catch up to him, but it is not going to be easy because Max has  the best car (I assume but also Perez makes it look like they don't) and Norris is not as good of a driver as Max if you ask me, that's why I think it is going to be pretty difficult to catch him and then pass him. Max will probably win every race left, that's going to be pretty obvious.

I have zero doubt about Verstappen to win the race comfortably. It wouldn't take him much time to take the lead and have a safe time gap with the others. However Q2 was still quite interesting. Verstappen was nearly staying out of top 10. He finished it just in the 10th position. But he made up for that really great by finishing as the 1st.

I really admired Perez's effort in the qualifying. Because recently we haven't seen him performing this good mostly. There was some progress previously and he improved it even more here. Despite the poor weather condition he was still able to finish in upper positions. He is starting the race right behind Leclerc so I wonder if he can take the lead by overtaking him on the start straight already.

It was topped by Verstappen and today we have the Sprint which I have no doubt at all that it will be dominated by Redbull again.Unfortunately the Redbull upgrades proved to be working well in this kind of long technical track,the opposite of Hungary where did not see a big dominance from Redbull overall,in here the dominance will be more extreme because of the long track and as such the difference with the other teams will be bigger than in Hungary.The fact that Verstappen was almost 1 second faster per lap than the direct contender says a lot about the developments of this upcoming race tomorrow.

2023 F1 Belgian Grand Prix - Free Practice Results (1)
Pos    Driver    Nat.   Team    Time
1   Carlos Sainz   ESP   Scuderia Ferrari   2m03.207s
2   Oscar Piastri   AUS   McLaren F1 Team   2m03.792s
3   Lando Norris   GBR   McLaren F1 Team   2m04.484s
4   Charles Leclerc   MON   Scuderia Ferrari   2m08.148s
5   Sergio Perez   MEX   Oracle Bull Racing   2m08.240s
6   Alex Albon   THA   Williams Racing   2m08.394s
7   Yuki Tsunoda   JPN   Scuderia AlphaTauri    2m09.067s
8   Kevin Magnussen   DEN   MoneyGram Haas F1 Team   2m09.229s
9   Daniel Ricciardo   AUS   Scuderia AlphaTauri   2m09.319s
10   Nico Hulkenberg   GER   MoneyGram Haas F1 Team   2m10.042s
11   Fernando Alonso   ESP   Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant Formula One Team   2m10.283s
12   Lewis Hamilton   GBR   Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team   2m10.299s
13   George Russell   GBR   Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team   2m10.475s
14   Valtteri Bottas   FIN   Alfa Romeo F1 Team Stake   2m12.085s
15   Zhou Guanyu   CHN   Alfa Romeo F1 Team Stake   2m14.002s
16   Logan Sargeant   USA   Williams Racing   No Time Set
17   Lance Stroll   CAN   Aston Martin Aramco Cognizant Formula One Team   No Time Set
18   Pierre Gasly   FRA   BWT Alpine F1 Team   No Time Set
19   Esteban Ocon   FRA   BWT Alpine F1 Team   No Time Set
20   Max Verstappen   NED   Oracle Red Bull Racing   No Time Set


As predicted, heavy rain on track.

Same weather for the Qualify in 2 hours.

Source: https://www.crash.net/f1/results/1032205/1/f1-2023-belgian-grand-prix-friday-practice-results

Very hard for any team to fight today against Max for pole in qualies but then again , the only one who can lose pole today is Max himself as with a slight mistake again , McLaren boys can speculate this and try for a perfect lap.

We still have Practice 2 in about 1 hour and 4 hours later we go for qualification session as this weekend as many of you told here , it's a weekend with sprint race and I do hope this format will be a bit adjust in the next season because I still find no joy watching the sprint races. 

It is another race week with an awkward order. I mean I think qualifying should be on Saturday rather than Friday. At the same time sprint shootout and sprint race should be on Friday. Because qualifying results determine the grid for the race as you know. Hence isn't it better to have this session right before the race? It looks weird to see it taking place two days before the main race. But I have heard that FIA are working on that now. However that change won't happen this season as it seems.

They are planning to change the system to the version I'm talking about by next season. It is still good to see that because I believe sprint day shouldn't divide qualifying and race this much.

Yeah, according to Sky RBR may have done it again and broken the budget cup this year too.

Not only a rumor, it will be confirmed or denied soon, very soon.

Are you aware of Toto Wolff (Mercedes) last comment about the spending cap?
He called for a change in the rules, believing that staff at non-Formula 1 teams should be fully protected in future editions to prevent loopholes in the cost cap being exploited.

Indeed, it is clear that a number of teams are benefiting from using parts of their non-F1 business (individuals and outside companies) to help drive their cars' progress into the premier category of world motorsport.

The publication of the technical guideline (TD45) banning the out-of-cost transfer of IP from non-F1 companies to teams has largely resolved the problem, but it is clear that there are still some 'grey areas' that need to be addressed. better addressed, and Mercedes is very unhappy with what its competitors are doing "within the law".

We are going to watch quite many events under rain most probably thanks to the sprint race added as well. I wonder whether Verstappen can preserve the same level of domination this year too. He had everything under control for the whole race weekend in the previous season. This time hopefully we see something different.

I don't have much hope about a different driver to win the race though. But the qualifying can be quite interesting if it rains quite much during the session. I would expect a solid effort to get to pole position from Norris and Hamilton especially.

Yeah, this track has a sprint race this year, they are doing a rotation within tracks.

For example this year they introduced at Spa and removed from Monza.

Yeah, I checked the weather too.  Rain has been happening noticeably more lately.  :/  It's prolly time to reschedule these races that suffer from rain almost every year.  Maybe European races should be reschduled at the beginning of the season?  It's so unfair for those fans making the trip at Spa and get nothing but getting soaked in the rain.

Here's the schedule for the race weekend.  Let's hope for no rain for the fans' sake.

2023 F1 Belgian GP Schedule

28 JUL:  Practice 1 13:30 - 14:30
28 JUL:  Qualifying 17:00 - 18:00
29 JUL:  Sprint Shootout 12:00 - 12:45
29 JUL:  Sprint 16:30 - 17:30
30 JUL:  Race 15:00

Didn't know this GP is gonna be in the new format. 

While I would love to see the rain in SPA I remember the race before two seasons which barely the drivers made 2 laps under the red flag and the race ended with that classification and I would not want to see such thing happening again,back then the rain intensity was extreme and the fans there were magnificent waiting for more than 4 hours in that heavy rain before FIA decided to conduct a just two laps race,we don't want anymore that rain intensity.

If rain is enough to make the race happen it would be a welcome change as finally we would love to see some other drivers rather than Verstappen have a chance to win the race as in the rain and in a long track like this one anything can happen.

@dothebeats I won’t be surprised if Verstappen easily win’s once again because currently each and every driver is clearly struggling to match his intensity and thus he’s my favourite driver to win the upcoming race. Lastly with rains on this race should definitely be interesting but a lot would depend on the risks drivers take otherwise it could get boring really soon if they decide to play it safe.

Things can get very challenging under rain on this track. It just becomes quite dangerous to drive on when it rains heavily there. But it is still doubtful whether it would affect Verstappen's performance negatively. He is just dominating races under every kind of condition.    But maybe the time gap wouldn't be as big as last season this time.

Rain creates a big chance to seeing surprising names in top places too of course. It feels like Ferrari will mess it up in qualifying session here. We have seen it before. In Canada the tyre strategy in the qualifying session wasn't good enough which caused their drivers to complete the session in bad places.

Here in Spa I won't be surprised if we see a similar scenario for Ferrari.

Another race week with lots of rain. We'll definitely see a lot of slips and crashes from a lot of drivers. Hopefully not a boring week for the fans seeing Verstappen just taking off against those who are behind him. The previous fights to the podium has been hella interesting, with Hamilton trying to get that 2nd spot but always being edged out by Perez in the last few laps.

In fact the rain has been quite present The rain in the last six F1 disputes this season... it greatly influenced the results of Montreal, Spiebleg and Silverstone, even the Monaco GP where it only rained in some parts of the track the dynamics of the race It completely changed the dynamics of teams.

In the specific case of Spa-Francorchamps, I agree with you because I remember too that at this year near Lotus championship, it was completely flooded after heavy rains hit the circuit. The amount of water was so excessive on the track that the drainage system could not handle it, with a real flood forming on the track and a waterfall of water in the stands towards the track until the Eau Rouge curve.


Obviously, from 2021 onwards, this must have gone through adjustments, because I hope the weather forecast is confirmed.... F1 is much more interesting when it rains

When it comes to Spa, rain isn't best news that we can get. I hope I don't have to remind ''race'' that we had in 2021. Also, fatal crash of  Dilano van 't Hoff happened during rain, so, I think that F1 will be extremely cautious if there will be rain.
Seems that there will be very low temperatures, almost 2x lower than we had in Hungary.

One mopre gp this week and one more week with rain  



Source: https://www.google.com/search?q=weather+spa+francorchamps&client=firefox-b-d&sxsrf=AB5stBjhQYDmL_ZKXkNYu2IDwxcipOrWQQ%3A1690315578828&ei=OivAZLuNMsuOxc8Pkv2JgAc&ved=0ahUKEwi7komd1KqAAxVLR_EDHZJ-AnAQ4dUDCA4&uact=5&oq=weather+spa+francorchamps&gs_lp=Egxnd3Mtd2l6LXNlcnAiGXdlYXRoZXIgc3BhIGZyYW5jb3JjaGFtcHMyDRAAGIAEGMsBGEYYgAIyBRAAGIAEMgoQABiABBgUGIcCMgUQABiABDIIEAAYigUYhgMyCBAAGIoFGIYDMggQABiKBRiGA0jcC1CaAVjrCXABeAGQAQCYAXegAaEFqgEDNC4zuAEDyAEA-AEBwgIKEAAYRxjWBBiwA8ICChAAGIoFGLADGEPCAhAQLhiKBRjIAxiwAxhD2AEBwgIIECEYoAEYwwTCAgcQABgNGIAEwgIKECEYoAEYwwQYCuIDBBgAIEGIBgGQBhC6BgYIARABGAg&sclient=gws-wiz-serp

In terms of a challenge for winning the race it was boring. Verstappen didn't have any difficulty as usual. However if we assess the race from a wider aspect I can't say it was boring as well. There was some really good competition among the drivers behind. Especially the competition for finishing on the podium was worth watching to me. Perez's climb deserved a big appreciation. Hamilton's high effort in the last times of the race wasn't enough to push Perez out of the podium.

This week we are going to Belgium. Spa track has always been one of the special tracks for me. Now we will have a sprint race as an addition to this race week as well.