Topic: Motosport General discussion tread --- Formula1, MotoGP, WTCC, ETCC, DTM..... - page 381. (Read 144145 times)

After hearing that Verstappen is gonna start from the last position to the race, the fans must be quite unhappy about it. But I guess that this is worth it as he changed the engine of his car. As long as he has a faster car, Verstappen would make up for this. If doing this didn't worth it, then Red Bull would never let Verstappen start like this. I think that Hamilton is highly the favourite driver to win this race now.

It all depends on the weather and the intensity of the rain, because this factor will immediately make any race unpredictable and can give the most unexpected winners and podium holders Unscheduled pit stops due to rain, as well as unscheduled appearances of a safety car can break any scenario that was planned before. Bottas undoubtedly began to feel more relaxed and should impose competition on Hamilton even more, although within reasonable limits, otherwise Russell may well change the team ahead of time The absence of Verstappen ahead seems to be supposed to untie the hands of Perez, but based on the experience of previous races, there are certain doubts about this, it seems that the results of practice are clearly in favor of Meresedes so far.

Mercedes drivers will dominate this race indeed. Because Verstappen is gonna start the race from the last spot. And I don't know whether Perez would fight back against Hamilton and Bottas on his own. He has already been having a difficulty in keeping up with them. He hasn't given the expected yet. Hence, the thing that I'm curious about the most is which one will be the winner at the end of the race, Hamilton or Bottas?  Bottas seems to be fired up after his future has become certain. It looks like he aims to hit Hamilton hard before leaving the team.  

It looks like Mercedes as always is going to dominate this track,they have the most victories here so I am afraid we are going to see a boring race,much different from last one in Monza where McLaren won after almost ten years of not doing so.The weather forecast is rain but not heavy one like in Spa in Belgium so most probably the race will be held at rainy weather because that's the weather until next Friday or more.This at least makes me inpatient about this race.I am hoping for an interesting race,one thing is sure in rainy races,Safety car will be deployed so by gambling that would be an interesting bet.

It is sad to hear that Max Verstappen is going to start from the last position. Because Red Bull is going to install a new engine into Verstappen's car as of this race. So, this means that even if Verstappen ends the qualifying session as the leader, he isn't going to be able to take the pole position. But I'm pretty sure that he will do everything he can not to let Hamilton take the pole. Leclerc and Verstappen will start this race from the back now. Let's see how many places each of them will be able to climb.

Red Bull assumes that Mercedes is too strong in Russia and that they will lose the least here by completely changing the engine unit. And because of the bad weather, anything is possible in the race, so they change the engine unit in Russia and not at another race.

Will be with the announced weather an exciting race I think and Verstappen has in any case the chance to come under the top 6 and not to lose too many points on Hamilton.

So I’m hearing Verstappen is starting behind the whole grid due to the engine change..?  I haven’t checked the lines yet but I think a nice spot could be top 6 finish for Verstappen if you could find decent line.  Something around 1.80 and up would def be good.

Edit:  Meh..  1.62 at Stake. No value.  Fastest lap is at 3.75 tho.  With the new engine that’s a good spot imo.

Second practice has been completed too

1   Valtteri Bottas   FIN   Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team   1m33.593s
2   Lewis Hamilton   GBR   Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team   1m33.637s
3   Pierre Gasly   FRA   Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda   1m33.845s
4   Lando Norris   GBR   McLaren F1 Team   1m34.154s
5   Esteban Ocon   FRA   Alpine F1 Team   1m34.402s
6   Max Verstappen   NED   Red Bull Racing   1m34.621s
7   Carlos Sainz   ESP   Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow   1m34.678s
8   Fernando Alonso   CHI   Alpine F1 Team   1m34.762s
9   Sebastian Vettel   GER   Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team   1m34.837s
10   Charles Leclerc   MON   Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow   1m34.925s
11   Sergio Perez   MEX   Red Bull Racing   1m34.938s
12   Kimi Raikkonen   FIN   Alfa Romeo Racing Orlen   1m35.052s
13   George Russell   ISR   Williams Racing   1m35.094s
14   Antonio Giovinazzi   GBR   Alfa Romeo Racing Orlen   1m35.178s
15   Lance Stroll   CAN   Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team   1m35.334s
16   Nicholas Latifi   CAN   Williams Racing   1m35.411s
17   Daniel Ricciardo   AUS   McLaren F1 Team   1m35.630s
18   Yuki Tsunoda   JPN   Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda   1m35.934s
19   Nikita Mazepin   RUS   Uralkali Haas F1 Team   1m36.099s
20   Mick Schumacher   GER   Uralkali Haas F1 Team   1m36.230

Source: https://www.crash.net/f1/results/988198/1/f1-2021-russian-grand-prix-free-practice-results-2

Timers are still slow.

Rain and heavy rain is expected for the following 2 days.

It looks like Bottas won't stay on the side until the end of this season and it will try it's best to win races , get points and leave Mercedes on a higher note than he joined. To be honest, this is a good option for him as everyone started to point at him for not having an ego and fight back against both Hamilton and Verstappen because he had numerous chances to win more races and even get closer to a title battle in 2018.

Tomorrow qualifiers should be a good one to watch.

@coinlocket$  The first practice round was really exciting. Bottas, Hamilton and Verstappen had a really close gap between each other. This might be a sign for that we can see a very competitive race between these trio. However, this is only the practice round and things can change very easily when it comes to the qualifying session and race. I feel like this time we will watch a great competition between Hamilton and Verstappen here. But I hope that we don't ever see an incident like in the last race in Monza. It was really horrifying to see Hamilton in that condition.

Results of free practice 1, no qualify sprint this time


Pos   Driver   Nat.   Team   Time
1   Valtteri Bottas   FIN   Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team   1m34.427s
2   Lewis Hamilton   GBR   Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team   1m34.638s
3   Max Verstappen   NED   Red Bull Racing   1m34.654s
4   Charles Leclerc   MON   Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow   1m35.117s
5   Sebastian Vettel   GER   Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team   1m35.781s
6   Pierre Gasly   FRA   Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda   1m35.794s
7   Carlos Sainz   ESP   Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow   1m35.811s
8   Lando Norris   GBR   McLaren F1 Team   1m35.959s
9   Sergio Perez   MEX   Red Bull Racing   1m36.188s
10   Fernando Alonso   CHI   Alpine F1 Team   1m36.225s
11   Esteban Ocon   FRA   Alpine F1 Team   1m36.236s
12   Lance Stroll   CAN   Aston Martin Cognizant Formula One Team   1m36.522s
13   Antonio Giovinazzi   GBR   Alfa Romeo Racing Orlen   1m36.795s
14   Daniel Ricciardo   AUS   McLaren F1 Team   1m36.877s
15   Kimi Raikkonen   FIN   Alfa Romeo Racing Orlen   1m36.952s
16   Yuki Tsunoda   JPN   Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda   1m37.794s
17   George Russell   ISR   Williams Racing   1n38.013s
18   Nicholas Latifi   CAN   Williams Racing   1m38.155s
19   Nikita Mazepin   RUS   Uralkali Haas F1 Team   1m38.586s
20   Mick Schumacher   GER   Uralkali Haas F1 Team   1m38.977s

https://www.crash.net/f1/results/988165/1/f1-2021-russian-grand-prix-free-practice-results-1

Lecler using the new engine is already 6-7 tenths faster over Sainz. Let's see if he will keep this paste.

@Maidak indeed rain races are more fun and at times preferred too, but sadly their frequency is very less and who knows with improvement in weather predictions we may not see these in the future. Also another master stroke by team Ferrari to test their engine in a race where they probably can’t win, and whether they win or lose it’ll be a nice experiment for them.

Rain races are like a refreshment version of races for me. Like watching the normal races sometimes become a bit repetitive for me to be honest. Whereas these rain races excite me whenever they take place. And if Max uses a new engine, that will be a challenge for him. He already has the crash penalties and if the new engine penalty is added on top of that, he will start almost at the end of the grid and that would be a big drawback for him. But let's see if he is able to recover from that.

Rain during a race or wet track during a race is not a problem, FIA couldn't comprehend that we would be fine with postponing the race to some other time, like maybe last week when we had nothing, that was the problem. If there can't be a race, then do not have a race, it is not a problem! Why was it so hard for them to understand this? Belgium was a disaster just because FIA made it a disaster, and they were keep repeating "we didn't want to risk drivers, we are not backing down our decision, driver safety is first" like anyone said we should had a race during that weather. NOBODY SAID THAT, but FIA replied like that was intender. Just postpone.

I do not know how weather will be at Sochi, how the track will be, if they can have a race, even if it is a horrible race, just let them have a race, if they can't, then don't just do 2 laps behind safety and stop, THAT IS NOT A RACE.

Leclerc will start from the last position, they have chosen to change the engine but they will need to pay the penalty since one engine has been destroyed by Stroll in the accident of 2 months ago.

The new engine is the 1st step of the 2022 engine, it is rumored to be 15-20 hps bigger.

Engine penalty does happen anytime you improve your engine and bring a new one. In case that it is the same engine but just a new one, basically just replicate of each other, you get to use 3 engines I believe, but they all need to be exactly the same engine with zero differences, in that case you do not get a penalty and only go into penalty when you need to get to use 4th one.

Max has that penalty as well, because of some crashes this year, he had to use his engine amount already and in Sochi he may use a brand new one, not a better one, exactly same but new one because he is also getting a grid penalty as well which means that if he is starting at last, why not get a brand new one. Ferrari on the other hand will be getting a brand new improved one, which will always get a penalty, and since everyone is at the back then it is a good time to use that right too.

^ As per the weather forecast, the rain might stay for some time. This could heavily affect the team's decisions and strategies. The drainages are unable to clear the flooded water. I looked up the weather forecast on Weeronline.nl and it said that wet rain is to expected on the first practice day which could dry out for the second practice to take place on a dry track. And maybe Saturday’s qualifying season might also get drenched in rain. Let’s see how the teams shape up with this in mind.

It doesn't look good. But I think I'd prefer another Monaco to another Belgium. Although at the moment the track looks more like Monaco harbour than Monaco roads.

The forecast says mostly dry for the next couple of days, but then heavy rain on Saturday, easing up around Sunday afternoon. So it might not be raining for the race, but it looks like this might be irrelevant if the whole place is underwater by then anyway... https://www.myweather2.com/Motor-Racing/Russia/Sochi-Autodrom/14-Day-Forecast.aspx

Sochi with rain will be a bigger Monaco especially in the part of the track in the middle of the city near the castle.




This is the situation of yesterday.

source: https://twitter.com/startonpole/status/1440352325546110976

So I like rain races because they are usually more interesting, the same as in SPA will probably no longer happen more embarrassing can not the Formula 1, it was also an exception that it rains so hard and does not want to stop.

I also read that Ferrari will bring the new engine parts in Turkey, there will also be a penalty for the engine swap or?