Williams are not at the bottom of the table due to the drivers, they're there due to lack of development funding. As it happens Latifi comes with £$£$£ AND a second place in the F2 championship. They could do a lot worse...
That would require a funding level playing field, which would require the proverbial turkeys voting for xmas... Ferrari in particular will always vehemently oppose anything that would truly improve balance, albeit 2021's revenue tweaks could help the lesser teams (tho' I'm not convinced), and the funding cap certainly will.
Williams' situation is dire - at present they're in a funding death-spiral: the worse they do, the less the sponsorship; the less the sponsorship, the worse they do...
As things stand, I'll just be happy to see them survive another season, hopefully with a fast AND wealthy driver on board, and hope 2021 takes some of the heat off them!
It is of their own doing, badly performing pay drivers and giving Clair Williams the top job (FW isn’t that involved) they should have employed an experienced successful team leader. GR is there because of Mercedes, this spiral is their own doing, maybe it is that someone with the resources to push it forward needs to buy them,
Last edited by adrianw; 29th November 2019 at 09:27.
The weekend begins...link:
Valtteri Bottas thought he had room to overtake on the inside
Romain Grosjean disagreed
Drivers are seeing the stewards at the time of posting.
I suppose RG hasn’t hit anything for a couple of races
VB recently announced the divorce from his wife of 3 years sighting their work/life balances as part of the reason. Hopefully he'll be carrying minimal weight from that into this weekend.
Whoever does not know how to hit the nail on the head should be asked not to hit it at all.
Friedrich Nietzsche
Whoever does not know how to hit the nail on the head should be asked not to hit it at all.
Friedrich Nietzsche
Offence Doc12 - Car 77 (incident with car 8 in turn 11)
No / Driver 77 - Valtteri Bottas
Decision Reprimand - Driving (This is the driver’s 1st reprimand of the season)
Reason - Valtteri accepted responsibility for the collision and acknowledged that it was a failed attempt at an overtake which resulted in the collision.
See...Valtteri and Emilia Bottas call it a day
See also Wiki: On 11 September 2016, Bottas married his long-time girlfriend, Emilia Pikkarainen, a fellow Finn...
And then...Vettel to arrive late to Abu Dhabi following birth of third child
Last edited by PickleB; 29th November 2019 at 17:54.
When you look long into an abyss, the abyss looks long into you.........
So how do component changes send him to the back of the grid yet a new engine only gets a Ferrari a ten place drop
I'm not aware of the details of either Bottas' or Ferrari's situation however aren't the grid penalties based upon a multiplier of components changed? The IC would carry one penalty with other components carrying others with totals added up to define the final grid penalty itself.
I feel like I should really know the answer to this one
Offence Doc7 - Car 77 (PU elements)
No / Driver 77 - Valtteri Bottas
Fact - 4th Internal Combustion Engine (ICE), 4th Turbocharger (TC) and 4th Motor Generator Unit – Heat (MGU-H) have been used.
Offence - Breach of Article 23.3 (a) of the FIA Formula One Sporting Regulations.
Decision - Required to start the race from the rear of the starting grid.
Reason - The penalty is imposed in accordance to with Article 23.3 b) of the FIA Formula One Sporting Regulations.
Article 23.3 (a) & (b) of the FIA Formula One Sporting Regulations:
a) Unless he drives for more than one team (see 23.3(c) below), and subject to the additions described below, each driver may use no more than 3 engines (ICE), 3 motor generator units-heat (MGU-H), 3 turbochargers (TC), 2 energy stores (ES), 2 control electronics (CE) and 2 motor generator units-kinetic (MGU-K) during a Championship season.
With the consent of (and at the sole discretion of) the FIA, the numbers above will be increased by one for any driver using a power unit provided by a new power unit manufacturer (as defined in Appendix 9) taking part in their first Championship season.
b) Should a driver use more than the numbers set in a) above of any one of the elements during a Championship season, a grid place penalty will be imposed upon him at the first Event during which each additional element is used. Penalties will be applied according to the following table and will be cumulative :
The first time an additional element is used Ten grid place penalty.
The next times an additional element is used Five grid place penalty.
If a driver incurs a penalty exceeding 15 grid places he will be required to start the race from the back of the starting grid.
Any of the six elements will be deemed to have been used once the car’s timing transponder has shown that it has left the pit lane.
During any single Event, if a driver introduces more than one of the same power unit element which is subject to penalties, only the last element fitted may be used at subsequent Events without further penalty.
Qualifying will be interesting if the tyres turn out to only be good for one lap or less
At one point Ayrton Senna offered to drive for Williams for nothing.
I agree, the current plight of Williams is a shame, they had phases when they were the dominant force in Formula 1, and even chose their sponsors on the basis os their corporate colours, so that the colour scheme of the car could be dark blue and white, unsullied by the brash colours of their benefactors.
They were, on the other hand, less fussy when they had Veltins sponsorship, with that awful red/black/yellow/blue scheme, but times were harder then.
Having seen the documentary on Williams, it seems that the dominant force within the team wasn't Frank, but his late wife Ginny, and the decline in recent years seems to have started when she died.
The appointment, swiftly followed by the departure, of Paddy Lowe indicates that there's a fundamental underlying problem at Williams, and the fact that Lowe, fresh from Mercedes, couldn't fix it, doesn't bode well. I hope that they can turn things around, and if they have to accept pay drivers in order to secure the team's future, then so be it - what's the alternative?
Although no trees were harmed during the creation of this post, a large number of electrons were greatly inconvenienced.
Although no trees were harmed during the creation of this post, a large number of electrons were greatly inconvenienced.
The VB RG crash was even more interesting when you listen to the commentary, they all blamed RG, when LH was told about it and that it was RG he said that’s not a surprise
Whoever does not know how to hit the nail on the head should be asked not to hit it at all.
Friedrich Nietzsche
Hamilton was on it there
It's nice to have consistency in ones life.
Night follows day.
Williams fail to get out of Q1
Romain whinges like a girl.
Mercedes especially Hamilton give it the beans.
and Ferrari manage a created a SNAFU.
Whoever does not know how to hit the nail on the head should be asked not to hit it at all.
Friedrich Nietzsche
I think it's just Andrew Benson from the Beeb filling in a column or two actually.
There is talk of Toto moving into a senior position in F1 or the FIA I thought which could be a factor in his decision
I think that winning the WDC in a Ferrari would add to his status. And winning the manufacturers’ championship would give him cult status with the tifosi...
'Against stupidity, the gods themselves struggle in vain' - Schiller.
Something not right with the Fuel in CLCs car, wonder if the magnifying glass has got bigger and they have been caught
Word has it that LeClerc's car has too much fuel in the tanks. Directive #34 is the buzz-word.
More fuel on board than they told FIA when they handed them this race’ specs and data.
Last edited by thieuster; 1st December 2019 at 13:55.
Technical Delegate’s Report
The fuel declaration of car number 16 was checked before the car leaft the pit-lane. There was a significant difference between the declaration of the team and the amount of fuel inside the car. As this is non in compliance with TD/12-19 I am referring this matter to the stewards for their consideration.
Jo Bauer
The FIA Formula One Technical Delegate
Is there are a set penalty or is it up to the stewards' discretion to decide?
Edit
Found online: "Technical directives currently only go out to the teams :( Martin Brundle raised this as an issue back in Australia to Charlie Whiting in his media meeting. Charlie said there was no reason why they couldn't go online, yet we still wait..."
Last edited by PickleB; 1st December 2019 at 14:53.
I think that this race proves my argument, scrap push to pass and save fortunes on Coming up with new regs and designing new cars
An intersting race without DRS and being able to see what the car's can do with just slipstreaming alone.
... and home per starting order.