2020 Portuguese Grand Prix - Portimão, October 23 - 25

[PlatinumZealot]

Or, he is simply short timing it.

Its not even "his" car at this point.

Hmm.
Perez got a shittier end of the stick and seems to be doing well. Vettel and his 35million i expect he should at least be giving his best and I believe he is! It is just that some issue has been affecting him since 2018 so I don't believe it has to do with his sacking. LEC has been outperforming him since the word go.

[TAG]

Merc. fvcked Valtteri by sending him out with a one lap strategy ?

Valteri said it was HIS decision, and it was obviously the wrong one. They're pretty equal at Mercedes when it comes to treatment of their drivers.

[El Scorchio]

Merc. fvcked Valtteri by sending him out with a one lap strategy ?

There’s no way that wouldn’t have been his choice.

Said it was his decision.

Very interesting that he wouldn’t just follow suit and do the same given he seemed to have the edge all weekend so far. To be fair the one lap he did do was a good lap and better than Hamilton’s first, but I guess it backfired on him a little ultimately.

[NathanOlder]

Merc. fvcked Valtteri by sending him out with a one lap strategy ?

There’s no way that wouldn’t have been his choice.

Said it was his decision.

Yeah you missed the point. He chose to do 1 lap. stop talking rubbish by saying Mercedes screwed Bottas.

[Just_a_fan]

And that's why Hamilton is rightly known a qualifying machine. Where did that come from? Bottas had Hamilton in his pocket all through the sessions yesterday and today. And then, bang, Hamilton pips him. That's got to hurt Bottas.

Well done Leclerc, making the Ferrari look like it's supposed to be up there at the sharp end again and his team mate look lost.

Well done Gasly getting in to Q3. Well done Russell getting in to Q2, again, and beating a Ferrari.

The McLarens are 5 thousandths apart. That's about 1ft.

[PlatinumZealot]

Merc. fvcked Valtteri by sending him out with a one lap strategy ?

Lol.. calm down calm down.
It was calculated by the BOSS himself.

[Just_a_fan]

Merc. fvcked Valtteri by sending him out with a one lap strategy ?

Bottas said in interview that it was his choice to do one lap. And that it was a mistake. Nothing to do with Mercedes shafting Botta.

[Just_a_fan]

Someone please put Russell in a faster car, even the Ferrari!

Or the Red Bull!

It staggers belief that some think Hamilton would comprehensively defeat Russell.

Russell would give Hamilton a lot of trouble. He'd give Max or Charles a lot of trouble too. The kid is seriously quick.

[dans79]

There’s no way that wouldn’t have been his choice.

Said it was his decision.

Very interesting that he wouldn’t just follow suit and do the same given he seemed to have the edge all weekend so far. To be fair the one lap he did do was a good lap and better than Hamilton’s first, but I guess it backfired on him a little ultimately.

I think The hot lap then a fast cooldown lap put the tires in the perfect temperature range. It also probably gave Lewis a very good feel for the current track conditions.

we also need to consider that Bottas might have potentially had his setup skewed slightly towards the softs.

[SparkyAMG]

Guys, Shrieker was literally the first to acknowledge when Bottas said it was his decision. No need to keep quoting his post and calling it out lol.

[PlatinumZealot]

Notice that HAM tires lost their edge by sector 3 so it was not a straight forward decision obviously.

[godlameroso]

Will the mediums hurt getting off the line tomorrow? How long will the tires last? Will it rain, and what effect will that have on the tarmac? Lots of unanswered questions. We know likely the Mercs will be pulling away at ~.2-.3 per lap, and they're on mediums so they should be in a position to do a one stop. Can the soft tires also do a one stop?

[godlameroso]

Someone please put Russell in a faster car, even the Ferrari!

Or the Red Bull!

It staggers belief that some think Hamilton would comprehensively defeat Russell.

Russell would give Hamilton a lot of trouble. He'd give Max or Charles a lot of trouble too. The kid is seriously quick.

The results really do speak for themselves. There's a certain type of spatial awareness you develop that just makes you fast. This track really rewards that because of the blind corners. A lot of times on this track you get lucky and find that perfect line and you can't find it again for some reason. It's a very inconsistent track so having any sort of consistency is incredibly difficult.

Perhaps pole was just down to being able to form that spatial map of the track in your mind, and the extra lap gave Hamilton that edge. Whereas the other drivers had to do one cold timed lap, Hamilton was able to work off a rhythm which you absolutely need for sector 2. He just put it together when it mattered and completely deserved pole.

Russell can do that with just one timed lap, if he were in that Red Bull he'd be right up there with Max.

[littlebigcat]

Bottas is stuck on doing the opposite of Hamilton even if it will hurt him.

[atanatizante]

I don`t get it: drivers complaining for the soft tyres are graining, meaning they couldn`t get enough heat into them.
Then Merc drivers and Albon went on the medium ones and get better times despite this tyres has a higher operation window than the softs.

Seems to me that (at least for the Merc drivers) they couldn`t afford to get to much load/heat into the softs not to overheat towards the end and thus slide more and end up with a slower time. And the reason why they couldn`t afford is due to their race setup which favors the medium tyres they`ll start on the race tomorrow ...

So I expect a 1 stop race for them and 2 stops for all but VER who is a dark horse for the race.

And last but not least very good job for LEC once again!