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Seeing Lando in interviews he certainly seems a lot more frustrated with the car lately… I wouldn’t blame him when all your peers have cars that can fight for wins and your stuck in no mans land
I'm going to get an angry mob coming after me here, but I don't think Lando has done enough to be in the category of Charles, Max or George. They came in and were brilliant from the start, Lando has been a slow burner and I'd really like to see him in a top level car to understand what he's really capable of when driving regularly against the best.
I don't know how you can make the argument for George? His teammates were Kubica and Latifi in his beginning years... I understand the last part obviously we wont truly know his true potential until he's in the thick of a championship battle .
Well I'll always support Dan and try to look at the positives. Like I've said before he brings alot to the team overall and he is contracted next year as well, the team love him and so still time to gel with the developing car and find the form of old. My take on the situation having watched Dan since before he came into F1, is that he grew alot more comfortable in the car last year as evidenced by him outscoring Lando in that second half. This year the car was different with new regs but also some carryover from last year requiring him to virtually start from stage one yet again. As the year has gone on he has got more comfortable in the car as evidenced by the last 5 races or so overall, the issues are less and heading in the right direction. The car will continue to be developed and pushed more towards an easier car to drive as Lando mentioned just recently as well saying its still a bit difficult at times. Key mentioned they were actively working on solving those issues and making it an easier car to handle. Its only early in these new regs its going to take time to work out the remaining quirks but I'd expect that sometime next year it will be easier and faster and we will see Dan back to what he does best, it all just clicked like that at Renault in that second year of evolution with the car when they used Dan's input ( after driving previous fast , well handling cars) and next year will be the second year of evolution with this new reg car. The upside for Dan is huge when the the car suits him, again just as we saw at RBR and as recently as Renault 2020 where he was doing the sorts of things Lando has been doing in the McLaren's. You don't suddenly lose your mojo in a couple of months changing teams, its obviously the car not suiting him and in this case a generally slow, poor handling car too. And no its not just 18 months every race driving poorly and underperforming constantly, saying that is just ignorance and only looking at the scoreboard, as we saw the last half of last season he was alot better and now recently in the last 5 races or so after the reset with this new reg car overall he is performing better with less difficult moments in the car.
Like was mentioned previously the critical thing in the short term is developing this new reg car not swapping out drivers which will be of inconsequential difference in the grand scheme of winning championships at this point. Yeah he has been disappointing overall, some not of his making but again looking at the last 5 races or so he has been better in general than previously, just Britain and this last stint in Hungary that was poor. Was good to see glimpses of the Dan of old when the car is in his window like that two car pass on Alonso and Ocon. The car though is still miles off the front and not how he likes it so that is obviously impacting what he can do as well as we have seen in previous teams how good he can be. This is my take on the facts available and what we know he can do in a car when its to his liking after watching him for many seasons.
As for Hungary could they not have put him on softs for that last stint if he didn't have any mediums? Those hards just put him in a world of pain being around guys on faster tyres. His sweet spot is the mediums tho. Maybe they just need to bring more medium allocations for him and just go for maybe even an extra stop not sure. They need to look into why he has trouble making the hards work though at times. Again he never had these issues at other teams in fact he was the tyre whisperer back in the RBR days, its quite strange this is happening now. It was a good drive though in that first half of the race so looking for them to continue to build and he keeps boxing on. Lets see how we go after summer with more car development and tracks he performed well at in the second half last year.
Last edited by runningmanz on 01 Aug 2022, 02:52, edited 22 times in total.
Seeing Lando in interviews he certainly seems a lot more frustrated with the car lately… I wouldn’t blame him when all your peers have cars that can fight for wins and your stuck in no mans land
I'm going to get an angry mob coming after me here, but I don't think Lando has done enough to be in the category of Charles, Max or George. They came in and were brilliant from the start, Lando has been a slow burner and I'd really like to see him in a top level car to understand what he's really capable of when driving regularly against the best.
I don't know how you can make the argument for George? His teammates were Kubica and Latifi in his beginning years... I understand the last part obviously we wont truly know his true potential until he's in the thick of a championship battle .
More about him taking the car to another level entirely and being very clearly top class from the get go. Dropping straight into a Mercedes and making a mockery of Bottas to boot. Fighting alongside one of the best F1 drivers ever now and holding his own just proves his class.
What a stuppid strategy for Ricci. From 8 to 14. Why to put that --- hard tyre???? We were gaining good points to Alpine...but now we have same points for Lando with Alpines.
Srems Ferrari and McLaren have same idi0ts as strategists
Yep phukin daft strategy putting him on the worst hard tyres when Stroll, Vettel and Gasly near him were on soft, medium, soft respectively.
Arrrgh, Im so frustrated right now!!! WTF are McLaren doing putting Dan on the Hards, even the Ferrari's are struggling with them - the track is too cold for them!!!!
What a stuppid strategy for Ricci. From 8 to 14. Why to put that --- hard tyre???? We were gaining good points to Alpine...but now we have same points for Lando with Alpines.
Srems Ferrari and McLaren have same idi0ts as strategists
Yep phukin daft strategy putting him on the worst hard tyres when Stroll, Vettel and Gasly near him were on soft, medium, soft respectively.
Arrrgh, Im so frustrated right now!!! WTF are McLaren doing putting Dan on the Hards, even the Ferrari's are struggling with them - the track is too cold for them!!!!
Yeah I said before the last stop please not hards, but I guess they thought it was the best at the time with the remaining tyres left. DId he not have some softs left to go on? He needs more mediums until they can figure out why he has trouble making the hards work at times imo
It was a good move, but what the heck was up with Ocon this race? Twice this race he decided it was more important to defend against Alonso than defend against the third car, and both times it ended up costing them both positions.
While Lando has been great outdriving the car, we still finished 78 seconds behind the leaders. Have to be blunt here the current situation I liken it to one guy being better at polishing a turd than the other. The car is neither fast or good to drive (currently) but as I said I still think it has potential. Sorry but have to laugh or will just cry at the situation we are in compared to where Ferrari are now. I just hope they can get back on track with this car by next year and somehow make a big leap forward like Ferrari did. When we have a decent car (one that was promised to the incoming driver) that handles normally and is fast I'll worry about Ricciardo if he still isn't able to do what we know he is capable of but in the meantime the car continues to be substandard , miles off a WCC challenger and obviously is the main issue. The team and drivers know it, hence why they are just trying to get on with making the car better rather than wasting time focusing on a driver merry go round and ejecting a proven race winning driver with a big upside when the car is strong.
Last edited by runningmanz on 01 Aug 2022, 05:32, edited 1 time in total.
I'm going to get an angry mob coming after me here, but I don't think Lando has done enough to be in the category of Charles, Max or George. They came in and were brilliant from the start, Lando has been a slow burner and I'd really like to see him in a top level car to understand what he's really capable of when driving regularly against the best.
I don't know how you can make the argument for George? His teammates were Kubica and Latifi in his beginning years... I understand the last part obviously we wont truly know his true potential until he's in the thick of a championship battle .
More about him taking the car to another level entirely and being very clearly top class from the get go. Dropping straight into a Mercedes and making a mockery of Bottas to boot. Fighting alongside one of the best F1 drivers ever now and holding his own just proves his class.
And what makes you say that Lando would not be able to do exactly the same?
If i would get the money to start my own F1 team, i would revive Arrows
Yep phukin daft strategy putting him on the worst hard tyres when Stroll, Vettel and Gasly near him were on soft, medium, soft respectively.
Arrrgh, Im so frustrated right now!!! WTF are McLaren doing putting Dan on the Hards, even the Ferrari's are struggling with them - the track is too cold for them!!!!
Yeah I said before the last stop please not hards, but I guess they thought it was the best at the time with the remaining tyres left. DId he not have some softs left to go on? He needs more mediums until they can figure out why he has trouble making the hards work at times imo
We need to always keep context in mind… Daniel pitted in Lap 46 for his set of Hards, he pitted ahead of Stroll, Vettel and Gasly… Therefore, there was no way for the team to know which tires each one of those were planning on running.
In addition, neither Daniel nor Lando had new sets of Softs available, they had 1 new set of Mediums and 1 of Hard for the race.
Finally, Lando pitted on lap 42 for Hards and did laps of 1:24.2 and 1:23.7 while Daniel was running 1:25.0… During the last stint, Lando was running on the mid 1:23.XX while Daniel’s best lap on the Hards was a 1:24.3 and he was running really on the mid to high’s 1:24.XX… Going for the Hards wasn’t really the issue as proven by his Team Mate
Arrrgh, Im so frustrated right now!!! WTF are McLaren doing putting Dan on the Hards, even the Ferrari's are struggling with them - the track is too cold for them!!!!
Yeah I said before the last stop please not hards, but I guess they thought it was the best at the time with the remaining tyres left. DId he not have some softs left to go on? He needs more mediums until they can figure out why he has trouble making the hards work at times imo
We need to always keep context in mind… Daniel pitted in Lap 46 for his set of Hards, he pitted ahead of Stroll, Vettel and Gasly… Therefore, there was no way for the team to know which tires each one of those were planning on running.
In addition, neither Daniel nor Lando had new sets of Softs available, they had 1 new set of Mediums and 1 of Hard for the race.
Finally, Lando pitted on lap 42 for Hards and did laps of 1:24.2 and 1:23.7 while Daniel was running 1:25.0… During the last stint, Lando was running on the mid 1:23.XX while Daniel’s best lap on the Hards was a 1:24.3 and he was running really on the mid to high’s 1:24.XX… Going for the Hards wasn’t really the issue as proven by his Team Mate
They should have gambled on used softs imo, they could see other teams having trouble on the hards. They always play it too safe and more often than not Dan has trouble in the McLaren warming up the hards. Would have preferred him to go out swinging on used softs and defending near the end if need be which he is good at rather than skating around on hard tyres losing alot of time.
Again Lando came out around cars that were on 30+ lap mediums not really under any pressure and able to ideally warm up the hards. Dan came out with Stroll on new softs and Vettel on new mediums breathing down his neck and also Gasly coming at him with new softs. Not the same situation. In hindsight it was the wrong call by the team to put him on hards. Like I said a gamble every now and then would be preferable to playing it safe all the time and still screwing up strategy more often than not.
While Lando has been great outdriving the car, we still finished 78 seconds behind the leaders. Have to be blunt here the current situation I liken it to one guy being better at polishing a turd than the other. The car is neither fast or good to drive (currently) but as I said I still think it has potential. Sorry but have to laugh or will just cry at the situation we are in compared to where Ferrari are now. I just hope they can get back on track with this car by next year and somehow make a big leap forward like Ferrari did. When we have a decent car (one that was promised to the incoming driver) that handles normally and is fast I'll worry about Ricciardo if he still isn't able to do what we know he is capable of but in the meantime the car continues to be substandard , miles off a WCC challenger and obviously is the main issue. The team and drivers know it, hence why they are just trying to get on with making the car better rather than wasting time focusing on a driver merry go round and ejecting a proven race winning driver with a big upside when the car is strong.
I dont think you will find many people arguing the car is good or fast. But, in many times and especially qualifying for the last 2 races the car is faster and better then Ricciardos performances.
He may improve if the car improves but that's not a given, he needs to be judged in the car as it is and against his team mate.
And he's hardly driving round in a back marker, it nay not be a car in the top but it's ahead of many others.
