Smell is really bad

Pierre Gasly suffered a near-miss when debris struck his helmet visor near his eye on the first lap of the Russian Grand Prix. The Toro Rosso driver described how a piece of Daniel Ricciardo’s car struck him at the start. Advert | Become a Supporter & go ad-free “At turn one Daniel lost a piece of carbon which went straight into my visor,” he said. “This was really scary because I thought it was going right through and it was straight in my eye. “It touched the visor and then came in the cockpit, so in turn four I had to take the carbon piece and throw it from the cockpit and then after that the brake just got really bad.” “At the time I had like five tenths of a second just to see it flying and hitting the visor. It was a piece, maybe a winglet it came from contact with Daniel and someone and it came pointing towards me and straight in my right eye. “When I saw it coming I thought ‘fuck, it’s going through the visor’ and fortunately the visor is really … [Read more...] about Gasly feared debris would hit his eye in “really scary” incident

Lewis Hamilton had a difficult start to the first day of practice for the Japanese Grand Prix. Advert | Become a Supporter & go ad-free The Mercedes driver ended Friday’s two practice sessions in 16th and 14th place. He was over 1.1 seconds slower than pace-setter Max Verstappen and half a second down on his team mate, George Russell. “It was a bad day, to be honest,” said Hamilton. “I really struggled out there. I’m a long way off: Two seconds off in the first session and over a second in the second. So just working away at trying to fix the car, fix the balance.” Mercedes enjoyed a more competitive weekend in Singapore but Hamilton said the high-speed corners at Suzuka are showing up some of the cars’ weaknesses. “We were obviously much closer in the last race where we didn’t have any high-speed [corners], pretty much, only one high speed corner but it’s not as high as the speed of the corners here. “Our car has, more often than not, been a little bit … [Read more...] about Hamilton says he needs to close gap to Russell after ending “bad day” 14th

Fernando Alonso expressed frustration that one of his radio messages during the Japanese Grand Prix was broadcast on Formula 1’s television feed “out of context.” Advert | Become a Supporter & go ad-free It’s not the first time a mid-race radio comment by Alonso at Suzuka has been the subject of scrutiny. But the circumstances last weekend were rather different to those of eight years ago. The radio message in question occured on lap 20 of 53 last weekend. Alonso was in his second stint, having swapped his starting set of soft tyres for hards nine laps earlier, and he had just been passed by a string of rivals, including the Ferraris of Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz Jnr. Having risen as high as sixth after the start he was now running seventh and appeared to be struggling. “You’ve thrown me to the lions, to stop that early, mate,” Alonso grumbled. “It’s unbelievable.” On the face of it, Alonso appeared to be venting in frustration about being passed. On … [Read more...] about Transcript: What Alonso really meant by being “thrown to the lions” at Suzuka

INDIANAPOLIS, June 21, 2005 – Let’s pass blame around for this debacle at Indianapolis Motor Speedway in what was intended to be the sixth annual US Grand Prix here. It turned out to be a six-car show with only Michael Schumacher’s intimidation of teammate Rubens Barrichello while exiting the pits from his second stop to excite any one of the remaining fans at the Brickyard. It’s estimated the Speedway had 130,000 on the grounds before 1PM EST but they began filing out shortly after the “start." This “race” was a yawner after all 14 Michelin-shod drivers retired before the official start, completing only their formation lap. All, including polesitter Jarno Trulli went immediately to their garages. Michelin vs Bridgestone Start the blame game with Michelin, who did not fully study the changes to the road-oval circuit after resurfacing and subsequent diamond grooving between the 2004 Brickyard 400 and the Indianapolis 500. In pre-May tire tests, Firestone engineers … [Read more...] about The blame game – 2005 United States GP at Indianapolis

Lance Stroll will not line up on the Singapore Grand Prix grid having taken the decision “together” with Aston Martin to sit out the race. Stroll suffered a massive crash in Saturday’s qualifying at the Marina Bay circuit when the Canadian clipped the kerbs through the final corner and lost the rear of his AMR23. He speared into the outside wall at speed, his car almost airborne, before spinning back across the circuit. Lance Stroll is ‘still sore’ after his qualifying crash He was taken to the track’s medical centre where he was cleared of serious injury but on Sunday morning made the call with Aston Martin to sit out the race. The team statement read: “The team face a huge job repairing the car today and Lance is still sore following such a high impact. Lance’s focus now shifts to fully recovering ahead of the Japanese Grand Prix.” Team boss Mike Krack added: “The whole team are relieved that Lance was able to step out of the car after yesterday’s accident – however, he … [Read more...] about Lance Stroll out of the Singapore Grand Prix in joint decision with Aston Martin

The 2021 world champion enjoyed one of his better weekends of an otherwise tough campaign at the Buddh International Circuit. Quartararo was sixth in the sprint on Saturday and scored his second grand prix podium of the year on Sunday after trailing a dehydrated Martin home. The Yamaha rider was able to close right in on Martin in the latter stages after the Pramac rider was forced to zip up his leathers, before Quartararo overtook him on the final lap when Martin ran off track at Turn 4. Quartararo’s stint in second, however, lasted all but one corner as Martin carved around the outside of him into Turn 6 and held firm through the last few corners. The Frenchman waved his hand in frustration when he crossed the line behind Martin, but explained that this was not directed at the Pramac rider. “To be honest, when he overtook me from Turn 5 to Turn 6, clearly the grip I had on the left was really bad and I could not do anything,” Quartararo said. Fabio … [Read more...] about Quartararo explains Martin India MotoGP overtake ‘frustration’

In the round-up: Pirelli motorsport director Paul Hembery says F1 should learn from how NASCAR promotes its drivers. Links Your daily digest of F1 news, views, features and more. Paul Hembery: F1 drivers need to be kings as fans want heroes (The Guardian) "In NASCAR the driver is the king. Even the guy at the bottom is a superstar with a multi-million dollar contract. I would love to see our drivers held in that esteem." Christian Horner's plan for a wind tunnel ban is foolish - Ferrari (ESPN) "That would be an extremely foolish direction for the sport to take." Renault took a 'massive step' - Key (Autosport) "I have to say Renault has made a massive step compared to Melbourne." Bottas over worst of it with back injury – Williams (Crash) "He has done 56 laps in intense heat in Malaysia, some reasonably high braking events around this circuit, running at a multiple stop race - so pushing for the whole race - and he hasn't encountered any problems. … [Read more...] about F1 can learn lessons from NASCAR – Hembery

The iconic figure-of-eight track has always been punishing on its rubber, but things could well be a bit more extreme this time around. Race day is expected to be another scorcher, and complaints that George Russell mentioned on Friday about a "strange" sliding have been caused by a track surface that has had a 15% drop in macro roughness (so effective grip) compared to 12 months ago. As Ferrari's Charles Leclerc said: "Especially with the very warm temperatures this year, the overheating is really, really bad. So, I expect that it [the race] will be all about the tyre management and the strategy." A two-stopper looks nailed on then, but it comes with not all teams having the luxury of what appears to be the ideal tyre allocation to get them through without much drama. F1 tyre supplier Pirelli thinks the best approach to the race is to start on the soft, run through until laps 12-18, and then split the rest of the grand prix up into two hard stints. But that is … [Read more...] about Are Red Bull and Ferrari on back foot for potential Japanese GP tyre wrecker?

With Pirelli predicting the best strategy for the Japanese Grand Prix will be a two-stop of soft-hard-hard, it’s advantage McLaren as the Woking team is one of only three outfits where both drivers have those tyres in hand. Oscar Piastri will line up alongside Max Verstappen on the front row of the Japanese Grand Prix, the Aussie having grabbed a career-best grid slot, with Lando Norris sitting third. But while the McLarens didn’t have the pace to challenge Verstappen on Saturday as the reigning World Champion crossed the line an incredible 0.581s faster, they could try for a two-pronged attack on Sunday. McLaren: The only way we can attack Max is tactical And according to Pirelli they have the tyres do it. Formula 1’s tyre supplier believes the best strategy for the Suzuka race is a two-stopper with the driver starting on the soft tyres and then slitting the rest between two sets of hard tyres. On a weekend in which the drivers dealt with high temperatures and … [Read more...] about It’s advantage McLaren in the strategy game at the Japanese Grand Prix