Posts by stormybadger8

Jack Kelly5 said:Stop kidding yourself, it's clearly Pirelli's fault.

Funny how before, you’d be blaming the FIA and their endless nonsense about cost-cutting instead of Pirelli...
In all fairness, it isn't exactly easy making tires for cars that don't even exist yet—cars they aren't even allowed to test their rubber on. But sure, just hand over the tires and go ahead and test them on some makeshift old chassis that barely resembles what you're actually building for...

And apparently, they had to decide which compounds to bring ages ago, and now they're admitting they should have brought US, SS, and S instead of SS, S, and M...
To top it off, the tires themselves are garbage because they're too hard, and there was basically zero testing since they're only doing it live during qualifying and the race...
Honestly, everything is going "great" considering the whole thing is organized like a complete circus...

neonfox65 said:Keep on trolling if you want, 👋

Just so you know, I'm pulling for Max Verstappen 🙂

You must have mixed up the numbers on the car 🤔
Don't go blaming me just because he hit the wall today...

Looks like they’re dealing with some seriously massive braking issues...
A couple of them missed their marks way too many times, which basically means the brakes aren't cutting it and—more importantly—they don't trust them at all...

Still, that shouldn't be as big of a headache during the race as it clearly was during qualifying...

Hmm, I missed his statement. Pretty optimistic considering how badly qualifying went.
Sure, finishing 3rd or 4th is fine, especially that 4th place for Sebastian Vettel, since it was obvious the car was a total disaster all weekend...
But if neonfox65 hadn't started rooting for Richie again, who knows how bad it could've been. Honestly, it feels like Sebastian Vettel could have easily finished behind both Red Bull Racing cars, maybe even behind Force India in qualifying...

jadeseal7 said:Max Verstappen is going to pull a fast one on Sergio Perez.

And he’ll do it ruthlessly, though I’m honestly worried he might even fool Ferrari...
If the track suits him like it did last year, Perez could easily end up back on the podium...

People keep claiming it wasn't Honda that killed Alonso, but rather McLaren's gearbox...
though I don't see it going down that way at all 🤔

Plus, Vandoorne was running an older engine but hitting 312 on the straights, while Alonso had the new spec and was clocking 327...
Progress is clearly happening. It just doesn't make total sense why they decided to switch Alonso back to the old engine. I mean, there might be some logic to it, but still...

The folks over at Honda are saying they went back to the old unit because they're basically dead weight at the back of the grid anyway with zero chance of anything. Apparently, this is just a move to save the new engine for the next race.

mellowtiger83 said:I wasn't talking about a single point. Three points for pole position would be fine, then maybe 2 and 1 for second and third place.🙂

Think back to 1989.

Even if they had handed out 10 points for pole position, it wouldn't have changed a thing—Ayrton Senna still wouldn't have walked away with a championship in any of those seasons.☕

Honestly, it’s a completely different game when you realize you aren't actually scoring points for Pole Position, but just for the race itself instead. It changes your whole approach.
Basically, some drivers were definitely rigging their setups with one goal in mind: they didn't care about being fast at the start—they just wanted to be the first ones across the finish line. 😉

https://thejudge13.com/2017/06/05/ho...-their-rivals/

Check out these numbers. It's pretty interesting how many miles each driver clocked during those pre-season Goodyear tests...
Sebastian Vettel
Kimi Räikkönen
Max Verstappen
Ricc
Lewis Hamilton

So now it’s a total mystery why some guys are suddenly having such a hard time with their tires, right?😁

wearymoose28 said:FIRST!

It's my first season following this, and I had a pretty good feeling while watching the race that this prediction might actually hit. 🙂

Monaco is my favorite race since it falls right around my birthday—this one was actually on the day. Talk about a gift. 😁

Nice one, twin brother. 👍
Maybe we should throw a party in Monaco next year since our birthdays line up perfectly...😁

Just you wait...
That American idiot is going to totally wreck NASCAR, and who knows if there will even be a sport left by 2020, let alone one that's actually better.🙄

neonfox65 said:Look, everyone keeps saying dominance ruins the sport and nobody wants to watch it, but you're the only one here trying to play philosopher.

People who don't know the first thing about sports are the ones talking 🤦
Fucking hell, you have to be a total amateur regarding NASCAR to start preaching about how dominance isn't good for the sport 🙄

Since NASCAR has been around, there’s always been dominance from one team, with very few exceptions in seasons where you might have two or maybe three teams fighting for the lead—but even then, they just trade wins...

That’s just how this sport works. It’s been like this for years, growing steadily alongside that dominance. We haven't seen this "Twitter/Facebook generation" yet—the ones who constanty bitch about everything without having a clue what they actually want.🤦

Ever since the beginning, there have been top-tier teams, mid-fielders, and backmarkers, just like there are elite drivers, average drivers, and rookies trying to prove themselves...
And honestly, that’s exactly what makes NASCAR great—something other series could never replicate...

Why am I saying this? Because dominance in motorsports is completely natural.
What you see in NASCAR is anything but natural; in fact, it’s so artificial it’s almost ridiculous...

neonfox65 said:In the US, NASCAR will never be bigger than NASCAR, just like football will never be bigger than the NFL—that's obvious. But I don't get why you're obsessing over the American audience when NASCAR is a global sport watched by the whole world, not just a handful of Americans.

Hamilton, do you even read your own nonsense?
Do you realize you're basically trying to "Americanize" NASCAR to mimic its own style, even though you know perfectly well:🤦 - that NASCAR will never outgrow itself in the States.
- that Americans aren't suddenly going to flock to it because of that; viewership will likely stay right where it is now.
- that the rest of the world watches this sport and they don't care for that specific American style—because if they did, NASCAR would already be way bigger than it is.

🙂

neonfox65 said:🤦

Why did viewership drop by a third?

I think any sane person just wants to see more competitive teams.

With the NASCARization of NASCAR, viewership isn't just dropping—it’s cratering so hard it might disappear entirely.☕
In fact, there'll be so few viewers that filming the races won't even be worth it with a smartphone, let alone pro cameras...

Honestly, this NASCARization probably won't even bring NASCAR closer to the American audience that watches NASCAR, because why would some kid watch a knockoff when they have the real thing?...
And if the European and rest of the world audiences outside the US actually wanted NASCARization, they'd probably just watch NASCAR instead of NASCAR.😵
For God's sake, you don't need to be an atomic physicist to realize this kind of stupidity can only drive NASCAR into total ruin...

Seriously, do you honestly think anyone in your country would pay for broadcasting rights to a NASCARized version of NASCAR that only you and nobody else will be watching?🤦

Given the circumstances, viewership has actually fucking increased, not dropped...
Because considering how many countries Bernie moved from FTA to payTV, it's a miracle viewership hasn't plummeted to 1/4... actually, not 1/4, but barely 1/4 of what it used to be...
You used to have FTA broadcasts practically everywhere, and now you can count on one hand the number of countries that have FTA coverage—and even then, it's all races Live, but with 70% commercials instead of actual racing...

Just a few years ago, you had reliable free Live timing, and now they make you pay for it through the NASCAR app.🙂
Now you pay for the broadcast, usually in some insanely expensive packages, and then everyone acts surprised when viewership drops.🤦

If they put a free live stream online without any geo-restrictions, you can bet viewership would jump by at least 100%.😍

neonfox65 said:Even in NASCAR, you've got big teams and small teams, but the gap between the giants is tiny. There’s no single dominant force, and that's exactly what Brawn is trying to fix for NASCAR too.

If we actually listen to this bunch of clueless idiots who don't know the first thing about NASCAR, all we'll achieve is destroying the sport entirely and turning it into some low-rent spectacle...

neonfox65 said:You clearly have no idea how much better NASCAR is than NASCAR when it comes to competition.

Honestly, I couldn't care less about this "artificial" sense of parity...

A real NASCAR fan doesn't give a damn about overall competitiveness anyway. Not ever. All they actually care about is whether their own driver or team is winning—not whether everyone else is keeping up. 😁

Total stupidity...
If there wasn't a dominant team, we wouldn't even have F1; we'd just be stuck watching IndyCar or NASCAR. 🤣

Bernie was right. If things keep going this way, they’re going to completely wreck F1 within five years, dragging it from the top tier down to some obscure series like IndyCar or NASCAR that basically nobody outside of a tiny niche actually follows...

Some details regarding Hamilton's upgrade...
Despite all the hype about a revolutionary Red Bull's upgrade, it looks like Hamilton actually pulled off the upgrade instead of Red Bull...

What’s actually kind of shocking is how Ferrari stayed competitive in Barcelona despite all those massive changes to Hamilton...

Terry Carter2 said:3. Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Räikkönen

Who even is this guy? Some random new Mexican dude, maybe? 😬

Linda Peterson43 said:I was speaking in much broader terms, referring to "everything from Barcelona onwards." It isn't that Ferrari collapsed, but rather that Red Bull finally stepped up...
Why do I feel the need to provide such exhaustive explanations, as if I'm presenting a case to a panel of lawyers? 🙂 🙂

Red Bull didn't suddenly become gods; Ferrari just spent the season finding every possible way to screw themselves over...
Basically, Red Bull snatched up every point they could get their hands on, while Ferrari managed to dump a massive amount of points. Honestly, I can't even remember the last time a team threw away this many points in a single season,
and most of it was thanks to pure stupidity from both the pit wall and the drivers...

Last year, Red Bull finished ahead of Ferrari by 70 points, but people forget that Ferrari had 8 DNFs (that's 4 for Sebastian Vettel and 4 for Kimi Räikkönen), while Red Bull only had 3 (1 for Kvyat and 2 for Max Verstappen; Ricciardo didn't DNF once)...
That's 5 races worth of zero points for Ferrari. Add in those 3 times Ferrari suffered a DNF when the Bear had a podium in sight—which Red Bull then happily picked up...
Not to mention, in one of those races, they actually grabbed a 1st or 2nd place because of some mess involving Ferrari and Mercedes. That single race alone accounts for more than half of the advantage Red Bull gained just from Ferrari's blunders. So where did the rest come from? Simple math.

If it weren't for all that nonsense, Ferrari would have easily finished the season ahead of Red Bull, regardless of how much Red Bull improved. 😉

Linda Peterson43 said:I wasn't referring to winning the WDC or WCC, but rather more about "disrupting the expected order"... 🙂

By the time we were in Barcelona last year, it had already become clear that Red Bull possessed "that something extra"...
And now, we look toward Barcelona...

Oh, obviously they can jump up to the top spot at any point during the season, let alone snag a podium or two...
But we're talking about the WDC and WCC here, where their chances are basically microscopic, if they even have any...

Linda Peterson43 said:I'm not so sure... I don't root for Red Bull, and generally, they aren't my favorite team, but one thing I've learned over the last few seasons is that they always "find something" that others missed... most often right on the edge of legality... but as long as it works, it works, and they take the points...🙂
The latest example is this business with the "nearly active" suspension, which Ferrari, working with NASCAR, got banned this year...🙂
I suspect that, along with those minor power unit upgrades from Ford, that was the primary reason they were able to overtake Ferrari in the second half of the season...

What do you mean you don't know?
Dammit, they’re already trailing by over 50 points in the constructors' standings and about 45 in the drivers' championship...
With Ferrari and Mercedes being relatively neck-and-neck, that gap is basically untouchable right now, even if they actually find some pace by the time we hit Russia.
I mean, it’s not strictly impossible, but to catch up, they’d need to consistently outclass everyone else, just like how Mercedes did last year. They can't just be better every once in a while and then fall off again...

In the drivers' standings, a comeback is slightly more plausible if there was only one driver ahead of them to chase down. But trying to overtake both, plus catching Kimi Räikkönen and Valtteri Bottas who would also be in the mix? That’s a massive mountain to climb for Red Bull.

Sure, they could potentially find "something," but it would have to be so insanely fast—providing such a huge lap time advantage—that I can't even wrap my head around what kind of upgrade could actually put them back in a serious title fight.e Realistically, they need a car that's at least 1 second, maybe even 1.5 seconds faster, just to guarantee they beat Ferrari and Mercedes regularly. And let's not even talk about reliability; they can't afford a single mechanical failure...

Think about it: even if Max wins the next six races in a row, and Sebastian Vettel finishes 2nd in every single one of them, Max still wouldn't be leading the championship...
That’s just how massive the lead is for the top Ferrari driver compared to the top Red Bull driver.

mellowtiger83 said:Let's take a quick trip down memory lane: this is basically how Sebastian Vettel looks at the end of 2017 after getting absolutely wrecked by Lewis Hamilton.

Don't you think even the Gays would be disappointed, just like whoever originally posted that...

neonfox65 said:Ric... 🤦 What a joke of a driver.

Just look at the nonsense Max Verstappen is pulling.😉

Give it a little while and they'll start rooting for Max, then suddenly they'll be claiming Lewis Hamilton is a disgrace of a driver.😲🙂🤣