2024 United States Grand Prix

FLRacingFan

FLRacingFan

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Massive weekend in Austin as the city becomes the sports capital of the world for a few days with Georgia @ Texas falling on Saturday night.

Verstappen on pole for the Sprint race ahead of Russell, Leclerc, Norris.

 
I wonder if this weekend could somewhat decide the championship in Max' favor. With him starting first and Lando fourth he could increase the points gap for the first time in a while .

FLRacingFan said:
city becomes the sports capital of the world for a few days with Georgia @ Texas falling on Saturday night.
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Lmao, sports capital" of the world" because of some College Football(?) game no one outside the states cares about
 
donthaveanickname said:
Lmao, sports capital" of the world" because of some College Football(?) game no one outside the states cares about
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Another reason why Yurrup et al. will never have it as good as us.

donthaveanickname said:
I wonder if this weekend could somewhat decide the championship in Max' favor. With him starting first and Lando fourth he could increase the points gap for the first time in a while .
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Yeah, any race in which Norris doesn’t take points off of him has to be considered a huge win at this point.

Ferrari and Leclerc seem to have really good long run pace again. I wouldn’t be surprised to see them continue to make a play for P2 in both championships this weekend.
 
donthaveanickname said:
I wonder if this weekend could somewhat decide the championship in Max' favor. With him starting first and Lando fourth he could increase the points gap for the first time in a while .


Lmao, sports capital" of the world" because of some College Football(?) game no one outside the states cares about
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Everything's bigger in Texas especially the hyperbole.
 
“F1 Insights powered by AWS” says Norris is gonna pass Verstappen in three laps, and Max proceeds to pull out two more seconds on Lando before Norris chokes away P2 to Sainz on the final lap. Art.
 
Just when we thought Red Bull was in trouble Max fights his way back. As far as the championship, I think Max has just about put it away. It's still more than possible, but Max showed he's back in the fight. Some people were saying Newey leaving caused their slump, but now it looks like the engineering talent there is deep. Can't wait to see how their motor runs.

Great run for Haas. Kev doesn't beat Nico that often

Great run for Colapinto. He had to be disappointed not to move up, but where he finished is probably as good as it gets with that car right now.

Man, the Ferraris were sure cutting each other up.
 
Norris bailed out by Russell crashing out as time expired. Verstappen was tracking purple until then.

Will make for an interesting start but I think Max and the team came to reassert themselves this weekend.
 
This has been unequivocally one of Hamilton’s worst race weekends ever. That looked a lot like Russell’s crash at the same corner yesterday though, the rear of the Merc just can’t stick on entry there.
 
Norris extending the opening stint on mediums as long as he did is going to pay off here. Verstappen just needs to not do anything stupid and minimize conflict when the fight comes.
 
Without seeing it again I would guess the stewards are factoring in how much Norris opened up his steering and kept his foot in the throttle. Verstappen knew what he was doing when he forced Norris into that position though. Until the rules or application of the rules are changed that’s what drivers are encouraged to do.

Big shame it ended like that because it was a great battle before that moment. Verstappen played excellent defense at every challenge beforehand, but Norris had too much grip left at the end.
 
Awesome weekend from Ferrari though…I wouldn’t rule them out in either championship just yet.

The way Colapinto is showing up Albon so far also makes me fully believe Sainz is going to put him in a blender next year.
 
FLRacingFan said:
Awesome weekend from Ferrari though…I wouldn’t rule them out in either championship just yet.
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Alson had a wild weekend starting in P1.

The way Colapinto is showing up Albon so far also makes me fully believe Sainz is going to put him in a blender next year.
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Colapinto had a wild battle with Alonso.
 
Saw another replay and Max definitely went deep and ran off track himself. Shouldn’t be a penalty for Norris and I imagine McLaren will appeal that one pretty strongly.

This is something the rule book should’ve sorted out years ago. As it is now you’re still incentivized to drive it in as deep as possible to get ahead at the apex and just run the other guy wide.
 
FLRacingFan said:
Saw another replay and Max definitely went deep and ran off track himself. Shouldn’t be a penalty for Norris and I imagine McLaren will appeal that one pretty strongly.
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I didn't like it either.

This is something the rule book should’ve sorted out years ago. As it is now you’re still incentivized to drive it in as deep as possible to get ahead at the apex and just run the other guy wide.
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There's only one guy doing it that I can see.
 
Doc Austin said:
There's only one guy doing it that I can see.
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There were at least three other incidents of the same kind that were investigated during the grand prix, and probably more that went unnoted. It just draws more attention when it happens between contenders and is on the broadcast. I saw some yesterday in the sprint as well. You’ll get that at any place that doesn’t have walls, grass, or gravel immediately off the side of the track.
 
FLRacingFan said:
There were at least three other incidents of the same kind that were investigated during the grand prix, and probably more that went unnoted.
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For reference, this is almost identical to Brazil 2021, and that got a penalty.
FLRacingFan said:
You’ll get that at any place that doesn’t have walls, grass, or gravel immediately off the side of the track.
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Or trees and buildings.
 
Having the premier motorsport in the world operate like this is just not for me and watching the USGP cemented that. In the same way that changing the points system in NASCAR resulted in drivers instead driving for points or just to get around more than it had before, leading to the introduction of stage racing and additional complexity for the purpose of juicing the show, F1 has a similar set of problems it has unintentionally found itself with. Tilkedroming everything means that there is endless runoff which means cars can drive as far out as they might ever want to. Except of course at the tracks that have physical barriers to Tilkedroming it, like Spa. The FIA has decided to officiate races like they're all at Paul Ricard even when they are not, which has (IMO) contributed to driver fatalities in the ladder series by not calling cautions quickly enough while also making passing increasingly impossible by forcing drivers to commit to their move within the comfy confines of the "track limits" and limiting the number of moves available to everyone to a single one. Max showed how to defend in a master class under those circumstances; take the preferred passing line (almost always the inside line; force the other guy into the marbles, be ahead at apex, drift all the way out to the white line on exit) and it's basically unbeatable unless you have a significant aero advantage over the Red Bull.

Whatever great racing happens in these events is almost always completely accidental and largely gets called back afterwards. Why bother?
 
If Lando had gotten penalized for moving under braking into turn one I could definitely see a valid point in the penalty.
The penalty for passing off the track is nuts though. If you don't wanna loose your spot all you have to do is run the other guy off the track, even if you go off too.
FLRacingFan said:
Awesome weekend from Ferrari though…I wouldn’t rule them out in either championship just yet.
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The drivers championship is over. Lando would need to win every remaining race and rely on others taking points off of Max.
We all know Lando will not win 5 races in a row and Leclerc, even if he wins 5 in a row is just too far back at 75 points.
I agree that the constructors championship is still open. McLaren do not have this in the bag at all and Ferrari have a much better chance of beating them than Red Bull.


FLRacingFan said:
Colapinto’s a lot of fun. Lawson had an awesome battle with Alonso in the sprint yesterday too. The kids are alright, just gotta give them a chance.
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I credit Piastri with initiating a youth movement in F1. His performances have encouraged teams to take a chance on the young guys. Lawson, Bearman and Colapinto have shown this was not a mistake and now possibly a fourth or more of the grid will be rookies next year.

It came too late for people like Drugovich or Pourchaire, but better late than never.

Unexpectedly, Albon is quickly getting under pressure by Colapinto and Franco is also proving how much of an amateur Sargeant was.
Lawson will be on the 2025 grid without a doubt, the question is in which car. After yesterday's race I'm leaning towards Red Bull.

Colapinto, even if he won't be on the 2025 grid, will return in 2026 and stay for years to come.
 
Aston was shockingly bad yesterday. I don't know if everyone else brought upgrade and they didn't or if they brought another failed upgrade but they were dreadfully slow and the second-slowest team, only ahead of Sauber.

They had the second-best car at the start of 2023 and have only gone backwards since.
It seems like they can't figure out their issues and are now throwing all their faith behind Newey.
 
The penalty for passing off the track is nuts though. If you don't wanna loose your spot all you have to do is run the other guy off the track, even if you go off too.
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I don't like it either. The FIA is going to be wildly inconsistent on dirty driving and always will be.
donthaveanickname said:
I agree that the constructors championship is still open. McLaren do not have this in the bag at all and Ferrari have a much better chance of beating them than Red Bull.
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Ferrari is only about 40 points back, so they have at least an outside chance. All they need is for Max and Lando to take each other out, which you know is going to happen eventually happen again with those guys.
donthaveanickname said:
I credit Piastri with initiating a youth movement in F1........It came too late for people like Drugovich or Pourchaire, but better late than never.
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If you're gone for 10 minutes the paddock forgets about you. Look at the struggle Mic is having. Drugovich will land in the Aston hypercar and Theo will probably end up in Indycar., but rides are getting pretty scarce there too.
Unexpectedly, Albon is quickly getting under pressure by Colapinto and Franco is also proving how much of an amateur Sargeant was.
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Albon had a wild weekend. In P1 he was sliding out of bounds when he wasn't he was catching a lurid slide. Colapinto might be the one the teams are fighting over.
donthaveanickname said:
Lawson will be on the 2025 grid without a doubt, the question is in which car. After yesterday's race I'm leaning towards Red Bull.
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My guess is that if Red Bull loses the constructors championship Chico gets the boot and Lawson gets the second Red Bull.
 
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