Grand Prix 2023 Canadian Grand Prix Practice, Qualifying & Race Discussion

This weekend its our 2nd of planned 5 trips to North American continent the most in F1 history beating the record held since 1982 when F1 went to Long beach, Detroit, Mexico & Caesars palace car park, shows the recent explosion, you could say recovery in American popularity when as recent as 2009 Brazil was the only time in the season we visited either North or South America, as F1 still felt the effects of Indy 2005 debacle

but its a relief to be talking about a race. because a week ago it didnt look good with all the wildfires in america & canada. we might be in the imola situation, but im things must have calmed down if F1 are going, because they are more mindful of world events now, unlike previous regime's repuatation of ploughing on regardless

Canada is normally 1 of my favourite races, a great location on the island ile Notre dame with all the trees & the beaches. as with most historic circuits like Monaco, spa, Silverstone it wasn’t constructed with motorsports in mind, as it Originally built as a venue for Expo 67/worlds fair that would take place in montreal. it then laid as a white elephant for 9 years until they montreal hosted the olympics & then 2 years later F1 moved to this location after deeming mosport park too dangerous. which is what makes it a year around place because there many tourist attraction or just places of work dotted around the circuit gilles villenueve, you may have missed or seen & not known what they are, if we go in circuit order

• on the right of the braking zone of turn 1, you have the popular with families Jean Dore Beach, which you have to purchase a ticket before your allowed entry
• on the exit of the turn 6 & 7 chicane where Button famously won in 2012 you have the offices of island & a popular venue for weddings
• on the entry to the hairpin on the left. the montreal biosphere will come into view that was built for the expo 67
• on the exit to the hairpin on the left, it has boating lake that was used for 1976 olympic rowing events. on the back straight.
• also halfway down the back straight, on the right. is the Casino de montreal
• on the start / finish straight underneath the grandstands are 8 beach volleyball courts
• the whole circuit is usually hope for 11 months of the year with it only being closed for F1 contrustion, is open as national park would be. so it usually used for cyclists

on this weekend, we have the usual forecast of rain that will likely never turn up. but then why break with its tradition. we will have red bull again attempting to try to win every race this season, or at least beat mclaren record in 1988 of 15 consecutive victories, but take Verstappen out of it & we would have a very interesting year because can Mercedes build on their promising upgrades, Aston Martin are bringing the own upgrade package to this race as well. that they will hope will end the blip seen at spanish gp where they went from fighting verstappen for the win to fighting ocon for 7th

 

[Splash]

Aston Martin is mainly Chinese/Saudi owned anyway.

 

[FB]

Don't Daimler Benz have a stake in the company as well?

 

[Splash]

From the last shareholders report:

Shareholder % of voting rights

Lawrence Stroll 28.43%
Public Investment Fund (Saudi Arabia) 18.67%
Yew Tree Overseas Ltd 15.03%
Invesco Limited 10.18%
Ernesto Bertarelli 10.02%
Mercedes-Benz AG 9.76%
Li Shufu (Geely) 7.60%

 

[Dartman]

MB supply the basic engine, AM then modify it to suit their cars which is why AM F1 is a genuine AM.

 

[Chris Tea]

Perez anonymous in the Red Bull rocketship.

That, or Max is extracting more from the car that is not a rocketship on every circuit. Just like AM is not exactely 2nd best car, but Nando is pushing it beyond its limits...

 

[F1Brits_90]

That, or Max is extracting more from the car that is not a rocketship on every circuit. Just like AM is not exactly 2nd best car, but Nando is pushing it beyond its limits...

i both cases i think its bits of both, both max & perez, Fernando & Stroll a bit like hamilton & bottas relationship for quite alot of the duration, i think 1 is overachieving & the other is underachieving. Max is looking more dominant because perez 3 races in a row cant get out of Q2

although the point from yesterday, lawrence needs lance to find 0.5/0.75 a lap for his personal & business life

 

[Speshal]

I very nearly vomited up my afternoon cornflakes when I saw this. Yes he equalled Senna's record of wins, big ****ing whoop.

That boy is going to kill himself or someone else, all down to his petulance and a few Daddy issues.

Full disclosure, I haven't watched a second of F1 coverage, unless posted in context here, since the final race of 2021, that was the final nail in F1's coffin for me, it used to be about racing, now it's about the "show".

 

[cider_and_toast]

I had to laugh on Sunday when Croft asked Brundle to compare Verstappen and Senna.

Brundle could be a politician quite easily. His response was along the lines of "yeah well erm reliability of the old cars and difficult to compare eras and Max is good and erm.... Anyway, oh look there's someone in the pits"

 

[F1Brits_90]

verstappen is not on that level for me i dont think anyone is. i think verstappen is certainly a great there no denying that he has driven very well. but he needs to leave red bull to get to the tier of schumacher & lewis. because otherwise he just in vettel problem where he was brilliant in 2011 & 2013. but how much was vettel & how much was newey

it was funny because they put this to him & even he politely told them it was ridiculous comparison these records v 70s, 80s, early 90s legends dont mean much because the season is a third longer now & senna wouldve got 60 or 70 in this era

That boy is going to kill himself or someone else, all down to his petulance and a few Daddy issues

2021 was ridiculous i think all neutrals can agree on that. Imola Spain Saudi & even though it was 50/50 technically Britain & Monza because it was max behaviour that forced Lewis to have to fight fire with fire.

but max has been relatively well behaved in that way with leclerc & perez when having a title battle. i think it was more personal than professional. so it would be interesting to see how he would be in 2024 if we have a close title battle

 

[FB]

Great drivers who Ayrton Senna competed against:

Alain Prost
Nigel Mansell
Niki Lauda
Nelson Piquet
Michael Schumacher
Keke Rosberg

Great drivers who Max Verstappen competed against:

Lewis Hamilton

 

[Brogan]

Great drivers who Max Verstappen competed against and was given an assisted win:

Lewis Hamilton

Fixed.

 

[Chris Tea]

but he needs to leave red bull to get to the tier of schumacher & lewis.

Yeah, some ppl keep saying that, but he already did that, by sticking an uncompetitive RB between HAM and BOT, time and time again...

 

[F1Brits_90]

Yeah, some ppl keep saying that, but he already did that, by sticking an uncompetitive RB between HAM and BOT, time and time again...

i think he would be still be a great, & your right more about bottas than Hamilton pre 2021, as lewis was too good, in same way perez this season. it was impressive that max won more races between 2017 - 2020, than Bottas in much better car

but at the moment for me verstappen is on the same level as vettel a great driver but only had his success with adrian newey, because as good job as everyone does at red bull in factory & pitwall. they wouldnt be where they are without newey. because i would always think to be on their level. you need to prove that you could be success in any competitive car. you look at senna you could put him in any front running car & he would win a race, same with schumacher & same with hamilton. i believe max has the potential but imagine if in 2025 for example he moved to ferrari & won a world championship he would move to that different level.

 

[Wombat]

Perez anonymous in the Red Bull rocketship.

This has too often been the case. The RB is such a superior car that Checo should be consistently putting it on the front row of the grid (and certainly at least the second row). However, unfortunately for us race fans, qualifying has been Checo’s greatest weakness. On occasion he gets it right and puts in a brilliant performance but too many times he just seems average (or slightly above). On the other hand, he often has good race pace. Yet, grid position is so important these days that good race pace typically gets nullified (i.e., in regard to competing for the win) if the driver qualifies poorly (or starts badly) and starts from back in the pack. Checo has been in this situation too often and thus tends to get bogged down in DRS trains or has to use up his tires too quickly while trying to work his way through the field. So, what is Checo’s main problem in qualifying? Is it that he doesn’t know how to get the most out his tires or that he’s not particularly good at setting up his car for qualifying? Or perhaps that he compromises his qualifying set up too much for his race set up? Or is his skill level just a bit lacking in this aspect of the sport?

Anyway, the RB is so superior at this point that the only car that can really compete with it is another RB. Checo certainly isn’t in the same class as Max but if he was able to put the car on the first or second row where it belongs, then at least the races wouldn’t result in such runaway wins. Of the teammates of the 3 elite drivers in the field (Lewis, Max and Alonso), GR is clearly the best and the only bona fide WDC caliber driver among them (I’ve been impressed with GR and believe he has the potential to be a multiple time WDC). I have no doubts that if GR was driving the RB he would consistently put it on the front row.

 

[Wombat]

So, what is Checo’s main problem in qualifying? Is it that he doesn’t know how to get the most out his tires or that he’s not particularly good at setting up his car for qualifying? Or perhaps that he compromises his qualifying set up too much for his race set up? Or is his skill level just a bit lacking in this aspect of the sport?

One other possibility that I forgot to add: Or is he just not getting sufficient help or effort from his team?

 

[F1Brits_90]

i think he is getting suffient support because they want to win the constructors & be 1-2 in the championship, we saw how much that meant to them last year. but perez has always struggled with qualifying as he is much better in the races. but i think only perez can take the blame for it as you can forgive missing q3 once because everyone has a bad day.

but in a dominant car that might well win every race or at least take mclaren record in 1988 of winning the 1st 14 races of a season. to miss 3 in a row isnt great. the issue is that with mercedes & aston martin bring significant upgrades his 2nd place might turn into 5th & then we looking at bottas in 2018 territory

 

[Il_leone]

Until Verstappen can beat a double world champion in the same car and win the world title then comparing to Senna is laughable

The number of offs he has over the kerbs and escape roads would have been dead and buried in the gravel trap back in the 80's. He is the most penalised top driver I've seen for so many illegal defence and overtake moves I've seen.
TBH the stewards are just chicken to do anything when its so blatantly obvious because Karen will moan its so unfair - the 5 second penalty rule is BS is should be minimum 10 seconds