Is Lando Norris reading my articles? It seems like it, because he’s taking my advice. He drove a near perfect race, from lights to flag.
That qualifying session was, in my opinion, one of the most exciting since Hungary 2023. It had me saying, “Oh my God” while walking down the street. My sincere apologies to anyone that saw me.
I knew we were set up for a better race than last year.
Still, improvements have to be made. It was like watching a stock after an IPO. There was a pop: the exciting qualifying session. Then the price dropped: the race lacked any real racing.
Having two mandatory stops made the race slightly more interesting. But there are still no real opportunities to pass another car on the track (see Charles Leclerc chasing Norris to the flag). The racing isn’t better. Also, it seems the best strategy is deliberately driving slowly to back up the rest of the pack and give your teammate an advantage.
I have a couple issues with this:
- It’s not good value for the money — who pays to watch fast cars go slow? It’s boring and kind of insulting to both the viewers and the engineers who worked so hard to build a race car. They were driving like school buses.
- You’re a racing driver first and a teammate second. There’s a reason Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg tried to kill each other: They’re competitors. Obviously, when it benefits my driver, I love the team game (see Valtteri Bottas at Mercedes). But, be competitive. Say no! Multi 21 Sebastian Vettel would not apologize for being selfish.
- It feels like a dirty play. There are no rules against doing it. It’s hard to police; I guess it’s one of those fun strategic plays. But, we must consider, George Russell was happier to take a drive through penalty than to stay behind a deliberately slow Williams Racing for one more lap. That’s saying something, considering that Russell is pretty much the hall monitor of Formula One.
Anyway, back to the race; at Imola, Fernando Alonso said he was the unluckiest driver in the sport. I already shared my thoughts on that in the last edition. But then he followed it up with rather spicy comments about another driver (who has been outperforming him for over a decade). And in Monaco he did not finish and is now one of only three drivers without a point this season, with Liam Lawson’s eighth place finish taking him out of that gaggle. So “vovô” (grandpa) as he’s called by the Brazilian commentators, let’s focus on ourselves and not luck. There’s no such thing as free lunch, especially not in Formula One.
Isack Hadjar, my boy. I’ve wondered about who I’d support after Hamilton’s eventual retirement: Leclerc, of course., Yuki Tsunoda, yeah. But Hadjar. We will be there. I will be there. Mark my words, he’s got it. At least, I want him to have it. And he’s showing that he has it. Since that shocking spin in Melbourne, he’s been cooking. He had his highest finish ever and had fun on the streets of Monaco. What more could I ask for?
Leclerc moved like a man possessed the whole weekend. After admitting that he watches qualifying laps to go to sleep, I’m not at all surprised about his performance. He’s probably the only driver showing the competitive spirit I want to see. He was despondent after qualifying second (I get it) and embodied the “second place is the first to lose” mentality. He fought with everything to pass Norris toward the end, but he might have needed a rocket engine in the back of the car to have any real chance at it.
Mercedes-AMG PETRONAS Formula One Team. What have we got here? Has all the data Hamilton spent three years collecting already run out? Couldn’t have, surely, but this race was miserable for the team. It was doubly beaten by its customer team Williams, and at no point in the weekend did the team look competitive. I’m not praying for its downfall or anything, I’m just intrigued. Is this slump track specific? Or has its issues with these “ground effects” era cars come back into play? We’ll wait and see. Still — on its poor performance — what was the strategy? There are 78 laps in the Monaco Grand Prix, and it took 65 of those laps to pit Russell for the first time and 72 laps to pit Kimi Antonelli. All I have to say about that is “???”
Speaking of Williams, that wasn’t a bad weekend for the team: It beat its engine supplier and had two cars in the points after a bit of (rather irritating) team play. All round, not bad.
Like Guenther Steiner, “l have to call Gene (Haas).” That was good work from the American team. Esteban Ocon finished in the points for the third time this season, and Oliver Bearman finished 12th after starting in 20th (he had a 10-place grid penalty).
The championship is closing up at the top, and if Ferrari can pull it together in qualifying, it’ll only get more interesting.
¡Nos vemos en Barcelona!
