moley

Tyre companies probably see a good advertising angle for suppling F1. Pirelli's brief was to make a tyre that is unpredictable, which can suddenly fall away to create more exciting racing. Indlanapolis 2005 was where the 6 Bridgestone runners competed as the Michelin runners sat in the pits as the tyres caused accidents in practice and qualifying. Bridgestone could make a tyre for Indlanapolis, Michelin couldn't. Not sure what is happening about 18"rims. I think there have been some testing trials. The reason 13"rims are used is because the side wall of the tyre is a big slice of the suspension of an F1 car.

Lewis said it was a bit of a struggle. He also said "We're all managing, at the end everyone's backing off so that the tyres don't deflate, blow up - we have no idea what they're going to do." If Mercedes are the only team with tyre issues at Spa Verstappen and Ricciardo should have been all over them at the end of the race, but they weren't.

Why would he? Everyone will have to pit for tyres at some point and when the dust settles he will still be out in front.

That's an average of 0.65 seconds a lap, which is probably what Hamilton was happy with for tyre life, fuel consumption and looking after the car. If the Renault engine is so good why did they let Hamilton build up a 13 seconds lead? 🤔

Toto explained that Bottas had an engine cooling issue when running close to the car in front, but didn't say what caused the poor start. Verstappen also had a poor start and struggled to pass. Hamilton on the other hand didn't have too many issues in getting from 16th to 7th.

Hamilton started the day 47 points ahead of Verstappen (157 =110) and ended the day 47 points ahead of Bottas (164 - 117)

Were these speed trap figures for when cars were slipstreaming? Mercedes clearly set the car up all wrong because before the red flag everyone else was all over the back of Hamilton, oh, sorry they weren't. Hamilton's fastest lap in the race, was how much faster than the next fastest time? There is a bit more to racing than being fast in a straight line, unless you're drag racing of course.

Both Ferrari's out and now Verstappen joins them. Will Hamilton get any points? Will Bottas win?

Hamilton gets a 10 second penalty.

Sounds like the team are trying to get rid of him.

Did Vettel say 'brakes failed' or 'Brains' failed ?

Blown diffusers, flexing front wings, increased fuel flow, Red Bull used to be creative and bend the rules to gain an advantage. Now they only appear to be capable of pi$$ing off every engine supplier in town and whinging that other teams are better than them.

This was being discussed on Radio 5L just now. Clearly Red Bull Racing believed that the rule change would disadvantage Mercedes more than themselves, well that backfired big time. I wonder what RBR will do next to get the rules changed to try and reign in Mercedes?

Out of all of the functions on my L&K the only one I turned off was lane assist. OK when on a nice section of Motorway with decent white lines, but in roadworks where white lines have been painted over existing white lines or roads where the white lines are faded the steering tries to drag you all over the place.

The tyre you start the race on is the compound that you set the fastest time on in Q2 and not the tyre used in Q3. Are there any teams in the top ten not starting on the soft tyre?

We will see later on today.

Second practice at Monza: Mercs 1 & 2 again. Ferrari's 9th & 12th 1.3 - 1.5 seconds a lap slower than Hamilton.

First practice at Monza. Mercs 1 & 2, Verstappen 5th after an 'off' into the barrier. Ferrari's 11th and 19th 1.2 & 2.2 seconds behind the fastest time. Sad times at Williams F1, but their glory days were when Frank and Patrick Head ran the show. Never going to forget Silverstone '87 when Mansell passed Piquet.

I recall that Renault were disqualified from a race last season because they were using an 'automatic brake bias' system.

Renault complained that the Racing point Brake ducts were a copy of the Mercedes brake ducts of the previous years car. Both teams denied this and although the FIA ruled that Racing point had broken the rules they were allowed to continue using the parts. When it comes to cheating look no further than Singapore 2008, where Renault made one of their drivers to crash forcing a safety car to allow their other driver to win the race.

From experience dealers just seem to change parts rather than look to overhaul or dig too deep into the problem.

What fault codes were stored when the engine management light came on? What mileage is the car on? You might be better off asking the opinion of a VAG specialist or a turbo specialist.

It gave Renault an extra point, now they are in 6th place and only 205 points behind Mercedes in the constructors championship.

The difference in mpg between DSG and manual is very small. You can 'manual shift' with the DSG and there are different driving 'modes' in auto. Can't see a situation where I would go back to a manual.