u/Cool_Masterpiece9308

This weekend reminded me of what Lewis had to endure in GE. They didn’t listen to him, much like they kept gaslighting George now. In the GE era, they got the upgrade wrong and kept blaming it on driving style. Now they delivered a package to their golden boy and it’s a flop.

I was listening to the F1 podcast (the one from Sky) where they talked about how McLaren is struggling to figure out why Lando's car is lacking pace. They thought it was power but they are not 100% sure if it is either power or something to do with the chassis or the integration of the chassis and power. Andrea Stella said that this PU is some of the most complex stuff he's ever seen in his entire career.

Then I found myself rewatching the few onboard videos of George because there are fans saying that the whole race he had no deployment and he was taking wild lines. It seemed like he was committing to some lines and tried to press boost. But then it ended up delivering no boost, he would steer really oddly because of the lack of power and Marcus Dudley didn't understand why.

Has anyone come across anything on how the deployment might affect lines, tyres or stuff? Seems so confusing.

I don't understand why Toto is making these comments about Kimi. Like Kimi is doing so well he does not need to hype him up even more and making these comments would just set Kimi up for ridicule when things don't pan out and when he fails. At the same time, he's trying to contain the hype from the Italian media and throwing George under the bus.

Also statement like this is just plain untrue - “Which driver has done the A-levels or the Baccalauréat? Name me one that has finished school. No one,” when you have Rosberg, Piastri, Lindblad with one of them being his former employee

I am genuinely baffled by the regulation this year. Having watched the pre-race press conference from Ollie, Oscar and Isack, the issue is prevalent up and down the pit lane. Not only it’s impossible to judge cars from teams but we now have inconsistency between teammates because teams can’t get a handle on the software. So ridiculous

Andrea Stella: “There's a large component that happens with live calculations, and the power unit kind of forward thinks, forward calculates what it has to do based on some [parameters]. This is why it's not so easy to understand what kind of calculations have been made as the car was going. This is not only for the influence it has on the straights, but also because it affects the braking points, because if you have an additional amount of [energy] harvesting before braking, then you are approaching the braking zone 10km/h slower and your braking point changes. This is quite difficult to master for the drivers. It's not only about getting the most out of the power unit, but also because the variations of the power unit affect your references as you approach a corner.”

This seems utterly confusing and impossible when you have non-deterministic algorithms affecting drivers’ input. Would make sense why drivers consistently complain about how sensitive the car is this year.

Side note, I absolutely love Stella - top notch communication and explanation

Loads of battery chat that didn’t make it to the Radio Rewind Highlights 😂

I love Spa and it’s absolutely outrageous that FIA is putting it on rotation. Now the clipping is just awful to listen to. The drivers are clearly defined by battery performance and I don’t really see how we call these cars on the limit when certain corners are just flat now. It really takes the magic away from what we normally see for this track.

I feel like it really punishes drivers when they change braking or take different lines. You get screwed on deployment or end up sliding weirdly. Charles, Oscar, Max and George all said the cars are super sensitive and quite confusing.

From Yelistener

From Copse to Maggots, Lewis’ car entry speed was so ridiculously low at 279kph and he just went flat through this bit. In 2025, drivers would lift at Maggots as their entry speed here would be almost 300kph. Even V8 had 300kph entry speed in this corner and the current speed felt like F2.

Engine clipping is severe enough to slow the car down and drivers may not even need to brake or lift to enter (Suzuka T1 same).

Gosh this is so sad.

All the expectations even on quali - Red Bull ICE will be good, Mercedes 1-2 and then Lewis pulled out with monster laps and the gaps between Charles to Lewis and George to Kimi look huge. The Mclarens have been quite strange too. Can I just say most of the sessions so far have been quite confusing?

Yes he had 2 wins where the margins to P2 are small. The guy has a pattern of not sodding away to win throughout his career. I just see this as a driver who knows how to play to his strength and weakness.

The Mercedes Austria debrief insta post confirmed that he managed at the end to preserve rubbers to defend. He had a seamless execution plan this weekend - monster quali lap (he would have been P1 in Q3 anyway had there been no single yellow), clean and building the gap at the start of the race, covering the undercut proactively and reading the race well (I was so impressed when he said and not seeing the cars if Kimi pushed to pressure Max, Kimi would force Max to pit so let’s just pit first and cover ourselves). He and Mercedes also continued to acknowledge that he is learning how to manage these hard tyres and unlike last year where it was routinely comfortable, it’s less so this year.

For me this is a really good sign for him. When things aren’t clicking and still spotty, he uses his experience and race read to manage well and deliver results.

ADDITION: To be absolutely clear, Kimi has the upper hand on raw race pace. But George’s experience and game plan deserves commendation here

What is it about their approach or style? They can be nowhere or average during most of the FP or leading up to Q2 and then all of a sudden manage to pull out a banger lap. Both are also similar in the sense that their race pace is also so so compared to their top level teammates.