[Gripping Pneus]

I wonder what the grip on the dragstrip was like in the dry? For dragging, if you walk on it you nearly leave your shoes behind as the surface is gooped.

 

[Gripping Pneus]

I was just interested in the 1965 rules, simple and to the point

That reminds me of a contemporaneous rule in the 1963 NHRA rule book that "ballast such as railroad track must not be wired to the front axle"

Simple and to the point indeed in those days.

 

[Gripping Pneus]

Am I missing something? Surely "starting" is when the car starts to move, not when the driver begins the procedure. You might have a very long-travel clutch and a handbrake to release in a vintage class. Anticipation of the start must be allowed. If the driver wants to risk it he/she can take a chance. If the car moves before the green, its a penalty. If its bang on the money then a couple of hundredths of a second are gained. You pays your money and you takes your choice.

 

[Gripping Pneus]

Some of us can remember when there was little or no TV coverage of F1, we would probably just get some very short highlights of the British GP and may be a race like Monaco and that would be it.

Ah, those were the days! The first F1 I can remember on tv (UK) was the 1957 Monaco GP and it must have been highlights as the races were much longer then. Motor racing wasn't allowed to spoil the uninterrupted afternoon of horse racing that was always shown. Snore. My next memory is of the 1958 Moroccan GP at Casablanca which IIRC was shown in full as it was the championship decider between Moss and Hawthorne. The horrible black pall of smoke from Stuart Lewis-Evans' fatal crash in the Vanwall was unforgettable.

I loved the commentaries by Raymond Baxter too. He didn't feel the need to talk gibberish incessantly or state the obvious. He commented when he was able to add something to what we could see with our own eyes.

Hunt was great as a commentator but Murray? Enthusiastic yes, entertaining yes, informative sometimes, exasperating mostly! I think that the standard of commentating today is superb, aided as it is with every electronic aid and stat. available. It's just a pity that the spectacle is so contrived.

 

[Gripping Pneus]

This could be a long thread! How about "You can see him catching now - almost visibly"

 

[Gripping Pneus]

It would make a change to hear Christian Horner speaking something other than well-coached 'spin'.

"Yeah, no, We can't rule anything out or in, and are looking at all the options right now. Yeah, no. No, yeah..."

Red Bullsh*t?

 

[Gripping Pneus]

A chap out on the finishing line, waving a flag to greet competitors home, is a piece of GP 'theatre' that has long-since departed, which is a pity because it added colour and drama even after a dull race.

I **** the pic. Any photo's of Toto Roche?

 

[Gripping Pneus]

Fed up with tedious F1? Watch the Spa 24 hrs coverage from last weekend. Twenty four hours, each one with more action than a whole Grand Prix, utterly unpredictable, lots of different manufacturers each of which has cars which look (mostly) and sound different, constantly varying weather conditions, visiblilty and track temperature, plus night racing. What's not to like?

 

[Gripping Pneus]

I can remember being very disdainful of Nikki Lauda when he first arrived in the UK competing in F2 because he was a rent-a-driver. It wasn't until he started winning GP's that I got over that feeling. He turned out to be pretty good, so maybe buying your drive should be seen as having a lot of faith in yourself, and a demonstration that you have sufficient talent to attract backers.

Having a wealthy father is quite different though.

 

[Gripping Pneus]

F1 generates too much money to be allowed to fail. Steam railways still operate so a way to avoid the pollution problem will be found. How much pollution does professional football generate? Not much on the pitch but plenty from spectator travel. That wont stop Im sure.

 

[Gripping Pneus]

The challenge is not in generating hydrogen - it is in creating an efficient fuel cell and safe means of storing liquid hydrogen so we arent driving around in bombs.

Car design is going to be interesting with fuel cells needing to only be a few centimetres thick. Your floor pan becomes the fuel cell, the motors sit inside the wheels

I can't see how the safety problem can be any worse than a tank full of petrol and we have been happy with that for over a century. As for pressurised containers on board, compressed air tanks are in normal use without problem. A catastrophic tank failure might not produce the conflagration feared as hydrogen disperses upwards very quickly together with the heat of its fire. There were a lot of survivors of the Hindenburg airship crash for this reason.

Re car design, might we see the return of a proper Mini? I hope so.

 

[Gripping Pneus]

Hydrogen peroxide should work in an i.c. engine too. Catalyse it to hydrogen, oxygen and heat. Exhaust is steam. Nice, but very dodgy stuff to handle and contain.

 

[Gripping Pneus]

You don't know who his replacement will be yet. F1 is showbiz for the masses so it could be Davina McCall or Paul O'Grady.

 

[Gripping Pneus]

Is it not the same for everyone? If it's a bit more slippery than usual, give Elvin Evans a go.

 

[Gripping Pneus]

lance and max into turn 1,but suspect max will be quicker off the line.

Would you like to re-visit that?

 

[Gripping Pneus]

It's beginning to look a lot like Russell . . . . . . .to replace Hammy for the next one. Yes please! He deserves a chance to show what he can do.

 

[Gripping Pneus]

I hope he does well as he is really showing some great ability in a pointless car ....

It often qualifies quicker than Ferrari who have a monster budget compared with Williams. Williams do a fantastic job with few(er) resources than the other teams and it is astonishing that they can be so close to the quicker teams in terms of lap times. They may be a second slower than the best teams but in a minute and a half lap time - just think about it. Count one second to yourself. Put Hamilton in the Williams and Latifi in the Merc and then see what the lap time difference would be.

 

[Gripping Pneus]

Am I right in thinking that no contributor to these posts believes Toto Wolff's explanation that the team radio failed on one side of the garage? It is more likely to be the truth than any conspiracy theory and fits the observable facts perfectly. Any skullduggery would be sure to be exposed and would tarnish Wolff's reputation for ever, so why bother? The principle of Occam's Razor is that if you reduce everything to the bare facts, then the simplest explanation of them is most likely to be the correct one.

As Trisha wrote (nearly)........ George Rex.

 

[Gripping Pneus]

Yes!

 

[Gripping Pneus]

Shouting, as Beardy suggests, would have been the solution, but that would have been too easy.

I'm sure that they would have done that, had they known that the radio had failed. The problem was that the whole situation developed in about fifteen seconds and nobody knew that the radio didn't work. Sod's Law in action.