2024 Formula 1 thread ***spoilers***

Lights_Guy3 said:
I'm just asking here: do you really and truly believe Redbull intentionally holds back their second driver?

I honestly just thought you were trolling with some Max hate, but you seem to keep tossing around that narrative in a way that seems genuine.

That's a very strange position to hold, and there's no evidence to support it.
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Very suspicious that the same thing is happening at Aston Martin, but even worse.

How can that be?

Same car, right? :laughing
 
Lights_Guy3 said:
I'm just asking here: do you really and truly believe Redbull intentionally holds back their second driver?

I honestly just thought you were trolling with some Max hate, but you seem to keep tossing around that narrative in a way that seems genuine.

That's a very strange position to hold, and there's no evidence to support it.
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If you look at Redbulls history, they've had problems when both drivers were intent on winning a Championship.

Then you have the inexplicable drop-off results with Vettel when he was going to leave Redbull.

Then last season when Perez was trading wins with Verstappen at the start of the season and started talking about possibly winning the Championship, followed shortly after that with a significant drop-off of results, essentially, suddenly a mid-packer.

I've seen the explanations, but they didn't really explain away all of the issues that Perez suddenly had. He looked like a guy who was fighting for the Championship suddenly having to drive at 100% of the limit of the car in order to compete with some of the other teams.

Evidence? They can hide the settings, so there would be no evidence unless somebody spoke up who had access to the deep settings of the car, and that would be very few people.

I could be wrong, but I'm not buying the storyline that Max suddenly so completely outdistanced his teammate that his teammate suddenly became a mid-packer despite driving the (supposedly) same car that was killing everybody else. It just simply doesn't hold together for me.

I think that there is a belief that no team would intentionally give one of the teammates a car that wasn't as capable as their 'star', but the ability to do so is quite undeniably there if they chose to do so, the only real question is if they would do it.
 
Climber said:
If you look at Redbulls history, they've had problems when both drivers were intent on winning a Championship.

Then you have the inexplicable drop-off results with Vettel when he was going to leave Redbull.

Then last season when Perez was trading wins with Verstappen at the start of the season and started talking about possibly winning the Championship, followed shortly after that with a significant drop-off of results, essentially, suddenly a mid-packer.

I've seen the explanations, but they didn't really explain away all of the issues that Perez suddenly had. He looked like a guy who was fighting for the Championship suddenly having to drive at 100% of the limit of the car in order to compete with some of the other teams.

Evidence? They can hide the settings, so there would be no evidence unless somebody spoke up who had access to the deep settings of the car, and that would be very few people.

I could be wrong, but I'm not buying the storyline that Max suddenly so completely outdistanced his teammate that his teammate suddenly became a mid-packer despite driving the (supposedly) same car that was killing everybody else. It just simply doesn't hold together for me.

I think that there is a belief that no team would intentionally give one of the teammates a car that wasn't as capable as their 'star', but the ability to do so is quite undeniably there if they chose to do so, the only real question is if they would do it.
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As far as Vettel goes, perhaps he couldn't adapt well enough or fast enough to the hybrid cars and regulation changes. He was spinning out what seemed like every other race for a while! It took him a year ish to get with it and then he had stellar performance with Ferrari.

But if we're going to go full conspiracy, I'll toss out there that Vettel had a performance escape clause. If he could "successfully" tank his 2014 season, then he gets a free out and gets to race for the "legendary" Ferrari team.

But that's just ridiculous, right?

As far as Max vs Sergio? I'll offer a crazy explanation: Max is a better driver. A lot better.
 
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Lights_Guy3 said:
As far as Vettel goes, perhaps he couldn't adapt well enough or fast enough to the hybrid cars and regulation changes. He was spinning out what seemed like every other race for a while! It took him a year ish to get with it and then he had stellar performance with Ferrari.

But if we're going to go full conspiracy, I'll toss out there that Vettel had a performance escape clause. If he could "successfully" tank his 2014 season, then he gets a free out and gets to race for the "legendary" Ferrari team.

But that's just ridiculous, right?

As far as Max vs Sergio? I'll offer a crazy explanation: Max is a better driver. A lot better.
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I'm fine with agreeing that Max is better than Perez, but Perez, in the best car out there (by a ways last couple seasons) is not a mid packer.

IDK how much of that was Vettel, and I won't rule out that there could have been some shenanigans going on from his side, he was always the guy who played the angles.

Anyways, interesting conversation, to me there are patterns and when they don't remain consistent then it means there is more going on than information that is available. In track, it's often an injury or ailment or sometimes just the timing of training cycles.
 
Why would a team jeopardize their position in the constructors championship by sandbagging one driver? There's too much money involved.

The teams don't get paid for the drivers' success, they get paid for the teams' success and position.... :dunno
 
With how close the top 10 is now, everyone except Max is a mid-packer on a bad day. Maybe even Max too, given how mediocre he was for the beginning of the Sprint with his engine settings wrong.
 
Johndicezx9 said:
Why would a team jeopardize their position in the constructors championship by sandbagging one driver? There's too much money involved.

The teams don't get paid for the drivers' success, they get paid for the teams' success and position.... :dunno
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Perhaps you didn't notice how much RB has won by in the last couple seasons...also, if they were doing something and it became close, it would be a very easy adjustment.
 
In any part of that conspiracy is RB poisoning Perez with a nerve agent or plutonium and not actually turning down the tune of the car. Might make more sense than simply firing him.
 
Hamilton was obviously available, why didn't RB grab him?

I think that Perez will be with RB again next year.
 
Climber said:
Perhaps you didn't notice how much RB has won by in the last couple seasons...also, if they were doing something and it became close, it would be a very easy adjustment.
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So if you can't explain, prove, or accept, it's a complicated conspiracy... yet again. :laughing

I'm thinking Perez is just a fragile little flower who's breaking under the pressure of not being able to catch, or surpass, the team's No. 1 driver.... He'll be joining the likes of David Coulthard, Mark Webber, and Eddie Irvine in no time.

Nah, that can't be it.

Edit: 2023 team payouts...

Red Bull: $140 million
Ferrari: $122 million
Mercedes: $131 million
McLaren: $113 million
Aston Martin: $104 million
Alpine: $95 million
Williams: $87 million
AlphaTauri: $78 million
Alfa Romeo: $69 million
Haas: $60 million
 
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Explain what? Prove what?

They can control things that we can't see, so there would be no proof.

Just external things that aren't fully explained.

It's not complicated, but by all means keep on your attack, you seem to like to do it.
 
Saying it makes no sense is hardly an "attack"! :dunno

Max is getting favorable treatment because he's the better driver, therefore taking away the need to sandbag Perez. Why would RB jeopardize the millions of dollars at risk for Max's "feelz", which you have implied in the past?

I'm not the only one making light of the conspiracy theories. ;)
 
Johndicezx9 said:
Saying it makes no sense is hardly an "attack"! :dunno

Max is getting favorable treatment because he's the better driver, therefore taking away the need to sandbag Perez. Why would RB jeopardize the millions of dollars at risk for Max's "feelz", which you have implied in the past?

I'm not the only one making light of the conspiracy theories. ;)
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Yeah, Red Bull absolutely favors and caters to Max for sure.

Whatever changes Max wants, Max gets, and the more specific the car is to him, the less specific it is to Perez.

I am definitely one of those that is totally making fun of the conspiracy theories, it's hilarious to me.

But it's all just fun, this is just the car version of sports ball, and I hear endless ridiculous justifications from people about how their favorite player/team from whatever game isn't doing well. There's always a reason: bad call from refs, cheating, bad play calling, injury, unfair practices, heck, even the turf or crowd having a negative effect. Every excuse in the book except for "the other guy/team is better."

The opposite is also true. Some superstar from a team they don't like? "That guys sucks/cheats/plays dirty/etc!!! It's so unfair!!!!!!11!!1!"

Everyone thinks they are the special one who figured out that one secret factor that no one else could. Every time.

It's the same thing.

Some honesty about it would be refreshing. Something like "I don't like Max and wish he would lose more. Because I do not like him, I will not credit his success to his own talent, so I will instead find a reason why he does not deserve it. The more unprovable the reason the better, because then you can't prove me wrong!"
 
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Johndicezx9 said:
Saying it makes no sense is hardly an "attack"! :dunno

Max is getting favorable treatment because he's the better driver, therefore taking away the need to sandbag Perez. Why would RB jeopardize the millions of dollars at risk for Max's "feelz", which you have implied in the past?

I'm not the only one making light of the conspiracy theories. ;)
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I understand that I'm mostly alone in my perspective.

I don't expect others to agree, I'm just voicing my perspective, to me the pattern simply didn't account for the reasons given.

Yes, I'm sure the car is 100% being designed to Max's preferences.
Yes, I think Max is a very good driver, certainly better than Perez.
No, I don't believe that Perez dropped off that much with some change in the car unless there were factors that Max was privy to and Perez wasn't that was significant.

Perez proved solid for years, then after giving Max a hard timr in the first few races of the season he was suddenly well behind not only Max but also other teams.....just doesn't add up for me. But we can all agree to disagree.
 
The conspiracy theory is that RB is sabotaging Checo's car, deliberately giving him parts and setups that are known to be slower, to keep him behind Max. They don't need to do any of those to keep Checo behind Max. Checo's performance deficit has been easily explained over and over again without sabotage. It's all very laughable.

Heres a little more justification for why sabotage is absurd. The days of F1 teams being run by the seat of the pants are long gone. There's a whole board of owners and investors that get eyes on major team decisions and spending. There's also hundreds of engineers that work through setups and data, from actually installing parts to making parts to analyzing the huge data stream during sessions back at the factory. The number of people required to keep sabotage quiet is too large, especially in the age of social media. Imagine how much the RB company value would decrease if sabotage become know. You may as well believe the moon landing was fake :laughing
 
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Perez has finished second three time, 5th once (Verstappen DNF'd as did Hamilton and Russel), and third once.

He's second in the driver standings ahead of LeClerc and Sainz.

So I'd say he's doing a very good job as the number two on the eam.
 
2023, Perez started off the season:
2, 1, 5, 1, 2.

At the end of that run, he was talking about Championships hopes. His following race finishes were:
16, 5, 6, 4, 6, 4, 3, 3, 56, 3, 8, Ret, 10, 5, Ret.

He ended up 2nd and RB easily won the WDC by a huge margin.
 
Perez had an average Qualifying Position of 8.95 in 2023.
Max had an average Qualifying Position of 3.1 in 2023.

Perez beat Max only 2 times, once was when Max had a drive shaft issue that took him out in Q2 and starting in 15th.

That same race, was one of the 2 Sergio won, and Max still placed 2nd only 5 seconds behind him starting from 15th on the grid. Not exactly "Sergio giving Max all he could handle. It was more like a gift win handed to Sergio.

Azerbaijan was probably his only performance of 2023 where he showed anything at all in terms of Being on Max's level. The rest of the races he was just ok.

Even in Miami when Sergio finished 2nd, he was on pole with Max starting 9th, and he still was 5 seconds behind. Yet you consider him "still giving max a challenge" He wasn't, not even after 5 good results, he really wasn't doing any better than Max, or really even close.

Sergio can't qualify well, even in the best car, while his teammate does. Sergio can't figure out how to pass cars without destroying his tires, and having to cruise to 2nd/3rd etc. And with Max always on Pole, he can easily save his tires and manage the race.
 
You all should watch Rob's video with Albon. He explains it very well in short time. It's a speed of adaption formula and the answer kicked out of that formula is that Max is quicker at adapting to changes in the the cars manners. A feel thing, from what I'm understanding.
 
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