Formula 1 - 2018 Season

David Croft & Anthony Davidson are a way better pair in my view. Yet they keep insisting on using Di Resta as Martin's replacement

 

Yeah, I don't dislike di Resta but I like Davidson. He's the closest thing I've gotten to Gary Anderson since the BBC's heyday. I hope he still does the odd practices. Brundle is great in his short bursts during the practices when he points out what to look for in specific corners.

 

Are Mercedes back? Was it the tweak in tyre compound that has helped them?

 

I think they said they have been gaining more understanding of how the tyre works with the car over the first races of the season, and that's now starting to translate to better performance. We won't know if that's actually the case for a few more weekends yet.

 

It will be interesting to see who gets pole in Monaco. I suspect Red Bull will do really well there.

Hopefully McLaren will too.

 

I forget, does Mercedes have trouble switching the tires on in low temps (like last weekend) or overheating in high temps? Or do low ambient temps help their engine more than others? They shaved 0.4mm of compound off the tires this weekend to prevent overheating/blistering from the overly smooth new track surface. I'm not sure Merc can count on that advantage, if it is one, in future races.

(It was confusing to hear Croft/Brundle say Alonso had trouble with grip in the opening stint because he had the super softs. I thought supers had a lower operating range and so would switch on faster than the softs and mediums everyone else was on.)

Rough stretch for Grosjean that's gotten in his head. Seemed like a bad decision to keep it planted and reenter the track perpendicular to traffic, but I'm no pro.

 

https://www.bbc.com/sport/formula1/44102809

 

Surely one of the teams would have disagreed, if they'd been all asked.

But possibly, at least to the letter, the change is not illegal. My speculation would be that Pirelli has some freedom to do changes to the tire compounds, especially as they can quote safety as the grounds for it

 

Here's Mark Hughes' report.

https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/reports/f1/2018-spanish-grand-prix-report

Re the new tyres:

 

Me too (I'm speaking in general, not for this particular instance : ) Except if that team is Ferrari. Or perhaps WIliams too.
They are the least transparent team in the paddok, it seems to me.

 

Ferrari has been very uncommunicative after Stefano Domenicali was fired, and let's face it, it is Sergio Marchionne running the show there. I feel like Arrivabene is just there to look suave.

 

Btw, here's a comment by Mark Hughes in response to a reader asking about that

 

But remember, the testing was unusually cold and they still blistered the tyres. Also everybody thought Mercedes would dominate this year and the switch was agreed upon after the first race.

It doesn't gel with me that this was Pirelli favouring Mercedes.

 

Well there has been controversy regarding tyres going back years; from pre-testing, the ones chosen for the race benefitting some over others potentially deliberately, to pressure and camber angle specification (some teams to work optimally for their racing car had to work outside the angle or pressure spec),etc.

Regarding Mercedes, Pirelli did give them some pre-testing back in 2013.
https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/107697/mercedes-angry-at-tyre-test-criticism

But at some point I think most of the primary teams have benefitted in one way or another with regards to tyre manufacturers.

E

 

Also here isn example of a mid-season tyre change that benefitted a team at the expense of others.
https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/111974/newey-tyre-change-helped-red-bull

 

But that is the opposite conspiracy. In 2013 RBR was dominating and the conspiracy was that the tyres were changed to stop the RBR domination. Now the tyres are changed to help the dominant team.

Bleh.