Source link : https://motorsports-news.org/2024/12/10/formula-1/has-the-russell-row-made-verstappen-to-mercedes-in-2026-much-less-doubtless/
The 2024 Method 1 season ended with Lando Norris’ win in Abu Dhabi securing McLaren’s constructors’ championship in 26 years.
Ferrari duo Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc completed in second and third, with Lewis Hamilton simply pipping team-mate George Russell to fourth in his remaining race for Mercedes.
BBC F1 correspondent Andrew Benson solutions your questions after the season finale in Abu Dhabi.
Has this weekend’s controversy made it much less doubtless Max Verstappen will go to Mercedes in 2026? – Tom
This can be a reference to the over their experiences within the stewards room in Qatar. And the reply is not any.
Verstappen’s future past the top of 2025 stays very a lot open.
He has a contract with Crimson Bull till the top of 2028, however there are methods he can get out of it if he needs.
He has a variety of choices.
Mercedes is the plain one – given the chance, Toto Wolff would signal Verstappen in a heartbeat, no matter whether or not it was to be as team-mate to Russell or Andrea Kimi Antonelli, Lewis Hamilton’s substitute subsequent 12 months.
However Verstappen being Verstappen, he can be in demand all over the place.
At Ferrari, for instance – what if Hamilton doesn’t go properly there? A gap would possibly emerge.
At Aston Martin, Fernando Alonso is below contract to the top of 2026, however Verstappen would possibly fancy ready till 2027 after which becoming a member of up once more with Honda and Adrian Newey after that if the automotive goes properly that 12 months.
He is in no rush. He’ll take his time, see how 2025 develops after which determine.
Who has had the higher of one another over the three seasons – Lewis Hamilton or George Russell? – Lohit
In some methods, this reply comes all the way down to fundamental statistics of qualifying and race, though there’s some nuance.
In qualifying, they had been evenly matched by way of their first two seasons collectively in 2022 and 2023 – in 2022, Hamilton had the sting by 0.05secs on common, in 2023, Russell was quicker by a median of 0.004secs over the season.
That has modified this 12 months, when Hamilton has actually struggled in qualifying, and in 2024 Russell has been 0.17secs quicker, and Hamilton has out-qualified him solely 5 instances on advantage.
The massive query is: Why? Not even Hamilton appears to know. However the reply seems to be that he’s not comfy with the automotive, and typically over-drives.
Within the championship, Russell has completed forward two instances out of three – in 2022 and 2024. The general factors complete was 697-695 in favour of Hamilton.
That is the place the nuance is available in.
In 2022, the stand-out Mercedes drives had been predominantly by Hamilton, except Russell’s win in Brazil – consider Spain, Silverstone, Hungary, the Netherlands and the US Grand Prix. And in 2023, Hamilton was comfortably the higher driver general.
Even this 12 months, though Russell completed forward by 22 factors, there have been races when Hamilton has been far more spectacular – for instance, Las Vegas and Abu Dhabi, when he began many locations behind Russell however closed in and both completed proper behind and even overtook him.
In fact, there have been different races the place Russell was extra spectacular than Hamilton, too.
The purpose is that, whereas Hamilton has are available in for some criticism this 12 months, it could actually’t be ignored that Russell is exceptionally good, so being crushed by him is not any disgrace in any respect, even for a seven-time champion.
In Las Vegas, I interviewed Mercedes trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin for a function on the top of Hamilton’s time at Mercedes. I requested why Russell had the sting this 12 months, and he began the reply by saying: “George is a very robust driver and he’s notably robust on a Saturday.”
The truth that Hamilton went into this season already understanding that he was leaving for Ferrari on the finish of it additionally must be thought-about as a contributory issue.
As : “It has been in all probability the longest 12 months of my life, understanding from the start I used to be leaving.”
Because the elder statesmen of the game now, do Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton get alongside after the trauma of their McLaren partnership? – Ed
At McLaren in 2007, their drawback was not a lot with one another, as with the administration and the way in which they dealt with the season.
However so far as I’m conscious, the connection between Alonso and Hamilton has not modified a lot lately.
It is fairly easy. They’re by no means going to be finest associates. There seems to be some sort of character conflict there, and so they every have fairly completely different views of the world, even when in some methods they’re in all probability extra comparable than both want to admit.
As Hamilton put it in an interview with BBC Sport and a few different retailers in 2022: “We’re a lot, a lot completely different folks and with a lot completely different values.”
However they’ve a excessive respect for one another’s capability and so they rub alongside properly sufficient on a superficial stage after they find yourself in the identical neighborhood, it appears.
Nonetheless, as has been seen lately, the inherent conflict of personalities there does get away into the open typically, particularly after they have an on-track contretemps.
Did McLaren err in not permitting Lando Norris to turn out to be the primary driver earlier, which might doubtless have put them as driver and constructors’ champions? – Tracey
It is debatable – to say the least – whether or not favouring Norris earlier would have made him world champion, as there have been truly only a few instances when McLaren may have, as normally he was forward of Oscar Piastri.
The apparent ones are Hungary and Monza.
In Budapest, Norris was on pole however Piastri took the lead on the first nook, after which there was the difficulty of whether or not Norris ought to let Piastri again previous after
It will have been very harsh on Piastri to maintain Norris forward – he had earned the win. However to illustrate they’d achieved it – that is seven extra factors for Norris.
In Monza, there’s a robust argument to say McLaren shouldn’t have allowed them to race on the primary lap, as a result of Piastri’s sensible passing transfer on Norris at Flip 4 ended up with Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari nipping forward of Norris into second place, from the place he went on to win.
It is not possible to know whether or not McLaren would have received had this not occurred, as a result of Ferrari should have tricked them with the one-stop. However even when Norris had received relatively than completed third, that is an additional 10 factors.
Verstappen completed 63 factors forward of Norris. So it is exhausting to argue that workforce orders in these two occasions would have made Norris champion – they would not.
However that is to not say that McLaren do not feel there’s something to be taught from the way in which they dealt with this season.
McLaren Racing chief govt officer Zak Brown was requested earlier than the race in Abu Dhabi final weekend whether or not he thought it could have been higher to favour Norris earlier.
He stated: “No. I do not are likely to remorse issues. I are likely to be taught and go, ‘I might have achieved that otherwise.’ In any other case you reside in a collection of regrets.
“It was exhausting, as a result of Oscar was by no means that far behind Lando [in the championship]. We began getting noise that we should always favour Lando midway by way of the season, which was actually early.
“I feel what we realized, like, in Monza was we went into Flip 4 first and second and got here out first and third, however the instruction we gave them was extra imprecise. It was subjective, it was: ‘Do not take dangers.’
“So Lando was pondering, ‘I needn’t block that arduous as a result of I needn’t take a danger.’ And Oscar was pondering: ‘Hey, door appears to be like fairly open to me.’
“In hindsight, we may have been extra definitive in, ‘the way you enter Flip 4 is how you should come out of Flip 4. Clear everybody after which go race.’
“I like that we let our guys go race. But when I take a look at Monza, that is what we realized. That we must be extra definitive, as a driver’s view of what is dangerous is subjective.”
Have Crimson Bull engineered their automotive up to now in the direction of Max Verstappen that no different driver may make it aggressive? – David
To the primary clause of this query, the Crimson Bull engineers would say no. However the actual reply is, ‘no however, sure, sort of’.
Crimson Bull would say that they do not engineer the automotive to favour Verstappen; they design the quickest automotive they’ll, after which develop it in a path that, from the expertise of racing it, suggests the place it may be improved.
Nonetheless, it is inevitable that if one driver is demonstrably, constantly quicker than the opposite, any workforce is probably going to offer extra weight to their suggestions than to his team-mate’s.
So, if Verstappen feels he can go quicker if the automotive has a extra responsive entrance – which he normally does – they’re extra prone to develop it so it has extra entrance downforce and grip than if his team-mate was saying that he wished extra rear stability, for instance.
Alex Albon would say this was the scenario through which he ended up when he was Verstappen’s team-mate in 2020 – Albon likened the steering response of the Crimson Bull to a pc video games controller turned as much as most sensitivity.
However that is a normal reply. Particularly, this 12 months, that’s not what Crimson Bull’s drawback has been.
The problem for them has been that the automotive’s steadiness has not been “related”, as drivers put it nowadays – ie the entrance and rear behave otherwise, typically from nook to nook, typically inside a single nook. Aston Martin have had an analogous drawback.
This makes the automotive very troublesome to drive. And in that scenario – in any scenario, frankly – a terrific driver equivalent to Verstappen is at all times going to adapt higher than a merely good one, equivalent to Sergio Perez.
The second a part of the query is whether or not another driver would have the ability to deal with this example higher.
It is a fairly secure guess to say that the easiest – Lewis Hamilton, Charles Leclerc, George Russell, Lando Norris, Fernando Alonso – positively would.
Would that stretch to Liam Lawson or Yuki Tsunoda, the 2 drivers Crimson Bull are contemplating to exchange Perez in 2025?
Nicely, as issues stand, it appears to be like like we will discover out, and that Lawson would be the newest experiment.
Why does unhealthy driving (a collision) that severely disenables one other automotive by no means end in disqualification? – Graham
As a result of it is usually not thought-about a severe sufficient offence for that punishment.
Drivers will be disqualified, however it tends to occur just for essentially the most egregious flouting of the foundations, or ignoring of officers’ orders.
A easy error in a racing scenario – even when it is a notably clumsy one, as a pair had been in Abu Dhabi on Sunday – doesn’t meet the edge.
Author : Motorsports
Publish date : 2024-12-10 08:53:35
Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source.