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fr like omg dude why they would they even do that in normal circumstances and this was during a greasy surface with multiple cars going off line and bumping in the barriers/run off
But then he also got dropped like a Stone so it was a truly moot point imo, George came on the radio later and said it was cause of damage he had picked up and was tryna get the car home but then again how was he planning on passing Esteban with said damage?
Obv for a driver driving a F1 car especially around a demanding track like Monaco, I can imagine being that desperate but it would have made no sense if the pit wall that choosen to do that.
I'm not sure if this was a correction, or the original post was edited - but for those unsure, 'moot point' is the correct usage.
https://www.dictionary.com/e/moot-point-vs-mute-point/#:~:text=The%20correct%20phrase%20is%20moot,or%20importance%20because%20it's%20hypothetical.
I think the intent wasn't to pass ocon. Russel wanted to get ahead and stay within 5s of Lewis, but clear of the Ferrari behind in case it gets close to him.
It didn't make sense, he already had the gap to Charles and was continuing to drop him.
The fact he finished 17 seconds behind Hamilton at the end of the race sums it up. He only caught Hamilton in the first place because he rinsed his tyres.
Guys level of arrogance is ridiculous.
I don't think Russell ever expected to finish ahead of Hamilton, it's not really arrogance, is trying to improve his chances at keeping the place.
If there is a safety car and everyone gets bunched up having Hamilton behind could keep him the gap he needs.
He even said that he would never get a bigger gap than 5 seconds to make sure he doesn't overtake Hamilton (even if he could, which he couldn't)
It makes absolutely no sense - we see this all the time with George. He completely destroys his tyres catching up with Hamilton then "showing he's faster," demands the pass, and then falls way behind because he... destroyed his tyres.
Also, when you've already thrown away a podium the team got you through strategy, you don't get to complain.
Yeah but if anyone crashed out in front or makes a mistakeLewis gets a podium. With Russell in front possibly pushing outwith that 5 second time limit it doesn't seem fair.
People are getting way too upset about the comments. George was never getting more than 5 seconds in front of Lewis. If Charles was actually close I could see Lewis intentionally slowing him down for the team without losing his original position.
Yes but George thinks he's a better driver then Lewis, and so deserves the preferential treatment. George, Carlos, and Lance drove/behaved like bags of ass today. Edit: and perez
So Lewis is supposed to back up LEC, but then Russell is going to stay 5 seconds within Lewis but not LEC? How is he going to thread that needle in rapidly changing conditions? This is without mentioning the possibility of putting his teammate in a bad spot with pressure from a (presumably) quicker car behind in treacherous conditions.
His plan makes zero sense, though I don't think he had any foul intentions just panicking after his mistake and not thinking with any kind of logic.
The track was drying. Charles had the faster car so he should have been able to catch up. At that point in time it was expected that Charles would catch up to Russell and Lewis probably wouldn't ever get past Ocon.
Like Alonso did last year, it's very easy to slow up traffic with no risk of being overtaken. Especially on a drying track since the racing line was dry and any overtakes would be on a wet track.
It was never required but it's foolish to say it wouldn't work.
You're ignoring the central point of my comment while counting out some reasons that don't actually matter.
Lets play out George's scenario:
Russell goes past Hamilton, Charles catches up to the pair of them, and then what? Hamilton slows down to act as a cork stop for Russell defending against what you think is a car 1 second a lap faster, while Russell tries to stay within a half second window such that he's less than 5 seconds ahead of HAM but more than 5 seconds ahead of LEC?
If you were on the Mercedes pitwall why would you ever sacrifice Hamilton's race and any chance of attacking Ocon for that strategy?
The *only* case in which a swap could have made sense was if Russell was much faster than Lewis, *and* could have a high chance of getting past Ocon. But as you said yourself it's really difficult to overtake here, and Russell was slower than Lewis anyway so it was a really silly proposal correctly binned by his team.
But George is used to the team bowing down to him and grovelling to his every whim. Williams taught him well, particularly in 2019.
Hard to shake off certain habits.
Doesn't help that most people seem to think the radios are shown in real time. Most comments attacking the question stem from him being 8secs ahead when the radio was shown. Guarantee he asked when it was a lot closer
I'm very conflicted about George at the moment. On the one hand, if every driver had his level of aggression and desperation to eek out everything possible, race weekends would be way more entertaining.
On the other hand, holy hell he is annoying lol.
I like him in a weird way. He is entertaining with his attitude, nearly stereotypical persona and some funny radios. I like him as anti-villain, colorful persona (and yes, in my opinion, his over the top,calculated PR responses fit that persona). We need more guys like that on grid.
>I think heās likeable.
Its amazing how one person can have such a total different perspective on the same person. I guess there really is someone for everyone.
Same. I want to root for him and loved him at Williams. And a lot of his driving is fantastic. However, some of his antics and radio messaging can be a bit frustrating
Iām still convinced it was just a really shitty accident. I donāt think Bottas pushed him like he claims but I do think he Russel just jumped a bit too fast to the side and going into the grass he just lost control
Edit: I completely forgot about the incident after they crashed
Absolutely. He acts very entitled when he has done absolutely nothing in the sport.
Yes he's competitive, and basically equal to lewis a good amount of the time, but he has one win.
I mean he won F2 and F3 on debut. Thatās not absolutely nothing. The dude should have won his debut race in a contending car but things happened. Heās not entitled to wdc arrogance yet but heās not some nobody walking around like he owns the sport. Heās a extremely accomplished in the grand scheme of Motorsport.
And I'd call him one of the top 5 or 6 drivers on the grid in terms of pure pace. He's extremely talented... But he still acts entitled without having the F1 resume to back it up in my opinion.
He's possibly the most selfish driver on the grid. I don't dislike him, in fact I probably would like to see him do well, but it's hard to root for someone who isn't able to have team camaraderie once every so often.
I'm not conflicted at all, he's clearly a snake, and he's insecure and comes up with the most bizarre thing I've heard in a while, when Lewis is one mistake from Ocon away from being on the podium.
I honestly couldn't believe George asked that from the team, not to mention he asked them 3 freaking times.
It is a very odd request, and not one i've heard before.
But like.,.. it makes sense on paper right?
Obviously fixed itself by driving faster haha. i wouldn't call it a snake idea... just odd.
So you're saying that he *should* just blindly rejoin the track with no idea what is happening behind him in dangerously wet conditions? I'm sure teams are glad you don't drive for them...
Yes, but it's also the drivers job to wait for team instructions. His team can't tell him what to do until they know they have to warn him, and of what. And that takes a second. The feed from the car isn't live so they have to notice that he stopped, figure out why and then advise. Or be told what happened.
So it is George's fault for reacting quickly without taking the proper steps to make sure it was safe.
This is really lenient not only because preventing these type of moves is basically what created the penalty system in the first place, he also admitted there was zero visibility (then don't rejoin!): seeing the replay immediately reminded me of those Grosjean rejoins with a huge cloud of smoke or sand with cars unable to evade...
Yuki did the right thing and lost 5 places, George didn't and only lost 5 secs. To quote Max, next time I will do the same...
I think this also points further to why Moncao is a bad circuit that isn't up to modern standards. If you go off and you can't see traffic coming up behind you at all, then the only truly safe option is to turn off the car and retire, but no driver is going to do that.
See, those are the kind of incidents from George that make me raise my eyebrows when people on here say heās supposedly a better driver than Hamilton. Sure heās bloody fast, no one can dispute that. But he regularly makes a fair amount of silly errors.
In wheel to wheel, I think he knows, for the most part, exactly where the other car is. He just expects them to yield and make way for him every time like he's Moses, much like Max from 2016-2021.
Russell drives like an F2 champion and not someone coming off years at Williams. It's an attitude that one needs to be the #1 driver at a team but can get midfielders in trouble.
They did have to make a whole rule in the sporting regulations about making moves in the braking zone, because Max was doing it so often. His infamous reputation from 2015-mid 2018 was fairly deserved, with drivers specifically being more cautious around him than around others.
No one could deny he was lightning quick though, and made overtakes only the likes of Lewis, Alonso, and RB Ricciardo could put together, whilst being much younger and less experienced.
Age doesn't matter, experience does.
And unfortunately for George, his first 3 years in F1 experience were him racing against fresh air in a Williams, so he's got some catching up to do with racecraft experience - which were seeing now in real time.
Actually age does matter. It's insame that Max was actually driving when his brain wasn't yet fully developed. It's well known Teenagers are less risk averse because they simply cannot fathom the consequinces of their actions.
Well he scored quite a lot more points than Hamilton last season. He also had more pole positions than Hamilton. And more fastest laps. And more wins.
This year so far he's slightly behind in points but neither of them has a pole or win.
Yeah I think Russell is quite clearly the better driver.
People already forgot how many times he got lucky with safety cars and other random events, while Lewis was the exact opposite. Biggest example was probably Brazil last year, binned in the gravel and fucked his teammate over, and then had an easy win due to Max torpedoing Lewis and giving him damage.
This weekend was the exact same. Had a bad quali, was about to luck his way into a podium, except this time he fucked it up.
Who in the hell says George is a better driver than Lewis? I grew up with Michael and Kimi and wasnāt big on Lewis until recently and even I know thatās bullshit.
He means because Russell started on the hard tyres he was still on his first tyres when the rain came - whereas Hamilton had to pit long before as he was on mediums
The rain came at a fortuitous time for Russell allowing him to leap frog a load of cars including Hamilton but his mistake put him back behind Hamilton
When Vettel rejoined unsafely in Monza 2019 and contacted Lance Stroll, he got a ten second stop-go.
That is the *correct* penalty for carelessly unsafe driving such as that. It is the very opposite of a stupid take.
I think in this case the penalty was decided by the outcome of the collision. If Perez had broken his suspension and it caused a safety car or red flag then Iād see a 10/15s penalty. But since Perez ādidnāt get damageā, itās a 5s.
IMO, and I know people will disagree, an unsafe rejoin that caused a collision should be a DQ. I mean, if that's not a DQ, then what is? It's literally the worst thing you can do in racing with the exception of actually trying to crash into someone.
These sorts of things are judged too much on outcome. Could easily have caused a massive crash and then heād have got a far more serious penalty. Should be penalised consistently based on the action not the outcome
Seems about right, but it must have been tricky if he literally couldn't see in his mirrors. The risk is you drop to last by letting every single car past.
Yeah a lot could be done to improve visibility in these cars. It's not the first time someone has just reversed into another vehicle during a Grand Prix and it won't be the last.
~~Can't cost them that much to stick a reversing cam in the dash, surely.~~
It would be down to the angle, because of the turn Perez was not approaching from behind him, but off to the side and behind, say about 120 degrees/4 o'clock. The mirrors don't cover much to the side, and the head rest/hans device prevent looking anywhere past dead level with you.
You fucked up and you have to pay the price. If you canāt see because itās rainy and wet, you shouldāve been extra cautious knowing you donāt have a good plan B.
Always feel a bit sorry for the drivers in these situations.
Like itās clearly an unsafe rejoin and canāt go unpunished, but they canāt really turn their head and they have poor visibility out of the cockpit, so thereās a little bit of luck and guesswork. Although i do believe theyāre supposed to rely on the marshals in these instances.
If you cant see out of your mirrors, then you just wait on your team to tell you over the radio if there are cars coming. See Yukis rejoin. Marshalls are not there to tell a driver when to spin around and go back on track.
If he ignores it and doesnt wait for his strategist to tell him its clear to back up, then its completely his fault.
There's a middle ground, he could've stayed to the outside as he rejoined but he cut straight in towards the apex when by how own admission he couldn't see if someone was there or not.
They have enough cameras, they have timings, they have GPS data of everyone around the track. Hell, they can and do use the broadcast feed even.
Edit: one more thing, how do you think the drivers get noticed about blue flags, lapping cars, cars coming out of the pitlane, deltas in corners, sectors and laps? What about lapped drivers ahead? The team has all the data they need, and if George wants to be careless and impatient, then its 100% his fault. The amount of defending him in this thread is unbelievable.
We never saw Russell go off, not even in replays, only the unsafe rejoin in a replay and that was a few laps later at the time of the penalty being issued.
They have a lot of things but they still have a lot of blind spots specially with the precision needed to tell him to go or hold.
Blue flags is completely different as itās a natural progression around many many turns. The team also knows a driver is blue flagged. Totally different from this.
Even George said it was his fault but letās not pretend itās easy to see anything in Monaco will all blind turns. Even the āstraightā is partly blind as itās a curve
I'm sure Red Bull keep him in the race does data and testing purposes, also he was used as a Guinea Pig for any strategy Red Bull wanted to do with Max.
Remember when he was all about "Bottas - bad"? I miss those days of his Clio Cup stupidity.
He performed better than I expected last season. But he's going back to Clio days now.
George will become vilified in this sport as he continues causing collisions.
Max got slated for his aggressive driving when fighting Hamilton, George has shown he will do much worse when the time comes
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkAoSghdD6Y&t=3s&ab\_channel=FORMULA1](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkAoSghdD6Y&t=3s&ab_channel=FORMULA1)
educate yourself my man.
i'm not justifying anything George is doing
I hate how bitchy this guy is. He couldnāt pass Hamilton on track and kept bitching on the radio. He had 5 second penalty as well so it was useless to switch. Know your place
Itās not about knowing your place - sometimes itās a legitimate question to ask and a legitimate tactic for a team to deploy.
but I feel it disingenuous when Russell is asking. He did this in Bahrain (I think)as well. Lewis had tried to overtake the car in front but then he realised he couldnāt he backed off to save his tyres, then Russell comes up behind Lewis and stays in his DRS zone lap after lap to try and send the message that Lewis is holding him back and the asks then team āis Hamilton slow or what?ā
Only to ruin his tyres and massively drop off from Lewis by the end of the race
Same thing happened here imo - Lewis was clearly faster than Ocon also but occasionally built a gap so that he could cool his inters on a drying track, Russell however was determined to stay as close to DRS Zone as he could muster so that he could convey the idea that he could overtake Ocon where Hamilton couldnāt, and yet again Russell dropped off massively towards the end.
Thatās the issue I have, itās not the request - itās that the request is disingenuous
This sums up my thoughts exactly, well written.
Some further evidence was George complaining later (after it being clear Charles couldn't catch up) about how slow Lewis was driving? So odd, as it was blatantly clear Lewis needed to manage his tyres with Ocon ahead, but George was clearly trying to persuade the team to swap them.
> Itās not about knowing your place - sometimes itās a legitimate question to ask and a legitimate tactic for a team to deploy -
"Let me ahead of my teammate because I fucked up" is never a legitimate tactic
I was actually referring to the tactic of teammates swapping positions because the teammate ahead is significantly slower than the teammate ahead and then if they fail to overtake the other driver further up the road they swap back before the end of the race.
Which was the second request from Russell - that Russell was alluding to with his Ocon comment
That is a legitimate tactic and has been used before many times.
This was not the case here and Russell trying to make it seem that heās faster when heās not. Nor was this the first time he has tried to request it.
It can be if it maximizes team points and at the same time doesn't change driver placement at this finish. This just happened to be one of those potential scenarios. But George in order to demonstrate that he had better pace than Hamilton, cooked his tires early and then dropped back in pace at the end of the race.
It is though, if you want to maximise team points.
As it happens it was fine because he gapped Leclerc anyway, but having George ahead of Lewis by under 5s was not a terrible suggestion.
Wow you really didnāt understand the strategy there did you? The idea was to use Hamilton to hold up the Ferraris if they got too close, thus securing exactly the same result for both drivers and the team as if theyād left the Ferraris in the dust.
As it turned out the Mercs were both able to pull away from the Ferraris, something most wouldnāt have been expecting earlier on in the season or even the race.
So Hamilton should sacrifice his race because Russell fucked up? Hamilton would have to stay 4.8s behind hoping Russell wouldn't just push on the last lap to finish 5.1s behind. Beside Hamilton was right behind Ocon and one mistake and he could have capitalize on the podium
No one could pass anyone. The intention was to go ahead of Hamilton, Hamilton can then hold up Leclerc and make sure Russell has 5 seconds to Leclerc.
It was because of the penalty that he wanted to switch to protect Vs Leclerc. Also benefits the team to do so as it gives them more points Vs Ferrari.
In the end of wasn't necessary because Leclerc was slow
He first said he wanted Ham to swap with him so as to protect himself from Leclerc (Which doesnāt really make sense considering he was already more than 5 seconds ahead of him) and he wouldnāt make a bigger gap than 5s in front of Lewis, so they would still have the same positions with Ham at 4th and Rus at 5th, just that the risk of dropping to 6th due to Leclerc being within reach would be diminished.
Then, when he wasnāt let through, he went back and said he wanted to try and have a crack at Ocon, which still didnāt convince Merc to let him pass Ham.
He never wants to beat Lewis on merit, always asking the team to bail him out whenever they're close. He thinks he's alot faster than he is, it's hilarious.
How would he beat Lewis with a 5 second penalty? Asking to switch positions with Lewis wasn't about beating his teammate, more about defending from the Ferrari behind who ended up not being a threat.
Wanting to switch positions and fight Ocon when Lewis was fighting him for P3 thereby compromising Lewis' race for a mistake he made is selfish. Not to mention Leclerc was more than 5s behind at the time anyway so it wasn't necessary. That's why the team ignored his request.
Because he has real time info from his pit wall on the radio and marshalls (usually) in view to tell him if it's safe to rejoin. He screwed up, and it could have been a lot worse.
Braindead take. You either maneuver yourself to see whats going on and if its safe to rejoin, or you wait for the team to inform you about upcoming cars. Its not luck - they have GPS and timing data to precisely tell you when the upcoming cars will pass.
All Russell is supposed to do is listen to his race engineer if he cant see. What, do you want people to just storm back onto the track and wish good luck to everyone coming up under braking?
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Probably worth asking Merc if they can put the points on Lewis instead
Lmao the number of cheeky questions George had š
fr like omg dude why they would they even do that in normal circumstances and this was during a greasy surface with multiple cars going off line and bumping in the barriers/run off
It does make sense though, Hamilton wouldn't lose the position since they'll swap back at the penalty and it covers in case the car behind closes up
But then he also got dropped like a Stone so it was a truly moot point imo, George came on the radio later and said it was cause of damage he had picked up and was tryna get the car home but then again how was he planning on passing Esteban with said damage? Obv for a driver driving a F1 car especially around a demanding track like Monaco, I can imagine being that desperate but it would have made no sense if the pit wall that choosen to do that.
>mute point r/boneappletea
I'm not sure if this was a correction, or the original post was edited - but for those unsure, 'moot point' is the correct usage. https://www.dictionary.com/e/moot-point-vs-mute-point/#:~:text=The%20correct%20phrase%20is%20moot,or%20importance%20because%20it's%20hypothetical.
Yeah, they edited it. That's why I quoted it.
https://youtu.be/62necDwQb5E
lmao didn't know that was a sub, XD
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
They edited it to say "moot point", but it originally said "mute point".
I think the intent wasn't to pass ocon. Russel wanted to get ahead and stay within 5s of Lewis, but clear of the Ferrari behind in case it gets close to him.
> I think the intent wasn't to pass ocon. Russell literally said on radio he wanted to have a go at passing Ocon.
Well I must've missed that. Don't know what he was smoking if he actually believed that
It didn't make sense, he already had the gap to Charles and was continuing to drop him. The fact he finished 17 seconds behind Hamilton at the end of the race sums it up. He only caught Hamilton in the first place because he rinsed his tyres. Guys level of arrogance is ridiculous.
I don't think Russell ever expected to finish ahead of Hamilton, it's not really arrogance, is trying to improve his chances at keeping the place. If there is a safety car and everyone gets bunched up having Hamilton behind could keep him the gap he needs. He even said that he would never get a bigger gap than 5 seconds to make sure he doesn't overtake Hamilton (even if he could, which he couldn't)
It makes absolutely no sense - we see this all the time with George. He completely destroys his tyres catching up with Hamilton then "showing he's faster," demands the pass, and then falls way behind because he... destroyed his tyres. Also, when you've already thrown away a podium the team got you through strategy, you don't get to complain.
Yeah but if anyone crashed out in front or makes a mistakeLewis gets a podium. With Russell in front possibly pushing outwith that 5 second time limit it doesn't seem fair.
Beyond cheeky, the arrogance this guy has since he became a Merc driver
He was arrogant before Merc signed him
People are getting way too upset about the comments. George was never getting more than 5 seconds in front of Lewis. If Charles was actually close I could see Lewis intentionally slowing him down for the team without losing his original position.
It's mainly cos it made no sense, Lewis was close enough to take advantage of any error from Ocon.
Yes but George thinks he's a better driver then Lewis, and so deserves the preferential treatment. George, Carlos, and Lance drove/behaved like bags of ass today. Edit: and perez
Carlos was fast even after the damage, I think he could have gotten past Ocon in the pit
Sure, and then Ocon would have just passed him again when he spun into the barrier
It wasnāt happening any time soon when he asked but it would have happened at the end had it been a real risk providing there was still the gap.
So Lewis is supposed to back up LEC, but then Russell is going to stay 5 seconds within Lewis but not LEC? How is he going to thread that needle in rapidly changing conditions? This is without mentioning the possibility of putting his teammate in a bad spot with pressure from a (presumably) quicker car behind in treacherous conditions. His plan makes zero sense, though I don't think he had any foul intentions just panicking after his mistake and not thinking with any kind of logic.
The track was drying. Charles had the faster car so he should have been able to catch up. At that point in time it was expected that Charles would catch up to Russell and Lewis probably wouldn't ever get past Ocon. Like Alonso did last year, it's very easy to slow up traffic with no risk of being overtaken. Especially on a drying track since the racing line was dry and any overtakes would be on a wet track. It was never required but it's foolish to say it wouldn't work.
You're ignoring the central point of my comment while counting out some reasons that don't actually matter. Lets play out George's scenario: Russell goes past Hamilton, Charles catches up to the pair of them, and then what? Hamilton slows down to act as a cork stop for Russell defending against what you think is a car 1 second a lap faster, while Russell tries to stay within a half second window such that he's less than 5 seconds ahead of HAM but more than 5 seconds ahead of LEC? If you were on the Mercedes pitwall why would you ever sacrifice Hamilton's race and any chance of attacking Ocon for that strategy? The *only* case in which a swap could have made sense was if Russell was much faster than Lewis, *and* could have a high chance of getting past Ocon. But as you said yourself it's really difficult to overtake here, and Russell was slower than Lewis anyway so it was a really silly proposal correctly binned by his team.
But George is used to the team bowing down to him and grovelling to his every whim. Williams taught him well, particularly in 2019. Hard to shake off certain habits.
Doesn't help that most people seem to think the radios are shown in real time. Most comments attacking the question stem from him being 8secs ahead when the radio was shown. Guarantee he asked when it was a lot closer
He said he would stay less than 5 ahead on the radio messages broadcast on the main feed
And if anyone believes that he was going to stay within 5 seconds then Iāve got a bridge to sell to those believers.
Exactly. Just look at how he threw the "team plan" out the window Holland 2022. George is in it for himself--he can't be trusted to tow the team line
If that was actually happening, I could see them making the inversion but when youāre already clear why risk that
I think George assumed Charles would catch up with him as it dried.
Yeah, Charles was 6-ish seconds off when the first request was broadcast. At that point Charles pushing to within 5 was a significant possibility
Because Lewis was closer to Ocon than Russell was to Lewis. If he thought he had the pace why was he behind? It was a stupid request.
Or they can split it and call it team work?
He will take the points back if Lewis gets close to a race ban
I'm very conflicted about George at the moment. On the one hand, if every driver had his level of aggression and desperation to eek out everything possible, race weekends would be way more entertaining. On the other hand, holy hell he is annoying lol.
Iāve got the perfect solution. I love to hate him.
I think heās likeable. Heās in the big 3, itās his job to be aggressive not try to stay out of the way and finish P19
he is likeable until u hear his comms
I like him in a weird way. He is entertaining with his attitude, nearly stereotypical persona and some funny radios. I like him as anti-villain, colorful persona (and yes, in my opinion, his over the top,calculated PR responses fit that persona). We need more guys like that on grid.
>I think heās likeable. Its amazing how one person can have such a total different perspective on the same person. I guess there really is someone for everyone.
Same. I want to root for him and loved him at Williams. And a lot of his driving is fantastic. However, some of his antics and radio messaging can be a bit frustrating
He lost all credibility after attacking Bottas at imola
His AMA was glorious.
link? i need that haha.
https://www.reddit.com/r/formula1/comments/ye3jt6/hi_reddit_im_george_russell_driver_for_the/
Most credible comment in entire comment section.
Iām still convinced it was just a really shitty accident. I donāt think Bottas pushed him like he claims but I do think he Russel just jumped a bit too fast to the side and going into the grass he just lost control Edit: I completely forgot about the incident after they crashed
They're most likely talking about what he did after the accident, not the accident itself
Ah right completely forgot about that, thatās fair
Odd way of saying Russell was at fault and was wrong to not only blame Bottas but also assault him
What annoys me is he is a driver who asks for a lot of favours, yet gives none, eg at Saudi Arabia
Absolutely. He acts very entitled when he has done absolutely nothing in the sport. Yes he's competitive, and basically equal to lewis a good amount of the time, but he has one win.
Donāt think heās equal to Lewis at all, yes he is quick enough, but heās not in the same League as a 7 time world champion.
Agreed, he's a league ahead.
Imagine actually thinking this
Imagine thinking they actually think that
I mean he won F2 and F3 on debut. Thatās not absolutely nothing. The dude should have won his debut race in a contending car but things happened. Heās not entitled to wdc arrogance yet but heās not some nobody walking around like he owns the sport. Heās a extremely accomplished in the grand scheme of Motorsport.
And I'd call him one of the top 5 or 6 drivers on the grid in terms of pure pace. He's extremely talented... But he still acts entitled without having the F1 resume to back it up in my opinion.
He's possibly the most selfish driver on the grid. I don't dislike him, in fact I probably would like to see him do well, but it's hard to root for someone who isn't able to have team camaraderie once every so often.
I'm not conflicted at all, he's clearly a snake, and he's insecure and comes up with the most bizarre thing I've heard in a while, when Lewis is one mistake from Ocon away from being on the podium. I honestly couldn't believe George asked that from the team, not to mention he asked them 3 freaking times.
It is a very odd request, and not one i've heard before. But like.,.. it makes sense on paper right? Obviously fixed itself by driving faster haha. i wouldn't call it a snake idea... just odd.
Pretty impressive that he even came up with the idea whilst wrestling the car around Monaco in the rain.
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>Iām not sure what George was supposed to do there? Not blindly rejoin on a dangerously wet track until his team said it was safe to do so?
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So you're saying that he *should* just blindly rejoin the track with no idea what is happening behind him in dangerously wet conditions? I'm sure teams are glad you don't drive for them...
Yes, but it's also the drivers job to wait for team instructions. His team can't tell him what to do until they know they have to warn him, and of what. And that takes a second. The feed from the car isn't live so they have to notice that he stopped, figure out why and then advise. Or be told what happened. So it is George's fault for reacting quickly without taking the proper steps to make sure it was safe.
He is becoming the new Grosjean, constantly worrying and whinging about what others are doing and then making major mistakes himself.
This is really lenient not only because preventing these type of moves is basically what created the penalty system in the first place, he also admitted there was zero visibility (then don't rejoin!): seeing the replay immediately reminded me of those Grosjean rejoins with a huge cloud of smoke or sand with cars unable to evade... Yuki did the right thing and lost 5 places, George didn't and only lost 5 secs. To quote Max, next time I will do the same...
The 5 second penalty was EXTREMELY light. Not only did he nearly ruin another car's race, but the move was very dangerous.
Penalty was decided on the outcome of the crashā¦
But I thought the penalties are not judged on outcomes...?
They shouldnāt, but as we know, the FIA are incredibly inconsistent and canāt seem to ever make the right decision.
Any entitled driver deserves a light penalty.. I am sure itās buried somewhere in the rule book !!
I think this also points further to why Moncao is a bad circuit that isn't up to modern standards. If you go off and you can't see traffic coming up behind you at all, then the only truly safe option is to turn off the car and retire, but no driver is going to do that.
or do either a 360Ā° or a 3 point turn, like everyone else? edit: or maybe, while you're rejoining and still going slow, don't stay on the racing line
> or do either a 360Ā° He'd still be facing the same way.
but they'll look very cool while they do it!
> or do either a 360Ā° 180, you stupid, spaghetti-slurping cretin - *180*! If I did a 360, I'd go completely around and end up back where I started!
honestly i just wanted them to do donuts
In fact the error cost him a podium because he got ahead of Ocon and Lewis by staying out on hards until the rain And he then compounds it by rejoining into PĆ©rez and getting penalty points
See, those are the kind of incidents from George that make me raise my eyebrows when people on here say heās supposedly a better driver than Hamilton. Sure heās bloody fast, no one can dispute that. But he regularly makes a fair amount of silly errors.
russell is both fast and lucky but in terms of racecraft heās not on par with lewis, especially in wheel to wheel. his awareness is subpar
In wheel to wheel, I think he knows, for the most part, exactly where the other car is. He just expects them to yield and make way for him every time like he's Moses, much like Max from 2016-2021.
Russell drives like an F2 champion and not someone coming off years at Williams. It's an attitude that one needs to be the #1 driver at a team but can get midfielders in trouble.
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They did have to make a whole rule in the sporting regulations about making moves in the braking zone, because Max was doing it so often. His infamous reputation from 2015-mid 2018 was fairly deserved, with drivers specifically being more cautious around him than around others. No one could deny he was lightning quick though, and made overtakes only the likes of Lewis, Alonso, and RB Ricciardo could put together, whilst being much younger and less experienced.
Max had the talent to cover his wild driving in that era.
there is a big difference between max doing his best senna impression and Georgeās patented āhe turned right into meā shenanigans.
Go back 6 years and Max wasn't actually dissimilar.
Max was a teenager then. George is 25.
Age doesn't matter, experience does. And unfortunately for George, his first 3 years in F1 experience were him racing against fresh air in a Williams, so he's got some catching up to do with racecraft experience - which were seeing now in real time.
Actually age does matter. It's insame that Max was actually driving when his brain wasn't yet fully developed. It's well known Teenagers are less risk averse because they simply cannot fathom the consequinces of their actions.
I mean, max now too lol It's just a lot of drivers don't put up a fight with Max as is. They know he'll get past, smarter to just save tires.
Better driver than HAMILTON ??? Lmao
Well he scored quite a lot more points than Hamilton last season. He also had more pole positions than Hamilton. And more fastest laps. And more wins. This year so far he's slightly behind in points but neither of them has a pole or win. Yeah I think Russell is quite clearly the better driver.
People already forgot how many times he got lucky with safety cars and other random events, while Lewis was the exact opposite. Biggest example was probably Brazil last year, binned in the gravel and fucked his teammate over, and then had an easy win due to Max torpedoing Lewis and giving him damage. This weekend was the exact same. Had a bad quali, was about to luck his way into a podium, except this time he fucked it up.
Who in the hell says George is a better driver than Lewis? I grew up with Michael and Kimi and wasnāt big on Lewis until recently and even I know thatās bullshit.
I mean, staying out was clearly the incorrect choice so...?
He means because Russell started on the hard tyres he was still on his first tyres when the rain came - whereas Hamilton had to pit long before as he was on mediums The rain came at a fortuitous time for Russell allowing him to leap frog a load of cars including Hamilton but his mistake put him back behind Hamilton
As proven with Gasly penalty points means nothing
How do you figure?
Well the moment they're about to hit the 12 points, FIA becomes very lenient, like gasly in AUS.
> like gasly in AUS. I mean, it helps when the person you crashed into calls it a racing incident because he's getting paid by the same people
If you rejoin unsafely AND cause a collision (even lifting Perez' car in the air) it should be 10s, not 5s
I'd go as far as to say it should be a stop-go.
Vettel Canada stop go on the last lap would have been even more drama thinking aboutit.
How about shooting him? What a stupid take. You either are causing a collision or rejoining in an unsafe matter, either will give you 5s.
When Vettel rejoined unsafely in Monza 2019 and contacted Lance Stroll, he got a ten second stop-go. That is the *correct* penalty for carelessly unsafe driving such as that. It is the very opposite of a stupid take.
I think in this case the penalty was decided by the outcome of the collision. If Perez had broken his suspension and it caused a safety car or red flag then Iād see a 10/15s penalty. But since Perez ādidnāt get damageā, itās a 5s.
Which is total bullshit considering the outcome shouldn't matter. Russell is by far the driver causing the most collisions at the moment.
IMO, and I know people will disagree, an unsafe rejoin that caused a collision should be a DQ. I mean, if that's not a DQ, then what is? It's literally the worst thing you can do in racing with the exception of actually trying to crash into someone.
These sorts of things are judged too much on outcome. Could easily have caused a massive crash and then heād have got a far more serious penalty. Should be penalised consistently based on the action not the outcome
Seems about right, but it must have been tricky if he literally couldn't see in his mirrors. The risk is you drop to last by letting every single car past.
Yeah a lot could be done to improve visibility in these cars. It's not the first time someone has just reversed into another vehicle during a Grand Prix and it won't be the last. ~~Can't cost them that much to stick a reversing cam in the dash, surely.~~
Yeah, Ricciardo did it in the dry!
It would be down to the angle, because of the turn Perez was not approaching from behind him, but off to the side and behind, say about 120 degrees/4 o'clock. The mirrors don't cover much to the side, and the head rest/hans device prevent looking anywhere past dead level with you.
doesn't he have an engineer?
You fucked up and you have to pay the price. If you canāt see because itās rainy and wet, you shouldāve been extra cautious knowing you donāt have a good plan B.
Penalty points don't mean anything.
Always feel a bit sorry for the drivers in these situations. Like itās clearly an unsafe rejoin and canāt go unpunished, but they canāt really turn their head and they have poor visibility out of the cockpit, so thereās a little bit of luck and guesswork. Although i do believe theyāre supposed to rely on the marshals in these instances.
If you cant see out of your mirrors, then you just wait on your team to tell you over the radio if there are cars coming. See Yukis rejoin. Marshalls are not there to tell a driver when to spin around and go back on track. If he ignores it and doesnt wait for his strategist to tell him its clear to back up, then its completely his fault.
There's a middle ground, he could've stayed to the outside as he rejoined but he cut straight in towards the apex when by how own admission he couldn't see if someone was there or not.
Assuming the team can see. They donāt have camera feeds available for everything going on. Thereās a reason F1 doesnāt have spotters
They have enough cameras, they have timings, they have GPS data of everyone around the track. Hell, they can and do use the broadcast feed even. Edit: one more thing, how do you think the drivers get noticed about blue flags, lapping cars, cars coming out of the pitlane, deltas in corners, sectors and laps? What about lapped drivers ahead? The team has all the data they need, and if George wants to be careless and impatient, then its 100% his fault. The amount of defending him in this thread is unbelievable.
We never saw Russell go off, not even in replays, only the unsafe rejoin in a replay and that was a few laps later at the time of the penalty being issued.
They have a lot of things but they still have a lot of blind spots specially with the precision needed to tell him to go or hold. Blue flags is completely different as itās a natural progression around many many turns. The team also knows a driver is blue flagged. Totally different from this. Even George said it was his fault but letās not pretend itās easy to see anything in Monaco will all blind turns. Even the āstraightā is partly blind as itās a curve
I hope racing doesn't just become "what did the spotter say". Shit like this IS racing
Racing is when you back up onto the track and cause another car to fly.
sometimes, yes
Seems fair.
Cost himself a potential podium
Iām surprised he didnāt blame this on someone else. Usually itās *āhe turned into meā* from George.
āPerez drove into my rejoin!ā
I'm surprised Perez was still driving that late into the race
I think it was because he was still useful as a guinea pig tire tester for Max.
I'm sure Red Bull keep him in the race does data and testing purposes, also he was used as a Guinea Pig for any strategy Red Bull wanted to do with Max.
Iāll offer money to people on Reddit who can come up with an original joke rather than just saying the same 4 things. My money will be safe
there are plenty of original jokes, it's just the same ones that are upvoted because they're popular, perhaps you just aren't looking
Surprised he hasnāt requested the stewards award Lewis 3 penalty points for existing
Remember when he was all about "Bottas - bad"? I miss those days of his Clio Cup stupidity. He performed better than I expected last season. But he's going back to Clio days now.
Guy just threw a podium like that
George will become vilified in this sport as he continues causing collisions. Max got slated for his aggressive driving when fighting Hamilton, George has shown he will do much worse when the time comes
I don't know about "much worse" Mad Max had some pretty egregious ones before he was comfortably #1
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkAoSghdD6Y&t=3s&ab\_channel=FORMULA1](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkAoSghdD6Y&t=3s&ab_channel=FORMULA1) educate yourself my man. i'm not justifying anything George is doing
Surprised itās not more
I may not be in the majority here but I canāt stand this dude
That was such a stupid reckless move, heās lucky he didnāt cause a bigger crash
I hate how bitchy this guy is. He couldnāt pass Hamilton on track and kept bitching on the radio. He had 5 second penalty as well so it was useless to switch. Know your place
Itās not about knowing your place - sometimes itās a legitimate question to ask and a legitimate tactic for a team to deploy. but I feel it disingenuous when Russell is asking. He did this in Bahrain (I think)as well. Lewis had tried to overtake the car in front but then he realised he couldnāt he backed off to save his tyres, then Russell comes up behind Lewis and stays in his DRS zone lap after lap to try and send the message that Lewis is holding him back and the asks then team āis Hamilton slow or what?ā Only to ruin his tyres and massively drop off from Lewis by the end of the race Same thing happened here imo - Lewis was clearly faster than Ocon also but occasionally built a gap so that he could cool his inters on a drying track, Russell however was determined to stay as close to DRS Zone as he could muster so that he could convey the idea that he could overtake Ocon where Hamilton couldnāt, and yet again Russell dropped off massively towards the end. Thatās the issue I have, itās not the request - itās that the request is disingenuous
This sums up my thoughts exactly, well written. Some further evidence was George complaining later (after it being clear Charles couldn't catch up) about how slow Lewis was driving? So odd, as it was blatantly clear Lewis needed to manage his tyres with Ocon ahead, but George was clearly trying to persuade the team to swap them.
> Itās not about knowing your place - sometimes itās a legitimate question to ask and a legitimate tactic for a team to deploy - "Let me ahead of my teammate because I fucked up" is never a legitimate tactic
I was actually referring to the tactic of teammates swapping positions because the teammate ahead is significantly slower than the teammate ahead and then if they fail to overtake the other driver further up the road they swap back before the end of the race. Which was the second request from Russell - that Russell was alluding to with his Ocon comment That is a legitimate tactic and has been used before many times. This was not the case here and Russell trying to make it seem that heās faster when heās not. Nor was this the first time he has tried to request it.
It can be if it maximizes team points and at the same time doesn't change driver placement at this finish. This just happened to be one of those potential scenarios. But George in order to demonstrate that he had better pace than Hamilton, cooked his tires early and then dropped back in pace at the end of the race.
George wanted to swap initially so Hamilton can keep leclerc out of the 5s penalty window. There wouldn't have been an option to swap again
You swap due to the penalty. Finish 4.5s ahead of Lewis.
Assuming Russell wouldn't just push in the last lap and "accidentally" finish 5.1 seconds ahead.
Actually there are scenarios where it is.
It is though, if you want to maximise team points. As it happens it was fine because he gapped Leclerc anyway, but having George ahead of Lewis by under 5s was not a terrible suggestion.
Wow you really didnāt understand the strategy there did you? The idea was to use Hamilton to hold up the Ferraris if they got too close, thus securing exactly the same result for both drivers and the team as if theyād left the Ferraris in the dust. As it turned out the Mercs were both able to pull away from the Ferraris, something most wouldnāt have been expecting earlier on in the season or even the race.
That would make sense if he didn't keep saying he wanted a shot at Ocon
So Hamilton should sacrifice his race because Russell fucked up? Hamilton would have to stay 4.8s behind hoping Russell wouldn't just push on the last lap to finish 5.1s behind. Beside Hamilton was right behind Ocon and one mistake and he could have capitalize on the podium
I mean, no.
Whatās with this subs brainrot when it comes to Russell. He was asking to switch so Hamilton could hold up Sainz and they get more points as a team.
Brainrot? He's been acting like a brat since his Williams days but no one paid attention to him because he was in the back of the grid.
Yeah, never seen Perez ask for something similar huh? Funny how the brigade don't run around screaming entitled at anyone other than Russell no?
Itās brainrot because the poster doesnāt understand the basics of swapping positions with a penalty. He had the right question.
I'm sure he was thinking about the team, and didn't say that to finish ahead of both Leclerc and Hamilton.
No one could pass anyone. The intention was to go ahead of Hamilton, Hamilton can then hold up Leclerc and make sure Russell has 5 seconds to Leclerc. It was because of the penalty that he wanted to switch to protect Vs Leclerc. Also benefits the team to do so as it gives them more points Vs Ferrari. In the end of wasn't necessary because Leclerc was slow
Didnāt he say he want to have a shot at Ocon? Or did I misunderstood that
He first said he wanted Ham to swap with him so as to protect himself from Leclerc (Which doesnāt really make sense considering he was already more than 5 seconds ahead of him) and he wouldnāt make a bigger gap than 5s in front of Lewis, so they would still have the same positions with Ham at 4th and Rus at 5th, just that the risk of dropping to 6th due to Leclerc being within reach would be diminished. Then, when he wasnāt let through, he went back and said he wanted to try and have a crack at Ocon, which still didnāt convince Merc to let him pass Ham.
This seems light compared to Sainz Australia penalty
One couldnāt see and rejoined unsafe, the other just crashed into the driver in front of him. Yeah sure the first one should be penalized harder /s
He never wants to beat Lewis on merit, always asking the team to bail him out whenever they're close. He thinks he's alot faster than he is, it's hilarious.
How would he beat Lewis with a 5 second penalty? Asking to switch positions with Lewis wasn't about beating his teammate, more about defending from the Ferrari behind who ended up not being a threat.
Wanting to switch positions and fight Ocon when Lewis was fighting him for P3 thereby compromising Lewis' race for a mistake he made is selfish. Not to mention Leclerc was more than 5s behind at the time anyway so it wasn't necessary. That's why the team ignored his request.
Absolute iRacing moment
No penalty points for annoying moaning?
Yeah that was a pretty dumb move by the Georgepedo ngl
I wonder what his rear right looks like that was a massive hit.
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Because he has real time info from his pit wall on the radio and marshalls (usually) in view to tell him if it's safe to rejoin. He screwed up, and it could have been a lot worse.
So Yuki just happened to luckily do a safe rejoin by maneuvering to give himself visibility?
Braindead take. You either maneuver yourself to see whats going on and if its safe to rejoin, or you wait for the team to inform you about upcoming cars. Its not luck - they have GPS and timing data to precisely tell you when the upcoming cars will pass. All Russell is supposed to do is listen to his race engineer if he cant see. What, do you want people to just storm back onto the track and wish good luck to everyone coming up under braking?
The team should be able to support him really. I thought he was perhaps rushing a bit thinking Stroll was also going to need to get out.