May 01 2016

Formula One 2016: Sochi

Sometimes if you don’t have bad luck you don’t have any luck at all. Lewis Hamilton, the defending Champion, probably feels like that today.

After 2 weeks of working on it he’s experiencing the same kind of overheating problems with his KERS that he did in Shanghai. As in that race he will start no higher than 10th and if they have to replace drivetrain parts it could be considerably farther back than that.

One of the things that make this such a handicap is not just the loss of power, which is considerable, but because the Energy Recovery provides a large measure of what you would call in a conventional car ‘engine braking’, the stress on the brakes increases and you have to drive the car more lightly in all respects to avoid catastrophic failure.

Last time out Hamilton struggled to a 7th at the finish (from dead last on the grid) and while that was good enough to leave him 3 points ahead of Ricciardo at 3rd for the Drivers Championship, it puts him no closer to Rosberg for 1st.

Rosberg on the other hand is having a dream season in the second Mercedes, on pole and with victories in every single race so far. He’ll start on pole today too.

Hamilton has been taking at least the spokesperson lead in the Drivers’ unhappiness with the rule changes for 2017. Among the things they’re upset about is more cockpit enclosure. The drivers contend it reduces visibility (which is indisputable, but not as bad as feared) and is ineffective against anything except freak accidents like the spring hit that happened to Massa. There they have a point because they would have done nothing to mitigate the fatal injuries to Jules Bianchi (too much energy in the impact) and the concussion suffered by Alonso earlier this season (you can keep the skull fairly straight, the brain kind of sloshes around inside it).

The other item of consequence, and this is actually quite important, is the new downforce package. The FIA is trying to achieve it through modifications to the aerodynamics and while they project lap times as much as 5 seconds faster the problem is that it spoils the air for the trailing car and makes it harder to pass. What you end up with is a faster train, which, given that the races will be even more stupifyingly boring than they are now, at least has the benefit of making the time you waste watching shorter.

Now you could get the same result from increasing mechanical grip by making modifications to the suspension and tires, but the FIA isn’t interested.

Another dispute, this one led by the engine manufacturers particularly Honda, is over changing the drive trains for expense at the cost of reduced displacement. Honda, which is finally seeing some success with McLaren understandably believes this would make the work they’ve done to make their engine reliable and fast so much garbage.

This week in Bernie outrage- well, first of all he said that women would never be competitive in Formula One which is not just sexist but provably wrong since a fair number of them have been hired as test and development drivers. Next he said Millenials were just a bunch of selfish pricks and he didn’t care if they became fans or not because it wasn’t their sport. Way to market Bernie, look what wonders that has done for the Republicans. Finally, because he’s convinced that people will think the cars are racier or faster if they sound louder he’s finally persuaded the FIA to institute a minimum decibel level.

Let’s face it, the sooner Formula One dumps him in a home for the cranky and senile the better off they’ll be.

Sochi is the 3rd longest track after Spa-Francorchamps and Silverstone. Today’s tires are Mediums, Softs, and SuperSofts. Race coverage starts at 7:00 am ET on CNBC with a repeat at 4:00 pm ET on NBC Sports.

rustymancuso581

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  1. Vent Hole

  2. Your half hour of hype

  3. Bets on who gets taken out on Turn 1 this week?

  4. Hamilton will start 10th, Vettel 7th. The track has been cold and slippery. Most teams have selected only the required amount (1 set) of Mediums.

  5. Sauber and Force India have severe financial problems. Renault is set for major upgrades in Canada. Honda is going to have to basically redesign the entire engine in 2017, new rules or not.

  6. Cars coming on track. Recon lap then grid.

  7. Verstappen reported some trouble with the power on his Torro Rosso.

  8. Only 10% chance of rain.

  9. Only Hulkenberg, Gutierrez, and Ericsson will start Softs, everyone else SuperSoft

  10. Formation lap

  11. We race

  12. Double Yellows in Sectors 3 & 4

  13. Virtual Safety Car Out

  14. Vettel and Hulkenberg are done

  15. Perez takes down a tire, switches to Medium as has Ricciardo

  16. Real Safety Car out for debris cleanup

  17. Gutierrez in for a nose and Mediums

  18. Haryanto is done

  19. Replays

  20. Kvyat bashed Vettel

  21. Gutierrez collected Hulkenberg who in turn took down Haryanto

  22. Lap 3 of 53

    Rosberg
    Bottas
    Raikkonen
    Hamilton
    Massa
    Verstappen
    Alonso
    Grosjean
    Magnussen
    Palmer

  23. Kvyat, Ricciardo, and Gutierrez on Mediums

  24. Lap 5 of 53

    Rosberg
    Bottas
    Raikkonen
    Hamilton
    Massa
    Verstappen
    Alonso
    Grosjean
    Magnussen
    Palmer

  25. DRS Enabled

  26. Lap 6 Hamilton passes Raikkonen for 3rd

  27. The Mediums are not very good, all 3 are at the absolute tail of those still running

  28. Kvyat pits (probably for Softs)

  29. No, 10 second penalty

  30. Gutierrez pits, also for penalty

  31. Lap 10 of 53

    Rosberg
    Bottas
    Hamilton
    Raikkonen
    Massa
    Verstappen
    Alonso
    Grosjean
    Magnussen
    Palmer

  32. Wehrlein passes Nasr for 14th

  33. Sainz pits

  34. Nasr pits

  35. Palmer pits

  36. Lap 15 of 53

    Rosberg
    Bottas
    Hamilton
    Raikkonen
    Massa
    Verstappen
    Alonso
    Grosjean
    Magnussen
    Button

  37. Bottas and Magnussen pit

  38. Hamilton pits

  39. Grosjean pits

  40. Massa pits

  41. Hamilton gets past Bottas on lap 18

  42. Lap 20 of 53

    Rosberg
    Raikkonen
    Verstappen
    Hamilton
    Bottas
    Alonso
    Massa
    Perez
    Button
    Ericsson

  43. Rosberg pits, Raikkonen and some others pitted

  44. Alonso pits. Only Verstappen has not pitted yet

  45. Verstappen pits

  46. Lap 25 of 53

    Rosberg
    Hamilton
    Raikkonen
    Bottas
    Massa
    Perez
    Verstappen
    Alonso
    Ericsson
    Ricciardo

  47. Sainz gets a 10 second penalty

  48. I should really be about not making any mistakes and not having anything break at this point.

  49. Perez pits unexpectedly

  50. Ericsson pits again.

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