56 laps of the 5.513-kilometre Circuit of The Americas in Austin 20th October Practice 1 18:30 - 19:30 20th October Race Qualifying 22:00 - 23:00 21st October Sprint Shootout 18:30 - 19:14 21st October Sprint 23:00 - 00:00 22nd October Race 20:00 - 22:00 All times are UK times Poll closes before Quali - FRIDAY!!!!!
thanks. I didn't even realise there was a sprint or first quali. it'll be another procession but hey.
Small amount of chatter about a bumpy surface just affecting RB slightly. Mercedes with final significant floor upgrade of the season and so too Aston Martin. Macca saying they might not have the tools for the slower bits if the circuit to keep RB honest and that they expect Ferrari and Merc to be problematic for them this weekend. Half expecting a Merc podium here
bumpy = red bull land. seriously the teams most affected by bumps have been ferrari, merc and alpine. the merc floor will be interesting but it's all about suspension too. the red bull has a softer suspension to soak up Bumps etc. the others dont
Ahead of today’s sprint stuff, I feel like I’ve given it a chance and concluded it’s not F1 and I’m really not bothered.
1 tenth from 1st to 4th with 4 different teams is quite something. If only it was anywhere near that close in race pace
Is it just the track or has Mercs new floor made a big difference, to be within a 1/10th of Red Bull in both quali sessions?
Not wanting to take anything away from Merc, I do think this is one of Lewis' fav tracks and he seems to gain a couple of tenths from the track and crowd.
Though there is a closing of the gap towards the end of this season, remember that RBR shifted their development focus a long time ago, so fully expect them to be as dominant next season.
God how boring is this sprint. And to top it off we had Lazenby and Brooks doing the “fun” part pre-race where they were passengers with Le Clerc and Sainz. ****ing woeful.
On the bright side- whatever Merc have trialled on their floor they have made a step forward in terms of next years direction.
I can’t even describe how utterly pathetic the past 20 months of F1 have been. That’s not Max or RBs fault, but it is the reality.
Nope. Not their fault at all. They have done a far better job by a country mile than the rest of the grid... But boy this is effing miserable
Did eventually get round to watching it. Time for some stricter penalties for passing off track I think - we can’t have people losing laps and hence multiple places for being millimetres over the line in qualifying and then others just deliberately driving around a competitor off the track knowing a 5 second penalty is better than staying behind. It looks like Max has the long run pace to win tomorrow in a straight race, at least we’ll have some interest in terms of him getting to that point.
