Tag: russiangp

2019 Russian Grand Prix

After 28 laps of racing the Ferrari of Sebastian  Vettel experienced an MGU failure and retired from the race. This caused a yellow flag condition and allowed the Mercedes of Lewis Hamilton to pit and gain the undercut advantage over the Ferrari of Charles Leclerc. Vettel’s comment over the team radio was music to every F1 fan’s ears, “bring back the fucking V12’s”.

2019 Russian Grand Prix

Romain Grosjean started 8th, and Kevin Magnussen 11th.
Magnussen got a great start and gained 3 positions by turn 3. Romain Grosjean retired from the race on the first lap as Daniel Ricciardo hit Grosjean in turn 3 and sent the Haas car into the wall, and out of the race.

At the end of the lap 28 incident, the Hass of Kevin Magnussen landed in 6th position when the race resumed at lap 33. At this point of the race the entire field had pitted and would make the remaining race distance without stopping. It was a 20 lap sprint for the checkered flag. 

But it was Sebastian Vettel who was the prime mover as he jetted from third, past the number 2 car of Hamilton, into the slipstream of his teammate Charles Leclerc and into the lead by turn 3

Lap 43, Magnussen was passed by the Redbull of Alex Albon. On lap 44, Magnussen was passed by the pink Racing Point of Sergio Perez… as Magnussen droped to P8. 

Lap 47, Kevin Magnussen received a 5 second time penalty for leaving the track limits, which at the time of the penalty would have put the Haas car out of the top 10 points position. But as it turned out, KMags was able to make up enough time on track so as to only drop one position. Kevin Magnussen finished 9th, scoring 2 championship points for the Haas F1 Team.

Yea, it was a bit heart wrenching to see Grosjean out of the race on lap 1. 

Next up on October 13th is the Japanese Grand Prix at Suzuka International Racing Course. Suzuka is one of the great tracks on the Formula 1 circuit. Until then, Sayōnara.

2019 Singapore Grand Prix

Under the cover of darkness, and in the sweltering heat, 280,000 race fans lined the streets of Singapore to watch the 15th race of the Formula One season.

The 2019 The Haas F1 Team announced earlier in the week that they would be retaining both h Kevin Magnussen and Romain Grosjean for the 2020 season. With that air of optimism, the two Haas cars qualified 13th and 17th respectively. 

By the end of the first lap Magnussen had gained three positions and moved up to 10th position. Romain Grosjean lost one spot and dropped to 18th place when he took the bypass in turn 1 to avoid contact with a Williams car but ended up 16 after some bumps and grinds forced Hulkenberg’s Renault and Sainz’s McLaren to pit.  One cannot help but wonder if Grosjean is curbing his competitive spirit and taking less risk during race starts. At the front of the pack was the pole sitting Ferrari of Charles Leclerc maintaining his first position, followed by the Mercedes of Hamilton, the Ferrari of Vettel, the Redbull of Max Verstappen, then the Mercedes of Valteri Bottas.

By the end of lap 2 Magnussen had moved up to 9th position. The field held their positions until lap 19 when Magnussen pitted and returned to the field in 14th position. 

For the most part the race was boring as hell. The Singapore street circuit design does not allow for passing. And most of the excitement was among the Sky TV commentators creating excitement where none existed. George Russel hit the wall in lap 35 and caused a full course caution. When the race resumed at lap 41 magnussen found himself in 8th position while Grosjean languished in 17th. 

Laps 35 through 51 were plagued with safety cars. When racing resumed, we saw Magnussen drop positions and was down to 14th position by lap 53. We will later learn that Magnussen picked up a plastic bag which was bocking his cooling and effecting his performance. And by lap 56 Magnussen had dropped to last position, 17th ahead of  Raikkonen, Perez and Russel; all retired.

Kevin Magnussen pitted on lap 58 for new tires and claimed the fastest lap. He finished the race in 17th position. But since he did not finish in the top 10, he does not receive the point for the fastest lap.

Grosjean finished in 11th position. AGAIN!!!

The Haas F1Team failed to secure points. 

Next up on the Formula 1 schedule is the Russian Grand prix in Sochi.


2017 Russian Grand Prix – P20 start for Grosjean

It is difficult to understand what is going on with Romain Grosjean.

In 2015 I wrote a piece about Grosjean where I suggest that racing for the factory Renault F1 Team is his life long dream. I think that underlying gestalt, sub-conscience motivation, is beginning to manifest in his brake issues.

Kevin Magnussen had a good qualifying session for the Haas F1 Team. He advanced to the second qualifying round where he finished P14. Grosjean blames his last place P20 start on his brakes. Last Place start….

The Haas Team tried changing their brake vendors from Brembo to Carbon Industries. They reverted back to Brembo for qualifying. It seems that the team may be going through the paces in order to demonstrate to Romain Grosjean that there may be more to the problem than the braking vendor.

Where is Grosjean’s head? We cannot know… but surely the team knows if they have a problem.

Is the eve of the Russian Grand Prix the wrong time to suggest putting Alexander Rossi in that seat for 2018? We love Romain, but he loves Renault. Can you blame Grosjean for perhaps wanting a Renault seat? In the mean time, Rossi is advancing up the Indy grid, upping his value as the most underrated F1 driver, not in F1.

more on this……

2016 Russian Grand Prix – Post Race Wrap

Again, the Haas F1 Team delivers. Both cars finished the race and Grosjean landed in 8th. My expectations were exceeded by the team scoring points. But I think we are going to get used to this real quick and the bar will continue to notch up.

The race review I am about to write seems like a repetition to my pre-race analysis, because my pre-race analysis was consistent with what happened.  Since it’s a journal I can say things like that. So…

Turn 1 was a bottleneck, Vettel was knocked out going into turn 2 by Kvyat . Grosjean was off with a jack rabbit start and in a safe position from the turn 1 contacts. Gutierrez found himself in trouble with the Force India car of Nico Hulkenberg and was forced to change his nose when the smoke cleared. Under Caution Gutierrez did not seem to  lose much track position, but in the end he did not gain any either.

Grosjean’s performance, on the other hand, must be bringing the attention from other teams. I give my driver of the day to Jan Magnussen because he did the most with the least. But Romain carried the mail for Haas today.

The Mercedes powered cars were the biggest threat to Haas. The Williams and Force India’s are the teams Haas seems to possibly be on par with.   The Force India of Sergio Perez was on the tail of Grosjean for nearly the entire second half of the race, and the Haas car provided the necessary performance for Grosjean to fight. In all but the Chinese Grand Prix are we seeing that Grosjean’s Haas is in the mix, and winning their battles.

On the other hand, the 21 car is not matching the 8. As Guiterrez settles into the car he will improve.  But the driver selection was based on blind expectations, and an apparent obligation to escalate the Ferrari reserve driver. Was this an out for Ferrari? A courtesy for Haas? We have a long season ahead of us, and a proper evaluation can only be performed after the season. But in the heat of battle it is easy to get over zealous in our evaluations.  But at some point the delta between the two drivers will be  evaluated and it’s impossible to avoid the subject.

Grosjean definitely got the jump on Guitteries when they went green. That put Grosjean into a better position and ahead, and allowed him to emerge unscathed from turn 1. Again,in the pre-race review I mentioned to watch the difference between their two starts. But Grosjean seems to be a master of starting, and that is a trait he brings at Lotus. But Gutierrez was lined up next

Based on the 2014 performance payout schedule, the fifth place team was Williams and  received $83 million dollars in FIA award payouts in 2015.  That is where Haas is on pace to finish.  for a team that is rumored to be operating in the $100 million range, the team could make  profit if they sell enough hats. … But seriously,  the team appears to be in a strong financial position as a result of their performance. Gene Haas was quoted somewhere as saying that paraphrase: Grosjean has already paid for himself.

So a great result. And again, I apologize to @RenaultSportF1  for a tweet comment.  It was made in the “esprit de l’occasion”.

Bring on Barcelona!