So… How do you call yourself an American team with the Russian Federation flag draped all over it? How can you call yourself a Formula 1 team when you’ve already foregone the entire 2021 season with no development on the calendar? Is it any wonder why this sorry excuse for a team – which gets its chassis from Dallara and pretty much everything else from Ferrari – continues to be a backmarker? Fuck it being an “American” team. Hope they crash and burn and disappear from F1 altogether.
Really, you couldn’t help but to cheer for this guy. Super friendly demeanor. Homies with Russell, Lando. A good driver. Humble beginnings. All the ingredients for fans to gravitate to this Thai-English driver. A flash of brilliance here and there, but enough fuck ups to make the cut throat Red Bull Racing org rethink the driver line up for 2021. With the spin and resulting last place at Imola, well… he’s done. He just had to cock it up yet again. At this point, might as well count either Perez or Hulkenberg into the RBR seat in 2021. A good try, Alex. And good luck.
Back in February, we referred you to a Netflix special documenting the racing life of Willy T. Ribbs, the OG black racing driver. In celebration of Lewis Hamilton breaking all sorts of records – already passed Schumacher’s record of 91 wins, soon to pass his all time number of laps led and ultimately the 7 driver’s championships – Sky Sports did a timely interview with the OG himself. As always, it’s fun viewing. Enjoy.
Does this actually surprise anyone? Grosjean has shown flashes of brilliance in the past but JUST flashes isn’t going to cut it. As for Magnussen, there’s still fuel in the tank but will he get another shot somewhere else? Not likely. Perhaps he can follow in his old man‘s footsteps and do sports car racing.
As for who may replace the duo, whispers of yet another trust fund baby entering the sport are abound. Do we really need Nikita Mazepin sitting alongside other trust fund babies Latifi and Stroll on the grid?
As Honda is set to leave Formula 1 after the 2021 season after mixed results this time around (3rd time in F1, if memory serves me correctly), Red Bull is now left holding its nuts in its hands with no readily apparent place to go. Would Mercedes provide engines to RBR? Nope. Would Ferrari? Maybe, but would Red Bull want them from Maranello considering how dismal engine performance has been in 2020? That leaves Renault. Remember their acrimonious parting a few years ago? (documented oh so in dramatic fashion by Netflix) The French manufacturer is probably Red Bull’s best (only) bet at this point. Sounds like Christian is gonna have to bend over and take one for the team!
Considering COVID has relegated most noteworthy automotive events to “virtual” or canceled status, our (shutter) trigger fingers have been dying/itching for something to cover/photograph. The LA Auto Show happens to be an in-town event for us, so needless to say, we were hoping the numbers would go down and allow for some resemblance of normalcy at the LA Convention Center in November. Nope. We can’t have nice things because a certain portion of society at large don’t act with caution/not wear masks. You know what you can do with yourselves… But yes, the LA Auto Show has been rescheduled to May 2021. It’ll feel a bit weird attending the event in early Summer but we’ll take it. See you 8 months from now.
I’m sure that every Formula 1 fan already knows of Racing Point – owned by Canadian billionaire Lawrence Stroll (is it just me who thinks he looks like a complete asshole?) – signed Sebastian Vettel to drive for them starting next year when the team will be known as Aston Martin (which Larry Stroll also owns) Racing. As a consequence of all this, Sergio Perez will lose his drive despite having a contract. As seen numerous times before, a contract doesn’t mean much in F1, apparently.
In the video by Formula World on YouTube – this is an excellent channel for F1 fans, by the way – Otmar Szafnauer, team principal at Racing Point describes how difficult a decision it was to bring Vettel on while letting go of Perez. I call Canadian bullshit on this. Stroll Jr. has played second fiddle to all of his team mates, including Perez. Vettel during the last couple of years has been absolutely trounced by his younger team mate, Charles Leclerc. So we are to believe that pairing 2 second drivers is going to produce a winning line up? Canadian bullshit. Daddy Larry wasn’t to demote his son and Vettel is the only former World Champion he could afford to hire. Kimi’s too old. No fucking way Lewis would go to a second tier team and Fernando would rather be at Renault.
The Italian bullshit referred to in the title of this post? If you are old enough, you’ll recall that Ferrari set out on a mission to create an all-Italian F1 team a number of years ago. As a result, they’ve stacked the team top to bottom with paisans which hasn’t led to much success for a very long time. And the only Italian driver promoted from within their young driver academy is the awful Antonio Giovinazzi. The only way they’ve been able to win is to cheat – look at 2019 vs. 2020, but let’s leave that for another discussion. But I digress. Toward the end of the video, none other than Jacques Villenueve comes to the same conclusion about the Scuderia. What do you know.
