I can't speak for everyone everywhere. But I do know that German speaking motorsport forums are pretty much unified in thinking it was a joke. But then of course Mercedes also have a connection to German... unlike, say, Red Bull.
F1 2021 Season
- Thread starter pauldyson1uk
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) is joined by CEO Duncan Drasdo and Financial Director Andy Green from the Manchester United Supporters Trust for a special episode on all things behind the scenes at Old Trafford including a brief history of MUST and their aims today, views on INEOS and Sir Jim Ratcliffe so far, and the Old Trafford regeneration.
I started using it for the first time yesterday after thinking I wouldn't need to. I can see me getting a bit trigger happy with it from now on
It is interesting to see where F1 goes from here. It feels like it's all just going to be swept under the carpet though and not mentioned again
I’m quite confident change will happen. Not the result and perhaps not in the public eye. But I think there is a good chance things change.
We’ve seen a lot of Masi bashing in this thread and rightly so. But I did read a few pieces which made me wonder a bit. Apparently Masi doesn’t have a team of people with him, and whilst obviously more analytics and information than all of us watching, he has nothing like the data and team that the actual racing teams do. He is obviously responsible for the call and in all circumstances he should have got it right, but I do think they could implement real changes there. Simple things like:
- More people, who might be responsible for communications with teams so they get them out of Masi’s ear.
- More people to support on analytics and data to have minds working through real time information.
- An assistant race director, or perhaps even turning the role into a 3-person team to get more balance in decision making.
- A clearer understanding of race director and steward interaction.
I think (and hope) Masi is removed. But unless the next person is a superstar like Charlie, without change we might still get weird decisions like this.
It’s better than no evidence at all, which is what the guy I was quoting gave
Amazing how many people miss this basic point.
Presumably you are a grown adult. Just a little reminder.
I started using it for the first time yesterday after thinking I wouldn't need to. I can see me getting a bit trigger happy with it from now on
It is interesting to see where F1 goes from here. It feels like it's all just going to be swept under the carpet though and not mentioned again
That's precisely where it goes. Mercs have already got a big deal from this no doubt, it won't be announced they are dropping the case properly until it all dies down and talk of next season has begun.
It's going to be both cringe but also extremely funny next season watching the Max/RB fans complain all year about the clear bias even more though. Forgetting perhaps why.
Comparing those other incidents is nothing comparable at all. Both drivers could have earnt more points through the season - obviously nobody had a perfect year.
It's not even 'hamilton fans' either, it's F1 fans in general. People that watched the race for the first time ever are saying it stinks. The fact is, the FIA changed the outcome of a race by not following the rules to make it seem more exciting.
You're sitting here happy to make excuses because your favourite came out on top because of it, but if it was the other way around you'd be screaming CHEAT.
Oh it would be so so sweet for the true golden team of F1 to return and get all the favourable decisions vs Max. Let’s go Le Clerc!
Max lost 70 points from bad luck and still beat Lewis. Not too worried about a guy who has just lost to Sainz.
Your analogy is fundamentally flawed because it’s nothing but a thinly veiled attempt to paint Max as a constant victim this season. Why not make your point without presenting your opinion as an underlying statement of fact.
What I need now from F1 is an answer to a simple question:
Are you guys 'competing' or are you guys 'performing'?
I will adjust my expectations for the event accordingly for the future.
In terms of competition, that was a 0/10. In terms of performance, that was a 10/10. Only missing Max doing crotch chops on top of his car.
Are you guys 'competing' or are you guys 'performing'?
I will adjust my expectations for the event accordingly for the future.
In terms of competition, that was a 0/10. In terms of performance, that was a 10/10. Only missing Max doing crotch chops on top of his car.
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Neither did Charlie Whiting. He sat alone in his office during races.
Masi forgot what his job is, safety. He thought he was responsible for entertainment and I'm 99% sure he will lose his job for it. Teams don't trust him, drivers don't trust him.
I don't think they would dare take Max's title away even though they probably should, what would be best for all is a non result this year.
Unfortunately the answer to that was made clear with Brawn's comments. He could have indicated at that point they will review the rules and make sure that future championships are at least consistently overseen, but they've obviously decided that ratings are the most important metric. He didn't even have to throw Masi under a bus if it was well worded.
If that's the way they want to go, fine but a sport doesn't have rules which can be changed on the fly.
Did you get to that part and stop reading the rest of my post?
Where I literally said I think and hope Masi is removed, and also that unless the next person is a super star like Charlie, they also could fail…?At that point it isn’t sport anymore - it’s just entertainment. In professional sport you don’t ever break rules to create drama. In boxing if someone is KOd in the first round you don’t wait an hour and go again so the fans and TV viewers get their full money worth. In football if a CL final is being won 6-0 you don’t just suddenly red card 3 players from their team. In rugby you don’t suddenly make tries worth 15 points to bring a game closer if one team is winning. In Tennis you don’t extend the match if someone has won in 3 sets (or 2). I could go on and on and on. Sport will always have contentious judgement calls, which will always be debated by fans of all sides. But sport never has a flagrant breach of rules and a change of protocol which impact competitor decisions and treat competitors differently (Sainz and Max for example).
I think people watching F1 for the first time think it stinks because they do not understand safety cars, and that resetting the field is a part of F1. The 3-0 up comments etc . That’s just plain bad luck for Lewis and deploying the safety car and resetting the field was absolutely the correct thing to do.
I have watched F1 for over 20 years and watching it live I didn’t think it was dodgy (I didn’t realise he only let 5 cars through for a start), I thought the track was clear, let them race, this sucks for Lewis but that’s F1. It was only after the race watching the aftermath on tv did I realise that the procedures were obviously not followed correctly and that it wasn’t right. My suspicion is Masi didn’t know every line of the sporting regulations - which if he genuinely doesn’t have any support is kind of understandable - and didn’t know that he had to do another lap under the safety car. I’d like to think it was an honest mistake rather than a setup - he didn’t cause Latifi to crash for a start.
For someone that's watched it for over 20 years, seems weird that you've probably forgotten this comment by Masi at the Nurburgring last year.
I will wait for the next steps to confirm but in that light, watching Lewis vs Max fans or Lewis vs Schumacher fans just makes it less serious and more hilarious in the future.
Not even sure Lewis should be knighted now. Was he given 7 titles simply because he was the most marketable face of the company at this period?
Yes, i'm currently having a bit of a crisis with F1 personally. It's like that time I was 10 yrs old and realised WWE was fake. Suddenly the champion didn't matter anymore, only the storyline.
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Christian Horner mentioned the other day a meeting that the principals/Exec's of each team had earlier on in the season whereby they all collectively agreed that races shouldn't be ended/decided by safety cars where it is possible.
This is probably explains Masi's retort to Wolf explaining that it's 'a Motor race'.
This is probably explains Masi's retort to Wolf explaining that it's 'a Motor race'.
Max is the biggest chancer and most dangerous driver in F1. He has taken unnecessary risks for years and one day will cause someone harm with his erratic driving.
You speak for most people do you? Thought not.
Just another blinkered fan boy view
I think you're being far too kind - you don't need to be a superstar to follow the rules, especially rules that you're already on the record for having used and understood. No amount of support and data is going to make a difference when you've got a glorified random number generator* making the decisions.
The ideas you have make sense to a point, although too many people and it risks becoming race direction by committee and being too slow to react to anything.
*This is the more generous interpretation, that assumes he's just hilariously inept rather than actively trying to influence the championship for drama, which could well be true too.
Did you get to that part and stop reading the rest of my post?
Yeah, just pointing out it's no excuse.
Masi has not had to make any particularly difficult calls this year, if viewed in the context of safety alone. He's fecked a lot of them up though.
I agree with you the first part. The way I see it, the only thing that should've been done differently, is that the lapped cars (all of them) should've been allowed to overtake a lap earlier, when the no overtaking message was sent out. Going by the team radios it seems quite a lot were expecting it at the stage too. Sainz especially went on about wanting lapped cars to go. If all the lapped cars had overtaken at that point, which was roughly the same part of the track, the safety car would probably have to go for another lap and the race would still have re-started at the same point in the race, and you'd expect the outcome to be the same.
Masi, who would know the regulations better than most, stated that the purpose of Article 48.12 was to remove those lapped cars that would “interfere” in the racing between the leaders and that in his view Article 48.13 was the one that applied in this case. He also stated that it had long been agreed by all the Teams that where possible it was highly desirable for the race to end in a “green” condition (i.e. not under a Safety Car).
They should really limit the number of people allowed to talk to the race director though. Should probably not allow team bosses to do so, they're the ones that get most emotional. i.e. Wheatley is usually a lot calmer than Horner. 'I'm not sure we agree, but I understand' for instance, at the lap 1 incident.
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Charlie did to be fair, Herbie Blash (his right hand man) was essentially was race director for the first two laps of every Grand Prix as Charlie was always starting the race from the gantry. I don't know if Masi has a team, but certainly needs to delegate some of the responsibility out there.
I agree for sure. And I’m not absolving him of blame at all. He should still have made the right calls - and I’ve said that throughout this thread because he has the no. 1 race director job in motor sport, to get that role you need to have competence beyond your typical person.
That being said, I think discussion of how you could make a race directors role easier is still important and still should be considered in its own right. I don’t think that undermines any view that Masi should be removed.
Just consider that at that time, in his mind he would have had safety in mind. He would have had the commercial interests of billionaires in his mind. He would have had (or maybe not as it were!) the rules in his mind. He would have the championship battle on his mind. He had two team bosses screaming down the line to him. And he had to manage communication not just with them but with all the other teams. I reiterate, I still think he should have made the right call - that’s why has the job - and that he should be replaced - but that is a lot of stuff going through one individuals mind with the whole world (ish) watching. I think his other mistakes show it’s beyond just the stress of this situation, but the point I’m making is that that’s a tough sport for ANY race director. So I don’t see why we should think about what we can do to help them.
I agree also too many people presents its own problems. But I certain don’t see why you can’t have someone / a team in charge of handling communication , a person in charge of identifying the factual rules for the particular circumstance, and then a race director whose job then becomes to be more “stand back” to use corporate jargon and bring all of that together.
The lap before, there was a truck on the road removing Latifi’s car. So no, they could not have let them go a lap earlier.
Unfortunately the Verstappen fans on here (and most I've met) are pretty good reflections of the man himself - spoiled, unsporting hypocrites who believe he's the only one who should be allowed to race 'hard'. Come to think of it, that's pretty much Red Bull as well.
Still, you can tell that the asterisk by his title 'win' is bothersome, as otherwise they wouldn't be trying to gaslight everyone else with youtube likes/dislikes and other nonsense, and would be busy actually celebrating.
I feel that too. You could see that with Sky's coverage of the situation. They give it coverage to say they've discussed but they also know their bosses need them to protect the image of the sport and switch the focus to Max. Crofty was even defending Masi.I started using it for the first time yesterday after thinking I wouldn't need to. I can see me getting a bit trigger happy with it from now on
It is interesting to see where F1 goes from here. It feels like it's all just going to be swept under the carpet though and not mentioned again
The online F1 media is similar. It will do them no favours in the long run if the image of sport ends up in the mud.
Yet more bullsh1t.
The starter job is now a separate function. Once that door was closed, Whiting was undisturbed for the duration of the race and nobody would dare pressure him the way Horner and Wolff do. Help or no help, I think Masi lacks the standing in the sport and changing his mind on the lapped cars proved that. His decisions no longer have any weight because everybody will know he can be pressured to change them.
Hard to say why but the number of safety cars and red flags has skyrocketed in the last 10 years, and that hasn't made the race director's job any easier. It's not that the cars are any faster, they've only very recently overtaken the 2004 spec in that respect.
Where have you got that information from?
Youtube doesn't even show the amount of dislikes anymore, it was removed recently so the only people that would know the ration would be the channel owners.
EDIT - This has been answered in the post below.
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There's a third party app that reinstates likes/dislikes.
It is reasonable to wonder what would have happened were the result reversed and Max/RB had been screwed on the last lap.
Would Max have shown anything like the same sportsmanship as did Lewis.
And would Horner and Marko not have protested about the total injustice?
Pretty sure we all know the answer to that...
That's not accurate.
The truck moved away on lap 55 and by the time cars came through again you can see the last of the stewards exit over the barriers (pictured below)
They had more than half a lap of non-action before they unlapped cars.
Fair enough, didn't know.
If Hamilton had won, he would have had the most points, with some elements of luck and fortune along the way, same as Verstappen.Yes. He would have been champion without being the best driver of the season. That is undeserved in my eyes.
He made too many mistakes in the first half of the season and lost too many points as a result.
At the end of the day, the best driver won the title, and that is uncontested if you look at the driver ratings.
These driver ratings on a race-by-race basis include scores from six different websites:
AMUS.de
Autosport.com
The-Race.com
PlanetF1.com
Crash.net
F1i.com
Five English speaking, one German speaking, no Dutch speaking.
How would that be undeserving?
It's not just decisions or luck. It's a literal break of the rules. Both drivers had decisions and luck go their way throughout the season, at different points. Only one driver had the rules broken for them.
For what it's worth: None of my friends are super into F1. Some watch the races, but that's it. This was the first time in years most of us watched and we actually talked about it afterwards. Even at work it was a topic. Everybody absolutely loved it, even though most favor Mercedes over Red Bull I can't speak for die hard F1 fans at all, but casuals and neutrals were universally thrilled from what I can tell.
It even rekindled some interest in the sport for me.
It was great as a spectacle, no doubt about it. But so is Wrestlemania. Many people were talking about it in my office too, but not that they cared who was the champion, just the show of it all. Some who tried to digest it further in a sporting manner, did not understand what had happened at the end and needed someone (me) to explain it.
I mean, I will still watch it as a spectacle and enjoy spectacular crashes and Masi screwjobs, but then let's not start giving out plaudits, knighthoods and accolades for the champion. Let's stop arguing who is the GOAT sportsman out of Lewis, Schumacher or Senna. It's like arguing whether Hulk Hogan or the Rock is the better sports competitor because who won more WWE titles how, when and where. We can argue about who is the best performer or most entertaining for sure. It is definitely Max as he is the likeliest to cause an accident and give us a spectacular show with flying tyres everywhere. Lewis is a bit too old and safe now. On that basis, defo Max deserves to be champion.
The course of the champion is so easily manipulated by the 'rules' the FIA make on the cars and tires each year (to prevent someone getting too dominant and boring the crowd), and also the decisions of the race director to ensure a Hollywood season finish by choosing when and where to penalise drivers during the course of the season.
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Stewards are on the track at lap 56 at turn 14, it would have taken until lap 57 for every car to unlap themselves as there are only two corners left. The safety car is supposed to come in the following lap (58) after the last car has unlapped itself.That's not accurate.
The truck moved away on lap 55 and by the time cars came through again you can see the last of the stewards exit over the barriers (pictured below)
They had more than half a lap of non-action before they unlapped cars.
My point was about the additional lap rather than allowing cars to unlap and that quote doesn't say anything about that.
I think it's entirely plausible Masi either just forgot (as alluded to by other posters he was under intense pressure with multiple things going on), or he thought that bit of the rule wasn't relevant. If however you believe he knows all the rules like the back of his hand, he could argue that, according to 15.3 he has complete control over the safety car (one of the arguments the Stewards used) and he believed the additional lap wasn't necessary (I assume it is there so the now unlapped cars get a fair amount ahead and don't need to be lapped again within a couple of laps (?) which on the last lap of the race isn't needed for obvious reasons).
My personal belief is he doesn't know every single line of the sporting regulations and just forgot, and he would follow 48.12 in full if he had his time again. I don't believe he himself believed he was invalidating procedures
EDIT: Posted before I meant to. I meant to finish off by saying that I believe he realised that what he did was incorrect after the event (but not during), but after the race he has found a way to wriggle out of it by referring to 15.3 and 48.13.
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That's not accurate.
The truck moved away on lap 55 and by the time cars came through again you can see the last of the stewards exit over the barriers (pictured below)
They had more than half a lap of non-action before they unlapped cars.
Apologies my mistake re: timing of the truck.
Still, they could not let them around on lap 56. If you look in the 55 picture there is still loads of stuff on the road that needed sweeping. They did this on lap 56. So, you can’t wave them through until they’ve crossed that point on 56 as if they did it earlier the marshals wouldn’t have had time to sweep up on lap 56. So the only time on lap 56 to give the order is literally during those last 2 turns.
Given what we now know, this is overall a rather odd line of debate. Clearly the race director wanted to start the race as soon as possible. If it was safely possible to do it the laps before, don’t you think he would have?
Ultimately, you cite racing incidents and random tyre problems.Max lost 70 points because of Pirelli and Mercedes playing destruction derby in Baku, Silverstone and Hungary.
Lewis still lost
Then you cry about the 7 points you lost in Abu Dhabi.
I cite specific rulings by the FIA to help Max.
But you think these are equivalent examples?
-Giving half points for a farce at Spa (advantage Max)
-Allowing Max to drive Lewis off the track in Brazil (advantage Max)
-Not penalising Max with grid penalty or points deduction for brake checking (advantage Max)
-The icing on the cake, handing the championship and final race to Max despite him being 11 second behind.
These are all decisions and rulings NOT racing incidents. If you can't see that then you may be in denial.