2025 Canadian Grand Prix - Montreal, June 13 - 15

[SiLo]

No they don't. Toto has already confirmed he's sticking with the current lineup.

Things can change there quickly though, yes I would say almost certainly George and Kimi will be their 2 drivers next year too but stranger things have happened; Thought Toto last week with the Max/George incident was interesting almost refused to really criticise Max, the reporters pushed him he took the smallest of bites even during the week he somewhat defended Max, saying somthing like Champions been to feel like they are fighting adversity, it does feel like Toto is just keeping that door open just incase.

Highly doubt Toto is keeping the door open. Given the rumors about the Mercedes engine in 2026 and the switch to the in-wash based design (That Mercedes was previously dominant with), there is a possibility that George will probably have 2 or 3 WDC under his belt before Max is ever available in 2027-2028. But, who knows, we'll see how it unfolds.

Mercedes have never been dominant with in-wash design. We haven't had in-wash since 2008, before the team even existed.

[chrisc90]

Nope. Far as I’m aware the lights were still illuminated on the safety car

The instruction was that the safety car was going into the pits and for drivers to head over the finish line, therefore defacto Russell safety car.

Having reviewed the video, the lights on the safety car did not go off before it peeled off into the pitlane.
The first time I have ever seen that happen.

That's operational error on the part of the safety car as per their lights off mandate to alert everyone it's going into the pits.

Edit from Merc thread:(Adam Cooper)

I've heard that @redbullracing has withdrawn the protest about RUS being too far behind the safety car. In fact he was complying with another rule regarding a yellow flag delta, and in effect he wasn't able to keep up with the safety car.

It’s not the final 300m to the finish line to take the chequered flag. It was when Russell collected the safety car.

Also, if you look at the video. The safety car allows 2 cars to pass at the hairpin on the lap it first come out. That’s a strange scenario too.

[Quantum]

It’s not the final 300m to the finish line to take the chequered flag. It was when Russell collected the safety car.

Still not sure if you're calling for a penalty or if you're saying the FIA befuddled itself because it didn't want to finish the race behind a safety car?

[chrisc90]

It’s not the final 300m to the finish line to take the chequered flag. It was when Russell collected the safety car.

Still not sure if you're calling for a penalty or if you're saying the FIA befuddled itself because it didn't want to finish the race behind a safety car?

I think you’re barking up the wrong tree with what I was commenting about.

I was saying that if you look at the penalty Perez got, which was for falling more than 10 car lengths behind the safety car, That it now appears that is no longer enforced because of paragraph 16 in the protest document.

[langedweil]

The whole 63/1 discussion was a nothingburger, and imho RB's protest was not really anything else than a counter to the SC shenanigans.
All other SC 'violations' got just a warning, I guess mainly because the procedure was weirdly (messy) executed.

The most odd decision to me is the 5s time-penalty for someone that nerfed himself to a DNF 4 laps before the end. That's silly AF ..

[Sevach]

The beauty of consistent stewarding. Oh wait.....

They always say they don't look at the results before handing penalties, but with Perez they 100% knew to punish him 5s and it wouldn't change race results.

My opinion:
What Russell did was a bit of dick move and unnecessary, i hope he cuts it out(the investigation may have been just awkward enough to remind him not to do it).
The FIA was never going to penalize him, and steal the victory, for this little gamesmanship(nor i think they should).

As for Verstappen's quick overtake, we already had this, if the guy returns the advantage before the re-start nothing gets punished.

[f1316]

It's more unfair because the penalty for getting caught out is basically an automatic race over.

If you're nearing your pit window, but then a safety car comes out and you cant pit and the entire field bunches up and then you STILL have to pit right after it goes green, you're basically automatically gonna be put into like last place, and likely with a strong gap to even get to 2nd-to-last. You could literally be in 1st place and get sent to last place because of something like this. The sheer extremities of the potential consequences are ridiculous.

Obviously it wouldn't always work like this cuz others might be in your same situation, but we still shouldn't allow for it to ever happen. This is clearly much less fair than simply gaining/losing like roughly 8 seconds or so.

Well, yes, but think about what that would actually probably mean: teams are then incentivised to pit earlier to avoid getting caught out and so therefore they push harder to make sure they use up the available speed in the tyre. Therefore not only does your extreme example probably not actual occur all that often but I’m trying to avoid it we’ve created a different, harder form of racing.

It’s like saying that now we could get a situation where someone just pitted for an undercut on lap 5 which put them right to the back and so if a safety car comes out then they would be screwed. But because of that possibility, no one goes for such extreme undercuts so the most “unfair” situation doesn’t occur. The teams will always optimise strategy vs the rules and so we need to create rules that mean that optimisation drives the most positive effect.

Teams cant just 'pit earlier' based on some magical thinking of a potential full safety car coming out, especially when we have a common VSC alternative. This doesn't work unless a team has a wizard on their team who can literally see the future and make calls around it.

The whole point is that you CANT foresee these things, and so you need to design a system that is a fair as possible considering the problems this creates. What you're suggesting is making things WAY more unfair.

And frankly, what you're suggesting is even more ridiculous, cuz you're actually saying that teams should basically always just all universally take the most cautious strategy. This would make things so much more boring and ridiculous.

A “wizard who can see the future” - or, in modern parlance, computer simulation which models the probability of events and defines the strategy accordingly. That’s literally what they all do already, you know that, right?

They also all already take the most cautious strategy - you know why? Because it has the highest probability of success. What I’m suggesting is that, by removing the opportunity of a “free” pit stop, you shift that probability to a more aggressive approach. Far from being more boring, it would mean (1) more pitstops (2) and much more importantly, the incentive to push during those shorter sprints, rather than eek out the tyres in case of an SC/VSC.

As I said before though , there doesn’t seem a lot of debating it since you seem to have your mind made up - and are getting increasingly worked up - and it’s not as if it’s something that’s likely to happen anyway

[Watto]

The whole 63/1 discussion was a nothingburger, and imho RB's protest was not really anything else than a counter to the SC shenanigans.
All other SC 'violations' got just a warning, I guess mainly because the procedure was weirdly (messy) executed.

The most odd decision to me is the 5s time-penalty for someone that nerfed himself to a DNF 4 laps before the end. That's silly AF ..

The the Norris one was just strange, I left if as a let the team sort it out since it was a team clash. If it was an opponent then it's a clear penalty. I guess in the end it had zero effect on his standing so what ever but why even bother.

[langedweil]

The whole 63/1 discussion was a nothingburger, and imho RB's protest was not really anything else than a counter to the SC shenanigans.
All other SC 'violations' got just a warning, I guess mainly because the procedure was weirdly (messy) executed.

The most odd decision to me is the 5s time-penalty for someone that nerfed himself to a DNF 4 laps before the end. That's silly AF ..

The the Norris one was just strange, I left if as a let the team sort it out since it was a team clash. If it was an opponent then it's a clear penalty. I guess in the end it had zero effect on his standing so what ever but why even bother.

Exactly, getting himself DNF'd without further consequenses to 81 would have been enough I'd say. Intra-team racing incident without malice .. just stupid.

[matt_b]

No they don't. Toto has already confirmed he's sticking with the current lineup.

Things can change there quickly though, yes I would say almost certainly George and Kimi will be their 2 drivers next year too but stranger things have happened; Thought Toto last week with the Max/George incident was interesting almost refused to really criticise Max, the reporters pushed him he took the smallest of bites even during the week he somewhat defended Max, saying somthing like Champions been to feel like they are fighting adversity, it does feel like Toto is just keeping that door open just incase.

Highly doubt Toto is keeping the door open. Given the rumors about the Mercedes engine in 2026 and the switch to the in-wash based design (That Mercedes was previously dominant with), there is a possibility that George will probably have 2 or 3 WDC under his belt before Max is ever available in 2027-2028. But, who knows, we'll see how it unfolds.

Rumors are meaningless, nobody knows who will have the best engine next year, one week its Mercedes then its Ferrari, then its Mercedes then its Ferrari again. We will find out come Q3 Australia

[SB15]

Things can change there quickly though, yes I would say almost certainly George and Kimi will be their 2 drivers next year too but stranger things have happened; Thought Toto last week with the Max/George incident was interesting almost refused to really criticise Max, the reporters pushed him he took the smallest of bites even during the week he somewhat defended Max, saying somthing like Champions been to feel like they are fighting adversity, it does feel like Toto is just keeping that door open just incase.

Highly doubt Toto is keeping the door open. Given the rumors about the Mercedes engine in 2026 and the switch to the in-wash based design (That Mercedes was previously dominant with), there is a possibility that George will probably have 2 or 3 WDC under his belt before Max is ever available in 2027-2028. But, who knows, we'll see how it unfolds.

Mercedes have never been dominant with in-wash design. We haven't had in-wash since 2008, before the team even existed.

The W10, W11, and W12 were all an in-wash design when it came to how the airflow worked around the sidepods, towards the rear of the car. A similar philosophy that the W13 and launch W14 (Zero-Pod concept) were following.

[Seanspeed]

A “wizard who can see the future” - or, in modern parlance, computer simulation which models the probability of events and defines the strategy accordingly. That’s literally what they all do already, you know that, right?

They also all already take the most cautious strategy - you know why? Because it has the highest probability of success. What I’m suggesting is that, by removing the opportunity of a “free” pit stop, you shift that probability to a more aggressive approach. Far from being more boring, it would mean (1) more pitstops (2) and much more importantly, the incentive to push during those shorter sprints, rather than eek out the tyres in case of an SC/VSC.

As I said before though , there doesn’t seem a lot of debating it since you seem to have your mind made up - and are getting increasingly worked up - and it’s not as if it’s something that’s likely to happen anyway

There is no computer in existence that can predict the timing of any safety car, let alone know when one might be a FULL safety car versus a virtual safety car.

I have my mind made up because it's blatantly just a bad idea for all the reasons I've outlined. You're the one who seems to be stubbornly arguing for it despite the obvious problems with it.

And no, teams do not always take the most cautious strategy. Teams gamble ALL THE TIME on more aggressive strategies trying to get ahead or make a play that will only pay off later in the race. F1 is absolutely not for the timid. Top tier sports in general require being bolder on strategy if you want to be(and remain) competitive. Sorry, but this is just again, not a good argument.

[basti313]

The whole 63/1 discussion was a nothingburger, and imho RB's protest was not really anything else than a counter to the SC shenanigans.
All other SC 'violations' got just a warning, I guess mainly because the procedure was weirdly (messy) executed.

The most odd decision to me is the 5s time-penalty for someone that nerfed himself to a DNF 4 laps before the end. That's silly AF ..

The the Norris one was just strange, I left if as a let the team sort it out since it was a team clash. If it was an opponent then it's a clear penalty. I guess in the end it had zero effect on his standing so what ever but why even bother.

Exactly, getting himself DNF'd without further consequenses to 81 would have been enough I'd say. Intra-team racing incident without malice .. just stupid.

I disagree. We saw many team battles where the team was powerless. Alpine as an example. We also saw Merc policing Ros vs Ham with the result of basically rewriting rules for F1...someone owning a corner came out of this nonsense.
F1 should police crashing with the same rules for everyone and everything. That is the first step to consistency.

[venkyhere]

Can someone explain to me why Norris didn't get penalty points on his SuperLicense ? In the recent past, IIRC, the people who have received penalty points for 'causing a collision' or 'pushing someone off track' :
- Verstappen
- Piastri
- Doohan
- Lawson
- Stroll
- Sainz

Is it because they all have the wrong passport ? Because people like Russel & Norris, have been 'not in control' and banged against other cars as well, but they have never been penalized on their licence. Norris got penalty for the Qatar 2024 blink-n-miss yellow flag, but other than that, yesterday's clunk was a clear case for Norris. So was Russel's bang into Verstappen in T1 Barcelona, when he braked too late and understeered after the SC restart. No license points in that case as well.

Why ? The whole system is more corrupt than warlord-ruled banana republics.

[chrisc90]

I agree, just because it’s a team mate it shouldn’t exclude you from the rules and the penalties attached.