2025 Monaco Grand Prix - Monte Carlo, May 23 - 25

[f1isgood]

Leclerc said he made mistakes too. Your evidence is literally "trust me bro".

My evidence is Lando Norris' pole lap at the Swimming Pool. Available for free watch on YouTube. He makes a mistake by riding too much of the kerb, unsettles the car, then corrects it and then still gets pole with a yellow sector (due to his own mistake).

So what? What does it prove? He lost 0.09s but gained more than that in the next corner - La Rascasse by driving it better, not necessarily because his car was better there. You can see on their onboards what exactly he did better, several corners( including rascasse) where he comes much closer to inside barrier. Charles lost through Rascasse not only to Norris, but to Hamilton as well, though 0.05s rather than a tenth. So a car was for sure capable of more. Max gained a whole tenth on in Rascasse in 2023 as well. Norris was pushing in T15-16 a lot and made a little mistake. On the other hand a driver can underdrive and you will never see anything on his onboard.
. For example Charles gained nothing in T1 from practice, whereas we know as a fact the track was improved and faster than in FP3. He lost another tenth to Norris there and like 0.03s to Hamilton. So, you can see it's not tough to find where Charles lost a tenth as well simply by underdriving or being not as precise.

To judge cars pace over one lap in Monaco by the whole season and other tracks is not correct. It is very specific track, demands very specific setup and car characteristics. History taught us, the best cars are cars with best aerodynamics(early turbo-era overpowered Mercedes were probably outliers), but in Monaco aerodynamics means effectively nothing or very little, when it comes to quali and performance over one lap. That is why for example, Schumacher - absolute god-tier driver at Monaco was nowhere near Pole neither in 2001 nor in 2004 - his otherwise most dominant seasons ever with Ferrari. He didn't get pole in 2002, 2003, 2005 and 2006 either. In 2006 he had to rely on questionable tactics in Quali in order to put it on pole.
His Ferraris were super strong aerodynamically, superior to other cars but other cars were better at other areas and suited demands of Monaco better.

Not sure what your point is. The discussion was if McLaren was the best car around this track. I think it was, since even after a mistake that cost Norris basically a tenth, he came out a tenth faster. You can always have discussions about how the driver drives or onboards or whatever - it doesn't matter much. The car had enough margin for NOR to make an error and still come out on top. Now Leclerc also made an error. Both drove imperfect laps. But NOR's imperfect lap potentially costing more still gave him a good cushion.

[ringo]

Lando did an exceptional job to be on pole. I do not think it should be downplayed as easy or anyone can do it in a McLaren. Piastri did not do it so clearly it's not easy. That pole was Charle's pole to lose as crazy as it sounds since the Ferrari has not been good all year.
The McLaren car had better traction out of the corners, but the ferrari had more grunt from the PU and more "supple" suspension according to Hamilton, so was more settled riding the curbs.
Norris was always going to take more risk over the curbs and bumps to find lap time vs the more settled SF25. So I would say things were quite even between the cars, just in different places around the lap and Norris did a stellar job.

[Seanspeed]

That pole was Charle's pole to lose

Absurd. smh

Also the fact that Norris could just confidently pump in fastest lap in the end further showed the superiority of the Mclaren.

[Sevach]

Take just one compound to Monaco, C6.
One obligatory pit stop that must be made under green flag conditions, further stops are optional.

That's what i would try.

No mandatory stop. If the tire degrades, we want someone to try and do a race on C6 while others do a pitstop. This is the tire delta that could allow us to see fights on the track.

Making a stop mandatory means you need extra fragile tires to get any type of strategy difference.

Could be, i think both ideas are worth a shot.
But definitely just C6 or a special uber soft tire that melts if you stare at it too hard.

For sure the most simple fix is just not to count tire change under red flag for one obligatory tire change they have to do. But that should not be unique for Monaco, but same for all grand prix. What many offered in the past - to ban tire changing under red flag was and still is completely silly, crazy proposal. That's why it never moved forward.
The dude who offered that 3 sets of tires rule should be fired immediately, so silly it was. Imagine if we had a red flag on lap 1 like last year, then another red flag 5 laps later allowing everyone to fit another set for free. What would that rule change let alone fix? Completely nothing.
The fix is really that simple - you can change tires under red flag, but that would not be counted as successful obligatory change. Of course there always be days when some drivers get lucky to pit just before RF and gain a lot of race time for free on those that didn't stop. But that's no different then what we have now, where drivers that stop just before red flag get screwed time after time again, and quite often undeservedly so. Of course everyone cannot be happy simultaneously on any particular day, there would be days where some drivers would get screwed. But I think this rule tweak would make things overall better, more fair for competitors and better for us viewers.
Would that fix what RB and Williams were doing? No. There should be another fix, it is a separate issue.

I agree, changing tire under red counting as your tire change is a terrible rule, always has been.
Often it's necessary to change tires with red flags for safety reasons, but it shouldn't count.

I''d go one further and say the obligatory stop must be made under green flag conditions, no SC and VSC, further pitstops could be made under SC and VSC but they won't count(for mandatory stop).
This could work for the whole championship too.

[woocasz]

Don't forget that Mclaren had two runs at the end of Q3. Mclaren took off like a slingshot at the exit of a any corner.
Put Charles in that Mclaren and he would end up 0,5s ahead of everybody else.

[avantman]

Accurate overlay of two fastest Quali laps from Palmer. Wish they at Formula 1 would make proper telemetry open for everyone.

[avantman]

Don't forget that Mclaren had two runs at the end of Q3. Mclaren took off like a slingshot at the exit of a any corner.
Put Charles in that Mclaren and he would end up 0,5s ahead of everybody else.

Albon this year was further ahead of Sainz than Charles has ever been in Monaco though...

Charles lap looks clean, but I personally like Norris lap a bit better just driving-wise, despite that mistake in 16 worth a tenth. Saint-Devot, Neuvelle Chicane, Rascasse....all major gains. Any of those were about superior rear grip, just driving technique and effective rotation. In last corner you can literally see how perfectly Norris rotates the car with the throttle midcorner and straightens it up much earlier. Of course he is on full throttle much earlier and gains over a tenth, not just on Charles but on Oscar as well. Fantastic driving imo.

[Juzh]

some laps from qualifying

P01 norris 1.09.954
https://streamable.com/q6gobw


P02 leclerc 1.10.063
https://streamable.com/6ygudf


P05 verstappen 1.10.669
https://streamable.com/ghpwnl

[Juzh]

Accurate overlay of two fastest Quali laps from Palmer. Wish they at Formula 1 would make proper telemetry open for everyone.
https://ibb.co/FLnNKLqJ

If you compare f1-tempo and f1insightshub.com (from dear user Emag of f1technical) to this official telemetry snippet you'll find f1insightshub is actually a lot more accurate in this case and follows the official delta very closely. Not perfect, but nearly.

[avantman]

Accurate overlay of two fastest Quali laps from Palmer. Wish they at Formula 1 would make proper telemetry open for everyone.
https://ibb.co/FLnNKLqJ

If you compare f1-tempo and f1insightshub.com (from dear user Emag of f1technical) to this official telemetry snippet you'll find f1insightshub is actually a lot more accurate in this case and follows the official delta very closely. Not perfect, but nearly.

Right, I do not use tempo anymore. Thanks for onboards!