Mark Webber Rn

Bahrain GP Highlights

It's lights out and away we go for the first time in 2024! Here's what happened in case you missed it:

Max 31 seconds ahead of P2 (Perez) for a bit (and then 41 seconds ahead later)

Zhou Guanyu early pit -> Held P10 for multiple laps (dropped to P17 after pit)

Charles Leclerc locks up...several times

Sainz overtakes Leclerc, gets overtaken, overtakes him again

Mercedes engine (and hence, the Williams car too) having issues with overheating and power

Sargent almost retires from the race after a mechanical issue, ends up 1 full minute slower than P19 and unable to regain his position :(

Albon having issues with the screen on his wheel (most likely too bright for a night race)

Piastri comes out of pits and has the inside line, but Hamilton overtakes him

Russel and Leclerc battle for 4th, Russel locks up and Leclerc overtakes him after a failed attempt before

Ricciardo and Tsunoda chasing Magnussen, with RB making a call to do a driver swap that happened unfortunately too late. The RBs were lapped by Verstappen seconds later.

[ Sainz overtaking Leclerc the first time]

RESULTS

P1 - Max Verstappen, ahead of his teammate by 22 seconds to get his 8th consecutive win!

P2 - Checo Perez, ahead of Sainz by 2.6 seconds

P3 - Carlos Sainz, who also won driver of the day!

P4: Charles Leclerc, after seemingly getting his brakes in check and passing Russel

P5, 6, 7: The Brits, with Norris in a Mercedes sandwich

P8, 9, 10: Piastri ahead of the two Aston Martins by a pretty large margin

P11: Zhou Guanyu, who I personally voted driver of the day for somehow keeping the same set of tires (SOFTS!!) from Lap 10-29, and holding P9/10 for 13 laps

P12, 13, 14: The RBs behind Magnussen, with Daniel trying to catch him after a team ordered driver swap

P15- Alex Albon

P16- Nico Hulkenberg, who qualified P10 again this year

P17, 18: The two Alpines, Ocon in front

P19- Valtarri Bottas

P20- Logan Sargent, who had a mechanical issue and went out, before rejoining the race

vlad is never got gonna serve with his photos like he’s genuinely one of my favorite sports photographers of all time. what are your some of his favorite shorts of his?

HAPPY HALLOWEEN *boops you* *boops you* *boops you* *boops you* *boops you* *boops you* *boops you* *boops you* *boops you* *boops you* *boops you* *boops you* *boops you* *boops you* *boops you* *boops you* *boops you*

Maxiel through the years

WAIT WE'RE SO BACK

life is a highway and i am carlos sainz at the 2024 jeddah grand prix

why i believe alex replacing logan is the worst possible decision williams could make

#1: logan’s confidence

we saw this exact thing happen with checo last year. after his brief stint of trading wins with max, max continued to consistently wipe the floor with him via the gap in their performances. this continued to eat away at checo’s confidence until, by the end of the season, he was t-boning alex albon in singapore for no reason and somehow retiring twice in suzuka. now that there has been an extended break and he has had the chance to grind and truly work on himself nonstop, he has returned with incredible form. but who knows how long this will last? as soon as there’s a race that isn’t a red bull 1-2, he will be completely torn into and i believe the downward trajectory of last year will repeat itself.

this is very similar to what logan went through last year. once he was announced, there was so much hope for an incredible debut season, but that never came his way. i think the first big nail in the coffin was getting his first p20 at his home race and i think the biggest hit was qatar. even though he should never ever be ashamed of putting his safety first, i understand why, from an athlete’s perspective, he would look at that race as a failure.

fortunately for him, he has had a team with incredibly strong leadership backing him up. giving him the opportunities he needed, never giving up on him, celebrating the single point he scored last year like he lassoed the fucking moon, and re-signing him because he has such incredible potential as a formula 1 driver. everything went wrong for logan, except for williams, who did everything right.

except now, williams has publicly stated that they have no faith in him to score points. now the only support logan has is random fans at races, strangers on the internet, and his own friends and family. that must feel fucking awful. logan has been so positive throughout the struggles of this year and last, but he has to be hurting right now. there’s no way he isn’t.

logan sargeant is not a bad driver. you can disagree with me as loud as you want to, but i won’t hear a word of it.

absolutely stunning junior career aside, logan showed incredible improvement towards the end of the season. not only did he score a point in austin, but he came unbearably close in mexico, and if it weren’t for a hydraulics failure, he very easily could have had two points finishes in a row.

this year may seem like it has gotten off to a bad start for him, but i heavily disagree. in bahrain he had great pace and was steadily climbing closer and closer to the points when he had a brake failure. the car switched his balance completely on its own and made it literally impossible for him to turn. even max couldn’t recover from that.

in jeddah his pace was wonderful again. i think his biggest struggle currently is qualifying, but he was overtaking beautifully and making his way up the field. while 15th isn’t a spectacular finish, he was matching alex quite well throughout the whole race. (also jeddah sucks so he gets a pass 👎)

george russell did not score a SINGLE point during his rookie season for williams and he is now a race-winning future championship contender and beating his 7x wdc teammate in the standings at p4. logan has already beaten that AND he has an experienced driver that he seems to get on with quite well as a teammate to mentor him, which george didn’t have; he was william’s number one driver from day one. logan has so much potential that is only being hindered by his lack of confidence, unpreparedness (reminder he was brought to f1 an entire year earlier than he was originally supposed to be; they planned for him to be a 2024 rookie), and a shitty car.

#2: alex albon

now poor alex is in the worst position of his life. brother already probably feels like shit for putting logan through this (even though it is NOT his fault and he has absolutely zero say in this decision) and if he doesn’t score any points this weekend, he will be torn to shreds by the media.

i have already seen multiple posts including alex in their list of fuck yous. this will do incredible damage to him pr-wise and will also make him feel even worse if he doesn’t somehow pull off a miracle performance.

#3: albert park

alex is an incredible driver, constantly pulling a back marker car into the points. however, this is a track that he has historically struggled at (in the exact same turn might i add!!) for multiple years in a row. who’s to say this mistake could not be made tomorrow or sunday as well? that will make everyone involved look and feel horrible.

not to mention that the fw46 is NOT SUITED for albert park. AT ALL. vcarb’s official website describes it as a ‘medium-high’ downforce track, which is exactly what the car is suited to struggle with, making it nearly impossible for albono to score points (which, like stated before, will be terrible for him) as well as making this gp a likely inconsequential race! meaning this is the perfect opportunity to let logan drive on the limit and really showcase his true talent and capabilities as a driver.

but now williams has chosen to do the complete opposite and ruined logan’s trust in his team as well as any other offers from rival teams for him for the 2025 season. if logan’s own team would bench him for his teammate, why should they take him over a talented upcoming rookie? (this is a rhetorical question; i truly believe he has the potential to, with a good enough car and team behind him, become a race-winning driver in the future.)

#4: james vowles and the future of williams

james has justified this decision by mentioning how every race counts and that a single point can make a world’s difference in the midfield. while this is true, james has also been on the record multiple times saying that he doesn’t give two shits about this season (as well as the next few). he has stated that his goal is long-term, to rebuild the team and return it to its former success of the 90s and early 2000s. so why ruin the reputation of your driver who you have been supporting since his junior career over the possibility of a single point or two? that is a short-term solution, not a long-term one. james is usually a wonderfully eloquent speaker, however, he has completely contradicted himself here.

in my opinion, the best decision would be to race logan. while i love alex to death, he’s the one who crashed his car, completely on his own with no fellow drivers or failures on the car’s side to blame. logically, he should be the one to sit out the race, no?

like i briefly touched on before, i also think this is a golden opportunity to put logan in a race where they will most likely come away with nothing anyways and give him the opportunity to pull off something incredible (which he absolutely can under the right circumstances). if he was able to have a good drive on sunday, he would be a star and williams would look like geniuses. with this decision, everyone just looks like an asshole.

final thoughts

to conclude, i am no certified expert, but this decision makes zero sense to me, as it also does to many others from what i’ve seen. i usually wholeheartedly agree with all of james’ decisions, but this one beats me. i cannot for the life of me figure out why williams would choose this.

there is a part of that hopes williams will reverse this decision before sunday in order to save themselves from all of the pr backlash they are facing, but i understand that that is very much wishful thinking. the only good thing that can come from this is williams finally learning how to be prepared and/or logan being able to channel his frustration into motivation (although i don’t think there’s any way for him to possibly work harder than he already has).

if anyone disagrees with me and thinks this is the right decision for williams to make, i would love to hear why. no one has to agree with me, these are just my personal thoughts on the situation.

-avis 🏎️💨

hey hi hello omg MAX P1 OMG WE LITERALLY PREDICTED THIS SHIT IM SO HYPED GRABBING UR HANDS AND JUMPING AND DOWN RN GIGGLING

I JUST WATCHED THE RACE!! This is insane to me I'm so giddy rn. Like I knew HE could do it but I had no faith in the car

I want ppl to have chemistry with me like the way the monaco track wall has chemistry with all these drivers😪✊🏽

They just can't resist the attraction can they😔

What is happening in the house of commons...