Official Pre Season Testing 2022 - BAHRAIN

Argh.

Sky only have a grainy picture of the new red bull.

 

I have to say that the more extreme the cut in it seem the more skittish the car. The merc looks very skittish indeed

 

Nice bit of racing between Lewis and Gasly there, looks like the cars can get a lot closer and stay behind unlike the previous years.

 

Hamilton and gasly have been having a ding dong

Zero trouble keeping up with each other through the corners etc and lapping really close and them both passing each other

Hamilton then bullied gasly off.

Davidson says ferrari looks best at the corner he is at

 

Good wasn’t it? That Merc looks like a handful at the moment though. If anyone can dial it in it’s Merc though, but how quickly?

 

Jesus Christ, the porpoising in the Alpine along the straight with Alonso was terrible.

 

I know we want technologically efficient cars engine wise etc, but are we not going the wrong way when the weight of the cars are just getting heavier and heavier? Listening to Martin Brundlefly, the cars today compared to his era it appears are almost 400kg heavier at the start of a race compared to then.

 

Porpoising be like:

 

Absolutely shocker.

 

I'm with George. Bring back active suspension and this porpoising problem goes away.

 

And issues with ride heights and downforce changing with fuel loads, and kerbs upsetting things.

 

There should have also been a lot more than the two testing sessions for these cars imo.

But the active suspension is a real option for fixing these issues. Thing is, it's not going to be something can be added quickly and it's going to hit the budgets, so that would need considering before setting a date to allow it's return if they went that way.

We'd see some insanely fast racing with active suspension back though.

 

Red Bull have turned up the heat- really nice couple of laps from Max

 

What's your take (or anyone's for that matter) on Hamilton saying it's going to be a while before they're in a position to challenge for wins?

Playing the game or are Merc genuinely in a bit of trouble?

 

Looks like some teams are opening things up!
I bet Merc will still be sandbagging!

 

I dunno. Are Merc really 1.6 seconds off the pace? Slower than Zhou’s Alfa? The car looks difficult but we have no real idea what the gap is and whether their porpoising vs pace problems are any worse than anyone else’s.

 

So I think there’s elements of both truth and exaggeration in what he says.

I do think they’re a long way off finding their optimum with this new car, but he also said his engineers are telling him there is loads of gains to find when they nail it. Merc have a track record of working hard and turning up at the race with a better handle on things so I suspect they’ll be much closer to the front but I wouldn’t be surprised to see RBR lead the opening race.

 

Just watching the McLaren- bearing in mind the braking issues, it looks really good in the flowing sections of the track - I think this test might just play into their hands from a low expectations/surprise performance in the season perspective.

Dare I say it- I’d argue it looks one of the best at times but we haven’t had chance to see it stretch out yet.

Certainly wouldn’t rule them out of anything yet but RBR and Ferrari for me so far.

 

Think Tsunoda might top this test you know- he’s going for it