baconbits

I’d love to be a fly on the wall during Red Bull debrief. Team orders should have been issued and Daniel should have been let go ahead of Max. I bet you that it will change next race. The amount of constructor points that these two have squandered in Baku may end up costing them tens of millions at the end of the season.

 

Verstaapen is a talented kid, but he has maturity of a 10 yr old behind the wheel. Freaking team management was fuming after the incident.

 

Good race otherwise. Would have never predicted the make up of the three on the podium until the very end.

One of the Sky Sports guys tried to get Horner to say a word but he just glared and ran up the steps for the debrief... Sky dude said something to the effect of "shaking with rage."

I get letting the drivers drive but team orders 100% would have prevented that, baring Max pulling a Vettel/Webber in Malaysia 2013. You're right about millions at the end of the year.

Well, the $950 price there is a bait and switch almost, because then he says $13xx to have it with the pictured DT Swiss wheelset...

That's a bit of scratch

The problem with looking at bikes. I started with an idea of a 2k budget and now I am talking myself into 5k....

Sounds like me trying to budget for a car to replace my Legacy.

I'm working on a project at work and we recently installed from 2x4' LED light panels... roughly $140/ea for 40w but are extremely bright and are fed from 110-277 and have internal transformers. Best part is, they can be flush mounted or recessed, have brackets for both, AND they're like 1" thick when flush mounted.

https://www.superbrightleds.com/moreinfo/led-panel-light/dimmable-40-watt-led-panel-light-fixture-2ft-x-4ft/3589/8581/

They have some cheaper options with white frames or different power draw and such as well, down to about $80.

That's an understatement.

I'm pretty salty about how the race played out because of that safety car. I'm not a huge fan of the track itself either.

Let's hope it rains so Max can teach them all how to drive...

You mean Alonso?

Ricciardo is indeed the passing king of the current driver line up. He is so freaking late on the brakes and can thread the needle. I'd be shocked if Ferrari doesn't try to get him in Raikkonen's seat next.

I'm a Ferrari fan for Kimi but outside of that, it'd Ricciardo. Dude passes like no one's business and Sir Patrick Stewart ASKED to do a shoey with him.

And I'm happy to acknowledge that I was wrong about coverage. The new commercial free coverage is definitely a joy.

I kind of miss Matchett from NCBSN coverage but I like commercial-free way more.

Now that was an entertaining Chinese GP. Way to go Red Bull on last second strategy after the safety car. Great result. Verstappen has got to get his head out of his ass. He threw the win away.

 

And f*ck Ferrari for nearly throwing Kimi's race away to aide Vettel.

 

Trying not to give any spoilers for those who watch the replay!

Toward the middle of the race, I was getting pretty bummed out but then the last half, hell of a drive from a couple folks. These races are much better than last year, with minimal rule changes to boot.

Yeah, but I'm sure they'll have that annoying 'side by side' going on in lieu of actual commercial breaks. Plus, now getting a beer or hitting the head gets harder, lol.

Negative... Bahrain race didn't have those and was 2 hours of glorious, commercial-free coverage.

The Ferrari mechanic broke his leg (two bones). Some really stupid pit stops in the last two races (Haas and Ferrari).

 

I was hoping for a Kimi win today, but that guy can't buy a break. Or pace anymore.

Just saw a slo-mo video of the stop. That guy's leg was ugly - 90° bent 6 inches above his ankle.

There was nothing Kimi could have done to know what was going on, but I bet he feels awful about that. I have a feeling Ferrari is going to change their red light green light procedure for stops. From what I understand, their computer saw green because the wheel hadn't been removed yet so once the other side went green from a proper change, the jack guy dropped it and away he went.

That pit stop was a disaster all around... the wheel hadn't even come off and Kimi was dropped and signaled to go. Hopefully he's just shaken up but where the mechanic's knee was relative to the tire, I can't imagine how he didn't tear something in there.

I'm surprised Vettel held off Bottas and from the radio, it sounds like Vettel was surprised he could too. Hamilton and Bottas seemed pretty upset about it.

With the amount of climbing the local trails have, with generally short descents mixed in, I hang out in like, 1x1-5 and then when I ride pavement just for fitness stuff, it's usually 6-7-8-9... 1x6 would make my bike unusable

You're right about the 1x12 stuff though... those big cogs are 52t or something.

Obviously baconbits is not much of a racing fan, at least from the technical perspective, or he'd know that NASCAR has been fuel injected since the start of the 2012 season.

Like I said, I don't watch Nascar because someone going 201mph in an oval for 5 hours on end passing a guy going 200.5mph isn't exciting. Same can be said for Indy.

I never watch Nascar but I loved watching Indycars/Champ Cars in the 90s. Brutal horsepower (900-1000) with nowhere near the downforce of F1 cars.

 

Personally, I prefer racing to all out engineering. Your view leads to a few teams always in the front, like the last several Mercedes years or Ferrari/Schumacher in the early 2000s. I do appreciate modern TV coverage of F1 becz they no longer just follow the leader around on TV but try to find the drivers actually racing each other.

 

Different strokes...

That's just it though. Mercedes isn't winning all (most) of the races because their front wing is best. So make the front wing narrower or simpler, and I'd bet money they still take the constructor's championship. So what has been gained? Teams admit the driver's championship is nothing more than bragging rights, so in the end, what's it matter other than bullshitting with fans about drivers? You limit the wings, the engines, the tires, the chassis, suspension, etc, and it's still likely Mercedes winning, at least now, because Hamilton is the best driver. So again, I ask, what has been changed?

You're just going to turn F1 into Indy by limiting everything, with the only difference being that F1 (thankfully) doesn't race on ovals.

Less tires have been cut because the front wings are narrower, but now there's more crashes because people are getting too gutsy with the overtakes under braking and hitting people on the inside. I sure would love to watch a race where 5 people finish.

Limiting engineers is just one step closer to turning F1 into a spec series. Watch Indy or Nascar if you want a spec series. Mercedes would still have the best engines with Ferrari close behind, so Mercedes would still win, just with narrower wings and fewer cut tires, because as you said it, the best drivers are still in the best cars, but the best cars have fewer features to play with. So what has been gained other than tying engineers' hands?

I watch F1 and WEC when I can because everyone is different by that little bit to try and get the edge. They might look the same but if you made those unbelievably stupid regulation gages to check Nascar car profiles, bumper shapes, etc, and put them on an F1 car, none of them would be the same.

Sorry, I can't get excited watching Nascar or Indy when one guy passes the other at 1mph differential speed. FFS, they're still carbureted pushrod engines.

...which is great because my Hope Pro2 hubs can't do 11s.

I've been thinking about swapping to 1x10 and trying to go super wide in the rear, like 11-42 or something so I can ride pavement quick for fitness with the upper gears and then I have the lower range for climbing better.

It's not allowed per regulations. It happened to Bottas at Spa a couple years ago when he was with Williams - three mediums and one soft made it onto his car in a stop and he had to pull off and retire.

The cars are the way they are now because of the engineers... same thing happened in the 80s and 90s during the turbo era. Drivers are only so good, why not work the car to give their driver that little extra bit? Hamilton is a great driver but you put him in one of the Alfas or a Force India and he won't crack the top 10. Cars are just as important as the driver.

Limiting wings and tires and whatever else won't help because then the best driver will be a parade instead of the best car. A parade is a parade regardless of the reason. The one regulation I think need 86'd is the power unit limits... they do it in the name of saving costs but it does nothing but increase costs. Procurement of parts is not as expensive as developing them.

I've been going back and forth with what I want to buy next too. I keep thinking about converting my 2007 Kona Explosif to a single speed for around town stuff but what would I replace it with for trails and then what would I ride for fitness... do I get a road bike and a full squish? Or keep the Kona with 1x9 for fitness riding and get a full squish? Kona for trails, road bike for fitness?

Carbon? Aluminum? I need more disposable income.

I was 6 in '93 and not concerned with anything other than Legos so no, I don't remember

Settings and physical exertion make driving these new cars harder, I think. I'm not doubting Senna's ability at all, not that familiar with Prost other than the rivaly, so all I have to say is that from what I've read and heard, it seems that Senna had raw, natural ability to get even garbage cars in terrible weather on the podium. It kind of reminds me of Alonso a little - the idea that Alonso could take those garbage McLarens and get them as high up on the grid as he did before reliability problem struck. It just seems like Senna had an uncanny ability to feel grip and what the car was doing more than others.

Holy crap!

 

That must still hurt though!

My back kind of "scorpioned" a bit... neck and back were pretty sore for a couple days but I'll take that over missing teeth 100% of the time.

My full face has saved me so many times. I sort of can't believe I ever bike without it. But you know I don't want to be a nerd.

I generally don't ride city streets with a helmet but any dirt trails or Ray's, I absolutely ride with a full face. This is the first time the face bit has come into it but I've definitely had a couple hard head knocks with it too.

Is it still ice and snow outdoors considering the indoor track?

We're pretty consistently in the mid 40s during the day but it's way too wet and muddy to ride dirt trails yet.

I went to Ray's MTB on Tuesday... Their new pump track is awesome. My 4 friends and I decided to race (what else do 5 dudes on bikes do) and coming to finish my lap, my front tire washed out and I took a header into a short knee wall. If I didn't have a full face helmet on (a must at Ray's imo), I'd most definitely be missing half a mouth of teeth.

The breathing hole in the mouth bar on my helmet met the top ledge corner of the knee wall as I fell and cracked a couple plastic trim clips on my helmet.

$75 well spent to avoid $xxxx in dental surgery. Ride safe everyone.

Edit: mouth hole hit that top right carpet corner toward the track at a pretty good pace