Here’s Your Daniel Ricciardo Friday-In-Texas Update
“That accent cycled through so many different accents,” our own North Carolina native Collin Woodard messaged in Slack after watching the clip. Yes, Danny Ric’s Texan still needs some work, but damn if the guy doesn’t get an A+ for effort. And for dropping a “hell boogedy” in there — he’s definitely got the vocabulary down, at least to this Pennsylvanian who’s spent all of four days in Austin over the course of his life.
Anyway, Ricciardo is entering the weekend in the appropriate attire, too. Here’s the helmet he’ll be wearing, courtesy of Jens Munser Designs:
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I need a windbreaker with “McLaren Service Plus” embroidered on the breast and the back, like, yesterday. Ricciardo will of course lap COTA in The Intimidator’s 1984 No. 3 Chevy before Sunday’s race — the culmination of his bet with McLaren boss Zak Brown for nabbing a podium (ahem, race win) this year — so it all checks out.
Oh, and yesterday, this happened:
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Ricciardo ended Friday’s Free Practice 1 session in 16th, 2.5 seconds off Valtteri Bottas’ lead time. His teammate Lando Norris fell eighth on the timing boards. The Aussie’s last race in Turkey was nothing to celebrate, as he finished 13th after stopping for new tires too early and lost two spots in the last two laps of the race.
I’d like to think his spiritual homefield advantage will work in his favor this weekend. After all, I’ve heard he draws his power from the clay under the track.
Qualifying for the Austrian Grand Prix dawned with packed grandstands and a host of Max Verstappen fans filling the circuit in hopes of seeing their semi-local hero take pole position. And luckily for them, anything was possible, with Verstappen taking pole position yet again.
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This weekend, Mercedes still looked to be the dominant team after several practice sessions saw its drivers topping the charts — though with Verstappen’s performance throughout the season, anything could be possible. As it turned out, Mercedes would be seriously lacking.
Knocked Out In Q1
16. Kimi Raikkonen (Alfa Romeo) 17. Esteban Ocon (Alpine) 18. Nicholas Latifi (Williams) 19. Mick Schumacher (Haas) 20. Nikita Mazepin (Haas)
Knocked Out In Q2
11. Carlos Sainz Jr. (Ferrari) 12. Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) 13. Daniel Ricciardo (McLaren) 14. Fernando Alonso (Alpine) 15. Antonio Giovinazzi (Alfa Romeo)
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The final qualifying session was quite a whirlwind. Fernando Alonso and Sebastian Vettel had an on-track spat in Q2 that allowed Williams’ George Russell to slip into the final qualifying session and try his hand at a legitimate top-10 starting position. He took ninth place, out-qualifying Aston Martin driver Lance Stroll. This is Williams’ first Q3 appearance since the 2018 Italian Grand Prix.
After that, all eyes were on the top drivers of the weekend, mainly Verstappen, who appeared unbeatable. Both Mercedes drivers went out for one final run at the end of Q3, but it proved fruitless for them; Verstappen took the lead.
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The biggest surprise, though, had to be McLaren’s Lando Norris. The papaya team has been doing pretty damn well this season after several years of struggling, and Norris’ performance epitomizes the success the team has been having. He’ll start the race in second place on the first row of the grid.
It isn’t often that I’ll admit that maybe Bernie Ecclestone was right about something, but after last weekend’s processional Monaco Grand Prix, I’ve been thinking that Formula One’s most iconic—and most boring—race could use a makeover. And with NASCAR’s rainy outing at Circuit of the Americas taking place at the same time, I started thinking, maybe installing sprinklers at race tracks to make artificially wet races wouldn’t be such a bad idea.
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As it turns out, I wasn’t the only one brainstorming what could make the race even slightly more interesting. Chain Bear on YouTube was sharing that wavelength.
The whole premise here is pretty simple: what would make the Monaco Grand Prix more interesting? What would it take? And I have to say that Stuart over at Chain Bear is, once again, the master of some very good ideas, such as:
Revamp the entire weekend, turning Saturday’s qualifying session into a one-lap attempt to set the fastest time. Then, on Saturday, run another staggered qualifying session, the assumption being the track will get better as the day goes on, so drivers will have the pressure of choosing the best time to go out.
If you’re still interested in the traditional Sunday race, introduce a mandatory Joker Lap, which will bring in a bunch of strategy opportunities that could shake up the running order.
Or, you could run an even longer and harder Joker Lap that basically reroutes the entire circuit.
I have to admit that these options are a lot more fun than me running with Ecclestone’s unimaginative artificial rain idea, which has the opportunity to fall apart at any possible moment.
But I’ll throw another idea into the ring. Make all the F1 drivers run Formula E cars on the Formula E Monaco circuit, which made for a fascinatingly exciting race earlier this year. It would still be part of the F1 Championship, but you’d just have a one-off event that would throw a money wrench into everything the series knows about itself, thus guaranteeing chaos and fun.
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I am amenable to hearing your ideas, so get pitching.
I do my best to be kind and share the love amongst my fellow writers, but there are just some times where I have to ask what the hell someone was thinking. So today, we’re going to run through some truly questionable articles about Formula One that have made their rounds on Twitter lately. If you’re thinking about doing the whole writing thing… maybe opt for a slightly different route than these folks.
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Lewis Hamilton’s Freestyle
This is a slightly older article from 2012, but it makes its rounds every so often as a gentle reminder that we aren’t particularly far removed from some incredibly racist notions about Lewis Hamilton. In this article, Autosport editor Mark Hughes imagines what it would be like if Hamilton were to “talk like he tweets,” where he proceeds to draft up a ridiculous freestyle rap-like dialogue between Hamilton and his race engineer.
The article is intended to be funny, I imagine, and probably also a little disparaging toward Hamilton’s use of Black vernacular on social media. Personally, I think Hughes unintentionally made Hamilton sound like a badass in the sense that this driver is just out here coming up with rhymes while also handily driving an F1 car. But you most definitely cannot ignore the fact that Hughes is picking fun at Hamilton for, essentially, being Black. Never a good call.
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But Have You Seen The Women?
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Part of me wishes this BusinessF1 story were a joke, because then it might be kind of funny. But I don’t actually think it is. I think this is a legitimate story intended to serve some sort of legitimate purpose. I just can’t imagine what that purpose is.
It starts off with an intro noting that there were no women featured in F1’s Netflix docuseries Drive to Survive. The solution? Why, just show off all the lovely wives and girlfriends in the paddock and have a chat about the drivers’ sex lives, of course!
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This spread spans 16 whole entire pages, during which time it refers to Sergio Perez as a “swordsman,” analyzes teenage girlfriends, hints that several drivers are actually gay, and posits that Finnish drivers Kimi Raikkonen and Valtteri Bottas are divorced because they drink a lot.
But don’t be offended, snowflakes: this story comes with a health warning that reads, “The editor wishes to apologize in advance for this article which some readers may find incompatible with their view of the 21st century.” Thank you for the clarification.
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Actually, Nikita Mazepin Assaulting A Woman Is Good
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That isn’t the only gem BusinessF1 has posted recently. At the start of the year, the publication went out of its way to exonerate Nikita Mazepin for his faults, which mainly get chalked up to an overreaction by cancel culture for a bit of harmless fun.
Basically, the premise here is that Haas F1 overreacted to a video of Mazepin allegedly assaulting a woman in the back of the car by calling that action “abhorrent” but also doing nothing else. The pull-out quote is one of this article’s gems, as it reads, “It was funny, harmless fun, no more no less and the girl thought nothing of posting it on Nikita’s social media sites.” The structure of the sentence somehow implicates the woman in the situation, who didn’t actually have anything to do with whether or not Mazepin posted the video.
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The author also notes that Guenther Steiner’s response should have quite literally been “boys will be boys.”
Don’t be put off by the fact that Techeetah’s Antonio Felix da Costa won today’s Monaco ePrix after scoring pole position—there were six passes for the lead during the event, and it was by no means a given that the reigning Formula E champion would pull off a victory. That he did is a testament to his skill after taking on a difficult field.
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As you can imagine, the opening lap was a bit of a hot mess. Da Costa managed to pull away quickly, but behind him, there were several moments where drivers were running three wide on their way into the first turn. There was contact, and Mahindra’s Alexander Sims stopped on track on the exit of the hairpin. Several other cars crashed into his rear end, with one basically driving over a corner of his car; he managed to drive off into the pits and thus avoid a safety car, but his day was done.
Da Costa didn’t have it easy, though; just six minutes into the 45-minute race, Envision Virgin Racing driver Robin Frijns pushed past da Costa for the lead. Minutes later, da Costa had regained his position—but he didn’t hold it long. Frijns took the position back with 26 minutes remaining in the race.
Ten minutes later, Fanboost was officially awarded, which provides drivers with two minutes of extra power based on a fan vote. Da Costa was one of three drivers awarded Fanboost, but Frijns was not, which meant the latter used that extra boost to push past Frijns for the lead.
It was a smart move, because Mitch Evans was hot on their tail. Evans quickly caught up to Frijns and made a pass for second place—but within 30 seconds, Evans had also overtaken da Costa and secured the lead.
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Had things proceeded smoothly from there, Evans might have easily locked up a win—but René Rast brought out a safety car just moments after Evans secured the lead. Rast had clipped the wall and stopped his Mahindra on the track. It was a bit of a long safety car, since it was a tricky spot to remove the car from, and the race went green with six minutes left on the clock.
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Evans held out for the lead when the race went green, but the safety car meant that there were several drivers hot on his tail. Commentator Jack Nichols at one point referred to Evans’ Jaguar machine as “the widest Formula E car in the world” because of how expertly the New Zealander had managed to hold off da Costa’s repeated attacks with just 90 seconds remaining on the clock. Even making slight contact wasn’t enough to deter the two drivers battling for the lead.
As he began to run out of usable power, Evans slowed ever so slightly, allowing the top four cars to become bunched up. Da Costa’s teammate, Jean-Eric Vergne, had used Fanboost to jump from seventh position to fourth, and even he looked to have a shot at making a serious challenge for the lead.
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With mere seconds left on the clock (and with a lap to follow the running out of the timer), points leader Nyck de Vries stopped on the track. Race officials opted to bring out a local yellow rather than a safety car to keep the action going, which meant Evans was going to have to battle it out to the very end.
On the final lap, da Costa attempted to push past Evans at every significant braking zone and couldn’t make it stick—until the very last braking zone before the finish line. Evans, at that point, was so low on power that he was forced to slow down, which meant Robin Frijns managed to pass him for second place just before the finish line.
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It was a truly stunning race, and one that Formula E can be proud of after some unfortunate mishaps (like half of the drivers running out of usable power) at a few of its previous events. The electric cars outshined Formula One at the latter’s most iconic venue by putting on an exceptional event.
A deal has been struck for McLaren to sell its iconic headquarters in Woking, England, to a New York-based firm for £170 million, or around $236 million, it was announced Tuesday. The complex had been on the market for months.
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McLaren will remain a tenant on the 840,000 square foot campus as part of a 20-year leaseback agreement, with plans to remain there long term. McLaren is in the middle of restructuring its debt, it said last year, with the money for its headquarters part of a broader equity raise it was doing to have “a sustainable platform for long-term growth and investment.”
“We are excited to announce that this world-class facility will become part of the GNL portfolio,” said James Nelson, CEO of GNL “The McLaren Group Headquarters’ state of the art buildings have won numerous awards, were designed by renowned architect Norman Foster, and are the type of mission-critical, net-leased properties that make up the GNL portfolio.”
Photo: McLaren
McLaren had initially sought £200 million for the complex, which has a wind tunnel testing facility and several artificial lakes, in addition to production facilities for McLaren’s road cars. Construction was completed on the tech center in 2003, while the production center was added in 2011.
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And while it’s a little sad to see it go, the pandemic has not been kind to McLaren, which was forced to lay off around a quarter of its staff last year. McLaren also got a $185 million cash boost from the National Bank of Bahrain last year.
There was even some suggestion that McLaren’s cash struggles might affect its performance in Formula 1 this year, though that hasn’t been the case; Lando Norris in particular is enjoying a fine start to the season, sitting in third in the driver standings. The team’s other driver, Daniel Ricciardo sits seventh, or right in the mix for what should be a competitive year for a team that is shooting for at least one driver in the top five.
