It was an interesting Grand Prix last year and I enjoyed the race. It had a lot of thrilling moments and I will talk about the things that I enjoyed or wondered about the most in the 2016 Mexican GP.
At the start the first four rows moved out of the grid without any problems but then suddenly Lewis Hamilton went off track and gained a huge advantage. No penalties were given which was very strange. He was far away from the rest but had to slow down when the virtual safety car was deployed. The reason for that was Pascal Wehrlein's retirement. If it wasn't for the VSC deployment then Hamilton would have gotten a penalty for sure.
What should they do so that the drivers wouldn't go off so much? In my opinion they should have more gravel or sand so that the cars would get stuck. When the drivers know that it is possible to even retire from the race if they go off then they wouldn't do stuff like that anymore. In Australia for example they have a lot of areas with gravel and nobody wants to go off track in those places.
Nico Rosberg also went off track after the first corner because Red Bull's Max Verstappen pushed him from the side. Typical Verstappen, is it a good or bad thing? I honestly don't know but at least it gave us some excitement.
Red Bull's strategy to make Daniel Ricciardo pit after the first lap was interesting. It dropped him to the back but in the end seemed to have payed off.
In the meantime when Ricciardo was making his way through to the top we saw very good fighting between Rosberg and Verstappen. Verstappen almost overtook Rosberg at one point but had too much speed and went off track. Rosberg was confident and didn't try anything foolish. He just continued calmly in 2nd place. It seemed that he was not taking any risks so that he could secure his world title.
Later on in the race Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel was behind Verstappen and it was thrilling to see them race for 3rd place. At one point Vettel came very close and Verstappen went off track again and gained a huge advantage. Vettel was screaming on the radio and Red Bull even told Verstappen to let Vettel pass him. He didn't and that made Vettel furious. Verstappen was simply waiting for the official call from the stewards.
Funny that he did a move like this also in the last race (2017 US GP) even though the advantage was not as big as in the 2016 Mexican GP. But let's focus again on last year's GP in Mexico!
When Vettel was busy screaming on the radio to his team, Ricciardo had caught his former teammate and almost overtook him. Vettel then panicked and changed his racing line when braking which almost lead to a crash. Vettel blamed Verstappen because he didn't let him through earlier. He continued to scream on the radio and even told Charlie Whiting to "FUCK OFF". Not very smart of him but it gave the race some color.
This year in the previous race Verstappen also said bad things he should not have said about his penalty which may still lead to trouble. They made it clear after Vettel's behavior that is should never happen again.
Some say that Vettel's behavior was bad for the sport because he is a role model for young kids and rookie racing drivers but in my opinion it is good publicity. Now all the papers are writing about what he did and said. I bet people remember last year's race because of this.
Verstappen crossed the finish line in 3rd place and was about to go on the podium. Then they finally gave him a penalty for cutting the chicane and Vettel was asked to go on the podium. He was very happy of course but also got a penalty after the ceremony and Ricciardo got 3rd place. Very dramatic finish to the race but in my opinion both of them deserved the penalties.
I really enjoyed the race! But what else happened?
Valtteri Bottas was the fastest man ever in an F1 race by driving 372km/h. The previous record was from 2005 and the record was made by Kimi Räikkönen (McLaren Mercedes). Before someone comes to me and says that it was Juan-Pablo Montoya I must tell you that his "record" was not in a race. It was in one of the practice sessions. If I remember correctly, before 2005, the fastest man had been Nico's father Keke Rosberg in the 80's.
That's about it for today and now let's see my predictions:
Pole position: Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes
Race:
- Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes
- Valtteri Bottas, Mercedes
- Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull
Fastest lap: Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull
Surprise: Sergio Perez and Felipe Massa might get good results here.
Post your own predictions to our F1-4-LIFE PREDICTORS LEAGUE!
The rules:
POINTS: 1st - 3 2nd - 5 3rd - 10
HOW IT WORKS: the aim of the game is simply predict who comes where in the race (top3). A total of 18 points can be won on a race day. If you get winner and and 3rd place right but 2nd wrong you get 13 points same if you get 1 correct. eg. 2nd you get 5 points. If a driver wins the race and you said he would come 2nd or 3rd no points would be awarded. Same if he came in another position, and you predicted that wrong. A table will be posted up every race weekend. The point scoring system will change once the cars become more competitive. Everyone will say a merc 1,2 so it won't be close or fun.
HOW TO SUBMIT YOUR PREDICTIONS: send an email to f14lifeblog@gmail.com or message the Facebook page to submit your predictions. You have until lights out to make them. If you submit them when the race has started they won't count. So be quick! like the Mercedes.
THE PRIZE: the winner of the league will win themselves a admin place on the F1 4 LIFE page along side AE, JT, MW, MH, JI and PM. If you don't want to be an admin you are welcome to participate anyway. We may also come up with some other prize if it helps.
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