The official Formula One and General Motorsport thread for the 2021 season! Season finale live on Sky & Ch4 Dec 12th 1pm

[Victor Mildew]

twitter.com/EngineMode11/status/1478644884961648642

[Memento Mori]

Otmar Szafnauer leaving Aston. I would imagine Martin Whitmarsh who came in as his boss a few months back is replacing him.

[Roonmastor]

Tough one. He seems a bit out of his depth but the team has always gone better than it ought to have done.

[Jam-Master Jay]

Rumour is that Szafnauer could be heading to Alpine along with the BWT sponsorship.

[Robbo-92]

If BWT leave Aston Martin at least the pink stripe on the car will be gone Be good if they kept sponsoring Vettel as a personal sponsor though, he seems to be a good fit for them with how much he cares about the environment and the like.

On Otmar, it’s a shame as he’s done a very good job considering the budget of the team and if it’s based on 2021 alone it’s harsh (as even though they say it’ll be mutual, who knows what happened) as they’ve not developed it outside of a couple of small parts and it’s largely still based on a 2019 car. Guess Whitmarsh will be taking over that role come the start of the season.

[Return_of_the_STAR]

twitter.com/EngineMode11/status/1478644884961648642

That's brilliant

[floydfreak]

twitter.com/autosport/status/1478758847510679552

[Robbo-92]

Started putting together the 2022 thread a little while ago, not long till the season starts now! Think I saw its only 10 weeks till lights out in Bahrain*

*They’ve not had a power cut, I’m just trying to channel my inner Crofty!

[Rawrgna]

this video pretty much sums up why for me the 90s were peak F1 where teams could scrounge together some money and attempt to string together a campaign

[Vermilion]

Some of those backmarker teams would get the occasional decent result too.

Had there been points awarded for the top 10 finishers back then, a lot of them would have racked up a decent haul too, at Adelaide 1995, Forti and Pacific alone finished 7th and 8th, and twice in 1991 did the Modena Lambo team finish in 7th (it says 9th in the video for San Marino, but Van de Poele was actually classified 7th after he broke down)!

[floydfreak]

That is what modern F1 is lacking as well though independent teams the manufactures have taken over the sport once they pull out the grid will get smaller. It was always interesting seeing which low budget team may get in the points or have a fluke result if the race has lots of accidents and high attrition.

[Vermilion]

high attrition races are something i miss too, we rarely ever get them these days.

[Vermilion]

https://www.jetpunk.com/user-quizzes/12 ... river-ever

Tricky quiz this, i scored 255/689

My most obscure correct answer was Pierre-Henri Raphanel who drove for Coloni in 1989

[Robbo-92]

I wonder if anyone has got near the 689 figure without copying and pasting a list!

I’m seeing some rumours on Twitter that the first pre season test of 2022 will be a fully closed event in Barcelona, before reverting to normal for the second one in Bahrain. I can understand why they’d shut it off to the public but I don’t ever recall a test being shut off to all of the press before, seems rather odd, especially given the brand new cars that a lot of fans will be very eager to see out on track for the first time! Hopefully the teams will each do an official launch themselves, or we’ll have a very American feeling ‘launch’ event at the second test where each team will probably have to wheel their car out in turn onto a big stage or something.

[Vermilion]

The press will do all they can to get pics regardless, even if it means camping out on a nearby hillside and using a massive zoom.

[Victor Mildew]

Maybe it's because they don't want pictures of Hamilton not being there...

[Robbo-92]

The 2022 thread is a go!

t:the-official-formula-one-and-general-motorsport-for-the-2022-season-has-the-2nd-era-of-red-bull-begun?f=7&p=4916325#p4916325