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

[Captain Kinopio]

Tough call but think it was the right one. Seemed too much of a risk.

[Robbo-92]

Hamilton still has a chance of 3rd here in my opinion, only a few seconds behind Leclerc and Perez.

[Errkal]

Hamilton doesn't sound happy

[GrinWithoutaKat]

It seems to take a while for the tyres to get up to speed though. Perez was 16s behinds Leclerc before anyone pitted, but now Leclerc is on the brand new tyres Perez had a clear pace advantage as he's had his on for 20 or so laps.

[Victor Mildew]

Thrown 3rd away there.

[captain red dog]

Unless he started losing about 1.5 secs a lap, it made no sense to pit.

[Memento Mori]

They waited too long to pit.

[Errkal]

I think Merc have strawberry floated it, 4 laps left and those tires take ages to wake up. Done a great job for max.

[Robbo-92]

Yeah they’ve really thrown away a lot of positions there, going to get passed by Gasly and maybe Norris too at this rate

[Captain Kinopio]

Tyres are weird.

[Return_of_the_STAR]

What a cock up

[GrinWithoutaKat]

After the praise he gave his team for making the call last race, I don't think he could have ignored the call to come in. I suppose if they were worried about a blow out, then even 7th is better than a DNF but it looked like he was fine to just hang onto 3rd.

[captain red dog]

Merc have been shaky on strategy for a while now.

[Robbo-92]

One of my favourite things about these conditions is how the cars end up, the side pod of the Alpha Tauri is filthy and you can see how the airflow works around the side pods

[Captain Kinopio]

I think the mistake was not pitting when Le Clerc did as opposed to not trying to make it till the end. It was Hamilton who decided not to come in when they originally called him to.

If they'd have stayed out I can't believe Perez wouldn't have gotten past. By not coming in earlier they sacrificed the probability of getting past Le Clerc and then being able to race Perez to the end.

[Robbo-92]

Great race for Bottas, was hoping he’d get a win in his final season with Mercedes.

[GrinWithoutaKat]

Yeah, happy for Bottas. He gets way too much stick. Can't be easy when a team is set up around the other guy but he's more consistent than most 2nd drivers. If Max ends up winning the title but just a few points, Lewis is going to feel sick. Like, I'm sure he won't be happy either way, but if that ends up being how it's decided... ugh.

[Robbo-92]

Mercedes left it to late to pit with the horrible phase the tyres go through, oh well at least it’s still close.

[Memento Mori]

Yeah, happy for Bottas. He gets way too much stick. Can't be easy when a team is set up around the other guy but he's more consistent than most 2nd drivers. If Max ends up winning the title but just a few points, Lewis is going to feel sick. Like, I'm sure he won't be happy either way, but if that ends up being how it's decided... ugh.

25 points dropped in Baku.

[captain red dog]

If Merc have the same pace in the dry at the remaining races, it's far from over.