At the beginning of the year I made a bunch of predictions about how this season of F1
would go and I’ve been checking in every so often so see how well I’m doing.
It was only June when we last looked at these but we’ve had five whole races and the opening
swing of the silly season since then so it’s well worth having a look at these before another
week goes by and everything turns upside down again.
So I predicted that this would be Kimi’s last year in F1 and really we’ve made little
headway on this.
This is a real will-they-won’t-they game with Kimi being a regular podium visiter but
not really much of a lead-challenger and very happy to play wing man to Vettel in basically
every situation This makes him kind of perfect for Ferrari,
so why not keep him on even though he’s just going through the motions these days.
They are very fast, impressive motions, don’t get me wrong but he’s not the eye of the
tiger, nor the thrill of the fight.
On the other hand, we have Charles Leclerc who has done nothing but impress all season
long (barring Germany), racking up points for Sauber and showing himself aggressive
and consistent (barring Germany).
Would it be the wrong time to catapult him up to the best team on the grid?
That’s the big question.
Let’s take these next two together.
Four different teams winning a race and one new race winning driver.
These kind of go hand in hand, don’t they.
In retrospect I shouldn’t have made them two predictions as they are inexorably tied
together.
Nonetheless, it’s not going to happen is it?
The gap between the top three and the rest of the pack is phenomenally big.
Sure, the 7 teams in the midfield are all bunched up like never before which makes the
race for positions 7 - 10 every race very exciting, but the odds are stacked against
these happening.
Honda - good but unreliable.
You know what.
I…
I’m going to give myself this one.
We’re 12 races in and Honda have given Toro Rosso are pretty decent engine, just below
Renault in most people’s opinions.
But Gasly and Hartley have taken about twice as many engine parts as they’re allowed
for the WHOLE YEAR and way more than anyone else on the grid, so - yeah.
Reliability still an issue there.
And speaking of engine penalties.
I said 15 cars would go over their engine allocation.
Five cars have gone over already and another 12 cars have already used a maximum amount
of components at least once.
I think this is looking good but we don’t know how they year-long engine management
strategy will play out yet.
I’m going to prematurely call this one too.
Superhards used exactly once.
Nope.
We’re never seeing that tyre are we?
I mean, it wasn’t SUPPOSED to be used - it was just a back-up, but the tyres are generally
too hard all round to they’re not reaching for that superhard.
Failing this one.
I said the 2021 power unit rules WOULD include an MGU-H. Nothing’s finalised on this front,
but after months of it seeming like the MGU-H would be scrapped, it’s suddenly looking
back on the table as the teams are now looking like they favour very minimal changes to the
power units in the interest of cost saving.
So.
Stay tuned, this one could be back on.
Valtteri Bottas IS fourth, and my goodness is he trying to help me out with this one.
He’s been as low as sixth when he should be AT LEAST a solid third or challenging for
second.
He’s chased a win down, lost wins in the last few laps, had a puncture while leading,
had the car fail on him, driven into people, been driven into and everything you can think
of that’s kept him away from a number of potential victories and podiums.
So he’s 4th, but I don’t think he’ll stay 4th.
But then again, the fates are not smiling on old Bottas as the moment, are they?
Right so Red Bull HAVE signed Honda.
Seems like old news now but I last looked at this Bingo board just before it was confirmed.
That’s a tick.
And Ricciardo has moved to Renault, leaving a big old seat for…
Alonso?
Probably not.
But suddenly this square has become a possibility, hilariously.
Watch that get proven wrong almost immediately as Red Bull promote from within.
Buuuuuut - Alonso.
You know?
Who wouldn’t want Alonso.
Speaking of Alonso.
He won Le Mans.
That’s a tick.
I mean, he might not even be in F1 next year, let alone Red Bull.
I think he misses winning things.
Will Vettel score twice Kimi’s points?
Well that’s looking less likely now, as Kimi’s been super consistent.
Vettel is currently at less than 1.5 times Kimi’s points so we’ll see how it all
shakes out one engine penalties start being a major factor in the second half of the season.
I predicted someone would be so naughty that they’d go over their 12 allowed penalty
points, but actually, the highest offenders are Ericsson and Grosjean (which is quite
funny as they classically did NOT crash into each other at Baku) with 7 each, so they’ve
got until October to get 5 more.
It seems unlikely, but they’re both a bit frustrated with a point to prove after the
summer break so who knows what mischief they could get up to.
Let’s be honest - Williams aren’t going to finish seventh.
They’re not even going to finish 9th.
How sad.
But Red Bull?
I mean, no, they’re not going to finish 2nd.
But then I keep remembered 2013 when Vettel was having a decent-but-not-incredible season
and then won all nine races after the summer break, so… let’s leave this one open
So now if we look at the board - the ones we’ve already ticked off and the ones we’ve
rejected.
Then let’s look at ones we haven’t yet rejected but seem unlikely.
If we want to get a line, we might be able to get one down the left hand side here or
right across the middle.
It could happen It could.
Shut up.
I’ll see you next time - probably in October!
- to do another check in.