Welcome Back To Another Episode Of What The Hell Is Happening In Quali?

Another chaotic race, another race summary! Usually I'd make these digitally but I got a new set of pens and really wanted to use them,, anyways I love this circuit and GP a lot so I'm glad it was at a normal time for us Aussies :'))

In case you haven't seen it already: The Bahrain and Saudi Arabia GP will be held on Saturday NOT Sunday!! Unless you're Australian like me. Then they're on Sunday... 2am/4am 🥲🥲

Drive to Survive will pay for convincing people through one heavily edited race that Yuki was "thoroughly outperformed" by Liam and Liam had his heart broken in Suzuka when the literal facts are

-Liam was told he would not be getting the seat before Singapore. This was literally said by him and also Yuki's manager. The rumor that Honda intervened in Suzuka to renew Yuki is blatantly false and nothing like what DTS showed.

-Yuki won the qualifying head-to-head 4-1. The one quali that Liam beat him at (Singapore) Yuki was impeded by Max in Q2 and looking at his Q1 time, he would have easily made it to Q3. Fair play to Liam though, he performed well in Singapore across the whole weekend.

-Monza and Singapore we weren't able to compare because Yuki didn't get to complete a single lap due to a DNS and DNF from Perez ramming into him. In races they both completed, Yuki placed ahead in Zandvoort (before a post-race penalty) and in Qatar after Liam crashed out. In Suzuka he finished one place behind because despite lapping faster, he was told to hold position and Alphatauri were coaching Liam to defend against him. So it's a mixed bag but Yuki comes out ahead.

Yes, Liam was the only one to score points in their 5 shared races. Fantastic work by him and something the team desperately needed. But in the 3 races where the AT had the best chances of scoring points (Zandvoort,Singapore and Monza), Yuki was not even able to start at the latter two and had some bizarre strategy in the first where he was kept on softs for 28 laps till he inevitably fell out of the points

-Yuki was the faster driver in terms of pace across all 3 races they shared.

Now let's be clear here: Liam did a fantastic job for someone who had to jump in at very short notice. He absolutely deserves a spot in F1. However, it's not Yuki who "stole his spot" by any metric. Look at the results of the four AT drivers last year. Yuki's points haul would have singlehandedly kept the team ahead of Alfa Romeo in the constructors. Not to mention he scored points and dragged the car to P11 multiple times at the beginning of the season when it was at its worst. He earned his renewal solely on merit.

Some of you are either a) so eager to discredit Yuki or b) so bored with current F1 that you need to artificially create narratives. Let Liam develop like a normal rookie instead of expecting him to beat an experienced teammate and then inevitably shitting on him when he doesn't. Has no one learned anything from the whole saga of "Nyck is gonna be team leader at Alphatauri and destroy Yuki". He is not the easy target y'all think he is.

GP and Helmut were betting on whether or not Max would get pole?? And GP bet AGAINST him and lost £50 ???? 😭😭😭

Yeah so he just retired 👍

So far:

- RB didn't pit Ricciardo during the safety car

- Stroll slams into the back of Ricciardo (who hit the breaks to avoid a collision with Piastri)

- Ricciardo reports floor damage

Another update: he just got a 3 grid penalty for miami. Lol.

So far:

- RB didn't pit Ricciardo during the safety car

- Stroll slams into the back of Ricciardo (who hit the breaks to avoid a collision with Piastri)

- Ricciardo reports floor damage

is the lewis hamilton and fernando alonso dynamic not just mr turner and dinkleberg on a less cartoony scale

Not only did he set the fastest lap of the race, but he actually BROKE the lap record for the CIRCUIT

Daniel Ricciardo you will forever be famous

If we interacted for the first time today via boops and are unlikely to run into each other again because we don't have the same fandom niches I just want you to know our boop bond is real and if I ever see you randomly come across my dash I'll think to myself "aww my boop bud" and send you warm thoughts and good vibes