F1Weekly Podcast # 1034
Play Podcast: 03-04-24f1weekly1034.mp3
Nasir Hameed, out in the field filing his goody bag In downtown Berlin, brings us a fully loaded Schnitzel in Motorsports Mondial an interview with founder and owner of grandprix247.com Paul Velasco.
Paul Velasco is founder of the popular Formula 1 website www.grandprix247.com
He was born and raised in Johannesburg and, as a young lad, saw Mario Andretti take his first Formula 1 victory at Kyalami in1971.
He was assigned by his agency as official photographer for Marlboro in the days of Senna and Prost at McLaren. Paul also worked in the Middle East for many years at the Dubai Autodrome.
Today, he is based in Berlin with extensive contacts in the world of Formula 1.
MoneyGram Haas F1 Team race recap
Kevin Magnussen and Nico Hulkenberg placed 12th and 16th respectively at the Bahrain Grand Prix, Round 1 of the 2024 FIA Formula 1 World Championship, held Saturday at the Bahrain International Circuit.
Magnussen started from P15 on the grid on Pirelli P Zero Red soft tires and made gains on the opening lap to run in P12. Magnussen ran a two-stop strategy, pitting on lap 12 for White hard tires, before pitting again on lap 33, taking on another set of the harder compound.
The Dane preserved P12 through to the checkered flag, holding off a spirited challenge in the final laps from the RB driver pairing of Ricciardo and Tsunoda.
Hulkenberg took the start from P10, also on soft tires, but his race unraveled at Turn 1 following contact with Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll. Hulkenberg was forced into a first-lap pit stop, in which he took on a new front wing and hard tires, leaving him out of sync for the remainder of the race.
The German stopped on lap 21 for a second set of hards, and pitted once again on lap 43 for softs. Hulkenberg came home P16 in a race in which all 20 starters reached the finish line.
Nico Hulkenberg:
“It’s very frustrating and disappointing, and it was a very similar scenario to last year into Turn 4 at the start. On a positive note, our race pace and tire degradation looked pretty reasonable compared to the other midfield runners, and I think we’re fighting Williams, Sauber and RB, so I guess we take that as a positive. There will be more findings after today, things to improve and optimize on. Jeddah is obviously a very different circuit with completely different characteristics, so we’ll see what we get there but it feels like we have a much better foundation to work with compared to last year.”
Kevin Magnussen:
“I’m kind of pleased – not over the moon, as we didn’t score points – but it seems like we have a car which is a bit better on the tires this year, not necessarily quicker than last year but at least better on tires, and I think we’ve shown that today. Nonetheless, it’s only one track, one bit of tarmac, and one set of conditions so we still have to show that elsewhere. It’s been a good couple of weeks of work, the team has done a really good job, and we’re in a good place – we just need to find more.”
Ayao Komatsu, Team Principal:
“Okay it wasn’t the perfect race, Nico had a bad start and damaged his front wing which essentially meant his race was over at that point. Kevin’s race showed that we can fight this year. We don’t have the best degradation but at least in the midfield, we can fight for the points. We didn’t do a perfect strategy but even then, Kevin was fighting in the midfield until the last moments which was a huge positive. We know the margin of error is very, very small so we need to step-up on that side as well. There are huge positives to take from this weekend and then looking forward to another chance next weekend. We’re really looking forward to a strong show again in Jeddah.”
Ferrari: Carlos, Charles and Frédéric
Carlos
It’s a solid start to the season and very good points for the team. I felt really good in the car all race long, being able to control the pace and doing good overtakes. I tried everything to manage the tyres on the last stint to try and attack Checo (Perez) at the end of the race, but they are still faster than us. However, I think we have a very good baseline to work on and we need to keep pushing to close the gap.
On to Jeddah!
Charles Leclerc
It was a disappointing race from my side. There was an issue with the brakes, so I struggled to stay on track, especially in turns 9 and 10. We would have had the pace in the car to put up a good fight so I can’t wait to get back in the car in Jeddah.
Frédéric Vasseur Team Principal
We were hoping for a better result but we had a brake issue during the race with Charles, so all in all we maximized the result on track today. Carlos had a good race with a very smart comeback after not getting a perfect start and he was able to fight with Perez until the final stages. We knew we would have been on the Hard tyre and Checo would have been on Softs and our aim was to put the Red Bull under pressure, which we did towards the end but it was not enough.
Charles struggled for the entire race with the brakes and because of that in the first stint flat-spotted his tyres so we had to pit him earlier than planned. We will have to investigate why the brakes were not at the correct temperature.
This weekend, our flying lap performance matched our expectations, but we have a clear step to make in terms of our race pace as we were not in the fight with Red Bull. That said I consider today’s race a good baseline as we were able to close the gap considerably compared to last year. We will continue with our development and I’m confident we will be able to take the fight to them more often.