Another gutting weekend of F1. Not nearly as bad as it could have been, but fuck’s sake. Bottas took pole and managed the HELL out of the race for nearly 20 laps, playing the field like a fiddle. Then, instead of playing the role of a supportive teammate (y’know, like Bottas is ALWAYS expected to do) and focusing on holding off Verstappen and Red Bull, Hamilton “had” to win, and attacked his teammate. Bottas made a clear mistake in giving Hamilton (fresh off a DRS attack) the “ole” at turn one when he pinched himself right and basically gave Hamilton the best line into the turn all to himself, but dammit, man.
Then yet another botched pit job for Bottas! Almost 3.5 seconds while they turned around and “figured out” how to manage Hamilton in 2.5 only a few seconds later.
THEN Bottas had a sensor issue that killed the power in his car as he was decisively closing the gap to Verstappen in P2. He’d lost P2 to Verstappen immediately after the aforementioned shit, I mean, PIT stop on cold, hard tires, but still managed to make substantially strong gains to re-take P2.
And THEN, they brought Bottas, in a comfortable P3 with Perez in P4 nearly 30 seconds behind, in to pit with 2 fucking laps to go! By the time they got him back out, Perez was only 3 seconds behind! That’s a lot of time to gain on only 2 laps, but it only would have taken one mistake or incident to rob Bottas of a podium, and it felt like the team was trying their hardest to do just that. Granted, the softs they put him on netted him a fastest lap (which he’d already managed on the cold hards) and some points, but still, WTF Toto??
Yes, I am biased because Bottas can do no wrong in my eyes and I would die for that man, but sometimes, even without the bias, it feels like the deck is stacked against him, or at least it’s stacked in Hamilton’s favor. I obviously wasn’t on the team radio, but it never felt like at any point when Bottas was leading, was there any direction for “team” play, but the SECOND Hamilton took the lead, the team couldn’t wait to tell Bottas that once the gap between him in P2 and Hamilton in P1 was +3 seconds, they were going to bring Bottas in to pit; basically, “once Hamilton is well ahead of Verstappen in P3, fuck your P2.”
Was good to see Bottas didn’t come out afterwards appearing salty, but I know he had to have been. And as much as I love the Croft’s commentating, if he could take his lips off of Hamilton’s and Verstappen’s penises long enough to celebrate anyone else, it’d be appreciated.
That said. Excellent drive by Ricciardo. Quali sucked BIG time, but he managed to get into points. Congrats.
Haas and Williams? Right where I expected. It’s almost like they’re in a different race every week. I feel bad for Hass; Williams, not so much (mostly because Russell is the heir apparent to Bottas’ seat at Mercedes.
