The fast road out of the slums: F1 and Motorsport 2019

[Flynnie]

Formula 1 is just a joke of a sport, sorry.

[Kevin S]

So it's Le Mans week, and there are some more one-off liveries to add to that Jumbo one earlier.

Dragonspeed have revived the classic Gulf livery:



Rebellion have done, er, this:



The Fords are brilliant, and sadly this is the last time out as a factory team:


And of course we all remember Porsche's classic 911 looks last year (pink pig and Rothmans styles). This time #91 and #92 have the usual livery but with gold instead of red. This marks the fact that they have already clinched the 2018-19 WEC titles with one race to spare:


The IMSA Porsches are also entering Le Mans and will look like this:

[Sits]

Thanks Kev, !ovely pics of mostly lovely cars. I've not paid close attention to sportscar racing in recent years; what sort of cars are the Jumbo, Dragonspeed and Rebellion? Absolutely pig ugly. Oh for the time they looked like this:

[ursus arctos]

Spotters' Guide here (answers that and many other questions)

[Kevin S]

Yeah, those are lovely.

The sportscar/endurance scene has been split into "Le Mans Prototype" (LMP) cars and "GT" cars. And the races have four classes because there is LMP1, LMP2, GT-Pro and GT-Am.

LMP cars had been entered by Porsche with the incredibly successful 919 Hybrid


And there was Audi with the R18:


And Peugeot even had one with the 908:


Now, there's only one factory manufacturer left with an LMP1 car, and that's Toyota with their Gazoo Racing TS050. They finally have their Le Mans win after a procession last year.


But it seems a bit hollow not having Audi and Porsche to compete with. They are just up against those independent LMP teams like Rebellion, Dragonspeed and SMP. Bit of a pig among guinea pigs.


Porsche turned their attention to the GT-Pro class and have factory racing 911s instead now, where they go up against those Fords, Aston Martins, Ferrari 488s, BMW M8s and the rest. As mentioned, Porsche have sealed the WEC series win even before this final race. Audi left the scene entirely.

There is to be one more season under these current arrangements (eight races from Silverstone in September up to Le Mans 2020) and then a new set of regulations come in for 2020-21 which hopefully will pretty things up again - allowing 'hypercars' based on road cars to compete. What I don't know is if this is supposed to replace prototypes or be an addition to the grid.

[Flynnie]

Spotters' Guide here (answers that and many other questions)

As an aside, definitely throw a few bucks to Marshall Pruett if you can. He pumps out incredible podcasts and articles on IMSA/sportscar and Indycar racing on the regular, and his wife keeps having to go back to the hospital to fight off cancer.

[hobbes]

Terrible decision by the stewards - yes, Vettel nearly squished Hamilton into the wall when he returned to the track, but it was obvious to anyone watching the replays that he was still gathering it up and didn't really have any other option.

That's all true. But it's also true that Vettel derived an advantage from a rule transgression.
Shouldn't have been a time penalty, but Vettel should have had to give up the place and they could both have continued racing.

Worth bearing in mind too, that if Vettel had have wiped out Hamilton but survived, he'd still have got a 5 second penalty despite ending Hamilton's race. SO the 5 secs that seems super harsh in one way, seems super lenient in the other.
And there's also precedent for the decision in 2018 and 2008 I think.

[longeared]

About half of Le Mans is free to air in the UK on Quest - a couple of hours at the start, a chunk overnight and the last few hours. Apparently Carlton Kirby is on the commentary roster again, hopefully he'll endlessly inform us of the time remaining "...from home" and as Le Mans is not all that far from the Normandy beaches he could fill some quiet time with some thoughts on the 75th anniversary of the D-Day landings.

[Third rate Leszno]

That's all true. But it's also true that Vettel derived an advantage from a rule transgression.

True, but that rule sits uneasily with me in this situation - I can't remember when it came in but I'm assuming it was when the run-off areas became more and more asphalt based and chicanes began to multiply? An old fashioned 'off' where you go bouncing and skittering across the grass was never viewed as 'taking advantage', was it? Or is that me pulling on my rose tinted goggles and going into a reverie about the good old days when everything seemed much simpler....

[Kevin S]

About half of Le Mans is free to air in the UK on Quest - a couple of hours at the start, a chunk overnight and the last few hours. Apparently Carlton Kirby is on the commentary roster again, hopefully he'll endlessly inform us of the time remaining "...from home" and as Le Mans is not all that far from the Normandy beaches he could fill some quiet time with some thoughts on the 75th anniversary of the D-Day landings.

That first sentence is brilliant news, cheers longeared.

[Kevin S]

Maybe of interest only to Les and me but M-Sport have released the new model Fiesta R1, R2 and R5..

https://twitter.com/MSportLtd/status/1138495891973857282?s=19

Rally Italia Sardegna this weekend as well.

[Third rate Leszno]

I'm not sure I see the point of the R1. They can't have sold more than a handful last time, (though Gus Greensmith had one, so they can point to that as an example of how useful they can be as a starting point) and there's no obvious place for them in the WRC or even most National series - a young talent who can't afford an R2 would be better off getting a year under their belt in an unhomologated Corsa or older Fiesta and something as underpowered as an R1 isn't likely to appeal to the gentlemen drivers who might fancy a couple of WRC events - they'll just buy an R5 and pootle round like they've always done.

[Kevin S]

Blimey, yes, over £40k and only 150 bhp...

Le Mans Q3 is running, around 1 hour to go. Both Toyotas on the front row as it stands, natch.

[Kevin S]

It's still the #7 car of Kobayashi, Conway and Lopez leading the #8 of Alonso, Nakajimi, Buemi. Given that #8 won the race last year, and Kobayashi has finished runner up twice (as well as setting the lap record) I assume OTF is generally behind #7 if it's between the two this time?

Not that we can ever rule out Jackie Chan's LMP2 team, of course.

[Kevin S]

Rally Sardegna update:

Stage winners:
SS1 - Ogier (Citroen)
SS2 - Suninen (M-Sport)
SS3 - Suninen (M-Sport)
SS4 - Tanak (Toyota)
SS5 - Lappi (Citroen)

There are 10 WRC entrants in this rally - two each for M-Sport and Citroen, 3 each for Toyota and Hyundai (who go with Neuville, Mikkelsen, Sordo this time),

So the main news is that the world champion and current leader of the WRC, Seb Ogier, has hit a rock on SS5 and broken his suspension. He's had to retire for the day and will be limited to a maximum of 5 points for the Power Stage on Sunday. This opens up the chance for Tanak or Neuville to take the lead in the drivers' championship.

Classification after five stages:
01 - Latvala
02 - Tanak @2.8
03 - Sordo @3.5
04 - Evans @5.9
05 - Suninen @7.7
06 - Neuville @14.1
07 - Mikkelsen @16.7
08 - Meeke @19.1
09 - Lappi @43.0

Looking at that, it's also not a bad chance for M-Sport (Evans and Suninen) to put pressure on Citroen (Ogier and Lappi) in the Manufacturers' Championship too. Once again Toyota have got out of the blocks quickly with their key guy sitting in second behind a team mate.

[Kevin S]

Oooh, and some breaking news ahead of Le Mans: Toyota have "announced hypercar" (as the twitter seems to say things these days).

https://toyotagazooracing.com/releas...c/0614-01.html

So this is to replace the LMPs then. The hope is that the new class will be seen as more 'road-relevant' by the likes of Mercedes, McLaren and others who have a current or future 'hypercar' in the pipeline.

[Flynnie]

If GT1 Two: Electric Boogaloo is a success, what's the timeframe for Porsche to come back to Le Mans? I say three years, tops.

[Kevin S]

The thoughts on Porsche's next hypercar are that it will be produced around 2025, so could be a while yet.

Stage 6 drama - Neuville and Gilsoul had a misunderstanding in the pacenotes and ended up going off into a ditch. He recovered well but there are now two holes in the radiator of the car with water leaking out. They've got to fix it somehow....

Tanak opened the road and was safely through.

[Kevin S]

WRC race radio explaining the possible options Neuville has, including using an egg:
https://www.wikihow.com/Seal-a-Leaking-Radiator

[Kevin S]

Race leader Latvala has stopped in the stage, giving Tanak the lead.

[Kevin S]

Latvala had rolled and was lucky not to end up going down the hill. Car has been righted and they're making their way to the end of the stage.

Tanak may be about to be overtaken in the race standings by Sordo, who is flying through SS6.

Neuville has managed to get some kind of fix done.

[Kevin S]

Latvala makes it to the end, exhausted.

Sordo finishes the stage 0.7 ahead of Tanak and that gives them a joint overall lead. Teemu Suninen gets his third stage win of the day, and is only 0.8 seconds off the pace overall!

Classification after SS6:
01 = Sordo & Tanak
03 - Suninen @0.8
04 - Evans @5.2
05 - Mikkelsen @16.0
06 - Meeke @17.5
07 - Neuville @25.4
08 - Lappi @1:01.0

[Kevin S]

Ominous... SS7 has been cancelled after Evans finishes due to an ambulance on the course.

https://twitter.com/OfficialWRC/status/1139541696444866560?s=19

[Kevin S]

No news on the spectator at the moment I'm afraid.

In SS8 Neuville is having trouble again, this time with his tyres, which are almost slick, and he finished around 30 seconds off the pace. Evans also seemed to struggle for grip and overshot a hairpin, giving up around 14 seconds.

Lappi continued his weird up and down performances with a storming run that was faster than Tanak but it's Sordo who takes the stage and the race lead, I assume, once they work out what to do with times for SS7.

[Kevin S]

Seven hours and a thousand miles into the race, #7 still leads #8 but it's very close. The SMP and Rebellion cars are not a million miles behind.

Both SMP cars have an F1 driver from last year in them - Sirotkin and Vandoorne. Alonso in Toyota #8 makes it a trio from F1's 2018 lineup.