F1 2023 (Sponsored by Ferrari strategists)

[Ben]

Haas kick off the car reveals (sort of) at 2pm today so we might as well do this now. We start a full two weeks earlier than 2022.

Calendar TRANSFERS:
- Qatar returns after a year off, again at Lusail after plans for a new circuit stalled.
- Las Vegas debuts with a street circuit literally on The Strip. This will take place on Saturday night local time.
- France are off the calendar again as traditional European circuits continue to fall by the wayside.
- China was briefly back before being re-fucked off due to their COVID-related immigration laws.

Grand Prix	Circuit	Date
Bahrain	Sakhir	March 5
Saudi Arabia	Jeddah	March 19
Australia	Melbourne	April 2
Azerbaijan	Baku	April 30
Miami	Miami Gardens	May 7
Emilia Romagna	Imola	May 21
Monaco	Monaco	May 28
Spain	Barcelona-Catalunya	June 4
Canada	Montreal	June 18
Austria	Spielberg	July 2
Great Britain	Silverstone	July 9
Hungary	Hungaroring	July 23
Belgium	Spa-Francorchamps	July 30
Netherlands	Zandvoort	August 27
Italy	Monza	September 3
Singapore	Marina Bay	September 17
Japan	Suzuka	September 24
Qatar	Lusail	October 8
United States	Austin	October 22
Mexico City	Mexico City	October 29
São Paulo	Interlagos	November 5
Las Vegas	Las Vegas	November 18
Abu Dhabi	Yas Marina	November 26

Team TRANSFERS:
- Honda are back. Well, they never left. But the name is back on the RBPT engine.

Driver TRANSFERS:
- Sebastian Vettel retired at the end of 2022.
- Fernando Alonso left Alpine to take up Vettel's seat at Aston Martin.
- Alpine then announced Oscar Piastri as the man to fill Alonso's seat.
- McLaren parted company with Daniel Ricciardo after two seasons. Ricciardo has since rejoined Red Bull as their reserve driver.
- Alpine forgot to provide Oscar Piastri with a valid contract so McLaren swooped him to sign him as Ricciardo's replacement.
- Alpine subsequently bought out Pierre Gasly's remaining contract with AlphaTauri to create a spicy All-French lineup alongside Esteban Ocon.
- AlphaTauri made an agreement with Mercedes for Nyck de Vries to fill the vacant seat left by Gasly.
- Williams parted company with Nicholas Latifi after three seasons and replaced him with F2 Rookie of the Year Logan Sargeant.
- Mick Schumacher was let go by Haas after two seasons, to be replaced by Nico Hülkenburg. Schumacher subsequently joined Mercedes as reserve driver.

Constructor	Car	Engine	Drivers
Alfa Romeo	C43	Ferrari	(24) Guanyu Zhou (77) Valtteri Bottas
AlphaTauri	AT04	Honda RBPT	(21) Nyck de Vries (22) Yuki Tsunoda
Alpine	A523	Renault	(10) Pierre Gasly (31) Esteban Ocon
Aston Martin	AMR23	Mercedes	(14) Fernando Alonso (18) Lance Stroll
Ferrari	SF-23	Ferrari	(16) Charles Leclerc (55) Carlos Sainz Jr.
Haas	VF-23	Ferrari	(20) Kevin Magnussen (27) Nico Hülkenberg
McLaren	MCL37	Mercedes	(4) Lando Norris (81) Oscar Piastri
Mercedes	W14	Mercedes	(44) Lewis Hamilton (63) George Russell
Red Bull	RB19	Honda RBPT	(1) Max Verstappen (11) Sergio Perez
Williams	FW45	Mercedes	(2) Logan Sargeant (23) Alexander Albon

Technical rule changes:
- Floor edges and diffuser to be raised to counter porpoising.
- Roll hoops will require a rounded top to prevent a repeat of Zhou Guanyu's crash at the 2022 British Grand Prix.
- FIA closed a loophole which allowed slot gap separators on front wings.
- Side mirror size increases 50mm.
- Total car weight is reduced 2kg to 796kg, whilst power unit weight increases 1kg to 151kg.
- Minimum fuel temperature reduced by 10°C.

Sporting rule changes:
- At two races in 2023, a new qualifying format will be trialled. Assuming the session is dry, teams must run the hard tyre in Q1, medium in Q2 and soft in Q3. This is aimed at reducing overall tyre usage and total sets available will be cut from 13 to 11 at these trial Grands Prix.
- A new tyre compound is available in 2023, between the existing C1 and C2 compounds. This is due to teams complaining about the C1 being shit.
- Budget cap (!) reduced $5m to $135m.
- Pre-season testing is cut in half from 2022 levels, down to three days from six.
- Sprint races will now be run at six events, up from three in the previous two seasons. These will take place at the Azerbaijan, Austrian, Belgian, Qatar, United States and São Paulo Grands Prix.
- Any political, religious or personal gestures will be dealt with in a manner the ruling Arabs see fit.
- COVID regulations are no more. Proof of COVID vaccination no longer required to gain entry to the paddock.

[Ben]

Looks like Sky are gearing up to bring back Rosberg as a co-commentator/analyst after the vaccine laws were dropped. They've made room for this by firing Herbert and Di Resta into the sun.

[Jimmy Floyd]

I would much rather listen to Johnny Herbert than Nico Rosberg, guess they've fallen for the 'relevant' fallacy.

[Ben]

I assume Herbert will carry on with F1TV doing podium interviews and the like.

[Giggles]

There is no part of the planet outside your garden walls that listening to Johnny Herbert could be considered a good thing.

[7om]

Surprised it took this long for di Resta. Never cared much for his technical analysis and he had the personality of a garden slug.

The new Haas livery is quite nice. Reminds me of some of the old Minardi liveries.

[Ben]

In the era of having to remove paint to save weight (lol), I think we'll see more teams incorporating plenty of "black" into their liveries this year like Haas have done.

[Disco]

I love Johnny Herbert, he had a superb run in F1 given he barely had one functioning foot but as with Damon Hill I have had to admit that his punditry is frequently awful and completely off the wall.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Damon Hill's is a bit bizarre sometimes.

Pretty hard finding good pundits, given that drivers are all mega-selfish weirdos and technical people are all ultra-focused drones who speak in that same nasal one-tone voice with no ability to use emphasis in sentences. There aren't many in the sport who have the reflective qualities needed to communicate well. Brundle does and I would say Button does to a degree even if I find him a bit oleaginous. I like Chandhok as well, though I'm aware not everyone does. Proper enthusiast for the sport.

[Ben]

Chandhok is excellent.

[Gray Fox]

Am I reading right that Mick Schumacher is now reserve driver for both Mercedes and McLaren?

[Shindig]

Yeah, he's available to spend time between both teams. Not sure how I feel about that.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Clearly in it for the courtesy cars.

[Shindig]

Or it's a sneaky way to stretch the budget of both teams.

[Disco]

I think it's more that reserve driver is a pretty pointless role so you might as well have a recognisable name in there who can chip in with promotional work etc.

[Disco]

New thread new old bullshit to annoy you all with.

I missed Argentina but as I recall this had almost everything happening all at once for the entire race as well as David Coulthard cementing a lifelong reputation by spinning repeatedly and crashing into Michael Schumacher.




Following that is Imola 98 where again it's Mclarens race to lose, I wonder how they will manage it this time. The Ferrari renaissance continues apace and while you can begin to see the cracks appearing in Murrays commentary (not a fan of Shinji Nakano) there's also some lovely little moments between him and Brundle.




And as a little (we all have two hours to spare on a Wednesday night right?) 'bonus'.....

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....we reach back into the Yank Bank to see what they were doing with a V8 motor and a wonky chassis at about the same time. Do it for Dale and associated americana.

[Shindig]

Ford moving back into the old Jaguar garage. Oof.

[Ben]

Jaguar became Red Bull did it not? Nice continuity I suppose.

[Adramelch]

Or it's a sneaky way to stretch the budget of both teams.

If you meant salary-wise, those don't count towards the cap I think?

[Ben]

Only the top three earners are exempt. So in the case of Mercedes, they can write off Wolff, Hamilton and Russell but everyone else is on the books.

[Gray Fox]

So are Ford entering as a separate entity in 2026 or are they stickering their badge over another teams?

It will be nice if we can start to get more than a 10 team grid as a regular thing. More competition and chance for drivers to shine etc.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Joining the Red Bulls, although you'd have to think post-Mateschitz at some point RB involvement will move on.

[Adramelch]

Only the top three earners are exempt. So in the case of Mercedes, they can write off Wolff, Hamilton and Russell but everyone else is on the books.

I thought it was the drivers + top three.

[Shindig]

I hope Murray spends all of 1998 calling every Renault engine Mechachromes.

[John Arne]

The noise

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[Jimmy Floyd]

I saw a video the other day of Liam Lawson taking an RB7 around Mount Panorama (I'm sure it's out there somewhere), you realise what we're missing now. Still, it means you can hear Crofty talk about how powerful the undercut is a lot more clearly.

[SincereTheRebel]

Black car all but confirmed by Merc

[Ben]

It's all about weight saving (black = no paint, look at the new Alfa for instance) but they can use it to take the moral high ground again. Win win.

[Jimmy Floyd]

I think they need to do something about that, or else all the cars will just end up black. Scottish Widows McLaren.

[Disco]

Black is better than grey and we don't want a return to those years.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1/64572992

This is a weird one, he's only been there five minutes and it's a job where the bar is only as high as not having a nazi spank orgy in your motorhome.

[Disco]

Monaco 98 (we're skipping Spain because it was crap, Hakinnen won by forever) notable for being the second race at which ITV have deployed their sick drum and bass intro, Jim got Fat of the Land for christmas evidently. These cars look a handful round here, dare I say it helped by the grooved tyres. Proper St Devote looks good too, they should put that back.



Do also tune in to about 45mins where Tony Jardine gives the most generous description of fucking someone into the barrier I've ever heard.

[Jimmy Floyd]

After 5 corners of the first lap Murray says 'Probably only 10 of the 21 cars will finish'. 11 finished. Unbelievable.

[Disco]

A race of attrition which is the only way Monaco ever works.

[Shindig]

Another fun Alex Wurz race. What a top lad.

[Disco]

Speaking of Alex Wurz it's Canada 98, a race where everyone seems to go crazy and which audibly ages Murray Walker. One of those inevitable Schumacher victories where no matter what happens he aways seems to end up about a minute ahead, look out for a cameo by a young Mattia Binotto celebrating at the end.

[Jimmy Floyd]

The first start is chaotic enough, but the second one is absolute madness. Hakkinen gets away fine but then when he tries to hit maybe 4th gear the thing gives up (can only assume it was transmission?) and the effect of them all trying to dive out of his way is Jean Alesi getting mullered by Wurz and Trulli yet again. Your heart bleeds.

[Shindig]

My favourite part is Diniz's agriculture. I don't think I've ever seen someone do that before or since. Also, big fan of Schumacher spooking Frentzen straight out of the pits.

[Disco]

Wasn't there some astroturf recently, I'm remembering astroturf for some reason.

[Disco]

I love a bit of nominative determinism and US Supercross this year has not only Nate Thrasher but Jet Lawrence. Add in Scott Speed and you've almost got the basis for a Happy Families deck.

[Ben]

Black car all but confirmed by Merc

Some goof accidentally leaked a photo which confirms this.

[Gray Fox]

The W14E PERFORMANCE is indeed all black. They seem to have put the numbers/trim on Lewis' car as a yellow and on Georges' as a neon green in order to tell them apart at a glance.

[Ben]

Good because I'm fucked if I'm learning T-cam colours to differentiate them. Mercedes were a nightmare the last few years.

It's more bare carbon than all black. I reckon it'll look mean as fuck after a GP in a dirty environment (like Turkey the other year). At least Toto had the balls to admit it's all for weight saving unlike some of the other principals claiming theirs is part of a nice livery.

[Gray Fox]

The name suggests they're turning up in Bahrain sidepodless again.

Interesting that they seem to be the only team that think that's the way to go, after Williams abandoned the idea. The talk was that they've sussed out the big issue was rear suspension related, but it was parts they were locked into for a season.

[Disco]

Good because I'm fucked if I'm learning T-cam colours to differentiate them. Mercedes were a nightmare the last few years.

If only there were some unique identifier on each car they could just make a bit bigger and solve this problem forever.

[Disco]

The name suggests they're turning up in Bahrain sidepodless again.

Interesting that they seem to be the only team that think that's the way to go, after Williams abandoned the idea. The talk was that they've sussed out the big issue was rear suspension related, but it was parts they were locked into for a season.

That's the impression I've gotten from all the off season chatter, they knew the root of the problem with the design but lacked the time or budget to correct it during the season. Hopefully they'll be back on the pace so we can laugh at Ferrari as well as enjoying a half decent title contest.

[Ben]

Ferrari's rear wing looks fucking great, though.

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[Disco]

Maybe this is their year....

[Clunge]

That Merc looks mean as fuck. And there's something about the Ferrari that reminds me of the mid to late-90s, which is no bad thing.

[Shindig]

That's the impression I've gotten from all the off season chatter, they knew the root of the problem with the design but lacked the time or budget to correct it during the season. Hopefully they'll be back on the pace so we can laugh at Ferrari as well as enjoying a half decent title contest.

I always thought the problem with the lack of sidepods would be overheating.

[SincereTheRebel]

I always thought the problem with the lack of sidepods would be overheating.

I thought similar.