Black White Or Grey?
Yesterday’s race was effectively shaped by Race Control — and the exact timing of the VSC relative to the positions of the leading drivers.
On Lap 14, Stroll’s car stopped, and about a minute later the VSC was deployed. At that exact moment, race leader Lando Norris was already around five seconds past the pit entry, while all his main rivals received a perfectly timed, cheap pit stop.
But was it simply luck for the eventual winner, Kimi Antonelli — or was there more to it?
Kimi’s engineer, Peter “Bono” Bonnington, was anticipating a reaction from Race Control and specifically instructed Kimi to slow down, effectively pre-empting a possible VSC or Safety Car.
That is exactly what happened.
Careful analysis shows that Kimi slowed by around two seconds compared with his normal race pace — and those two seconds turned out to be exactly what he needed.
Conspiracy theory lovers will immediately suspect a connection between Mercedes and Race Control. But there is something much more fundamental at play here.
Real life is complicated. No set of rules, procedures or algorithms can guarantee perfect equality and fairness in every possible situation.
So perhaps the next best thing is to let time even out the lucky breaks and the unlucky ones.
That is exactly what happened at Madring on Sunday.
Lando may have felt robbed of a victory — but his very first F1 win was almost handed to him by a perfectly timed late Safety Car in Miami.
So perhaps the picture is not black or white.
It is grey. 🏎️⚖️
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Can McLaren Get the Updated Mercedes Engines Before the Works Team?
McLaren could receive the new Mercedes ADUO specification before the works team itself — at the very next race in Baku.
And the reason is very interesting.
McLaren have a relatively draggy car, and their shorter gear ratios favour corner performance rather than long straights and outright top speed.
Yet those are exactly the conditions the teams will face in Baku.
So McLaren are not expected to be particularly competitive in Baku — just as they struggled at Monza.
Mercedes could therefore be choosing to give McLaren the upgraded engines for Baku while fighting them with the older specification.
Just one of those strange and fascinating things about F1: an engine supplier fighting its own upgraded engines in a rival team’s cars. 🏎️⚙️
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How could such a mega-project turn out to be so wrong?
Several drivers said they almost fell asleep during the race at Madring because there was virtually no action on track — just a procession of laps.
Carlos Sainz was brought in as an ambassador and, after the appalling race and a tsunami of criticism from across the racing world, was forced to explain that he had nothing to do with the circuit layout, which was homologated by the FIA.
And maybe the problem lies right there.
Concerns about poor racing had been raised numerous times during the planning process, but were apparently rejected — not by the promoter or F1, but by the FIA.
The problem is that the negative consequences now fall first on the fans, then the promoter and F1 — while apparently very little falls on the FIA.
Apparently, solutions are already in place to be implemented for 2027.
Which raises a rather obvious question:
If the solutions were so quick to find, why weren’t they implemented in the first place — so that the very first Madrid GP could deliver the racing F1 fans expected?
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That’s a chequered flag 🏁 for today.
Tomorrow, best. 🏎️