This video explaining the 2016 Formula 1 tire regulations will make your head spin.

Why do Formula One teams need to employ armies of strategists and simulation engineers?  A few minutes into this clip and you might be asking yourself why it is that the brightest minds in motorsport have to chase after this kind of problem in the first place.

As you watch,  keep in mind teams will have picked compounds for the Australian GP in the middle of December, 2 months before the 2016 cars will have even rolled on their first test session.

In theory this will allow a greater "spread" in tire compounds to make more teams happy.  Over the past few seasons, Ferrari and Force India were hoping to softer tires while Red Bull and Mercedes like the harder compounds.Pirelli has tended to play it safe favoring the latter.

What this will mean in practice, remains to be seen.   For sure Steve Matchett will have his hand full explaining it to American audiences.

Rosberg takes final pole of 2015.

You might argue racing left a bit to be desired in 2015 but you cannot deny the 2015 Formula 1 cars are mighty things.

You don't think so?  Ride along with Nico Rosberg as he scores his sixth consecutive pole in Abu Dhabi, adding an exclamation point to Mercedes' almost complete domination this season.

Rosberg was almost 4/10th faster than his teammate, a huge margin considering they are in the same car.

Third place for Raikkonen who needs to end the season on a high and beat the other Finn who many had said should be in his Ferrari seat.

Ferrari needs Kimi to do well after their spectacular fail, telling Vettel to abort his  final lap in Q1 when it was obvious times were dropping like stones.   Anyone can screw up but that sort of thing looked like it had been eradicated from the Scuderia's pit wall.

Guess not,  as Lauda would say,  "it's bullshit!"

Vettel sings Happy Birthday.

Does this man know something we don't?

giroveloce.it

Because he sure is in a good mood despite a rather "non-headliny" Free Practice 2 in Abu Dhabi today.

Further analysis shows his long run pace to be suspiciously close to the two Mercedes.
Time for Toto to turn up the engines to 11? ( or is it 9.5...)

As for Seb,  maybe he couldn't care less about Instagram or those who accuse him of not caring about promoting the sport but, for sure,  he just gained another million fans.

Why Hamilton is not Senna.

Lewis Hamilton fans get irate with us when we point out attitudes that, in our eyes, are not worthy of a champion and a driver with  his undeniable talent.  

But somebody has to.

The vast majority of motorsport journalism is UK-centric, like the sport itself and Hamilton gets a pass on most of his off track pronouncements.  When, as it was reported this week, he slams his rivals and colleagues,  it gets glossed over by adoring writers.  

But it should not.

Axis is not alone of course,  Leo Turrini is one of the deacons of Italian sport journalism,  he is full of admiration for the Briton's talent but in a column this week, nails the problem with Hammy.

There is something rather discordant, writes Turrini, in the way Hamilton has been publicly  trying to diminish Rosberg's belated resurgence (and slamming his colleagues and rivals, from Schumacher to Vettel, Webber and Raikkonen).

Senna, who Hamilton, compares himself to often absolutely hated Prost as a human being, Turin says.  At least  until after '93 when "the Professor" retired, then they became great friends.

Despite the animosity,  Senna never once spoke ill of Prost's driving talent.  He considered him a great champion and said so every chance he got.

Nigel Mansell praised Piquet even though he wanted to punch him often.

Schumacher  always praised Hakkinen.

Vettel has always spoke highly of Alonso.

Why?

Because they were smart enough to realize that if they went around saying their rivals were no good, what would be diminished is their own accomplishment in beating them.

Hamilton seems incapable of grasping this concept.

That's why, concludes Turrini, he's no Senna.

We could not agree more.

Rosberg frustrates Hamilton in Brazil.

In what turned out to be a rather dull race up front, Nico Rosberg capitalized on is Saturday pole performance by dominating Lewis Hamilton who, for his part, lamented overtaking was not possible at Interlagos.

After blaming his mother and a cold for his early morning Zonda crash in Monaco and skipping the traditional post qualifying photo Saturday, today the British instagram star blamed the circuit.

I guess "18 year old" Max Verstappen didn't get the message.





For the second race in row, Mercedes gave both drivers identical strategies.  Toto Wolff confirmed this was to keep the peace within the team.   Indeed  Mercedes has been consistent, always basing strategy on the driver leading and it's interesting there wasn't really that much complaining about it when Hamilton was on a winning streak.

Be that as it may,  F1 needs to stop being a strategist's world championship and get back to being a driver's championship.    Drivers should be the ones making the calls on their tire and brake wear,  those sensors hold be eliminated.   If Hamilton wanted to try a crazy strategy today as he did in Monaco, he should have been allowed to.  

Unfortunately the reality of the prize money for points scheme likely means even Mercedes cannot risk entertaining the fans beyond turn one....

You be the steward: Kimi vs Valterri Pt II, The Finnish revenge.

For the second time in three races  it was a clash of Finns ad Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen and Williams' Valterri Bottas argued over ownership of  a tight right hand turn.

In Sochi last month is was Bottas on the outside with Raikkonen going for a low percentage lunge on the final lap.    Today, in Mexico City, positions were reversed.

Perkele ensued.



Bottas blamed Raikkonen saying the Ferrari driver knew he was on the inside and should have given him room.     After the Sochi clash, Bottas said he did not know Raikkonen was there and Raikkonen should have given him room....

Raikkonen said it's just racing and it did not matter.

Officials called it a racing incident which seems about right.

The two incidents were very similar but, once again the FIA's lack of consistency confuses:  Raikkonen, whose car was damaged and had to retire in Russia was hit with a grid penalty and license points.  Bottas who was able to continue and eventually finished on the podium was not sanctioned.

F1 deserves consistency.

What does Hamilton mean "unlike Schumacher"?

Lewis Hamilton in action

Never one to pass up the opportunity to keep his mouth shut,  Lewis Hamilton  told  Germany's Focus  he has has won his championships strictly because of his "natural ability", unlike Michael Schumacher who had done "other things" to win.

What those "other things" might be, the Briton did not elaborate on.  

Presumably, Hamilton whose first championship was owed to other people's errors and who has won two more after stepping into a car so superior to the rest of the field it has been accused of killing F1,  feels Schumacher  had it easy.

It's true, Schumacher never did have to pose in his underwear on Instagram which is hard work.  

Schumacher also spent five years raising Ferrari from chumps to champs at the turn of the century,  and later two seasons with the thankless task of developing the very car the British working class hero driver got to step into.  

Hamilton also had kind words for his teammate Nico Rosberg:   "Nico did really well this year, but  people can see I'm driving better"

Yup, Lewis is a natural alright.

Rosberg fastest in Mexico qualifying

For the fourth time in a row Nico Rosberg had the measure of Lewis Hamilton in qualifying,  besting the champion by about 2/10th. On the second row will be Sebastian Vettel and Danil Kwyat.

Hamilton said afterwards he was using a better race setup. The forecast for tomorrow is calling for a 90% chance of rain. 2/10th is not a difference between a full dry and a full wet setup so it will be interesting to see how thing play out.

For sure the lack of grip is providing lots of entertainment for the capacity crowd in Mexico City. It must be especially satisfying for race promoter Tavo Hellmund after the fall out with COTA investors to have such a huge success in Mexico.

Here's Rosberg's qualifying lap.

Pos	Driver	Team	Q1	Q2	Q3
1	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1:20.436	1:20.053	1:19.480
2	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1:20.808	1:19.829	1:19.668
3	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	1:20.503	1:20.045	1:19.850
4	Daniil Kvyat	Red BullRacing	1:20.826	1:20.490	1:20.398
5	Daniel Ricciardo	Red BullRacing	1:21.166	1:20.783	1:20.399
6	Valtteri Bottas	Williams	1:20.817	1:20.458	1:20.448
7	Felipe Massa	Williams	1:21.379	1:20.642	1:20.567
8	Max Verstappen	Toro Rosso	1:20.995	1:20.894	1:20.710
9	Sergio Perez	Force India	1:20.966	1:20.669	1:20.716
10	Nico Huldenberg	Force India	1:21.315	1:20.935	1:20.788
11	Carlos Sainz Jr.	Toro Rosso	1:20.960	1:20.942
12	Romain Grosjean	Lotus F1 Team	1:21.577	1:21.038
13	Pastor Maldonado	Lotus F1 Team	1:21.520	1:21.261
14	Marcus Ericsson	Sauber	1:21.299	1:21.544
15	Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	1:21.422	1:22.494
16	Fernando Alonso	McLaren	1:21.779
17	Felipe Nasr	Sauber	1:21.788
18	Alexander Rossi	Manor	1:24.136
19	Will Stevens	Manor	1:24.386