Nothing succeeds like success, as the phrase goes.
F1 in 2017 is learning this – having spent years demonstrating the veracity of the Bob Dylan equivalent that nothing succeeds like failure… But both are true. Things create their own momentum; good things can create a virtuous cycle. And small things can make a big difference.
Bigger numbers, two-seater rides, interviews in front of the grandstands, crying young fans being taken to meet their hero… All small things in F1 this year making a big difference; things that really the sport should have been doing years ago.
Yet it’s not just about that. In a happy coincidence it’s applied on track too with something like symmetry. Just like in the previous few years there are two main men at the front most of the time this season. But, in a crucial departure, those two are not inside the same team.
And the difference from this is massive. Two protagonists from different camps can hardly fail to thrill. As for team mate battles, some in the past have thrilled us, not least the Ayrton Senna vs. Alain Prost epic at McLaren. But much more often they a have wet blanket thrown over them by their bosses – Fangio and Moss; Andretti and Peterson; Schumacher and Barrichello… And even Lewis Hamilton vs Nico Rosberg – that same tete-a-tete of recent times that we touched upon. The Mercedes management rightly got plaudits for letting its two dominant drivers race. But in one sense they kept things well under control.
Two protagonists from different camps can hardly fail to thrill. As for team mate battles, some in the past have thrilled us, not least the Ayrton Senna vs. Alain Prost epic at McLaren. But much more often they a have wet blanket thrown over them by their bosses
And for our best illustration of the chasm between the two scenarios we can rewind roughly 18 months, to the Brazilian Grand Prix of 2015. It was a race that on track at least had little to recommend it. Nico led Lewis off the line, and that was that. But that’s a lot of the point.
“Is there a different strategy you could give me?,” Hamilton asked after 10 laps in Rosberg’s wake and unable to get close enough to pass. And the answer – despite repeated asking – was in the negative. He pitted a lap after Nico every time; got the same tyre compound too. Thus they circulated to the end in formation.
On the podium Lewis returned to the subject. “I’m here to race, and when you have to do the same [strategy] it’s kind of set from the beginning.
“For sure, if there’s any other strategies, let’s do it, let’s take a risk, let’s do whatever, they’re [the Mercedes team] like ‘look after the tyres’, I’m like ‘no I’m racing!’. I think that’s what people want to see, but unfortunately today as I say I couldn’t get close enough to be able to put on a great race.
“It was relatively boring following in a tow.” We noticed, Lewis. We noticed.
For sure, if there’s any other strategies, let’s do it, let’s take a risk, let’s do whatever, they’re [the Mercedes team] like ‘look after the tyres’, I’m like ‘no I’m racing!’. I think that’s what people want to see – Lewis Hamilton
He expanded on the subject in the press conference too. “It will be great to sometimes be able to do something different rather than ‘you’re in on lap 15 and you’re in on lap 16’. Have some options and see how it plays out.”
Nico’s comments in response to this sounded a little absurd, but also framed the team’s thinking. “It wouldn't be fair for the guy running second to go for another strategy and for it to turn out it was massively the better strategy. And you won the race just because of luck and the other strategy being so much quicker.”
It was the explicit Mercedes priority to keep everything even-handed. “If you start splitting the strategy, the controversy you create within the team is very bad,” boss Toto Wolff confirmed, “because first of all one might get the right call, the other one will get the bad call, then you have to discuss why one driver had Strategy A and the other had Strategy B”.
As for the point that they could have let go a bit as by this point the championships were sewn up, Wolff again spoke of keeping the balance even as doing that might create a “precedent” for the following season.
“It’s been like that here since 2013,” Wolff went on. “From the fan’s point of view I can understand that they might wish to see it different. But we could have done, like other teams, a number one and two driver where the number two is not allowed to fight at all. At least we haven’t done that and you have seen many good fights between them. But we don’t want to go this one step further.”
In many ways the Spanish race just passed was identical to that in Interlagos in 2015. Lewis running in second and struggling to get close to the leading car. Perhaps Lewis was quicker in clear air; perhaps not. But what we got could hardly have been more different. It all was down to having two different teams facing off
It wasn’t entirely true though, as in Merc’s early day of its recent era of pomp it did allow some constrained strategy variation. We recall the thrilling late laps in Bahrain in 2014; perhaps also Rosberg closing in on Hamilton late on in Spain a couple of rounds later. And both were set up by strategy splitting, wherein Nico against the grain bolted on the harder compound for the middle stint, allowing him to attack his team mate on softer tyres later on. But it seemed at some point between times – no doubt one of the instances of ‘controversy you create within the team’ that Wolff talked about – the squad lost its nerve on this one. And we watching on lost a lot of the entertainment.
And, to return the original point, what a difference comes from having two teams involved. In many ways the Spanish race just passed was identical to that in Interlagos in 2015. Lewis running in second and struggling to get close to the leading car. Perhaps Lewis was quicker in clear air; perhaps not.
But what we got could hardly have been more different. It all was down to having two different teams facing off.
No synchronised swimming was going down between Ferrari and Merc in Barcelona, instead it was no holds barred. Strike and counter strike. And it served to give us a thriller.
It started with a breathless Hamilton barely able to keep up with leader Vettel in the opening stint, despite his team imploring that it was vital to do so. And his team was right, as his eventual chipping into the Ferrari’s advantage in this first stint nudged Ferrari into pitting Seb earlier than ideal. It also involved the risk of having him emerge behind Daniel Ricicardo, though as it transpired that didn’t cost him much.
Then Merc put in part two of its plan, by running Lewis several laps longer before pitting in a classic ‘offset’ so he’d have fresher tyres than his rival later in the race (ironically an offset was one of the few options that Merc countenanced in Interlagos). In addition when the Englishman pitted Merc went contrary by putting the medium tyre on, setting him up to really attack on softs in the last stint when Seb would be on mediums himself. In a flourish also Merc kept Valtteri Bottas out even longer before pitting to hold Vettel up for a couple of laps.
No synchronised swimming was going down between Ferrari and Merc in Barcelona, instead it was no holds barred. Strike and counter strike. And it served to give us a thriller
The race looked hard to call anyway, but another twist came with a Virtual Safety Car period, thanks to Stoffel Vandoorne driving into the side of Felipe Massa. VSC periods can be pivotal in modern F1 as they can reduce the pit stop loss time to something like 10 seconds – around half what is usually lost. And by this point we were beyond half distance and pitting to run to the end was possible.
As outlined in James Allen’s as-ever excellent strategy review Vettel indeed radioed suggesting to the team that they pit, but the team apparently was still spooked by Canada last year when it lost control of a race from pitting in this scenario, and left Vettel out. Yet Merc had a conundrum too, as the only scenario under the VSC that would help it was Lewis pitting and Seb not. Two of the other ones – both pit or only Seb pits – would aid the German. Neither pitting would be neutral.
It looked to the outsider that the team ummed and ahhed, as Merc didn’t pit Lewis first time past then only did next time just as it was announced the VSC was about to end. Wolff insisted after the race that this was deliberate so to ensure Ferrari couldn’t respond by also pitting under the VSC. Whatever, the move gained Lewis around half of the eight second deficit he had to Seb.
He gained the rest on his out lap on fresh rubber, to the point that Seb expressed surprise that when he pitted next time round he emerged to find Lewis right alongside. He (robustly) held Lewis off at the pit exit, but Lewis on his softer tyres kept coming, and eventually got the deed done by passing to lead.
One more strategy twist was possible as Ferrari spoke of a ‘Plan C’, presumably stopping one more time to attack on soft tyres. But Lewis kept himself just far enough ahead to allow him to react to any such Ferrari stunt. Thus the point became moot.
Over the last couple of years, Mercedes I think backed away from letting anyone take strategic risks or doing anything too different. So it meant that every race did kind of play out in the same way. We’re not going to have that this year – Glenn Freeman
And a galling thought is that simply replacing Vettel with Rosberg in another Merc in Barcelona’s race would likely have given us an afternoon a lot like that in Brazil in 2015. Straight from stupefying to soporific.
“This is the great thing about having two drivers fighting in rival teams,” noted Autosport’s Glenn Freeman afterwards on this very subject. “I think we’ve seen over the last couple of years, Mercedes I think backed away from letting anyone take strategic risks or doing anything too different. So it meant that every race did kind of play out in the same way.
“We’re not going to have that this year, and Spain was the perfect example of it, and that made it captivating. It’s another thing that bodes well for the rest of the season.”
Remember what we said about small things making a big difference.