#racing point 2020

[delulu-4-lewlew]

I fear these cars will never serve cunt like the Pink Mercedes.

[pitconfirm]

Lance and Checo chat during lockdown in 2020

[feraltwinkseb]

Lance Stroll celebrates with his pole position award November 14, 2020 - Istanbul, Turkey Source: Clive Mason/Getty Images

[scrollonso]

it's so insane to me how even in 2020 people were shitting on lance even though out of all the races he finished in that season he only finished out of the points ONCE.

out of 11 races he completed he got points for 10.

in the austrian gp lance lost power and dnf (not his fault ofc)

in the styrian gp lance finished 7th (qualified 13th)

in the hungarian gp lance finished 4th (qualified 3rd)

in the british gp lance finished 9th (qualified 6th)

in the anniversary gp lance finished 6th (same in quali)

in the spanish gp lance finished 4th (qualified 5th)

in the belgian gp lance finished 9th (same in quali)

in the italian gp lance finished 3rd (qualified 8th)

in the tuscan gp lance got a puncture and dnf (he was doing amazing, having gotten from 7th up to 3rd-5th before a nasty crash)

in the russian gp lance spun out (this race was so insane, like 3 incidents in the first 3 corners)

in the eifel gp nico raced for lance (he had covid)

in the portugal gp lance dnf (early contact with lando, basically ruined his race)

in the emilia gp lance finished 13th (qualified 15th, only time he finished out of points)

in the turkish gp lance finished 9th (qualified 1st, very wet race)

in the bahrain gp lance dnf (he flipped, scary crash in a scary race)

in the sakhir gp lance finished 3rd (qualified 10th)

in abu dahbi lance finished 10th (qualified 8th)

to summarize, lance isn't as bad as people say he is ur just mad his dad actually loves him >-<

[batsplat]

Qatar 2004: a back-of-the-grid penalty, an "unbelievable" start, a lot of overtakes and a crash

Time stamps

News & explanation of penalty

0:00 - news of penalty, "... Rossi's team who took it upon themselves last night, and Biaggi's team as well, to go out there and clean that spot on the grid and there was a complaint from the Repsol Honda team..."

1:23 - press room chaos, "... when I went down between the 125s and the 250s, when nothing had been quite confirmed, there was a lot of very excited Italians around with bits of papers in hand and accusations..."

2:08 - Gibernau's opportunity, "Looking at the championship, this is a huge race for Sete Gibernau. He knows that he's starting from the front row of the grid; he knows that Valentino Rossi starts from the back row of the grid."

2:25 - race predictions, "[Rossi] has struggled hasn't he, this weekend, we've seen him go off track quite a few times as well."

On the grid

2:40 - Rossi on the grid, "Just wonder what his mood is. Will he look and smile? No, he won't. He is seething."

3:38 - Gibernau's reprieve, "He's got to win this race."

3:54 - Gibernau's form, "... so one thing Gibernau can't complain about this season is his luck..."

4:14 - Rossi preparing, "When he's really concentrating you don't know what's going to happen."

Start of race

4:21 - warm-up lap, "[When we usually] ride with Valentino Rossi, he's riding to the front of the grid, in pole position or on that front row. Now we're going to see the grid all in front of him."

4:45 - race start, "Valentino Rossi has made up - whoa - around ten positions into the first corner, maybe even more."

5:24 - overtaking Hayden, "He's already back into that eighth position that he would have been on on the grid if it weren't for that penalty."

5:55 - Rossi's starts at Yamaha, "He's been making some good starts this year, actually, has Rossi on the Yamaha, but never quite as good as that."

6:09 - overtaking Bayliss and Capirossi, "Rossi surely has now moved up into seventh place."

His progress

6:54 - stuck in the pack, "He's having to work very very hard to get past the likes of Colin Edwards and Alex Barros and Ruben Xaus."

7:08 - overtaking Barros, "... and Rossi and Barros have touched! And Rossi stays on board and raises his hand to Barros, Barros runs it wide and Rossi knows there that he's the guilty party for that one."

7:36 - replay of Barros overtake, "He's apologised to Barros but the upshot is that he's got past him."

7:53 - Nakano's engine fails, "Of course all that does is move Valentino Rossi further up the pack." [...] "... it's helped Gibernau and Checa in front because while all that happened with Nakano blowing smoke everywhere, everyone else behind him has had to slow down."

8:12 - Barros falling back, "Barros is actually now down in 17th place, so I'm not sure if he was hit by Valentino Rossi and perhaps he's damaged one of his brakes or his clutch lever or maybe even part of his body."

The crash

8:42 - Rossi crashes, "His hands are on his head [...] He runs wide onto the grass, onto the astroturf, loses control of his Yamaha..."

9:41 - the championship standings, "Fourteen points, what a lifeline for Sete Gibernau."

The full race is available here.

In 2004, Valentino Rossi came into Qatar with a 39-point lead in the championship over Sete Gibernau. Including Qatar, there were still four races to go, and Gibernau's excellent early season form had tailed off. Gibernau had made the podium in all of the first six races (including 2 wins), but in the six subsequent races had only scored two podiums (1 win) and had DNF'd twice. The title seemed like it would be Rossi's once again - his first on a Yamaha.

This was the first time MotoGP visited Qatar and the conditions were brutal: then still a daytime race, it was very hot, with all the riders struggling on the slippery sand-covered track. Rossi had gone off the track repeatedly in the sessions leading up to the race, qualifying only in eighth. The concern was that the dusty track would lead to poor starts, so Rossi's team used a scooter during the night to lay down rubber on his grid slot. The next morning, there was outrage - and Honda filed a complaint against Rossi. (It is a little unclear whether the main instigators were Respol Honda, who were supposedly officially behind the request, or Gibernau's Honda Gresini team, whose team boss Fausto Gresini allegedly took the complaint to race direction.) The physical evidence along with a blurry photo reportedly taken from the press room was enough to sway race direction. A six second penalty was applied to Rossi's qualifying time, leaving him to start at the back of the grid. Yamaha filed a counter-protest against Camel Honda rider Max Biaggi, whose team had swept sand off the grid slot, and he was given the same penalty.

The penalty infuriated Rossi and he blamed Gibernau and his Honda Gresini team directly for what had happened. He considered it a dirty game from Honda given that riders typically got away with tampering with grid slots (usually in the context of wet races where towels would be used). It is unknown to what extent, if at all, Gibernau was directly involved in the complaint - he denied it after the race, publicly saying he thought Rossi "didn't deserve" the penalty. Here is what Rossi reportedly said in the immediate aftermath of the penalty (from Stuart Barker's 2020 biography):

“I’ve been looking for an excuse not to talk to Sete. Today he gave me one.” “Sete was the one who was behind all this,” he said. “He has acted like a child. It is like a knife has been pushed into my back.”

In any case, Rossi made an excellent start from the back of the grid, getting up to ninth by Turn 1 and making up two more positions in the first lap. He continued working his way through the field, including by overtaking Alex Barros:

Rossi had made it up to fourth and was sitting behind Colin Edwards when he ran wide onto the grass and crashed on only lap 5 out of 22. He walked away head in hands at his mistake and had badly injured his little finger - though not enough to be an issue for the rest of his season. As he put it in press before the next race in Sepang: “I have a hole in the finger, but I don’t think it’s a big problem for ride this weekend”. Gibernau won the race, making it a Gresini 1-2 alongside teammate Edwards. Rossi's championship lead had been whittled down to a mere 14 points with three rounds to go.

Rossi was still furious at Gibernau, reportedly calling his team "bastards" on live television, and, of course, vowing that Gibernau would never win another race again. For the rest of the season, he took matters into his own hands to ensure his promise would be kept. He won the remaining three races - including with two risky last lap passes on Gibernau in Australia, when a second place would have been enough to clinch the title.

Here he is in his autobiography (published in 2005) on the benefits and perils of riding angry:

At the 2003 Australian Grand Prix I was very fast, I was ahead, I was leaving Capirossi way behind. We were still in the first part of the race when I was made aware that I was now second. I was still in the lead, but I was in second place [initially in seventh] because I had been given a ten-second penalty for ignoring the yellow caution flags. Yes, the silly caution flags which the stewards, for reasons known only to them, insist on putting in invisible places, where nobody can see them. The same thing had cost me a win at Donington a few months earlier. "Enough!" I told myself. And, from there, I went on a tear. Without realising it, I started going even faster. I gained back nearly a second per lap, and, by the end, I was once again in first place. I had made up the ten seconds and there was still time to increase my lead. It's not as if I had been biding my time before the penalty that day. I wasn't planning on saving myself for the end. No, I was going as hard as I could. It's just that, afterwards, I went even harder, crazy as it sounds. I turned my rage into pure speed. Most riders can't do that. For them, rage just raises the level of tension and increases their chances of making crucial mistakes. I'm like that too - some of the time. Qatar in 2004 is a good example of that. I remember, I was absolutely furious because Honda had filed a complaint and I was forced to start from the last row. In just a few laps, I had come back up the field into fourth place. I should have calmed myself down and waited for the right moment. Instead, I fell. Looking back on it, that was a moment of uncontrollable folly. Normally it doesn't work that way. Normally I can control it. Or, at least, my brain can. And I'm thankful for that, or else I'd really be in trouble!

^"This time, and for once, Valentino Rossi does not escape."

[inhidingxoxo3637]

I'm really happy Aleix is doing good but I do also miss watching him be a road block and a half back in 2020

[run-towards-something]

Checo comforting George after Sakhir 2020 is something that can be so personal

[checoarchive]

Checo you will always be famous.

[kimisicecream]

The most impressive thing Ferrari has ever done is somehow convince the entire world of F1 that Kimi Räikkönen is the only driver they ever did right by when in reality they did him so fucking wrong.

[lewishcmilton]

I made fun of ferrari for being so useless despite having good drivers and millions of dollars but seeing mercedes rn is just like. wow karma is real (mercedsz being useles)

[checoswrld]

A day like today two years ago... 🎉🏆

THE MAN WHO WAS IN LAST PLACE AT THE END OF LAP ONE, COMES HOME TO WIN THE SAKHIR GRAND PRIX, SERGIO PEREZ, WOW, WHAT A RACE!!!

[feraltwinkseb]

September 3, 2020 - Monza, Italy Source: Mark Thompson/Getty Images

[sebnameyourcar]

😶

[vetteldixon]

Sergio Pérez hugs his race engineer Chris Cronin after finishing 2nd at the 2020 Turkish Grand Prix. (📸 Mark Sutton)

[singsweetmelodies]

katiee, your lovely styria anon is making me have a breakdown over piarles races that are very significant to not only their careers but also to each other

like this makes me remember monza, they will always have monza! they're tied together, their names are inked next to each other in history and the fact monza is their favourite race win?? like it was the race pierre got to fulfill one of his biggest dreams, the biggest possible fuck you to rb & everyone that doubted him. for charles, it's the race where he got the meaning of belonging, the understanding of the true power of ferrari and tifosi, it's where he finally felt accepted and loved. monza is theirs individually but also theirs collectively, only they have felt true magic there

and in 2019, it was a hard weekend for pierre (with the press conference picture you reblogged, with still processing anthoine's death, with dealing with the true weight of him going back to toro rosso), but he was so happy for charles anyways? and in 2020, it was a hard weekend for charles, a ferrari double dnf in monza of all places in one of the worst years ferrari has ever lived through, and then it was a huge crash, even he said that it was big. for charles, whose first response is to always ask about the car or yell at himself, he was so shaken up that he couldn't stop saying that it was a huge hit. he would have had bruises for days and that idiot was so happy with pierre winning that he not only postponed his medical check up but also watched the podium. how many drivers except the ones on the podium, even watch it?? he also nearly threw off romain to hug pierre. charles is never happy unless he wins and he was GRINNING for him like he had won it himself

charles and pierre always continue to place their friendship over everything else, they keep choosing each other every single time because they know what they have, even platonic, is something special, is something they'll never have with someone else. it's just them against the world, against every other person

they've been each other's number one constant their whole lives (i would have said este too but with the ups and downs in their relationship, i don't think he's a constant the way charles is) and now they share such a huge thing.

I can see them keep coming to visit monza again and again together, even when they've both retired (even if they have failed to recognise that they're soulmates in more than just the romantic sense hehe)

monza is theirs, they've made it theirs, and nobody can ever take it from them.

ahhhh, HIIII my lovely monza anon, and sorry for being the most distractible person in the world and only getting to this reply now 🙈🙈 but omg. THIS!! every word you have said here makes me ‼️ in the best way possible.

like. their names forever being inked together in history at monza... find me flat on the FLOOR omg. it always makes me think of that one interview where pierre is talking about them watching f1 on charles' couch and dreaming about making it one day, but knowing how small the odds are. but now they're HERE!! those two little dreamers are here, they made it, and they made it together, and monza will always be a reflection and an irrefutable proof of that. AHHHHHHHHHHHHH.

ALSO!! everything you said about them being happy for each other's monza wins despite everything is just... yes. yes yes YES. in both 2019 AND 2020, it would have been more than understandable if pierre and charles weren't visibly happy for each other/didn't go congratulate each other. but no. they literally said "no <3" and "he's my best friend" and celebrated each other as though they were the ones who had won. and i just. ahhhhhhhhhhhhh. they just mean so much to each other, even if you put all shipping aside - their support and genuine joy for each other is just absolutely beautiful, and definitely something special in this sport.

and everything you said about them being constants for each other... gahhhh, go straight for my heart, why don't you? like. that is one of the things i love most about piarles. the history, the familiarity, the "of course i'll be there with you" of it all. it just makes me want to scream and cry and tear my hair out because THAT. that is what otps are made of. that is the epitome of childhood best friends to lovers and i just... AHHHHHHHHHHHHH ❤️❤️❤️

and as for that second-last paragraph of yours... you know, i feel like this is something that should become a fic. 20k slow burn best friends to lovers; them going to monza year after year and making it a tradition because "it's our place, pear. no matter what happens, it's ours" 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺❤️ and!!!! oh my GOD... i was just listening to the song walls by louis tomlinson earlier tonight, and. that lyric "for every question why, you were my because?" THAT. don't you think that would be the most perfect title for a piarles monza fic like this?! ‼️‼️‼️

... anyways. yes. well this answer got incredibly long and rambly, to the surprise of none 😅😅 but, monza anon, i love you so much and thank you so so very much for sending this amazing ask 😍❤️❤️❤️

[delulu-4-lewlew]

Bitter spice and sky sports saying that this was p*rez’s best race is straight up bullocks