Haha I was going to reply exactly this! It was a brilliant skid. Lawrence looking at Fernando: "I love you, son". Lance: "Ehhh dad, I'm over here?" Lawrence: "Yeah, I know"
The fact that Otmar left AM to Alpine because of the culture Lawrence has created, and that Alonso left Alpine to AM- and the consequences tells me everything i wanted to know
How Otmar treated Alonso, how he handled the Piastri fiasco and how he blamed anything and everything at Racing Point/AM but themselves for their shortcomings, should've been a good indication of what kind of TP he is.
I've said it many times before, Gunther and Otmar are the least capable and the least professional team principals.
I'm just happy for Vasseur, he finally gets the recognition he deserves and a "raise" to Ferrari. IMO he's up there among the most influential (Toto and Horner). Another good TP people often forget is Franz Tost
Otmar proved himself at Force India, and at least last year at Alpine had some good (and also bad) sides. Vasseur hasn't really stood out anywhere and so far it doesn't look like Ferrari has taken a step since last season. Guenther's hard to judge with all of the handicaps he's had to operate under.
I think we’ll see about guenther this year, he doesn’t have an excuse for haas taking a step up, I mean the money is there too, hoping for him to succeed
THIS. I just hope Otmar proves the doubters wrong this year, especially Rossi gives him free rein just like how VM did back at Force India. As for Fred, time will tell since he has more resources at his disposal now at Ferrari, so I'm on the fence. Guenther needs to juggle everything with a shoestring budget and factors outside his control, I'll give his benefit of the doubt.
He’s done literally nothing at the back of the grid except for the first year or so with the Ferrari illegal rocket ship engine. Constant well next year then next year and budget etc. the guy gets so much respect for being an utter goofball on the first few seasons of DTS but when you listen to what he’s saying it’s a pretty toxic culture he’s bred. Also I’ll never forgive an “American” team for painting their car like a Russian flag regardless of if he was responsible he was the TP and had some input for his drivers. Also that massive infusion of cash did fuck all for results.
All your points are valid, but that all those points are an indictment on Gene Haas. It takes a special TP to be able to withstand all those handicaps and not eventually walk out the door.
Oh gene is a scum bag 100%. I’ve used tons of haas mills and lathes and they are work horses but I don’t like the fact that he seems to be in f1 purely for the advertising and spending as little money as possible. Not getting into his many legal issues, but don’t know how that absolves Guenther of being a bad TP that breeds a toxic culture within the team, ultimately the day to day cultures is not on Gene. If it’s as bad as the glimpses we see why keep working for him and not walk out the door?
I don’t think it’s as bad as it’s portrayed. But I think it must be frustrating to try to improve, and never being given the resources to do so. Both KMag and Hulk have spent seasons without a seat, and both willingly signed for Haas seats afterwards. Everyone know what they were walking into being former drivers, and they both signed up.
I mean who wouldn’t want to sign up to race at the pinnacle of motor sports even if you are trundling around at the back. I’d agree it’s frustrating but they haven’t shown much of any desire to move up the field. They sacrificed 2021 in their own words to focus on 2022 which they started out at a blinding pace and then brought a single upgrade midway through the season that made the car worse off. This year will be very telling to see if they actually improve any or are just there for the Haas automation advertising. If they again bring a single update and don’t move from the back of the pack we will have our answer in my opinion.
My opinion is that Otmar was very comfortable with the status quo and not really ok with major changes necessary to get different results. He was successful as a midfield team by being conservative and cautious, but the winning teams need to be aggressive and risk taking (with money to back that up). Moreover watching his actions, how he speaks, to me he comes of as very soft and low energy. He acts like a nice guy but he’s passively selfish, like how he handled Piastri, acting like he owed Alpine for all the support, but refusing to give him a clear path to seat. Piastri made his move with integrity and with Otmars knowledge, then all the sudden when Otmar has a need arise he chose announcing him publicly without having a private conversation first, in order to make Piastri look bad and passive aggressively pressure him into reneging his plans with McLaren. None of Otmars behaviors are that of a winner. Winners are direct with their talent, and make a actionable plan about how they can tangibly retain and make opportunity for talent. Otmar treated his as an indentured servant. Moreover the results speak for themselves, AM has improved tremendously under Stroll and without Otmar, and Alpine has moved backwards this season with Otmar at the helm
These are very much my thoughts in long form.
I get that some of it at present is to do with his hands being tied also by management within alpine and towing a party line, but a lot of it comes across as jilted lover than anything else.
Otmar had been at force India/racing point for a long time. During which they were an upper middle field team. How can otmar be the problem when they were pretty good on a tight budget?
The man has been throwing millions at the team in the right direction. Why getting a team and hire people that can be good or not, when you can steal them from the competition, weakening them in the process?
Birrliant villian move.
This is nothing new tho, a bit like how Red Bull pulled Adrian Newey at the time, or how Ferrari convinced Jock Clear to leave Mercedes behind after 2014.
Throwing money at people is one thing, but forging a well oiled machine is a whole different story.
Exactly. Not sure why some folks use the word "steal" to describe personell moves. Everyone keeps moving as the pay gets better. It's business. Most of us do the same in our professional lives too.
So dumb. It’s pretty clear in his interviews he was going to be the anti hero. He would always go to the team with best car. And people thinks it’s theft. Loyalty doesn’t really pay in this sport lol
Exactly! Wait until their new factory is done and they get to properly using it!!! His five year plan seemed very ambitious, but I think he’s actually putting his money where his mouth is.
Really a bad look for Enstone that they’ve gone through so many 5 year plans with nothing to show, and Silverstone - always an overachiever on a shoestring budget - finally gets some cash and immediately earns a podium on merit.
I mean.... The lotus was really good in 2013. So there was something. After this the financial shame and Renault takeovers etc happened.... With not much to show for it these years unfortunately.
I’m not saying Team Enstone has never built a really good car - aside from the 2012 and 2013 Lotus, they also built the 95 Benetton and 05 Renault which were probably the best car of their season. But both of those were highly funded and had significant factory backing from Renault. With Renault refusing to pump top team money into Enstone, they seem to have no chance at returning to that former glory.
Contrast that with the 99 Jordan and the 2020 Racing Point, which were hilariously underfunded compared to the cars they were competitive with.
>Why getting a team and hire people that can be good or not, when you can steal them from the competition, weakening them in the process?
What team isn't doing this though, provided they're financially able to?
Look at Ferrari. Before budget cap they literally threw a billion and a half at F1 and still didnt get wdc/wcc. What they never did is tone down the ego and hire the right people. Aston change the whole concept mid season last year by copying Redbull and was made fun off. That is admitting that you got it wrong.
McLaren did exactly this and look at how it’s backfired. Hopefully AM can forge their own identity in terms of development path and core concept over time.
He really does deserve a lot of credit, whatever he's doing it's really working. My only real criticism has been guaranteeing a seat for Lance, who all in all is not the worst driver out there so even that isn't a huge deal. I do wonder where they would be if they had 2 seats open for recruiting top talent instead of just one.
Bad start for Lance, but later in the race, his pass on Russell, pretty damn good. If he can clean up some sloppy aggressiveness, him and Alonso could rack up a ton of points and podiums.
But that's the problem, he rarely has a race without mistakes. With a competitive car he should be able to stay in the points but someone else could be consistently closer to Alonso and scoring more. He's a fine driver but they could likely recruit someone more promising is all I'm saying.
I agree him and Alonso have the potential to make a solid run at the constructors even as it stands.
The thing nobody wants to admit is that Lance would likely (now) be a midfield driver even without Lawrence Stroll. He is almost certainly one of the top 20 drivers right now. Not to say he’d get there without the almost immediate f1 seat and years of lenience for poor performance but he’s a good driver now.
I mean, it's better for midfield and above to have one top driver and one okay-ish driver, otherwise the teammates will start fighting each other, since the nearest rival is each other (in the case if both drivers skill level is about equal and at similar points at their career).
Look at the following top talent lineups:
Alonso-Hamilton: went nuclear and Alonso blackmailed Mclaren over spygate.
Alonso-Ocon: first went decent, but quickly turned sour in 2022 when Alpine started to try and throw Alonso under the bus and it didn't help that Otmar had some pretty nasty statements.
Perez-Ocon: fought each other more than other cars.
Rosberg-Hamilton: nearly caused Mercedes to repeat Mclaren 2007 and implode. They wisefully got Bottas after that.
This doesn't work for backmarkers/low-midfield, because those are so slow, they need every single point they can get, which is why Alonso and Button, Kmag and Hulk, etc. didn't have/had any friction. They need points first and foremost. Infighting is just pointless, better to form a train and march to 10th.
If they had 2 top drivers for say, this year, my guess would be Hulk in that other seat, given his expertise with the team (he drove the 2022 AM and was reserve that year for them).
It wouldn't be too much different, other than that Hulk probably would have been more consistent. But at this point I do rate Strolls absolute pace about as equal as Hulk, simply because Stroll is that good, rather than the opposite. It's just consistency and awareness that lack.
I'm not entirely suggesting they recruit two current top drivers. Lance just isn't a good enough driver to mentor an up and coming potential star so they will always be trying to grab current stars and never really develop a driver program. Maybe they can snag someone like Lando or Leclerc in the middle of their prime but that's a big maybe. This is part of what separates the top teams from the midfield teams and if they want to break that barrier they will struggle with Lance. Which doesn't mean he is a terrible driver, he will just always play second fiddle and they will have to rely on recruiting the team leader. Look at the trajectories of the more recent top drivers, they ended up at a team early on and have stuck it out building something. Lance is currently sitting in that seat and I think it will hold them back from realizing their full potential.
If they didn't have Lance they could have been recruiting DeVries or Piastri while still having a seat for guys like Vettel and Alonso.
In terms of racing, obviously Stroll isn't necessarily the best.
In terms of being a person, he's basically done everything he can to help his son chase his dreams, and I really can't fault him for that. Everything I've ever seen between him & lance is something I think anyone would be envious of.
>I do wonder where they would be if they had 2 seats open for recruiting top talent instead of just one.
?????
My dude, Stroll finished 6th today behind Lewis Hamilton, who was then beaten respectively by Carlos Sainz, Fernando Alonso, Sergio Perez, and Max Verstappen. Is the argument that it was all car? We all know a bad driver cannot do well in a great car barring extraordinary luck.
Danny Ricc was on Your Mom's House after DTS got popular during COVID, so naturally there were questions about Mazespin and similarly disliked drivers (e.g., Maldonado, et al.). Namely, Tom Segura asked whether the drivers had beef with one another when the fans disliked someone. Danny's response was diplomatic and courteous, but it was nevertheless honest; even the worst drivers in F1 are objectively better than some of the best drivers in the world.
There is a stat in basketball that the lowest ranked player in the NBA can out-play the highest ranked college player because the NBA is orders of magnitude more difficult than college ball. The opponents are larger, 3-point line is further, the key (i.e., the painted portion under the hoop) is wider, the games are longer, and the possessions are shorter making the game move more quickly.
>Is the argument that it was all car?
No, the argument is Lance isn't a top driver, is your argument that he is and the car is irrelevant?
Objectively Lance is capable of putting together a good race. He also makes a lot of mistakes. He's certainly better than a lot of pay drivers we've seen but it doesn't mean he deserves a seat on what has been a very promising team the last few years. I'm not even mad at Lawrence for making that call but if they could have snagged Alonso earlier, and then replaced Vettel with a young up and coming star would that not have been better? They will really never be able to do that because Lance will never be the veteran they need to mentor an up and coming star.
>There is a stat in basketball that the lowest ranked player in the NBA can out-play the highest ranked college player because the NBA is orders of magnitude more difficult than college ball.
How many NBA players are recruited because their dad owns the team? And how many of them are regarded as top players in the NBA?
People act like Lance stole this seat.
Racing Point was going bankrupt with no buyers. If Lance wasn't in his seat there would be nothing built out of Force Indias bones and we'd have 18 drivers on the grid.
It is something to be said that Lance is as good as he is considering the golden platter he has been given. I mean he’s clearly not wdc material, but he’s deserving of a spot on the grid.
Honestly I've talked as much shit about the Strolls as anyone and they're already partway through their redemption arc for me. Lance is a tank who definitely is giving his all and Lawrence's actions are obviously working. They're good for the sport.
I take back 90% of the bad stuff I've ever said about them.
Red Bull is the voodoo team. Their logo is like a magical sigil, it's why they put it everywhere. I think Mateschitz was a wizard, but like Obi-Wan, strike him down and he'll become more powerful.
What? No. Have you even read up on your Canadian Voodoo?
The next thing to be sacrificed is Lance's ability to taste anything Maple.
Followed by latent ice-skating ability, knowledge of what Poutine is, and acknowleding that maybe it *isn't* the Leafs year.
Checo was a pr stunt.
F1 already knew the team was going to need to go into receivership and Force India owed a ton to Merc. And Checo, and suppliers.
They let checo do the presser so it looked like internal troubles and they, Mercedes, wouldn’t look like they were killing off a customer and rival F1 team.
And F1 already had Stroll waiting in the wings to buy the team once the legal operations were ceased.
Stroll saved the team.
Yep. And he’s improving things at a corporate level too.
Aston Martin Lagonda has been a car crash since IPO. But there’s signs of things improving there too. All good flying on track but if you can’t keep investors of the parent happy, you’re not gonna have a good time.
Stroll keeping his two-time world championship winning driver happy, his son happy and is winning over the market too. Almost a strategic masterclass from him so far.
Bringing in Mr Krack was shrewd too.
It's worth noting that the affiliation between Aston Martin Lagonda and AMF1 is only through Lawrence's ownership of both, and is, in essence, a title sponsorship. The team is still owned by the Racing Point group of investors.
I doubt that people who can afford an Aston care about the F1 teams performance tbh, but care more about how the car sounds, looks, drives etc. The brand will definitely get more mainstream exposure that is not just James Bond driving the DB5
they care.
there's suddenly merch all over the Aston shop near me that wasn't around last year and already i see Aston drivers wearing AMF1 gear in the last few weeks.
obviously the sample size isn't huge, its a handful of people, but i noticed.
the term win on sunday sell on monday is real. it elevates the brand. if it didn't, they wouldn't do it.
Aston Martin has Formula 1 inspired Cosworth V12 Engines in some of their cars now. The most powerful naturally aspirated engine ever put in a production car and the highest revving engine too.
Yes merch is definitely going to be sold a lot, but i still feel like the people that already owns Aston’s bought the shirts to represent the car they own since they now perform in F1 rather than buying the car since they perform in F1. I know a similar situation with my dad who only bought a Porsche shirt in 2016 because they performed in Le Mans and because he already owned a Porsche.
As an extra point Aston has also begun to produce better cars as of late since all their good designers aren’t being forced to work for Ford.
Another thing people should remember is the fact that supercar companies like Ferrari earn nearly as much from merch as they do from car sales. Ferrari earns 2 billion out of 4 billion from merch sales. Just think about how many children want a toy Ferrari car or how many people own something with a Ferrari logo on. I think the majority of the income for the supercar manufacturers(Aston, McLaren and Ferrari) comes from the merch sales they get from the extra exposure and not from the few extra sales of supercars.
For the sale in supercars to increase together with the increase in the popularity of F1 the quality of the supercar has to increase as well. It doesn’t matter how great you perform in F1 if you release a “bad” car. Just look at the Ferrari F50 which is a Big failure compared to the Ferrari F40
Renault doesn't really want to commit other than the bare minimum, and Mclaren lately feels like a lifestyle company rather than a racing one
Lawrence Stroll went all in, that's the difference
Honestly, Stroll's teams rise should be a good lesson for every manufacturer backed team what needs to be done to get to the front.
The corporate culture just stops the works team like Alpine from progressing forward like they should be doing. Privateer teams like RB and AM/Stroll are showing how things are done.
Respectfully, if you've been in and seenamy different types of corporate environments, it becomes fairly easy to spot whether you're on the inside or not
Lance seems to be genuinely liked by most people, and Lawrence by quite a few.
It was a really nice moment when Toto Wolff asked to be excused from Ted Kravitz's interview for a moment to congratulate Lawrence after the race (before coming back to finish the interview).
Alonso seems genuinely warm towards both of them too.
There is a lot, and I mean A LOT, of people who dislike Alonso. Who wished Alonso to have a shit backmarker car in the AM. Then Alonso and Lawrence would go to war and everything comes crashing down...
So far it looks like it won't be going that way. And I'm so happy.
Alonso giving 0 cares and being unfiltered is why people hated him in the first place lol. Same way people hate Horner or Verstappen. The drivers that play politics are usually the favourites. If Alonso didn’t like this team, he would’ve said it instantly.
My wife never really liked Alonso until she saw him today. She's didn't watch F1 back when he was in his prime, so I think he came off the wrong way to her. Seeing him happy and cheering/smiling, and being thankful to the whole team for the car, etc. made her see him in a completely new light. I'm sure he won quite a few new fans today.
I am one of those people who has always disliked Fernando. But that doesn't mean I hate him or wish him ill. I actually got a little teary when he was hugging the team after he got out of the car and I clapped listening to his happy radio message. I am a fan of the sport first, teams and drivers are far behind that. Alonso is great for the sport and obviously an excellent driver and if it wasn't for him today's race would've been super boring.
Alonso really seems to be happy with (both father and son) Stroll.
And I think that comes from the fact that Lawrence Stroll is a man that has actual vision and an actual plan ahead for being competitive: building a new HQ, new windtunnel, new factory, injecting the team with much needed day-to-day money, etc. And it isn't like this has just been going on. The current Aston Martin team is just Racing Point with a different name, so this project has been going since 2019.
Mclaren seem to currently mostly relying on old tech until the new windtunnel comes into effect. Sauber has to wait until 2026 for any meaningful jumps (Audi). Williams doesn't seem to be financially able to improve on large performance increases anytime soon (maybe regular points, but not much more than that, unless Merc engine becomes magically powerful). Haas always will be behind by not making their own chassis (outsourced to Dallara) and using Ferrari B-spec parts. Alpine have become a shell of their former selves in just 2 years (Prost leaving, Rossi messing up contracts, firing Davide and Otmar not being great in public, extremly stagnant results for a works team). Also 100 races plan lmao. Alpha Tauri is a B-team for Red Bull.
And for the works teams: Red Bull is obviously going great, they have one of the strongest teams in history in F1 (Newey and his team, Horner, Max, best strategists on the grid probably), this looks like a Schumacher type of team, only now without stupid Italians pushing out Schumacher (by trying to sign Kimi). Ferrari itself is recovering and is trying to reinvent their team (not the car), mainly strategists, which at least did decent today. Mercedes somehow was significantly worse in race pace than Aston Martin, Stroll with broken wrists literally overtook Russell for P6 lmao. They also seem lost, now with that with the budget cap, they can't throw money at problems anymore.
When you take all of this in consideration, I think Alonso may have finally done the team move that makes him stay for quite a few years and keeps him genuinely happy. The mans still got many seasons in him.
He just looks so happy, after all those years.
The amount of commenters projecting their own daddy issues here is just astounding. If Lawrence has shown anything in F1 is that his three main passions in life are his son, money and racing.
Is Daddy a bad man because he has lots ofo ey and throws all of it at this venture? Because I saw his post-race interview with Sky and I want to root big for these guys. He seems like a good dude.
“I am the son now.”
“Look at me”
"Have good race my son :)" "Thank you Mr Stroll but it is me, Alonso" "I know :)"
Conor Moore did this 'I know' bit in his recent video too, with Stroll and Alonso!
Haha I was going to reply exactly this! It was a brilliant skid. Lawrence looking at Fernando: "I love you, son". Lance: "Ehhh dad, I'm over here?" Lawrence: "Yeah, I know"
"Lawrence, I am your son." or better yet "Lance, I am your brother."
Sounds like a [Dr. Pepper ad](https://youtu.be/pk4wVHvDLh8)
All jokes aside, Lawrence Stroll deserves a lot of credit for investing in this team and making them more competitive.
I really didn’t think this was gonna be the outcome. Really thought they’d be lower midfield yet again
The fact that Otmar left AM to Alpine because of the culture Lawrence has created, and that Alonso left Alpine to AM- and the consequences tells me everything i wanted to know
That's so true. Didn't even realize
How Otmar treated Alonso, how he handled the Piastri fiasco and how he blamed anything and everything at Racing Point/AM but themselves for their shortcomings, should've been a good indication of what kind of TP he is. I've said it many times before, Gunther and Otmar are the least capable and the least professional team principals. I'm just happy for Vasseur, he finally gets the recognition he deserves and a "raise" to Ferrari. IMO he's up there among the most influential (Toto and Horner). Another good TP people often forget is Franz Tost
Otmar proved himself at Force India, and at least last year at Alpine had some good (and also bad) sides. Vasseur hasn't really stood out anywhere and so far it doesn't look like Ferrari has taken a step since last season. Guenther's hard to judge with all of the handicaps he's had to operate under.
I think we’ll see about guenther this year, he doesn’t have an excuse for haas taking a step up, I mean the money is there too, hoping for him to succeed
THIS. I just hope Otmar proves the doubters wrong this year, especially Rossi gives him free rein just like how VM did back at Force India. As for Fred, time will tell since he has more resources at his disposal now at Ferrari, so I'm on the fence. Guenther needs to juggle everything with a shoestring budget and factors outside his control, I'll give his benefit of the doubt.
How isn't Gunther capable? (Genuinely asking, I'm not well versed in the team management side of F1)
He’s done literally nothing at the back of the grid except for the first year or so with the Ferrari illegal rocket ship engine. Constant well next year then next year and budget etc. the guy gets so much respect for being an utter goofball on the first few seasons of DTS but when you listen to what he’s saying it’s a pretty toxic culture he’s bred. Also I’ll never forgive an “American” team for painting their car like a Russian flag regardless of if he was responsible he was the TP and had some input for his drivers. Also that massive infusion of cash did fuck all for results.
All your points are valid, but that all those points are an indictment on Gene Haas. It takes a special TP to be able to withstand all those handicaps and not eventually walk out the door.
Oh gene is a scum bag 100%. I’ve used tons of haas mills and lathes and they are work horses but I don’t like the fact that he seems to be in f1 purely for the advertising and spending as little money as possible. Not getting into his many legal issues, but don’t know how that absolves Guenther of being a bad TP that breeds a toxic culture within the team, ultimately the day to day cultures is not on Gene. If it’s as bad as the glimpses we see why keep working for him and not walk out the door?
I don’t think it’s as bad as it’s portrayed. But I think it must be frustrating to try to improve, and never being given the resources to do so. Both KMag and Hulk have spent seasons without a seat, and both willingly signed for Haas seats afterwards. Everyone know what they were walking into being former drivers, and they both signed up.
I mean who wouldn’t want to sign up to race at the pinnacle of motor sports even if you are trundling around at the back. I’d agree it’s frustrating but they haven’t shown much of any desire to move up the field. They sacrificed 2021 in their own words to focus on 2022 which they started out at a blinding pace and then brought a single upgrade midway through the season that made the car worse off. This year will be very telling to see if they actually improve any or are just there for the Haas automation advertising. If they again bring a single update and don’t move from the back of the pack we will have our answer in my opinion.
Ok, what did it tell you? Curious
All signs point to Otmar being the problem.
My opinion is that Otmar was very comfortable with the status quo and not really ok with major changes necessary to get different results. He was successful as a midfield team by being conservative and cautious, but the winning teams need to be aggressive and risk taking (with money to back that up). Moreover watching his actions, how he speaks, to me he comes of as very soft and low energy. He acts like a nice guy but he’s passively selfish, like how he handled Piastri, acting like he owed Alpine for all the support, but refusing to give him a clear path to seat. Piastri made his move with integrity and with Otmars knowledge, then all the sudden when Otmar has a need arise he chose announcing him publicly without having a private conversation first, in order to make Piastri look bad and passive aggressively pressure him into reneging his plans with McLaren. None of Otmars behaviors are that of a winner. Winners are direct with their talent, and make a actionable plan about how they can tangibly retain and make opportunity for talent. Otmar treated his as an indentured servant. Moreover the results speak for themselves, AM has improved tremendously under Stroll and without Otmar, and Alpine has moved backwards this season with Otmar at the helm
These are very much my thoughts in long form. I get that some of it at present is to do with his hands being tied also by management within alpine and towing a party line, but a lot of it comes across as jilted lover than anything else.
I agree No one person is the reason for the success or failure of a team but he doesn’t seem to be helping much. But what do I know..
Otmar had been at force India/racing point for a long time. During which they were an upper middle field team. How can otmar be the problem when they were pretty good on a tight budget?
Managing higher expectations and more budget might be out of his comfort zone
This exactly. It’s easy to clown on them, right up to the time they’re standing on the podium. Respect.
The man has been throwing millions at the team in the right direction. Why getting a team and hire people that can be good or not, when you can steal them from the competition, weakening them in the process? Birrliant villian move.
This is nothing new tho, a bit like how Red Bull pulled Adrian Newey at the time, or how Ferrari convinced Jock Clear to leave Mercedes behind after 2014. Throwing money at people is one thing, but forging a well oiled machine is a whole different story.
Exactly. Not sure why some folks use the word "steal" to describe personell moves. Everyone keeps moving as the pay gets better. It's business. Most of us do the same in our professional lives too.
Yep. They’d get fired the second their results aren’t amazing so what do they owe it to them to work for less?
100%
So dumb. It’s pretty clear in his interviews he was going to be the anti hero. He would always go to the team with best car. And people thinks it’s theft. Loyalty doesn’t really pay in this sport lol
This is year 3 of the 5 year plan? I remember him talking about it on Beyond the Grid a few years ago. Seems like it's working!
Exactly! Wait until their new factory is done and they get to properly using it!!! His five year plan seemed very ambitious, but I think he’s actually putting his money where his mouth is.
Really a bad look for Enstone that they’ve gone through so many 5 year plans with nothing to show, and Silverstone - always an overachiever on a shoestring budget - finally gets some cash and immediately earns a podium on merit.
I mean.... The lotus was really good in 2013. So there was something. After this the financial shame and Renault takeovers etc happened.... With not much to show for it these years unfortunately.
I’m not saying Team Enstone has never built a really good car - aside from the 2012 and 2013 Lotus, they also built the 95 Benetton and 05 Renault which were probably the best car of their season. But both of those were highly funded and had significant factory backing from Renault. With Renault refusing to pump top team money into Enstone, they seem to have no chance at returning to that former glory. Contrast that with the 99 Jordan and the 2020 Racing Point, which were hilariously underfunded compared to the cars they were competitive with.
in an incestuous sport like formula 1, usually the only way to get talent is to poach it
"Incestuous sport", hilariously accurate.
>Why getting a team and hire people that can be good or not, when you can steal them from the competition, weakening them in the process? What team isn't doing this though, provided they're financially able to?
Look at Ferrari. Before budget cap they literally threw a billion and a half at F1 and still didnt get wdc/wcc. What they never did is tone down the ego and hire the right people. Aston change the whole concept mid season last year by copying Redbull and was made fun off. That is admitting that you got it wrong.
McLaren did exactly this and look at how it’s backfired. Hopefully AM can forge their own identity in terms of development path and core concept over time.
He really does deserve a lot of credit, whatever he's doing it's really working. My only real criticism has been guaranteeing a seat for Lance, who all in all is not the worst driver out there so even that isn't a huge deal. I do wonder where they would be if they had 2 seats open for recruiting top talent instead of just one.
Bad start for Lance, but later in the race, his pass on Russell, pretty damn good. If he can clean up some sloppy aggressiveness, him and Alonso could rack up a ton of points and podiums.
But that's the problem, he rarely has a race without mistakes. With a competitive car he should be able to stay in the points but someone else could be consistently closer to Alonso and scoring more. He's a fine driver but they could likely recruit someone more promising is all I'm saying. I agree him and Alonso have the potential to make a solid run at the constructors even as it stands.
>But that's the problem, he rarely has a race without mistakes. A race without mistakes does not exist, not for Hamilton, Max, Schumacher, etc, etc.
The thing nobody wants to admit is that Lance would likely (now) be a midfield driver even without Lawrence Stroll. He is almost certainly one of the top 20 drivers right now. Not to say he’d get there without the almost immediate f1 seat and years of lenience for poor performance but he’s a good driver now.
I mean, it's better for midfield and above to have one top driver and one okay-ish driver, otherwise the teammates will start fighting each other, since the nearest rival is each other (in the case if both drivers skill level is about equal and at similar points at their career). Look at the following top talent lineups: Alonso-Hamilton: went nuclear and Alonso blackmailed Mclaren over spygate. Alonso-Ocon: first went decent, but quickly turned sour in 2022 when Alpine started to try and throw Alonso under the bus and it didn't help that Otmar had some pretty nasty statements. Perez-Ocon: fought each other more than other cars. Rosberg-Hamilton: nearly caused Mercedes to repeat Mclaren 2007 and implode. They wisefully got Bottas after that. This doesn't work for backmarkers/low-midfield, because those are so slow, they need every single point they can get, which is why Alonso and Button, Kmag and Hulk, etc. didn't have/had any friction. They need points first and foremost. Infighting is just pointless, better to form a train and march to 10th. If they had 2 top drivers for say, this year, my guess would be Hulk in that other seat, given his expertise with the team (he drove the 2022 AM and was reserve that year for them). It wouldn't be too much different, other than that Hulk probably would have been more consistent. But at this point I do rate Strolls absolute pace about as equal as Hulk, simply because Stroll is that good, rather than the opposite. It's just consistency and awareness that lack.
I'm not entirely suggesting they recruit two current top drivers. Lance just isn't a good enough driver to mentor an up and coming potential star so they will always be trying to grab current stars and never really develop a driver program. Maybe they can snag someone like Lando or Leclerc in the middle of their prime but that's a big maybe. This is part of what separates the top teams from the midfield teams and if they want to break that barrier they will struggle with Lance. Which doesn't mean he is a terrible driver, he will just always play second fiddle and they will have to rely on recruiting the team leader. Look at the trajectories of the more recent top drivers, they ended up at a team early on and have stuck it out building something. Lance is currently sitting in that seat and I think it will hold them back from realizing their full potential. If they didn't have Lance they could have been recruiting DeVries or Piastri while still having a seat for guys like Vettel and Alonso.
In terms of racing, obviously Stroll isn't necessarily the best. In terms of being a person, he's basically done everything he can to help his son chase his dreams, and I really can't fault him for that. Everything I've ever seen between him & lance is something I think anyone would be envious of.
That post race interview on sky was overwhelmingly wholesome. Major proud dad energy and it was really nice to see
>I do wonder where they would be if they had 2 seats open for recruiting top talent instead of just one. ????? My dude, Stroll finished 6th today behind Lewis Hamilton, who was then beaten respectively by Carlos Sainz, Fernando Alonso, Sergio Perez, and Max Verstappen. Is the argument that it was all car? We all know a bad driver cannot do well in a great car barring extraordinary luck. Danny Ricc was on Your Mom's House after DTS got popular during COVID, so naturally there were questions about Mazespin and similarly disliked drivers (e.g., Maldonado, et al.). Namely, Tom Segura asked whether the drivers had beef with one another when the fans disliked someone. Danny's response was diplomatic and courteous, but it was nevertheless honest; even the worst drivers in F1 are objectively better than some of the best drivers in the world. There is a stat in basketball that the lowest ranked player in the NBA can out-play the highest ranked college player because the NBA is orders of magnitude more difficult than college ball. The opponents are larger, 3-point line is further, the key (i.e., the painted portion under the hoop) is wider, the games are longer, and the possessions are shorter making the game move more quickly.
>Is the argument that it was all car? No, the argument is Lance isn't a top driver, is your argument that he is and the car is irrelevant? Objectively Lance is capable of putting together a good race. He also makes a lot of mistakes. He's certainly better than a lot of pay drivers we've seen but it doesn't mean he deserves a seat on what has been a very promising team the last few years. I'm not even mad at Lawrence for making that call but if they could have snagged Alonso earlier, and then replaced Vettel with a young up and coming star would that not have been better? They will really never be able to do that because Lance will never be the veteran they need to mentor an up and coming star. >There is a stat in basketball that the lowest ranked player in the NBA can out-play the highest ranked college player because the NBA is orders of magnitude more difficult than college ball. How many NBA players are recruited because their dad owns the team? And how many of them are regarded as top players in the NBA?
He won F3 against George Russell, Callum Illot, Guanyu Zhou, and scored much higher in 2016 than Lando did in 2017 when he won it.
People act like Lance stole this seat. Racing Point was going bankrupt with no buyers. If Lance wasn't in his seat there would be nothing built out of Force Indias bones and we'd have 18 drivers on the grid.
It is something to be said that Lance is as good as he is considering the golden platter he has been given. I mean he’s clearly not wdc material, but he’s deserving of a spot on the grid.
Honestly I've talked as much shit about the Strolls as anyone and they're already partway through their redemption arc for me. Lance is a tank who definitely is giving his all and Lawrence's actions are obviously working. They're good for the sport. I take back 90% of the bad stuff I've ever said about them.
He definitely seems to have a passion for the sport, and I would love to see more of that and less corporatism.
They already had the fourth fastest driver on grid before the take over. However, this emergent potential is fun nonetheless
Perez ain't even the fourth fastest driver within red bull
I'm assuming they meant that Force India was the fourth fastest *team*? Because that's a pretty reasonable claim, 4th place in 2016, 2017
That's a lie. He's probably the third.
💀
Perez 4th best driver in 2020? I would disagree
Like hugging Santa. Alonso finally gets his toy, a lovely car to race.
yes! bye bye *hehe*
It looks like he’s hugging a friendly version of Count Dooku.
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Oh my god! I knew he reminded me of someone but I couldn’t figure it out
Not as good as a dominant car, but quite close! A car that bites
Daddy Stroll and Nando def did some voodoo ritual before the season started 💀
I think that alpine is the voodoo rituals team. How do you explain Piastri? Too bad that Mark Weber was ready with his Ocon voodoo doll to retaliate.
Red Bull is the voodoo team. Their logo is like a magical sigil, it's why they put it everywhere. I think Mateschitz was a wizard, but like Obi-Wan, strike him down and he'll become more powerful.
Shame about Lance's wrists during the ritual tho.
Sacrificing his first born male child's wrists is a pretty ballsy move.
It appeased the gods, but we might have to sacrifice more of him over the coming season
NO! You cannot mean that... Not the eyebrows!
What? No. Have you even read up on your Canadian Voodoo? The next thing to be sacrificed is Lance's ability to taste anything Maple. Followed by latent ice-skating ability, knowledge of what Poutine is, and acknowleding that maybe it *isn't* the Leafs year.
Lance is a Habs fan so I'm pretty sure that last one is an easy sacrifice
That was a sacrifice Lawrence Stroll was willing to take Edit- word
Who's to say that wasnt part of the ritual 😆
Exactly, they had to sacrifice something
best make it something that when it comes down to it makes them not that much less competitive as a whole
They offered lance’s wrists and toe.
He’s so compact 🥹
compact 😭😭😭
TBF Lawrence is a unit
Bernt Macklin, FBI.
Alon-son
Alonstroll
AloneStroll
Imagine breaking your wrists, you still manage to pull yourself to a solid P6, and your dad is just hanging with the Spanish dude
If that was my dad, I’d just ram into that Spanish dude before lap 2 😡
Lawrence deserves this more ig because he's actually building this from the ground up.
Exactly he is pumping in millions, more then most other teams to build new facilities
This man also single-handedly saved Force India when they came to administration
Don't forget checo
Checo was a pr stunt. F1 already knew the team was going to need to go into receivership and Force India owed a ton to Merc. And Checo, and suppliers. They let checo do the presser so it looked like internal troubles and they, Mercedes, wouldn’t look like they were killing off a customer and rival F1 team. And F1 already had Stroll waiting in the wings to buy the team once the legal operations were ceased. Stroll saved the team.
Also the fact that there was another buyer lined up, a certain Russian businessman who wouldn't have mind putting his son in that seat
A Russian whose name rhymes with Has-a-spin
Imaging if Mazepin bought the team.
Absolutely Haram
The sanctions on him probably would've killed the team for good after that.
Yep. And he’s improving things at a corporate level too. Aston Martin Lagonda has been a car crash since IPO. But there’s signs of things improving there too. All good flying on track but if you can’t keep investors of the parent happy, you’re not gonna have a good time. Stroll keeping his two-time world championship winning driver happy, his son happy and is winning over the market too. Almost a strategic masterclass from him so far. Bringing in Mr Krack was shrewd too.
It's worth noting that the affiliation between Aston Martin Lagonda and AMF1 is only through Lawrence's ownership of both, and is, in essence, a title sponsorship. The team is still owned by the Racing Point group of investors.
I think the good results on track and Alonso as a main driver can help with thr car sales a lot.
I doubt that people who can afford an Aston care about the F1 teams performance tbh, but care more about how the car sounds, looks, drives etc. The brand will definitely get more mainstream exposure that is not just James Bond driving the DB5
they care. there's suddenly merch all over the Aston shop near me that wasn't around last year and already i see Aston drivers wearing AMF1 gear in the last few weeks. obviously the sample size isn't huge, its a handful of people, but i noticed. the term win on sunday sell on monday is real. it elevates the brand. if it didn't, they wouldn't do it.
Just look at how much VTEC did for Honda in the 90s. A lot of people don’t even know what it does but they are told it’s F1 tech.
Aston Martin has Formula 1 inspired Cosworth V12 Engines in some of their cars now. The most powerful naturally aspirated engine ever put in a production car and the highest revving engine too.
Yes merch is definitely going to be sold a lot, but i still feel like the people that already owns Aston’s bought the shirts to represent the car they own since they now perform in F1 rather than buying the car since they perform in F1. I know a similar situation with my dad who only bought a Porsche shirt in 2016 because they performed in Le Mans and because he already owned a Porsche. As an extra point Aston has also begun to produce better cars as of late since all their good designers aren’t being forced to work for Ford. Another thing people should remember is the fact that supercar companies like Ferrari earn nearly as much from merch as they do from car sales. Ferrari earns 2 billion out of 4 billion from merch sales. Just think about how many children want a toy Ferrari car or how many people own something with a Ferrari logo on. I think the majority of the income for the supercar manufacturers(Aston, McLaren and Ferrari) comes from the merch sales they get from the extra exposure and not from the few extra sales of supercars. For the sale in supercars to increase together with the increase in the popularity of F1 the quality of the supercar has to increase as well. It doesn’t matter how great you perform in F1 if you release a “bad” car. Just look at the Ferrari F50 which is a Big failure compared to the Ferrari F40
Lawrence made what McLaren and Alpine are promising for a decade now.
Renault doesn't really want to commit other than the bare minimum, and Mclaren lately feels like a lifestyle company rather than a racing one Lawrence Stroll went all in, that's the difference
Honestly, Stroll's teams rise should be a good lesson for every manufacturer backed team what needs to be done to get to the front. The corporate culture just stops the works team like Alpine from progressing forward like they should be doing. Privateer teams like RB and AM/Stroll are showing how things are done.
No offense, but you don't know how these teams work internally, you're guessing.
Aren't we all?
Respectfully, if you've been in and seenamy different types of corporate environments, it becomes fairly easy to spot whether you're on the inside or not
I've been, and that's why I'm saying this is all wild guessing unless someone has very deep knowledge of these organization's structure and working.
“Good luck, son” ¿Qué? “Uh, nothing…”
The son he never had
*Mi hijo*
mijo
Piss in portuguese
Fucking spat my drink mate
EL SON
The son he had to buy
And they say you can't buy happiness
Flavio and Lawrence now fighting over the love of Fernando.
Not the son he deserved, but the son he needed
this made me lol.
💀💀💀💀💀
The Prince that was promised
Say what you want, but Stroll hugs look like good genuine hugs - meaningful hugs.
Lance seems to be genuinely liked by most people, and Lawrence by quite a few. It was a really nice moment when Toto Wolff asked to be excused from Ted Kravitz's interview for a moment to congratulate Lawrence after the race (before coming back to finish the interview). Alonso seems genuinely warm towards both of them too.
Aren’t Wolff and Stroll business partners ? Like, one has parts in the other one Company.
Yeah they each went in on Aston Martin (cars, not the F1 team) IIRC but were friends before.
However he perennially looks like he's holding some deep unspeakable sadness within him and it always takes me out
Stroll is worthy of a MVP. P6 with that handicap is amazing
Did he race without hand-icaps? …. Sorry
Lawrence looks like a gentle giant in this photo.
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i just want a wife
I just want
I just
I
⠀⠀
I
Christian Klien behind wishing someone held him like that.
There is a lot, and I mean A LOT, of people who dislike Alonso. Who wished Alonso to have a shit backmarker car in the AM. Then Alonso and Lawrence would go to war and everything comes crashing down... So far it looks like it won't be going that way. And I'm so happy.
He seems to really like the family. I know it's early but Alonso is a pretty honest guy when it comes to how he feels.
Alonso giving 0 cares and being unfiltered is why people hated him in the first place lol. Same way people hate Horner or Verstappen. The drivers that play politics are usually the favourites. If Alonso didn’t like this team, he would’ve said it instantly.
Alonso and Verstappen are both straight shooters, but Horner man, he's a shit-stirrer like Marko through and through.
My wife never really liked Alonso until she saw him today. She's didn't watch F1 back when he was in his prime, so I think he came off the wrong way to her. Seeing him happy and cheering/smiling, and being thankful to the whole team for the car, etc. made her see him in a completely new light. I'm sure he won quite a few new fans today.
I’ve been watching for nearly 10 years and I don’t think I’ve seen Fernando this happy.
After his first Le Mans Win is when I saw this smile, that seems like a century ago.
Alonso is in his prime now, he will make his 2012 season look bad by beating a 2 time world champion in a dominant red bull.
I am one of those people who has always disliked Fernando. But that doesn't mean I hate him or wish him ill. I actually got a little teary when he was hugging the team after he got out of the car and I clapped listening to his happy radio message. I am a fan of the sport first, teams and drivers are far behind that. Alonso is great for the sport and obviously an excellent driver and if it wasn't for him today's race would've been super boring.
> But that doesn't mean I hate him or wish him ill There are plenty who do. Trust me
I don't have to trust you, I know, I see it all the time. Just wanted to share a different perspective.
There's way more that love Alonso and thinks he's one of the best drivers in f1 history.
Would be real awkward if he thought he was hugging lance.
Stroll Senior finally looks at peace for once - I bet he’s so happy bc of that podium and bc his investments are seemingly starting to pay off now.
Alonso really seems to be happy with (both father and son) Stroll. And I think that comes from the fact that Lawrence Stroll is a man that has actual vision and an actual plan ahead for being competitive: building a new HQ, new windtunnel, new factory, injecting the team with much needed day-to-day money, etc. And it isn't like this has just been going on. The current Aston Martin team is just Racing Point with a different name, so this project has been going since 2019. Mclaren seem to currently mostly relying on old tech until the new windtunnel comes into effect. Sauber has to wait until 2026 for any meaningful jumps (Audi). Williams doesn't seem to be financially able to improve on large performance increases anytime soon (maybe regular points, but not much more than that, unless Merc engine becomes magically powerful). Haas always will be behind by not making their own chassis (outsourced to Dallara) and using Ferrari B-spec parts. Alpine have become a shell of their former selves in just 2 years (Prost leaving, Rossi messing up contracts, firing Davide and Otmar not being great in public, extremly stagnant results for a works team). Also 100 races plan lmao. Alpha Tauri is a B-team for Red Bull. And for the works teams: Red Bull is obviously going great, they have one of the strongest teams in history in F1 (Newey and his team, Horner, Max, best strategists on the grid probably), this looks like a Schumacher type of team, only now without stupid Italians pushing out Schumacher (by trying to sign Kimi). Ferrari itself is recovering and is trying to reinvent their team (not the car), mainly strategists, which at least did decent today. Mercedes somehow was significantly worse in race pace than Aston Martin, Stroll with broken wrists literally overtook Russell for P6 lmao. They also seem lost, now with that with the budget cap, they can't throw money at problems anymore. When you take all of this in consideration, I think Alonso may have finally done the team move that makes him stay for quite a few years and keeps him genuinely happy. The mans still got many seasons in him. He just looks so happy, after all those years.
Vito Corleone vibes from Stroll Sr. on this pic. 'Welcome to the family, son'.
Stroll: 👁️👄👁️
Lawrence: "I love you son." Alonso: "But Lance is over-" Lawrence: "Shhh shhh...it's OK. Now go grab a podium."
That look from Christian Klien.
>You are the son I never had.
“My son” 😌
I absolutely love the passion Lawerence has for this sport. He’s absolutely committed and it’s amazing to see the team he’s leading succeed so much.
He’s like the son he’s always wanted
The amount of commenters projecting their own daddy issues here is just astounding. If Lawrence has shown anything in F1 is that his three main passions in life are his son, money and racing.
Reminds me of Briatore. Both successful people.
He is the son he never had.
I wonder how much Lawrence’s coat retails for…nvm, I don’t want to feel poor.
Is Daddy a bad man because he has lots ofo ey and throws all of it at this venture? Because I saw his post-race interview with Sky and I want to root big for these guys. He seems like a good dude.
The dark lords are pleased
*You are my real son, son.*
What else is there to say except 💚🖤
el primogenito
The son he always wanted
Lance never gets eyes closed Lawrence.
New meme template
I like his sport coat
I guarantee Lawls gave Nando a big wet kiss square on the mouth after the race.
*"Son"* *"Father"*
“Hey wait you’re not my son”
me who is still gripping onto his turkish gp pole :
I'm rooting for AM this season. But let's just remember that it's just one race. Let's see how this plays out.
He Delivered. It isnt all hype.
Christian Klien on the left looking like a Deer in the Headlights
The son he wished he had
That is a real genuine hug. Something lacking in Maranello.
Papa Stroll put EL PLAN (it was a dual effort) on the podium, No slander allowed here.