Hope nobody is going to take off and fly on corner 1, better warn the Austin International airport that Sunday a F1 could be landing in there unexpected.
I don't normally watch P1 but I have my alarm set to remind me to watch Practice 1 at 10am ET tomorrow. Just in case anyone needs it FRIDAY Practice 1 at 10am ET Practice 2 at 2pm ET SATURDAY Practice 3 at 10am ET Qualifying at 1pm ET SUNDAY Race at 1:30pm ET
FWIW, I think the race starts at 2pm ET and I think that ^^^ 1:30pm ET is the start of broadcast on Speed. Delta = half hour of pre-race show. I think...
Yup, P1 might be entertaining. Everyone learning a new track, trying out all those corners for the first time on a green track.
Austin-Berstrom Int'l Airport is safe. They are going away from the airport at that corner. However, there might be a few ranches that might like to know that info... :lol:
:cornut: The 2 young Ladies are wearing Del Valle High School colors Red and White which should be just the other side of the highway from Austin Bergstrom and next to the track. They didn't look that good in my day. Jason
This track I just amazing I wish I could drive anything there, even run my bicycle it doesn't matter.
Personally, I can't fault Pirelli, after the fiasco that Michelin had at Indy that one year they had to tread carefully.
True. They imagined a lot of skepticism of F1 in America as a result of that one problem more than any other, expected intense scrutiny, and didn't want their tires to be the center of critical attention. They're already criticized regularly this season for using aggressive compounds in an attempt to influence race outcomes. I probably would have gone conservative as well. Unless the rules prohibit it, I would have been tempted to bring three compounds along, just in case, justified I think by the unknowns of a new track surface. Let the teams decide by majority vote after the Friday test which two compounds to run the rest of the weekend. The track is rubbering in though and getting less slippery. I imagine those teams and drivers digging deepest for excuses for their lack of pace are griping loudest about the tires. By this point on any given race weekend they'll have all gone through the same issues. The track is always either slicker or grippier than they expected at first. Tires, car setup, or both would have been blamed and they would have dealt with it and moved on. Same at every track, this one was just more of an unknown than the rest because they had no data from running in prior years. On the other hand, something about that Turn 19 still has many drivers flummoxed. They're calling it slippery and blaming the track and the tires but I'm sure the track is the same there as it is elsewhere and they don't change tires for that one turn, so they're laying the blame in the wrong place. They're taking it too aggressively because the combination of profile and layout are deceptive. It's a challenging corner and it's taking them a while to figure it out...which could make 19 the most important turn on the track.....
I'm happy to watch the race tomorrow on TV and online but I'd like to be there in person for the classics race this afternoon (3:20p ET). Wish they were broadcasting it. Couple pics from earlier: