Good race, clean and fast. Track is in great shape so the speeds were up, no wrecks. The biggest problem for drivers was brake wear. There's 200 feet of elevation change in a lap, and the corners are harsh and F1 drivers go as fast as they can. Several cars retired from the race with blown brake discs, which explode from centrifugal force and extreme wear. Sebastian Vettel, 5 time world champion is not having a good year, and shortly after the race start his transmission threw up its hands and opted not to work. Then it did, just as suddenly, but he was a lap down and out of the points. After half a race they retired the car, withdrawing him from the race. He has not finished three of the races this year, putting him well out of the points for any kind of championship run.
Kimi Raikonnen, Finnish F1 driver famous for his curt answers to long questions: "Yes. No. I went faster.", ended up 10th, continuing this year's streak of underwhelming performance. Many are suggesting he retire at the end of this year. F1 is usually a young man's game. Ego and immortality are required, and must be matched by fearless skill. If you aren't fearless, you can't apply the skill, and without both those, you can't compete.
Fewer cars than usual retired from the race from overheating at least. It was mostly brake problems. And thanks to a lack of wrecks the only obvious puncture was Daniil Kvyat, young Russian driver. The Grand Prix of Russia is still on, despite the genocide in Ukraine and the increasingly eccentric megalomaniacal actions of the Soviet Dictator, Vladimir Putin. We may as call him a Soviet Dictator, because he's clearly trying to get the Band Back Together. Whatever that's worth.
The race was good, the track was good, I'm glad its back in service. I just wish they'd offer alternative setups for the cars, with non-electric engines. The drivers look like skeletons, they've lost so much weight to keep the cars legal, and the overheating problems and acceleration wouldn't be an issue if they didn't have the damned batteries for the KERZ system. Lose those 200-400 pounds of battery and the cars would return to proper speed, and the drivers could eat a burger sometime. They're basically living on bacon these days. How sad is that? A big bowl of bacon. No carbs. The fats will provide energy, but they're starving. Looks terrible. This is asking too much.
Overall, the teams are mostly surviving in spite of the new car engines, not because of them. A lot of formerly good drivers are being held back by this, and it is hurting the sport. They can't get rid of the engines from the series due to a 4-year iron clad contract, and the R&D costs won't be repaid until 3 of those years are done. But if the races stay dull, they'll lose their audience, ticket prices will drop and the money will go out of the sport, followed shortly by the quality. Ferrari are really seriously talking about dropping F1, and Renault is too. Honda is coming into it next year, but if their cars are just as crippled by bad electronics and overheating as the current cars? It won't fix what is wrong.
Really, power to weight ratio remains king. If you only break even between power and weight to a lighter car without all the weight of batteries, the answer is stupidly obvious. Austria was decided by brakes. Lower weight means the brakes would have lasted so they could have gone into corners harder. Lower weight means the sideways grip wouldn't be fighting as much momentum, so they could corner sharper and take tighter lines, able to pass more easily. More passing means more exciting race. All the KERZ gives you is a quick passing boost, and you could easily do that with variations in the valve timing, since F1 cars use pneumatic valves, powered by air pressure rather than springs. That gets your RPMs up again, since fuel management keeps them down at 12,000. That sounds like a lot until you realize they used to run at 18K RPM.
Dump the batteries, F1. It isn't working. 2.4 L Turbo and 3.0 L normal aspiration engines instead. That will put the fun back in the cars. And drops them about 400 pounds of weight. Let your drivers eat a dinner roll. Maybe see about some alternative fuels, if you want. Audi TDI won LeMans again, running diesel. Can F1 do that?
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