Well, the dust has finally settled on the dustup between Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton and Red Bull’s Max Verstappen at Silverstone’s Turn Nine, also known as Copse, at the British Grand Prix on July 18. At a hearing on Thursday, the stewards declined Red Bull’s request to modify Hamilton’s 10-second penalty and assess a more severe sanction. As Sergeant Joe Friday would say, “Copse caper, case closed.”
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Which takes us to this week’s Formula 1 race in Hungary, the final contest before the August break. There had been concern about damage to the Red Bull’s Honda engine in the 51g crash, but Honda engineers inspected the unit, replaced a few ancillary bits, and pronounced it good.
Verstappen used the engine on Friday and topped the charts in the first practice. He was not able to match Mercedes’ pace in the second practice however, placing third, almost three tenths adrift of the two Silver Arrows. Bottas was quickest with Hamilton less than three hundredths behind.
Qualifying aired at 6 a.m. Saturday, so if you didn’t record it, you missed it. The race airs on ESPN on Sunday, also at 6 a.m.
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Do I expect another situation like Silverstone on Sunday? Not necessarily, but I’m not ruling it out. These are two very competitive and talented drivers in cars that are at the top of F1 performance, and they’re racing for the championship.
So there will be no quarter given and none taken. Which should make for a very interesting race. Hopefully it will last for more than one lap. And despite the fact that Lewis has won eight times in Hungary (the most of any driver) and Max has yet to score a win there, oddsmakers favor the Red Bull driver.
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Both NASCAR and the NTT IndyCar series are idle again this weekend while NBC Sport airs the Olympics, but there is news from both camps.
Jimmie Johnson hasn’t exactly set the world on fire since his IndyCar debut, but he now has his sights on the series Super Bowl, the Indy 500. Despite his initial reluctance to race at ovals in the open-wheel series, Johnson has scheduled a test at Miami-Homestead next month, with an eye toward the big race, and maybe some other ovals, in 2022.
Currently Tony Kanaan is handling the oval racing duties in the No. 48 Dallara/Chevy while Johnson takes the road and street courses. Kanaan has a two-year deal with Ganassi, so the team will have to field an additional car if Jimmie decides to race at Indy.
Johnson’s assessment of his IndyCar skills has progressed from a two out of 10 at the beginning of the season to a five entering August, but he says, “I realized early on after St. Pete that this mountain was a little taller than I first anticipated.” But he says he feels more comfortable in the car every time out, even if the results don’t necessarily show the progress.
Another IndyCar rookie who has so far avoided the ovals is also taking the plunge, as former F1 driver Romain Grosjean tested on the World Wide Technology Raceway oval last week. He was pleased with the result, although he said it was not as easy as it looks. He turned 166 laps and spent the day learning how an Indy car handles on an oval and learning to use the “tools” to adjust the handling.
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Finally, some happy news from the NASCAR side of things. Bubba Wallace proposed to longtime girlfriend Amanda Carter last week and she accepted. No wedding date was announced, but I’ll be waiting by the mailbox for my invitation.
