Nanny state officiating is the only reason Max got penalised for an obvious race incident. He's done way worse than this in the past and gotten away with it. If someone is still bitter about Abu Dhabi 2021 and how Michael still is tied for 7 WDC, it should not let them influence your thoughts on it. F1 should get rid of stewards but for excessive dangerous driving, they're not fit for purpose. Max ruined his own race, which was enough of a penalty in its own right. The other penalties called out were also farcical. Piastri getting nailed for going off into the gravel trap in qualifying, then Norris +5 seconds for going off and losing time, then +5 seconds for Hamilton for dashing over a line and the hilarious fine for Tsunoda for an obvious heat of the moment temper tantrum. Like I said earlier, it's time to ask questions of Pirelli why their tyres go off like balloons for the slightest of taps when that didn't use to be the case back in the Bridgestone days. When I saw Norris out for a clash I imagined there was a proper whack and a suspension being bent halfway to Vienna, not a 100 kph tyre nudge. Then people call that dangerous driving. It's ludicrous. Drivers themselves need to respect each other and also learn to back out of situations if there is not enough room.
The racing line is that you go all the way to the left with a slight angle under braking and then turn in because of the acute angle of the corner. It and Bahrain 9/10 are the only corners on the calendar where moving under braking is part of the racing line. The little kink before forces you towards the centre of the track by a few inches so you have to move back or else you will hit the corner in the wrong angle and destroy your rear tyres on the exit. I know that because I've probably done that corner at least 25,000 times in various video games for 25 years. If you take the acute angle your car will be as mobile as a double decker bus and unless a driver is fully alongside you will be wary of that. Then again, the people who are the angriest are also the biggest members of the track limits fan club. In other words, they think that you can see your wheels in relation to the white line from way underneath a halo, think Niels Wittich is a high priest, and don't understand how an F1 vehicle is driven.
Also, Norris comes across as really weak in decisive situations and looks nowhere ready to win a title. When Charles had a race-winning car he was mostly let down by the team and the engine, but Lando does it all by himself. Messes up starts, overtakes and chokes in qualifying. Mind you, I'd still rather had him than Hamilton for sure because he's not past his prime yet, but Charles is the better driver of the two. If he had the McLaren with a competent team principal and race engineer he'd be knocking on the door for the title.
To summarize, vast numbers of 'F1 fans' from a certain island really are anti-Max cult members and it's quite sad
Whoever is trying to stop the latest chosen kid from one the villages of Moneypile in Eliteshire to win gets piled on, be it Michael, Fernando, Sebastian or Max, but above all the entire Ferrari team. It's been like that ever since Damon fumbled in a superior car against Michael twice during the Benetton years and with social media it's gotten worse. Not everyone is, that's important to distinguish and it's mostly funny rather than malicious.
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