Lando also took some debris from Leclerc and had to pit as some wing blocked airflow to his brakes and made them overheat, hence his early pit.
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Very interesting.
But letās be real here - Lewis and Mercedes won this yearsā Championships during Barcelona testing already 
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By pretending to be slow while Ferrari got all the testing glory? 
Based on Autosportās testing analysis post-Barcelona, Merc were as much as half a second down on the Scuderia, Haas were the quickest midfield runner, and McLaren were no better than ninth fastest. How things have changed.
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Ladies and gentlemen, here to deliver her TED Talk entitled āPlaying things close to your chest; or the subtle art of the sandbagā, please welcome to the stage Mer Cedes.
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Also on the program: āToto Domination: Psyching out your opponent in five easy steps.ā
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Iām going to take a leaf out of the WTF1 podcasts book and do an ABCDEF1 rating for all the drivers for the Japanese GP.
Bottas - A: He drove a good race and did exactly what was needed to win the race.
Vettel - B: That start cost him dearly, and these rookie mistakes should not be part of his race weekend. The rest of the race was done well
Hamilton - B: He got shafted a bit by a bad strategy call from his team, but ultimately got the job done and nearly overtook Vettel
Albon - B: Iām giving him a B because while his race was very well done, that āpassā on Norris was a bit too ambitious and heās lucky to have escaped that without major penalties
Sainz - A+: My driver of the day. He showed great race pace and was well clear of the rest of the grid. The McLaren in Sainz hands is looking more and more like a very competitive car.
Ricciardo - B: Great race to get so high up the order and score a good chunk of points. He had some terrific passes on track, just a pity qualifying was so bad, hence the B
Leclerc - D: Poor weekend. Got beaten by Vettel to pole, horrible mistake into turn 1 to take out Verstappen, and driving dangerously and ignoring the teams instructions to pit. Very bad race for Leclerc.
Gasly - B: Yeah he is a Torro Rosso driver. That car just suits him so much more than the RBR. Drove the car like he stole it, but may have caused the Perez crash on the last lap
Perez - B: Giving him a B because he did drive well and was on for some good points. Just a pity for that last lap incident that I donāt think was really his fault
Hulkenberg - C: Average day for Hulk. Drove well but couldnāt really get the same performance as his team mate.
Stroll - C: Apparently got shafted by the early race ending call and lost his point finish because of that. But did nothing special otherwise
Kvyat - D: The Torro Rosso shouldāve done better, and I donāt know, he didnāt seem all that fast over the weekend
Norris - B: Iām giving him a B. That Albon incident and the brake fire issue destroyed his race potential, but did well to fight back up to 13th.
Raikkonen - D: The Alfa looked so slow this weekend and not ever Raikkonen could get any pace out of the car.
Grojean - C: The Haas just sucks in race trim. He did have a great qualitying which is why he gets a C
Giovinazzi - F: Just a bad day at the office for him.
Magnussen - F: A weekend to forget for Magnussen as he is beaten by his team mate in such a bad car. Couldnāt even quality well either and crashed
Russel - C: Well there is only so much he can do in the Williams I guess, so average rating
Kubica - F: Woefully slow, crashed in qualifying, at the moment he is really just there to fill the numbers.
Verstappen - N/A: Shame he canāt be scored after being taken out by Leclerc like that in turn one. Such a shame, but the RBR was much slower than anticipated during qualifying.
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Obviously he deserves an F. Did not even make it past the first 2 cornersā¦ 
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Lekker man! Must be nice to have the World Cup and F1 in Japan at the same time
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At least Max supports the right rugby team.
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Yeah, that was super funny.
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Come on now, you know youāre not the only one.
Hereās to podiums and wins soon.
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Im just scared, deep down the Macca love has never gone away, I donāt want to get my hopes up!
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