BLUE FLAGS: YES OR NO

In this day and age it is quite rare to NOT hear the words "blue" and "flag" together in one sentence over the course of a race weekend. You're pretty much guaranteed to hear this every race weekend. Whether it's Sebastian Vettel yelling "BLUE FLAGS" or commentators from around the globe starting a debate on whether to abolish them; you will most likely hear those words. But, are we getting bored of the words "blue flags?" With the current top three teams so far ahead from the rest of the pack, are their races ruining races for other teams because of blue flags? In this post, I'll be looking at the positives and negatives surrounding the blue flag system and whether I think Formula One and other forms of motorsport should keep or abolish them.

Flags in racing are an important form of communication towards drivers racing on track. Whether it is to warn of a hazard on track, slippery conditions or an oncoming faster car; you will see them in every motor race around the world. In Formula One, a total of ten flags (or lights, in some cases) are used. These are:

Green Flag: Start of race, restart, end of hazard, pit lane open

Yellow Flag: Hazard on track

Red and Yellow Striped Flag: Slippery Surface

Red Flag: Session stopped

White Flag: Slow vehicle on track

Black Flag: Disqualification

Black Flag with Orange Circle: Pit due to mechanical problem

Black and White Diagonal Flag: Warning for unsportsmanlike behaviour

Black and White Chequered Flag: End of race

And, last but not least:

Blue Flag: Faster car coming. Lapped cars should move out of the way.

So, as we can tell from the above, the blue flag is waved at a driver to move out of the way if a faster car is coming towards them in the means of lapping them. But is this right? Should this be the case? It's a race after all. Everyone should be entitled to race. However, that is not the point of the blue flag. In some motorsport series, the blue flag is not mandatory. And in others, if ignored, you get a penalty. Simple as. Most of the time, the blue flag is considered as a safety aspect but also is seen as a sign of respect and a courtesy to the faster drivers. But as mentioned before, this racing? Shouldn't the drivers just race?

This has been an ongoing debate for years gone by and personally, I have been against blue flags. I see it as, the drivers are out there to race, why should they move out of the way. I can understand the use of a blue flag in a safety aspect but for anything else baffles me.

After the most recent Formula One race where blue flags played an important part in the race, I went to twitter (@brxn_) to ask fellow Formula One and motorsport enthusiasts their opinions on the blue flag debate. The results may or may not surprise you.

Out of 54 voters, 63% were happy for blue flags to stay whereas the other 37% wanted them gone. Now, this may not be a very reliable poll. For example, a Lewis Hamilton fan may be in favour of blue flags staying as it gets slower cars out of his way. But, a Kevin Magnussen fan may want blue flags gone because as soon as the blue flag appears, his race would be hindered in some aspect.

When starting this poll, I also asked voters to comment their actual opinions. And, the feedback was pretty much one sided with, as shown in the results, the majority going with keeping.

Some of the comments I got back included some interesting points such as:

"It used to be more of a problem when there were 26 cars. Now, not so much."

"It is about how drivers handle it. It's about awareness and respect."

"Keep them. They were brought in for a reason. The grass looks greener but rarely is."

"I wouldn't want to see races or even championships decided by by guys blocking front-runners for political reasons."

These comments opened my eyes. As someone who was all for getting rid of blue flags, I started to think. All I want is fair racing. But now I don't know if without blue flags it would be fair. It's almost like you're driving your road car and a slow moving car pulls out infront of you and continues to go along the road at a snails pace. Now imagine it in a race. The leader would not want their race ruined by a backmarker. I'm shocked that I am now thinking this way but rules are rules. I understand completely that blue flags would be most effective in a 26 car grid, for example rather than a 20 but 20 is still a large number compared to some motorsport series.

I guess, whether blue flags are kept or not is all down to your own opinion. Now, I think they should stay. As we know, some drivers don't have much spacial awareness and without blue flags I think there could be some dire consequences for leader and lapped cars alike.

FERRARI & VETTEL: A DREAM TURNING INTO A NIGHTMARE

If you think back in time and look at the history of Formula One, you may start to think of drivers such as Fangio, Senna, Prost and Schumacher. You may also think of Formula One's longest and most successful team; Scuderia Ferrari. The team known as the "Prancing Horse" has guided a good handful of drivers to World Championship Victory, thus gaining a very valuable reputation in the world of motorsport. For the 2015 season, one of Formula One's most notable, current drivers; Sebastian Vettel, joined the Italian outlet, where, after a number of tough years, the team were back on track. As of 2018, Ferrari and Vettel had a decent start to the season but slowly things began to change. The partnership that many Ferrari and Vettel fans had dreamed of, was turning into a nightmare. But why? Here, I look at some points as to why this could be.

Scuderia Ferrari. A team of history. Debuted in Formula One in the 1950's, taking part in every single Formula One round since the beginning. Sebastian Vettel. A four time Formula One World Champion. Made his debut in 2007, racing for BMW Sauber. Since the start, Ferrari had always been Vettel's goal. And in 2015, that goal was achieved.

It is no lie that Vettel and Ferrari have been a match made in heaven. A team that is so passionate about it's sport and a driver that is so passionate about his job. A perfect pairing which has more than proved itself on track with Vettel challenging for the championship since his inaugural season with the team. And, the beginning of 2018 was no different, winning the first two races of the seasons, Vettel was a majority's favourite to win the championship this year. Now, with only six races to go of this 2018 season, what has gone wrong?

I think first of all, the one thing we cannot ignore is the strange strategy calls coming from the Ferrari team. Pitting at the wrong time, putting on the wrong tyre and/or leaving the car out for to long, to name a few. Teams, especially with Ferrari's experience and reputation cannot be making mistakes like this. It's a rookie error. The practice sessions are there for a reason. The teams have data and telemetry for a reason. It's almost like the team ignore this and do what they want. In fact, it reminds me of a very infamous quote from Kimi Raikkonen; "Leave Me Alone, I Know What I'm Doing." Well, you'd think Ferrari should know what their doing but obviously not. You can't deny, being a strategist in a team is a hard, pressurized job and you can't expect them to get it right every single time. But there is a different between one time and four/five. And, the pressure of the strategies is starting to wear onto the drivers, especially Sebastian Vettel. Raikkonen probably just doesn't care.

This leads me onto my next point, the drivers. As this post is focused purely on Vettel, that is who I'll focus on. Sebastian Vettel has had his fair share of errors this year. A handful being rookie errors. However, despite that, they are errors in which valuable points have been thrown away. With these extra points Vettel would be leading the championship but that is not the case. Has the pressure of mistakes from the team gotten to the four time world champion? Or, is he just being impatient? Probably both. Seeing Lewis Hamilton winning championship after championship must be painful. Patience will run out sooner or later.

Talking about patience, comes my third point; criticism from the driver. When the driver criticizes his team, something is not right. In this case, with the teams troubles, you can understand why Vettel points this out. However, the guys in the team work just as hard as the driver and it's almost an insult when the driver starts to ask questions. Has Vettel's passion and sensibility strained his relationship with the team? Possibly.

So, how do Ferrari and Vettel work around this? Personally, I think the structure of the team itself needs looking into. Communication is a key and it's like the team has none of it bar Vettel. With better communication, strategies are more precise, consistency returns, making the team calmer and with less mistakes made. They have the car, they have the driver. But right now, they don't have the team.

STOFFEL VANDOORNE: WHATS GONE WRONG

If you look at the amount of drivers on the grid, you may be able to pin point a certain few who are just a walking bag of bad luck this year. Max Verstappen, Daniel Ricciardo, Nico Hulkenberg, Fernando Alonso and the one which, in my opinion, has had one heck of a time as of late; Stoffel Vandoorne. In no way, shape or form, does a driver with Stoffel's credibility, have a talent that suddenly "disappears." It's a mystery I am eager to solve. A driver like Stoffel deserves his place on the Formula One grid but why is it just not working out for him?

Stoffel Vandoorne was born in Belgium in the month of March 1992. It wasn't until, at the age of six, during a visit to a local karting track that the Belgian found his passion for motorsport. During his first few years of karting professionally, like many young racers starting out, Stoffel was hindered by a lack of funds. However, he went onto win the Belgian KF2 Championship and finished as a runner up in the CIK-FIA World Cup in 2009. Having a total of 45,000 euros as his winnings, Stoffel could start his racing car career.

Stoffel spent his first season in single-seaters racing in the F4 Eurocup 1.6 series where he won the championship with his first attempt. Because of this, he graduated into the Eurocup Formula Renault 2.0 series for the following year. He finished fifth overall in this championship before going onto win the title the following year which helped him move up another series, this time to Formula Renault 3.5 where he would come face to face with fellow Formula One drivers Kevin Magnussen and later on in the championship year; Carlos Sainz. After a tough season fighting against the Dane that was Magnussen, Stoffel ended the year in second, just points behind Magnussen. At the end of that year, Stoffel left the Formula Renault family and moved to the GP2 series where it took him only two attempts to win the championship. It was in this year, 2015, in which Stoffel started to catch people's eyes. He dominated that years GP2 season, winning the championship with 108 points difference to his nearest contender, American; Alexander Rossi.

However, due to the limited amount of seats available in Formula One, Stoffel would not graduate to the series for the 2016 season. McLaren sent him to race in Super Formula, finishing fourth overall in that series. But Stoffel didn't have to feel disappointed about missing out on a Formula One seat for the 2016 season for long. Due a catastrophic crash in Melbourne, Fernando Alonso was injured and thus had to sit out the following round in Bahrain. Stoffel was called up and made his debut that weekend. It is more than fair to say that Stoffel impressed many on his debut. He first managed to out-qualify teammate Jenson Button on his first attempt before going onto score points in the race when he finished tenth. Stoffel became the first reserve driver since Sebastian Vettel in 2007 to score points on their debut.

Later that year, current McLaren driver Jenson Button announced his retirement from the sport and that Stoffel Vandoorne would be the guy to replace him. I, personally, was looking forward to seeing Stoffel race a full season in Formula One. After seeing him race in his early single-seater career, I believed we were in for something special. However, things just didn't go as planned.

Stoffel finished a miserable sixteenth in his first full season in Formula One. Although at this point, McLaren were racing with a very ureliable Honda engine. So, seeing both McLaren's finish the season near the bottom of the table was no surprise. However, with a change to engine suppliers for the 2018 season, many were expecting both McLaren drivers to be back on it. Scoring points and possibly podiums but we are now over half way through the season and Stoffel currently sits sixteenth in the championship with a mear eight points.

It is no lie that McLaren are still struggling. But does this prove, with their new engine, that Honda were not to blame at all?

Stoffel has literally been no where bar the back of the grid this season. Where as Fernando has been, at best, just below the top ten. But what annoys me most is that people are looking at Stoffel's recent performance, race results and qualifying compared to Fernando and writing him off. Let's delve into this a bit more. If you look at all of Fernando Alonso's teammates in the past ten or so years, Stoffel is the guy who has been closest to him, racing wise. You could say it has been a bit unfair for Stoffel to go into Formula One with Fernando Alonso as a teammate. Fernando is supposedly the best in the world. And, with a car as temperamental as McLaren's and an engine as unreliable as Renault's, things just haven't been fair on the Belgian. There is no way Stoffel has lost his talent. He's been unlucky. If he looses his Formula One seat after this weekend then a talent has been lost. McLaren or another team need to give him a chance. This guy has a lot more to show us yet.