#but there's one thing that happened that i cant get over
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this is my first time hearing of this so i dont know if theres like some other context related to this im missing (or if this message just happened out of the blue) but i dont really wanna know either way.
^^^ but all points in this are valid (the reblogged post i mean)
i would like to at least hold out hope that nothing bad happened until it is confirmed (do not ask them what happened, im sure its stressful as it is) but that is not to say that i invalidate the people who spoke up because im sure they have their reasons too but we do not know what happened and we cannot know what (again do not ask what, we are not entitled to that information)
i want to believe in both sides. i don't want to end up being the kind of person who doesn't believe in a victim or is against a person who didn't actually do anything wrong, so im going to be patient and if nothing ever gets said about it thats fine too
do not speculate. what comes out of it could be aiming pitchforks at someone who didn't do what you think they did, or bringing out someone's trauma over something all over again because you want to know or you think oh maybe this could be why so and so happened
this is my own opinion, but id say to withhold any judgment and thought you might have on this until we get a confirmation. this is not to say that you can do whatever you want with this information after, because that is not true at all.
feeling uncomfortable regarding it is valid, im not saying you cant have your own opinions over it, id just prefer it if people could treat this sensitively, and with respect for the other members to not try to find out more then what has been shared, nor overly target people over something you do not have confirmation over
im sorry as ive been repeating points a lot, but ive seen people acting really disrespectfully to all the people involved in something similar to this because they want to know, but they do it with zero regard for the person on the other side of the screen
(this is more referring to people asking those who were friends to that person about it but it was a really bad situation overall, and they were attacking them when they didn't get a response out fast enough without considering that they'd just learned that someone they cared about was a terrible person and needed time to process that. now in this case its not fully confirmed but i really dont want to see that happen again.)
^ updating my response above, as there is a doc with information about what happened which i noticed in one of the comments on the original post. i just wasnt sure if something really bad happened considering the vague statement in the twitter post but considering its been spoken out now of what happened i can safely conclude that hes probably not innocent (understatement). (again, please do not hound the victims nor the hermits on information about this)
i just didnt wanna assume anything. this isnt to say that i didnt trust in what evidence they saw that made them conclude that the accusations were credible, it was just worded in a way that sounded very vague, and as a person who would like to see the goodness in everyone i tend to stay in denial about these kinds of things because i want to believe that they are not that kind of person, at the very least until its either admitted by the guilty party, or theres a credible statement from the victim
also it might feel like im understating things with how i describe them, thats my bad. i usually describe things in swear words but considering hermitcraft has a mainly young audience im trying not to and it also feels a little inappropriate over a serious topic. but it means i default to referring to something as 'bad' or 'not so good' which can come off as like im trying to make it seem not as bad as it actually is which isn't true at all. im just trying to be really careful about how i word things or what i say considering this is a serious topic but it means im not sure how to describe it so i end up going with what i default to outside of swears.
um. also please dont go asking for proof from the people affected nor the hermits cause i really dont think its appropriate and could lead to triggering them further. its also very personal.
i emphasize my point as a person who has also gone through bad things, and trying to look back through those old messages were really triggering and it was just not a good time. i imagine it was rough enough to get screenshots of what they did get so please leave it alone. they went through the trouble of sharing it in public, you are not entitled to more
and i get it might be rough to trust CCs after having your trust broken with one being revealed to be a bad person but PLEASE do not accuse other CCs of the same behavior. they are just as shaken as you that someone they thought they knew could be like that. please leave them alone, thank you.
PLEASE KEEP THIS IN MIND:
we, as fans, do not have a right to private information. anything shared with us on this is a privilege. please do not abuse it. the cc's could shut down and never talk about it if we overwhelm them.
also, please keep in mind that ONE HERMIT and THE ENTIRETY OF HERMITCRAFT are NOT THE SAME THING. the entire fandom is not 'ruined' or 'completely unsafe' because of the actions of one person.
PLEASE DO NOT ASSUME THAT THE OTHER HERMITS KNEW ANYTHING ABOUT WHATEVER'S GOING ON WITH ISKALL. this is not some big conspiracy, it's the consequences of one person's actions. they weren't hiding this from us, that's not how hermitcraft works, they truly didn't know. they probably knew as much as us about this, so making it an 'us against them' situation is immature and shortsighted.
ALSO, I AM BEGGING EVERYONE TO PLEASE NOT SENSATIONALIZE THIS. PLEASE DO NOT TURN HATING ISKALL INTO A MEME OR A JOKE.
mcyt'ers being revealed to be less-than-great people is not a rare thing, sadly, but i've seen it turned into a joke/meme/trend in other fandoms. this both minimalizes the actual people's/victims' struggles, makes the entire situation feel less serious than it is, especially to outsiders looking in, and makes everyone in the fandom look immature, petty, unable to take anything seriously, and genuinely harmful.
this server, fandom, and community are not dying, it is not ruined forever, this is one (major, i'm not trying to minimalize it) issue that we're currently dealing with. it will be okay. we will move on. this is not the beginning of the end. please calm down. i love this fandom, god bless all of you. <3
edit: doc has said on stream that we will likely get more information as time passes. like i said, this is a PRIVILEGE. we are not OWED information. please be grateful for what we're given, and POLITELY ask questions if you must. if a cc doesn't give you the answer you want, or doesn't answer at all, LEAVE THEM ALONE. THIS IS NOT AN EXCUSE TO HARASS PEOPLE. the hermits are likely just as stressed out as us, if not probably more so, so please keep that in mind when contacting them.
don't freak out, we'll be okay, this is not the end of the world, nor is it the end of Hermitcraft. we will be okay.
second edit: please remember that (at least as far as we know) ISKALL AND STRESS WERE NOT KICKED OR BANNED. THEY LEFT OF THEIR OWN VOLITION.
ALSO!!! VERY IMPORTANT!!!
WE. DO. NOT. KNOW. EXACTLY. WHAT. HAPPENED.
PLEASE DO NOT ASSUME ANYTHING SIMPLY BASED OFF OF OTHER MCYT'ERS PAST ACTIONS/SCANDALS. WE DO NOT KNOW EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED. WE MIGHT NOT EVER KNOW EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED. WE NEED TO BE OKAY WITH THAT AND NOT DRAW OUR OWN CONCLUSIONS.
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Alastor With A Seemingly Innocent S/O
-He wonders how the fuck you’re in hell
-like, someone as perfect and sweet and kind as you? No chance.
-until you tell him how you brutally murdered a huntsman and hand to hand strangled his three dogs after killing your boyfriend.
-coincidence? I think not.
-Alastor knew this story sounded awfully familiar but couldn’t quite place what it was he remembered about it.
-anyways
-Alastor would try to change how he acts, especially around you.
-so no killing or maiming when his s/o is around.
-the only time your not your sweet, innocent little self is when Angel Dust drags you into a terf war or something.
-then hes laughing and cheering you on from the sidelines.
-As you know, Alastor loves to dance and sing.
-so expect him to turn on some swing jazz and quite literally sweep you off your feet in the middle of the lobby.
-lots of spinning, dipping, and side stepping.
-he’ll also sing along to whatever is playing, too.
-if its a slow song, expect to be held close to him as one of his hands clasps tightly to yours and your chest is pressed against his.
-his other hand will wrap around your waist as he hums along in your ear.
-but this kind of dancing normally only takes place behind closed doors and within the comfort of your shared room.
-speaking of rooms, he would love it if you’d stay with him at night.
-he doesn’t sleep a whole lot, so make sure he gets the well deserved rest he needs.
-he’ll hold you close while petting your hair or running his hands up and down your arms to help you fall asleep.
-in the most non-creepy way possible, he loves to watch you sleep.
-he finds it so wholesome and heart warming that you choose to lay next to him every night.
-Alastor has never been a huge fan of sex, but when its you, he can’t help himself.
-especially when he’s in a rut. He almost always cant keep his hands off of you.
-as much as he cant, he loves to breed you
-he constantly praises your body and loves the bump that forms at the bottom of your tummy when he fills you up.
-saying things like “darling, you take me so well, gonna fill you up so nice” like AHHHHHHH
-aftercare is a given. He’s an old timer, he knows how to treat a woman.
-expect to be carried into the steamy bathtub as he crawls in next to you and scrubs you clean.
-pda is a little iffy with Alastor.
-he could either be all over you, a hand on your waist, shoulder, or arms linked 25/8
-OR he could have a no touching day (which you are completely understanding to)
-i think you would deny his request of proposal many times.
-maybe you are trying to redeem yourself and you dont want to hurt him if you do end up going to heaven.
-but either way, you ended up saying yes, and the wedding was held at the hotel with minimal guests.
-im sure he would invite rosie and mimzy, too.
-who both absolutely adore you
-rosie ends up being that of an older sister to you
-mimzy is just kinda…there.
-you dont like her very much.
-on top of it all, he loves you so very much and wont be afraid to show you just how much.
-he would do absolutely anything to have his way, and if someone (like Vox) were to get in his way, he’d make sure it wouldnt happen again.
message me for more <3
#alastor hazbin hotel x reader#alastor x reader#hazbin hotel#alastor x reader headcanons#innocent s/o#reader insert
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Join Zenless Zone Zero with Tsukishiro Yanagi, the deputy leader of Hollow Special Operations Section 6! Beneath her ordinary office lady exterior lies a meticulous, emotionally intelligent big sister to the team.
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The Lion's Lamb - Chapter 7 - MV1/33
Max Verstappen x reader
The Lion's Lamb Series: Aesthetics, Ch.1, Ch.2, Ch.3, Ch.4, Ch.5, Ch.6
Over the next few days, the two would meet up casually, either to get coffee at the cafe they met at, going for walks, and even getting casual dinners together.
Their conversations usually surround you, about your life, dreams, and aspirations.
Whenever the conversation switched over to Max, mainly about his line of work, he would always quickly change the subject.
You thought it was odd, but figured it wasn't something he wanted to talk about and he'd open up when he wanted to.
It was Friday evening and sadly Max was pushed into a boys nights with his friends, leaving you to figure out what to do for the night.
You knew Max had told you to text him if you needed him, but you didn't want to bug him, especially if he was around his friends.
You didn't want to be the type of girl that would continuously blow up a man's phone while he was out.
It was around 8pm when Amelia came storming into your room, "you're coming out with me tonight."
"Why do I have to go out?" You asked.
"Well I can't go alone," Amelia said dramatically, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.
"Cant you go out with your friends? I really don't feel like going out tonight."
"You have too! Who knows what will happen to a young, pretty girl like me all alone at a club!"
You bit your lip while nodding your head slowly, feeling guilty if you left Amelia to go out alone and something were to happen to her.
"Great!" We leave at 10:30," Amelia said smugly before happily leaving the room.
By 10:45, the two girls had arrived at the club. You're trying your best to keep close to your roommate as they made their way through the busiest club in Monaco to get to the bar.
It was true that Amelia wanted the girl to go out with her so she wouldn't be alone, but it wasn't the full truth.
She knew how pretty the you were, how your aura of innocence you projected attracted men like a moth to a flame.
You had no idea that your roommate was using you to attract men. You were playing the oblivious wing man.
After ordering both of the girls a drink, Amelia was quick to pull you out onto the dance floor before you could even think about protesting.
While your roommate started dancing, trying to attract men towards her while you sat there awkwardly taking small sips of your drink.
You were uncomfortable with the amount of people surrounding you causing you to feel claustrophobic.
They were on the dance floor long before two men found their way towards to the pair.
One was blonde with brown eyes, average built and height. The other was brunette with brown eyes so dark they could be mistaken for black. But this man was shorter then the other but slightly more built. They were both attractive looking, and just by looking at them, a person could tell they reeked of daddy's money.
While the blonde went over to Amelia and whispered something in her ear, the brunette stood there, staring at you. The look in his eyes made you nervous and intimidated the hell out of you.
"We're joining them at their table," Amelia interrupted before grabbing you by the hand and dragging you to the two men's booth.
Amelia is moving to sit next to the blonde and the brunette coming to sit next to you, uncomfortably close.
"I'm John," the man stated after an awkward amount of time passed with them just sitting in silence.
"(your name)," the girl responds softly, giving the man a small smile, trying to be polite.
The smirk that rested on John's face told the girl everything she needed to know. He knew he was an attractive man and used it to his advantage.
He knew that any girl at that club would be clawing to get his attention, yet he was intrigued on the one girl who didn't want it.
You continued to talk to him, making small talk because you didn't know any better.
You thought you were being polite and just trying to make it through the night. John took it for flirting.
Little did he know that the only person you were interested in was a blue eyed Dutchman.
"What is a pretty girl like you doing in a place like this?" John asks while slowing inching closer towards you, resting his arm behind you on the back of the booth.
"My roommate wanted me to come out with," you politely stated, deciding to ignore the compliment and keep it short.
Before John could continue, alcohol was brought to their table. John, his friend and Amelia all were taking shots, the man next to her talking at least 5 in a 30 minute period.
They asked the girl if she wanted some, but you declined, okay with sipping what was left of your original drink.
It didn't take long for John to make his move after that. Thought their conversation, he had scooted closer until his knees were touching her.
His arm behind your back, causing you to be slightly trapped when he leaned in and started to run his hand up your thigh.
"Why don't you and I get out of here baby," he whispered in her ear, his lips grazing her ear.
You quickly jumped back from your seat, trying to get out of his reach.
"No," you stated sharply, but fear filled your entire body. You turned to catch Amelia's eyes to try to signal to her for help, but she was too busy making out with John's friend.
"Come on sweetheart, you wouldn't be here dressed in that sexy little dress if you weren't trying to get someone attention," he said slowly moving closer again, like a predator stalking its prey.
In an instant, you stood up mumbling about having to go to the bathroom. you bolted to the toilets in hopes of escaping the situation.
Max had spent the evening hanging with his friends and playing videos games together.
He hadn't done it in a while since meeting you, but you insisted he hang out with his friends, thinking he never gets to see them because he travels so often.
He was glad he did it because he had time to relax a bit before their next race in Qatar next weekend.
He arrived home close to midnight, and immediately laid down in bed, ready for a good nights rest when his phone sudden rang.
Looking at the caller ID he couldn't help the smile that erupted across his face.
"Hello beautiful," he said gently.
"M-Max," he heard your weak stuttering voice through the phone.
"What's wrong?" He asked, sitting up immediately.
"I'm scared." Your broken words echoed through the phone, leaving an impact on his heart with those two words.
"I-I went out with Amelia, a-and this man started to put his h-hand up my dress and I'm scared."
"Where are you? I'll come and get you right now"
"I don't know," you say softly, "I've never been here before. I don't remember the name."
"Okay love, can you send me your location?" He spoke softly, not wanting to cause anymore fear or anxiety.
"Okay," you mumble.
Max looked at where you were at and luckily the club was only 5 minutes away from his apartment.
"Okay love, I'll be there in 10 minutes. Why don't you go wait outside in front so the bouncers can watch out for you."
"Okay," you stated quickly before hanging up.
The Dutchman quickly bolted towards his front door, scared out of his mind. In his line of work, fear wasn't an option.
If they have fear while driving, they wouldn't survive. For the first time in his life he actually felt fear when hearing your meek voice say those words.
I'm scared
Those words echoes through his brain as he drove to his little lamb. He felt like someone stabbed him in the heart.
He made a promise to himself that his little lamb will never have to feel this way ever again.
You decided you had to grab Amelia and take her with you, or at least have to decency to tell her you're leaving if she refuses to come with you.
Swiftly, you left the bathroom to go back to the booth where you end up finding no one except one person, John.
"Where's Amelia?" You asked with hesitancy, wanting nothing more than to just leave.
"She left sweetheart," he said with a smirk.
"What?"
"She went home with David," he started to make his way closer to her again, his eyes darkening even more than they already were, "Now it's just me and you daring. Why don't we go and have some fun?"
"No," You said, taking a few steps back, "my friend is waiting for me outside."
Without another word, you finally made your way towards the exit, deciding not to give John the chance to keep coming after you.
It wasn't until you felt the cool Monaco breeze on your skin did you actually let out a breath of relief. You tried to even out your breathing, calming herself down but you couldn't.
The loud pounding of the music emitted from the club caused you to slowly make your way down the street towards the street corner.
You started up in the night sky. A wave of peace and calm washed over you as you gazed upon the stars that filled up the dark night sky.
Sadly, this peace did not last long as you felt a hand grip your arm tightly, making you cry out in pain as the person turned you towards them.
John stands before you again, yanking your body closer to him, leaving no room for you to struggle.
You scratched and tried to fight him but he quickly gripped your wrist, tight enough that there will surely be a bruise there tomorrow.
"I've been looked my everywhere for you darling," he whispered close to ear, pulling back with a wicked grin on his face.
"Let go of me," You hoped your voice would come out strong but it came out weak and fearful.
"I can't do that sweetheart," he tilted his head slightly to the side, starting you down like you were a monkey in a zoo, "you're coming with me."
"No!" You shouted hoping that someone would hear you. You need to escape somehow now or else-. You honestly didn't want to think about what would happen if you didn't.
"Stop fighting," John snaps, annoyed at your struggling, but You refused to go down without a fight.
One minute you struggled with John, the next you were being pulled away from him into someone else's arms.
This person wrapped you up in their arms, their firm chest provided you some form of comfort.
You didn't care who this person was, anyone was better than being stuck with John.
"Don't you dare fucking touch her!" The rumble of a familiar voice vibrated through the chest you currently leaned into.
Max.
Taglist: @shelbyteller, @smithieandy, @fangirlforever2000, @herexpertcollector, @vip-access, @genevieve-blr
#f1#f1 x reader#f1 imagine#max verstappen#formula 1#max verstappen x reader#formula 1 x reader#lando norris x reader#formula 1 fanfic#charles leclerc x reader#formula one x reader#formula one imagine#formula 1 x you#formula 1 x y/n#max verstappen one shot#max verstappen fluff#max verstappen fanfic#max verstappen x you#max verstappen imagine#formula one#las vegas gp 2024#red bull racing#f1 memes#max verstappen f1#max verstappen fic#max verstappen x yn#red bull f1#mv33#mv1
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riddle me this. what does a 50 million dollar drive, a giant helmet made from recycled materials, the british media, safety infringements, an aborted start, six red flags, rain, team orders, the first black flag in seventeen years, the dutch national anthem and ayrton sennas 1990 mclaren all have in common?
stumped? well i’ll tell you.
it’s the 2024 brazilian grand prix.
the last race of our second to last triple header. a sprint weekend. and chaos in its highest form.
today is november 23, 2024 and make sure you get a snack because this is a long one.
we started the week off pretty strong with lance stroll getting broken up with on his birthday.
well, maybe.
his girlfriend deleted all of the pictures of him off of her instagram account on his birthday, which really doesnt look good. and this really set the tone for the week of bonkers shit that was now upon us.
things like lando being asked about the dreaded Last Week With Max incident. in an interview he was asked (told?)
“Are you aware that people watching at home don't want to see the fight between you and Max for the world championship ending in radio messages, tedious steward inquires, time penalties? They want to see you racing nicely and cleanly.”
lando was in agreement clearly because he said
“And so do I! And I do.”
max on the other hand still remained max about the situation
he was asked during the press conference: “a lot has been said since mexico. are you going to change the way you go racing this weekend?”
and max said, like a badass:
“yeah, ive heard that before in my career. its my tenth year in formula 1. i think i know what im doing!”
christian horner brought receipts, as in actual data sheets, to his mexico gp media session about how max’s penalties from mexico were unjust. i don't think that anyone really listened to any of this though because the penalties were never unturned.
one penalty that they did figure out what charles’s swear penalty from the press conference in mexico. the fia finally made a decision. charles will be pleased to know that he does Not have to do community service with max. but honestly (and this is now my own opinion here) why give one guy community service and not give it to the other? max apologized for his language Before he said “the car is fucked.” charles apologized After once he realized what was going to happen. not really sure here why the fia is out to get max but whatever i don't make the rules. also. the fines and the community service seem to Only be confined to the press conferences because as we know. people have cursed in the cool down room (lando in singapore notably) and also many have over the radio (checo, franco, charles, george, etc etc) and they have not been told anything. hm. in any case though, we have more important things to focus on than weird swear bans.
like charles leclerc nation going insane when this video was posted, which is a new contender for best weird yet still sexy video of charles on the ferrari page
liam lawson told everyone that he is “not here to make friends, im here to win.” following his Incidents with fernando and also checo at the us and mexican gps. which is interesting for a few reasons. 1. hes in a vcarb and statistically they have not won a single thing all season because they are vcarb and 2. he was soon after seeing being besties with yuki.
oh and also. max reacted to (was asked about?) the whole liam flipping checo off while they were driving in mexico thing, and max said “Checo, I think if I did that to you, I would be quite afraid leaving the country.”
and there were also the usual “this is checo’s last race weekend” general threats. weve seen these before. so theyre not worth wasting typing space on because i cant imagine that theyre going to fire him this late into the season. and why would we talk about the goofy red bull rumors that always are swirling everywhere when we could instead talk about lewis hamilton and franco colapinto.
lewis hamilton praised the crap out of franco colapinto. at the press conference on media day. as we all know franco is a lewis fangirl. so. he honestly might still be in a state of shock.
“It's always great to see young people, young talented individuals get the opportunity to come through and shine, and he did that in the first race. We had a great little battle and it was super safe. It was hard but fair. [...] He's saying it's not for him to decide, but my advice would be - I would be pushing on my side to make sure I'm doing absolutely everything. At the end of the day, he's got to continue to focus on doing his job every weekend, as he is, and hopefully, he's got good people behind him who are doing the right job to make sure that he's here racing next year.”
and low and behold a few hours later franco did make a fangirl post about it.
also. brazil is Not franco’s home race, but they are now officially in south america, so it was like a home race adjacent for him (hes from argentina) and the crowds were definitely in agreement. we will get back to that later.
there was a fan at the race who saw him in the paddock and yelled at him “FRANCO. CAN YOU SIGN MY SHIRT? IT’S A KNOCKOFF ONE. FRANCOOOOO” and he lost his shit over that. because remember a few weekends ago he told everyone to buy williams knockoff merch cause it was just as good and not as much money?
we also had some helmets. valtteris had coffee on it because its something that brazil is known for.
oscars had funny little androids on it that were all different hims (he also said he only recently learned that it was polite cat and not sleepy cat)
esteban had some brazil themed stuff
lewis had a senna/brazil tribute helmet
lewis was also going to get to drive ayrton senna’s 1990 mclaren after qualifying on saturday.
oh and of course we had stake do a funny little meme thing on their twitter because theyre quite known for their funny little meme things.
is this a terrible glimpse at media day? yeah absolutely but u know what i have 7 pages of notes front and back from the races themselves so deal with it i suppose. unlike what some of you may think, i 1. do not want to be writing this post forever and 2. also have other things i need to do.
one person was not at media day though and it was fernando alonso and it was because he was in the hospital im pretty sure somewhere in spain for what im also pretty sure was intestinal issues. he had also been out last week for media day due to sickness, but he was back for the race. between this and lace’s probable breakup it was shaping up to be a banner weekend for aston martin, and it was only going to get worse!
someone who definitely didn't miss media day though was sebastian vettel. if you don't know who sebastian vettel is, he was a four time world champion, menace, shit stirrer and boy toy twink esque guy who is now mostly unreachable and is the epitome of “hey i cant do nothing to nobody no more” and comes out of hiding maybe twice a year to subject the grid to a new arts and crafts project. but do not be fooled. this is the same guy who was asked, after winning his first race, if it was the best moment of his life and he said, and i quote “you obviously weren’t there when i lost my virginity.” anyway, this time his arts and crafts project was a giant helmet made from recycled materials paying tribute to ayrton senna. and yes, he made the whole grid get in the helmet. his whimsey is still off the charts.
he was also wearing really terrible shorts. as in they were long, over the knee khaki shorts. some things never change.
he also tried to make a bet with sky germany about max winning the championship. sky germany refused.
ok im not even going to Pretend to know what happened during the practice session. max got a 5 place grid penalty for sundays race because he took a new engine. i think george’s car briefly broke? idk. he did get it fixed tho and ended the session in p2, behind lando who was p1. and then we had a special guest in p3.
who was it? well i will give you a clue. it was NOT kevin magnussen!!! why? because he wasn’t feeling well.
so, everyones favorite (team dubbed) “super sub” jumped back in the cockpit once again.
you guessed it, it was ollie bearman!!! originally i think he was supposed to just be in for practice (and yes he did get p3 in practice). but since its a sprint weekend (yeah, i forgot that too) that means theres only one practice session and then sprint qualifying later that day. and so. the way formula racing works. is that whatever driver drives the car for qualifying also needs to drive the car for the race. they cant get replaced if the car has already qualified.
ollie by the way had never driven in brazil before. he said that he did it once in a video game. and now he was about to do it irl in a real car. he also got a phone call at 6:45am saying heyyyyy buddyyyy you wanna jump in the car this weekend? we happen to have an opening! and well that's not the exact quote but that is what happened.
and then haas announced that kevin was not going to be racing that weekend due to sickness. ollie responded in a definitely very normal way which was “of course condolences…i mean, give my best to kevin.” and then he was officially In The Car for the weekend. what could do wrong???
well lets just say that a Lot happened:
starting with lovely and wonderful Sprint Qualifying. yes that’s right. this is a sprint weekend. why does the fia do this to us guys.
two things were important to note.
there was a slight threat of rain
2. the track had been resurfaced and it was bumpy, which is not great when you're driving over 200kph. it really can affect your vision and also your back
lewis had trouble with the car a few years ago when it was porpoising and he was also not doing great at this race. but merc said that he was “all good.” he was not the only driver complaining about the bouncing though. it was extreme and it was dangerous and we will hear more about it later.
i think that franco took a nap at some point. at least its in my notes so it must have happened. and i think that it was also in the car. unfortunately i don't have a photo. like many other things on this post you will just have to trust me.
aston martin had decided that their car sucked to massive degrees and rolled back their upgrades all the way to suzuka. u know, just to see if they could figure out what the fuck was wrong with their car. Unfortunately though they could not because both of their drivers got out during sq1.
one team was pleased with what was happening and that was mclaren. they had a new rear wing that was brazil specific and also apparently legal unlike the last one and they were Flying. in sq2 lando took the fastest time with a 1.09.0. on medium tires. last years fastest time was 1.10 on soft tires, so in the words of the commentators, “norris is on another planet!” this was good for them because they hadnt actually been sure they were going to be able to race. theor freight for their car (and some other teams cars) had all been delayed cause they were shipped in wooden boxes and you cant ship things in wooden boxes to brazil because they need to protect the rain forest.
the commentators, mostly karun, also lamented about the swear bans, which they rightfully thought were stupid as hell. he brought up a good point though which was “are you going to have translators for every language? how are you going to monitor it?” because very few of them speak english as their first language and most speak more than 1 language so it is possible they could just curse in Not English
but we don't have time for that right now. not when ollie bearman had just knocked checo out of sprint qualifying. that’s right, ollie went just slightly faster, pushing checo from p10 down to p12.
liam and checo also almost crashed. which wasn't a surprise but it was still funny.
also surprising was that oscar pulled out a pole lap at the very end of sq3, a 1:08.899, only a few thousandths faster than lando.
“where did that come from?” karun asked. “was he saving something in his pocket away from his teammate? that is a very fernando alonso trick”
regardless of what it was, he was still on pole. for the second time during a sprint.
“very very happy,” oscar said in his interview. “try and win obviously…starting from the best seat in the house, make sure it stays that way.” which is an important surprise tool that you should all remember for later. later being the sprint race.
they all lined up
oscar, lando, charles, max, carlos, george, pierre, liam, alex, ollie, lewis, nico, checo, franco, valtteri, fernando, esteban, yuki, lance and guanyu.
and before we get into the sprint, lets get a little reminder on the championship standings.
1 Max Verstappen 362
2 Lando Norris 315
3 Charles Leclerc 291
4 Oscar Piastri 251
5 Carlos Sainz 240
6 Lewis Hamilton 189
7 George Russell 177
8 Sergio Perez 150
9 Fernando Alonso 62
10 Nico Hulkenberg 31
11 Lance Stroll 24
12 Yuki Tsunoda 22
13 Kevin Magnussen 14
14 Alexander Albon 12
15 Daniel Ricciardo 12
16 Pierre Gasly 9
17 Oliver Bearman 7
18 Franco Colapinto 5
19 Esteban Ocon 5
20 Liam Lawson 2
21 Zhou Guanyu 0
22 Logan Sargeant 0
23 Valtteri Bottas 0
so max, lando and i believe also charles and maybe oscar?? were still in contention for the championship title. and as a reminder. oscar was starting on pole, with lando, charles and max all behind. lando was able to knock some points off of max in mexico with the time penalties that he racked up and was really hoping to continue to do that in brazil. so max needed to get around charles at the start asap so he could start duking it out with the mclarens.
and speaking of mclaren, there was some good speculation that we might get faced once again with the “papaya rules” aka mclaren team orders. as in, oscar might have to let lando past.
and so. lets see what happened on lap 1.
well. max did not pass charles. lewis dropped several places, ollie dropped several places, and the two mclarens started to pull away from the rest of the pack, especially oscar who managed to get half a second ahead of lando.
so we had a slightly new running order:
oscar, lando, charles, max, carlos, george, pierre, liam, nico, ollie, alex, checo, franco, lewis, esteban, valtteri, yuki, fernando, lance and guanyu
and then max and charles started battling on lap 3. by lap 4 charles had taken the fastest lap. and by lap 6 he had closed the gap to lando and was in an epic drs train because lando had also closed the gap to oscar.
george had also started struggling, probably because he was in a mercedes, and was trying to get passed by pierre gasly, in a alpine.
lando meanwhile, was still up in p2 and not entirely pleased.
“yeah, im not sure what were doing here i thought we talked about this” he said over his radio right before he locked up and fell out of oscars drs and into charles and then also max’s drs. he was probably referring to, why the hell hadn’t mclaren done their team orders business yet?
well, his race engineer, will jacobs, had absolutely no information to offer for him, he instead said. “understood keep doing what you’re doing.”
“yeah whatever,” lando said, unimpressed.
there was some announcer speculation that oscar might give it up to him on the last lap, on the last corner, similar to what lando did to oscar way back in hungary. hungary? idk. its been a long season. and its still even longer.
anyway. checo had been stuck down behind nico hulkenberg in 11th for a very solid nine laps, unable to pass him. he finally managed it on lap 9. his reward? another haas to pass! ollie bearman! he managed that a few laps later and was met with quite possibly his biggest foe: liam lawson. who, just to add even more insult to injury, was in the last points position of the race.
mclaren meanwhile had decided to do some team orders, but not the ones that lando wanted. they told oscar to drop back to give lando some drs, to rescue him from the charles and max inferno that was chasing him. and oscar did. the top 4 though were still separated only by 4 seconds.
and charles, he understood the assignment. he was racing absolute balls to the wall, elbows all the way out. doing anything and everything to keep max behind him.
max was though, unimpressed.
“ah come on charles man, so many mistakes,” he said over the radio.
charles was told about this post sprint, and he had a funny little reaction. unfortunately i could only find that reaction in gif format.
in any case, i believe this was a clip from sky sports, possibly probably alex jaques who said after that radio "that is max verstappen urging a rival that he's had since his childhood to stay with the McLaren because he wants the ferrari to stay there. but that error has created now two battles instead of a four car battle for the lead."
to make it worse for max, lando could have gotten ahead of oscar here, but alas there were no team orders. so he could not. and also he was still slightly too close to charles and max to not be under threat from them. still, oscar was told to floor it to open the gap between lando and charles, for the potential swap.
and there was nothing that charles could do about it cause he had absolutely no battery power.
will jacobs finally decided to mention the team orders threats on lap 17. “we are happy to hold these positions until the last lap.”
to which lando said “yeah i will overtake.”
and so it seemed that the commentators were correct. there was a prophesied last lap swap coming from mclaren.
in case you're tired of this mess, checo was still battling for 8th place with liam. he managed to get it very briefly. and then he lost it because he locked up.
oscar went fastest on lap 18. and then max also passed charles.
so it was game fucking on at the front of the grid. and everyone, including gp, max’s race engineer, knew it. because he told max on lap 19 “cmon mate, lets chase em down.”
mclaren responded as anyone would. by telling oscar “verstappen we believe is faster than leclerc” on lap 24. which is like. fork found in kitchen. max is the king of putting that red bull in places that it should never be allowed to go and that is the front of the grid.
speaking of red bulls, checo finally managed to pass liam lawson for 8th. and he did it cleanly without locking up this time. and liam didn't even flip him off.
and mercedes, to no ones surprise, had no race pace.
then! interestingly! there was a yellow flag! but the cameras didn't quite cut fast enough so we didn't really see what happened. turned out that nico hulkenberg had pulled off with an exhaust issue. he was technically off the track, but it was not in an overtaking spot (can overtake during yellow flags) and he seemed to still be trying to maneuver the car further away from the track, so the announcers said that this would not hurt the overtaking battle that was looming between the mclarens and max. the cameras then jumped back to that, kind of ignoring nico.
they had still not swapped, and max was gaining.
then the cameras cut Back to nico hulkenberg. and he was now out of the car. standing on the grass near some barriers. and this picture doesnt really do it justice but he is about 15 feet from a live race track
(there was still a yellow flag in that specific sector but he was OUT OF THE CAR next to a FORMULA 1 TRACK with NO SAFETY CAR)
there was now though a Threat of a safety car. gee i wonder why. his car was stopped not too far from the track and he was standing on the track, it was a massive disaster waiting to happen.
and so, mclaren gave the team order to swap positions.
lando and oscar did.
and immediately.
and i MEAN IMMEDIATELY they called a virtual safety car.
oscar had dropped back into the clutches of max verstappen and max had just revved up to pass him when suddenly! no no! safety car!
which was interesting.
but we will get back to that in a minute.
now, under a virtual safety car, cars need to keep the gap between them, but the track can go green at any moment and without any warning.
and max was on top of that. “pay attention to this!” he said over radio “because if hes (oscar) on purpose driving slow (to give lando a bigger gap) report it!”
oscar though seemingly remained on his best behavior.
and on the last lap the virtual safety car was announced to be ending.
max was getting antsy behind the two mclarens and pulled up next to oscar in preparation for the track going green, but it went green a second too late and oscar was able to pull away and make a beeline all the way to the checkered flag while still keeping max behind.
lando came in first, followed by oscar, max, charles, carlos, george, pierre, checo, liam, alex. lewis, franco, esteban, ollie, yuki, guanyu, and lance and nico DNFd.
oscar was clearly very disappointed about the result (remember he said after sprint qualifying that he wanted to hold onto his p1). and karun wondered aloud if “mark webber will negotiate a bonus for oscar with that, he should.” cause remember, mark webber was the infamous number 2 red bull teammate to sebastian vettel who was forced to pretty much give up anything and everything for him. and, need i remind you, this weekend seb was running willy nilly around the paddock getting drivers to get in his giant recycled helmet. all very distressing things for one mark webber.
oscar also said that it was “a bit tricky….bit bumpy….learned a lot for the race tomorrow.”
lando said that “we work well as a team together….i thanked oscar….he deserved it but you do what you have to do.”
later, in the press conference, an interviewer congratulated oscar on his win. oscar, confused, said “i don't know what i won but thank you”
max said that he “had to wait for some mistakes and luckily they came” in regards to overtaking charles. “it took a bit too long with charles…but whenever hes on the drs, hes very hard to attack!”
charles said in a later interview about max “i think max was a lot more on the reserve at the beginning then started pushing at the end. he had more pace, he did a better job with tire management”
lets remember that these two are Not Teammates.
max though was brought to the stewards though for a vsc infringement (when he pulled next to oscar) because that is Not Allowed. and he ended up with a time penalty that demoted him to fourth. so charles ended up finishing third. and he got a penalty point on his super license.
but what about that safety car call?
well i am so glad that you asked.
the post race show opened with one will buxton talking to one andrea stella, the mclaren team principal. and here was what he had to say about the mclaren 1-2:
“very good news, a mclaren 1-2… [we had a ] clear conversation with both drivers [before the race]” here he then called them both number 1 drivers again (which everyone thought we were past) “[it was] very risky swapping even with 1.5 seconds [to max], we were waiting for a few more seconds to materialize, but it never did”
will buxton, ever the shit stirrer and also as we know, probably the number 1 person pissed at mclarens team strategy this year, then asked why lando was so upset over the radio.
andrea was having none of it. “well i already answered the question didn't i? when you're a number 1 driver you get nervous when you are behind…we needed to do a very good job to stay ahead of him [max].”
he then departed and james hinchcliffe quite literally Stumbled into frame with his own thoughts on the mclaren swap. “it ended to plan, it didn't go to plan,” he said. “they got very lucky with the vsc.”
he then talked about the vsc. “the timing of the vsc was weird to me” you know with the driver being a solid 10 feet from the track with zooming cars? “i don't think it was done the best it could have been done.”
and this seemed to be the general consensus everywhere else online. why on earth wait to call a safety car when quite literally we had a driver who was out of the car and standing next to the track? that is quite literally a Safety Problem. and given the timing of the mcalren swap, it seemed Possible that perhaps race control had been waiting for mclaren to swap before calling the car. which is, as im sure you could all figure out, kind of weird and sketchy.
but aside from that. there was still much praise for max. “max played it so smart today,” james said, referring to max selectively murdering charles’s tires by fighting with him for the first half of the race. “with not the best car on track hes still performing above expectations.”
there was some proper francomania in brazil. so much so that flights from argentina to brazil had sold out. franco said on the post race show that “the rivalry between brazil and argentina is in football not motor racing.”
pierre had scored a p7 which he was happy with. mostly because it was a points position and those are kinda hard to come by at alpine.
lewis though just about wanted to quit. they asked him how his race pace was and he said “horrendous. one of the worst races ive had” which is really saying something when you remember that he has had 353 race starts. he wanted to change the car entirely before quali.
and lance stroll also winked at esteban ocon while they were interviewing ollie bearman.
most notable quote from the post sprint was this, by max:
the interviewer asked him: “lando said ‘i don't have to change my driving style, if anyone has to do it, it's max.’ do you agree? you won't change it?”
and max said: “[im a] three time world champion. i don't have to change anything.”
max, as some of us may forget, is a very good driver, he’s just in a shit car this year and other people are very very fast. finally. but he is in fact a 7 time world champion. he won every race except 3 last year. he’s insane and he loves this sport. it never pays well to underestimate max verstappen.
and with that absolute banger of a line, let’s get into qualifying.
what's that? its delayed? why is that?
oh! cause its raining!
like comical, almost biblical amounts of rain.
during the delay we had one will buxton and one james hinchcliffe speaking to us about all the current drama.
for example: is checo doing enough? apparently christian horner has dialed back the intensity of his support, so whos to say! but then again, this is red bull, they drop people for anything and everything
and they briefly mentioned the audi seat cause everyone is in contention for the audi seat apparently, including gabriel bortoleto, who is currently leading the f2 championship and a mclaren academy driver.
but they mostly debated their favorite topic: what the ever loving fuck is going on at mclaren.
specifically, this edition: Why Didn't They Swap Cars Sooner????
(please know this conversation was had in rain jackets in the pouring damn rain and it looked like they were like uh we got no broadcast happening cause downpour we need to fill the time we need to fill the time hmmm what to do oh! we got will and hinch! give then a microphone and let them go for it! and that they did)
james thought that they left themselves exposed to max and charles for too long, and apparently mclaren said that it would swap the cars at the first opportunity originally but then they didn't swap when they said over the radio that the gap to leclerc was significant.
will buxton had a theory: “they’re trying to do it without upsetting either driver”
he then, in true will buxton fashion, went completely and totally off the rails about it:
“andrea stella wrote the guidebook for team orders when he worked at ferrari. where is that? [why aren’t they saying ‘you work for us, you do what we say’?]”
“the team [the drivers] needs to understand who pays the bills here” james added.
“if they don't lay down the law now they put themselves in an awkward position or later” will said about how this would affect the future of mclaren because if they were already starting to win now and be in contention for the championships then whos to say that they couldn't do it again next year?
and then, somewhat inexplicably, they stopped talking to us and we had no screens no nothing no view on anyone for about 40 minutes. all we could assume was that qualifying was delayed.
and that it definitely was.
once we finally got a visual on the track again it was in fact still raining, and only getting worse.
but if theres one thing about formula 1, its that they know how to have fun in the rain.
like how they let ted loose in the pit lane and he stalked through the mercedes garage, and proudly told the whole world that bono, lewis’s race engineer, has a carbon fiber cup of tea. and then the camera zoomed in on it.
he then also tried to talk to toto by picking up a headset and shouting into it “we miss you toto!” but instead of getting to toto the message went to jack, toto’s son?
and then someone, i don't remember who, perhaps it was karun, told ted to “look at fred vasseur, hes a handsome man most of the time.”
the crowds were shouting “ole ole ole franco!” which was different from their usual chant of “ole ole ole senna!” and will buxton told franco that “flights from buenos aries to sao palo have sold out, that's the affect you are having” franco was impressed.
ollie bearman, who has objectively, by the way, been thrown now into three increasingly more insane race weekends (saudi arabia with like a few hours notice, singapore, and now the hellscape that was the giant rain storm in brazil) decided to do the sensible thing and take a nap.
"at his age it's gonna be his bed time soon, right?" one of the servus tv announcers said about ollie.
lewis decided to brave the rain to take some aesthetic rain pics
which he then posted on his instagram story
kimi antonelli was not so lucky. he got shoved into the rain by some mercedes mechanics. for sport.
george meanwhile was off jumping in puddles
instagram
and looking like a polite bowling pin wearing maybe some toe nail polish
and jack doohan made everyone tea in the alpine garage
instagram
oscar had a lovely little chat with fernando alonso
and then so did mark webber
perhaps the most insane part of this was that no one and i mean no one knew how they were going to decide the grid order, should qualifying not happen. and as it got progressively more and more delayed, that was looking like it was going to be the case.
the race director told everyone at one point that it was “not really possible to qualify” which was you know, a problem, since that needs to happen in order for them to race.
hilariously, there was nothing in the regulations for if someone like this were to happen.
next years regulations said that championship standings could be used for qualifying order if qualifying was not able to occur, but that's not this years regs so they couldn't do that. there were though regulations for what should happen should qualifying for a sprint race not be able to occur and that was use the standings from practice 1. and there was also regulations for what should happen if qualifying could not occur on a normal race weekend and that was use the standings from practice 3. but this was a sprint weekend in the main grand prix. so should they use the standings from practice 1? that would be particularly advantageous to haas who had ollie bearman come in third. should they use the standings from the sprint race? that would benefit mclaren.
“i’ll add this to the list of reasons why i’m glad im not a steward,” karun said.
they continued to debate. everyone went back and forth. theyre going to use practice 1! theyre going to use the sprint! they’ll use sprint qualifying!
they got a hold of mike krak (the aston martin tp) who said that it was “a bit too dark and a bit too gloomy and a lot wet” definitely too wet for racing.
sure enough qualifying was then switched from “delayed” to “postponed” perhaps indefinitely.
there was a chance that they could move qualifying to sunday morning. but the weather was not good for then either. and so the session ended, with no one knowing what the fuck was happening and sir lewis hamilton interrupting f1 ceo Stefano Domenicali’s interview saying:
"I wanna go out give us better wet tyres and warming blankets so we can go out!"
and that was it
now, rain at the interlagos circuit is not exactly unheard of. mostly because it is literally interlagos (between two lakes, in portuguese)and theres been some insane rain races here before. namely 2016. max, who was still nearly a rookie and only in his first full year at red bull at that point had qualified fourth but ended up down in 16 with 15 laps to go due to some oversteer and pit stopping. he managed to make it all the way up to 3rd by sheer willpower and insanity alone and toto wolff called it “the verstappen show” because it was “physics…being redefined.”
another infamous rain race was the one in 2008, the season finale race and where lewis hamilton won his first world championship title at mclaren. he almost lost the title to felipe massa at ferrari. felipe won the race, and lewis was running in 6th around the last few corners to the checkered flag when the person driving in front of him, timo glock, started going slowly and he managed to pass him for 5th place, which was all he needed to get to win the championship. but there were a few minutes of celebration in the ferrari garage where they thought they had won the drivers championship, until lewis crossed the line. and “is that glock going slowly?” is one of those very famous facing quotes
and last year at qualifying in brazil it ended with an absolutely biblical storm (according to crofty) and we got the infamous max verstappen storm lap for pole position
the running fan theory though as to why there was such massive amounts of rain this year was that nelson piquet was in the paddock. why does this matter? well. nelson piquet (a three time world champion and also father of max verstappen’s current girlfriend kelly) was fined 1 million dollars and banned from entering an f1 paddock again as punishment for racist and homophobic comments he made on video about lewis hamilton. and he was just there. in the red bull garage. like nothing was wrong. (this is made infinitely worse by the way that f1 drivers have since been banned from making “political statements” on the track and etc, mostly because lewis in 2020/21 did a bunch of advocating for black lives matter and got some other drivers in on it (he was stopped by the fia for wearing a shirt that said “Justice for Breonna Taylor” and sebastian vettel did some other advocating for the environment and also lgbt community, so they cant really even complain too much about this)
lewis did though tweet this tweet after that whole incident.
but anyway. qualifying. what was to come of qualifying??
well. let me tell you.
qualifying was postponed until 7:30am on race day, local time. and the race was moved up to i think 10:30 ??? am? to try and avoid as much weather as possible. which was good progress for f1 cause usually they don't do this.
it wasn't great for the drivers though who had to be awake at about 4am, barely ate food and jumped into the cars. esteban ocon set his alarm at precisely 4:31.
and george had coffee on an empty stomach. lando had a nutella sandwich. and off they went.
and by off they went i mean, it was still raining. “wetter than a fisherman’s boot” according to crofty.
but they were qualifying.
ollie had never driven an f1 car in the wet before. which he was about to get a whole lot of experience doing.
some drivers though really love the wet. rain at at f1 race, while scary, is sort of a neutralizer because it really comes down to the skill of the driver and not so much the car. george loves the wet (a la spa 2021 when he managed to qualify a shitbox williams in p2) and so does esteban and lewis and max among others.
lance also likes a good wet race. “well hes canadian, lance stroll,” crofty said. “he’s rather good on the ice.”
and to make it extra fun, theres no tire warming blankets for the wet tires to save money, which seems a little counterintuitive, but they don't really get used very often.
everyone was whipping around, dodging the puddles as best as they could, trying to clear the track of water a little, and we had some interesting people up in the top 5. as in the top five was esteban ocon, fernando alonso, yuki tsnuoda, checo perez, and lance stroll.
and then, could it be? in this economy? a red flag???
it indeed was! and it would not be the last!
it was franco, he had found the wall. he was okay. but the car was not.
and there was not a lot of time to fix it.
karun took this time to tell everyone that he thought that franco could not possibly get the red bull seat (which was a thing that was being debated hotly in the paddock despite franco saying that he was not in talks for a seat last weekend) because of incidents like this due to his own inexperience.
crofty brought up a separate but interesting point which was that in all the previous times that we have had qualifying on a sunday, a german has been on pole.
he is of course, correct.
japan 2004: michael schumacher
japan 2010: sebastian vettel
australia 2013: sebastian vettel
texas 2015: nico rosberg
japan 2019: sebastian vettel
and there was of course only one german on the grid right now. nico hulkenberg.
“its written in the stars!” crofty proclaimed loudly and to the general annoyance of karun, who did not want there to be a german polesitter this race because then crofty would be “insufferable” about it.
while they were debating that, the red flag had cleared and everyone went out again. including george russell, who was so impatient to get out that he overtook in the pit lane and despite being impeded a few times, still managed to put his mercedes in p2.
max got his lap time deleted and was now stuck down in 12th. lewis still needed to get out of the bottom 5 and lando was stuck in 15th.
everyone had one more lap.
lewis managed to only go 14th. then got pushed to 15th.
lando managed an okay first sector but needed “a middle and final sector of his life here” in order to clear the elimination zone. and he got a personal best in the middle sector but still only managed to go 14th. he was safe, but lewis was out. along with ollie, franco, nico and guanyu.
(“your run of german poles on a sunday is gone,” karun happily told crofty)
lewis, as could be predicted, was very unhappy with his car. as he should have been. according to crofty he is “one of the top 3 drivers of all time in the wet” and yet. here he was. in the wet. out in q1.
at the start of q2 it was not actively raining, which was good news. but it was still slippy and people still had on wet tires for the most part.
george went for a little spin but he was okay. no damage and no walls for him.
carlos was not so lucky.
he found the barriers. another red flag.
later he said that he had clearly misjudged the grip.
his crash was pretty big, bigger than francos, and again, theres less than 5 hours until the race.
everyone was ushered back into the pit lane as the track was cleared and repaired.
at the time, oscar was leading, followed by george, lance, max, liam, checo, valtteri, fernando, charles and carlos with lanco, pierre, alex, yuki, and esteban in the drop zone. 5:51 to go.
when they came back on track fernando alonso somehow managed to go fastest. could it be his first pole in over 4000 days???
and as everyone was on their final flying lap, including lando and max and checo, the yellow flags came out. it was lance stroll, he had gone off.
again, like in the sprint, the cameras did not immediately cut to him. but the announcers said that “i think race control are waiting for these laps to count before calling the red flag.” because several people were on flying laps and it was the end of the session, so it would not be resumed after the red flag.
lando crossed the line. he went fastest. almost immediately the red flag was called. max and checo were unable to finish their flying laps.
the red flag has had to be called cause lance was in “a dangerous position”
later, there was a half baked excuse that they thought that lance was trying to get the car moving which was why they did not call the red flag. this, by the way, was the state of lance’s car:
it was clearly not in any state to be driven.
and yet. it took them 40 whole seconds to call a red flag for this. the previous two red flags were called in under 5 seconds.
and, need i remind you, that the delay of this red flag allowed for lando to get himself out of the bottom 5 and also knocked max and checo out of the qualifying session.
now might also be a good time to mention that max had a five place grid penalty for changing his power unit. so he would be starting all the way down in seventeenth.
and he was fucking pissed.
because remember. the 40 second delay of this red flag allowed Everyone to finish their flying lap Except for max and checo. so q2 ended with lando in first, followed by fernando, oscar, liam, alex, charles, esteban, george, lance, and yuki with valtteri, max, checo, carlos and pierre all getting eliminated.
also this is a very very valid safety complaint. it should not take that long for a red flag to be called when the car is not moving, had three clearly broken wheels and is also 15 feet from the track. all the worst accidents in f1 happen when there is a car that is already not moving from an accident or a problem and then it gets hit by another car. there have already been people who have died this way. it does not need to happen again.
aside from the bs flag call, checo was also pissed at red bull for entirely separate reasons and those reasons were because red bull had waited really long to go out for the final run which was part of the reason why they were not able to finish.
“cmon guys,” he said over radio. “we gotta do that better…if everyone is already waiting at the end of the pit lane why don't we go?”
fans were outraged at this. one commented on instagram under a post about the teams qualifying positions “what is checo's garage doing? seriously???” and a red bull mechanic named greg commented underneath it saying “giving him the same tools as max.” then, a second red bull mechanic named charlie commented responded to greg, saying “why you lying for”
so. shit is certainly hitting the fan in more ways than one at red bull.
but back to qualifying.
there were no red bulls. which was odd. but we did have nine cars: both mclarens, both rb’s, and one aston, one mercedes, one williams, one ferrari and one alpine. what an interesting mix.
and it was about to get even more interesting because fernando alonso found a wall.
another red flag.
“red flag was much quicker that time,” crofty said. “19 seconds instead of 40.”
and another wrecked car.
the standing order, with 6:59 left on the clock was lando, alex, oscar, esteban, george, charles, yuki, liam, fernando and lance.
and the rain could be coming back.
but there was good news for some people! like alex albon who was, according to crofty “on course for his highest start” as he was currently sitting in p2 rather comfortably.
and in anticipation for the rain to re start, everyone had already queued up in the pit lane, despite the fact that the track had not yet been green flagged.
“it’s like the post office on a tuesday morning. you go down to get a box of stamps and they're already queuing up!” crofty said, making absolutely no sense.
thankfully there was no need to dwell on it because the track went green and they all spilled out again.
yuki went off and into the gravel, but was able to get out. so there was no red flag.
that came a few minutes later, for one very, very unfortunate alex albon.
yes, the same alex albon that had been on course to have his highest ever start. that alex albon.
and it was a big crash. he ping ponged right across the whole track like a very expensive and very broken ping pong ball.
he had no idea what happened either. over the radio he asked if the brakes failed.
and now williams had two very, incredibly broken cars to fix in just about three hours. remember that this team is held together by an excel spreadsheet.
three minutes, thirty one seconds to go.
and esteban ocon was seated at the front of the pit lane, waiting. behind him, the remaining six cars still left in the qualifying session from hell. remember this was all before ten am. at least two of them were running on only coffee and nutella.
“if i were him [esteban ocon], i’d select first gear and then wait ten seconds,” crofty said, speaking about how to impede lando and waste time, who was behind him, when coming out of the pit lane.
“oh you’re naughty,” karun said. then he went on a rant about how you physically cannot lie to the stewards because they will find out out. he apparently knew this from experience.
esteban did not impede lando and oscar upon exiting the pit lane. they all came out as they should.
“glad to see esteban found his first gear no problem and is out on the track,” crofty said. “[this is] quite the day in the championship battle.”
and that it really was. five red flags, seven cars still standing, max verstappen starting p17, lando finally starting to really close the gap to him in the championship, qualifying at 7:30am on a sunday, race in three hours, rain, back end of a triple header, no one’s been home in a month, and everyone was awake at 4am.
still, lando managed to improve his time, staying on provisional pole. oscar locked up and didn't finish his lap, he stayed p3.
liam lawson was gaining. he went second.
he was then replaced by yuki. for second.
then esteban ocon pulled out a third, splitting the two racing bulls.
lando extended his pole lap a second time.
and then george pulled out a p2.
charles unfortunately did not get in on the p2 fun. he stayed 6th.
and so. 1 hour and 45 minutes and five red flags later, with only barely 3.5 hours to the race. we finally had the starting order of the 2024 brazil gp.
p1: lando norris
p2: george russell
p3: yuki tsnuoda
p4: esteban ocon
p5: liam lawson
p6: charles leclerc
p7: alex albon
p8: oscar piastri
p9: fernando alonso
p10: lance stroll
p11: valtteri bottas
p12: checo perez
p13: carlos sainz
p14: pierre gasly
p15: lewis hamilton
p16: ollie bearman
p17: max verstappen
p18: franco colapinto
p19: nico hulkenberg
p20: zhou guanyu
one person wasn’t satisfied with their position and that was charles leclerc.
“that's p6” his race engineer told him over the radio.
“that's fucking shit” charles said.
the top three were definitely pleased though.
“a lot going on today,” lando said, accurately. “a little surprised.”
“really pleased to be lining up p2,” george said. “i loved it [coming in early] to be honest. maybe this is the format for sunday morning.”
“very tricky,” yuki said. “certainly enjoyed it. feels much better than yesterday, good pace.”
yuki also ran into all of his mechanics in victory.
and we got this hilarious picture.
and i know what you're thinking. did everyone manage to repair their cars in time for the race?
yes. everyone except for alex albon, that is, who had to withdraw from the race due to significant damage.
what? that was not what you were thinking?
oh. you want to know if lewis got to drive sennas 1990 mclaren??
yeah! he did! before the race! and he did it no handed, in the rain. not to be biased here, but that's my fucking seven time world champion.
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and. finally. without any further ado. the race. or more accurately, the drivers parade.
charles was standing with pierre and then Yanked his had away from him so that he could shake hands with max. they seemingly developed somehow even more of a soldiers bond here, having a weird unspoken agreement that they were going to stop mclaren at whatever costs, because honestly what else could these two be yapping about, looking like they were teammates? especially when max was one minor inconvenience away from burning down the entire paddock?
meanwhile george and alex were causing all kinds of problems, completely oblivious to the scheming going on around them
and that about sums up the drivers parade.
onwards.
to the race.
it was still slightly raining when the cars all pulled off for their formation lap. and unfortunately that was where the chaos began.
with lance stroll going off during the formation lap. he then turned out of it and got himself stranded in the gravel after boinking into the wall and was effectively stuck.
and so there was an aborted start. some drivers, the several at the front, started to go around the track again, but their was confusion from others (like max) if aborted start meant that they did go around again or if they just sat on the grid and waited for the mechanics to come back out. in any case, everyone ended up going around again.
in the end, it ended up being that lando, the polesitter, was not supposed to go around again. and he did. and a lot of people followed him around. and no one knew if anyone (like his engineer) told him to go around again or he just did it on his own. he was still noted for going, and the whole mess was going to get brought up to the stewards later.
because what were they supposed to do in that instance? penalize everyone?
“yet another reason why im glad im not a steward,” karun said.
one thing was for sure and that was that lance definitely should buy his mechanics dinner that night as an apology because they had worked very hard to fix his car only for him to bin it again. (though the car had been in several pieces not too long again and there was a chance something was not connected correctly, he did say later that the car had felt pretty bad to dive in the formation lap)
this isnt even the first time that a car hasnt completed the formation lap in brazil. just last year charles leclerc crashed on the formation lap due to steering failure.
once they all arrived back on the grid after formation lap 2 the mechanics came back out and started rechecking the cars and etc while they waited for lance’s car to get cleared. and the mercedes mechanics made a sneaky little adjustment to the tire pressure, hoping that no one would notice. unfortunately, they noticed.
onto formation lap 3! and thank god! everyone made it this time!
so with 18 cars and a rainy race ahead, lights went out and away they went into lap 1.
george was able to hold onto the lead!
and at the end of the first lap (which everyone blessedly survived) we had the following order: george, lando, yuki, esteban, charles, liam, oscar, fernando, pierre, lewis, max, franco, ollie, valtteri, nico, guanyu and checo.
that's right. max made up seven places. seven. and lewis had made up five. they were coming. max especially
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checo meanwhile had briefly gone spin, hence why he was now down in last place.
max passed lewis for 10th, already back into the points by lap 2.
george took the fastest lap on lap 3, already leading by 1.5 seconds. lando took it from him on lap 4. there was no DRS due to the rain, so lando was going to have to pass george the old fashioned style.
ollie bearman briefly went off the track after a small incident with franco, but he was able to rejoin.
and max passed pierre for 9th on lap 5
and then was up to 8th on lap 6 after passing fernando
meanwhile, along with lando, george, yuki and liam were all also noted for the starting procedure infringement at the beginning of the race. they would have to go with lando to the stewards after the race to hear their fate. meaning that no matter what the outcome of the race was, there was still a chance that they could get slammed with penalties after, so who knew if the real winners would in fact be the winners.
max, who had followed the rules for the starting procedure, took fastest lap on lap 7 as he started to close the gap to oscar in p7.
lando had started to eat into george’s lead a little, and george was now only .8 seconds ahead.
and the stewards noted the incident between ollie and franco. ollie received a 10 second penalty for causing a collision. which didn't really make a lot of sense to people as franco didn't really even have any damage.
max was declared to be the fastest man on track, faster than george, as he still zoomed up to the back of oscar.
meanwhile, lewis’s car had started bouncing, but george seemed unaffected as he took the fastest lap again on lap 10.
max passed oscar on lap 10, now in 7th. “he came from so far back,” oscar said, entirely not expecting it.
“max has tremendous confidence,” karun said.
and might i remind you all that it is RAINING
and then he passed liam for 6th on lap 11. unsurprisingly, liam was more compliant with max passing him than he had been with checo passing him in mexico). he was only 2.5 seconds behind charles, who was in p5. he had already made up 11 places in 11 laps in the pouring freaking rain.
lewis was not having as good luck. he went off the track and then got passed by franco.
“if i was haas i’d be annoyed with the penalty,” the announcers said, referring to ollies 5 second penalty. “nothing is wrong with that williams.”
by lap 15 there was a four way battle brewing for third. yuki, esteban, charles and max. who again i will remind you was 17th a mere 15 laps ago. this performance was starting to put even his 2016 brazil rampage to shame.
lewis was still not doing nearly as well, he tried to pass franco and failed.
lando was still in second behind george on lap 17 and said that he was struggling to overtake and that they were slow on the straights.
and to top it all off. the rain was set to get heavier in 15 minutes time.
charles, meanwhile, was managing to keep max behind. maybe he had brushed up on his skills since yesterday when max had called him out during the sprint for making so many mistakes over the radio.
no one had boxed yet. and the rain was starting to come down a little heavier. “getting slippery with these worn tires in the wet” nico said on lap 18.
and now as we know, its a crapshoot at best figuring out when to box for tires when its not raining. all that gets compounded into a fuckshoot when its raining. because it its expected to rain more soon, you'd want to put on new tires closer to then so that you have a better chance at clearing the water. plus theres always a chance it could get red flagged and then you could get a free pit stop. so the teams needed to get to the point with the big rain and then box for tires and hope that that was the right choice and that no one went off before then.
lando was back to gaining on george on lap 18
and ollie passed lewis for 14th
hamilton was clearly struggling in the mercedes, but george was leading? so was it a lewis problem? was it a car problem?? no one knew
max, meanwhile, was still under a second behind charles, no drs, on lap 20. charles had managed to hold him up for 9 laps and counting, which was a true feat when you remember how many places he has already made up.
“car’s not driveable mate,” lewis said on lap 21. “locking up, bouncing everywhere.” apparently the mercedes had some kind of a brake problem, but george was managing it just fine. he was still leading.
on lap 22 max tried to pass charles
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charles, clearly, did not let him
“that was charles leclers knowing exactly where max was going to go and defending it a long way out!” karun said.
“he was squeezing me!” max complained. “he didn’t leave a car’s width!”
no one else seemed to have this view though because the stewards did not note the incident.
carlos was seemingly having some kind of car problem as he stopped behind ollie and lewis after going off the track briefly.
and this was all looking like it might be a good time for some new tires.
by lap 24, with heavier rain rolling in any minute, here were the standings:
george, lando, yuki, esteban, charles, max, liam, oscar, pierre, fernando, nico, ollie, lewis, franco, carlos, checo, valtteri, and guanyu.
the drivers had to make the call for the tires to go to the wets, according to the announcers. its something that the driver has to feel, not really the team, because the driver is the one in the car.
charles pitted for inters on lap 25.
not full wets, which was interesting (wets have more groves on them, inters have less, and they were about to have a shit load of rain)
lando asked to box to overtake george on lap 26. mclaren wanted him to stay out, despite his protests that he wanted to box for new tires. so he stayed out.
liam lawson meanwhile went off the track due to contact with oscar. he came back on in 9th.
nico hulkenberg pitted for inters on lap 26
lando was half a second behind george on lap 27
and apparently those inters didn't work too well for nico hulkenberg because he went off track and managed to get stranded on some banking.
a virtual safety car was called on lap 28, though not before esteban ocon managed to pass yuki for third.
again, who knew why it took them so long to call the safety car.
many people decided to pit.
oscar, fernando, lewis, ollie, carlos and checo.
and at this point, mercedes was finally reported for adjusting their tire pressure on the grid, which is not allowed! and also very bad news for george should he win the race because usually that behavior results in a disqualification and i don't think that george could handle another dsq after winning this season.
nico hulkenberg, meanwhile, was able to get back on the track
and the virtual safety car ended.
right as george and lando went to pit. which was incredibly unlucky
prior to this, george came on the radio to say that he thought that it was now red flag conditions. and he was probably correct.
“i think this is going to go red mate,” he said on lap 28. “this should go red. we cant keep a car on the road like this. theres going to be big crashes. theres a big puddle through 4 and 13. there will be a crash there. i think stay out. it should go red.” and that would be good because then george could get his free pit stop and also maintain the lead of the race.
“understood, understood,” his engineer said. “so box, box.”
“i think, no, its going to go red,” george repeated.
“box box. box, box. box, box. we need to box,” his engineer said. and so george had no choice but to box.
someone who didn't box was esteban ocon. he chose to stay out and with both lando and george pitting he was now leading the race on lap 29.
liam lawson and yuki tsnuoda pitted.
and after all the pit stops, we had:
esteban, max, pierre, george, lando, yuki, charles, oscar, fernando, valtteri, lewis, carlos, checo, ollie, franco, guanyu and nico.
“after a truly awful season,” crofty said. “alpine is 1 and 3.” that they were. somehow. maybe it would stay that way.
and after all that. lando finally managed to pass george. but only for fourth, not for first.
and the safety car was deployed for rain.
so now no one could pass anyone.
esteban ocon had a 7 second lead on max verstappen.
and franco colapinto took this opportunity to pit for new inters.
oscar got a 10 second penalty for causing that collision a way long time ago with liam lawson.
and merc were still under investigation for the tire pressure thing.
and then all the others were still under investigation for the start procedure mishap as well.
at this point, max had gained 15 places. pierre had gained 10.
and behind the safety car they all pootled along. esteban, max, pierre, lando, george, yuki, charles, oscar, fernando, liam, lewis, valtteri, carlos, checo, ollie, franco, zhou and nico
that was, until franco had a huge crash.
and once again, there was the return of the red flag.
so now williams had crashed three whole times during the weekend. remember, they have no money and hardly any parts. and the mechanics were distressed beyond belief.
lando hopped on radio, annoyed with the mclaren strategy error because now everyone at the front (two alpines and max) would get free tires and he would not have the opportunity to get back to the front after they pitted.
george on the other hand….
“so, red flag, red flag,” his engineer said.
“fuck!” george cursed. “i fucking said it! shouldve stayed out!”
yuki got a pep talk immediately after getting out of the car from team principal laurent
and oscar jumped out of his car and immediately apologized to liam lawson for the incident.
“theres a proper variety bag of pick and mix penalties that need investigating,” crofty said.
including nico hulkenberg who was being investigated for restarting his race after getting assistance from the marshalls pushing him back onto the track
and the results were in. he got a black flag. meaning he fucked up so bad he was disqualified. he was out. and it was the first black flag in 17 years. team haas was really doing it different this year. cause remember kevin got the first race ban in 12 years this season as well.
and ted just happened to watch nico get told this. he felt very awkward about it.
“i cannot watch this anymore, it’s too depressing,” ted said, turning away.
it was then announced that the race would be restarted as a rolling start. in 10 minutes.
max sprinted down the pitlane. meanwhile george and lewis peacefully scootered. they might still get disqualified for the tire pressure. they didn't seem to care.
george even stopped to get his boots cleaned as he stepped into the car (which yes i know is a thing cause they were wet with water but it looked so funny to see the mechanic wiping his feet like he was a princess)
and alpine, as we know, would be starting 1 and 3. they had not been in the top 5 all season at all whatsoever.
george did not like that there would be a rolling start. “that’s more dangerous than a standing start,” he said over the radio.
and carlos thought that they needed 2 or three laps behind the safety car to decide. cause remember it is still very much raining.
but it was officially a rolling start. in six minutes. a rolling start meaning that they wouldnt line up on the grid, they’d go out and do a slow lap and then just zoom! go!
carlos had a problem with his tires as they pulled out onto the track. “ricky,” he said. “these are not new inters. which ones are these? ….hello?” ghosted by his own team.
and they went racing
zhou and bearman ended up in the grass pretty quickly, but they were able to get back on.
lando also went off and came back on just ahead of george. george took the position back.
and charles briefly went off.
on lap 34 esteban was still leading and had managed to stay 1.5 seconds ahead of max
hamilton overtook alonso for ninth.
ollie went spin spin spin into the barriers on lap 37. he was able to get going again but he had boinked his front wing. which had already been replaced during the red flag.
and yuki suddenly didn't have pace anymore because he was down in 8th. and getting hunted down by lewis.
ollie went off again. “interlagos is really testing him,” crofty said. yeah no shit. prior to this race he had only driven the track once in a video game (not even the sim!) and he has no experience with f1 cars in the wet, much less this much wet.
on lap 39 esteban ocon was still leading by 2.8 seconds now.
and then carlos ended up in the barriers. no red flag, just a safety car.
he was okay. but he didn't get out of the car. it then became clear that he was trying to get the car out of the barriers before getting out. and thent here was a tractor on track. with a safety car. in the rain. cause that's safe and totally didn't happen at all during the fatal 2015 japanese gp.
it was at this point that they realized that most people who had gone off track had done so because they had gone over the white lines. and remember, the track had just been resurfaced. and despite the anti slip paint, they were still slipping. hm.
also, the last time that alpine had gotten a double podium was back when they were lotus with kimi raikkonen and romain grosjean in 2009 (?)
and, because this race wasn't already interesting enough, there was potential for more rain at the end of the race.
the safety car ended and they all went racing again on lap 43. ocon, verstappen, gasly, russell, norris, leclerc, piastri, tsnuoda, hamilton, alonso, lawson, perez, bottas, zhou, and bearman. the remaining 15 cars.
and max finally managed to get in the lead. all the way up for 17th place at the grand prix from absolute weather hell.
lando went off! dropping all the way down to 7th!
meanwhile liam passed fernando for 9th
and fernando went off the track, triggering a brief yellow flag.
max was already 1.5 seconds ahead of ocon. doing what he does best and making a gap. no one had ever won from 17th before at brazil either
and he took the fastest lap too, on lap 45
so our new order was:
max, esteban, pierre, charles, george, oscar, lando, yuki, liam, checo, lewis, ollie, valtteri, guanyu and fernando
mclaren popped on the radio with some infamous papaya rules and told oscar and lando to swap positions, so now oscar was in 7th and lando was in 6th, minimizing the damage to the gap that lando had just managed to close in the drivers championship very very minutely.
charles was noted for rejoining unsafely
and max took another fastest lap on lap 48
“massively impressed with the alpine’s pace in these conditions,” karun said.
the last time that two french drivers finished on a podium was in 1997 in spain
on lap 50 checo and liam lawson started to battle for ninth. the commentators brought up the ever present talks that checo might not be in f1 next year.
oscar briefly went off the track, but managed to stay ahead of yuki, who was chasing him down.
and lando, despite the swap, was still quite stuck behind charles, despite having more pace. and we had already seen charles keep max behind for many many laps, so there was no doubt that he would continue to fight with lando. he and max were low key now teammates, after all
and yet, there still might be more rain
checo was still trying to pass liam lawson. he was still failing.
fifteen laps to go (finally)
max was still leading esteban, pierre, george, charles, lando, oscar, yuki, liam, checo, lewis, ollie, valtteri, guanyu and fernando on lap 55
and checo still could not pass liam
max had an 8 second lead
and even if the race ended up getting red flagged and not resumed for rain, everyone would get full points because the race was more than 75% complete
checo and liam had a minor incident. it was noted. “he drove into the side of me!” liam complained
on lap 57 ted popped on to give his Insignificant and Unnoticed Award of the Day “to fernando alonso, he was 20 seconds down and now hes cut it down and is going to overtake zhou.”
max took yet another fastest lap, he was now 10 seconds ahead of ocon
“hes never changed one iota since he came in,” crofty said about max. “sometimes when you get penalized for the same thing over and over you do need to change.” though honestly, max was proving that he really didn't need to change, because he went balls to the wall with confidence unlike any other, and was leading a race he had started in 17th by 10 seconds. in the rain.
and george had managed to get within a second to pierre gasly
if pierre could hold onto third, alpine could jump from 9th to 6th in the constructors championship. which was estimated to be a difference of 50 million dollars in prize money.
lando was told over the radio to go close to leclerc. “i am!” lando said. “what do you think im doing?”
by lap 63 max was still leading. this time by 13 seconds.
max was set to get 18 points more than lando at this race, and that was before any start penalties that lando might get awarded.
and he took another fastest lap
on lap 66 max was leading esteban, pierre, george, charles, lando, oscar, yuki, liam, lewis, checo, ollie, valtteri, fernando and zhou
“looking like he [max] will be a 4x world champion and hold off the threat of mclaren,” crofty said.
and then, fernando alonso’s radio crackled to life.
“i will finish this race for the mechanics, they did a very good job today,” fernando said. “but my back hurts so much, there is so much bouncing. this is not normal.” and he did sound very in pain saying that. this re brought up concerns about the porpoising on the track. lewis had complained about it earlier and its been at no other track this year, meaning that it must be a track thing. meaning further that the track was probably resurfaced badly. because this is not normal. and yes, fernandos been having a terrible time during the triple header. hes been sick, he was in the hospital, he missed media day. this is still not normal though and cant be attributed to that.
lap 68. nearly to the end now. and max was leading by 18 seconds.
“he’s got more god given talent in a finger than some drivers every have,” karun said,
and meanwhile his teammate was down in 11th, trying to pass lewis for 10th. and failing.
last lap! finally!
and max won by 19 seconds! and he broke the record for most consecutive days leading a championship, breaking the record previously set by michael schumacher. and made it from 17th to first in the rain, despite all odds, in a car that barely worked, no drs, just spite and rage and pure talent. a true world champion
one by one, everyone else crossed the line
p2: esteban ocon
p3: pierre gaslu
p4: george russell
p5: charles leclerc
p6: lando norris
p7: oscar piastri
p8: yuki tsunoda
p9: liam lawson
p10: lewis hamilton
p11: checo perez
p12: ollie bearman
p13: valtteri bottas
p14: fernano alonos
p15: zhou guanyu
“brilliant for alpine today, disastrous for mclaren,” crofty said
max, predictably, was absolutely thrilled saying that it was "SIMPLY LOVELY"
he sprinted to his mechanics, screaming and celebrating everywhere. he kissed kelly. he did not kiss christian.
this was only the 5th time, in this history of formula 1. 1125 races. that a race had been won from 17th or lower.
alpine was also thrilled.
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the funniest part was esteba ocon’s radio, where they asked him “did you think we were going to be here?” and he said “funnily enough, no!”
ruben barichello did the post race interviews.
max said that he “stayed out of trouble, made the right calls.” he had 17 fastest laps. which you can watch here.
and you can watch all of his overtakes here.
esteban was also thrilled. “what a day that was after a difficult season! very happy to be on the podium!” they didn't know that the car would perform this well in the wet.
and pierre was equally as excited. “its incredibly for the whole team…in these conditions everything was possible. im absolutely buzzing right now….would have been easy to just give up but we never give up.”
because lets remember where alpine started at the beginning of the season. heaviest car on the grid. and also the slowest. and now, here they were, with a double podium. and scoring the most points out of any team at the brazilian gp (35)
alpine even made a little graphic, reminding everyone of this:
also, id like to remind you, that pierre and esteban don't really get along. they used to be friends and now theyre not for complex reasons, and they were so overcome by the emotion of their double podium that they effectively ended the french civil war
the cooldown room was quite excitatory. never had we ever seen a podium where everyone was so insanely happy to be there. max said in the cooldown room to esteban that "You were fast. You were so fast I was happy to settle for second."
and of course. we got our dutch national anthem. she was back ladies and gents! she was back!
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and we had the goofiest looking podium selfie
esteban and pierre dropped their champagne bottles down to their mechanics. they celebrated. they were on top of the world.
prior to today, esteban had 5 points. today he scored 18.
“red bull might feel a bit more back in the game, but they still need 2 drivers,” crofty said. “mclaren are leading by some 46 points.”
max though, now had a 62 point lead on lando.
and so lets see what our favorite dynamic duo, james hinchcliffe and will buxton, had to say about all of this in the post race show.
“i don't know what we were missing,” james said. “we had everything.” and he was right.
starting off with the fact that max absolutely showed who was boss and now lando has to score 21 points every weekend in order to beat him in the drivers championship. prior to this weekend max hadnt been within 20 seconds of the winner at all in the last ten races. and today he won by almost 20.
and alpine hadnt finished in the top 8 all season!
“i take my hat off to them” will said. “they were 19th and 20th in bahrain, their car was overweight, there was no hope and they got their heads down and they got it done.”
then we were joined by yuki and liam lawson.
“it was like floating around!” yuki said about the conditions.
“i nearly crashed probably 10 times,” liam said. “i came into the pitlane and i tried to stop nad i wasn't stopping. crazy race.”
the two of them said that they just didn't have good luck today and got stuck behind others in dirty air. “shame pierre got p3 and they overtook us in the championship,” yuki said. “but we keep going.”
then they examined the start. lando, george and yuki all went for the second formation lap. esteban ocon asked over the radio if he was supposed to say where he was and the tea, said yes. but then they eventually told him to go. james said that this was not great and someone from the team should have reminded the drivers of the procedure.
lando, george, yuki and liam were all going to see the stewards about the start.
then they moved on to discussing lando. “lando did not have his day when max showed his absolute best,” will said.
lando said in his own interview that he was “just unlucky with the vsc pit. just that's life sometimes, not talent, just luck….still made a couple of mistakes in the end, little unfortunate….4th was the best anyone who boxed could do.” which, its unclear what hes really talking about here. if hes saying max just had good luck or if he had bad luck. in any case, insane to call a run from 17th to first just luck and not talent. and will buxton agreed.
“verstappen proved once again that he is the best in this sport. to beat the best you need to be better than the best.” and today lando wasn't.
james was in agreement with will, saying that mclaren did make some bad calls and also that max has a habit of putting his car where it doesnt deserve to be
first lando lost to george, then the safety car pit, then his mistakes on track, then he lost position, then he swapped positions and still couldn't get past charles. it was “enough mistakes that it does come down to his driving,” will said. “max was ruthless today. there was no drs and he [still] found it.”
“doesnt take many mistakes to lose to max” james added.
mclaren also posted one of the strangest post race videos ive ever seen. usually theyre like somewhere in the paddock or whatever. this week they were in what appeared to be a weird dark closet, with lando and oscar only half in frame. oscar sitting on a desk and lando sitting in a spinny chair next to andrea. and it vaguely looked like they were all being held hostage. oscar aso said that “lando has one sock on inside out and that sums up our weekend.”
then they moved on to mercedes.
“my take is that iv we stayed out we would have been at the front,” george said. “i was pretty angry at the time cause i wanted to say out” because he was confident despite the conditions and thought it would get red flagged.
by comparison “lewis hamilton looked like he was having a horror show today in the first half,” will said.
“hes been unsettled with the race car,” james said. “his highlight was before the race even started,” as in driving sennas car. and it was.
lewis had this to say on instagram about the whole thing
“Grateful for the team and the engineers, we did our best out there but it was a hard race throughout in really tough conditions. This could’ve easily been a weekend to forget but the energy and passion from the fans have made it memorable for me. I still can’t put into words how it felt to drive Ayrton Senna’s car. To share that with this crowd means everything to me. Thank you Brazil for the support and the love. I feel it, even on days like this, and I send it back to you 🇧🇷🫶🏾”
checo, they said “was having a good comeback drive, but then that incident with lawson threw him off.”
and ollie “equipped himself pretty well.” he said that it was a “tough race…finished p12, quite close to the points…really tough day, learned a lot that's for sure…racing in these conditions the water is quite rare and valuable.”
will was disappointed in the stewards decision with his 10 second penalty. and they gave him two penalty points as well.
will tried to also look on the bright side for sauber by saying they could have gotten their first points.
james was unimpressed by this take.
“i’m trying to out a spin on it, i just want them to get one point this season!” will said.
they then moved to feranndo alonso, commenting on the amount of pain that he was in at the end. “very 2022,” james said. “havent heard that in awhile, especially with the wet” so it was definitely the track surface itself.
there was also a clip of fernando getting out of the car post race where he almost needed help from the mechanics.
and they were unimpressed with lance. “he had the ability to get it onto the black and he drove it into the gravel.”
and nico, to them, very obviously got disqualified because he had help from the marshals, something he should have known would happen.
they agreed that it was a tough day for williams. especially losing a place to alpine in the championship.
ferrari also have a “tough day…at the end of two brilliant gps” and charles was “kind of in no mans land today.”
james agreed. he said they “just never had that spark….salvage what you can kind of weekend.”
“all good things just come to an end,” james said, realistically.
also on the not having a great day list was oscar. though he thought his penalty was deserved. “it was tricky,” he said. “just trying to stay on track was difficult at some points”
they also spoke with oliver oakes, the alpine team principal. “big result today,” he said. “we were confident [staying out] was the right chouse but we werent sure [about other peoples choices to stay out]. today is a bug result, doesnt chage what we are doing….gotta stay humble and keep pushing.”
and alpine were definitely humble about their win
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but they also hula hooped in the trophy
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“i just want to say so many words but i need to calm down first,” pierre said. “unbelieveable, its historical for the team….its been difficult..at the end of the day we never give up…no one thought one alpine could make it onto the podium this year and we made it two…there is so much to say but from p13 to p3 im so happy.”
and esteban said “i don't know ig we are in reality right now it this is just a dream…my alarm rang this morning at 4:30 and we had no idea….[ive kind of been] thinking when is my rime going to come, if we all had the same car…the cars they level out in some tracks.”
and finally, we had max. “I was very frustrated in qualifying, but tried to use it as motivation in the race….made all the right calls again…was hoping for two points so this is amazing.” he was also asked how driven he was and he said “we had moments, but after that quali where i knew we'd be fast, i nearly destroyed the entire garage. i was barely able to hold myself in. but i started the race very driven. i think i'm the best when i driven, i don't show it an awful lot, but usually yes.”
he was also asked about lando and he said that “if you look a few hours ago it was the other way around…three hard races to go, we need to make no mistakes.”
so turns out, after all that, max’s quote from earlier in the weekend was correct. he is a three time world champion and he doesnt need to change how he drives.
this though was too much for the british media to handle and they didn't bother to show up to the press conference. which max called them out on.
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in the end, no one ended up getting penalties from the start and mercedes did not get disqualified. mercedes got fined 5000 euros for each car. and the stewards agreed that "The gate to access the grid was not immediately opened. The FIA accepted that given this short notice it was extremely difficult if not impossible for the teams to follow the procedure prescribed in the technical directive"
which meant. this was our current championship standings.
for the drivers
max verstappen: 393
lando norris: 331
charles leclerc: 307
oscar piastri: 262
carlos sainz: 244
george russell: 192
lewis hamilton: 190
checo perez: 151
fernando alonso: 62
nico hulkenberg: 31
yuki tsunoda: 28
pierre gasly: 26
lance stroll: 24
esteban ocon: 23
kevin magnussen: 14
alex albon: 12
daniel ricciardo: 12
ollie bearman: 7
franco colapinto: 5
liam lawson: 4
zhou guanyu: 0
logan sergeant: 0
valtteri bottas: 0
and the constructors
mcalren: 593
ferrari: 557
red bull: 544
mercedes: 382
aston martin: 86
alpine: 49
haas: 46
rb: 44
williams: 17
stake: 0
“fun to watch it all, cool to watch it all, but at the end of the day you have to congratulate max verstappen for another championship win,” james said. “by far most dominating performance of the year and one of the most ever.”
“we leave you with one message resonating louder than ever,” will said, staring directly into the camera. “mess with the bull, you get the horns. we will see you in las vegas.”
the 2024 formula 1 silly season and drama master post, part 2 (part 1 here)
Hello and welcome to ah fucking fuck auto caps fuck fuck fuck how do i turn off auto caps AHA there we go okay. take 2
hello and welcome to the great and very insane formula 1 2024 season drama post, part 2. if you are new here or are just looking for part one (which contains the previous 16 (?) races, the off season, pre season testing and everything else, that can be found HERE. (a word to the wise: open it in a browser, not the app, and preferably on a computer to avoid crashing. its fucking long).
what the hell is formula 1? car go fast. fastest cars in the world zoom around tracks at top speeds of over 300kph, piloted by the top 20 drivers in the world. it might not sound dramatic, but oh man. you will Not be disappointed. this post focuses on the drama, the insanity, the sheer what the hell how is this a serious sport. no legitimately. we've just about seen it all this year. grindr, dogs, watersports, ice cream brands, its all here.
the point of this post? to educate, to catalog the insane drama, and to just have a good time. people like to gatekeep this sport, there is also a lot happening. i try to make it easy to understand. again, probably best to start at the beginning of the post because it does a pretty good job of explaining things, which i began way back in january, and can be found HERE (again, shes long, be careful)
and, as usual, if you do not want to see this post EVER AGAIN, block the tag #saph explains silly season 2024
and a second caution, i assume this post will be getting long as well. including this one we have minimum 9 updates left!
anyway, those of you who have been following along the whole time, welcome back! i know we got a little delayed. and i know we’re on a new post, so lets just briefly take a second for me to explain what the fuck happened. first i had an anatomy test, second i work 2 jobs with fuck ass hours, third tumblr decided to stop letting me look at any of my drafts, fourth tumblr support ghosted me about the drafts issue and the post was half saving half not so i just decided fuck it, were going with post 2, electric boogaloo, and fifth, i decided to start typing this instead in a google docs so. many changes. if you're new here i am usually more on top of this.
but here we are. were back on street circuits. we’re in baku, azerbaijan, for the start of the last third of the season. 8 races remain, world championship titles are still within grasp of multiple people. the drama is dramaing. and today is september 22, 2024 and lets fucking go.
first and foremost, on account of the fact that this post is late (again, see above), were going to have to do a bit of a speed run. if you're new here, i promise that this is not representative of my normal dedication to the update post. and for those asking, yeah, ill probably compile it somewhere better than a tumblr post after its all said and done, but we don't have time for that now.
what we do have time for is the Off Week (and like some of the media stuff). and it was filled with silliness:
george russell decided to wear what can only be described as slightly ugly yellow short shorts with his taylor swift shirt that he got at the eras tour. this was baffling for several reasons, the main reason being that i don't think the internet knew that he was capable of wearing a graphic t shirt
fernando alonso got his aston martin valkyrie finally. in case you are unfamiliar, a valkyrie i think is the worlds fastest street legal car. he posted tweets about this that made it seem like he wanted to fuck the car. hilariously, the car broke down an hour later.
we also had the very thrilling conclusion to grill the grid. oscar won and he somehow managed to look more pleased about his grill the grid win than his first race victory.
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nico rosberg went to the green awards and he wore a fantastically insane teal blue suit. yes i know hes not a current driver. but you all like hearing about him so ask and you shall receive. unfornunately i cant find a picture of it though
and also not a current driver is mick schumacher, but my roommate asked me to include that he was seen on his girlfriends instagram being bad at golf. like. exceptionally bad at golf. like he hit a tree 20 feet in front of him.
also playing golf was lando norris. except he managed to look like try bolton from high school musical 2.
he also talked about the world driver championship with his friend max fewtrell while they were playing golf. unfortunately i lost this link in the sea of technical difficulties, but the gist of it was that he was saying that there is still hope for him to beat max in the championship (hes about 60 points behind right now). lando doesnt usually talk about the championship because he doesnt want news outlets to paint him as “desperate” so this was interesting
charles leclerc had an insane off week. first he rear ended someone in monaco. then he spoke at a yacht conference. he was not scheduled to speak at said yacht conference, he was there doing something else and they were like hey you're cool people know you, heres a microphone. he alsp ended up on a weather channel while promoting a karting event he was doing for the jules bianchi foundation (his god father, the one who died during the f1 race in japan 2014). he also changed his instagram pop and re centered it because some random tiktoker told him it matched his aesthetic better.
oscar piastri posted a photo of himself sitting in the cockpit of a plane and then promptly deleted it. because he posted it on 9/11. for anyone who doesnt know what that is, that was when some terrorists hijacked commercial planes and few them into the world trade centers in nyc and the pentagon in washington dc
max verstappen also posted a plane pic with himself and lando norris, but he did not delete it.
we also had the return of daniel ricciardo’s jpg instagram account, which is kinda like a finsta for photos that hes taken. i think lando started this a few years ago.
heading into the race week we certainly got a weird ass batch of pr. including but not limited to:
lewis hamilton was back on top and slaying in the fit game. as was yuki.
lewis hamilton also exposed george russell as listening to katy perry pre race. katy perry and taylor swift (this was after he claimed that he liked listening to old school rap music.) though, lewis then started singing wrecking ball???? confusing vibes all around
george was not off the hook yet tho because some intern definitely make him say skidibidi toilet or whatever the thing is idk, i might be gen z but im not insufferable, okay? actually george in baku was just all kinds of unhinged
george and alex also got up to something, what it is no one knows but it is clearly something
max pulled up to the paddock de aged about 10 years. picture one is of him in baku in 2015 (i believe he was 17) and picture 2 is this year. no i am not kidding.
and franco walked into the paddock telling everyone about argentinian mate (which is a drink, not a friend)
and max shoved a microphone out of the way so everyone could gossip
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then of course, we had some slightly more relevant drama
haas announced that ollie would be replacing kevin at baku. in case you forgot, kevin magnussen received a total of 12 penalty points over the season so far, which means he gets one race ban. how did he get the points? well he was mostly wreaking havoc on everyone else so that his teammate, nico hulkenberg, could drag his car into the points. lets all remember the time in saudi arabia where he managed to get 20 seconds of penalties by basically driving like a mad man just to make sure that nico could keep his position after he pit stopped. anyway, nico was kind of pissed about the race ban situation and said “maybe the guidelines for F1 penalties need to be reviewed as the stewards ‘want to get involved’ no matter the contact.”
in any case though, k mags was out. and ollie was in. we’ve seen ollie before. notably he subbed in for carlos sainz at the saudi arabia gp when carlos had appendicitis. he managed to get points as well. since then, he has been announced as a haas driver for 2025 and is now subbing in for k mags (haas, later in the week called him a super sub. clearly no gen z person read that over.) he can do this because ferrari has a haas engine so they share reserve drivers.
adrian newey finally got employed. i know! i can hardly believe it either! but he did! and youll never guess where!
ferrari? no that would be too obvious.
mercedes? nah
williams? no too much of a shit show
aston martin? ding ding ding! just the right amount of shit show!
that is right. newey is going to aston for 2025.
apparently he was offered a “good package” according to himself, which i assume means pay and also the fact that lawrence stroll made him a shareholder? stakeholder? whatever its called. in the team itself. basically he has a lot of power.
he said that he always wanted to work with fernando and lewis. and he couldn't do both. and aston had a better package than ferrari.
fernando looked positively evil during all the announcement pictures. and called the team "definitely the team of the future" and for those of you who don't know, fernando is positively evil. hes just been stuck in a shit box and we havent seen very much of him, but man does he know how to evilly slut it up. so that will be fun to see.
by contrast, people said that lance was not excited enough. and well. lance 1. has resting bitch face and 2. never really looks excited about anything. also he lives in a world where take your child to work day somehow became his job. (his dad owns the team).
lewis hamilton was asked what he thought about adrian not going to ferrari, and here's what he had to say:
"i feel like, while I have mentioned before that it would be an honor to work with adrian, i have been privileged to work with two championship winning teams that didnt have adrian."
mclaren announced pato o ward would do FP1 in mexico. who is pato o ward? hes one of mclaren’s indycar drivers and one of the f1 reserve drivers. he is incredibly charming and definitely runs his own social media as seen here:
mclaren Also claim they figured out who their number 2 driver is and they claim its oscar. i say they claim because the statements were a lot more complex than that. essentially, according to andrea stella, the priority is to the team first, then lando and then oscar. so they didn't outright say that oscar is the number 2 driver and i am willing to bet real money that this is because mr mark webber, oscars manager, has something in oscars contract that prevents him from being a number 2 driver. this is of course because mark webber was one of the most infamous number 2 drivers in f1 history to none other than menace war criminal sebastian vettel, who in their time as teammates, managed to win 4 back to back world champions. or, top to bottom if you're mrs darbus from high school musical.
lando was asked about this and he said that yes, the team does support him. though he would not expect oscar to give up a win for him and that it is more complex behind the scenes. i suppose we will see if there are any papaya rules coming out this weekend….
and oscar said "i think the main point is its not purely just going to be me pulling over for lando every single race, because thats how none of us, including lando, wont want to go racing, if we feel that someone has done a much better job on a weekend, whichever way it is, we want that person to be rewarded."
max verstappen commented on the mclaren situation as well. which was funny mostly because red bull has one of the most defined number 1 and number 2 drivers of any team. he said "you look at it form oscar's perspective, he is closer to lando than lando to me. they have to deal with that."
and allow me to put on a tin foil hat as we are about to talk about the future of the red bull seat. because all i have to offer here is a baseball hat and a red bull can.
a long time ago we talked about the red bull cans. the ones that red bull makes to promote f1. at the end of last season red bull put max and checo on the red bull can. this season at the start it was just max on the red bull can. well. now checo has reappeared on the cans too. and i will tell you what i think this means. it means that checo is not getting swapped this season, which was a possibility for awhile.
but! there is more!
daniel ricciardo made an instagram post this week. and it was very interesting. but most interestingly he was wearing a red bull hat.
which he does occasionally, no big deal really. he did race for the for several years, he technically does currently. BUT then he showed up TO THE PADDOCK wearing the red bull hat.
which is Big Interesting. usually you show up in a statement outfit or wearing the team kit. and daniel is not a red bull racing driver. he is a visa cashapp racing bulls driver. they might be owned by red bull but they are Not the same team. so why the red bull hat. in the paddock. well, the rumor is that hes taking checos seat for 2025. and the rumor is that this will be announced before mexico. so checo can have a proper send off.
and with that. the baku lore.
theres a lot that has happened at baku. as i said its a street circuit. and i think its the fastest street circuit. but over the years theres been some notable events.
such as the great kimi raikkonen radio for gloves and steering wheel:
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they gave mini kimi this week gloves and steering wheel in honor of that
the max and daniel crash in 2018 when they were running p1 and p2 respectfully
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and of course. how could we forget. charles’s infamous “i am stupid” radio.
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speaking of charles, he crashed again in fp1. not quite in the same spot, but nearly. he took a picture with the marshalls.
then in fp2 he rage quit, basically saying that the car sucks.
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but he was back and better than ever in practice three because he managed to top the time charts. welcome back fuck ass ferrari.
some other teams definitely experienced the lows but not really the highs of baku during practice. like lance stroll who came on the radio to say “this is not a car” (good thing they have adrian newey now, right?
franco colapinto also cut his ear before practice on the neck strengthener stretcher thing that they all use and the team wanted to give him stitches but he was like no no no i need to be in the car in about 5 minutes im not doing that. so he jammed on his helmet and jumped in the car. he also crashed and when he went to the medical center he took off his helmet and there was blood everywhere and they were like no no no you cannot race! and he was like no! this is not from the crash! and then explained it and they let him do qualifying.
also im pretty sure? ollie bearman crashed? in practice? but frankly i don't have time to google it so whos to say.
but alas. qualifying.
i know i know this is kind of a shitty update. i promise ill go all out in singapore. i PROMISE.
so as i said. its a street circuit. high speed. 90 degree corners. and also windy as hell. we also had the dynamic duo of karun and harry in the commentary box.
max led the first practice, george led the second and i think charles led the third. or some order like that.
slipstream here is almost essential (slipstream: going behind another car to reduce the wind drag so you can go faster)
charles has the last three pole positions (first in qualifying) here in baku, but he has never won. by comparison, red bull have never had pole here but they have won.
and franco has never been to baku before.
i think that's all the exposition that we need here.
q1 started with max complaining about his car. “the car is jumping around like crazy on the rear axle” he said. despite this he was sitting in p3.
the mid field battle though….the mid field battle was heating the hell up. mostly because none other than franco colapinto, who if you will remember, has never been to baku before, had split the two ferraris. he was in third for the moment, .109 seconds behind carlos sainz and .159 seconds ahead of charles leclerc. we still had a lot of qualifying left to go, so this was probably not going to stay, but it was still insane. he was pushing insanely hard, nearly kissing the walls. clearly he had learned from his crash in practice.
the two mclarens waited until the very end of q1 to do their final flying push lap, and oscar made it through, but tragedy struck for lando.
lando was in the middle of his last flying lap, time was ticking down, and there was a Very Brief yellow flag on the track. now, according to rules, you cannot complete your flying lap if there is a yellow flag. so lando pitted and was stuck down in 17th and out of qualifying. this would be the first time that he was out in q1 since vegas last year (which if i remember correctly was also not his fault)
now though, of course nothing is ever that cut and dry. people thought that there had been a mis showing of a flag. yellow flag means that a car is stopped on track, white flag means that a car is going slowly on the track. and people thought that there had been a yellow flag shown when it was actually supposed to be a white flag (if there had been a white flag then lando would have been able to keep doing his flying lap) lando himself said that he had no idea what people were talking about because there is a light on the steering wheel that lights up when flags are called and he had a big yellow light. so it was clearly a yellow flag.
if you're concerned about lando being able to pull it out of the bag, id like to point you in the direction of the mexican gp last year where lando qualified 17th and finished 5th. on a track that was hard to overtake on. he can be absolutely insane when he wants to be. worry not gentle reader.
in any case. also out in q1 was daniel ricciardo, valtteri bottas, zhou guanyu and esteban ocon.
and notably, williams, who was on fucking fire this weekend as we already saw, finished q1 with alex albon in second (ahead of oscar) and franco colapinto in 8th. pierre gasly had somehow managed to also get into 4th. and nico hulkenberg was in 7th with ollie bearman in 13th. i told you the mid field battle was heating the hell up.
q2. everyone zoomed straight out of the gate. they didn't want to get lando norris’d. but, speaking of that, if lando managed to get no points in the race and charles managed to win, charles would overtake lando in the drivers championship. mark webber himself told this to charles, who was absolutely baffled.
in any case, charles was kinda suffering right now and that was because he was not getting slipstream from carlos to make his lap faster. meanwhile, carlos seemed to be actively trying to give charles the slipstream because he came on radio to say “he keeps missing the tow”
and amazingly, franco colapinto was 4 tenths AHEAD of alex albon. alex albon who had not been unqualified by his teammate once since the start of 2023. ex red bull driver alex albon. that alex albon.
max topped the times in q2, followed immediately by charles. insanely, fernando alonso managed to drag the aston martin to fifth. and franco was right behind him in 6th. by comparison alex albon was in 10th.
and from q2 we lost ollie bearman, yuki tsunoda (who has never qualified lower than 8th in baku), pierre gasly, nico hulkenberg and lance stroll. so yes, ollie bearman managed to outqualify nico hulkenberg. this is ollies second ever f1 race.
steaming on forward to q3.
we had, for review, in q3 the following:
both ferraris, both red bulls, both mercedes, both WILLIAMS (has not happened since vegas 2023), plus fernando alonso and oscar piastri.
right out the gate it was wild.
“red bull! theyve re found their mojo! or have they!” karun said. red bull were in 5th and 6th and not entirely sucking for the moment.
everyone did one flyer and then came out at the end for a second flyer.
here were the standings:
charles, carlos, oscar, george, checo, max, lewis, alex, franco, fernando
and everyone was making it to the line and all was going smooth until-
wait a second what is that
could it be! alex albon! with the air box fan still on his car! surely not!!!
oh but it was! and harry and karun were like oh wow so unfortunate for williams tisk tisk
meanwhile ted jumped on the radio to Loudly announce to everyone that this was insane and if i have time here i will put the rant he ranted cause it was Fantastic.
and what do you know i have time
so we had 3 minutes left qualifying and everyone was pulling out of the pits for their last flyer when oscar hopped on the radio to say
"the williams still has the air box fan in"
"oh what an error! disaster for williams!" karun and harry said. they speculated if the marshalls could get it or if the session needed to be red flagged. but alex threw the fan off the car.
and then they asked "ted have you ever seen that before?" and ted did not hold back:
"ITS A MASSIVE YELLOW FAN HOW COULD YOU MISS IT???!!! HOW COULD THE MECHANICS MISS IT???? I CANT BELIVE THEY WOULD MAKE SUCH A MISTAKE DOWN AT WILLIAMS! SUCH AN EXPERIENCED BUNCH OF GUYS AND GIRLS! WHAT IS GOING ON AT WILLIAMS OPERATIONALLY? HOW COULD YOU SEND A CAR OUT LIKE THAT?"
alex, obviously, got fined for an unsafe release 5k euros. he also had to throw the fan off to the side and got slightly covered in dry ice. he did not get to the a second flying lap.
franco did tho!
and here were out qualifying results:
p1: charles p2: oscar p3: carlos p4: checo p5: george p6: max p7: lewis p8: fernando p9: franco p10: alex p11: ollie p12: yuki p13: pierre p14: nico p15: lance p16: daniel p17: lando p18: valtteri p19: zhou p20: esteban
oh ho ho but we werent done yet. because pierre gasly got disqualified from qualifying. for failing fuel flow regulations. and lewis was going to have to start from the pit lane for changing his power unit.
everyone, and by everyone i mean oscar max and checo, pretty much said that charles was going to get pole no matter what, they knew this coming in and the best they were trying for was second
onto the race.
notably, this is considered a checo track. this was one of the three races that max did not win last year. because checo won it. its a track that he does well on, evidenced by the fact that he qualified above max in qualifying. so people were expecting big things from him.
and so, we head into lap 1.
charles managed to hang onto the lead. checo passed carlos straight out of the gate for third and max managed to pass george to take fifth. lando had managed to get ahead of nico and up into 13th. notably, franco held onto 8th and ollie was able to hold onto tenth.
someone who was not doing well was lance stroll, who came on the radio saying that he had a puncture. this was from contact with yuki. lance had to pit for fresh tires and was pretty immediately thrown to the back of the grid.
by lap 2 lando had managed to get past daniel and was in 12th, he was trying to get past yuki next, which he managed by lap 3. yuki also lost a spot to nico.
also slaying in the mclaren was oscar, who took fastest lap. then charles took fastest lap.
and lewis hamilton, who had started from the pit lane, was up to 16th. already. somehow. though he was displeased with the tires, sayig that “this tire is pretty bad” over the radio.
yuki meanwhile was clearly having a problem because he had started going very very slowly. thought the pit wall said that he had no problems. this would later turn out to be false but we will indulge them for the time being.
franco was STILL ahead of alex albon on lap 6. STILL.
lando on lap 8 managed to push his way into points positions, overtaking ollie bearman for 10th. though this was where things were about to slow down for him because in front of him were alex, franco and fernando, who were all very close together and would be hard to get past.
george was back in bad luck hell as a plastic bag entered his airbox. will he ever catch a break.
on lap 11 nico hulkenberg finally caught up with ollie bearman and passed him for 11th.
and max’s car was not working. to potentially no one’s surprise. “i have zero bite in the car” he said. and this was probably true because checo was a whole 6.5 seconds ahead of him. insane gap.
several pit stops later that i will not detail out because we simply do not have the time, alex albon ended up in 4th and lando ended up in fifth. and oscar was about to get undercut by checo.
“mojo seems to be back for checo perez” harry said, correctly.
mojo was back for him indeed. and now he was right behind lando.
and if you will recall, according to mclaren themselves, priority at mclaren is the team first, then oscar, then lando. but oscar was ahead of lando. so what did mclaren do?
they asked lando do hold up perez, but not compromise his own race.
remever a long time ago when i said mclaren wouldn't have any internal drama this season? man how i was wrong.
lando managed to hold up perez for around a lap or two before he got past. this was crucial because this was during when oscar was in the pits.
thanks to lando and the power of the papaya rules teamwork, oscar ended up coming out in 4th, only .706s ahead of checo.
mclaren are working together everyone! mclaren are working together!
meanwhile, turns out that yuki did indeed have problems because he retired on lap 17 with a hole in his sidepod from the contact with lance on lap 1. this was now two races in a row where he had had to retire for reasons out of his control.
several more people pitted. and eventually charles was back out in front, oscar was in p2. until he wasn't. no, he didn't dnf. he overtook charles! he was in p1! he popped out of nowhere! nowhere being 2 car lengths back and just flooring it to spring around charles like a little silly slinky! karun called it a “good, fair and robust defense,” which sounds like its descibing notes in wine. but this was not wine. this was the baku gp. and we were only half done.
ollie bearman was defending against lewis hamilton, holding on tightly to 14th place.
charles was still behind oscar and he could not get past, despite the fact that he was still very much in spitting distance. “they are pushing like crazy or they have more grip than us” he said.
carlos got past both lando and alex albon and was up into 4th
this brought max up behind lando. max was on 11 lap old tires and lando was on 24 lap old tires. but lando still defended like hell and managed to hold onto sixth. max was 0.632 seconds behind lando on lap 25 when he said that “my brakes are not working.” this was hardly a surprise. max has hated the car since china.
also experiencing technical difficulties was sir lewis hamilton. he was stuck down in 14th and was first told to do “everything you can do to get the surface temp down” of the tires. he said “im trying” then several laps later on lap 29 he came on the radio to say “are you seeing how i have to drive this thing?” “yes,” bono, his engineer said. “quite effective though.”
max was still half a second behind lando. mclaren faked a pit stop call over the radio to get max to pit. he did not.
but, george russell did manage to pass him. which was “not good for max’s world champion aspirations.”
this was also when ted very bafflingly said that “if i had a sofa in the pit lane i would be jumping up and down on it” im not sure what that was in response to.
meanwhile, ollie was still holding off sir lewis hamilton. and charles was trying to get oscar to pit again by lying over the radio. it was not working.
lando did a pit stop finally and came out a whole 15 second behind max. he was hoping to catch max by the end of the race. but it might be tight. lets go last lap lando.
“lando, imagine andrea on your shoulder saying ‘zero wheel spin’ in every exit,” lando’s race engineer said. if you're confused, everyone else was too.
10 laps to go and here were the order of affairs:
oscar
+.449s charles +1.865s checo +2.989s carlos +16.530s george +1.909s max +11.535s lando +9.715s fernando +2.589s alex +2.451s nico +4.667s franco +1.590s lewis +1.261s ollie +1.791s pierre +9.205s daniel +23.919s esteban +.789s lance +3.862s valtteri +3.631s guanyu
lando was determined. he took fastest lap on lap 43 and was 8.8s behind max
at this point, the leaders were starting to lap the cars in the back. “the back markers are starting to come up,” checo’s engineer said to him. “its going to get messy.”
“hold onto your hats and if you don't have one go get one and hold onto it” harry said. harry would turn out to be correct.
we had the top 3 all running very close to eachother, that was oscar, charles and checo and “welcome to the party carlos sainz!” who was now 1.2 seconds behind checo in the four way battle for the lead.
definitely not leading was lance stroll, who retired on lap 47 with a brake problem.
oscar managed to pull ahead of charles by 1.5 seconds, finally knocking him out of DRS range. so now it was a three way battle for second. and charles had “no rear tires. no rear tires at all.”
and, just like i said he would, lando managed to pass max on lap 49. he was closing the gap slowly in the championship.
“verstappen’s day goes from bad to worse,” harry said. because lando still had fastest lap, so he would score 3 more points than max. which is important if lando wants to beat max in the championship (though i think hes still like 60 points behind)
meanwhile! franco managed to pass nico hulkenberg for 10th! he was in the points!!!! at his second race!!!
but this was short lived because there was a crash! a big smackeroo! between carlos and checo!! checo was mad, carlos didn't know what happened.
what happened was that carlos was trying to pass checo but checo did not move over. it was deemed an equal fault accident. both of them were utterly confused at what happened and apparently spent 20 minutes in the medical center being utterly lost and aparently saying that sometimes this sport sucks. and! contrary to what several people said! checo did not bang on carlos’s helmet after the crash.
the crash actually caused chef's dad to have a heart attack. he is stable now.
and well. this clip of george from the post qualifying interviews definitely didnt age well:
instagram
but! since we were a matter of a few laps from the end, this meant that the rest of the race was finished under a virtual safety car.
which meant
OSCAR PIASTRI WINS THE AZERBAIJAN GP
and george inherited p3!
and on his own merit too! no safety cars, no team orders, no weird shit!
“yes!” he whispered over the radio.
he almost fell getting out of the car, then gave us all the “one moment” hand gesture before properly celebrating.
instagram
he also got driver of the day!
(this was marginally better than george russell, who said over the radio “i cant get any rubber (to pick up on his tires) all im getting is leaves”)
gunther steiner also hosted the post race interviews. which was interesting.
george said that the most difficult part of the race was “driving full gas into a wall of carbon fiber on the penultimate lap…the vsc should have come out sooner”
charles bashed ferrari because they didn't do any high fuel runs in practice.
oscar was entirely pleased. “i managed to overtake and hold onto it for the next 35 laps..one of the better races of my career.” and honestly, oscar winning a race straight after mclaren basically announcing that he was their number 2 driver is nothing short of hilarious.
and! mclaren was now leading the constructors championship by 20 points! for the first time in ten years!!!!
the top three had a moment outside of the car that was filled with baffled:
and oscar's engineer tom got to stand on the podium with him. he usually takes a selfie with oscar after each race he podiums at, but he was too excited to so george took this picture for them
(george also aparently demomished oscar in a game of uno on the plane, immediately humbling him)
george also shielded himself from the champagne on the podium
the cooldown room reacted to the crash in a very straight forward manner:
instagram
and very quickly cause its midnight and the singapore gp starts in 8 hours, the post race, speed ran:
-mark webber told off laura winter for thinking that oscar didn't have good tire management
-alex albon was “super happy, that's a lot of points for us” (williams finished in 7th and 8th). he cut his own interview short when ollie bearman arrived, saying “I can go, im happy to go” and then waving comically.
-williams was so pleased with this result they blasted everyone with champagne. and they overtook alpine in the constructors championship! this was also their best race finish all season
-(and a quick note, if youre going to really blame logan for being that shit of a driver here, please remember that the car he was driving was several rounds of upgrades behind alex's pretty much the entire time he was driving it)
-ollie became the first driver to ever score points in his first two races for two different constructors because the double dnf pushed him up to 10th place. he said that there was not much difference between the haas and the ferrari, the ferrari was just red
-franco continued to charm everyone and flirt with the reporters.
-they interviewed george and lewis and the camera had to be adjusted for george's height. it was comical and resulted in my favorite edit so far of the season (sound on)
instagram
-lando looked pleased and happy for once. he said about holding off checo that “i didn't hold him up i just had to cool my tires a little.” he was delighted to be leading the constructors for the first time in ten years and he defended alex albon saying “i struggled to get past alex for a while, which is common, alex doesnt make mistakes.” he also ratted on max for going to fast during the VSC and said “i didn't complain, facts were stated.” and to sum it all up he said that “im executing things well, i’m very quick…i’m not going to be the happiest guy, but i am never the happiest guy….car is performing well everywhere…some red cars behind us seem to be our biggest competitors right now”
-by comparison george insulted all of pirelli. the tire people. “pretty infuriating that it (the pace) changes this so much….its black magic, people who make the tires don't understand the tires…..for 20 laps we had a car not worthy of points and for 20 laps we had a car fighting for victory and the only difference is the tires.”
-lewis was notably upset after the race and walked through the paddock with his helmet on, not wanting to talk to anyone. but he did talk to franco and ollie and congratulate them on a job well done defending against him and racing against him. franco even fangirled over this on his instagram.
-charles was clearly upset with ferrari. he was so upset he posted a thirst trap.
-and oscar. oscar was very happy this afternoon. and his mom was there! she doesnt usually come cause it scares her, but nicole was there today!
-mclaren celebrated with a hell of a lot of champagne. both oscar’s wina and lando’s insane recovery, and the fact that they were leading the championship. red bull have been dethroned, at least for now.
-there was so much champagne that lando took off his socks to spray it. all seems well at mclaren.
-at least one thing is for sure, oscar had a better time here this weekend than last year when he got food poisoning and only ate four pieces of toast
and with that. we head into singapore. quite literally as it is starting in a few hours. again, i apologixe about this post. its a little sad, but the next one will be better. pinkly promise.
see you all soon!!!
#not a tag#from saph#saph explains silly season 2024#brazil gp 2024#it was insane it was wild and im glad im done writing this lol#THREE MORE LETS GO#Instagram#Youtube
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i did it last week so i'm doing it again; how we feeling about gempearl this session 6...
the divorce arc isn't even that angsty anymore it's just like, we are watching several minutes of two people who are so obviously obsessed with each other and are just being dumb (/lh) about it. i think that it's just so clear now that they both want to get back with each other but they just??? are stupid and gay????
gem wanting pearl to kill her in a 1v1 because she knows pearl is capable of doing it and, that way, she could start earning her forgiveness back but pearl just doesn't do it?? the whole "you got ants in your pants" "yeah, yeah they are named pearl"??? pearl so obviously trying to make gem jealous with the camel and gem responding so curtly???? the little "did you even look me in the face during our murder camel… happenings?" from gem?????
they are so bitter. they are so gay. they want each other in ways that are dangerous to the rest of the players. every single interaction thay have is charged with intense queer tension. i need them to have a homoerotic fight
you genuinely took all the words from my mouth I CANT EVEN START WITH THEM? its nearly embarrassing /lh its gem giving pearl so many chances to kill her before she gives up and goes over to skizzs place ??
and i get Why pearl didnt take the offer for a proper 1v1 between them. like out of ALL PEOPLE, pearl would be the one who would understand the need to prove your capabilities in a nice even match considering she has that same need with scott (that still has not been fulfilled imo lmao the pufferfish was nice but it probably still didnt satiate that urge for her)
BUT pearl is on yellow, and her self preservation instincts kick in and even if shed love to bury this hatchet with gem she has other goals in mind. (Gem on the other hand has a very different laid-back? attitude towards lives. shes confident surviving even on red and thinks other people should share the same sentiment)
and dont even get me started on the camels. smth smth never left the desert smthg smthg never got off that damn camel.
THEYRE SO BITTER. they both want things to go back to "normal" but normal to pearl is just the two of them as they are and normal to gem is back in SL when theyre both on their red life and its them vs the world ITS HORRIBLE!!! GET IT TOGETHER YOU TWO PLEASE FIGHT IT OUT ALREADY
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Slenderman x Maid!Reader || Drabble
Plot: After Slender has been, well, himself; and frustrated the hell out of you one-too-many times in a day so you storm out of the mansion for a walk to clear your head. He comes after you asking where the hell his servant is going-
Just in time to find the bear staring you right in the face.
//
Or, everyone is annoyed. Including the bear.
(Inspired by videos of animals CLEARLY SEEING something demonic that we cant see.)
Same universe as This fic and This fic.
Warnings: A little bit of Slender being an ass, high-stress situation, Slender being unhelpful and then scaring/hurting a bear (Just making the static noise so the bears ears hurt), mind reading, Slender in a dissociative hunting state, etc.
Tagging: @microwavemadness , @miss-understood , and @yesthetrashbin .
NO BEARS WERE HURT IN THE MAKING OF THIS FIC. WE DO NOT SUPPORT HURTING BEARS HERE.
You storm out of the there as fast your legs will take you without actually running, slamming the door as hard as you can behind you. Maybe he owns you, maybe he's your 'boss', maybe you have to do what he says for the rest of your life- but if you leave without asking, then the bastard cant tell you no.
After walking at the same powerful pace fueled by the raging frustration roaring inside you for a good 7 seconds, just breeching the wall of trees that surround the clearing that the spooky old mansion exists in, you freeze in your tracks violently fast; eyes wide as dinner plates and suddenly wishing you'd stayed inside and put up with your ass of a master.
Because there's a bear. A fucking bear. Its the size of 3 men, its staring right at you, you're stuck staring directly into the terrifying creature's black eyes (The worst thing you could possibly do in this situation), and it looks i r r i t a t e d.
You must have startled it when you stormed into the tree line.
S h i t.
~
When Slender looks for you after you left his office a few moments later, searching for your very annoyed little form (So much anger for one so small) in his mansion, blinking from one room to another until he's checked everywhere- he cant find you. And that ignites a flicker of frustration in himself. Where the hell have you gone, now?? He needs his servant. He loves his peace and quiet, absolutely, but annoying you is a favourite pass time. You're almost as high-strung as he is, after all. And with everyone else gone from this place currently (His brothers, the pasta's, his other proxies), he has all the time in the world to enjoy the quiet. For now he's bored, and he wants to speak to you about your lacklustre method of organising the linen cabinet; just make your life a little hard.
So where the fuck, did you go?
Static fizzing in the air around him, he turns his search onto the woods. He appears right at the edge of the tree line, and immediately finds you in your predicament.
"... ah." Well thats not an ideal circumstance for little Y/N, is it?
As soon as you sense his presence a few feet behind you and hear his voice, you feel all your fear boil over and you want to run behind him. But you don't- you stay still. Slowly, you take a deep breath. You speak while moving your mouth as little as possible, especially when the bear grunts and roars. It seems to hate your voice, but is unbothered by Slender's. Like he's not even there. "... Slender, help me."
Slender does intend to help, truly. He cant be losing his servant. He will not allow a thing, to happen to you. ... But that doesn't mean he cant use this. A glimmer of amusement tickles at the old eldritch monsters cold, ancient heart at the terrible situation.
He was only looking to mess with you a bit, before... but this infinitely better.
"Why should I? You stormed out like a child- this simply appears to be karma, to me."
Oh for FUCKS SAKE- You want to whip around and glare at him, or kick everything on the forest floor at him, but moving might mean getting mauled by a bear right now so you're forced to stay still.
"... please, Slender." You grit your teeth together. Even when the bear grunts again, and stomps a paw down into the dirt. "I'm sorry."
Slender takes the tone of a teacher, as if this is some mental 'teaching moment'. Pretending to be sensible even though he's LITERALLY crazy- He drives you nuts. "Now, that doesn't sound very sincere Y/N. You can do better the that." Stupid, evil, obnoxious, insane creature- "Thats definitely not going to do it."
"I shouldn't- " When the bear lands both front paws down on the ground, prepared to lunge at you and take bite right out of your neck you flinch. Start again. "I shouldn't have y- yelled at you... left the mansion... I'm sorry. Okay???" The bear must hear the panic in your tone, or maybe smells the fear all around you, because it gives a few huffs, and paws dangerously at the ground. Bares its teeth at you.
"Hmm... you know Y/N, I think the bear can tell you're afraid of her. What do you think?"
Suddenly the bear jumps up onto its hind legs, roars and slams back down on the ground, coming forward towards your soft, weak little body, and you squeeze your eyes closed against the terror. "Slender please!- "
When you aren't torn apart by claws or teeth for a few moments, and the roar turns abruptly into a whimper and then heavy breathing- you force yourself to crack an eye open just in time to see the bear backing off again; retreating. You look up with both eyes open to see Slender, grossly tall and with his tentacles floating in the air threateningly around you both, directly behind you now- hanging over you, and although your ears and your head are clogged up with horrible grilling static, you've never been so glad to have him with you; The very visage of a creepy marionette doll or otherwise. Lowering your gaze back to the bear, which looks terrified all of a sudden at the creature behind you and rubbing its poor ears at the sound- you immediately feel awful.
"Slender." You say, cautioning. "Slender, stop."
He doesn't respond, focus trained entirely on the bear.
"Slender."
With a thud of your heart dropping in your chest, you realise this must be what he looks like when he's not at home, seeming almost human with a supernatural ability to annoy you; when he's hunting. And immediately your stomach turns over.
Turning around in place, you grip his old worn suit and tug at it. "Slender!! Stop now! You're finished, the bear will leave!" You make your voice as hard and bossy as you can muster it, trying to cut through whatever horrible old monster instincts are over-riding Slender's personality right now.
When you finally get through to him, yanking his jacket so ferociously that you actually budge him (Not by much; but enough to get his attention), the static cuts off like a switch. He lowers his faceless head to see you down below him, and it takes a little staring, but he comes back to himself. He rolls his shoulders, and you release a relieved breath.
"... you don't want me to kill the bear?" He asks, softly. Almost disbelieving. As if he didn't know that about you; like he was someone else for a minute there.
"No!"
.... With a tone just like an eyeroll, back to himself, Slender straightens up again. You let go of him. "Of course not."
Slender gives the bear a final Look, and the bear turns tail and retreats fully into the trees. You cant see her only hear her- then you cant hear her anymore, either. Gone.
After a few moments Slender turns his head to you again. "... So. Are we going back inside or are we going to stand out here like lemmings for the rest of the day?"
With that he turns immediately, disappears, and then reappears on the porch by the front door; waiting for you. Pretending like none of what just happened actually happened even though you're still in shock and confused. What the hell was that?? Did he just fly into a dissociative state? Are his instincts to protect you???
... is that because you're his proxy, or because you've been having sex? That might be the most important question. What does this mea-
"-What are you waiting for? I have some notes on your ability to put linen away appropriately. Come."
You squint at him; stare into that blank white face waiting for you. Is he listening to you think and distracting you or is he really just that indifferent??
... you cant tell. No surprise.
"I'm coming," You sigh, trudging back towards the mansion. You can think more about this later, maybe. Maybe not. You probably should, but... "but I don't want your notes- "
"Oh you're getting them. Now, about your folding technique- "
But that would mean facing which you want it to mean.
#Slenderman x Reader Drabble#Slenderman x Reader#Slenderman#Drabble#Creepypasta#Slender Bros#Slender Brothers
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Ghost Foxes AU - 01
Have seen a couple of snippets of 'Ghosts' the tv show, and now i cant get the thought of all of the foxes being Ghosts and Neil ending up moving in there.
The house is the Baltimore house which Neil grew up in, the one where his father and mother had been in at one point, a place that Neil wants nothing to do with, and is desperate to get rid of. He can't however, when he realizes that he is not alone. When he realises that so many innocent souls are stuck there, and if they don't end up leaving, they will perish.
He isn't a good man, he just doesn't want countless ghosts following after him after the house is demolished, doesn't want to die only to be surrounded by spirits that have been waiting for him to give his last breath, it's absolutely not because he feels somewhat guilty.
The first time he sees one of them is when he is in the basement, fighting for his life at the hand of his father. He sees a ghost, a woman in her mid thirties, telling him to hold on, that he will be alright. He sees another man with tribal tattoos, telling him that he believes him, that he didn't survive through all the sh*t he went through just to give up then.
And Neil does make it.
He makes it, is carried off to the hospital and barely makes it on time.
But it doesn't change the fact that he makes it.
He is only 16 when that happens, and for 2 years he wishes to have nothing to do with the house, but when it is requested of him to return back there and to go through his mother's stuff he ends up agreeing only for his uncle's sake.
His mother has more stuff than he had thought, and there are also stuff that had once belonged to other victims of Nathan's, which he finds himself feeling somewhat responsible of.
So he stays, at first planning on staying only for a night or two, but ends up staying far longer than he had planned in the end.
At first, he sees them like flickers of light and nothing more. Their faces growing clearer only when they finally find peace by Neil letting know their families of what happened. Of Neil handing over their remains to their families.
It is only after all the lost spirits, the vengeful ones, those that had fallen at the hands of Nathan, that he finds himself able to catch sight of the others.
That he is able to see the foxes.
The first one he meets is Abby, whom he is unable to remember for such a long time because the night at the basement had been rough and he had blocked off memories from back then, even if he hadn't done it intentionally.
Abby is amazing, and somewhat keeps the other ghosts away for a while.
She is there after each nightmare so are almost all of the others, but Neil doesn't know at first, and at some point she will end up becoming something akin to a mother.
Nicky is the second one, a bundle of energy that get Neil used to having others around, and there to help him get not-so-lost in his head at the end of the day. He also manipulates Neil's dreams every now and then too, shows him of softer things, of fields free of anything but flowers, of the sunrise, of an exy field that is endless.
He blocks out Neil's demons as much as he can, even though it means that they get plastered in his own mind instead.
Allison, surprisingly enough, is the third ghost Neil meets, followed by Seth and Dan and Matt. They care for him, in a way that no one else has, they have seen his scars, have witnessed him get them and someone of them had even tried to stop Nathan more than his mother ever had.
Neil is at first uncomfortable by their love, but slowly grows accustomed to it.
The next ghost he meets is Wymack, and he breaks apart when he meets the man, when his eyes land on the tattoos on his wrists because he remembers the man, not only from the basement back then, but also from sleepless nights that were only made bearable by the presence of Wymack who told him countless stories and is the reason that his obsession with exy began in the first place.
(Had to get these ideas written down somewhere before i ended up losing all of it, have so many more ideas for this au but this post is getting quite long so will probably make a second post about it, feel free to send me asks <3)
#Ghost Foxes AU#all for the game#aftg#alternate universe#neil josten#the foxes#aftg fic#the foxhole court#au#fanfic#aftg au#andrew minyard#kevin day#palmetto university foxes#all for the game fanfic
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Y'know re zero reminds a lot of umineko and higurashi. Stories where the protags are dying and resetting over and over again to fight against fate. For a chance that is "infinitely close to zero"(yes literal quote---thats how unlikely victory was) or that one dude from toaru that died 100 billion times, resetting through horrific worlds.
What do they have in common? The protags save/forgive/pity their torturers. WHDAA cast has every right to beat some sense into Subaru damn. I get the whole "understanding the heart of others" theme. I love it, but like--there should be a line somewhere that got lost in the corpses of previous loops. Especially, since most of the time they are redeemed because they have a tragic backstory. Like "ofc I forgive you for torturing me for 100 years because your parents are dead"
Penny for your thoughts?
God I need to watch Higurashi. Too bad I cant FIND THE DAMN SERIES ANYWHERE— also I’ve heard of Umineko but I have no idea what it is lol. Maybe I’ll check it out. Same with A Certain Magical Index.
And — honestly, to an extent I agree with you lol, cause even if I haven’t watched any of those series I am very familiar with the “all is forgiven” trope that tends to happen in anime a lot. I think it often tends to feel a little unbalanced, ESPECIALLY if the perpetrator is some sort of waifu character. Like — okay, there’s this anime that came out a few years ago called Ranking of Kings that I actually really liked for the most part, except the way they handled the main villain (a woman named Miranjo) was just BAFFLING. She did all this horrible stuff in the first half, but then the second half was basically just — everyone bending over backwards to excuse/forgive her simply because…that’s what the author wanted to happen. And the thing is? I was one of like five viewers (judging by those comments :/) who would actually have totally been on board with her redemption if they hadn’t done that. I thought she was a fascinating character, possibly my favorite in the series, and I even saw the potential for her becoming a better person if they were to go that route. But then they hammered it in SO MUCH because the author wanted the audience to like her SO BADLY that — it just RUINED her.
That’s what I think the problem often is: the hand of the author becomes too obvious, and as their actions get excused by the narrative practically bending over backwards to get the audience to like the characters, the characters get flattened down and all their edges sanded off. To be entirely honest it’s the main issue I have with how Rem is often portrayed in this fanbase, because — a really large subset of fans seems to have looked at that HOT MESS of a person and decided that taking her “perfect waifu” facade at face value was the more appealing option, lol.
—It totally makes sense for Subaru, though. As a character this is, it makes SOO much sense that he’s like this. And…I’m actually holding out hope that it’s gonna be addressed as an issue in-universe at some point, due to 1) some very choice descriptors on his part of all those horrible things being “good memories” that are VERY worrying and 2) post-amnesia!Rem very explicitly ending up in antagonistic role to her old self regarding how they each want Subaru to develop going forward.
As for my own react fic…yeah. Rem is. Rem is gonna be in some SERIOUS hot water. If I may: I think that a lot of react fics tend to gloss over her behavior a little too much for my liking, due to her being a popular character (or even a favorite of the author lol) and as such the fic goes out of its way to make sure that the conversation leads to everyone forgiving her one way or another. …I, personally, do not plan on pulling my punches one single bit.
;)
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since we don't really know anything about the curtis' extended family i feel like that means that the brother's parents weren't close to them and of course there has to be a reason for that (and if there isnt lets just pretend there is) so could we get some hcs for somehow all of them getting together to celebrate the holidays and they learn that reason?? whatever it may be (also get the shepards in there because i looooooove them, perhas even some little things of them defending the brothers for whatever reasons)
rubbing my hands together i was actually thinking of something like this earlier
•lets say the reason y the curtis parents arent close to their own is bc mrs curtis was a soc who got w mr curtis (who was a greaser, duh)!!! her parents aint approve and they ran away, andddd thats how the curtis parents ended up where they were
•mrs curtis said they never saw her part of the family bc they were too far away, while mr curtis said his part of the family were dead (and he was kinda right, he meant they were dead to HIM but now a good portion of that family IS actually dead, whoops), non of the bros rlly questioned it nor did they have a HUGE curiosity for visiting em, just something they never questioned
•howeverrrrr, mrs curtis’ family did know about pony, soda, and darry, bc mrs curtis sent some pics of the family bc she did always miss them, but they never responded to those letters, untillllll
•one day!!! darry found a letter from their grandma, for their mom!! it was around the holidays and she was wondering if she wants to come over w the family (begrudgingly mr curtis too) to celebrate it w the family after years being apart, and darry just, didnt know how to react to that
•he didnt immediately tell soda or pony, he would just reread it over and over, wondering if he should respond, and if he did how the hellllll was he gonna tell her she died years ago,,,,
•when darrys in doubt, he confides in tim cause he thinks tims the closest hes gonna get to someone understanding how he feels and hes not even wrong!!! a drink w tim is like darrys therapy, but this time all tim could do was listen, this situation too fucked up even for him😭😭, all he said to darry was that theres no wrong decision for him here, he was forced into it, so whatever happens, he tried his best w what he was given
•since the holidays were approaching, darry realized he would have to tell pony and soda about this too, he feels its especially unfair for HIM to decide for all of them, shes their grandma just as much as she is his after all
•now for soda, out if the brothers hes always been the most curious about meeting his extended family, but finally having that chance and the context behind y theyve never seen em, i cant say hes saying a straight up “yes” to this, he wants to go but its not gonna b the way hes been hoping for, for years, so would it really b worth it??? would they b accepted even if theyre greasers???? this could fuck up his holidays for the next few years depending on how traumatizing this is!!!
•ponys just like darry, hes not saying no, but also saying yes either, hes so on the fence about it. of course he’s learned not to judge soc’s, but this is so much more personal and TIED to him, is he mentally ready to face on all this bs???? he dunno
•pony remembers the multiple times his mom said he looked just like his grandma and would stare at him, and he could see darry staring the same way at him, it kinda freaks him out and makes him feel bad, he cant look darry in the eyes</333
•he opened up to curly about it n curly was crackin jokes, he cant take not SHIT seriously 100%🙄🙄, BUT like tim, he did have just one thing to say, ur not obligated to do it, dont base this off of ehat ur parents wouldve wanted, do it how U do
•feels like this would also mean that if ppl found out about the situation, they would see the curtis’ as “lesser greasers” bc in their eyes, they were greasers by choice, but anyone who questions the curtis’ identity shall b beaten or intimidated by one of the shepards and their goons
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aheem heem
whimper
#the horrors are relentless#the thing is that i genuinely think i'm not that bad at like getting over most parts of the relationship#obv i'm nowhere near being OVER IT over it but i can tell it's getting better and my thoughts on everything are changing slowly#i'm sad and hurt and jealous but realistically i can live without that person wanting me or liking me and i'll get there#but there's one thing that happened that i cant get over#it's like a traumatic memory and i relive it every few days and everytime it hurts just as much as it did when it happened#hmm thinking abt if i should write it down here#but idk it's not like ACTUAL trauma or anything it was just a very humiliating and emotionally extremely draining situation that i was#basically trapped in for almost two weeks#and idk how to live w the fact that they won't ever understand how hurtful it was#like they kinda apologized for parts of it but not really and i know there's no way to make them understand#i'm just left w this pain and they can move on bc they think they've apologized and that we were both equally wrong or smth like that#when we objectively weren't but it took so long for me to actually see that#🍓
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it's been exactly a year since the last chapter of Operation Walburga's Arbitrary No Kissing Ever Rule and I still miss it. This scene is probably one of my favourite things I've ever written and I've wanted to draw it for forever, so now seemed like an appropriate time
#jegulus#jegulus fanart#marauders fanart#regulus black#james potter#james x regulus#marauders#regulus black fanart#james potter fanart#starchaser#sunseeker#regulus x james#marauders era#jegulus fanfiction#fic: operation wanker#hp#mine#my art#ngl this drawing specifically made me realise why i prefer writing over drawing#i think too much in concepts to be able to capture a scene in a way that i want#you cant draw the same thing from several perspectives at once if you dont wanna go for cubism#(tho honestly cubism fanart sounds like a concept i could get behind mmmmm)#anyway i stayed up far too fucking long to finish this in time for today (and by too long i mean until 8am too long)#because originally i had planned to start posting ritardando as my anniversary celebration. yk more fake dating and all that...#but alas i scrapped the whole thing so drawing happened instead#not 100% satisified with how this turned out cause i dont know how perspectives work. or people. or backgrounds outside. you get the idea#i really very much like the second one tho i think its very pretty
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TF One Sentinel Prime
#maccadam#transformers#poll#smash or pass#request#tf one#sentinel prime#i want horrible dirty things to happen to this man so so badly. i know for a fact the valveplug is gonna go INSANE#you cant show me a hot evil douchebag getting grabbed by tentacles within an inch of his life and then expect me to NOT sexualize him#i need to smack him with a hammer repeatedly. i need to put him in the blender. i need to run him over with a 2008 honda civic#hasbro giving us this terrible rat bastard man is the equivalent to bringing a shiny new chew toy home for their dog.#crunch crunch squeak squeak squeak squeak squeak squeak
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(ID in alt) I literally said I was gonna post this month's ago and then never had the wherewithal to describe it and so I didn't Lmao (said with pain). But since I'm thinking of opening my commissions I figured I should remind ppl that I. Yknow. Can draw.
Lots of Steph here (I had major art block making all of these and my brain worms for her kept me going) + some sprinkles of stephcass for Cass nation to enjoy!
#dc comics#dc#stephanie brown#cassandra cain#jason todd#(yes for the teddy bear. it counts)#batgirl#batgirls#mine#< keep forgetting to tag my art as that I'm terrible 😭#ANYHOW I'm slowly getting back into drawing again after my last ipad got nuked (cant think abt that or ill cry) and i finished uni#oh yeah j finished my first year of uni btw. i went to an Olivia Rodrigo concert like a week or 2 ago. I've been busy lol#but yeah it's looking like I've got a fun summer of bottom feeding ahead of me now that I've officially been told i got passed over for that#-comic job i applied for. lol. lmao even#it's fine honestly it was a pretty daunting prospect i just have to find a way to fill the time by myself now#I've plenty of comics to read so that's nice. got wayyy into mark waids DD run recently (mostly for Chris Samnee's art)#so that's been fun! i have my empowered omnibus (embarrassing and kept under my bed <3) i have TT year 1 i have huntress and WW#uhhh i got flash 1 minute war. lots of good stuff!#so hopefully i don't go. completely feral from lack of stimulation#also hopefully commissions will be a thing i can do#godddd there's many mkre things i want to draw. i got too enamoured w my own bad theory and now I've drawn tim!bats#but unfortunately now i only want to draw tim!bats being laughed at my the batfamily bc seriously tim?? really??#< it's literally probably not going to happen but I've invested myself in this terrible future for some reason#imagine damian trying to robin for tim!bats for 1 (one) night and the next morning he doesn't say anything he just moves to bludhaven#he can't take this shit#oh so many ideas...#ANYWAY. ues. finally art. now if you like it. consider commissioning me (in 2 to 3 business weeks <3)#(no pressure)
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hilarious mpreg zosan thought, sanji has a kid that has green hair but its not zoros kid. he has in fact never disclosed who the other father was (choose ur own adventure dead beat dad edition) and his siblings already have amazing technicolour hair so its not outside the realm of possibility for his biological children to also have weird hair colours. but when the kid pops out with green hair everyone immediately connects the dots that hey, doesnt the strawhats first mate that sanji famously doesn't get along with also have green hair? is this why sanji never said who the other father was? hes a fucking dead beat! get his ass!
this misconception integrates into everyones mind bc it makes too much sense to not be true and everyone is suddenly deadset on "protecting sanjis honour" and making zoro "take responsibility"
sanji is screaming crying throwing up disgusted bc no!!! the shitty mosshead is not the father!!! stop saying that!!!! but since he still wont say who the actual father is, everyone is just like its ok sanji, you dont have to defend a deadbeat even if he is your crewmate and sanji has no choice but to kill himself and also zoro for daring to have green hair
when the strawhats show up for sanjis baby shower they also unanimously come to the misunderstanding that sanji and zoro totally boned. franky goes as far as to call the kid mini marimo. brook makes a hundred innuendos, chopper is upset at the implication of them having unsafe sex, and robin alludes to "knowing all along" in a very ambiguous way. usopp is the only one who refuses to connect the dots and he is sanjis favourite strawhat fr. jinbei pats sanji on the back and says he hopes they work through their differences for the sake of their kid. sanji is dying, youre killing him, you're killing your cook
even more shenanigans ensue when zoro shows up 3 whole days late to the baby shower and is gaslit into thinking hes the father by everyone in attendance despite being Pretty Sure that he and sanji never fucked. zeff gives a pretty good shovel talk and nami gives an even better one (debt increment is involved) while zeff nods approvingly behind her and then luffy slingshots in all parents should be married right? and doesnt wait for an answer
anyway, like 2 hours later zosan find themselves standing at a makeshift altar on the thousand sunny, saying their vows. sanji insists to the very end that zoro is not the father so they dont need to get married but alas luffy isnt giving him a choice in this (he wants to eat wedding cake)
to sanjis eternal despair, the kid grows up to really like swords
additional zosan thought, sanji does not help things by shouting "this is all your fault!" the moment he sees zoro. zoro is futher gaslit
#mine#zosan#one piece#love putting them in the funniest scenarios possible#the kid also cant be convinced that zoro isnt their actual father#i think zoro does his whole wandering swordsman thing and sanji has to endure lovelorn husband jokes#angst alternative: zoro is in fact the father but does not remember their one night stand bc he was black out drunk#and sanji refuses to be the only one that remembers their ~night of passion~ and decides to keep the father a secret#luffy forces them to get married anyway#op#this got kinda long oops#dont ask me why the baby shower lasts over 3 days i just think the strawhats party hard and party rock and theyd definitely go all out here#zoro in this is very much embodying this might as well happen
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Samurai and Ninja in crappy pics because December here is under a constant cloud and I just want y'all to see them all golden and cute without learning how to take aesthetic pictures 🥴 💙❤️😆🥰
linktr.ee/Mezzy
#klance#can i tell everyone to look away before i write tags to someone privately lmao no? damn#anyway yes i meant music!! and thank you for sharing something!!#baking seems like a hyperfixation#like i know you said you baked once but then look at me#...i was thinking if i could make salads.... i gotta be medicore at least at one food thing#its a joke its a joke#i will one day get used to focusing on more complicated kitchen work than heating up meat or cooking things in salt and water#anyone else had trouble getting out of bed this december?#once i do i try to pick physical activities that dont require creative thinking because man#at the post office i had small talk with a lady waiting in line she didnt speak polish so u know me it happened#and she recommended light therapy lamp#im very tempted to try it becase i had record bad thoughts sleepless nights and jerking awake this month#it might be rooted in economic instability growing inflation costs of living and shitty working conditions while still trying to buy gifts?#but hey there are things we cant have control over and there are things we can#ive got winter wonderland comic coming though#i will try my best to speed-finish it as a christmas gift aight#i hope its going to be a nice thing!!#wow thats a long set of tags
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NO I AM NOT OKAY. IF THIS PERSON WHO DID IT IS SOMEONE WHO FOLLOWS ME TAKE IT FREAKING DOWN. I NEVER GAVE PERMISSION FOR SOMETHING LIKE THIS AND NEVER WILL.
If someone knows about this fic. Please please please I beg you please send a link to me so that I could report it. If I remember correctly it is only the author who could report something being stolen on wattpad. (The story they took from is one of my original works that is Just One Drop) And please if you do know or if you find out don't go attacking this person.
#i dont know how to react to this... lost sleep a couple of time cause i was always scared that one day i will find out that someone#stole my works and say that it was there own or something like that.#but now that it finally happened i feel like a deflated balloon more than anything#more of the mentally of like “I guess it finally happened to me.” i cant say i am too surprised about this situation#but i am definitely not happy about this at all.#if you are someone who stole one of my works why do you even do this?#likes or whatever??? there is literally nothing nice about the whole thing. do you feel happy?#do you feel happy that you get likes over something that you didnt make? will anything do to make you happy then at this point??#i am not trying to be understanding here i am trying to get it in your skull that in the end#you get nothing from this#doing something like this will only get you likes if not that numbers then what else? You built everything on stuff that didnt belong to yo#fame? what fame could you even get from something like this. sooner or later you might just abandon it and then what??#there is nothing to feel good about it.#this is the reason why people hesitate to even post stuff online at this point cause why even bother#when everything that we make will be stolen at one point and posted again under someone else when we clearly said that we do not want that
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