Reject of the Race - Canada 2024

[Londoner]

1. Ferrari. A disasterclass worthy of the Binotto years.

2. Sergio Perez. Not doing anywhere near enough to justify his contract extension.

[TomPryce]

Yep - same as above.

[rachel1990]

1- Ferrari- Bad Saturday with no pace turned into the Sunday from Hell with Engine problems, terrible pitstop calls then giving up and retiring the car (Charles) then Sainz binning it and taking out a very unlucky Alex Albon

2- Sergio Perez. Binned in and destroyed the rear wing. In 15th I think. another q1 exit as well. Why are you bothering with that Contract Red Bull?

HM Logan Sargent- His teammate did an amazing move and then was a victim of the Ferrari day from Hell. Logan binned it and almost caused a Red flag. Forget 2025 He will be fortunate to last the whole of 2024.

[Meatwad]

Ferrari: What an absolute nightmare, nowhere all weekend, ending in double DNF.

Dishonorable mentions to Pérez (great signing, Red Bull!) and Sargeant.

[golic_2004]

Yeah…. Ferrari and Perez

[dr-baker]

Double DNF for Ferrari and for inadvertently causing Williams to also have a double DNF.

George Russell for having the opportunity to win and nearly finishing 5th instead. At least Norris always consistently seemed in the running for a podium.

[dj_vicious]

1. Sergio Perez: Nowhere in qualifying and binned it in the race. This was a weekend where he just signed a contract

2. Ferrari: Slow all weekend and a disasterpiece of a race. Leclerc was sent out on hards on a soaking wet track, which ironically mirrors Malaysia 2009 when Kimi was sent out on a dry track in wets. Sainz was nowhere, then a lazy spin ruined Albon's glorious race. Admittedly I don't hold Sainz in contempt for Albon, he was collateral damage.

HM goes to Logan Sargeant. Nowhere and went off twice, with the second time causing a safety car and possibly robbing Norris of a win.

[Ciaran]

1. Perez for wasting Red Bull's catering budget.
2. Race control for taking about 40 seconds between Sargent stopping on track and bringing out the safety car.

[mario]

1- Ferrari- Bad Saturday with no pace turned into the Sunday from Hell with Engine problems, terrible pitstop calls then giving up and retiring the car (Charles) then Sainz binning it and taking out a very unlucky Alex Albon

2- Sergio Perez. Binned in and destroyed the rear wing. In 15th I think. another q1 exit as well. Why are you bothering with that Contract Red Bull?

That seems to sum things up best - it seemed as if everything that could go wrong did go wrong for Ferrari, and it's even more awkward when Leclerc had been hoping Ferrari could close up on Verstappen and the McLaren drivers in Canada.

As for Perez - it feels like that was the sort of performance you get from a driver whose role at the team is to fill a seat and sell merchandise, and has guaranteed job security.

[IceG]

1. Ferrari. A disasterclass worthy of the Binotto years.

2. Sergio Perez. Not doing anywhere near enough to justify his contract extension.

+1

[RAK]

1. Ferrari. A disasterclass worthy of the Binotto years.

2. Sergio Perez. Not doing anywhere near enough to justify his contract extension.

Yeah, can't think of any other more worthy candidates myself.

[Wallio]

While I can't disagree with the slam dunk picks of Ferrari and Checo, I will add one that flew under the radar:


Alpine/Ocon - Got into a lap-long pissing match over team orders and letting Gasley through in what seems to be nothing more than trying to get him to disobey so they can fire him early. You scored the same number of points, why does Pierre have to be ahead?

[Alextrax52]

Ferrari: As soon as the words “Ferrari” and “Championship Challenge” started being mentioned in the same sentence after Monaco I knew a poor weekend was just around the corner but I didn’t think it’d come just one race later or be that bad, they were just slow and lacking grip all weekend. Both cars were knocked out in Q2 on merit and in the race Leclerc lost a lot of engine power, was bizarrely put on dries too early then retired, Sainz moved up a little bit on dries but would have only finished 8th at best before a rare mistake. Instead of challenging Max/Redbull, Leclerc/Ferrari are now looking over their shoulder at Norris/McLaren

Sergio Perez: What more do we need to say about this guy? He started 16th, stayed there for all of the wet portion of the race, only climbed to 13th once it dried before a mistake all by himself. Why has he been resigned by Red Bull? It must be money and marketing surely because it sure ain’t on recent performances. If it’s to be a number 2 to Max then he’s not providing anywhere near the help needed for the Drivers title. If it’s because he’s genuinely allowed to race Max for wins (which I think he is) then he’s failing much worse than we all thought

HM: Logan Sargeant: At this point I won’t be surprised if he gets booted out before this year’s over especially when the much hyped Antonelli is eligible for a Superlicense in August. Sargeant has shown flashes of speed but overall can anyone really say he’s been that much of an improvement on Latifi?

HM: Alpine Team Orders: Took most of the shine off the points they scored on track. Call me cynical but I think they’ve well and truly made Gasly their favourite son and wanted him to finish ahead of Ocon. More shenanigans like this and I could see Ocon/Alpine ending before the year is even over in a Vinales/Yamaha kind of way

HM: Mercedes Drivers: Controversial perhaps? I lauded the Mercedes team to the skies in IIDOTR because they should have won but I feel these 2 were the reason why they didn’t. As The Race said in their verdict: If only they could combine their drivers into one being, they might have won the race. Instead Hamilton can’t qualify to save his life right now which renders any strong race pace he has utterly useless. Russell meanwhile has been electric over one lap but firstly burnt through his intermediates too quickly and then after switching to dries he threw away a chance at the win by making a mistake and then nearly threw a podium away with his clash with Piastri. In short the Merecedes team could have done no more to win that race but both drivers executed it horribly.

[sswishbone]

1) Ferrari - that was pretty pathetic strategy which followed a poor qualifying.

2) Perez - another sorry excuse of a weekend. Rumour suggests the deal is one year with options for two. RB may now have true buyers remorse

[dr-baker]

Perez and Mercedes drivers

Do you realise that if you combine both Mercedes drivers as described, you will have got one driver challenging for the win, but then the other driver would be Perez?

In terms of overall results, would you rather be RedBull with the win or Mercedes with both drivers with a chance of a podium? Your post comes across as criticising both options.

[Har1MAS1415]

Perez: Red Bull can make all the excuses for keeping him that they can think of but they're fooling less and less and people the longer they stick with him and he keeps coming out with performances like this. Kind of like Ferrari with post-crash Massa.

[Ducktanian]

In my eyes this can only be Ferrari as this was an absolute disaster of a weekend. Least we forget that Leclerc had finished in the Top 4 in every race this season, and Sainz in the Top 5. Leclerc even won the last race! But this weekend, not only did they have the utter embarrasment of a double Q2 knockout, not only did they struggle to get into the points positions in the race, but they also had a double DNF due to their faults, they put Leclerc in slicks at exactly the wrong point as if it was some kind of bizarre comedy sketch, Sainz spun in a way that took Albon out. This was laughably pathetic in a way we've not seen all year. Perez was bad yes, but Ferrari was truly rejectful.

[justin_baumann]

I agree with most here, but not entirely with the people at fault:

Red Bull instead of Perez: What Perez has delivered is nothing new and I honestly didn't expect anything else from him. For me, Red Bull is Reject of the Race for extending Perez's contract. Any other driver would be better. And it bothers me that Albon and Gasly, for example, who were better than Perez compared to Verstappen, were quickly sacked, while Perez is tolerated for six years at best.

Sainz and Leclerc instead of Ferrari: Sainz spun and Leclerc misjudged his tyre choice. Ferrari had an outlier in terms of performance, just like every other team in the age of the ground effect. But I don't see any particular fault with the team itself. The car doesn't suit the track, just like Red Bull doesn't suit Monaco. That's why Red Bull didn't become Reject of the Race, and so Ferrari should not as well.

Sargeant: Makes Latifi look like a world champion.

[Row Man Gross-Gene]

Yes, Ferrari was rejectful, not just bad. I think they are a good, old-fashioned, reject choice this time around. But let's be realistic, this wasn't them "throwing away the championship" or anything like that. It was just a proper rejectful weekend, fully deserved.

[mario]

Sainz and Leclerc instead of Ferrari: Sainz spun and Leclerc misjudged his tyre choice. Ferrari had an outlier in terms of performance, just like every other team in the age of the ground effect. But I don't see any particular fault with the team itself. The car doesn't suit the track, just like Red Bull doesn't suit Monaco. That's why Red Bull didn't become Reject of the Race, and so Ferrari should not as well.

If you look at what Leclerc and Sainz were saying before the practice sessions, both drivers went into the weekend believing that they would be competitive - see, for example, Leclerc saying in the interviews on Thursday that “we will be very closely matched with McLaren and Red Bull”.

Meanwhile, if you look at Vasseur, he was commenting that Ferrari had been competitive in the previous races, where the tracks were very different in nature, and that he had a "good feeling" about how they might perform in Canada. Now, you might say that the drivers could have had an optimism bias, but it seems that Vasseur had also been expecting the team to perform more strongly in Canada than they ended up doing.

Furthermore, it should be noted that Vasseur did later concede that there were operational mistakes in qualifying that cost the team - in particular, he admitted that sending both drivers out on the sole set of fresh soft tyres they could afford to use in Q2 at the start of the session when most of their rivals did their initial runs on used tyres was a mistake.

[Jarvis]

I don't see another option than Ferrari and Sergio Perez like most of the guys above.