Originally Posted by abm89

I don't recall any constructors' championship winners in the hybrid turbo era except Mercedes. Mostly by over 250 points.

I don't know why you're bringing that up. I specifically mentioned overall tire performance.

Two blowouts from Baku were the public reason for the compound change. One assumes that more analysis was done, but we're not privy to it. I don't recall any other unexplained tire failures this season before Silverstone. But maybe that was coincidence.

This is purely conjecture. There are reports that Pirelli stated the blowouts were due to improper running conditions (ie. pressures), and they enforced checks in the subsequent races, not a compound swap (to correct myself). I couldn't find anything about a compound swap, but Verstappen's pace at Silverstone makes that argument a moot point.

Everyone pushes the envelope. Be it RB trying to include a horsepower increase in an engine swap, to Ferrari doing whatever they were doing in 2018-2019, to DAS. And 1000 other initiatives. Some have been good for the sport, others not so much. I'm not sure if Mercedes lives within the rules, or is just better at hiding it.

True, but my point earlier outlined how the teams go about exploiting those gray areas. There is a notable difference between making the changes and getting clarifications on the interpretations of the rule-set before running the parts in competition.

Clearly, they sold their 2019 car plans to Tracing Point - that was not a case of clever copying. Might have been Stoll's indiscretion, but a transaction takes two parties.

Again, wildly accusative claims. There was never any proof that the car design it self was sold to Racing Point. With technology today, it is easily possible to design a look-alike car with imaging technology. The one thing that IS a fact with that saga is that the rear brake duct designs were not introduced in 2019, thus rendering them illegal to use in 2020 based on the rules. Listed parts are allowed to be shared between teams so long as they followed that rule. The front duct designs were introduced in 2019 thus being legal. Now, if you want to scrutinize the handling of the FIA allowing the team to continue to use the rear brake ducts in 2020, that's a totally different argument. Combine this with the fact that Racing Point had the FIA check over what they were doing throughout the design process, it is hard to believe that the whole car design was outright sold from Mercedes. More info on that issue and how it a solution was approached for 2021 here.