Marussia have “made a massive step forward”

F1 Fanatic round-up

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In the round-up: Marussia believe they have made huge progress this year.

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Marussia ask for ‘level playing field’ on Formula One prize money (The Guardian)

Graeme Lowdon: “Outside of Mercedes we have probably made the biggest step forward in sheer pace. We have made a massive step forward. People can see we are doing a good job on extremely limited resources. We have a suitably obscene amount of money to go motor racing with but nowhere near the levels of the other teams.”

Lewis: ‘Any driver, any place’ (Sky)

“I would go up against any driver. Any time, any place. Any team. Whoever it is, that’s not a worry for me, I would have happily been Sebastian [Vettel’s] team-mate. He has a great car, so it would have been a great experience.”

Hamilton says test ban ‘sucks’ (Autosport)

“That [the ban] does suck a little bit because that test is quite an important test for the year – it’s the only test really. It’s important because we had a lot planned, upgrades and stuff, that we were hoping to test on those three days.”

Bernie Ecclestone : ‘I am not sure what happiness is’ (The Times, subscription required)

“I am not sure what happiness is. What do those feelings mean? I have experienced satisfaction when I have planned something and it has come off. But happiness? I am not so sure.”

McLaren trial upgrades ahead of Silverstone race (F1)

Managing director Jonathan Neale: “The only issue with our car is we lack downforce and that is what we are trying to create at the moment. We’ve got a range of upgrades for the weekend but we’re not there just testing parts, but testing some fundamental understanding issues as well.”

Stefano Domenicali: “We would like to always start from pole…” (Adam Cooper’s F1 Blog)

“The aim is to at least be consistently on the top two rows. Obviously, we would like to always start from pole, which would make everything much easier and that would be even more the case when you consider our car’s potential in the race itself.”

Claire Williams: How rude to ask when I’ll get pregnant (The Telegraph)

“We at Williams have a skills shortage so if girls are coming up to the right level why on earth wouldn’t we recruit from the pool where 50% of society is female?”

Q&A with Jean-Pierre Menrath (Renault)

“In terms of design, the modern simulation tools didn’t exist back then [in the 1980s], nor did all the computer systems and software used to design the engines more effectively and track their performance more accurately. There was no telemetry, no data acquisition. For the record, the driver could alter the booster pressure. Our ‘telltale’ was a dial with a needle that was stuck pointing up. So, at the end of the day, the level of monitoring was somewhat limited. Nowadays, engine technology is a lot more effective. We’re very close to the complex systems used in aerospace.”

The "nightmare" of aerodynamic correlation (GoCar)

“While correlating the factory-based models (CFD and/or tunnel) with track, a ‘common language’ has to be established. Otherwise the exercise would risk becoming a sort of guessing game and quite often a cause of painful confrontation… In other words, similar conditions have to be ensured if at all possible, and the un-removable differences need to be recognized and known in terms of effects, for them to be taken into account very, very carefully.”

A never ending tradition (Ferrari)

Pat Fry: “We’ve got a few upgrades coming through for this weekend and so we have to ensure we are well prepared to run them.”

Narain Karthikeyan: “Auto GP is a great championship” (Auto GP)

“I wanted to continue racing in a powerful and extremely competitive single-seater championship and thus Auto GP was a logical choice in this context.”

Tweets

Comment of the day

Over 70% of F1 Fanatic readers consider Mercedes’ test ban too lenient but Andy isn’t one of them:

Compared to a tyre test, this is a fully-fledged test where you can do anything you want to. Pirelli would have never allowed Mercedes to bolt on never-raced updates; that would have contaminated the data. At the Young Drivers Test on the other hand they can do that, with tyres that are known by now.

I also see the eagerness to downplay the input of a “young driver”. Most teams actually do not run a young driver, but a driver who has extensive experience in both other racing series and the in-house simulator. Rest assured: they know perfectly how to drive, operate and set up an F1 car! Therefore, the quality of their input will be only slightly behind that of a regular F1 driver (so much for Helmut Marko’s comments).

Even beside that, the teams run a huge amount of sensors, racks and flow-vis paint. Even completely without any input of the driver they will be able to gather huge amounts of data.

Mercedes drove with until-now never used tyres, will most likely not have been able to test any updates and were limited to 1000km. You can do an additional 500-750km on the same three days if you want to.
Andy (@Turbof1)

What’#s your view on Mercedes’ test ban? Have your say here:

From the forum

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday to Alex Bkk, Greg, Kathryn S and Lemon!

If you want a birthday shout-out tell us when yours is by emailling me, using Twitter or adding to the list here.

On this day in F1

We mentioned a French F1 driver of the eighties here yesterday so let’s make it two and a row and wish a happy 58th birthday to Philippe Streiff!

Streiff scored a podium finish in his sixth start in the inaugural Australian Grand Prix of 1985, having taken over from Andrea de Cesaris at Ligier. That third place was the peak of his achievements in F1 though he did claim four ‘class wins’ in the Jim Clark Cup for non-turbo competitors in 1987.

For 1988 he rejoined AGS, who he had raced for in Formula Two. But during pre-season testing in 1989 he suffered a major crash at the Jacarepagua circuit in Brazil. A spinal cord injury left Streiff with paralysis.

Image © Marussia

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75 comments on “Marussia have “made a massive step forward””

  1. Old fart Ecclestone cannot feel happiness, and he does his best, so we can’t feel it either

    1. Sadly too many wealthy people do not achieve the happiness they expected from being wealthy so resort to gaining satisfaction by taking as much as they can from others.

  2. Christ. I’m going to break something if I read another article about how amazing it is that a woman has a job in F1.

    I honestly think people like Susie Wolff and Claire Williams do more damage to gender equality by spending their time talking about how wonderful it is that they’re women in a “man’s world” than Sir Stirling does with his old-fashioned comments.

    The only way to achieve equality in anything is to shut up about it. That’s it. Until we see an end to these mindless articles about women breaking barriers in motorsports (even though it is absolutely nothing new) then these girls will never be taken seriously.

    1. +1 As a woman, nothing makes me cringe more than articles such as the one above. It seems to me like Williams and Wolff, in particular, spend more time harping on about their gender than actually doing their jobs.

      1. lol, is this the reason for Williams’s slump…….? On a serious note I can’t wait for a full time female F1 driver but then these kind of articles will be coming out every week :(

        1. The only way to achieve equality in anything is to shut up about it. That’s it. Until we see an end to these mindless articles about women breaking barriers in motorsports (even though it is absolutely nothing new) then these girls will never be taken seriously.

          Hear, hear.

    2. I agree. Rather than hear about how amazing it is that a woman has a job in Formula 1, I’d rather hear about an amazing woman who has a job in Formula 1. Someone like Monisha Kaltenborn, who hasn’t made a spectacle (or had one made for her) about her gender.

    3. I Love the Pope
      26th June 2013, 3:19

      What is really confusing is how she said that she has “time” to have kids, yet is 36. It doesn’t get easier as you get older. In fact, it not only gets harder, it can be dangerous.

      Having young kids at my age I can tell you as a prophet…have them when you’re in your 20s. You’ll thank me for it later.

    4. Sorry but I disagree with you totally, don’t blame her, blame the journos who ask her the questions, I doubt very much that either of them are ringing up the press saying please come and interview me about being a woman in F1.
      Whether you like it or not, there are so few women in F1 that they are role models and pathfinders, it wont change until there are so many women that it is the norm rather than the exception.
      Of course you could always take the approach of not reading the article, after all you do have a choice.
      As for Sterling Moss, which old fashion views are you referring to, the highly offensive and discriminatory ones about who would play him in a film or what ?
      As for @kingshark referring to these highly professional people as “girls”, well that speaks volumes as to why there are so few women in the sport.

      1. I agree entirely. Well said.

    5. @jackysteeg I disagree here. Women are nowhere near breaking the barrier. Claire and Susie are the exceptions, not the rule. I’d rather they talk about it so it becomes a point of discussion. Otherwise, people forget it and don’t do anything about it (because they don’t think it’s a problem – out of earshot, out of mind).

      That said, their words should be backed up by their results to them to be of any real significance.

      1. @journeyer and @smudgersmith1 the problema here is , IMHO, that neither of them got to F1 on their own.

        Wolff got here because her husband has lots of money; and Claire because her father is an owner.

        On the other hand, Monisha Kaltenborn is really breaking barriers. And with out making lots of noise about it. She is doing her!

        Woman will and should be getting in F1 because of merits, if not is only hurting and diminishing chances for other women.

        1. I think saying that Williams got there because her father is an owner that way is unfair to her @celeste.
          Sure, she got interested because of Frank Williams and its his team, and it certainly gave her motivation, but Frank Williams was not at all amused by her wanting the job and she had to do a great lot of work to get where she is right now.

          1. @bascb ok, maybe I was a big harsh on Williams, but there is no way you can talk me in to think that Susie Wolff deserve an F1 drive

          2. No, I am not even going to try and convince anyone of that @celeste :-)

            If the will to do it and moderate driving qualities would qualify someone, we could have a grid of a couple of thousand drivers!

    6. Maybe journalists should stop giving life to the case…

    7. Agree!!!

  3. Ben (@scuderia29)
    26th June 2013, 1:00

    strange comments from hamilton, less than half way into his first season with mercedes and he discusses an ambition to drive for ferrari and is open to a return to mclaren

    1. OmarR-Pepper (@)
      26th June 2013, 1:09

      @scuderia29 the question is if mclaren is open to a return with him after all the dirt he threw on Ron Dennis and the prison-break feelings he has now after finally leaving McLaren.

      1. Ben (@scuderia29)
        26th June 2013, 1:16

        @omarr-pepper
        well maybe 3 years on at the end of his contract with mercedes all that might have been forgotten about…maybe. I think Mclaren would have to be quite desperate to offer him a contract in the future, i just hope he never ever drives a ferrari XD

      2. @omarr-pepper

        I seriously doubt Mclaren will ever deny Lewis from joining the team again. Just look at Jenson Button… how can Mclaren have a future with that guy as a team leader?

    2. Have you considered that Lewis was most likely asked his opinion on the matter? Your comments are very naive.

      1. True, but there’s a way to answer those questions. That won’t please the Mercedes people too much.

        1. Oh please. These are hypothetical questions, which he answers in a hypothetical way. And how many times does he repeat that he’s extremely happy at Mercedes? Half the article consists of him declaring his love to MGP.

          1. @baremans He could’ve stopped there. The moment he says “but”, that’s when the other shoe drops.

  4. COTD spot on. Ambiguity clarified and hopefully everyone can move on. Would have been interesting at the time to hear the views of the teams that kept quiet!

    1. Absolutely right.

    2. In addition, in one the Hamilton articles, Lewis made the point that it is actually very important for the simulator drivers to get some real track time, to be able to better assist in the development of the car. In fact, in the only in-season test of last year, McLaren did not run their race drivers at all, but Turvey and Paffett instead.

      1. Yeah I agree completely with COTD and would only add that of the 1000km Mercedes did for Pirelli, only 10% of it was on current tires. The YDT for Mercedes would have meant ALL the mileage being done on tires they know about and would have had control over.

  5. The excellent if not rivetting article in GO CAR on aero-testing pretty much confirms my view that the testing ban is not the money-saver it is touted to be. Those of you who supported my recent pro testing post before it was expunged can bask in the warm glow of self satisfaction, those who opposed my view can find more information on the subject from a more qualified source by reading the article, and those who missed the whole debate can get up to speed and see why there is a move back to testing.

    1. The excellent if not rivetting article in GO CAR on aero-testing pretty much confirms my view that the testing ban is not the money-saver it is touted to be.

      If it wasn’t then most of the teams would not be as opposed to testing as they are.

      The thing you need to remember about testing cost’s is that the team/s have to pay to rent the circuit, Pay for the engine’s, tyres, car components, transportation, crew accommodation, all the parts been tested & even small things like catering, security etc….

      Also consider the thing thats never considered when talking about testing & thats the mechanics. There’s no dedicated test teams anymore (And teams don’t want to bring them back) so the race crew are going to have to handle all race weekends & any testing thats done. These guys/girls are already spending way more time than anyone really wants to away from there homes/families & there already working much harder than they ever have because of the expended race schedule & its accompanying travel.
      Any testing thats done is going to see them spending more time away from home & more time working as hard as they do & from a teams perspective this has been one of the biggest issues discussed with regards to testing agreements.

      Dedicated test teams were cut to reduce operating cost’s & as has been seen in recent FOTA discussions none of the teams really want to bring them back.

      Ferrari were always against the testing restrictions & the eventual ban, Why? Because they never faced the same issues everyone else did, They have a much bigger budget, They never got rid of there test team & since they own there own test track which is right next to there factory they never needed to spend as much on testing as the others did to start with so testing cost’s was never that big an issue to them.

      1. GT-racer, you obviously missed the earlier discussion where I called for less formal testing ie. a team could run 1 car and driver at a local track or aerodrome, much like straightline testing is currently conducted, being able to do so could possibly allow a team to go straight from CFD to the track without having to make a massive investment in a wind tunnel and the associated personnel . Regardless of what you or I think, it seems the teams have elected to follow the MotoGP practice of after-race testing.

  6. it’s the only test really

    .

    Not for you guys, it’s not.

    BTW, Lewis’ probably right about Vettel “having it easy” with a great car at his disposal. But considering he himself entered F1 the big way (first race, already on a top team), maybe he could shut it up a bit? If anything, Lewis had it a lot easier than everyone around him. Vettel jumped to a midfield car and spent there a good amount of races before finally getting a top drive (“getting”… well, it was quite a given at the time).

    Maybe, who knows, had Vettel got his drive in the 2007 McLaren he’d have been champion right away.

    I don’t like Vettel a lot, but I admit he’s a hell of a driver that happens to have a great car and team around him. Continuosly saying he “had it easy” sucks (as Lewis’d say) quite a lot IMO…

    1. Aditya (@adityafakhri)
      26th June 2013, 5:53

      actually, most of the current champions had been in relatively top team/car in their early success.
      Vettel – 2009 Red Bull, 2nd full season (2nd in WCC)
      Alonso – 2003 Renault, 2nd full season (4th in WCC)
      Raikkonen – 2002 McLaren, 2nd full season (3rd in WCC)
      Hamilton – 2007 McLaen, debut season (DSQ-ed from WCC, but if they weren’t, it’d be 1st in WCC)
      Button – well…2009 Brawn, 10th full season.

      Unlike Hamilton, they’re all starting from scratch. In other hand, Vettel has to waited only a year until Red Bull regularly win (only Button and Brawn interfere their success). Raikkonen would taste a lot better success in his early days if Schumi-Ferrari’s dinasty weren’t so dominant and McLaren had better reliability. Alonso was doing well in progressing Renault until breaking Ferrari domination.

      So the only one who has really right to say, “Vettel had it easy” is Jenson Button. Hard time in Williams and Benetton, a brief enjoyable stint in BAR, disastrous time with Honda (except for his win in Hungary), until finally got title with Brawn.

      1. If Raikkonen and Alonso had a top car at their second season, then Button had a good car then Button had a good car in 2004 if not 2000. No offence there.

      2. @adityafakhri Still, it’s a lot different to enter F1 in a 2001 Minardi or Sauber… or a 2000 Williams, a team that had just made a big change (BMW engines), than a 2007 McLaren that the current double-champion had chosen as his next team…

        Of all those guys, Hamilton entered the sport the easy way. He had a championship winning car in his first 2 seasons. Can’t get better than that can it?

        1. Aditya (@adityafakhri)
          26th June 2013, 13:16

          @sigman1998
          of course I’m not offended :)
          and yes, 2004 BAR was the 2nd best car on the grid at the moment. I’m not underrating Kimi and Fernando, but their career development with their teams was on right path (IMO).

          @fer-no65
          indeed, maybe JV with 1996 Williams was almost similar comparison.
          but I’m still curious how McLaren turned the unreliable MP4-20 and (slower) MP4-21 and create the beast in MP4-22 (spygate aside)

  7. Managing director Jonathan Neale: “The only issue with our car is we lack downforce”

    Really? It’s ok then, I thought it was something more serious…

    1. Its almost the same as saying “the only problem is that we are slow”

  8. Bernie, happiness is that nice feeling when you are relaxing with your girlfriend and your pet guinea pig, lying and watching your favorite show and you just feel so very glad that those dear to you are happy and you are all there sharing the moment together. Or driving round twisty coastal road with your missus, riding a small scooter and looking for a nice secluded beach to cool down before continuing your adventure.

    Someone needs to tell Bernie that your personal happiness most of the time doesn’t actually come as a result of someone else’s misery.

  9. About the Claire Williams article, it may be rude to ask when she’s getting pregnant, but it’s not completely irrelevant either. She says she wants to have children and dedicate herself 100% to them, does that mean she will only be with Williams until she gets pregnant? In which case it would be relevant. Even if she would leave the day-to-day care of the child to her partner, there is still the question of carrying the child. When my wife was pregnant for the first time, her pregnancy sickness was such that she could only work a couple of hours per day – she would not have been able to fly around the world and run a Formula 1 team.

    This asymmetry between men and women is even worse for drivers. There are plenty of racing dads out there, but to combine motherhood with racing cars, you would have to miss at least one (if you time it right) or two seasons of driving. That’s even worse than having a two-year rallying sabbatical for every expansion of the family ;-) In all seriousness, Raikkonen is a world champion and was good enough to get a drive after a two-year absence, but I think for most other drivers, if you are out of F1 for two years, you are not coming back.

    1. I agree that questions about pregnancy are both impertinent and relevant at the same time.
      And I guess poor Claire isn’t very informed on the subject, because at 36 the clock is ticking very hard. Then again, my wife’s mother was 40 when she had her.

    2. @AdrianMorse I think you offer a balanced view here. Women and men are different, our bodies are different, which means that female racers will most likely never constitute 50% or more of an F1 grid. I also believe that any gender quotes would only hurt the sport.

      That said, I personally believe that Claire Williams is right to talk about these issues. There will always be women, who can and want to become professional racing drivers, engineers or team principals and who are good enough to outperform the likes of Chilton or Allison. And they should be encouraged to follow the dream. I think that’s what Claire Williams is talking about when she says that “it’s about women changing their mindset.”

      1. “it’s about women changing their mindset.”

        I actually find statements of this sort (which you quoted, this is not against you) patronizing and more offensive than anything Stirling Moss said. First, are women really so stupid that they need to be told what to do with their lives? And second, why is it wrong that they (apart from some exceptions) do not care for F1? What’s so wrong with wanting to be good mothers, good doctors, good judges? (I chose these professions since in our country women happen to comprise clear majority in these two.)

        IMHO women who put great emphasis on family got it right, and if anything, it should be men in general (and mass media!!) changing their mindset. The future of our culture rests with parents who take time to have kids and then teach them to be honest, responsible, aware that they are a part of society, aware of the value of education and knowledge. This is a task both parents should share and be proud of.

  10. Regarding the Claire Williams interview: I think it’s a good thing to strive for equality between men and women in Formula 1, but I think it’s more of a society problem than specifically a Formula 1 problem. I’m currently doing a technical study at a university and the number of women is shockingly low: just 7%. The reason why this is so low is not exactly clear to me, but I think it has more to do with women simply not wanting to do a technical study than any form of discrimination.

    In a way, Formula 1 is a bit of a micro-universe: it’s essentially eleven businesses going head to head, but at a much smaller scale in comparison to ‘real’ companies (please don’t take offence here). Therefore it’s great that F1 shows the world how little gender matters to them, with women now claiming two of the eleven highest seats at these businesses. The outrage following Stirling Moss’ comments earlier this year shows that F1 has an open mindset, and I honestly believe this outcry has had a positive influence on the way non-F1 people think about women in society.

    One thing F1 needs to be wary of is forcing it. Claire Williams denies Susie Wolff’s position in the team is based on gender – I really don’t believe that. If you start favouring women, like for instance Ecclestone pushing for a female F1 driver, in my opinion that’s just as bad as favouring men over women: in both cases, gender apparently does matter, which shouldn’t be the case. Fortunately women in motorsports is becoming more and more common – I’m not sure 100% equality is ever going to be realized, but F1’s definitely on the right path.

  11. Why does everyone of this equality promoters are thinking that every single area of work – F1, school or nuclear physics has to have strong 50/50 men/woman proportion to be “equal”?

    1. That sounds like a nonsense straw man argument to me. I’m sure what they’d actually prefer is for things to be ‘less unequal’ rather than literally equal.

      1. But what is “unequal” about the current situation? Have there been women in feeder series that were good enough to get a place in F1 on merit over their male competitors? Are women being deliberately sidelined?

        Honestly, I don’t think so. If anything, a woman in F1 would be pretty lucrative for a team from a commercial point of view. So I’d wager if there was a woman that was good enough, she would be in F1 in no time. But it hasn’t happened.

        Look at the grid. Most of the drivers, even those that are paying for their seats and are deemed by some to not be worthy of F1, have won seasons in top-league feeder series (GP2, FR3.5, …) or have obtained at least multiple wins and top-5 in the season. Can you name any woman who has done that?

        How would you change anything? Promote it? Should I put my 3-year-old daughter in a kart in two years, or should I just wait and see what her interests are? Maybe women are just less interested in motor racing, so there are fewer of them.

        No, I don’t believe they’re being treated unequal or unfair. There just hasn’t been a woman good enough to enter F1 in the past 20 years. Maybe within a few years that could change. RBR has signed Beitske Visser into their junior programme. We’ll see how that turns out.

    2. ‘equal’ in this context is not a mathematical equality: it means that both men and women face the same psychological (not physical) hurdles – so no discrimination.

  12. Marussia have “made a massive step forward”

    Have they hired Glock back ? :D

    1. Haha! :P

  13. Yeah thanks for the COTD (and correcting the grammar mistakes; it was typed in a hurry on a small iphone screen). I just felt like the mercedes witch hunt got a bit too far.

    1. And you did well. I mostly agree with your analysis.

    2. I can see you’re point of view, but i don’t share the same opinion.
      Mercedes and Brawn knew excatly what they were doing…And FIA knew it too

  14. I didn’t realise the Porsche LMP cars were being powered by Renault engines next year.

    1. :-) Maybe they hope he will be the frontman of their Alpine Le Mans project?

  15. petebaldwin (@)
    26th June 2013, 10:49

    In addition to COTD, it’s worth pointing out that the young drivers who use the simulator will get a feeling for the real thing and how it corresponds with the simulator. In doing so, they can give much clearer and accurate feedback.

  16. Bernie is definitely real life´s Mr. Burns. He does not know what happiness is and it is extremely sad.

    On another note, It is impressive how one can despise a driver at first and then warm up to him on sheer talent and a gun-ho attitude. I used to hate Lewis in 2007 and 2008 (specially 2008) and now that I´ve started to notice how good he really is, I´ve totally warmed up to him and although I´m a Ferrari/Alonso fan, he is definitely without a doubt my second favorite driver. It´s comments like the one in the roundup that really do it for me! The guy is fearles and I hope he does get his wish! It would be awesome to see him going toe to toe with the “kid” and see who comes out on top. I feel, that there would definitely be sparks coming from inside RBR if that were to happen but it´s likely not to happen because SV is so well protected in RBR that I´m sure, just like in the Ferrari case, that they would not welcome another rooster into the “kid´s” henhouse. It would definitely be interesting to watch though!

  17. If I were Hamilton I wouldn’t be so confident of taking on Vettel on his turf: I’d absolutely support him should he choose to do so as I feel the battle would be excellent, but he smacks of arrogance in saying “he has a great car” – I believe the implication in that statement is that he doesn’t feel Vettel would be a huge challenge (given his history of complimenting Newey over Vettel; a clear sign he thinks Vettel’s success is solely down to the car).

    Given the fact he’s walked into Mercedes and failed to entirely stamp his authority as many expected against Rosberg (of course he’s still beating him, but Rosberg is the member of the team whom has won first) I am highly skeptical that he could beat Vettel. In actual fact, I think Vettel would beat him without having to break too much of a sweat in a Red Bull (for the first season at least). So really my message to Hamilton is I wouldn’t be so sure of myself: relish the challenge but don’t talk as if you’d succeed so easily.

    1. he’s still beating him

      You’ve said it all…

      1. Personally I don’t think LH has said anything here that isn’t true or that any driver wouldn’t say. The fact is Vettel has a great car and that is the necessary ingredient to winning a WDC. I’m sure all the drivers on the grid not currently driving for RBR would love to have their hands on the WCC winning car and have their turn to prove themselves. He doesn’t say being Vettel’s teammate would mean he would beat him soundly. He says it would be a great challenge, not a cakewalk. And that he is not afraid of any teammate. I think any WDC would say the same thing.

        1. @robbie fair enough, although I can just sense the implication from his mentioning of the car given his past history!

    2. Hamilton is beating Rosberg though, who has had 3 more seasons than him at Mercedes, so I feel he is doing as expected. Both drivers are extremely quick so he’s doing a good job.
      I do disagree with Hamilton (or anyone) if he is indicating that Vettel’s success is all down to the cars he’s had, but I feel he would give him a good fight in the same car.

      1. @deej92 don’t get me wrong it’s a fight I’d love to see but I think he may indeed be implying he’d find it to be a cakewalk, which it hasn’t been at Mercedes (again, he is winging but not dominantly) so yea really I think he should just leave it at “I’d like to be in the same team as Vettel” without going on to talk about the car!

        1. @vettel1 I may be misinterpreting Hamilton’s comments, but what I take from them is that being Vettel’s team-mate in a great car would a great challenge.
          I don’t think Hamilton, or any other driver really (or I sincerely hope not), is naïve enough to believe Vettel’s successes are all down to the cars, because that theory is very wide of the mark. I know there have been comments suggesting it’s all down to Newey, but I just can’t take them seriously, and any driver who thinks it would be easy to take on Vettel in the same car needs to rethink.

          1. @deej92 agreed entirely: I’ve probably been inflammatory based purely on his past history (“Fernando is a great driver” “Vettel has a great car” etc.) but I would sincerely hope he would not be so naïve!

            I agree entirely though: I reckon actually no driver would give Hamilton such a difficult challenge of the current crop (I don’t say Alonso purely for the reason that Hamilton is a better qualifier but Alonso a better racer which deflects a certain element of pressure, whereas Vettel and Hamilton both have very similar strengths and weaknesses). So yes, the battle would be epic!

        2. I think Hamilton would have to learn more from his experience with Alonso, and with Button, but also from Rosberg now before he would be able to get on top of Vettel @vettel1.
          His best opportunity would be for them do do so when both go to Ferrari (a new team for both), because from what I see about Vettel, he has the team perfectly mastered (I see that as a positive and critical skill – see Alonso at Ferrari, or Schumi at Ferrari before, but also how Button got under Hamiltons skin at McLaren) and it will be very tough to beat Vettel “on his own turf”, if Hamilton is capable of it at all.

  18. Pirelli wouldn’t allow Mercedes to run new aero parts everything else they wouldn’t know about and besides Mercedes wasn’t going to risk their data with new aero parts, I think the penalty is okay only because of the ruling.

  19. I would go up against any driver. Any time, any place. Any team.

    Okay Lewis… Time- 2011, Place- Any race weekend, Driver- Jenson, Team- McLaren….

    go, go, go….

    1. Actually in many of those cases he did beat Button. And that was more due to Hamilton has been his biggest opponent then anyone else.

  20. A good wide spread round up I have to say. Not really one topic sticking out, but several interesting topics in this one. Cheers Keith!

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