New F1 “more of a driver’s car” – Magnussen

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In the round-up: Kevin Magnussen says the new F1 designs are ‘real driver’s cars’.

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New-look F1 ‘more driver dependent’ (Autosport)

Kevin Magnussen: “It really is a driver’s car – more than the old ones. With the blown diffuser [on the 2013 cars] it became a little bit easy, but this year it’s more of a driver’s car and I think that’s great.”

Investing in Faenza (Toro Rosso)

“The new unit, currently known by the name of STR4 is proof that Scuderia Toro Rosso plans to spread its roots even further in the Faenza area, as one of only two Formula 1 teams based in Italy – the other being the one that builds the red cars with the black horse logo!”

Operation Melbourne underway (Ferrari)

“We can expect a different type of racing compared to the past, with greater performance gaps between qualifying, when all the car’s potential can be used and the race, when fuel and energy management will be key, whereas up to 2013, tyres were the only main variable.”

Williams FW36 test run (F1 Fanatic via YouTube)

Mute footage of the Williams FW36 running in its new Martini livery.

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Comment of the day

@JerseyF1 weighs up who will come out on top between the two Ferrari drivers this year:

I’ve put Raikkonen to beat Alonso, and looking at the current voting a lot of others have too.

I see Raikkonen as an absolutely top class driver who often doesn’t get 100% out of himself.

On the other hand Alonso is a driver who may not have quite the speed or ability (in a simplistic sense) but on the other hand is much more capable of getting the maximum from himself week-in and week out and plays a good thinking game.

The issues of settling into the team aren’t so huge, Raikkonen is a former Ferrari driver and the cars are so completely different to last year that both drivers will have just as much to learn about the new car as the other. Also, Alonso didn’t exactly endear himself to the team with his criticisms over the last couple of years whilst Raikkonen remains Ferrari’s most recent drivers’ champion (who was also a good team player in supporting Massa when needed).

So for me the Ferrari intra-team battle comes down to whether or not Raikonnen peforms to his potential. My feeling is that sharing a team with Alonso could raise his game.
@JerseyF1

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72 comments on “New F1 “more of a driver’s car” – Magnussen”

  1. That’s a very precise COTD. I just hope that Kimi will give 100%. After all they are both mature and dosen’t have a lot more seasons. I’m counting the hours till FP1!!!!

    1. It’s exactly 120 hours until FP1 at the time of my reply!!

    2. I voted Alonso because I expect Kimi to be unlucky.

    3. Chris (@tophercheese21)
      9th March 2014, 4:06

      I found the Kimi/Fernando vote the most difficult. I think Fernando has the slight edge on speed and race pace, but, Kimi is probably a bit more consistent.

      They’re both points vacuums. They may not win every race, but they’ll always be there or thereabouts. It’s ironic that they’ve got a car that looks like a vacuum, since Kimi and Fernando are always hoovering up the points.

      1. Agreed. They both are mature enough (this year we’ll see how much, though, but hopefully games like Alonso vs Hamilton in 2007 are behind), are among the most experienced drivers on the field, know how to fight for the title even with suboptimal cars. their approach and style is a bit different in my opinion. Räikkönen has a tremendous “first touch”, i mean he sits down behind the wheel, and he is instantly quick, and this way has not much room to improve later. Alonso is a little bit slower at first, but he gets better with every lap he puts into the car, and this way at a certain point of the grand prix weekend he will have the upper hand to Räikkönen. It all depends on the time it will happen, and of course how the Ferrari would able to keep the pace with Mercedes teams. I beleive this pairing is much more interesting than the last WDC combination (Hamiltonand Button at McLaren), and their car is good enough, they will be in for the constructors title for sure. The drivers title, and which of them would be closer to it, is another question

  2. Is Magnussen reallly entitled to make a confrontation between 2014 and 2013 cars? Being a rookie, I mean.

    1. His experience in the simulator would have given him a good impression of what the 2013 cars were like, so I’d say his comparison is valid despite his rookie-ness.

      1. Didn’t he do the YDT?

        1. He did surely. He would have had to so he’d get his super licence, so he’s in a good position to comment on the 2013 machines. I hope he does well this year.

    2. @alfa145 He tested the car besides who can deny what he is saying after looking to amount of torque and the lap times of testing.

  3. Magnussen gets it. Hopefully it’ll put all the Button benefiting from the new regs to bed. We already know he’s only as fast as the best when the car is almost to his exact liking. I see this season bring Magnussen, Hamilton, Alonso to the forefront. From what I’ve seen they are the few drivers who can maintain fast laptimes with a car going sideways. Seb and Button to suffer the most for me. Button for the reasons above, and Seb because he’s had a black hole for a diffuser the last five years now!

    1. Disclaimer: I think Sebastian Vettel is easily one of the best drivers on the grid and is in my top ten of all time.

      Interesting that you brought up Seb and the new regs. With the counter intuitive style of the Red Bull in recent years Seb has often initially struggled when that advantage of the diffuser was taking away (Silverstone and Germany 2011 and the start of 2012) from him. I see it like playing a video game and changing the settings to inverted look, then going back to normal after a year. This is by far the least rear downforce Vettel has had in his career and it could force him to drastically change his driving style.

      1. By all accounts from those within the sport though, he’s one of the most capable at adapting when he needs to to drastic changes, hence his ability to adapt to the counterintuitive style of the EBD where Webber was never able to adapt in the same way.

        1. @us_peter Mmm he adapted to the unique EBD Red Bull developed, which is a much smaller feat compared to what is to come with more torque and less downforce. The key to RBR’s diffuser was basically keeping your foot on the power mid-corner, almost the polar opposite of how he’ll need to drive now. In terms of adaptability in general, who really knows? He’s had the car of the field the last 4 years, and not much has been wrong with it/needed adapting to..

          1. this comment is not directed to anyone special, but I think you’re going to be disapointed if counting on either RB to stink all year, or Vettel to be unable to adjust to a new driving style… He did (as mentioned) adjust quicker and better than anybody to the EBD driving style after all.

            Not my favourite driver of all time, and DEFINITELY not my favourite team, but you can sorta count on them bouncing back.

          2. @dr-jekyll

            He did (as mentioned) adjust quicker and better than anybody to the EBD driving style after all.

            He adapted to his team’s solution to the EBD.. they varied from team to team, and quite drastically. Remember Lotus’ Front Facing Exhausts.. it goes into general engine mapping as well. Which is why some teams wanted the engine mapping freeze, and others didn’t (can’t remember if that was last season or the season before-last). You can’t blanket all EBDs, some were more complex than others.

            To say he adapted faster than anyone, is almost impossible to say, without data from every car and driver. Because he won, doesn’t necessarily mean he adapted the best. We all know the RBR was on rails, even in Webber’s hands sometimes, and Newey can engineer a world-beater. Maybe Vettel adapted at the average rate.. but because the car was better than any other, you think he’s a fast adapter?

            I’m just basing my view of his ’14 season on the fact his car’s been near perfect for almost 5 years now. It’ll take an awful lot of adjusting, and I think it’ll take time.

            On the notion of Vettel and RBR’s season as a whole.. I think it’s clear they’ll eventually challenge for wins, it’s just a matter of time. Once they sort the engine, and the two ERS then the Newey chassis (which is almost guaranteed to be very fast) can show it’s potential.

          3. @timi – As US Peter said, it is various accounts from within the sport (then documented by publications like the BBC and Auto Motor Und Sport), that suggest he adapts his driving style to whatever is required, better than most. Also Vettel’s adaptaility comes from before Red Bull. There’s the fact he won his first 2 WSR races, while being competitive in F3 and testing for BMW’s F1 team at the same time. And doing so well when called up to 2 different F1 teams/cars mid-season in 2007.

          4. @david-a No doubt he adapts his driving style, no argument with that. I was disputing the claim of his adapting faster than the rest of the field. It’s too hard to say, that’s all.

            You make a good case, but with each case the downforce levels and grip increases.. to the pinnacle of 2012 maybe 2013’s levels. Now there is a massive reduction in downforce coupled with more torque. There’s adaptability to faster and more stuck-to-the-ground cars, i.e. Button’s favourite type of cars (lol), and then there’s the massive torque, low downforce adaptation. I’m not saying he won’t get there. It’s just a massive contrast to what the field, and he especially ( with the RB8-RB10) will take time to get used to.

            I’ve never seen him drive a car that’s a handful, not knocking him. But that’s just a fact for me. I’ve seen most others do it though, and the three I listed can do it while keeping insane pace.

            I feel you and @dr-jekyll interpreted my comments as slating Vettel and determining he won’t ever adapt. But that was not my meaning, nor was it my aim

        2. he’s one of the most capable at adapting when he needs to to drastic changes

          that remains to be seen….

        3. He adapted pretty quickly to the BMW he drove in 2007 and he drove a Torra Rosso to victory in 2008. I’d say his ability is down to more than just a superior car.

  4. That’s one media-skewed point of view at Alonso-Raikkonen partnership.
    I think media is always trying to portray drivers in a bit of a poetic way, where big characters and heroes always have some superhuman skill and ability, but always must have an Achilles’ heel, too. It’s a romanticized view and it really doesn’t work that way. Amazing drivers don’t need to have some secret, fatal flaw, that can tear them down, like when you’d pull a card from the bottom of a house of cards. There are no extremes in their abilities and big differences in between their assets.
    Saying Alonso isn’t that fast or doesn’t have ability, whatever that means, is ridiculous. Just because he has fierce intellect and huge determination, doesn’t mean that he can’t be at the same time just as fast.
    I’ve seen reasons why you’d call Kimi disinterested at times, but I don’t think he isn’t 100% committed at the track. Only areas where I’d say that he isn’t really putting himself into, according to his former bosses and colleagues, is effort outside of the car, because of personal preferences, not because he lacks ability to motivate himself on the track. Just because Kimi isn’t going around, advertising his efforts, doesn’t mean he isn’t putting any effort.

    COTD makes it sound, and media keeps portraying that way in order to make a more compelling story, as if we are in a video game, where we have a certain amount of points that we have distribute across 5 skills. Which means that if you are strong in one or two skills, you won’t have any more points to put into other 2 or 3 skills. That’s way too simplistic and it’s doing a great disservice to portraying just how comprehensive set of skills top F1 drivers must have to operate at the level they do.

    1. yup fully agree with you. Its also the way that drivers portray themselves that also make people think like that.
      All of the drivers on the grid have pure speed/talent and all are extremely smart drivers, or else they wouldn’t be in formula.

    2. Exceptionally well-written comment, Sir OBE. But I still think Fandango will beat Kimi. He’s got the edge in motivation. I agree: on track, they both give 100%. But the off-track efforts greatly affect the on-track efforts, so ALO has an advantage.

    3. Luth (@soulofaetherym)
      9th March 2014, 3:01

      This should be COTD to be honest :).

    4. If there was an upvote function on this weblog I would upvote this comment. Plus, Alonso has maximum hit-points and a charisma of 18.

    5. This a million times. See the same thing with hamilton, he’s super fast so he has to be unable to look after fuel or his tyres. Or button, is really smooth and the perfect driver but only when the car is set up to perfection.

      This is real life not dungeons and drivers. There might be kernels of truth in some of the things stated but probably much less than people think, generally you’re either fast or you’re not.

  5. @JerseyF1

    I’ve put Raikkonen to beat Alonso, and looking at the current voting a lot of others have too.

    I see Raikkonen as an absolutely top class driver who often doesn’t get 100% out of himself.

    On the other hand Alonso is a driver who may not have quite the speed or ability (in a simplistic sense) but on the other hand is much more capable of getting the maximum from himself week-in and week out and plays a good thinking game.

    I would love to hear a single good reason to why Raikkonen is faster or more talented than Alonso. Just a single reason.

    Kimi has never pulled off a season of the same calibre as Alonso’s 2012 or 2006. And while people like to criticize Alonso for his 2007 season, he certainly wasn’t anywhere near as bad as Raikkonen in 2008 – the single worst season ever by any top driver, even worse than Hamilton in 2011.

    1. The first half of 2008 Kimi was beating Massa. I’d say, he had an average 1/2 season and even there he finished 3rd overall. If that’s his worst, it’s not too shabby.

    2. @kingshark You missed F1 in 2008. First Kimi was plagued with bad luck which culminated in Canada after that Ferrari were admittedly working for Massa and Raikkonen made the part of good team-mate.

      1. @peartree
        Still doesn’t change the fact that Kimi made a lot of bad mistakes in 2008. Australia, Monaco, Silverstone, Belgium, and Singapore spring to mind. Those crashes and spins cost him a total of over 20 points. Nor does it change the fact that Ferrari had the best car in ’08, and both drivers failed to deliver. Alonso has never had a season as poor as Kimi in 2008 or Lewis in 2011. I also firmly believe that if Fernando had driven the F2008, he would have comfortably won the WDC.

        1. Well given that Massa nearly won it and Alonso just got done eating Massa for breakfast it’s a pretty safe bet Alonso would’ve won. The F2008 was the fastest car that year.

    3. Personally I think this is all pointless speculation, the BS stops when the chequered flag drops, but my experience watching in 2008 did make me feel that Kimi wasn’t 100% motivated, watching Kimi circulating around in a non-podium position I could imagine his thought processes being something along the lines of ” that Sunseeker of Eddies’ would be great for parties but I think something smaller and faster might be more fun, hmmm, oh! lap 49 already, better put in a couple of fastest laps to keep the team happy, but then I could keep a couple of Jet-skis on the bigger boat, I’ll ask Eddie which one he liked best, get out of my way Fernando”
      Which is why I was impressed with how well he did with the Lotus.

    4. @kingshark I think Kimi’s 2012 season was also very impressive, as was his 2005 performance. Certainly two seasons you could put forward as being right up there to compare with Fernando’s best.

      However, given a choice between the two, I would pick Alonso over Raikkonen myself.

    5. What about his 2003 season? He had a car slower than Schumi’s Ferrari and the Williams yet came within 2 points of the title……..

      1. @magnificent-geoffrey

        I think Kimi’s 2012 season was also very impressive, as was his 2005 performance. Certainly two seasons you could put forward as being right up there to compare with Fernando’s best.

        I can give you 2005, but in 2012 Kimi’s Lotus was on par with Fernando’s Ferrari, yet he finished 71 points adrift. Likewise, he couldn’t seal the victory in either Bahrain nor Hungary when the E20 was the best car. Kimi was good in 2012 but not on par with Alonso.
        @ferrari-412t

        What about his 2003 season? He had a car slower than Schumi’s Ferrari and the Williams yet came within 2 points of the title……..

        That was a good season, probably the best season of Kimi’s career. Almost as good as Fernando in 2006 and 2012.

        1. @kingshark

          but in 2012 Kimi’s Lotus was on par with Fernando’s Ferrari,

          I seriously doubt that. At the end, no one can know, but I saw very little to indicate that, and the common consensus is that the Ferrari was the fastest after the McLaren and the RB.

    6. @kingshark

      Because no everybody think Alonso is unbeatable, perfect, the best ever, etc etc? I think Raikkonen’s 2005 was better than Alonso’s, so was his 2013 (less mistakes, better results compared to his car, even without being paid).

      And while 2012 was a great season for Alonso, I don’t think it was that much better than Raikkonen’s 2013.

  6. Luth (@soulofaetherym)
    9th March 2014, 3:10

    “I’ve put Raikkonen to beat Alonso, and looking at the current voting a lot of others have too.
    I see Raikkonen as an absolutely top class driver who often doesn’t get 100% out of himself.

    On the other hand Alonso is a driver who may not have quite the speed or ability (in a simplistic sense) but on the other hand is much more capable of getting the maximum from himself week-in and week out and plays a good thinking game.”

    In my opinion that is flawed logic. How many times do you hear the phrase ‘Consistency is key’ in F1? If you’re ‘a top driver’ and you’re inconsistent, then you’re no ‘top driver’ at all.
    Alonso has shown to have the speed and ability to overwhelm his teammate and the whole grid race-in and race-out, year-in and year-out, bringing an out-of-shape Ferrari into places it shouldn’t be for four seasons in a row.
    Alonso may not be the absolute fastest, he may not be the absolute smartest, or the most absolutely talented, but he gets 9.5/10 on each of those categories, as he’s shown for 4 straight years now. And I do believe he has the edge this year, we will know in a week :).

  7. I do hope Magnussen is right, certainly in qualifying I expect he is and in racing I fervently hope he is. My worry is that the combined needs to use less fuel, baby the tyres and not overstress the PU may result in a couple of fast laps after the start followed by a 56 lap procession at economical tyre saving pace and a 2 lap sprint to the finish, if it turns out this way it will be a tragedy because the extra torque and less downforce is a recipe for great racing.

  8. Where was that Williams footage filmed?

    1. Jack (@jackisthestig)
      9th March 2014, 6:24

      Not 100% sure but I’d say it was the Ascari Resort.

      1. It is Ascari Race Resort indeed.

    2. I think the shocking part is that Williams actually used their filming day for filming!

  9. By describing these as “drivers’ cars”, Magnussen has inadvertently acknowledged the issue with modern Formula One. They’re drivers’ cars, not racers’ cars.

    F1 is no longer about racing, it’s about conservation. Conserving tires. Conserving fuel. Conserving engines. Conserving gearboxes. Not testing. Not developing. Only driving 100% on the limit in one single session of the entire weekend, and even then, only for perhaps two or three laps at best, and only if you believe you have to (otherwise you put in a banker.)

    And now we face a season where the champions are hobbled by rules that, having had a bad start to the extremely limited testing, now prevent them really doing anything to fix it. Engines are homologated, parts can’t be tested on track, and you have to beg to be able to change anything. And fans will likely be robbed of seeing a rival beat Red Bull fair and square this year — the defending champions look set to be at best a middle-of-the-pack team, perhaps even fighting with the backmarkers.

    And then we throw in the blatantly unsporting double-points nonsense, on top of the unsporting push-to-pass DRS system and the only-slightly-more-sporting KERS systems. (Along with the complete lack of response to the uproar from fans over double points — we don’t matter in the least to Bernie or his whipping boy teams.)

    The shine is off the apple, for me at least. I’ve not missed a race since the start of the ’90s, but for the first time ever, I’m considering stopping watching F1 altogether. Perhaps the only reason to watch is in the hope that Ecclestone’s race fiddling tactics will backfire badly, and that Red Bull will win again solely because of the doubled points in the final race. I can think of nothing I’d like to see happen more, actually.

    1. Chris (@tophercheese21)
      9th March 2014, 5:51

      And fans will likely be robbed of seeing a rival beat Red Bull fair and square this year

      I don’t see how the other teams won’t have beaten Red Bull fair and square. All the teams have known about these regulation changes for several years now, and have had plenty of time to prepare for them.

      Red Bull have put themselves in this situation by choosing to continue development of their 2013 car so late into the season, when they should have been fully focused on 2014 after Monza. They didn’t need to develop their 2013 car anymore after that race because the performance difference between themselves and everyone else was already over a second, and they’d still have comfortably won both championships. Every other team had stopped their 2013 R&D quite early, and it’s paid dividends this year.

      So, if the other teams thrash Red Bull this year, and it’s looking very likely that that’s going to be the case, then it absolutely is fair and square.

      1. I phrased that poorly, sorry, and didn’t really get what I meant across. I didn’t mean to imply that it was unfair to win with car development, because I don’t believe that — the car is part of the overall package in F1 and always has been for as long as I’ve been watching.

        What I meant was simply that the baton won’t be passed on-track with hard-fought, wheel-to-wheel action. If you’re not a Red Bull fan, you want to see another team fight them tooth and nail and come away with the win. If you’re a Red Bull team, you want to see your guys fighting every bit as hard to try and keep the crown, even if they fail.

        What nobody wants is to see the dominant team become a backmarker overnight, solely because when they have a problem, and they’re now not allowed to work on fixing it.

        And arguably, the problem isn’t even Red Bull — it’s Renault. Look at the testing results — every single Renault team is at the back, behind every single Mercedes team and almost all of the Ferrari teams. Sure, some Renault teams managed more testing mileage than Red Bull, but they did so because they’re backmarker teams who never extract anywhere near as much from the car — you’re less likely to blow the engine or ERS system if you’re slow and unaggressive to start off with.

        What it looks like to me is that we’re going to see an utterly boring whitewash when it comes to the title. The question isn’t “Will we see a hard-fought battle with Red Bull and a new champion”, it’s “Which of the Mercedes teams will take the title”.

        It’s kind of sad to see a foregone conclusion before the cars have even turned a wheel in a race weekend. We’ve been robbed of a battle, all in the name of saving the teams a little bit of cash and pretending to be green, instead of fairly distributing the TV revenue to the teams and admitting that the major lack of greenness in F1 is not the racing, it’s transporting teams and fans to the races. (If F1 really wanted to be green, it’d be focusing on making TV coverage better and more accessible, so fans watched at home rather than at the track, but I digress…)

        1. And fans will likely be robbed of seeing a rival beat Red Bull fair and square this year.

          So we have had people cry “Vettel only wins because of his car” and now we are going to have “Vettel didn’t win because of his car.” ;) This is a team sport, if team X is better prepared and beats team Y, I fail to see how that isn’t a fair and square win.

        2. @gweilo8888 If you are done with F1 so be it, but I can’t agree with your reasoning. In fact, most people seem to be of the opinion that RBR will get their act together soon. Some think it won’t be until next year, but that it will happen. So I wouldn’t be relegating them to being back markers quite yet.

          I get that some people would rather see a healthy RBR get beaten, but it is what it is. It is up to them now to compete just as the other teams have been told over the last 4 seasons.

          And on that note, I don’t get bemoaning a “foregone conclusion” of a Mercedes team dominating when for now we have no proof of that, yet we just finished 4 years of foregone conclusion with RBR. So it’s not ok to nail your package and make it look easy unless you are RBR? Not that we even know how it is going to ‘look’ yet?

          We may have been robbed of ‘a battle’ but I don’t know how anyone could have guaranteed that not happening, and now we hopefully will have some other real battles and with any luck much more close ones between more teams. If it is to be Mercedes dominating, then I predict a much closer battle between LH and NR than SV/MW provided. And that could allow other teams to stay well in touch with them, unlike an SV runaway with no ‘healthy’ car/driver able to get close.

          But then, since you have already decided how the season is going to play out, I guess it makes sense that you not watch.

      2. @gweilo8888

        And fans will likely be robbed of seeing a rival beat Red Bull fair and square this year

        According to you Ferrari were never fairly beaten in 2005-2006 either, it was just Bridgestone tyres.

        Renault sucks, well too bad for Red Bull. They are the works team, the 2014 reg changes have been known now for many years. It’s their fault.

      3. I didn’t know Red Bull were developing Renault’s tricky power plant. Nobody can really say how good Red Bull’s car is until they can manage to get some reliable power out of the unit and not have a motor that compromises the car it’s on the most out of the offerings this year.

        Sad thing is Red Bull might have the fastest car out there, you just won’t know unless their motor is working. And this is where F1 fails so hard, its taking the performance away from the teams who can get the most out of their car and putting the initiative in to the engine manufacturers who will most likely be deciding who wins by virtue of who has the most fuel saving motor. Which is exactly what needed to happen to take Red Bull down and give Ferrari a chance to help out the TV ratings and the mitigate the potential loss in prestige.

        I hope Red Bull destroys Ferrari this year, because I don’t care for speculating about rule maker’s interests, and I love to see arrogant control freaks get humbled.

        1. @pcxmerc

          And this is where F1 fails so hard, its taking the performance away from the teams who can get the most out of their car and putting the initiative in to the engine manufacturers who will most likely be deciding who wins by virtue of who has the most fuel saving motor

          This is Motor Sport or am i missing something ?? You seem to forgot that F1 and motor racing in general has been always about engine development (apart from some periods like the post 2009 era or “les garagistes” era in the 60’s)
          F1 has given the non manufacturer teams like the energy drinks company the chance to compete by letting them buying the engine and focusing on the chassis, RBR could have bought a manufacturer or even made their own engine but instead they have chosen to buy the engines and focusing on aerodynamics

          Which is exactly what needed to happen to take Red Bull down and give Ferrari a chance to help out the TV ratings and the mitigate the potential loss in prestige.

          You seem to be new to F1, the 2014 rules has been set before even Red Bull start to dominate, teams has been working on these rules for more than 2 years, you don’t have to be smart to know which team has been damaged the most by the FIA regulations in the last years (testing ban, RRA…….)

          I hope Red Bull destroys Ferrari this year, because I don’t care for speculating about rule maker’s interests, and I love to see arrogant control freaks get humbled

          Unlikely to happen but keep hoping, if there is a bunch of arrogant that should be humbled this year it would be the energy drinks team (Marko+Horner+Newey) except of course the drivers

    2. F1 prior to the 80’s often involved conservation of the car, transmission, etc, as they were not as reliable then, so to say that was not racing is wrong.

      We have short memories, my thirsty friends.

  10. “It’s still going to be impossible to win in a car that’s not able to win, but it’s Formula 1; it’s man and machine, and I hope we will see the drivers making more of a difference.”

    Wut?

    1. Jack (@jackisthestig)
      9th March 2014, 6:55

      It won’t just be man and machine in FP1 at Silverstone this year!

  11. Why does that a-hole Simon Lazenby have to take over Ted Kravitz’s ‘The F1 Show’ on Sky… This guy is always there to hog the limelight, disgusting…

    Anyway, for non-Sky people, here a wonderful link to watch it. Go ahead. <Video>

    1. Thank you for the vid.

    2. Chris (@tophercheese21)
      9th March 2014, 10:52

      I’m not a fan of Lazenby either. But I think Sky are overusing Ted too much. Don’t get me wrong, I love me some Kravitz, but it’s just a bit too much. He’s got pre-race pitlane ramblings, teds tech corner, and his everlasting post race Notebook.

      I’d like to see and hear more from Brundle. He’s the only reason I prefer Sky over BBC.

      1. When Brundle switched from BBC to Sky, he said that he is excited that it’s an exclusively channel and he will have so much room to have features and stuff but I’ve rarely seen Brundle do much apart from his commentary and pre and post shows which he was anyway doing at BBC.

        Sometimes I feel that Brundle seems lost and I don’t see that same enthusiasm that I saw in him at BBC. I am sure that if BBC and Sky both are all for all the races, he’ll jump ships to BBC

        1. exclusive^

          I am sure that if BBC and Sky both are LIVE for all the races, he’ll jump ships to BBC

        2. Yeah same he seems to be just collecting a cheque at sky. Personally I cant really stand kravitz, he just seems so smug and self satisfied all the time but a lot of people seem to like him so fair enough. My f1 broadcasting dream team would be:

          Natalie Pinkham presenting, DC and Eddie doing their pundit thing. Brundle and crofty commentating race & quail, Anthony davidson replacing brundle for practice sessions . lee mackensie and ted in the pit lane. The rest can get lost. Herbert and Hill are ok sometimes but they aren’t Eddie and DC and there’s no room for them in my dreamteam ;)

  12. Regarding COTD, it’s a good point that you come up with @JerseyF1 but I beg to disagree.

    According to me, the real strength of Fernando is his intelligence and the way he applies it in the race which we call as race craft. He has the capability to foresee and calculate certain events which I’ve seldom seen in drivers ever. For example, drivers were struggling to make a way past on a twitchy and wet Hungaroring in 2006, Fernando used his race craft to the fullest and made so many places in the first few laps or in USA 2012, when he made up so made up so many places round the outside at turn 1 on the first which other top drivers couldn’t think of or as recently in Spain 2013, when he foresaw the potential to overtake at turn 3 by using kers where others failed (one was Lewis and the other was Kimi).

    The real issue with Kimi has been his motivation and according to you, he hasn’t shown 100% potential since his return (correct me if I am wrong). Kimi is and will be strong and there is no doubt about it but I feel that Fernando will have a measure of him on most occasions.

    My feeling is that sharing a team with Alonso could raise his game.

    That’s the problem. One can just HOPE with Kimi that he gives 100% of his potential and more importantly, CONSISTENTLY.

    1. Actually I’d say Kimi has done pretty well since his comeback (certainly better than his last two seasons before he went rallying) – but I wonder if he can raise his game slightly back at Ferrari and against Alonso. I’m in agreement with what you say about Fernando’s strengths and I think that his recent success has been largely due to that and his tenacity.

      The one thing which would have been even better than an Alonso/Kimi match up for 2014 would have been a match up in 2003-2007 which I think is when they were both at the top of their game.

      1. The one thing which would have been even better than an Alonso/Kimi match up for 2014 would have been a match up in 2003-2007 which I think is when they were both at the top of their game.

        Yup! That would have been intense because I believe that 2007 taught Fernando a lot and he started developing and honing various skills which Kimi haven’t developed at that rate.

  13. Totally unrelated to anything that’s gone before but: anyone know if the Guardian is running their usual F1 season preview at some point this week? I find coverage of motorsport in UK newspapers to be pretty sparse generally, but they do usually raise their game the week before the season starts.

  14. I sure hope Kevin Magnussen and Valtteri Bottas are correct and we get to see more wheel spin and twitchy back ends! That sounds fantastic.
    There have also been other drivers commenting how the lower downforce and greater torque will not really make that much difference so I guess we’ll have to wait and see. One thing we can be sure of is a bit of good old fashioned unreliability playing a greater role in races. That alone will spice results up a bit.
    I think it was @timi yesterday who wrote about how much more input the engineers will have on racing. Like him (I assume he is a ‘him’) I am not looking forward to all the radio messages cautioning drivers to conserve. It was bad enough last year with the tyre situation. Now I fear there will be a need to conserve fuel and PU’s and as such I am expecting lots of radio messages regarding changing settings or advice about what lap time to stick to so as not to overheat things.
    It is a pity that all these advances in technology are taking more of the skill away from the drivers and IMHO taking away from the spectacle.

    1. Is it possible for race-engineers to meddle in the racing more than they already do?
      Let’s see how the new cars race – but if the drivers are constantly nagged to manage their ersks, ershes, save their ice and keep their poo together, I’ll save some energy by turning the TV off.

      A lot rests on how the commentators present it. If they get absorbed in the race and make an informed contribution to the excitement it’ll be great. Murray Walker understood this. But if they’re moaning about the engine sound, and banging on about energy stores and fuel strategy instead of following the action it’ll be dull as anything to watch. Particularly for the mythical “casual viewer”.

  15. yes it will be more of a driver car, but unfortunantly to win, you will only need a Mercedes engine. this new formula will make the spread between teams even greater then before, so it will probably make racing more boring then previous. im not looking forward to seeing Hamilton dominating with Rosberg a close 2nd, I don’t think they are good enough drivers for that. will be a shame to see better drivers vettel and Alonso making up the numbers, not because of talent, not because of the car they are driving, but because of inferior power units. I foresee Mercedes/Hamilton will not make the best of their package anyway though, like history has proven in the past, though still will be enough to win.

  16. Mark in Florida
    9th March 2014, 22:30

    I agree with an earlier statement that the car’s will have a different race pace from the qualifying pace. My fear is that we will have a blazing qualifying and a boring race as everyone tries to manage fuel and ers. I hope that the fuel management can get worked out in time for the first race so this doesn’t happen.

  17. I strongly feel Kevin M will beat Jenson B this year.

    Alonso and Kimi I’d say 50/50, both have their good and bad points but they will surely bring in huge points for the horse.

  18. On the other hand Alonso is a driver who may not have quite the speed or ability (in a simplistic sense) but on the other hand is much more capable of getting the maximum from himself week-in and week out and plays a good thinking game

    :)… i guess the one that chose the comment of the day must be a die hard KR fan….

  19. That’s good to know Magnussen.

    Let’s go Lewis!

    1. Interesting that Vettel dominated during a period that LESS driver dependent.

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