Mercedes confirm Rosberg contract extension

2015 F1 season

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Nico Rosberg will remain at Mercedes for at least another two seasons, the team has confirmed.

A new “multi-year contract extension” was announced by Mercedes on Wednesday.

Rosberg, who joined the team in 2010, said: “It has been a difficult road to get to where we are now – but everybody kept believing and, thanks to the fantastic support from Mercedes-Benz, we are now leading the way in F1.”

“There has been big progress during the past year, building up our structure, management and capability for the future. We have an awesome team and I am confident that we have the right people in place at every level.

“I’m looking forward to the next years together, when we will keep pushing to win even more races – and, hopefully, championships.”

Rosberg scored his first win with the team at Shanghai in 2012. He has already won three races this year and currently leads the championship by four points over team mate Lewis Hamilton.

“Nico has been part of the Silver Arrows project since day one and he has a big stake in the development of the team since 2010,” said Mercedes’s head of motorsport Toto Wolff.

“His speed, commitment and focus have all helped to give clear direction and to drive the team forward. With his performances in 2014, Nico has demonstrated to the outside world what we knew already in the team: that he is one of the very top drivers in Formula One.

“This new contract brings us important stability and continuity for the future and I am delighted to be able to make the announcement in time for the home race of Mercedes-Benz and Nico in Hockenheim.”

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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43 comments on “Mercedes confirm Rosberg contract extension”

  1. It’s something we all probably knew already, but good, I’m glad they’ve extended it. Be interesting to see if Mercedes will still be the dominant force in 2 years time.

  2. Nothing… unexpected. So, Mercedes will retain the WDC in 2015 for sure now.

  3. It’s convenient on both sides… Rosberg might go on to hol the record for most seasons at Mercedes for a long while!

  4. So Rosberg is onboard until 2016 at least and Hamilton’s current deal runs out at the end of next season (if I recall correctly he signed a three year deal). I see no reason why they wouldn’t keep these two together long term, they are two of the quickest on the grid.

    1. @geemac

      Hamilton’s current deal runs out at the end of next season (if I recall correctly he signed a three year deal)

      Yep that’s right.

      1. Congratulations to Nico! And thanks @keithcollantine for that link – I’ve had a quick scan through some of the comments of that time and I just can’t stop laughing at some of them. For instance, hilarious is this.

        How are mercedes looking good for 2014?

        Building an F1 car takes a firm understanding of f1 science, only Redbull and Mclaren design teams show that

  5. WilliamB (@william-brierty)
    16th July 2014, 9:34

    Logical, Mercedes have, in my opinion at least, something of a dream-team. With Hamilton they have world beating pace and speed, and with the ever-improving Rosberg they have calm clear head as a safety net in even the most demanding of circumstances. And they also have a benign relationship…for now…

  6. Poor poor show from Rosberg and his lawyers. While the new deal is most likely highly lucrative, the smarter move would have been to wait until seasons end. He’d be in a much stronger bargaining position if he were to become WDC this year. I hope that’s when Hamilton waits until he negotiates his next contract. This is just baffling from a business perspective (from Rosberg’s perspective), genius from Mercedes though!

    1. Who cares. Rosberg makes millions no matter what and drives the fastest car in Formula 1. He must be happy enough with this

      1. Of course, in the grand scheme of things it doesn’t matter – he’s still absolutely minted and will continue to be so. But as a businessman I just see it as a missed opportunity – one should always push for more, in my view. And with the Championship looking so good I can’t help but feel a WDC win, followed by a contract extension would have been better news and a better deal. But you’re right, it really isn’t a big deal

    2. @timi That Mercedes seat is the hottest property in F1, Rosberg needs Mercedes more than Mercedes needs Rosberg. Why would he go for brinksmanship, taking a risk for a bigger payout, when there is an at least equal (probably greater) chance that his team-mate will take the title and the dream scenario you describe would not pan out.

      Mercedes will not want to risk picking up scraps for next year so if Rosberg wouldn’t sign then they would have no choice but to start looking into other options and unless his is somehow 100% certain that Vettel and Alonso (maybe others – Hulkenberg fits the German criteria) have watertight contracts that’s an enormous risk to both his chances of having a top drive next year and indeed his whole F1 career.

      I can see no sensible reason why Rosberg would not have accepted any reasonable offer for a 2 year extension at the current time.

      1. Couldn’t put it better myself

    3. Unless someone like Alonso showed up with Santander on the front door before the end of the season.

  7. Definitely a great move for Mercedes, Rosberg has proven himself to be every bit as competitive as Lewis and I think has promoted himself into the higher echelon of the racing fraternity.
    In my mind the driver rankings are as follows at the moment;

    Complete racing driver
    Alonso
    Vettel
    Rosberg
    Raikkonnen (not so much this year)
    Hulkenberg (been driving consistantly fast for a long time, needs a top drive)

    Good but flawed:
    Button (lacking aggression)
    Hamilton (inconsistant)
    Grosjean (fast but crash prone)
    Massa (Ferarri ruined him and he may be passed his sharpest now)
    Perez (hot head)

    Fast but unproven:
    Ricciardo
    Bottas
    Kvyat
    Magnussen
    Bianchi

    Rubbish:
    Maldonado
    Chilton
    Sutil
    Gutierrez
    Kobayashi (passed it)
    Ericsson

    1. Forgot Jean Eric Vergne so he goes in the “Meh!” category :)

    2. Michael Brown (@)
      16th July 2014, 10:24

      I don’t know where people keep getting that Grosjean is crash prone, he hasn’t crashed since Monaco 2013 if I recall.

    3. @twentyseven Thank you for using “in my mind”. Too often people knock out their opinions as though they were common knowledge/fact!

      1. Side note: I actually think Hamilton is one of the more consistent drivers out there. Have a look at this and go back through the years. One must note, however, that 2012 is an exception (ironic, I know since we’re talking about consistency!)

        1. @timi Yes it was actually 2012 that I was thinking about re. Hamilton’s inconsistancy, it was frustrating when he had a car capable of results that he seemed to “over-drive” it. And while he’s been relatively consistent since, it’s still a larger blot on his copy book, a wasted season, which other top drivers don’t have.
          The same goes for Grosjean @lite992 monaco 2013 was just last season and before that he was a complete liability, hard to forget that.
          @gicu what I meant by a “unproven” is that they haven’t competed at the sharp end and consistantly pulled out results, so you can’t tell if they’re a future champ or not. Hulkenberg is the exception to the rule in that he hasn’t always been at the sharp end but he’s consistantly produced strong results in underperforming cars.
          Makes sense in my head anyway :)

          1. I hope you are joking.In 2012,he lost 100 or more points through no fault of his own.It was because of Mclaren disaster pit stops and many reliability problems.I think he would have won the championship that year or at least fighting with Alonso and Vettel till the last race,that’s for sure.

          2. @twentyseven 2012 was that season with disastrous pit service at McLaren and DNFs through reliability issues… Lewis did alright.

          3. @jcost and @LH44 My sincere apologies, it was 2011 I was thinking of, when he threw away points, eg. crashing into kobayashi in Spa, and finished well behind his teammate at the end of the season when he should have been up there with the likes of Alonso.
            In general the rankings above (always bound to cause controversy) are from the perspective of say a team boss thinking of getting a new driver. You wouldn’t focus on this season, although you might weight it more heavily if a driver is in great form. That’s why I think Rosberg has consistantly done a great job, held his own against Schumacher for 3 years and is now keeping Hamilton under control. Hamilton is the obvious big talent to not be in the complete racing driver list but I the reason is the lack of dependability shown over the years which Rosberg has in spades.
            The same goes for Riciardo, if you had a choice as a team boss would you pick him over Vettel? It is a tough call, but I think if you weigh it up, Vettel is a proven champion and has shown that he has all the requirements necessary to win championships. You’d have to go with him

    4. It depends, mostly, on how you define “at the moment”. In my opinion there is no way Raikkonen is a complete driver at the moment, Bianchi has proven himself with the first points for Marussia, Ricciardo is currently beating Vettel 6-3 in qualifying (chose qualifying because of Vettel’s numerous misfortunes and bad strategy calls, and we all know Vettel is a good qualifier), Bottas is, in my view, on his way to 3rd in the WDC and there is no way that Grosjean can be considered crash-prone anymore. And I certainly don’t see Rosberg as more complete than Hamilton. Excluding Silverstone, Rosberg hasn’t had a clean, mistake-free weekend since Bahrain, that’s not really ‘consistent’. I’m not saying Lewis is better, per-se, I’m trying to say that Lewis is at least in the same tier as Rosberg, certainly not lower than him.

      1. @twentyseven

        You must have missed Dan’s efforts this year mate ??

        1. @garns You always expose yourself to a rimming putting a list like this together! In my book Dan hasn’t proven himself over a number of seasons and although he’s been insanely good this season he just can’t be refered to as “A complete racing driver”… Again, IMHO!

          1. @twentyseven lol at you’re list Hamilton will be virtually top 3-4 in stats bar champoinships when he is done. How can you put Ros in most complete yet?, Hamilton has had edge this year. Ham is a world champion, has 27 wins and Ros has like 6. Yet you say Ric has hardly proved himself? What is more impressive NR or Ric crushing a 4xWC?. If Ros was crushing Ham i would understand you’re article.

    5. It’s a insult that you put four drivers above Hamilton.The only complete racing driver is Alonso, then comes Hamilton , Rosberg , Ricciardo and Bottas at the moment. As for Vettel and Raikkonen, they are being trashed by their teammates especially Kimi and yes, Hulkenberg is consistent but nothing more nothing less. Perez is matching him and he’s usually faster than the Hulk.

      1. @LH44: I wouldn’t call Vettel being “trashed”. With less reliability issues and tactical errors by the team in Canada and Great Britian, the situation would look a lot more different for Vettel.

        Vettel is taking the situation quite easy as he’s never had such a team mate. Compare that to Alonso with Hamilton as new team mate.

        1. @xenomorph91 Vettel has an average of .031s over Ricciardo in qualifying and has led Ricciardo in 176 laps compared to 214 for the Australian. Remember that Vettel has usually been leading Ricciardo when he has blown up. Some of the strategy calls by his side of the garage have been pretty questionable this year compared to Ricciardo’s side. The only weekend where it all seemed to go to plan for Vettel was Malaysia. Vettel has not been driving badly as such, I think it’s a combination of Ricciardo driving very well and a lot of misfortune for Vettel as to why he is 28 points behind. That is nothing compared to the inter-team battles at Williams, Force India and especially Ferrari, Marussia and Lotus.

          1. @craig-o
            From Autosport:

            “The statistics speak for themselves. Daniel Ricciardo has outqualifed red bull team-mate Sebastian Vettel six times out of nine races, outscored him 98 to 70 and fnished ahead of him every time both have fnished. he
            was promoted to one of f1’s choice seats after proving his prodigious speed beyond any doubt while at Toro Rosso, and he has answered all
            questions that hung over his racecraft and ability to cut it at the front of the feld. But vettel is making ground. After previously mastering the technique needed to exploit
            exhaust-blown downforce to its maximum, he has taken time to re-adapt to the demands of a more conventional car. struggles to get the car to perform as he wants under braking, when harvesting with the MGU-K, are also causing problems, with further software tweaks needed. It’s down to Vettel to adapt and to get the car handling the way he needs it to do that. Progress has been a little slow, but he’s not far off ricciardo and needs to continue to ride that upward curve in the second half of the season.”

    6. @twentyseven I respect your opinion, but also disagree with everything in the ‘fast but unproven’ category. Ricciardo has proven to be as fast as Vettel or even faster without complaining all the time like Vettel does. Bottas is out-performing Massa and has consistently finished in the top 5. Kvyat would have scored more points if it wasn’t for his mechanical failures through no fault of his own. Magnussen has done well in a Mclaren which has proven to be one of the slowest Mercedes powered cars and even got second place in Australia. Bianchi scored 2 points in a Marussia despite getting a penalty! All these people are definite championship contenders in the future! Also I disagree with Hamilton being inconsistent. He is one of the fastest drivers in F1 at the moment, and is one of the most successful british drivers. 27 wins, 61 podiums, a championship, 35 pole positions, 1,263 points and 15 fastest laps just say it all. I also disagree that Raikkonen is a ‘complete driver’. He has made many rookie errors this year and despite the Ferrari being a rubbish car, Raikkonen is nowhere near Alonso. Also in 2008 he had a chance to be a two-time world champion but screwed it up. And how is Grosjean crash-prone? The last time he crashed was in Monaco 2013 and he has been quick and consistent since then. He has scored 8 points in a Lotus which this year has been very poor. Maldonado is the one which is crash-prone. And he is slow on top of it. Of course everyone has their opinions, this is mine. :)

      1. Ricciardo has proven to be as fast as Vettel or even faster without complaining all the time like Vettel does. Kvyat would have scored more points if it wasn’t for his mechanical failures through no fault of his own.

        I have no idea how you were able to write those two sentences together. If there is one driver on the grid who has benefited in the teammate battle thanks to his own good fortune/his teammates ill-fortune, that driver is Riccardio. And if there is one driver on the grid who has lost points via mechanical failures and “through no fault of his own”, it’s Vettel. Daniel has not demonstrated himself to be faster than his teammate, merely luckier.

        It’s possible that DR may, in time, show himself to be faster/better than SV. But there’s no evidence to show that so far. On those infrequent occasions when his car has worked properly and his team has not badly bungled his pit stop strategy, Seb has looked at least as quick as Daniel. And in spite of all his bad luck Vettel has not complained all the time, he has shown remarkable stoicism and patience.

        1. You wish.
          Ricciardo is being faster than Vettel for most of the year.

          Vettel’s supporters are full of talking about DNF’s, but let’s see then where he was when his car failed. Except for Monaco, he was always behind Ricciardo when his car failed. And he is constantly being tricked on strategy too, like in Canada and the last race.

          The only thing that i agree with you is that this isn’t enough to judge who is faster. But is also easy to say that Vettel is quicker when Red Bull tailor a car for him like they did on the past seasons.

          1. Nope The Only Underperforming races from Vettel is China and some ways Bahrain and Underperforming Q is Austria , All other races Vettel has upper hand but misfortune or Messed up strategy is made him behind RIC ,
            Lets take a look race by race
            Australia
            Q – A bad engine software setup
            R – Retirement due to the same issue
            Malaysia
            Q – P2(Even had a software reset between Q time)
            R – P3 with right strategy
            bahrain
            Q – Waste gate failure in Q
            R – Under performed in race at ending stages
            China
            Q – P3 Lined up Behind Daniel
            R – Complete Out Performed by Daniel
            Spain
            Q – Gearbox failure in Q3 and had no running in FP1 &2
            R – P4 by storming through the field
            Monaco
            Q – MGU-K Failure
            R – Retired due to Turbo Failure
            Montreal
            Q – Lined up P3
            R – Messed up strategy let Daniel ahead of him
            Austria
            Q – Underperformed in Q lined up P13
            R – Retirement due to Technical issue
            Silverstone
            Q – After an up and down session for all lined up P2
            R – Another Strategy mess up made him behind Ric
            So Overall
            Vettel doesn’t lost his pace apart from Bahrain and China Race days and one Q underperform in Austria . Apart from that he was doing very well
            If we look at Q it was 3-3 for both and 3 which out of conclusion
            Daniel – Bahrain , China, Austria
            Vettel – Malaysia, Montreal, Silverstone
            Out of conclusion – Australia, Spain& Monaco(Debatable )

      2. @ultimateuzair @ultimateuzair Grosjean was doing a better job than Kimi in the second half of the season last year…

        Quite frankly, IMHO, Kimi Raikkonnen should be place in the category of the “have beens”

    7. It’s really strange to consider Rosberg a “complete racing driver” and Hamilton not.

      Just to remember, Hamilton has been outscoring Rosberg this year if you exclude the DNFs.

      I do agree that Hamilton has been inconsistent on the last races, but he also is clearly the most competitive of the two. Since Rosberg’s main weapon to fight Hamilton is Hamilton’s own weaknesses, i would never put him on the same league as Vettel and Alonso. He is not there, he isn’t a champion and a lot of people don’t see him as one for a reason.

    8. @twentyseven could not disagree more my friend.

      Fernando Alonso is the best out there too, even tough I suspect he would struggle to consistently beat either Lewis Hamilton or Sebastian Vettel in equal machinery (even though RIC vs VET 2014, makes me think twice)

      But I don’t see Rosberg more consistent than Hamilton, if you putting an extra weight on qualification mistakes, you should bear in mind that Rosberg has an equally rich collection of his own this year alone; Australia, China and Monaco come to my mind. On race day, Lewis is sporting extreme consistency since 2013 and I can’t recall majors mistakes of his own making…

  8. Congratulations again, Nico. Two new marriages in one week.

  9. Awesome to hear!!

    I picked Nico to win one like his Dad did (And I think he will still this year, but Lewis is on fire so a tough run) but a great team to stay with next year! Nico is my 2nd driver to follow after Dan!!

  10. Good news for Nico. At least he will have a real chance to get his first WDC when Hamilton leaves to Ferrari in 2016.

    1. @david-beau Oh, do you have a source?

      1. That is the other hill to climb for Hamilton. Just my gut feeling. Every driver wants to go to Ferrari at some point in time. No better time to arrive than when Vettel is there.

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