Getting very tired of the 2 brats at Mercedes
Discussion
k. Dad would watch it and pay me a tenner to mow the lawn. F1 didn't really begin to pique my interest until Alonso started winning, and again when Brawn happened. zebra said:
.
Some of those races were embarrassing.
Mansell and Piquet, British GP 1987. They lapped the whole field, including Senna with the same powerplant behind him.Some of those races were embarrassing.
Great race though. In fact one of the most exciting I can remember. There were only a handful of cars left on circuit at the end.
The McLaren years that followed, with Senna and Prost in the same team, were thrilling as well. The nadir of F1 was when there was just the one driver in it. The Schumacher years were dire at times. I mean 'Fast' Eddie as a team mate. I love irony but you can go too far.
There was the tyre fiasco, with one cover being the sole prerogative of Ferrari, giving, if memory serves, a second and a half's advantage.
If we ignore the dreadful management of F1 and the Damoclean threat to the sport because of it, a big ask I know, these are halcyon times.
Sit back, enjoy it and remember it. Memories might be all we have left of proper F1 in a few years.
AstonB said:
Jes*s f*cking Chr*st.
yes....exactly.....one of the first videos shown to me at a marshals training day. So when that jumped up little prick of a german said In the press conference that 20kph slower was more than enough for double yellows it made my blood boil. Lewis, vettel, Riccardo are right....the rule says slow down and be prepared to stop....NOT set a purple sector and pole position. the stewards as as much to blame for being so slack on it over the last few years. Flooble said:
I am thinking back to the early noughties Ferrari, when the only question was by how much Schumacher would win.
This statement often gets brought up, but I'm not totally convincedback in those noughties, Williams-BMW, McLaren and Renault were much closer to Ferrari (see Wikipedia stats)
looking back at the qualifing - here are the total time advantage/dis-advantage (advantage is -ve) for all the races (~17) from Wikipedia
2000 : MS +2.7s .'. avg = +0.15s/race - was outqualified 8 of 17 races
2001 : MS -2.0s .'. avg = -0.12s/race - was outqualified 5 of 16 races nb: see note1
2002 : MS -2.0s .'. avg = -0.11s/race - was outqualified 9 of 17 races
2003 : MS +2.3s .'. avg = +0.17s/race - was outqualified 8 of 13 races
2004 : MS -1.3s .'. avg = -0.08s/race - was outqualified 7 of 15 races
note1: excluded BEL 2001 as this was an odd result and would have skewed the result to be MS +0.6
compare to best MERC to others
2015 : MERC -10.25s .'. avg = -0.6s/race - was outqualified 1 of 17
OK, I've compared MS vs MERC and perhaps should have compared Ferrari vs The Rest
I originally looked at average qualifying positions - stats available here - but decided that this wouldn't show the speed advantage, only relative qualifying positions
no doubt there lots of different ways to analyse the data
food for thought maybe ?
nb: some qualifying data was missing from Wiki...
I'm getting tired of not knowing the full rules of engagement between the Merc drivers. At least then you know the guy won the race because he'd been locked in a fight all through the race with his team mate, and not because he led after the 1st corner or the 1st lap and the team gave him the favoured strategy. It happens like that now anyways. The guy behind ends up following the leader around with the tyre strategy: after you sir!
I have always struggled to maintain an interest if only one team stands a chance of winning a given race. It's a team sport and the dominant team is always selfish in looking after it's own interests. That's fine but I want to see drivers from different teams fighting against each other, where the gloves are well and truly off. I can see my interest in this season waning, as I fully expect Hamilton to win the WDC, as other teams that have the potential to challenge Mercedes ramp down on their car developments to focus on next year. The WCC is a done deal any way. Hope McLaren keep improving.
What makes it worse is that, whilst Rosberg is a very fast driver, you never get the feeling that he can go toe-to-toe with Hamilton on a given day and come out on top. He has won races on merit, but it seems there's always a question mark. If I was being cynical, I'd say that Mercedes have taken the safer option signing Rosberg for the next 2 year. I sincerely hope Mercedes don't dominate the next couple of years. Nor any one team for that matter.
I have always struggled to maintain an interest if only one team stands a chance of winning a given race. It's a team sport and the dominant team is always selfish in looking after it's own interests. That's fine but I want to see drivers from different teams fighting against each other, where the gloves are well and truly off. I can see my interest in this season waning, as I fully expect Hamilton to win the WDC, as other teams that have the potential to challenge Mercedes ramp down on their car developments to focus on next year. The WCC is a done deal any way. Hope McLaren keep improving.
What makes it worse is that, whilst Rosberg is a very fast driver, you never get the feeling that he can go toe-to-toe with Hamilton on a given day and come out on top. He has won races on merit, but it seems there's always a question mark. If I was being cynical, I'd say that Mercedes have taken the safer option signing Rosberg for the next 2 year. I sincerely hope Mercedes don't dominate the next couple of years. Nor any one team for that matter.
While that's fair, it sort of points to Michael Schumacher as not great at qualifying. I can recall he often used to park on the grid with his car pointed at his competitors - kind of a threat.
I recall many races where he used to finish with a pit stop or more in hand (I think he must have slowed on the final lap, as the results I just looked up imply it was often far closer, and I am sure it wasn't).
e.g Brazil 2002
1 1 Germany Michael Schumacher Ferrari 71 1:31:43.663 2 10
2 5 Germany Ralf Schumacher Williams-BMW 71 +0.588 3 6
3 3 United Kingdom David Coulthard McLaren-Mercedes 71 +59.109 4 4
Yep, a whole minute ahead of David Coulthard, but only half a second ahead of his brother ... I don't recall the Ferrari and BMW dicing for the lead in the way that half second gap implies - although this was during the era when we had one season with a grand total of a single overtake, if I recall correctly.
There was also extreme monotony of the Schumacher seasons - he wrapped one season up (2004) with 12 wins in the first 13 races (and only 18 in total in the season). Hence to people my age we recall simply watching Schumacher win every weekend. Another year (2002) he won with six races (of 17) to go before the end of the season, and finished all but one race either first or second (in the solitary race he was third). As he was a clear number 1 driver, there wasn't even the chance of his team-mate winning instead.
E.g. Schumacher's Championship Winning Margins
2001 - 123 points to 65
2002 - 144 points to 77
2003 - Close! 93 to 91
2004 - 148 to 114 (and 85 to a non-Ferrari)
We have not yet sunk to that level of repetitiveness. We are in danger of getting there, but at least 2014 was a hard-fought battle which went to the last race, albeit between drivers in the same team. 2015 was more of a cake-walk but still not on the level of the Schumacher years. This year again will be a two-way fight, unless things go really badly for Hamilton. Even during the Red Bull years, Webber ran Vettel close and there was one year where five drivers (I think) were in contention until a couple of races from the end.
I recall many races where he used to finish with a pit stop or more in hand (I think he must have slowed on the final lap, as the results I just looked up imply it was often far closer, and I am sure it wasn't).
e.g Brazil 2002
1 1 Germany Michael Schumacher Ferrari 71 1:31:43.663 2 10
2 5 Germany Ralf Schumacher Williams-BMW 71 +0.588 3 6
3 3 United Kingdom David Coulthard McLaren-Mercedes 71 +59.109 4 4
Yep, a whole minute ahead of David Coulthard, but only half a second ahead of his brother ... I don't recall the Ferrari and BMW dicing for the lead in the way that half second gap implies - although this was during the era when we had one season with a grand total of a single overtake, if I recall correctly.
There was also extreme monotony of the Schumacher seasons - he wrapped one season up (2004) with 12 wins in the first 13 races (and only 18 in total in the season). Hence to people my age we recall simply watching Schumacher win every weekend. Another year (2002) he won with six races (of 17) to go before the end of the season, and finished all but one race either first or second (in the solitary race he was third). As he was a clear number 1 driver, there wasn't even the chance of his team-mate winning instead.
E.g. Schumacher's Championship Winning Margins
2001 - 123 points to 65
2002 - 144 points to 77
2003 - Close! 93 to 91
2004 - 148 to 114 (and 85 to a non-Ferrari)
We have not yet sunk to that level of repetitiveness. We are in danger of getting there, but at least 2014 was a hard-fought battle which went to the last race, albeit between drivers in the same team. 2015 was more of a cake-walk but still not on the level of the Schumacher years. This year again will be a two-way fight, unless things go really badly for Hamilton. Even during the Red Bull years, Webber ran Vettel close and there was one year where five drivers (I think) were in contention until a couple of races from the end.
37chevy said:
yes....exactly.....one of the first videos shown to me at a marshals training day. So when that jumped up little prick of a german said In the press conference that 20kph slower was more than enough for double yellows it made my blood boil.
He's not really German, just pretending 
Dr Z said:
What makes it worse is that, whilst Rosberg is a very fast driver, you never get the feeling that he can go toe-to-toe with Hamilton on a given day and come out on top. He has won races on merit, but it seems there's always a question mark. If I was being cynical, I'd say that Mercedes have taken the safer option signing Rosberg for the next 2 year. I sincerely hope Mercedes don't dominate the next couple of years. Nor any one team for that matter.
Good analysis. It was quite funny that a journo asked Rosberg in last week's Thursday press conference how he felt about being paid a lot less than Hamilton. His reaction was ''What makes you think I'm on less'' and then two days later Lauda said ''Of course we pay Lewis much more as a world champion''. Amusing This is what's going to be good though, The others are catching up very quickly in relative terms, in 2014 Mercedes could go 1.5 seconds a lap faster than anybody else at 90% pace, now I get the impression they are being pushed a little more. It looks as though Red Bull and Ferrari can get comfortably within half a second now.
The Mercedes PU not holding the advantage it once did could make next year with all the regs changes quite interesting- there's no guarantee Mercedes will be so convincingly on top of things for the remainder of this season and 2017.
The Mercedes PU not holding the advantage it once did could make next year with all the regs changes quite interesting- there's no guarantee Mercedes will be so convincingly on top of things for the remainder of this season and 2017.
deadslow said:
REALIST123 said:
37chevy said:
2) nothing wrong with the post race press conference, lewis explained why he wanted things clarifying, Daniel Riccardo agreed with lewis, as has vettel since....it only seems like nico thinks its ok.
........and the stewards, of course. Things seem clear enough. 
trueI am surprised that a driver can take pole from a fierce competitor in the same equipment on a lap that had waved yellows on a corner.
And that on another occasion a driver was handed a penalty that may affect the outcome of the championship because he reversed a few feet slowly in the pit lane.
HustleRussell said:
This is what's going to be good though, The others are catching up very quickly in relative terms, in 2014 Mercedes could go 1.5 seconds a lap faster than anybody else at 90% pace, now I get the impression they are being pushed a little more. It looks as though Red Bull and Ferrari can get comfortably within half a second now.
The Mercedes PU not holding the advantage it once did could make next year with all the regs changes quite interesting- there's no guarantee Mercedes will be so convincingly on top of things for the remainder of this season and 2017.
I disagree. I think Mercedes still have a massive advantage, but don't show their true pace when they don't have to. The Mercedes PU not holding the advantage it once did could make next year with all the regs changes quite interesting- there's no guarantee Mercedes will be so convincingly on top of things for the remainder of this season and 2017.
heebeegeetee said:
And was it not exactly this 'clarity' that led to the death of Bianchi?
I am surprised that a driver can take pole from a fierce competitor in the same equipment on a lap that had waved yellows on a corner.
And that on another occasion a driver was handed a penalty that may affect the outcome of the championship because he reversed a few feet slowly in the pit lane.
don't forget the silly cone in Russia where he was expected to turn 90 degrees left at 100mph straight towards a wall to go around a poxy cone....despite the fact hed backed off the lap and wasn't gaining an advantage. I am surprised that a driver can take pole from a fierce competitor in the same equipment on a lap that had waved yellows on a corner.
And that on another occasion a driver was handed a penalty that may affect the outcome of the championship because he reversed a few feet slowly in the pit lane.
again the fia are coming up with poxy rules, and enforcing them to the letter while not using common sense or concentrating on the real safety issues
cgt2 said:
Dr Z said:
What makes it worse is that, whilst Rosberg is a very fast driver, you never get the feeling that he can go toe-to-toe with Hamilton on a given day and come out on top. He has won races on merit, but it seems there's always a question mark. If I was being cynical, I'd say that Mercedes have taken the safer option signing Rosberg for the next 2 year. I sincerely hope Mercedes don't dominate the next couple of years. Nor any one team for that matter.
Good analysis. It was quite funny that a journo asked Rosberg in last week's Thursday press conference how he felt about being paid a lot less than Hamilton. His reaction was ''What makes you think I'm on less'' and then two days later Lauda said ''Of course we pay Lewis much more as a world champion''. Amusing Even if Red Bull had a dominant car in 2011, to my mind Vettel drove like a different man to 2010. He never looked back after that, overcoming a tough period in the first half of 2012 to win and going on to one of the most dominant winning streaks the sport has ever witnessed in 2013. The team coming around you helps, but it seems once you get that 1st WDC, the self-belief kicks up a notch--it's easier to believe that you belong with the best. Moments of self-doubt are easier to quash. Maybe, we'll see a different, more confident Rosberg if he does indeed manage it this year. I want him to win the WDC, just to see if he'll be different, and support my pet psychological hypothesis.
Dr Z said:
I do wonder if Rosberg will be different if he ends up getting the WDC this year. For being such a technical sport, ultimately I believe a lot of the on-track performance differences between closely matched drivers is psychological. If you look at the 2010 season, you'd say Vettel didn't deserve that WDC as his performances were below par, apparently being matched and on many occasions beaten by his team mate 'journey man' driver.
Even if Red Bull had a dominant car in 2011, to my mind Vettel drove like a different man to 2010. He never looked back after that, overcoming a tough period in the first half of 2012 to win and going on to one of the most dominant winning streaks the sport has ever witnessed in 2013. The team coming around you helps, but it seems once you get that 1st WDC, the self-belief kicks up a notch--it's easier to believe that you belong with the best. Moments of self-doubt are easier to quash. Maybe, we'll see a different, more confident Rosberg if he does indeed manage it this year. I want him to win the WDC, just to see if he'll be different, and support my pet psychological hypothesis.
But on the flipside to your argument, Kimi totally switched off in 2008 after winning it Even if Red Bull had a dominant car in 2011, to my mind Vettel drove like a different man to 2010. He never looked back after that, overcoming a tough period in the first half of 2012 to win and going on to one of the most dominant winning streaks the sport has ever witnessed in 2013. The team coming around you helps, but it seems once you get that 1st WDC, the self-belief kicks up a notch--it's easier to believe that you belong with the best. Moments of self-doubt are easier to quash. Maybe, we'll see a different, more confident Rosberg if he does indeed manage it this year. I want him to win the WDC, just to see if he'll be different, and support my pet psychological hypothesis.
cgt2 said:
Dr Z said:
I do wonder if Rosberg will be different if he ends up getting the WDC this year. For being such a technical sport, ultimately I believe a lot of the on-track performance differences between closely matched drivers is psychological. If you look at the 2010 season, you'd say Vettel didn't deserve that WDC as his performances were below par, apparently being matched and on many occasions beaten by his team mate 'journey man' driver.
Even if Red Bull had a dominant car in 2011, to my mind Vettel drove like a different man to 2010. He never looked back after that, overcoming a tough period in the first half of 2012 to win and going on to one of the most dominant winning streaks the sport has ever witnessed in 2013. The team coming around you helps, but it seems once you get that 1st WDC, the self-belief kicks up a notch--it's easier to believe that you belong with the best. Moments of self-doubt are easier to quash. Maybe, we'll see a different, more confident Rosberg if he does indeed manage it this year. I want him to win the WDC, just to see if he'll be different, and support my pet psychological hypothesis.
But on the flipside to your argument, Kimi totally switched off in 2008 after winning it Even if Red Bull had a dominant car in 2011, to my mind Vettel drove like a different man to 2010. He never looked back after that, overcoming a tough period in the first half of 2012 to win and going on to one of the most dominant winning streaks the sport has ever witnessed in 2013. The team coming around you helps, but it seems once you get that 1st WDC, the self-belief kicks up a notch--it's easier to believe that you belong with the best. Moments of self-doubt are easier to quash. Maybe, we'll see a different, more confident Rosberg if he does indeed manage it this year. I want him to win the WDC, just to see if he'll be different, and support my pet psychological hypothesis.
cgt2 said:
Dr Z said:
I do wonder if Rosberg will be different if he ends up getting the WDC this year. For being such a technical sport, ultimately I believe a lot of the on-track performance differences between closely matched drivers is psychological. If you look at the 2010 season, you'd say Vettel didn't deserve that WDC as his performances were below par, apparently being matched and on many occasions beaten by his team mate 'journey man' driver.
Even if Red Bull had a dominant car in 2011, to my mind Vettel drove like a different man to 2010. He never looked back after that, overcoming a tough period in the first half of 2012 to win and going on to one of the most dominant winning streaks the sport has ever witnessed in 2013. The team coming around you helps, but it seems once you get that 1st WDC, the self-belief kicks up a notch--it's easier to believe that you belong with the best. Moments of self-doubt are easier to quash. Maybe, we'll see a different, more confident Rosberg if he does indeed manage it this year. I want him to win the WDC, just to see if he'll be different, and support my pet psychological hypothesis.
But on the flipside to your argument, Kimi totally switched off in 2008 after winning it Even if Red Bull had a dominant car in 2011, to my mind Vettel drove like a different man to 2010. He never looked back after that, overcoming a tough period in the first half of 2012 to win and going on to one of the most dominant winning streaks the sport has ever witnessed in 2013. The team coming around you helps, but it seems once you get that 1st WDC, the self-belief kicks up a notch--it's easier to believe that you belong with the best. Moments of self-doubt are easier to quash. Maybe, we'll see a different, more confident Rosberg if he does indeed manage it this year. I want him to win the WDC, just to see if he'll be different, and support my pet psychological hypothesis.
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