The Official 2017 F1 Pre-Season Thread
Discussion
VolvoT5 said:
Vaud said:
Source?
Ferrari thought enough of him to pitch for his services. Williams have generally been fairly ruthless on driver selection.
Yeah they considered his services in late 2014 and early 2015 when Raikkonen was performing poorly vs Alonso and Vettel..... and yet after weighing up their options they still decided to stick with Kimi. That can't say much about how highly rated Bottas is, can it? Based on 2016 form it looks like the right decision as well. Ferrari thought enough of him to pitch for his services. Williams have generally been fairly ruthless on driver selection.
thegreenhell said:
Despite all the media chatter about a possible move, Bottas wasn't available to Ferrari then. He was tied into a long contract with Williams, who weren't about to let him go to a direct rival. Of course enough money can buy anything in F1, but it would have cost Ferrari far more to buy Bottas from Williams than it would have cost to keep paying Kimi €20 million each year. Although he was underperforming in terms of results, Kimi is a known and respected performance benchmark within the team, isn't political, gets on with everyone in the team and just quietly gets on with the job. On balance they decided to stick with what they knew, which was also the least expensive option at the time. It doesn't reflect badly on Bottas at all that Ferrari didn't sign him. The fact that people thought he was a serious contender for the seat at the time shows how he is regarded by those in the paddock with access to all the data. The fact that he was the first choice of Mercedes to replace Rosberg bears this out.
Are you suggesting Mercedes choice has nothing to do with Wolff being Bottas manager?tommunster10 said:
Ha ha provided the Merc is of the same dominance in 2017 as last few seasons Bottas is guaranteed 2nd place in the WDC and picking up the first win of his career in F1....
It's offensive to the team at Merc to suggest otherwise, that car is simply genius.
I think you should have said 'that car was simply genius.'It's offensive to the team at Merc to suggest otherwise, that car is simply genius.
Until the first few races of the season we have no idea of the relative merits of the cars.
Looking at pundits analysis shows Bottas as a bit slower than Rosberg overall. I do not think it will be a stroll in the park to finish immediately behind Hamilton in the WDC, unless the car is as dominant as before. My view is that the Red Bull will be in the mix for wins this year.
suffolk009 said:
Are you suggesting Mercedes choice has nothing to do with Wolff being Bottas manager?
Being familiar with good governance... it maybe an influencing factor, but not Toto's decision. It would be a decision of the operating board, probably with review by the non-executive board (likely given the sums involved)swisstoni said:
I'm not seeing Bottas as a clear rung below Hamilton. People thought that about Rosberg and he never made it easy for Hamilton and is WDC 2016.
If Hamilton cared (which I'm sure he doesn't) he'd like a teammate who might win the odd race but then go missing for a few. Bottas isn't that.
I guess it depends on what you mean by a "clear rung below" but I only see Bottas getting the better of Hamilton if the latter has either car problems or suffers one of his occasional bouts of brain fade; if Lewis has a reliable car and his head's together I don't see Bottas beating him very often (if at all). If Hamilton cared (which I'm sure he doesn't) he'd like a teammate who might win the odd race but then go missing for a few. Bottas isn't that.
Same applied to Rosberg in my view. Last year he made the most of Hamilton's problems and took his chance to (deservedly) win the title but in a straight fight with similar reliability he was never as quick as Lewis - quick enough to keep him honest most of the time but when it came to it he could never quite match Hamilton when Lewis was focused and in a reliable car.
Vaud said:
suffolk009 said:
Are you suggesting Mercedes choice has nothing to do with Wolff being Bottas manager?
Being familiar with good governance... it maybe an influencing factor, but not Toto's decision. It would be a decision of the operating board, probably with review by the non-executive board (likely given the sums involved)JNW1 said:
swisstoni said:
I'm not seeing Bottas as a clear rung below Hamilton. People thought that about Rosberg and he never made it easy for Hamilton and is WDC 2016.
If Hamilton cared (which I'm sure he doesn't) he'd like a teammate who might win the odd race but then go missing for a few. Bottas isn't that.
I guess it depends on what you mean by a "clear rung below" but I only see Bottas getting the better of Hamilton if the latter has either car problems or suffers one of his occasional bouts of brain fade; if Lewis has a reliable car and his head's together I don't see Bottas beating him very often (if at all). If Hamilton cared (which I'm sure he doesn't) he'd like a teammate who might win the odd race but then go missing for a few. Bottas isn't that.
Same applied to Rosberg in my view. Last year he made the most of Hamilton's problems and took his chance to (deservedly) win the title but in a straight fight with similar reliability he was never as quick as Lewis - quick enough to keep him honest most of the time but when it came to it he could never quite match Hamilton when Lewis was focused and in a reliable car.
In fact more pressure on Lewis.
It's all to play for at the start of the season.
If any of the drivers is performing badly, then I am sure just a bit (OK .. loads
) more effort is placed behind who has most points except of course where a driver stipulates a clear no 1 in the team place.
Anyone got one of those this year ?
If any of the drivers is performing badly, then I am sure just a bit (OK .. loads
) more effort is placed behind who has most points except of course where a driver stipulates a clear no 1 in the team place.Anyone got one of those this year ?
Rich_W said:
If Mercedes ACTUALLY thought Bottas was a good option. They'd have signed him for at least 2 years.
1 year deal is so telling!
It's one year + one year.1 year deal is so telling!
Maybe he has signed an option at Ferrari that is solid. Who knows?
Be careful reading too much into headline statements in F1...
Popular opinion here suggests that Bottas is not in the same league as Hamilton, and / or is no better than Rosberg. If that turns out to be the case, I wonder if we are we going to see a complacent Hamilton disappear ever further up his own arse, increasingly absorbed with his instagram, music and fashion careers?
HustleRussell said:
Popular opinion here suggests that Bottas is not in the same league as Hamilton, and / or is no better than Rosberg. If that turns out to be the case, I wonder if we are we going to see a complacent Hamilton disappear ever further up his own arse, increasingly absorbed with his instagram, music and fashion careers?
If the car has an advantage and VB isn't challenging him (as I suspect he won't) so he's winning everything (relatively) easily. Then Yep this is a possibility. Though tbh a happy Lewis is generally OK to deal with, he can be poncy, but he's not hard work. It's when he gets stroppy the toys are sometime lobbed. Not that it makes me hate the guy.
I dunno about Hamilton being generally easy to deal with. He didn't let up with the digs and mind games even after Rosberg announced his retirement. I'm not sure Hamilton is ever 'off' in that respect. He repeatedly speaks out of turn in defiance of the team. To me he generally comes off as a diva.
It's great. I don't think even Hamilton has decided if he's the good guy or the bad guy. It is perhaps the single greatest similarity between him and his idol.
It's great. I don't think even Hamilton has decided if he's the good guy or the bad guy. It is perhaps the single greatest similarity between him and his idol.
suffolk009 said:
But I'm speculating the reason Bottas was even on the list in the first place, was that he was (still is?) Toto's driver.
It was widely reported yesterday that Toto removed himself from Bottas`s management team once he was confirmed as a Mercedes driver to avoid any conflict of interest. Wh00sher said:
suffolk009 said:
But I'm speculating the reason Bottas was even on the list in the first place, was that he was (still is?) Toto's driver.
It was widely reported yesterday that Toto removed himself from Bottas`s management team once he was confirmed as a Mercedes driver to avoid any conflict of interest. Wh00sher said:
suffolk009 said:
But I'm speculating the reason Bottas was even on the list in the first place, was that he was (still is?) Toto's driver.
It was widely reported yesterday that Toto removed himself from Bottas`s management team once he was confirmed as a Mercedes driver to avoid any conflict of interest. Europa1 said:
But no conflict in being part of it whilst Mercedes is deciding who they will pick and negotiating terms with that driver and the team they are taking from him from? Interesting view on life, Mr Wolff.
And Mr Wolfe would be equally criticised if he didn't put Bottas forward even though he was the strongest driver available because he was his manager.Nothing is being hidden here, no unspoken back-handers, etc, so I think Mr wolfe has handled it pretty well in the circumstance.
Wh00sher said:
suffolk009 said:
But I'm speculating the reason Bottas was even on the list in the first place, was that he was (still is?) Toto's driver.
It was widely reported yesterday that Toto removed himself from Bottas`s management team once he was confirmed as a Mercedes driver to avoid any conflict of interest. 
The Surveyor said:
Europa1 said:
But no conflict in being part of it whilst Mercedes is deciding who they will pick and negotiating terms with that driver and the team they are taking from him from? Interesting view on life, Mr Wolff.
And Mr Wolfe would be equally criticised if he didn't put Bottas forward even though he was the strongest driver available because he was his manager.Nothing is being hidden here, no unspoken back-handers, etc, so I think Mr wolfe has handled it pretty well in the circumstance.
And surely the purpose of an unspoken back-hander is that it is hidden? (not that I am alleging there were any, spoken or unspoken).
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