Nicktendo86
Member
Sorry to DP but judging by how he has barely said a peep about the shit cars he has had to drive at Ferrari I would say roughly four years.
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The Formula 1 2014 Season |OT2| Louder Than Formula E
- Thread starter Addnan
- Start date
Sorry to DP but judging by how he has barely said a peep about the shit cars he has had to drive at Ferrari I would say roughly four years.
Myoclonic Jerk
Member
Ferrari is firing everyone!!!!!!
Nicktendo86
Member
Rumour has it Marco was given the boot for the handling of the Alonso matter, they have had to pay him a lot of money apparently. This whole mess seems like a total shambles.
So, the 2015 car looks like a dog. Their star driver has had enough and they have actually paid him to leave. Team is rudderless and directionless. They have got in someone who knows the politics side more rather than an experienced TP.
Does that sum it up?
So, the 2015 car looks like a dog. Their star driver has had enough and they have actually paid him to leave. Team is rudderless and directionless. They have got in someone who knows the politics side more rather than an experienced TP.
Does that sum it up?
Vettel will save them all. You'd be surprised how much of a better driver and great team leader he's become in the past 22 hours or so.
The spin in Italian media is consistently fantastic.
Mastah
Member
I couldn't care less about playing dirty, team orders, spying, you name it, but I absolutely do care when someone gets unfair preferential treatment. On the other hand it makes current situation even funnier, how on earth Ferrari with all their privileges can suck so bad, lol?
As for Alonso, well I'm sure with huge money from Ferrari AND Honda he won't be too annoyed:
Gold.
Don't think any of this will help Ferrari honestly. Having incompetent people take responsibility is good and all, but in the end they still have a shit care and a shit team, and they're not going anywhere fast. Ferrari has tons of money, and they can attract all the most talented drivers to their team with legacy and paycheck, but at the end of the day, they seem to have completely lost their way on the engineering end. What a pathetic team they have become in the last half-decade.
nature boy
Member
I doubt Ferrari payed him 2 full years and let him sign for Mclaren - especially if Fernando was the one who pushed to leave. They might have wavered some clauses in his contract to speed up the process, but tens of millions of dollars? Find that hard to believe.
Joe Saward is reporting that the Phillip Morris contract was up for renegotiation (which might explain the appointment of Arrivabene) and that Mattiaci had interviews with the road car divisions of Aston Martin and... Mclaren.
Joe Saward is reporting that the Phillip Morris contract was up for renegotiation (which might explain the appointment of Arrivabene) and that Mattiaci had interviews with the road car divisions of Aston Martin and... Mclaren.
theignoramus
Member
Fred Alonso nailed it back in 2012.
"I think McLaren sometimes is not the easiest place to live, so I think he will be much more happy now in Mercedes than what he was in the past"
Brundle also nailed it. But Sky is being gracious in not printing what some of the retired legends of the sport said at the time, in particular Sirs Stirling Moss and Jackie Stewart.
F1 loosing on average ~17% of their viewers compared to last year here in germany makes me fear for new TV rights in 2016. Lets hope i don't have to buy sky
It'll happen, so best prepare for it.
Lets face it, it happened everywhere. They prefer the quick downside cash over the numbers of viewers. Rather than take a loss and keep F1 on free TV.
nature boy
Member
They will probably adopt the dual broadcasting model: All races on pay-TV and some races free.F1 loosing on average ~17% of their viewers compared to last year here in germany makes me fear for new TV rights in 2016. Lets hope i don't have to buy sky
Vettel just isn't the draw that Michael was.
For sure Ferrari knows what they're doing, for sure.
Rosberg was in the title hunt until the last GP this year too.
Rosberg was in the title hunt until the last GP this year too.
Fox Mulder
Member
Fun first season for me. Will spend the off season going back and watching old stuff.
hope ricciardo wins next year.
hope ricciardo wins next year.
Psychotext
Member
I think the only teams that have a chance next year are Mercedes and McLaren... and McLaren is really, really unlikely.
I'm hoping Williams can occasionally fight for some wins though.
Pay TV numbers are down aswell. Bernie will probably get a lot less money from german TV stations.
zomgbbqftw
Banned
I think Red Bull will be competitive. Renault will make enough inroads into Mercedes' lead and Red Bull will make up the rest with crazy aero.
JadedWriter
Member
Man Dennis and Joe Saward were salty as fuck when his switch was announced. Nice words from Alonso though. Dude outscored his old team single handedly lol. I wonder what brand of Scotch Dennis downed watching Hamilton get crowned as a 2x world champion.
Norwegian Rudo
Member
Got a big increase in Australia just recently going to the Sky model.
Norwegian Rudo
Member
What Alonso wanted and angled for is irrelevant, legally speaking. Ferrari signed Vettel before they negotiated a release for Alonso, so he would be in his full right to sit out and receive his full pay for the length of his contract.
Of course he doesn't really want to do that, so they'll negotiate a compromise. I would expect it to cost Ferrari a fair chunk of change though.
Psychotext
Member
Should be nice to see Alonso's new teammate in action.
Pretty much. Next season is going to be a repeat of this season unless Renault and Ferrari can get what they want.
McLaren released a short video of the McLaren-Honda at Silverstone
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzouwIF-5CU
They can just get Will to dump it into the Marina near the end of the session.
Yeah but he's French
Spanish press has been saying it's a 2+1 deal with no performance clauses. After 2 years both McLaren and Alonso can terminate their deal. Alonso wanted a 1+2 deal but Honda wanted a 3 year deal. They settled for a middle ground.
Also rumored that Alonso included a Lewis Hamilton clause in the contract. If he joins McLaren, he gets an option to terminate his current deal and join another team without paying McLaren.
Monégasque. I know, right?
Psychotext
Member
That sounds a bit too silly. I think the Spanish press is just letting their bias get to them!
Big Takeover
Member
A Prost/Senna/Williams situation. It actually sounds plausible. If McLaren-Honda can get their act together, I'd very much expect Ron to make a huge push to atone for his past mistakes. I think FA would want to get something out of it if that were to happen. Not necessarily a problem with LH per se.
Same source that revealed Abad trip to Japan in September 2013, days after Kimi was announced for 2014...
To me it seems like something very natural coming from the likes of Alonso and Abad. It also kills two birds with one stone: a) Avoid another Hamilton/Alonso clash especially with Ron Dennis back at the helm; b) Get a shot at the so much desired empty vacancy at Mercedes.
I fully expect this McLaren - Alonso pairing to end with titles or with either Ron Dennis or Alonso out of the team before the end of 2016.
Also about the Ferrari 2015 performance rumors it doesn't seemed surprising to me. James Allison already said before Hockenheim they had a meeting with both Alonso and Kimi before Hockenheim to show them the rebuiliding plans for 2015 and 2016 and hoped that their plans was enough to convince them to stay. That was enough confirmation for me. You don't show a rebuilding plan for 2016 if you think 2015 is going to be a good year...
nature boy
Member
Does the german public really care about Nico?
Did they really have 3 contracts or 2 contracts and a pre-contract with Vettel? I don't think Ferrari are that careless. Once Alonso said "I'm out" they probably approached Vettel with their pre-contract, waited for Alonso to terminate his contract (I don't think this delay from Fernando and Mclaren had anything to do with Ferrari, probably sponsor-related) and then signed Vettel for 2015. They would have to be monumentally stupid to have 3 contracts for 2015.
If that happens, it will just give him power to take away the European GPs :\
So tomorrow is the first day of testing in Abu Dhabi and the F1 commission is meeting in Geneva.
Only interest in the Abu Dhabi test is to the see the Mclaren-Honda in action (they won't go for laptimes, just testing all the systems and getting some feedback).
The F1 commission should be more interesting, since we should find out about the engine freeze/unfreeze rules and what will happen to the financial distribution. Oh and we will see WTF the FIA are going to do.
This article on the finances of F1 teams is an interesting read:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/csylt/2...-up-570-million-of-losses-in-just-five-years/
Adam Scott Aukerman
Member
Given that they said they're taking a year off, and it's now been two... the signs aren't looking good. I have to say (again) that I much preferred the GP Predictor we used last year. Everyone has a chance race-to-race, and even if one or two people dominate the field like this year, the rest of the top 10 (and the bets) mean that it still remains a challenge to max out your points.
As for the one we were using this year that no one seemed to give a shit about...
...I won.
EDIT: Looks like I also came 3rd (or joint first, if we're being proper) in the ALT F1 league as well
Congrats!
Yeah I know it doesn't look good for an F1RM return. I tried the GP Predictor for a couple GPs (this year or last, don't recall) and it seemed like regardless of outcome I never had enough money for upgrades. It could be just the person (me) though, lol.
Wax Free Vanilla
Member
Honda's Arai did an interview at Abu Dhabi:
- The car just went on track, nothing more, nothing less, not about pursuing performance yet like some might expect. It's about a few laps, really. Same as what must have been like for other existing manufacturers back in this year's first test at Jerez, I guess
- Encountered some expected issues such as noise and system communication glitch. Taking time tackling those issues, atm. Working on it by checking the order of launching controller of each system one by one. Sometimes something doesn't start or so dealing with each issue.
- MP4-29H is a car made by copy & paste based on 29. Bulkhead and position of transmission axis is regulated by regs so that's the same, but other than that, our package is quite different from Mercedes, so adapted things to retrofit it by hand. Main purpose of the chassis is for checking electronics.
- Havent reached the stage to assess cooling yet. Recovery system worked, but not about pursuing performance yet
- At forthcoming Abu Dhabi test, we will check data communication between track, Japan and Mclaren. Will use Honda's network, so will have to monitor various things. should take time
- We race to win, that's what partnering with Mclaren should mean. Excuses like "1st year is exercise/learning year" isn't acceptable.
- Concerned that F1 might vanish if it fails to appeal to a wider generation. In fact many people don't know "powered by HONDA". ATM talking with Mclaren about on-car logo/emblem thing as part of comprehensive contract talk. We want to increase public awareness of Honda by participating in F1, so. Think it's ok if it's about/through liking drivers.
translation by muramasa: http://as-web.jp/f1sokuho/info.php?c_id=1&no=61760
Sainz Jr's backers bought him a Toro Rosso seat for $20M
Vergne to Williams as test driver.
- The car just went on track, nothing more, nothing less, not about pursuing performance yet like some might expect. It's about a few laps, really. Same as what must have been like for other existing manufacturers back in this year's first test at Jerez, I guess
- Encountered some expected issues such as noise and system communication glitch. Taking time tackling those issues, atm. Working on it by checking the order of launching controller of each system one by one. Sometimes something doesn't start or so dealing with each issue.
- MP4-29H is a car made by copy & paste based on 29. Bulkhead and position of transmission axis is regulated by regs so that's the same, but other than that, our package is quite different from Mercedes, so adapted things to retrofit it by hand. Main purpose of the chassis is for checking electronics.
- Havent reached the stage to assess cooling yet. Recovery system worked, but not about pursuing performance yet
- At forthcoming Abu Dhabi test, we will check data communication between track, Japan and Mclaren. Will use Honda's network, so will have to monitor various things. should take time
- We race to win, that's what partnering with Mclaren should mean. Excuses like "1st year is exercise/learning year" isn't acceptable.
- Concerned that F1 might vanish if it fails to appeal to a wider generation. In fact many people don't know "powered by HONDA". ATM talking with Mclaren about on-car logo/emblem thing as part of comprehensive contract talk. We want to increase public awareness of Honda by participating in F1, so. Think it's ok if it's about/through liking drivers.
translation by muramasa: http://as-web.jp/f1sokuho/info.php?c_id=1&no=61760
Sainz Jr's backers bought him a Toro Rosso seat for $20M
Vergne to Williams as test driver.
That's only a fraction of the shade thrown Lewis' way when he made his decision. There are so many people who were wrong. PEACE.
I gave up on it when it turned out that Mercedes was going to dominate and whoever in the league that got their chassi or engine first was going to win.
Norwegian Rudo
Member
Given that Mattiachi was apparently fired at least in part because of it, I'd say yes.
Don't really see what a pre-contract has to do with this situation. You don't have a pre-contract for the next year, but for some future time. Vettel signing a pre-contract would have been if he was signing on to join in 2016 or whatever.
Vettel is not stupid enough to quit RBR without having a signed contract from Ferrari. I'm guessing Ferrari were fucked when RBR immediately announced Vettel was leaving, instead of waiting till Ferrari had organized Alonso's exit.
I really hope JB gets another season out of McLaren. He should leave the team on his own terms, surely a driver of his stature deserves as much anyway.
We need teams like Marussia and Caterham to give the Vandoornes, Saniz Jr's etc. of the world some seat time without the insane pressure that comes from a first season in a leading team.
We need teams like Marussia and Caterham to give the Vandoornes, Saniz Jr's etc. of the world some seat time without the insane pressure that comes from a first season in a leading team.
Psychotext
Member
I really think that Marco was a short term solution- they probably wanted Brawn to take over, but he declined and then all this stuff with Alonso happened, Luca left and Marco ended being a scapegoat.