2016 F1 Testing General Discussion Thread

[Mike_grpA]

OK open genuine question you think Lewis could of been Champion in the McLaren?

C'mon man, nobody would think that...

Spot on, I know you semi joke but certainly most current F1 drivers could get that Merc into second at least

Oh I was most definitely joking, but that doesn't make it any less true. Imagine Maldonado as double world champion

 

[RX-7_FD3S]

OK thats one down then... you speaking on behalf of all of his fans?

OK open genuine question you think Lewis could of been Champion in the McLaren?

He actually was world champs on mclaren or did I miss something ?

The heroes of the mercedes cars are Brawn and the engine departement that could make the most powerfull motor and that would fit in brown vision for the car.

Also off course no, no one could have been champion on last year Mclaren, yet Nico as no part in the mercedes car beeing that good.

A Lewis fan such as myself could tell you that Mercedes had only one win before Lewis came, what's the tally now ? Off course I'm smart enough to know it's not the case at least not all of it.

 

[Mike_grpA]

Literally the only reason they've won so much is because Mercedes put the vast majority of their resources into the 2014 regs as early as 2010. They had a running concept of the engine in 2011. Brawn knew there was no point chasing Red Bull while they were in an aero-dominant formula. He knew with the right team, the funds Mercedes had, and enough time, they could perfect the 2014 engine-dominant formula, and have a big chance of not just winning, but dominating, the new formula.

He's a very smart man, and it's not the first time hes done that. He was even on the board who first drafted the 2014 regs, so he knew exactly what could be done within them, and he knew as soon as they were tossing ideas around roughly what the regs would end up being. Mercedes did absolutely everything right under Brawn, and they deserve the success they're having right now, and I say that as a Ferrari fan.

Edit: With that said, I really hope Ferrari can bring the fight to Mercedes this year, as it'd be amazing to see a close fight for the title between Hamilton and Vettel in these beasts.

 

[J_Starscream]

A Lewis fan such as myself could tell you that Mercedes had only one win before Lewis came, what's the tally now ? Off course I'm smart enough to know it's not the case at least not all of it.

Lewis is a phenomenal driver, definitely World Champion material (well, 3 titles), but I don't think he was the sole cause of Mercedes' run of success. As @Mike_grpA said, Mercedes built their car around Brawn way before the 2014 regs, and as we've seen in recent years - the earlier you act, the more prepared you will be.

Lewis can be partly the cause for Mercedes' success but I certainly wouldn't pin more than a quarter of the claim on him. It's definitely behind the scenes that makes the difference.

 

[RX-7_FD3S]

Lewis is a phenomenal driver, definitely World Champion material (well, 3 titles), but I don't think he was the sole cause of Mercedes' run of success. As @Mike_grpA said, Mercedes built their car around Brawn way before the 2014 regs, and as we've seen in recent years - the earlier you act, the more prepared you will be.

Lewis can be partly the cause for Mercedes' success but I certainly wouldn't pin more than a quarter of the claim on him. It's definitely behind the scenes that makes the difference.

I never said that he was the only one. I actually said the same things as you so not sure what's your point.

And I also hope that Ferrari can be closer because I like fight tight fight for the title. MotoGP last year was awesome, I'm still grumpy over it but at least it was thrilling to watch.

 

[J_Starscream]

I never said that he was the only one. I actually said the same things as you so not sure what's your point.

And I also hope that Ferrari can be closer because I like fight tight fight for the title. MotoGP last year was awesome, I'm still grumpy over it but at least it was thrilling to watch.

Oops, I guess I misinterpreted your point.
At least we're on the same page.

I'd love to see a full-on attack from Ferrari, but in all honesty, I doubt they're actually any closer.

 

[RX-7_FD3S]

Oops, I guess I misinterpreted your point.
At least we're on the same page.

I'd love to see a full-on attack from Ferrari, but in all honesty, I doubt they're actually any closer.

I think that both Williams and Ferrari are a bit closer, not sure what the impact will be but they seems closer. Problem is that Williams wont be able to follow Ferrari and Mercedes during the year, they usually fall short after the summer break. The only hope I have is that I feel that Mercedes are really bad strategy wise. They dont take the good decision when something happen during the race (this is only my opinion but it happen a few times last year), so if it's a bit closer it could open up some opportunity for Ferrari, especially since Vettel is so good to convert the opportunities he gets.

 

[Mike_grpA]

Lewis can be partly the cause for Mercedes' success but I certainly wouldn't pin more than a quarter of the claim on him. It's definitely behind the scenes that makes the difference.

To say Hamilton is one quarter responsible for Merc's success is doing a disservice to the team IMO. In 2014, they had well over a second in hand over the next quickest car, and only lost when things went horribly wrong. In 2015, they had between a second and 6 tenths depending on circuit, and only on one occasion did Ferrari genuinely have more pace (Singapore). If Hamilton wasn't there, and Mercedes was able to field just one car, Rosberg would have won every race he finished in 2014, and most of them in 2015, and would have easily wrapped up both titles with rounds to spare.

Hamilton is responsible for being able to extract more from the car than Rosberg, but with the pace advantage they've enjoyed, only Taki Inoue could have lost those two titles lol.

With that said, I also disagree with people that say Hamilton "lucked into" such a great team and car. He knew very well what Mercedes were doing and what work they had put towards 2014 when he signed up in 2012. He made the smartest decision of his career, and he's now enjoying reaping the benefits of such a good decision.

On the flip side, Alonso seems to make the absolute worst decisions every single time. He left Renault after winning back to back titles to go to Mclaren, expecting to be treated as number one, even though Mclaren were promoting the driver they'd been grooming to be a world champion, then proceeds to fall out with said driver and the team, and wind up going back to Renault, who by then had seen a mass exodus of good staff. Then spends two years in uncompetitive Renaults before signing for Ferrari for 2010, even though Ferrari had their worst season in well over a decade in 2009. He even turned down Red Bull in this time. Then after coming very close multiple times with Ferrari, he starts publicly criticizing the team in 2013 and 2014 for not being up to his standard, which leads to Ferrari gladly letting him out of his contract a year early to move back to Mclaren, right in time for Mclaren to have their worst season in decades, and Ferrari to jump back to second in the WCC. How can one driver make so many bad career moves?

 

[Dodzzz]

You could probably make an argument for Schuey having an important role in building the team, because he had worked so closely with Brawn at both Ferrari and Bennetton in the past, and they both knew all too well how to build a strong technical team around them. With that said, I still wouldn't give Rosberg any credit. His job could've been done by any of the other drivers, and the team would be equally dominant now without him having ever been there.

I honestly haven't seen anyone claim any of Merc's current success is down to Hamilton, but I don't know any fanboys of any driver that are that delusional lol.

Honestly, Merc could have hired Maldonado and Max Chilton in 2014 and they'd still be back to back double world champs lol.

How about Narain Karthikeyan?
Just imagine that, Karthikeyan points his finger in a 2014 Merc at Vettel..

 

[dopedog]

How about Narain Karthikeyan?
Just imagine that, Karthikeyan points his finger in a 2014 Merc at Vettel..

Well we now know that both Alonso and Button (both WDC's) in a back marker car struggle with rest of them so whos to say a backmarker from previous years couldn't of got up higher in the right car...answer, of course they could.
Who would say that Alonso or Button in a Merc would be at the back still?

 

[twitcher]

I don't like excessive asphalt runoff, but I understand the reason for the existence of sealed runoff areas, and it's not entirely a safety thing.

The first point in favour of sealed runoff is it allows a driver who has left the track to regain or retain control of the car, avoiding dangerous and costly crashes in most cases. With grass, the driver becomes a passenger in most cases at high speeds, leading to major crashes, and with gravel, the car can dig in and flip, or can skip across the top of the gravel, neither of which are good for safety. The other point to make in favour of it is that a driver who is bumped off the road through no fault of his/her own won't have their race ended in the gravel.

Now the point to make against it is that it gives the drivers an incentive to drive beyond the track limits to gain an advantage, as there's no danger of ending your race by running as close to, and beyond, track limits. This point can be fixed by proper policing of track limits, which has been so inconsistent for years, but which the FIA has recently come out and said it will be much more strict on from this year onwards (here's hoping they stick to it). Another point might be that driver's bravery isn't rewarded like it used to be, which is true, but that's just an unfortunate bi-product of the modern professional era of motorsport, where people don't drive on tracks with power poles and trees lining them. But this is not unique to F1, as all major motorsport series are very professional now, whereas things were very amatuer and simple 50 odd years ago. The same things can be said about V8 Supercars when compared to Australian Touring cars of the 60s and 70s.

As for the Halo, well you know where I stand on that abomination.




Well we've all got Nico Rosberg to thank for that. Seemingly he's only got any pace when the pressure is off him, which is sad. Although, even though I'm not really a fan of Hamilton, I'd much prefer to see him win than Rosberg. Rosberg is just such an entitled little princess, it's funny seeing him spit the dummy, especially when you've got Vettel winding him up at every press conference lol.

As far as the lack of competition goes, we've had that more times we can count in the past. The rose tinted glasses eras of the 60s, 70s, and 80s people regularly pine for were full of utter domination and a lack of competition between team mates. I still love seeing old GPs though, even though you'd regularly only have a few drivers finishing on the lead lap.

I understand the upsides of the paved runnoffs. For anything other than F1 and WEC it makes a ton of sense, especially in the cost savings department. I just wish there were higher consequences (not implying I want to see physical harm to the drivers) and more reward for bravery in the two top levels. At the same time, I definitely don't want to see permanent tracks tailor made only for F1, as I see that as a massive waste.

@twitcher We watched a different 2015, cause it played exactly like 2014. Up until Rosberg cut down Hamilton's tire mid way through the season.
.............
and in reality I can see why they'd do that. However, this is difficult with equal cars and drivers that are many times on par, but also the fact that these aero cars make it difficult to catch a twin car if you're not in DRS range.

That's pretty much why I find the racing rather dull compared to other forms of motorsport.

I'd have to go back and rewatch most of the season, but the races that spring to mind in regards to "the attack which never came" are Canada and Brazil. I know there was more, I just can't put my finger on which ones they were. There was also Monaco where I believe Hamilton was told he would have to make the move on track, to which he replied "it's not going to happen."....or was that Monaco 2014? Memory is foggy


Anyways, based on the testing so far, I'm hoping maybe Ferrari has an ace up its sleeve and can maybe catch Merc out at races which use the softer compounds, and/or the really hot races like last year. However based on the reliability Merc has shown so far compared to Ferrari's, even if Ferrari can steal a few races from Merc, I have a feeling that we're in for another repeat of 14 and 15. Fingers crossed I'm wrong though. I don't care who wins, I just want to see battles for the win.



@daan, are we supposed to make another thread?

 

[G_Parrilla]

 

[catamount39]

Oh ****

 

[GTPorsche]

Today's results.

1. S. Vettel 1:22:852

2. C. Sainz Jr. 1:23:134

3. F. Massa 1:23:644

4. S. Perez 1:23:721

5. L. Hamilton 1:24:133

6. D. Ricciardo 1:24:427

7. J. Button 1:24:714

8. J. Palmer 1:24:859

9. M. Ericsson 1:25:031

10. R. Grosjean 1:25:255

11. E. Gutiérrez 1:25:422

12. R. Haryanto 1:25:889

13. N. Rosberg 1:26:140

 

[Speedracer8218]

Mclaren may have sorted out their PU reliability issues but they seem underpowered as I don't think they went over 325kph during the 2 weeks of testing

 

[GTPorsche]

That data is most likely skewed due to teams sending cars out with very low downforce, low fuel, softer tires, etc.

 

[Speedracer8218]

That data is most likely skewed due to teams sending cars out with very low downforce, low fuel, softer tires, etc.

Yea I know, it just seems McLaren was hesitant to push the car at all

 

[GTPorsche]

What's the point of pushing the car to speed they'll only see at Monza?

 

[sems4arsenal]

Testing recap, Merc and Ferrari still top dogs, no clue if Ferrari have caught up but I don't think it's there yet. No Team will be awful so mid to rear battles should be fun, Mclaren still no where near close to the top.

 

[Peter.]

Understatement of the century when they said they were having brake by wire "issues", that looks a bit more than just as issue!

 

[[Nor]MclarenF1]

Understatement of the century when they said they were having brake by wire "issues", that looks a bit more than just as issue!

Looks like a brown pants moment.