GPWizard F1 Forum
F1 News & Discussions => F1 Teams => Topic started by: Jericoke on August 27, 2017, 07:31:38 PM
-
With the Ferrari pair under contract, as well as RBR and Hamilton, the most desirable race seat for 2018 would seem to be Hamilton's partner at Mercedes.
I think that Bottas has more than proven he has the talent to be a winner and the temperament to be Hamilton's teammate and should be a lock for the spot.
However, both Alonso and Verstappen have said they're unhappy with their current teams and want to go somewhere more reliable. If they're serious with their threat, I can't see them swapping seats if they're leaving for the same reason. To me that means they're both angling for the open seat at Mercedes.
There seems to be a consensus that Alonso is still one of the best, and would be a WDC in a better car. There's also plenty of talk of Max being a future champion. That would give Mercedes plenty of options. If I were Mercedes, I'd use this logjam to see who wants it the most: put out a lowball offer. I don't think that picking any of the three would be 'wrong', so why not take the most affordable option?
-
I like what you said in chat Jeri, (slightly paraphrased) if I was a driver looking for the best drive next year, I would look at whatever team Alonso was leaving. If Alonso leaves, Mclaren will be a winner in the next couple of years. :DD :DD
-
Maybe karma is paying Alonso back for that Singapore
win he didn't deserve. Karma is paying Mav back for being a jerk
-
Karma is paying Max back
That's my guess too.
-
Can't see Merc changing anything for next season, Bottas has done enough to keep his seat.
I've heard Williams is making a big time play for Alonso next term.
-
I think Merc will keep Bottas, too. It looks like a textbook case of, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."
Alonso made a radio call during yesterday's race. "There's only one car out here I can pass. I'll do it, but it won't change my life." I really can't see him staying at Merc next year. If I were to predict which team he will end up with next season, my guess would be Williams or Andretti. Andretti's loss of Sato to Rahal-Letterman-Lanigan for next season makes them even more likely to want Alonso.
-
Maybe karma is paying Alonso back for that Singapore
win he didn't deserve. Karma is paying Mav back for being a jerk
I tend to disagree...i think he did deserve that Singapore win. Maybe karma is paying Alonso back, however it's not cause of the Singapore win :P
-
Piquet crashing on purpose is pushing team order
to the extreme. No matter how he portrays himself now
he's still the put yourself number one he has alway been
-
That order came from Flavio Briatore, not Alonso.
-
That order came from Flavio Briatore, not Alonso.
I don't recall Alonso saying I can't be a part of this
it's unsporting. What I do remember is the look on
Piquet's face....and it wasn't a happy face.
-
One thing with all the contracts getting tied up is where will crybaby Max go? With the doors closed at Merc and Ferrari, and Alonso clambering for a good drive next year, Horner likely won't put up with Max's threats to leave very much longer. He'll be telling him to move on and don't let the door hit you on the way out.
-
One thing with all the contracts getting tied up is where will crybaby Max go? With the doors closed at Merc and Ferrari, and Alonso clambering for a good drive next year, Horner likely won't put up with Max's threats to leave very much longer. He'll be telling him to move on and don't let the door hit you on the way out.
[/q
Maybe Max has never heard the saying don't burn
your bridges. While he's having a run of bad luck
it's still one of the best rides. Maybe he'd best start
buying his mechanics presents just in case he p*ssed
one off in the past
-
One thing with all the contracts getting tied up is where will crybaby Max go? With the doors closed at Merc and Ferrari, and Alonso clambering for a good drive next year, Horner likely won't put up with Max's threats to leave very much longer. He'll be telling him to move on and don't let the door hit you on the way out.
RBR likes to hire from within their driver training programme, mostly to prove it works I suppose. IS there another Red Bull driver ready to replace Max? By now I think it's safe to say that Max is outdriving Kvyat, and I'm not especially impressed by Sainz.
Maybe Max has Marko over a barrel, which ties Horner's hands. Still not sure what he gains by whining about it though.
-
In the history of F1, there has been a number of driver pairings where one driver DNFs far more than the other. Is it always just down to luck? Maybe Max's more aggressive style somehow puts just enough extra strain on the car to break it?
-
Max needs to treat his car with the same respect he
shows the other drivers
-
Alonso wasn't in on the Briatore, Symonds, Piquet scam at Singapore in 2008. If there's any karma going around for him, it's to do with the way in which he has left teams, not for Singapore 2008.
Bottas will keep the second Mercedes seat. He has done a good job and has clearly improved team harmony, giving Mercedes an easier time from the point of view of driver management.
-
Here in the US you can be guilty by association :nono:
-
I think he was the getawaywithit driver ;)
-
Alonso wasn't in on the Briatore, Symonds, Piquet scam at Singapore in 2008.
I look upon this as case not proven rather than he knew nothing.
The Piquets might have many reasons not to implicate others, particularly Nando, in this murky episode.
There was also little incentive for Flavio or Pat to put anyone else in the frame - no gain at all for them.
-
We can speculate and go into conspiracy theories, but the evidence was that Alonso was not involved.
-
Max needs to treat his car with the same respect he
shows the other drivers
That would only make the problem worse, as he doesn't respect the other drivers at all...
While I am not convinced that Max is entirely to blame for the large number of mechanical issues, he does make a lot of errors in his driving, and the sort he makes tend to be the sort that damage cars.
Max is Helmut Marko's "golden boy" - he was hired into the group because Helmut believed him to be the epitome of what being a Red Bull driver is all about, and now neither of them are willing to accept any evidence that he is not. The Verstappens don't have Helmut over a barrel directly, but if Helmut's declarations are irrefutably proved wrong, he stands to lose a lot of face in the company and it would put his position as Dietrich Mateschitz's trusted consigliere at risk. Not because Max was proven wrong, but because the philosophy Helmut endorses and Max embodies had been proven wrong. Put simply, Helmut has too much pride, power and possibly even friendship on the line to replace Max voluntarily. Where Helmut goes, the entire Red Bull family is obliged to follow, due to the "my way or the highway" attitudes there.
Anyone else would have been removed from Red Bull entirely had they been kicked out of Toro Rosso mid-season, but the "golden boy" pride led to the welcome mat being issued to Red Bull instead, that would have been better given to Carlos Sainz (assuming it was even necessary to demote Daniil Kyvat - something of which I am not convinced, and ruined his career). Anyone else would have got into serious trouble for the number of pointless collisions Max has done.
As for Singapore 2008, I believe Fernando was deliberately kept in the dark about the nature of his "miracle". He really doesn't know how to keep a secret, and so if he had found out - or even suspected - there was skulduggery afoot, it would have been round the paddock before you could say "Not another spying incident!" Also, after feeling backstabbed by McLaren, there would have been the risk of Fernando simply reporting the whole thing to the FIA before or immediately after the cheating was enacted (remember his doing exactly that at the wrong moment for McLaren was what turned a close squeak into a bruising penalty). In short, Fernando is too loose a cannon for any cheater to have deliberately confided in him.
The only one who might have confided accidentally - Nelson Piquet Jr - was, I suspect, too intimidated by his team-mate to start casual conversation that was the least bit risky (we already know, from his own testimony, he was intimidated by the power of senior figures at Renault in general). If I recall correctly, Fernando wasn't in the room when Nelson initially came up with the ridiculous idea. So, however implausible it may seem, I think Fernando genuinely didn't know his win in Singapore 2008 had relied on dishonesty until he was informed of it by the FIA. (As for why he still insists his victory was fair... ...well, he didn't cheat himself and I've seen no evidence he knew, let alone contributed to, the cheat, so he's hardly going to renounce the validity of his win even if the rest of us think he is wrong...)
In the UK, guilt by association is not possible, but it is possible to be convicted of conspiracy to commit crime. This requires a higher level of intervention - either something not reported that should have been (which was why Witness X needed indemnity under the 2003 anonymity rule in order to safely report the incident almost a year later) or actual contribution to the planning or execution of a crime. Simply being in the same team, or even simply benefitting from the crime, is not enough (unless a corporate charge is laid on, which is not much help in a market as mobile as F1's).