And The Top Overtaker In F1 For 2011 Is...

As I've said before, *next* year!......

We're turning into regular gambling addicts - Two bets now;

- Mike finishes ahead of the Young Lad
- Kimi outpoints Romeo

All adds to the interest!

Cheers,
Ian

 

I'm with you Ian, I will go as far as saying we may even see Michael win a race next season, and I have a feeling that Kimi will blow RG into the weeds.

 

I do hope so!

Question then becomes if Merc do a good job, which of 'em will win first?

I've gotta be honest, young Nico continues to surprise me - I honestly believed he'd be blown away by the Old Man.

Fpiloto (bless him! ) continues to find odd sector times etc where's he quicker, but bottom line remains WDC points......

Cheers,
Ian

 

I agree. I think most people don't think of the fact that Kimi HAS been driving race cars during his time away from F1, unlike MS had been. Plus his time away has been a bit shorter and he's younger. I have pretty high expectations for the Kimster to be honest.

 

+1

He's certainly quick enough. And a winner. And the undisputed #1 on the team - Romeo would do well to pay attention IMO [Although, before someone notes it *again*, I said the same about Michael & Nico, so what the hell do I know?! ]

If his heads into it, and I believe it is and he's realized, as RP noted, "he was put on this planet to drive an F1 car" then he could do very, very well....... He's kind of like Fred - Take an average car and wring its neck to get the best from it.

With hindsight, his success came a little too early and too big. Add in legendary Ferrari politics and he'd had enough. I believe he may be able to do a "mini Michael" at Lotus......

Cheers,
Ian

 

Did anyone notice that the stat was compiled by Mercedes GP?

 

Yep. They're clutching at straws

 

It is a sad time when that is your most relevant stat.

 

It's other things too though. Michael is regularly quicker on average race lap times. Michael holds off quicker cars. Michael passes (Nico being passed by those he had been passed by in '11 is inexcuseable). Michael's qualy pace is the only thing keeping him from being ahead in the points as he is clearly the superior racing driver. I believe much of his qualy pace is due to him setting up for race pace rather than qualy pace as W02 was a car which behaved very differently due to the high CoG fuel tanks. Nico's setup was just a bit different but he actually suffered on race pace in comparison. I don't know, maybe Nico believed he would rather qualy higher and suffer a bit of race pace in the name of not having to battle with traffic and passin issues.

Not a big deal to me. A 4th place team is a 4th place team and the statistics are difficult to get anything out of as so much is due to circumstance of other cars and traffic.
It was a good season for Michael and he has every reason to continue to deserve an F1 seat which is pretty much what everyone was looking for out of him this year. His Canada drive was one of his best ever. Had it continued to rain it would have been Monza '09 all over again. DRS didn't help either.......Thus is life.

 

No question that Kimi will drive circles around the salad bar.

As for a win by MS: I doubt it. Podium seems more likely.

My prediction is that RB will continue to dominate while MB and Renault will continue to suck. Overall the competition will be closer though: McLaren and Ferrari will be duelling more with RB.

 

MB is definitely up in the air. It could go either way. Same thing for Ferrari. RB I am sure will not be as dominant as their entire solid rear end based design paradigm is changing for '12. '12 has lower and shorter noses which means less air being directed under and around the car not to mention the exhaust changes being the biggest change. About the only thing that will remain the same are the diff and wings and the wake pattern they provide. I suspect front suspension design will go pullrod for one of the top teams and I bet it will be Ferrari, and I bet anything they will have serious issues getting it right especially if they are trying to hydraulically connect it to the rear. Just remember Newey has designed some really terrible cars in the past when the rules change the way things must be done. Plenty

I believe Mclaren could be 'the' team next year. And if Ferrari fail to 'do it' next year then they won't for quite a while. MB has an all-star line up and will learn a lot next year and I am sure will perform better but I have no idea how much.

W02 needed one thing: a longer wheelbase to take care of CoG issues and that would have eliminated the 1-1.5 second gap to the front. The CoG issue absolutely killed that car and its internal packaging which in-turn killed things like sidepods and cooling which took them 6 races to figure out with unfortunately Michael being the one who suffered the most from.


One thing was for sure though, NO ONE, not one single team saw the same benefit that Red Bull saw from the EBD, which they designed their entire car around. If all things were equal regarding EBS efficiency I believe Mclaren had 'the' car of the field followed by RB and Ferrari who would be very closely matched. RB definitely saw a minimum of .3 over the rest of the field with their EBD efficiency. The car was designed almost as a snow shovel wedge it was so efficient.

 

Who here predicted Felipe vs Kimi and the end result. I will not be so quick to judge Grosjean vs Kimi.
Kimi has been outperformed before. Won a title equally lost by LH vs won by Kimi.
Kimi is the newcomer. Grosjean is managed by Boullier. He is fighting an uphill battle to put it mildly. He has zero experience with the new tires or rules. Grosjean has experience. WRC is not quite F1, and yes it is good he was racing(Kimi) no matter. GP2 is more like F1.

The press about Kimi from the principal of Genii is a bit hedged at best. They know his past and he is a risk. A good driver but he hardly has done what Alonso did at Ferrari in terms of dominance and team leadership.

After 5 races and he has not mastered the car or his team mate do you think he will last his contract? He certainly has taken a pay cut I would imagine.

Ferrari was happy to pay him to leave. The environment he left has not changed in terms of the press and its ability to transmit data/make rumor etc. Frankly is worse.

 

Agreed, plus now that Petrov won't be racing (hopefully) his chances of avoiding contact have increased tenfold!

 

Yes, he can still drive.

Yes, he needs a better car.

But the facts are that his junior teammate finished higher in the points than him and if my memory serves me correctly outqualified him as well.

Michael, for as a great a driver as he was, has tarnished his reputation by coming back into the sport. Sure, it's been good for ticket sales and internet debates....... but the people that are new to the sport and didn't see him drive in his hayday only have his current drives to judge him by.


And to the point of the OP, or at least the article quoted, it's easy to make passes when you start toward the back of the field.

 

Looks at faster racing laps, fastest racing laps, holding off quicker cars, and there is no comparison to Nico. The truth of the matter is if Michael even finished the same number of races Nico finished Michael would be well ahead. The problem is Michael is a very aggressive driver and he is making some mistakes during race laps and other times idiot young drivers (Petrov, Perez) just plain take him out because they're idiots. Stats from a 4th place team are too circumstantial to do any good most of the time especially in this case. MB and the entire Brackley team know who their top driver is, and it's not Nico. Nico is a good qualifier and decent starter and rarely is anyone other than Michael challenging from behind. This is where his success come from. Other than that, he is nothing special. How many times did Michael pass Nico and vice versa. Chew on that for a bit. Nico never ever, not once, could he get a position back from Michael once Michael passed.

 

The truth is spoken.

 

Ok, I'm lazy so this may not be accurate but I looked at the first four races of the year and Nico's fastest lap was quicker than Michael. The end of the year may prove otherwise.

Maybe so.... he's had more practice holding off quicker cars (and drivers). And why is that?

I'll give you that one.

Yep. He is aggressive. And part of that sucks.... when he took other drivers to the edge of the track. That showed an act of desperation (in my opinion).

No doubt. Never, ever thought otherwise. But history is full of teams where the number one driver is outclassed by their teammate.

Can't answer that as I have no idea where to get those stats. But I'll take your word for it.




I seem to have struck a nerve with my opinion of Michael. I'm sorry it doesn't agree with your opinion. I will respect your opinion, even though it's wrong


Don't get me wrong, I think Michael is talented, but not as talented as he once was. I also think he brings much more to the team than Nico. His ability to develop the car for one. I can only assume Michael is much better at that than Nico.

 

Haha. Thanks for the reply. Yeah it's definitely a debated topic. In the end though, this proves the naysayers who said he would do just as poorly if not worse this season than he did the previous season. There were some heavy hitting naysayers too, ex-world champions and the like.


And regarding Nico holding off quicker cars. Nico has had good starts where he has gotten the jump on Mclarens, Ferrari's and the like and he has never been able to hold them off for more than a couple turns.

The racing lap bit vs Nico. There is a really good website which decodes every race of the season showing every lap time and compares it to any driver on the field. What Michael is known to do is be a ten or two behind Nico the first around 15-20 laps of a race, and then Michael's pace goes through the roof the second half to the tune of .5-.8 and sometimes a full second quicker. This is clearly a difference in setup between the two. Nico was also much harder on the rear tires this year.

I'm thinking Nico's style is a bit of a mix of Michael with the sharp front end and any dirt track racer. Nico can really kick the tail out and still be quick.

 

As FP mentioned, it's a long and continuing debate that keeps us occupied during these dreary months.

I too am a *huge* Michael fan [he cost me two bottles of wine over the past two seasons, damnit!] but *nobody* sees a silver lining like FP! - Dig deep enough into the stats, and you'll always find something to support "your man".......

Cheers,
Ian
PS - I have yet more wine on the line next season too - He'll get there!......

 

I love Ian. W03 can't be released quick enough

 

Indeed. Haven't they already said they're going to miss the first test again though? - That I don't like - You've gotta be out there on day one IMO - Forget hiding stuff and sandbagging, there isn't enough test time these days. And we know Michael loves testing more than almost anything......

Cheers,
Ian

 

I see two positions to this. The first being what you mentioned, and the second being the approach which involves getting a baseline on the new tires and only after having this knowledge sticking them on the new ride which is what Mclaren and RB like to do.

They tested W02 in waves of new parts which was definitely just a bad idea because they could not quite get the setup correct with all the new bits in Aus.

We'll see how it works out. I think it was good they were mentioning this very early though. If they would have mentioned the new car not being at the first test a week or two prior to the first test then all the naysayers would come out in droves and insist something is awry at MB. This way they are stating their intentions as a strategy rather than as a necessity which is the perception it would give if they mentioned it later. Also, if they do have something crazy clever then no one will be able to eyeball it until THEY say so. Remember RB7 constantly being surrounded by people hiding the rear end in the beginning? Sandbagging aside, they need to test the thing.


Which bring me to the other point. They saved almost all their wind tunnel testing hours alloted to them from '11 meaning they probably already have W03 in the tunnel more than anyone else has their ride in the tunnel. And then W03 will have the '12 hours on top of that. No one else saved wind tunnel testing hours for those curious.

 

does that mean he no longer has 7 titles?

Poor Michael....tarnished, tarnished.

In 10 years time he'll still be Michael, 7 times WDC.

lol..maybe 8

 

Even Michael has said that in interviews.

 

Nope... he still has them. And he still will in ten years.

Are you seriously not able to see the difference in getting out of a/the sport at the top of your game as apposed to continuing past your prime.

Brett Favre comes to mind.



Please take these comments as friendly banter.....