You guys must be delusional if you think MB can suddenly turn things around so quickly in 2-3 months. They "looked good" in last year's test, as well as the year before and look where that got them lol. Unless every other top team car consistently bursts into flames or taken out by the Grosjean/loldonado effect I don't see MB contending for the wdc...winning a race or two maybe, especially in the first half of the season when teams are trying to figure out Pirelli's new compounds which seem to fall off the cliff even sooner.
Yup. Really got me last year and cost me many points in our F1 pool for stupidly believing in the Mercedes hype. Only won the pool championship on the very last race by just half a point (I'm the Vettel of arm chair racers, you know ).
Am in Geneva. Saw this today. Will be interesting to see the hype around in Stuttgart this week. Possibly contact 'Andi' in Boeblingen for an update.
Everyone knew going into the season that w03 had tire issues, very one just hoped they would fix the issue. They did at certain tracks but not really. The issue was the suspension system was simply too complicated which is one of the things Also Costa reportedly simplified. Also, W03s only band aid for tire performance was in the form of ruining their aerodynamics as well, they had to raise front ride height, less wing angle, it was terrible what they had to do to that car just so the tires would last a bit longer. So, W03 had a lot more downforce than people give it credit, the team simply had to dial it back a large amount in the name of tires which is sad. W04 is easier on tires now and has half again as much rear downforce as W03, and with this car they can dial it all in thanks to Costa. MB have done a wonderful job but I can't choke down the preseason hype until I see how they are competing come halfway through the season. If they are still competing for podiums and wins then I know they will really have their team together and Lewis/MB will win championships
MB are getting just what they want in having the most talked about team and teammates of the season. No such thing as bad publicity.
Well that's a lot of delusional folk eating crow then. It's not too long till we find out who will be getting there first serving of it.
Fixed. I'm sorry, but with this team I really have to see it to believe it. Can't blame me after 2/3 years of empty promises.
It's a fair point Bas, I hope they do well though I do not want to see Merc pull the plug on F1 to be honest.
True. More teams the better. I'm hoping for a competitive Kimi/Massa/Vettel though, with Kimi taking it...I don't know how many came back to F1 and bagged another wdc. Can't be many...So far only Lauda spings to mind!
Past isn't always precedent, otherwise Red Bull would still be Minardi or Jaguar (or whichever team they replaced). Teams figure it out over time. I agree that it remains to be seen if Mercedes has somehow figured it out, but there seems to be a lot of significant names in F1 who believe that they have.
It was simply maddening watching the prior half-committed efforts from other big auto manufacturers. They might have a couple good people running things, occasionally a decent driver, but never did any of them give it an honest all-in effort with the right people. Rather than get the right people, they would throw massive sums of cash at the issue which solves nothing. Honda developed bgp001 but it was too late. Now Mercedes are getting on the right foot and have great people with them so they have a real opportunity to do something special. I certainly hope they do as I can see nothing better for the sport. It just kills me that it appears the car is finally right but Schumacher is gone.....
True, but that car was way ahead of the competition....I don't think anyone is going to be that dominant this year, thank goodness.
+1. And IF the Merc is a dominant force this year, you can bet your ass that Hamilton fanboys are going to claim it's all because of him (even though Schumacher did the most of development work...). Thanks.
Don't worry...neither Schumacher nor Mercedes will ever amount to anything. Tifosi12 told me so, and I read it (over and over) on FerrariChat, so it must be true! lol
Why? That car was the best excuse you could possibly find in the past 3 years... BTW: Speaking of. Here a picture from today at Valencia. SPEEDWEEK - Michael Schumacher: Er fährt bereits in Valencia! Image Unavailable, Please Login
Obvious reasons, he came back to F1 and was never given a fair shake to be competitive. His car was a crutch, and now the fruits of 3 years of his development work is being capitalized by others. 2007 all over again. It was sort of like Prost going to Williams and immediately winning a championship.
MS was never given a fair shake due to MB's sheer incompetence. MB stepped into the team that had been defending WDC and WCC the previous year; its not like they had to build a backmarker team into a winner. Timimg is everything and it appears that Costa may have righted the ship (finally!) and nico n Hammy will reap the benefits. If I were running MB and Costa has in fact built a winner, people who have been there prior to Costa's arrival would be sacked.
True, but there are also LH fans who realize that F1 existed before LH showed up and they are true f1 fans. We (all true F1 fans) all know that LH put as much into developing the W04 as I did. Then again, it's his-and Nico's-job to drive the car, not design it.
Just to set the record straight, it was Brawn's shrinking of the team to a skeleton crew midway through their WCC season that sunk their ship. MB had nothing to do with it. Brawn thought everyone would be doing the same with the RRA, but the opposite happened. Brawn sold the team to MB and made a fortune and of course stayed on. Everyone important who had a hand in BGP001 basically remained, but very much in skeleton form. Loic Bigios was pretty much the only one who was of note though. MB buys the team, Jenny skips to Mclaren, Brawn has a 'come to Jesus talk' with Schumacher and who knows what was said but Schu was expecting to step into a car that could do something and that just wasn't the case. MB started building the team a little in 2010 but still not enough, then 2011 comes and they really start posting jobs, and 2012 comes and they're buying everyone under the sun similar to what Adrian Newey told Dede he (Red Bull) needed to do in 2007. So MB gets a plethora of genius designers to build their uber team, it took them a while to build up with the proper people but here we are. Let's see what they can do. I will however say this, If MB bumps a place in the WCC Ferrari could have had, then blood will be the price the Italians will insist upon for losing Aldo Costa. And it will be ugly.
