Sorry but Schumacher has and remains Vettel's idol and very close dear friend, not just of Michael but of Michael's entire family. I'm not saying Vettel will absolutely jump to MB but if you think Schu has not coached/talked to/helped Vettel and his self-management choices you are absolutely out-of-your mind. If Vettel sees promise in going to MB, he will go but only if it is worth his while and there is potential. Remember, at first Schu did not want to go to Ferrari but others convinced him and the rest is history. No driver would recommend a WDC heading to a non-competitive team unless there was something happening that were really special or they had no other choice. Could Vettel do the same for MB as Schu did for Ferrari? I suppose if the funding and personel at MB is right anything is possible. I don't really care either way. He's a great driver and will do well wherever he is and I could care less what team he is at. However I would like to see him with a suitable teammate. But don't for one moment believe Vettel doesn't have a ton of help from those closest to him that he occasionally pulls from. I don't believe we will see him at another team until the new engine regs come into play anyway
I love this quote above. Can you imagine 5-6 years ago anyone saying RB would be the dominant team.....ever??? Saying Red Bull would be the top team would be like someone today saying Force India or The Clowns for Outer Space team would be dominant. Could anyone in 1991 believe Ferrari would win multip WDC and WCC in less than 10 years time??? No, people believed Ferrari was a name and were stuck in the dark ages. All this talk about, "that was for pleasing the board of directors" and, "Brawn has to answer to the board" is so incredibly biased it's laughable. You think Ferrari doesn't have to answer to someone for this season? Come on. For every big desk there is an even bigger more powerful desk. Every year Ferrari threatens to leave F1 but never do. I love them dearly but I am tired of their BS rhetoric and dogmatic mentality. The difference with MB is that they just got here and the board actually wants to wipe the floor with everyone just the same as RB wanted to. They are hungry and you will owe me a case
Obviously I don't know either of them, but any time I've seen them having any interaction, that's certainly the impression I've been left with.
Seb had posters of Schu in his bedroom practically his entire life. Schu met him first when Seb was 10 and kept regular contact with the family and him when he was older. They are like family
Looking at the pre-2009 Red Bull seasons is like looking at Force India.....only worse. Their cars were consistently placing 13-14 and retired due to some problem or other all the time. They retired more races than they actually finished. It's so laughable now that they are incredibly dominant. Makes me chuckle.
Pre-2009 Red Bull was also the time pre Vettel. You can make a similar observation e.g. with Williams pre 78/79. I take it you're trying to build an argument in response to my prediction MB will never build a WDC winning car. Well, here is how I summarize that scenario: RBR came from mediocrity to dominance MB turned a WDC winnning car into a midfield car The main difference between RBR and MB is that RBR is a successful independant team whereas MB is another big corporation exercise like Toyota, BMW etc. RBR will not always be at the top (look where Williams is now), but for the foreseeable future chances are they stay there.
The Brawn GP car was not the dominant car by the end of the season. They were about 3rd by the end of the season (behind RB5 and Mclaren) and they had not the means to develop W01 they way it should have been developed. Many people were old BAR/Honda people and the year of W01 was essentially a year of cleaning house. Brawn GP01 was a stroke of luck because of the DDD otherwise it was not a remarkable car once everyone else figured out the technology. RB5 was the car to have and they further evolved that car with RB6 and the rest is of course history. RB is the same corporate team as any other team and are only as good as the people who are working for them. The same can be said for anything business. RB shot from back of the pack to the front with the RB5 and 'figured it out' I suppose is the best way to describe it. This can happen with any team who have the right people. Ferrari figured it out and developed the crap out of last year's car due to a horrendous previous year. Williams is in their position because they don't have the right people and are hiring and firing people like crazy lately. They just hired a couple major players a couple days ago but they won't be out of the woods for a couple years is my guess. MB has all the players required as of late last year and early this year: Bob Bell, Brawn, Toshi Iguchi the suspension guy (from Mclaren, BMW sauber, Toyota, hired November '10) meaning they probably have a couple years to go but they have the required elements for sure. How is this any different than RB a couple years ago? Confused.
+1 but I think this is why RBR will stay on top is the fact that they do not operate like a big corporation. One guy is calling the shots instead of dealing with all the corporate bureaucratic BS. Kind like how Ferrari is.
Not to be too off-topic in a RB discussion, but you think Brawn is hesitant about calling shots or has to discuss shots for his team for fear of the MB board? That's stretching a ton there, especially since you have decided to throw MB under the bus as another Toyota or Honda. If Toyota and Honda taught is anything it's that it doesn't matter how much $$$$ you throw at a team, you will not win without the right people. Those two threw money good after bad like no one's business which doesn't sound very, "I have to please the board" to me, but rather it was the board opening the monetary flood gates until they won. Which eventually they didn't and had to pull out. MB is taking a different approach in that Brawn is calling the shots and he actually knows what he's doing as he has won many many times already. If some green unexperienced fellow were running the team I would be inclined to agree with you, but it's just not being run that way. It's being run the exact same way RB was run in their early years. Highly experienced people with good backing.
Haug is calling all the shots. Even though Brawn is running the team any decision he makes he still has to have Haug and Mercedes approve it. At Ferrari it wasn't like that for Brawn or Jean Todt. The ultimate decision came down to them.
But my point is the team isn't being run by people who don't know what they're doing. If they tell the board they require 'X' to win or be more successful, they have credibility and know of what they speak. Why would the MB board shut the door on their endeavors if they have made it clear they want to win? If that's the case, then why would the great Mercedes Benz, who swore off of racing many many years ago even bother to get involved in F1 if they were simply going to stonewall some of the best players F1 has ever known? That position doesn't make sense and does not fit in their game plan. Ferrari answers to Fiat for resources the same way all other teams have to answer to someone. With Honda and Toyota, if anything those companies respective boards provided the teams with entirely too much free reign as they spent everyone under the table and got nowhere. I still don't understand how MB is like Honda/Toyota. All Honda/Toyota did was say, "YES" to everything but they did NOT have the right people running the team. Honda/Toyota was not a crazy corporate environment for that one reason that they did say yes to anything and everything the team wanted. The problem was they didn't have the right people running the show! MB stonewalling would be them not allowing massive staffing changes, a new state-of-the-art simulator which is even more advanced than Mclaren's (MB's is not quite completed yet), free reign over Stuttgart staff designated for the F1 program, and the list goes on. Resisting the obvious here is futile. And the obvious is that they are a future WCC team. Ferrari is great and I am sure they will do well but if anything their resources are more in-check than what MB has seen lately due to their rebuilding of Chrysler and wanting to be a more world class car maker. If you noticed earlier in the year they stated the off-season was all about producing the same result by way of being more most cost-effective. Smart and that's how everyone should think, but it's not really something I would expect from Ferrari. It could be fluff-talk for all we know. Matschitz went to Newey and told him to win, and Newey said it will take time and huge amounts of cash, and it did, but the point is Mateschitz had the wherewithall to hire people who know what was required to win and gave them a means to do so. Same with MB only Brawn had to clean house and rehire the best available people to make it happen, and he has as of early this year.
pretty soon we will see how good he really is. he will be driving a kia cee'd, at least that's what i heard.
hahahahahahahaha. I expect the race to certainly be less of Red Bull placing Seb's car into 'automatic' or 'cruise control' for sure. I am really seeing an unbalanced car under braking and a car with far less rake carrying much less speed into corners, but still carrying more out of corners.
Which means it will be a wet track and the time completely meaningless. Every time TopGear has a super driver or super car it is wet ...and if it is not wet they discount the time because the car is too low or some other BS PS: I'm a big TG fan but they should take that comparison more serious and honest
