30 days to go!!!! Lets see your season predictions :)

wax · Feb 6, 2004

I see the infamous copycat wannabee ForzaFerrari blatantly copied my soon-to-be-champion spot-on prediction and changed #6 & #7 around. Trickery is eeeeeevillllllll.
As they say where ladies wear no pants, en garde!

96impalaSS · Feb 6, 2004

96impalaSS said:

1 Ferrari
2 McLaren
3 Renault<--------- Hope
4 Williams BMW
5 Jaguar
6 Jordan
7 Sauber
8 BAR
9 Toyota
10 Minardi
Click to expand...

I wish i could put McLaren at the bottom since I dislike them so much. But there to good and im trying to be realistic here.

daz355 · Feb 6, 2004

96impalaSS said:

I wish i could put McLaren at the bottom since I dislike them so much. But there to good and im trying to be realistic here.
Click to expand...

I think you will find that Mclaren will win both both constructors and drivers championships.Ferrari have been to conservative with their car.

beast · Feb 6, 2004

daz355 said:

Ferrari have been to conservative with their car.
Click to expand...

Being conservative may be just the ticket to winning a championship. Just because a team comes out with a radical new design does not result in domination on the track. I have see quite a few pictures of this years McLaren going thru corners with the driver correcting for a slide. It could be that they have reduced so much drag that they have also lost down force.

The First test at Firanio(SP?) was trouble free, for the F2004. The Imola tests have not been as reliable with Hydralic issues limiting running of the car. Ferrari Last year was about the fastet car in a straight line cosistantly, This says that the team had a very efficient Aero design. This year they went and improved the design, made the wheel base shorter, and made the engine more reliable.

In my opinion Ferrari is going to be the team that will be having all the others scratching there heads saying "Holy crud this looks like it is going to be a repeat of 2002"

Rob

beast · Feb 6, 2004

bostonmini said:

Guys Im terribly sorry as Im sure the topic has been covered, but do you think that Ferrari's strategy may have been to make aerodyn improvements because of the durability of a proven design otherwise? Arent the rules different this year (Im no expert) in that as the whole weekend needs to make the engine last, thus improve durability quite a bit eh? I think ferrari is the winner this year, it just feels right with Shuey still racing.
Click to expand...

You are correct that the rules state that the engine must last an entire weekend. If a team changes a motor the driver will lose 10 places on the grid. One other major change is to the rear wing reducing down force at the back of the car. Most teams have gone to large barn door style rear wings This brings the down force back but also creates a lot of drag so look for slower straight line speeds this year. Now one other item about extra drag is more stress on the engine. So the engine designers will have to do there homework to make sure that on high speed, high down force tracks that the motors can survive the added stress.

One other change that may throw so other teams off is the back to back qualifing sessions. where a driver goes out in points order does a flyer on empty tanks to determine the full tank qualifing slot. Then they run with full tanks again. Teams may have to employ weather spotters to check conditions 1 - 2 hours away from the track so that they can tell there drive to take a scenic cruise around the track light so that the can qualify heave on a dry track instead of ending up at the back of the grid because of a down pour at the end of the session.

I think Ferrari already employs this tactic. If you were at the USGP last year you could see near the north and north west vista stand that there was a helicopter in SF team colors flying back and forth in and out of the storm clouds.

So this year will be as interesting as last years but i think that Ferrari did there homework this time and will not have a disaster season like last years.

Rob

tifosi12 · Feb 6, 2004

Rob, weather spotters have been used by the big teams in F1 for years. There are some famous stories. Don't remember exactly, but I think one French GP was won by Williams (?) because they had the better spotters than Ferrari. Also Jordan comes to my mind for Spa.

JMJ575M · Feb 6, 2004

My spin on this question is that Ferrari knows that the F2003GA is much better than the Bridgestones allowed them to demonstrate last year. Hence only a refining of the 2003GA. And I think the tire war will be a lot closer this year than most people are talking. I'm pretty sure Bridgestone is not loafing. I'm not counting Ferrari out this year.

JMJ

stokpro · Feb 6, 2004

1 Ferrari
2 McLaren
3 Williams BMW
4 Renault
5 Toyota
6 BAR
7 Jaguar
8 Sauber
9 Jordan
10 Minardi

tifosi12 · Feb 6, 2004

Rob,

how about tallying up the lists and build an average?

GrigioGuy · Feb 6, 2004

1 Ferrari
2 Williams BMW
3 Renault
4 McLaren
5 Toyota
6 BAR
7 Sauber
8 Jaguar
9 Jordan
10 Minardi

This is assuming that Bridgestone puts together a decent tire this year. Otherwise Williams will win.

beast · Feb 6, 2004

tifosi12 said:

Rob,

how about tallying up the lists and build an average?
Click to expand...

Andreas;

Sounds like a plan but lets let it run a little bit longer first

Rob

beast · Feb 6, 2004

JMJ575M said:

My spin on this question is that Ferrari knows that the F2003GA is much better than the Bridgestones allowed them to demonstrate last year. Hence only a refining of the 2003GA. And I think the tire war will be a lot closer this year than most people are talking. I'm pretty sure Bridgestone is not loafing. I'm not counting Ferrari out this year.

JMJ
Click to expand...

JMJ;

The F2003-GA had some serious issues. One was a weight placement problem causing improper balancing of the chassis. The other was the fact that the wheel base was streched out. This made the car stable in high speed sweeping corners and a handful in tight corners.

The F2004 might look like a rehashed F2003-GA but Ferrari has applied the lessons that they learned from the F2003-GA.

Rob

JMJ575M · Feb 6, 2004

Yes, beast, it was obvious at the start of testing, even last year that the F-2003GA had a few issues. But I still think it was a better car than the Bridgestone's allowed it to show itself to be. We're saying the same thing about applying the lessons learned to the F-2004.

JMJ

Bart · Feb 6, 2004

Last year I saw my first Formula Grand Prix in Melbourne. Gee, I liked it. The sad thing is I cannot go back this year, as my brother-in-law is not having a good time.

The good thing is I have found the Formula One thing, which I like.

wax · Feb 7, 2004

So far...
"Totals" next to Team name are somewhat akin to Golf scores
________________|_1st_|_2nd_|_3rd_|_4th_|5th_|6th_|7th_|_8th_|_9th_|_10th_|
Ferrari: 19________|_11_|__4__| ("2nd" aka the Gang of Four - to be tried for treason)
Williams BMW: 40__|_2__|__4__|__6__|_3__|
McLaren: 41______|_2__|__5__|__3__|_5__|
Renault: 50_______|____|__2__|__6__|_7__|
Sauber: 94_______|____|_____|_____|____|_2__|__8__|__4__|_1__|
Toyota: 94_______|____|_____|_____|____|_4__|_5___|__4__|_2__|
BAR: 103_________|____|_____|_____|____|_4__|_3___|__2__|_3__|__3__|
Jaguar: 111_______|____|_____|_____|____|_2__|____|__5__|_6__|__2__|
Jordan: 122_______|____|_____|_____|____|_1__|_2__|_____|_3__|__9__|
Minardi: 150______|____|_____|_____|____|____|____|_____|____|_____|_15__|
________________|_1st_|_2nd_|_3rd_|_4th_|5th_|6th_|7th_|_8th_|_9th_|_10th_|

ze_shark · Feb 7, 2004

beast said:

The F2003-GA had some serious issues. One was a weight placement problem causing improper balancing of the chassis. The other was the fact that the wheel base was streched out. This made the car stable in high speed sweeping corners and a handful in tight corners.

The F2004 might look like a rehashed F2003-GA but Ferrari has applied the lessons that they learned from the F2003-GA.
Click to expand...

It will be interesting to see what Sauber squeezes out of their F2003-GA clone with the 2004 engine. I'd assume that Sauber (and Massa) knows as well as Ferrari what was imperfect in the 2003-GA, so they might have improved it too.

I don't see Renault as far up in the rankings as the others. Brand new engine architecture with the challenge of the 1 engine/week-end rule, I think we're going to see quite a bit of white smoke coming from the blue cars. Add Trulli's legendary 'luck' and all is left is Alonzo's grinta.

beast · Feb 7, 2004

ze_shark said:

It will be interesting to see what Sauber squeezes out of their F2003-GA clone with the 2004 engine. I'd assume that Sauber (and Massa) knows as well as Ferrari what was imperfect in the 2003-GA, so they might have improved it too.
Click to expand...

The strange thing about the Sauber is that it is almost a F2003-GA clone. The Sauber has almost the same dimensions of the F2003-GA While the F2004 is a much shorter and narrower car. Un fortunatly is Sauber makes changes to the car to bring its wheelbase back to where the F2004 they will have to buils an net chassis and get it crash tested before it can race.. That would cost lots of $$$.

So in my opinion Sauber will struggle at some tracks and may run better at others. The largest change will be for the team in terms of set up since they went from a "Twin Keel" chassis to a "Single Keel" this year.

Rob

tifosi12 · Feb 7, 2004

beast said:

The strange thing about the Sauber is that it is almost a F2003-GA clone. The Sauber has almost the same dimensions of the F2003-GA While the F2004 is a much shorter and narrower car. Un fortunatly is Sauber makes changes to the car to bring its wheelbase back to where the F2004 they will have to buils an net chassis and get it crash tested before it can race.. That would cost lots of $$$.

So in my opinion Sauber will struggle at some tracks and may run better at others. The largest change will be for the team in terms of set up since they went from a "Twin Keel" chassis to a "Single Keel" this year.

Rob
Click to expand...

It isn't that strange if you think about the development cycle of F1 cars: They are designed before the halfway point in the season. Basically just after the 2003GA came out. Sauber knew they would use Ferrari's engine and gearbox, that made it halfway the Ferrari car whether they wanted that or not.

Aside from that their wind tunnel just opened, so they couldn't use it yet for the design of this year's car, hence the conservative copycat approach. They did state though, that their car will have aero mods throughout the year now that they can actually test in the wind tunnel (they could before, but not in their own tunnel, which made it a hassle and less precise).

As far as the Renault is concerned: Some people see it as the 'secret' WC contender. I wouldn't go that far, but I'm quite certain Alonso will repeat his victory feat this year.

Gilles27 · Feb 7, 2004

Let's see, my predictions for the 2004 season:

--Mc Laren will be a strong contender.

--Coulthard won't

--Ralf, obviously self-conscious of the Williams' homely appearance,
will continue to pretend that Montoya doesn't rattle him.

--Rumours of his sexual orientation will re-surface.

--Rubens will continue to believe that he can beat Michael. And that
if it were even possible, the team would allow him to do so.

--Eddie Irvine will show up, probably in Monaco, and make his annual
inane comments criticizing the talent of various drivers. Fortunately,
they will only be heard by Danny Sullivan and several hookers while
partying on Irvine's yacht.

--Damon Hill will do an interview with Autosport, during which he will
AGAIN question Michael Schumacher's talent and reluctance to retire.

--Heidi Klum will put down any rumours of her intention to marry
Flavio, much to his approval.

--Eddie Jordan will announce he found a new sponsor, but ultimately
turned down the $100 million offer so that he didn't have
to share equal billing in the team's name.

--Mark Webber will work hard with the Jaguar, continuing to carry
himself as a man among boys.

--Sauber and BAR are going to have some good battles.

And finally...

In a bizarre twist, a long-ago-reported-missing doctor from Indiana will surface, having recently escaped from capture. He will tell the world about how, years ago, a young Tony George was diagnosed as unstable and incapable of simple tasks and recommended for institutionalizing. It was at that point the doctor disappeared...

My god, I'm actually watching NASCAR!

tifosi12 · Feb 7, 2004

Absolutely brilliant Jack!

BTW: The rumours about Ralf have already started up again, I would say this time in his favour: Katie Pierce (Mrs Ex hot Jordan Playmate) claimed to have had a steamy relationship with Ralf for three years.

Don't ya lov' it?

Latest gossip: Hakkinen tips Raikkoenen for WC. At the same token the Mc Larens suffer reliability problems in their recent testing.

Gilles27 · Feb 7, 2004

Do you remember when Ralf had a toss with Jordan the model? I guess she didn't really give him high marks.

amenasce · Feb 7, 2004

Ferrari
Williams
Mc Laren
Renault
Sauber
Toyota
Jaguar
Jordan
Minardi

ferrari_kid · Feb 8, 2004

Ferrari
McLaren
Renault
Williams
Toyota
Sauber
BAR
Jag
Jordan
Minardi

i'm saying ferrari on top even though i have yet to see the b'stones really prove themsevles. i think the tires limited the F2003GA, so i if they get that together ferrari could win again. it would be a great end to schumi's last couple years.

the reason i put williams out of the top three is because, well i just don't like jpm, and i don't see the reliability in the new FW26. i'm hoping that renault pulls out enough wins to stay in the top three, even though i have a feeling it'll be more like last year. they'll be strong on a few select tracks and williams will probably end up top three anyway.

ze_shark · Feb 8, 2004

McLaren is said to be in trouble, there are already rumours of a MP4/19B being designed in emergency.

F1racer · Feb 8, 2004

Lets see..

1. Ferrari (MS world champion again and RB will have a strong season)
2. Williams (JPM will be have an average year but Ralf will have a BIG year)
3. McLaren (RK ...enough said)
4. Renault ( FA will be on podium more than last year)
5. Sauber (Fisichella and Massa ..great duo)
6. BAR (They're with Michelin this year)
7. Jaguar (I don't expect a big improvement compared to last year)
8. Toyota (They're getting better each year)
9. Jordan (Last year the car had terrible handling and the engine wasn't good)
10. Minardi (if they can get 1 or 2 points in the WCC , that will be great)

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