Mercedes F1

2010 Abu Dhabi was bad strategy no doubt, and Dyer was unfairly roasted for it. Then Ferrari stunningly fired Costa, and a culture of fear was created. Boy, what I wouldn't give to have Costa building Ferrari cars again, and Dyer call the shots instead of Rueda.

Now? Ferrari has gone from a culture of fear, to a culture of incompetency being tolerated and harbored.

Todt and Brawn had the right balance. It was "Make the same mistake 2-3 times, and you're gone".

 

As usual you are 100% spot on. Not only did they lose Aldo, but what about the fact that when the Cars designed by James Allison put Seb in contention back in 2017 and 2018, and yet he left Ferrari for MBZ.

 

And the worst part is that had Allison stayed on and been TD, he would've no doubt done better than Binotto and developed the car better. But Vettel was up against Hamilton and Mercedes having Costa and then Allison, in addition to the HP advantage Mercedes had. Vettel never stood a chance.

Something with Ferrari's development when Binotto took over in 17'. The cars are also way too draggy as the season goes on.

 

Well, Allison left for the reasons he left. Bad luck.

 

The 2016 car was a failure.
And he was technical director in 2016.

 

The whole field was 50bhp below Mercedes from 14-16'. 15' Ferrari actually had a good car, but the power deficit to Mercedes was simply too big.

One thing that didn't happen under Costa or Allison was for the cars to get worse over the course of a season. They always made good development progress. Ever since Binotto was given the role of TD we've seen Ferrari fall off a cliff by summer, along with their title hopes.

The worst thing about Binotto's leadership is that his designs are reliant on loopholes in the rule book. First the fuel meter cheat, and now we discover the F175 was designed to rely on a flex-floor, which was closed in TD39. That's twice he's embarrassed Ferrari doing that.

 

The 2015 car won three races with Vettel.
I really doubt they could have won with 50 HP deficit.
This kind of deficit was true in 2014 because of our naïve dirigeants and the nonsense token System.
Absolutely agree about your Binotto comment.
So two things.
1/ We are the only one to be caught « cheating «
2/ Other « cheats » either but their political power let them free to do it without consequences ?

 

Everybody was short on power but the Ferrari of 2016 was worse than the Red Bull and comparetively worse than the Ferrari of 2015. It was a disappointment.

The second part is not accurate, Ferrari had problems mid season earlier. Actually everybody has problems to outdevelop Red Bull, and seeing their recent budget cap troubles, I'm figuring why.

 

https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/wolff-mercedes-lost-8-10-months-of-development-curing-2022-f1-car-problem/10396307/

Wolff: Mercedes lost 8-10 months of development curing 2022 F1 car problem
Mercedes thinks it lost up to 10 months of development time with its current Formula 1 challenger because of early-season porpoising problems.


By: Jonathan Noble
Co-author: Luke Smith
Nov 7, 2022, 2:49 PM


The German manufacturer has endured a tricky season with the W13, which suffered a lot early on from excessive bouncing.

It took several months for Mercedes to understand the factors that were at play and implement car tweaks that have helped Lewis Hamilton and George Russell make progress over the second half of the campaign.

But while it was able to get on top of the porpoising, its chances of beating Red Bull for a race win have not been helped by the fact its car is still lacking a bit of pace.

The team was also hurt by not being able to work on performance upgrades until it had cured its issues, meaning it fell away from the frontrunners.

Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff reckons that his squad is still playing catch-up now, which will not make it easy to be back in the hunt for victories from the start of 2023.

"We believe that we understand where the gap comes from," he said when asked if he felt that Red Bull's early advantage with F1's new 2022 rules would put it in good stead for years to come.

"They will carry over some of their sweetness in the car, and we've maybe lost eight to 10 months in terms of development because we couldn't figure out what was wrong. So there's definitely a challenge.

"But we're playing the long game here, all of us. Both drivers are playing the long game, the team. The judge around the team, of performance, is not based on a single year or weekend. It's how we have been able to win championships over the long term."

 

Before, Mercedes was very good at redressing a situation, and throwing money at a problem.

But with the budget cap, I am not so sure.

 

I think an inequity of the budget cap is stagnant competition. You do not attain a good profile at the start and then no hope for significant improvement = LIMIT competition. Thats just a touch counter-productive to GOOD racing, I think. That applies to the entire grid.

 

Yes, you are right, the budget cap is stifling competition.

Nobody will ever convince me that limiting testing and development is beneficial to F1.

 

And I still don't understand what problem the budget cap was meant to address. If a team can't afford to finance a competitive car they can drop out of the circuit and be replaced by a team with deeper pockets or partner with a richer entity. The same thing goes for the grid penalties- if a team wants to put a new motor in the car every race why not let them do it. We want to see racing at the highest level and don't care about "leveling the field".

 

This !!

 

It's mostly artificial.

Haas spend what, 120 million or so last year? That pays for everything...their salaries, development (or lack there off), travel, catering, everything, the lot.

Mercedes spend 330 million, and if we are meant to believe the fia, spend 145 million on car development and the remaining 185m on bose headsets and tables.

The point is...the big teams still spend an enormous amount more than the little teams because they haven't got more money. They haven't got 145 million for car development, and another 85 million for Gunther Steiners' swearjar.

RB, Ferrari, Mercedes, they spend a little bit less on development but it's a drop in the ocean. Nothing.

 

Including engines? Engines are not included in the budget cap. Neither the salaries of the best paid employees, and you can bet Lewis Hamilton is expensive and Toto Wolff a greedy son of a *****.

 

That was excluding engines, engines was another 160 or so million USD in development.

So call it 500 million

 

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Hamilton looking forward to never driving Mercedes W13 F1 car again
Lewis Hamilton says he is looking forward to not having to drive the troubled Mercedes W13 again after next week’s Pirelli Formula 1 tyre test.

"So kind of reminiscent of some of the previous races before kind of Austin, and bouncing is back. So that's not been easy."

Asked what the team needs to address with next year’s car, he made it clear that there is more than one weakness with the W13.

“Brakes, bouncing is probably number one, drag is probably number two,” he said. “Or equal number one. There's loads of other things.

https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/hamilton-looking-forward-to-never-driving-mercedes-w13-again/10402648/

 

Maybe Seb see's something in Russell?

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The road leading into the Mercedes F1 factory pays tribute and has been named to an F1 legend.

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RtR!

 

Russell represents excellent value, points per $$. Time for a salary review at Mercedes ?

 

George did pretty good with it.

 

Toto should low ball Lewis. Seriously where else would he go?