Formula 1 2020 - General Discussion Thread (See MOD warning on first post)

Anjobe

vectra wrote: »

Ah,
It is amazing how a smartar$e can only see what suits them.
How about you read the part I made in bold which is exactly the reason I hit the like button.



And yet again, Mr. Smartar$e highlighted the part to suit himself.
Like to read the part I agreed with by any chance?





Isn't it just. :rolleyes:

You need to actually read the posts and engage with the arguments rather than just trade silly insults.

The posts you thanked were putting forward an argument that the Mercedes performance increase this year can be regarded as suspicious that is predicated on the idea that Ferrari were correctly regarded as having been cheating based on their own performance increase during last year. As you have continually rejected any notion of Ferrari's cheating due to lack of evidence from the FIA, your support of this argument to raise suspicion against Mercedes without any evidence is completely hypocritical.

vectra

Anjobe wrote: »

You need to actually read the posts and engage with the arguments rather than just trade silly insults.

The posts you thanked were putting forward an argument that the Mercedes performance increase this year can be regarded as suspicious that is predicated on the idea that Ferrari were correctly regarded as having been cheating based on their own performance increase during last year. As you have continually rejected any notion of Ferrari's cheating due to lack of evidence from the FIA, your support of this argument to raise suspicion against Mercedes without any evidence is completely hypocritical.

Carry on Mind reader.
You seem to know exactly what I think and feel.

Enjoy posting rubbish about other members.

Man with broke phone

They were bizarre comments on Claire Williams not being good enough for Frank.

Sad to see it being sold up and sad that the Williams name and lineage will probably fade out of F1 over the next few years.

quokula

AMKC wrote: »

That's very harsh. How do you know any of it was Claire's fault? She probably just done what her father wanted and asked her to do. Maybe William's would still be in this position no matter who was there in charge. I do that blame Claire one bit. She done the best she could do under the circumstances and William's is a lot smaller than Mercedes, Ferrari and even Renault so they have a lot less resources and funding to use and as you know it must be very hard to get it right in F1 as it can change very fast.
I am delighted to see William's secure an investor do and hopefully they have more success in the future. 2012 is the last time they won a race or had a podium.

Based on the limited insight from race weekends and things like the Netflix documentary, she does come across as someone who is a bit out of her depth after basically inheriting the family business rather than most other team bosses who generally got there through qualifications and making their own way up the ladder.

I agree that the current formula gives independent teams a near impossible task and they of course are never going to stand a chance against car manufacturers with the way the sport is loaded against them these days. But on the other hand teams like Sauber and Force India have achieved more with less in recent years, and been rewarded for such with external investment. Hopefully this deal will give Williams a shot at moving forwards, but without any of the details being public, I doubt a financial investment firm looking to turn a profit will be providing the same kind of cash injection that an Aston Martin or an Alfa Romeo would.

It will presumably be enough to tide them over until the cost cap levels the playing field a bit in 2022 though, and I wouldn't be surprised to see them hiring someone from outside the Williams family to run the team by then.

PukkaStukka

quokula wrote: »

... I wouldn't be surprised to see them hiring someone from outside the Williams family to run the team by then.

You can take that as a given.

ELM327

PukkaStukka wrote: »

You can take that as a given.

As it should be.
I disagree with the personal comments made towards Claire but professionally she should not be in that role.

PukkaStukka

PukkaStukka wrote: »

You can take that as a given.

Just to be clear, my comment above is based on an investor wanting their people to run their newly acquired business which is pretty much standard practice in these situations.

GarIT

quokula wrote: »

Based on the limited insight from race weekends and things like the Netflix documentary, she does come across as someone who is a bit out of her depth after basically inheriting the family business rather than most other team bosses who generally got there through qualifications and making their own way up the ladder.

I agree that the current formula gives independent teams a near impossible task and they of course are never going to stand a chance against car manufacturers with the way the sport is loaded against them these days. But on the other hand teams like Sauber and Force India have achieved more with less in recent years, and been rewarded for such with external investment. Hopefully this deal will give Williams a shot at moving forwards, but without any of the details being public, I doubt a financial investment firm looking to turn a profit will be providing the same kind of cash injection that an Aston Martin or an Alfa Romeo would.

It will presumably be enough to tide them over until the cost cap levels the playing field a bit in 2022 though, and I wouldn't be surprised to see them hiring someone from outside the Williams family to run the team by then.

With a cost cap of €150m reducing to €135m. And the prize money for last being increased from €50m to a currently unknown amount. They have a good chance.

GarIT

Infoanon wrote: »

"says something like" -please at least deal in facts

Your comments about Claire Williams was not unacceptable

The exact quote from her just last year "It would be over my dead body to see Williams sold or turned into a B-team"

Which summarises her leadership, saying one thing and then folding to whatever happens. What I said was too harsh but she never had the skills or experience needed to run an F1 team. And she went on for way too long with the "Look at me, see women can be sucessful in F1" when she was born into inheriting the position. I think women can be successful in F1 just like any man, but Claire wasn't a good example of that.

Infoanon

GarIT wrote: »

The exact quote from her just last year "It would be over my dead body to see Williams sold or turned into a B-team"

Which summarises her leadership, saying one thing and then folding to whatever happens.

That's a bit different from what you originally wrote.

There is nothing wrong with a person displaying passion and emotion about keeping their family team going but you also seem to have completely forgotten that Williams is a public company with a Board of directors.
Folding to reality is an odd way to look at things - bad leadership would have been to do nothing.

Next team in play for a take over is Haas .

GarIT

Infoanon wrote: »

That's a bit different from what you originally wrote.

There is nothing wrong with a person displaying passion and emotion about keeping their family team going but you also seem to have completely forgotten that Williams is a public company with a Board of directors.
Folding to reality is an odd way to look at things - bad leadership would have been to do nothing.

Next team in play for a take over is Haas .

It's not that different. The conversation was in the context of financial issues. When asked if she would sell to secure finances she said over her dead body. A fair interpretation of that was she would rather the team go bankrupt than sell.


You're slightly incorrect in the board of directors in that Frank Williams had 52% of the votes on that board.


It's not folding to reality thats the problem. It that she make many strong claims about not letting certain things happen, verbally taking a strong stance on things and then letting the things happen that she said she wouldn't let happen. She was either all talk and no action and claiming to be able to do more than was possible.

Man with broke phone

The team names are changing so much I cant keep track of whos who.

Red Bull used to be Jaguar.

Midland became spyker becane force india (did they become force 1) became racing point.

Virgin to marusia to manor.

Lotus to team lotus to caterham?

Were lotus actually renault at one stage?

Minardi, skuderia alpha tauri, toro rosso.

Williams will change just the same id say.

Cool_CM

Sad to see that it will no longer be under the control of the Williams family and certainly the end of an era, but if it's what they need to do to keep the lights on, then it's what they need to do. I'm genuinely surprised that they have managed to keep going for this long and happy that they will still be around (in some guise) - hopefully they now have the investment that they need to make it through the next season and a half and target the rule changes in 2022.

It's important to note too that McLaren were dangerously close to going to the wall - will be interesting to see what they do to resolve their ongoing financial issues
https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/150210/mclaren-secures-150m-loan-from-bank-of-bahrain

vectra

Man with broke phone wrote: »

The team names are changing so much I cant keep track of whos who.

Red Bull used to be Jaguar.

JORDAN became Midland became spyker becane force india (did they become force 1) became racing point.

Virgin to marusia to manor.

Lotus to team lotus to caterham?

Were lotus actually renault at one stage?

Minardi, skuderia alpha tauri, toro rosso.

Williams will change just the same id say.

FYP

Frank Bullitt

https://twitter.com/_markgallagher/status/1296794269584437248

g1983d

PukkaStukka wrote: »

Harsh. But it was Frank's decision to give her the team over her brother Jonathan who was tipped by many to be the more capable of his successors.

Listened to a podcast with Claire last year and she said that Bernie had a big band in putting her into the role, no mention her brother was ever in the running and from what I've seen if him in a documentary before he seemed more than happy ro be looking after the Willams heritage collection

El_Duderino 09

g1983d wrote: »

Listened to a podcast with Claire last year and she said that Bernie had a big band in putting her into the role, no mention her brother was ever in the running and from what I've seen if him in a documentary before he seemed more than happy ro be looking after the Willams heritage collection

Handy number though. Maybe there's loads of work you don't think about l but I'd say it's a great job and could hardly take up all his time. Keep everything preserved well, run the tours and sublet the space they set aside for future Williams world championship winning cars.

g1983d

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Handy number though. Maybe there's loads of work you don't think about l but I'd say it's a great job and could hardly take up all his time. Keep everything preserved well, run the tours and sublet the space they set aside for future Williams world championship winning cars.

A lovely number if you were into the cars and could keep it interesting but I got the feeling his heart wasn't really in it, he seemed to love the family history but if they were anyone else cars he'd have no interest

Hijpo

Who knows how true the netflix doc is but I got the feeling she was everyone's friend, always bubbly. I never got the impression she demanded very much but was content with the feeling that everyone was trying to do their best?

I know it's an extreme example but for contrast, Guenther Steiner.

Infoanon

g1983d wrote: »

Listened to a podcast with Claire last year and she said that Bernie had a big band in putting her into the role, no mention her brother was ever in the running and from what I've seen if him in a documentary before he seemed more than happy ro be looking after the Willams heritage collection

Didn't Bernie play a big part in getting rid of Adam Parr ?, who held the position prior to Claire Williams appointment

Cork Trucker

Fair play

https://twitter.com/TeamL4NDO/status/1296439651419521025?s=20

g1983d

Infoanon wrote: »

Didn't Bernie play a big part in getting rid of Adam Parr ?, who held the position prior to Claire Williams appointment

Not sure but I wouldnt disagree with that, something about him was a bit off to me.
Another Eric Bouiller

Anesthetize

Man with broke phone wrote: »

The team names are changing so much I cant keep track of whos who.

Red Bull used to be Jaguar.

Midland became spyker becane force india (did they become force 1) became racing point.

Virgin to marusia to manor.

Lotus to team lotus to caterham?

Were lotus actually renault at one stage?

Minardi, skuderia alpha tauri, toro rosso.

Williams will change just the same id say.

Of the current teams:


Tyrrell -> BAR -> Honda -> Brawn -> Mercedes
Stewart -> Jaguar -> Red Bull
Jordan -> Midland -> Spyker -> Force India -> Racing Point
Toleman -> Benetton -> Renault -> Lotus -> Renault
Minardi -> Torro Rosso -> Alpha Tauri
Sauber -> BMW Sauber -> Sauber -> Alfa Romeo

McLaren, Ferrari, Williams and Haas are unchanged.

AMKC

Anesthetize wrote: »

Of the current teams:


Tyrrell -> BAR -> Honda -> Brawn -> Mercedes
Stewart -> Jaguar -> Red Bull
Jordan -> Midland -> Spyker -> Force India -> Racing Point
Toleman -> Benetton -> Renault -> Lotus -> Renault
Minardi -> Torro Rosso -> Alpha Tauri
Sauber -> BMW Sauber -> Sauber -> Alfa Romeo

McLaren, Ferrari, Williams and Haas are unchanged.

I disagree
McLaren might be the same team but it is not just McLaren
McLaren Mercedes then mclaren Honda, McLaren Renault and next year they are back to been McLaren Mercedes.
I don't remember McLaren before they had Nercedes engines but maybe they had other engines too and were called something different and
William's Renault was a think for a while before William's Mercedes.

GarIT

AMKC wrote: »

I disagree
McLaren might be the same team but it is not just McLaren
McLaren Mercedes then mclaren Honda, McLaren Renault and next year they are back to been McLaren Mercedes.
I don't remember McLaren before they had Nercedes engines but maybe they had other engines too and were called something different and
William's Renault was a think for a while before William's Mercedes.

I don't think the engine supplier changes who the team are, you could add several changes to all the other teams in that case.


I would say that McLaren being Bahraini team now instead of a British team and Williams being an American team instead of a British team and the owners changing in both makes a bigger difference.

quokula

Anesthetize wrote: »

Of the current teams:


Tyrrell -> BAR -> Honda -> Brawn -> Mercedes
Stewart -> Jaguar -> Red Bull
Jordan -> Midland -> Spyker -> Force India -> Racing Point
Toleman -> Benetton -> Renault -> Lotus -> Renault
Minardi -> Torro Rosso -> Alpha Tauri
Sauber -> BMW Sauber -> Sauber -> Alfa Romeo

McLaren, Ferrari, Williams and Haas are unchanged.

While BAR did buy up Tyrrell assets, they were an entirely new team with a new workforce and factory built up from scratch, so I don’t think they would count as a continuation. The rest are spot on.

H3llR4iser

pjohnson wrote: »

I think once Ferrari went through 6 engines in two days in the early 00's. Badoer had three fail at Fiorano while Burti (one) and Barrichello (two) had issues at a larger multi-team test.

It was fairly standard procedure for top teams to use AT LEAST 6 engines during a race week end through the '80s, '90s and part of the 2000s.

They would have a fresh engine each day on each car and, in the case of the 1980s turbos, they would even have special qualifying engines.

This is without even considering the T-Car, which depending on how much running they did, could also use a couple of engines - and the T-Car was usually run on track as much as the driver's designated racecar for setup reasons (and it wasn't that rare a driver decided to swap racecar for T-Car if they thought the chassis was better).

Some top teams would also occasionally bring a T-Car for each driver (McLaren's case at the 1992 Brazilian Grand Prix was particularly famous, when they brought 6 cars - an MP4/6 and an MP4/7 racecar each for Senna and Berger plus a T-Car for each model.

So yeah, realistically, a top team could use 6 to 8 engines over a week end. Add to this the fact there were two qualifying sessions (Friday and Saturday), special qualifying tires designed to last just one hot lap, a Sunday morning Warmup session...and yet, the costs - even normalized to today's values - were still nowhere near what they are today. Not all is the "fault" of the hybrid formula 'though, R&D is where there needs to be a look taken.

AMKC wrote: »

I disagree
McLaren might be the same team but it is not just McLaren
McLaren Mercedes then mclaren Honda, McLaren Renault and next year they are back to been McLaren Mercedes.
I don't remember McLaren before they had Nercedes engines but maybe they had other engines too and were called something different and
William's Renault was a think for a while before William's Mercedes.

McLaren's most famous successful era is actually tied to Honda rather than Mercedes - we're talking the Prost-Senna time. That's why, when they reunited in 2015, some people were expecting them to "make it happen" again. They've also used the ubiquitous Ford Cosworth DFV, TAG-Porsche, Ford gain, then some brief and unsuccessful experiments with Peugeot and one famous single test with Lamborghini (Senna loved the engine, but it didn't happen in the end) before their "first Mercedes era".

And of course Williams-Renault was a thing (1989-1997), as it was Williams-Honda before it and even...Williams-Judd (for one season only) Also, Sauber-Mercedes, which very few remember but were the team roots, they were running Mercedes' program in Group C and Sauber was how they got back into F1 in 1993.

GarIT wrote: »

I don't think the engine supplier changes who the team are, you could add several changes to all the other teams in that case.

Exactly, teams used to change engine partners much more often than today. The one point that can be made about McLaren is that during the 1995-2014 partnership, they came to basically be Mercedes and vice-versa (not on the road cars...funny fact, McLaren 1998 F1 road car used BMW engines); It went quite a bit further than just a works engine agreement, to the point it was the Woking cars being called "Silver Arrows". Mercedes used to own a significant share of the team, which they sold back to Ron Dennis since.

El_Duderino 09

AMKC wrote: »

I disagree
McLaren might be the same team but it is not just McLaren
McLaren Mercedes then mclaren Honda, McLaren Renault and next year they are back to been McLaren Mercedes.
I don't remember McLaren before they had Nercedes engines but maybe they had other engines too and were called something different and
William's Renault was a think for a while before William's Mercedes.

I don't agree. Sometimes the engine supplier bought into the team but if they didn't take a majority stake then it's still the original team.

Mclaren sold 20% (I think) to Mercedes in the 90s and sold the shares when it bought it's own team. I still consider it the same mclaren team all along

pjohnson

McLaren used those hopeless Peugeot engines for a year before Jordan and then Prost took them until Pegueot left.

Yamaha used to power Jordan (for free irrc) and then Tyrrell.

Ilmor powered Leyton House before switching to Sauber and then becoming the Mercedes engine factory.

Jordan 199

pjohnson wrote: »

Yamaha used to power Jordan (for free irrc) and then Tyrrell.

That was in 1992. Those engines were free and were works engines aswell. It was the free Yamaha engines and the Sasol deal that saved Jordan.