Settle down, chap... We're not all blaming Whitmarsh. Miggins. I really don't want to go and add up all those points, it'll just make me cry, but it is a chunk.... a big chunk.
I'm not normally like this, but what a twat that Tsheporam person is I think he is more mentally insane than a certain known member here.
He's convinced that whitmarsh and button are in a relationship, and are trying to ruin Hamiltons career.
Tsheporam on a website called JA606. He's completely insane. If you thought some of my drunken ramblings were mad, this guy is on another level.
I think you've got it right but it was a mixture of driver unreliability and the fragility of the car that hampered them for a while. I think it's safe to say that they have essentially the same car today but the differences now are that they've refined it and reinforced it to make it more reliable; and that Vettel has matured and stopped being a 'crash kid'. The momentum of confidence from winning the title and the car having evolved to, perhaps, its optimum level are what made them invincible for the first half of the season. On the other hand, McLaren came this year with a fresh design and, to be fair, it was much faster out of the box than anyone expected. However, it is still at an early stage of evolution and should be refined, and hopefully better, next season. I seem to recall Whitmarsh saying something to the effect that they were playing a long game; if recent reports are true, Button is more than keen to stay and reap the hypothetical benefits. Lewis, however, needs to have more faith and certainly more patience, but then he's younger than Jenson. Aside from this, as others have pointed out, they do need to stop making so many strategic errors because these have been occurring far too frequently and continue to cost them dearly. I'd say the strategists' errors are costing McLaren more dearly than Lewis's.
I'd say Lewis has probably lost close to 100 points uneccessarily this season, through one thing or another, I'd say 1 or 2 penalties were in order, but no more than that, and a few pit lane ****-ups, Button probably somewhere between 50 and 80. a dnf is a really high cost. So many factors have ruined McLarens chances SO FAR this season, and they tend to have a compounded effect. Although I'm pretty sure RBR/Seb have the title, there is the possiblility that RBR will suffer a run of horrendous luck, but I can't see RBR strategists suddenly gambling on their strategy. I feel if McLaren had actually trusted their car to come good and not played a risky 'we gotta catch up, risk everytthing' approach so early in the season, they may have stil been in with a shout despite their mechanical/accident dnfs.
Yeah, taking last Sunday as an example, as the race panned out, only Button came close to challenging the Red Bulls - from starting 13th! It was a strategic error that put him there in the first place, otherwise he might have won it. (Yeah, I know: what if..?) Lewis's now infamous Monaco meltdown was itself preceded/provoked(?) by a strategic howler in quail, not that that excuses him. I wasn't clear in my last post but really I wrote it to illustrate, or to try to disprove, the notion that Whitmarsh is the source of McLaren's woes. There are many factors that contribute, both internal and external, but the most significant is probably that this season Red Bull have been reaping the rewards of three years of diligent and very clever hard work. I think Whitmarsh is right to play the long game. Yes, he seems wishy-washy and appears to lack Ron Dennis's authority but overall McLaren weren't really any better under the old regime.
exactamundo Max, it's a case of almost everything that can go wrong at McLaren has. And yet they're still in there. Gonna put my money on a McLaren WCC next year, and a reverse forcast on Hamilton and Button as I think one of them will be WDC next year and the other 2nd. They can't have a season like this again, it would be too much of a freak. Edit: I did say when I first saw the carit would be the best by mid-season, I was right, but I did also say that they would be challenging vEttel very closely for the win, I was wrong there, as I just didn't expect all the mis-haps
