Horner came out last week and said the three main contenders to replace Mark Webber next year are Kimi Raikkonen, Daniel Ricciardo and Jean-Eric Vergne. Speculation for outsiders seems to be focused on Paul Di Resta (although Horner did state they weren't focused on him), and Jenson Button, whose SkyF1 odds for taking the seat have been dramatically slashed very recently for some unknown reason. So who do you think will take the 2014 RBR seat, and who would you like to take it?
Skybet were the only the bookmaker taking money on it, they'd have done that to generate interest in the market. I think it's still all to play for. Red Bull will take their with an STR driver because they wouldn't want to risk picking one and see them get thrashed by their team mate for the rest of the year. Perez's form dipped alarmingly when he signed for McLaren, I imagine Red Bull will want to assess how well their youngsters do under the increased pressure and scrutiny, everyone's watching them a lot more closely since Webber's announcement. They obviously know what Raikkonen has to offer. If they choose him it will be sooner rather than later I think, unless they want to keep the Toro Rosso drivers under pressure for a bit longer.
I imagine they'll be looking for a number 2 driver to replace Webber, then a new number one driver if Vettel goes elsewhere later on and their replacement for Webber isn't good enough to lead the team. So Ricciardo seems like a sensible choice right now.
Kimi or Vergne, Vergne beat Ricciardo in his rookie season and is beating him again this season despite suffering from lots of bad luck, Ricciardo looks good in the odd race during a season and looked decentish in the HRT, but Vergne is better Imo. I'd be surprised if they overlooked Kimi, but it may depend on his lotus contract.
You want bad luck for Ricciardo? How's this? - Exhaust failure in Australia - Exhaust failure in Malaysia - Massive set-up error issues (team admitted fault to that one) in Bahrain - Crashed into by Grosjean in Monaco - Braking failure in Canada - 8 seconds lost in slow pit stops, consistently got undercut by several laps, wasn't pitted under the safety car at the end, and the team didn't follow up that aggressive move by Sutil in Britain,. His engineer couldn't have made worse decisions if he tried. And you all thought Kimi had it tough. - Vergne's engineer is actually very experienced and formerly from Renault; Ricciardo's happens to be his data engineer from last year, and from what I hear he's about young as Ricciardo is. It's not that either of these drivers can't impress, but just the team's stupidity reflects poorly on them.
This is pretty much verbatim what I feel about this, although I agree with RR's points about Ricciardo's luck and the team's messy regime. But don't we already have a thread on this topic..?
It has to be Ricciardo just to give Miggins and RR something to argue about. I don't necessarily think Vergne is the better driver either. Ricciardo's the better the qualifier and perhaps has more potential because of that, raw pace is less likely to come with experience than race pace in my opinion. They're both pretty tidy in races to be fair to them, neither of them charge round causing collisions. To Vergne's credit he's excellent in the wet.
It's Kimi, I'll be amazed if Horner's voice is not heard in this as he wants Kimi to replace Webber, not the RB duo.
Well, as Iceman says, if Kimi's willing and available, it would appear to be a no-brainer - but is he? Toro Rosso as a feeder team have been a mess since they had to cut the massive support they used to receive from Red Bull; none of their driver choices has really had much opportunity to shine since. It seems to me that STR sort of defeats its own object if it can't provide a platform for inexperienced drivers to show their talent.
It'll be Kimi, but i want Ricciardo to have the seat. As RR said, he's been desperately unlucky during his time with Toro Rosso, when things have gone for him, he's looked a very decent driver, better than Vergne. And as a Kimi fan, i don't want him being overwhelmed with all the media work RBR will make him do if he gets the seat, i don't want him to get pissed off with the sport and bugger off elsewhere again. Would be bad for F1
I don't think Red Bull would lump too much on to Kimi media wise to be honest. That would have to be written in to the contract as well. He may just have to do a bit of extra work here and there to what he currently does.
Let me summarise Red Bull's position: If they don't put Kimi Raikkonen in they are passing up a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to put a former WDC with proven talent in their car. If they do, what was the point of Vergne and Ricciardo pootling around the field not generally troubling the points (the latter in an HRT for chrissakes)? Also, there is another albeit slightly less likely option: Buemi.
