I think the whole Perez treatment is harsh. he has matched and beaten their clear #1 driver many times this year. Its clearly all down to the money they thought they may get but may not be now.
Benson labours the point by saying Button has outqualifed Perez in 9 out of the 17 races, which sounds bad .............. so that's just 9/8 in his favour then. Overall he leads the quali race by 1. Hmm.......
Or to look at it another way. Perez is being beaten in Button's weakest area... Checo is actually pretty lucky to have half of Jenson's points total IMO.
Perez qualifying was never a strong point at Sauber, so McLaren knew what they were getting in that regard. What the driver debate does mask, is the ultimate deficiency with the car which has made it hard for both drivers to show how good they are.
What was so disappointing about Perez's performance in Abu Dhabi? He comfortably outqualified and outraced his team mate. There's a poll on the Sky website asking who should drive alongside Button in 2014; Perez, Hulkenberg or Magnussen. In my opinion it should be Magnussen, but alongside Hulkenberg not Button.
As a big Kobayashi fan, I see where this viewpoint comes from, but I do think that the 3rd place in Japan aside, Kobayashi was just as disappointing for big chunks of last year as Perez was (granted, he had horrendous luck to be taken out by Grosjean having qualified 2nd in Belgium, so we may never know what he could have achieved). Realistically, I would be very disappointed if Mclaren dropped Perez after only 1 year in a poor car. That said, one looks back at Hamilton now and realises what good fortune he had in 2007 to have Montoya gracefully step aside and leave the car vacated.
I don't see how losing 20 seconds to a teammate when they pitted less times is a disappointment, especially when Perez was stuck behind traffic most of the race because of Massa's illegal overtake on him into T2 on the first lap. He's beating Button in both quali and the race lately and has finally found his feet, give him another year and if he's still like what he was at the start of the season then sack him.
Well in the second half of the season he's beaten Button in the race twice. Those two both being where Jenson lost his front wing on the first lap. I wouldn't call that super impressive. I would agree that his Abu Dhabi performance was nowhere near as bad as Benson is making out, and was mainly spoiled by traffic, but he still spent too much of the race going slower than JB on fresher tyres. All that said i do think he deserves a second season and a chance in a proper McLaren. There's no need to rush Magnussen in either.
I can see where JC is coming from, but I made the same observation that Benson was trying to make the facts support a pretty flimsy case. Shoddy journalism.
Surely he deserves another year , esp given the rule changes for next year ? At least start him, if after a few races it is clear he is not good enough (if the car is ) drop him .
I'm pretty sure the Hulk to Lotus deal will be announced shortly, I think it's the drive he's been holding out for, and now they have the money I suspect it'll be announced in Austin
I thought I read somewhere that McLaren had already dismissed the idea of Hulkenberg due to his height / weight ? Might be wrong though .
I think this was where all the weight discussion began. I'm not trying to be provocative but if Checo's seat is so unsafe, why should Jenson's be so secure? Both drivers have under-performed but that should be no surprise in that car. Of course, there's a lot of behind-the-scenes politicking going on and we're just getting bits of it.
Not provocative at all IMHO . Does the fact JB has a 1/2 Japanese GF give him favour as far as Honda are concerned ?
Button is proven. They know he'll win races if they give him the car. They know he's been noticeably better than Perez this season. I actually think that the car has masked a quietly good season from Jenson, certainly much more consistent than a sloppy 2012. I don't know if Mclaren rate him highly enough to be their lead driver, but even if not they're more likely to try and replace Perez with the superstar and slot Button back into the role he had when Lewis was there and that's why they view Checo being reasonably far behind him as such a problem. Alternatively all the Perez talk might just be trying to them deflect attention away from the ****box that is MP4-28.
