Brawn confident of strong 2010 season http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/79688 Mercedes confident of strong 2011 http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/89191 Brawn confident Mercedes have turned corner after unveiling 2012 challenger http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/fo...s-Brawn-confident-Mercedes-turned-corner.html Never heard him use hopeful though, either they have something we haven't even seen yet or next season will be a pile of ****e as the ban on this DDRS will hurt Mercedes like a ton of bricks since the whole WO3 was designed around it. The WO1 was just a follow up of the Brawn of last year with little changes and that was still a pretty good car, the WO2 was unreliable like hell in testing for their first design and they never got on the podium and it chewed it's tyres stupidly. The WO3 was in the planning even before Seb won the WDC in 2011, you could see the early stages of the DDRS being used with the hole on the nose. Now Mercedes are starting from scratch again, I smell a WO2 start for 2013 but a decent finish at the end when they start to finish things up. But all things point to an ugly 2013 for Mercedes that even Sauber, Williams and FI might beat them net year. Their problem isn't the start, it's the whole season which they cant keep up with. They just start to fall off the pace and never come back, but this extra 50 million might change that. Only problem is that Force India have got 50 million extra as well, Sauber have got Carlos Slim again and Williams have got Pastor and Bottas who bring some serious cash.
Car numbers are only provisional at this stage, in 2011, McLaren had Jenson as 3 and Lewis as 4 before changing for the final draft. However its pretty certain these numbers will remain the same as the newer guy always gets the higher number unless he is current champion. For example 2009: Mark 14 Seb 15. 2010: Massa 7 Alonso 8.
Lewis Hamilton not ruling out McLaren return after Mercedes spell Although Mercedes has endured a disappointing season - finishing in a distant fifth place in the constructors' championship - Hamilton insisted he has no regrets about his decision.
.......and Brawn talking things ups! http://www1.skysports.com/formula-1...edes-ambition-and-objective-is-to-win-in-2013
Would love to see Lewis and Rosberg up in the fight next season, but as a Mercedes fan I just don't see this "explosion" on the scene they keep promising every year. With RBR you could at least see they would challenge for the WDC the season before like we saw in 09 up to 10 when they won the double. Mercedes are making slow progress car wise, but from 1 race win and 2 podiums to a WDC title charge in the span of 6-8 months? I don't think so! since it will take a massive haul of development resources for the completely new WO4 that Mercedes "might" just ditch it halfway to focus fully on 2014 onwards for the WO5. At least Lewis is repeating what I think is likely to happen net season, it wont be pretty but the work should pay off for 2014 and beyond to get the WDC and maybe the WCC as well.
But Red Bull had some tough building years even with Newey in 2007 and 2008, could you really say at the end of 2008 that they will dominate the sport for the next few years? Not expecting miracles overnight but I think the paring will eventually come good it just depends if Lewis has the patience to stick it out, for instance say if Vettel does move to Ferrari in 2014 (more unlikely now) would Hamilton really reject a possible move to RBR in 2014/15?, I don't think so.
I think this is a really good point: "even with Newey". It's true, Red Bull now work on a higher level than the rest as a team. People single out Newey or Vettel but it's much bigger than that. Funny that no one singles out Horner: does he deserve the credit for elevating the team or is it Marko or someone else? It was the same with Ferrari during the Schumacher years: was that because of Brawn? If so, he's well qualified to repeat the success.
It wasn't just Newey that got Red Bull there, you only have to look at some of his right hand men there and they mostly came from McLaren. (Autosport awards: Red Bull chief technical officer Adrian Newey collected the award Peter Prodromu, Rob Marshall, Mark Ellis and Paul Monaghan, his key allies in the squad's design team.) In 2009 RBR got 6 wins, 10 podiums and 5 poles before winning the double with their massive resources. Somehow 2012 wasn't really a show of confidence for Mercedes if they couldn't even get half of that with their resources and background history in F1 and all that firepower in the department. Mercedes need a whole new team structure to work properly, somebody like Horner to make it all work and so far Ross or whoever isn't...
Red Bull have top people like Adrian Newey, Peter Prodromou and Rob Marshall. Ferrari have top people like Nikolas Tombazis, David Sanchez, and Rory Byrne (part-time). McLaren have top people like Paddy Lowe, Tim Goss and Marcin Budkowski. Mercedes have Geoff Willis, Aldo Costa, Bob Bell and Mike Elliot - they are all competent guys but nothing special. There's also the problem that every year since 2009 they've been destroyed in the development race by the top teams. I can see them being on the podium and possibly winning in the first few races of 2013, only to go backwards and give up on development early to focus on the next year, where they go on to repeat the same cycle.
You can have all the firepower in the world, but if you cant make it work over a season like Mercedes is doing you will be left in the dust sooner or later by the big 3 (RBR, McLaren, Ferrari) even Lotus with the lack of money were outdeveloping Mercedes over the season which is scary considering their limited wealth. Maybe Mercedes should be looking at Lotus and poach a few of these guys who clearly know what they're doing, hell I would put Eric Boullier in charge over Ross at the moment.
The development of any car hinges on the car having fundemental pace that can be developed or "unlocked". It seems that Merc have lacked thos since day 1.
I don't think it's simply a question of having the best collection of top people; this can be more destructive than constructive - just think of all the egos! It's about synergy, I think, but management of all that talent to get it working optimally must be very hard to achieve. What I wonder is, is this synergy something that can be managed or is there a natural element of chemistry, personal and/or professional, that makes one particular team rise above the other equally well-equipped teams?
Until next season starts I'm working off the assumption that the cars will be more or less the same pace as they were in Brazil, just maybe slightly closer together
So Lewis did leave for the money? McLaren reported to have offered him £13.5 million a year, Mercedes gave £20 million a year... (From his own mouth)
McLaren keep claiming they were offering him more money than anyone on the grid, I feel that until feelings have settled down we'll never know the full story here. The guardian also claim he's on £60m for 3 years at Mercedes (the same)
