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Originally Posted by Octane_Power Wow! That's good to hear. It would have been superb if Alonso would have replaced Rosberg. In driving skills, Hamilton and Vettel are good, but Alonso is The Daddy!
Btw, is it possible for a driver to terminate the contract mid-season and join another constructor? How does that work?
-Bhargav |
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Originally Posted by Hatari This seems the only positive thing in this current mess. Alonso is getting hungrier. Which means easily another 3-4 years at the top. He definitely wouldn't want to leave languishing in the bottom half of the grid.
Mercedes and Ferrari would be highly unlikely though. |
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Originally Posted by MCR Looks like Fernando Alonso is pissed off with Honda. He has said that the entire team is looking to win other than Honda!
Link to New Article : http://www.skysports.com/f1/news/124...ead-of-f1-2017
He has also vowed to not retire until winning one more Championship. Does it mean that he is already discussing with Mercedes or contemplating a return to Ferrari? Only future will tell. |
It's possible. Depends who will pay the damages.
However, I think Bottas will be happy to play second fiddle to Hamilton, who is likely to win the WDC. They will probably sign both drivers for next year as well. Alonso has a better chance with Ferrari if Kimi retires at the end of this year, though I doubt the Scuderia will be interested in rehiring the guy that ditched them.
McLaren did exactly that though.
For me its more about the cars than the drivers.
Looks like 2017 season will look very similar to 2016 at the front of the grid.
Mercedes and Ferrari ahead of everyone else. Red Bull relatively fallen back from them but will get back up front in the immediate future.
Looking at Vettel’s race simulation, Ferrari should be competitive – all going well.
Williams have built a solid car and Haas is once again poised to be a points scoring midfield team. Renault have improved with their car but there are still question marks over the reliability of the engine. Toro Rosso have struggled in the test, and seem as if suffering more from the Renault engine failures than their own.
Force India is still an unknown quantity.
Sauber will be the backmarkers.
Which brings me to McLaren, my favourite team.
McLaren debacle continues. Looking more like the 2015 version of the saga than 2016, from a distance.
A lot is being made of their recent failures, mostly because it’s easy to attract clicks with catchy headlines. If you are interested, the below links are good where the complete answers given by Fernando during his recent interview is given. It gives a better understanding than the click-bait articles that are churned out based on that interview.
https://badgergp.com/alonso-honda-mclaren-time-attack/ http://www.gptoday.com/full_story/vi...iate_reaction/
Now, about the infamous Honda PU, one can hear lots of rumours. Some say the new engine, which is supposedly a TJI type with Mercedes like split turbocharger is structurally too weak. There are problems with combustion, vibrations and temperatures as per the rumours, possibly started when Hesegawa said that the new engine is lighter, with lower SG & complete re-design from scratch.
The current PU clearly shows lack of actual track testing. Honda has not used test mules for sure. Maybe Honda is constantly trying to make improvements to design until the last moment instead of concentrating on improving what they have built already and in turn that delay leads to lack of testing time for each upgrade putting reliability into question.
Insufficient block stiffness can certainly cause a lot of problems throughout the engine that wouldn't necessarily show up on a normal engine dyno. But with the computerised stress evaluation tools available, it would be a shock if Honda missed it and the block was twisting excessively in the car. The block forms the foundation of not only the ICE but is also a stressed member for the entire rear structure of the car. And that should get Honda’s top bosses attention as it points to a fundamentally flawed development process.
I appreciate Honda´s courage to take on the best in F1 when VW, BMW and Ford etc. are avoiding it themselves while busy in other categories.
Lots of people are wondering why Honda doesn’t take help from Mario Illen (Ilmor). Even if they want to probably after the cooling off time/ gardening leave is over (contractually from Renault) by the time Ilmor had worked their magic, Honda's existing team would probably have solved the issues and moved on to other developments already.
Another question to ask is , does Honda want to win by "buying it" anyway?
Mercedes-Benz bought Ilmor (in its previous incarnation) and subsequently rebadged it as "Mercedes-Benz High Performance Engines". It's the pinnacle of “German F1 engineering” based in Brixworth, England.
F1 isn't marketing to Honda in the way it is to Mercedes. It's more than that.
The "Honda way" is trying to solve all the problems without buying in talent/experience/skill from across the F1 engineering pool which basically is in Europe. That is apart from the cultural differences in the two continents. Given enough time and resources, Honda eventually might end up with better solutions than the others, but how long will it take?
Will McLaren and F1 in general with the fast paced style of competition have patience and time for understanding the reasoning and satisfaction of achieving something in the “right/ old fashioned” Honda way?
As for me, I am a bit old fashioned I guess. So I prefer they get it right themselves rather than to bring in a smart European consultant.