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2020 FORMULA 1 SEASON

torga

Autocross Champion
Location
Seattle
Car(s)
'11 GTI

1ashchuckton

Autocross Champion
Location
Ohio
Social media didn't make this rich kid stupid. He already was stupid & social media just showed the world. I don't do any social media & I'm glad I don't have to see this kind of crap.

Now I wonder if his daddy being a billionaire will make Hass forgive his stupidity.
 

Thumper

Autocross Champion
Location
Sedalia, MO
Car(s)
2012 Golf R Stg3 APR
Let's change Formula 1 to Formula Mercedes and give all 20 drivers a W11. Mercedes makes a BOATLOAD of money and we all get to see closer racing. WIN/WIN.

They have that, it's called NASCAR and it's boring and dangerous as hell. LOL

I just want some respect for the engineers and not all heaped on the drivers as some sort of gods that carry the team. ;) Just saying, how much does Lewis get paid? How much does Russell get paid? How much did the engineers get paid? :)


Social media didn't make this rich kid stupid. He already was stupid & social media just showed the world. I don't do any social media & I'm glad I don't have to see this kind of crap.

Now I wonder if his daddy being a billionaire will make Hass forgive his stupidity.

I disagree, they used to say TV rotted our brains and in excess they probably weren't too far off. Video games at least stimulate the thought centers. Living in a world where people think everyone in the world needs to know what color socks they just bought and that they drank a Diet Coke for lunch is making people stupid. Both consuming the massive amounts of idiocy splashed all over the 17 different mediums of social media and spending precious time trying to figure out how to get famous and rich posting stupid videos.

As for Haas, I am sure he will make a heartfelt apology and move on with life in F1.
 

torga

Autocross Champion
Location
Seattle
Car(s)
'11 GTI
They have that, it's called NASCAR and it's boring and dangerous as hell. LOL

I just want some respect for the engineers and not all heaped on the drivers as some sort of gods that carry the team. ;) Just saying, how much does Lewis get paid? How much does Russell get paid? How much did the engineers get paid? :)
I mean... they'd still be racing on the same, mostly magnificent tracks. It'll be less like NASCAR and more like a better version of IndyCar.

But no yeah, I agree with that. Lewis is an amazing driver, and he will be remembered as one of the greatest of all time, deservedly so. But his success is hugely thanks to Mercedes' development team, no one can deny that. If he were in an Alfa, he would be absolutely nowhere.
Drivers make up the tenths on Sundays, engineers make up the tenths over an entire season.
 

95gto

Go Kart Newbie
Location
STL
LOL Agreed but missing the point. My point was the car is so good Russell who has been stuck in the bottom half in his car was easily able to run the track in first just like Lewis does. ;)

I didn't miss it. I just wasn't sure how to take it and didn't want to start a pissing match under false pretenses. Does the team need credit for Lewis's success on track, absolutely. Whether the team is contributing more than Lewis to secure the wins is highly debatable. The best equipment in the world is garbage in the wrong hands and you can't forget that the driver is an integral part in getting the car's development dialed in. I think Lewis is the most talented driver in F1, and has been so for several years. Because of his talent he has been able to take the advantage that is the Mercedes team and car and essentially make himself unbeatable.

Looking to a driver's teammate is always a good way to see just how much of their performance is equipment and how much is talent. Look at the delta between Max and Albon at the first Bahrain race. Sure Albon placed right behind Max on the podium but he was way behind him in the race. So much so that Max made headlines for criticizing Albon's performance post race.
 

CarlosCanizares

Autocross Newbie
Location
Surrey, BC, Canada
Car(s)
Mk7 Golf R
I think it also worth exploring how consistent George would be compared to Lewis. He usually dominates week-in/out. Give Lewis' car to Valteri and I doubt he'd reach the same level of consistency.
 

Thumper

Autocross Champion
Location
Sedalia, MO
Car(s)
2012 Golf R Stg3 APR
I didn't miss it. I just wasn't sure how to take it and didn't want to start a pissing match under false pretenses. Does the team need credit for Lewis's success on track, absolutely. Whether the team is contributing more than Lewis to secure the wins is highly debatable. The best equipment in the world is garbage in the wrong hands and you can't forget that the driver is an integral part in getting the car's development dialed in.

Not sure why a pissing match is needed at all. I'm not going to fight you outside over my opinion about a sporting event. LMAO ;)

I had a wall of text and then realized, meh, I'll stick to my topic sentence instead.
 

Supercrumpet

Ready to race!
Location
Georgia/South Carolina
Car(s)
'19 Alltrack SE 6MT
I didn't miss it. I just wasn't sure how to take it and didn't want to start a pissing match under false pretenses. Does the team need credit for Lewis's success on track, absolutely. Whether the team is contributing more than Lewis to secure the wins is highly debatable. The best equipment in the world is garbage in the wrong hands and you can't forget that the driver is an integral part in getting the car's development dialed in. I think Lewis is the most talented driver in F1, and has been so for several years. Because of his talent he has been able to take the advantage that is the Mercedes team and car and essentially make himself unbeatable.

Looking to a driver's teammate is always a good way to see just how much of their performance is equipment and how much is talent. Look at the delta between Max and Albon at the first Bahrain race. Sure Albon placed right behind Max on the podium but he was way behind him in the race. So much so that Max made headlines for criticizing Albon's performance post race.

Performance relative to a driver's teammate is usually a good indicator, but it's not always the full story in my eyes. Best recent example is again Red Bull when you consider the performances of Gasly and Albon, especially when you look at how Gasly is doing now. Sure, RB has obviously built a car that's capable of getting excellent results, but it seems like only a small number of current F1 drivers can make the most of it, let alone consistently. I feel like that brings other factors in to play: Was the car tailored to a particular driving style? Is one driver consistently getting updates/upgrades before the other? Are the resources allocated to the second driver relatively lacking? Is the team environment unequal between the two drivers? (I know these questions have answers so I'm not looking to answer them now; just trying to provoke some thought, and this goes for other teams beyond Red Bull.)

Compare that to Mercedes, for example: Their car seems much more approachable in addition to being incredibly fast, as Bottas is able to keep up with Lewis (to a degree) on most weekends, and he's able to consistently qualify very closely to him as well, despite most fans not considering him a top tier driver. Obviously George is very talented, but he was able to jump in the car and perform extremely well on short notice as well.

One last example of this that springs to mind, but I won't go into detail since I don't follow the sport as closely, is Honda in MotoGP with Marc Marquez. Maybe that's more of a case of Marc just being that good on a bike, but it seems similar to the RB situation in F1 from my perspective. Maybe someone who follows MotoGP more closely could give some insight.
 

95gto

Go Kart Newbie
Location
STL
Not sure why a pissing match is needed at all. I'm not going to fight you outside over my opinion about a sporting event. LMAO ;)

I had a wall of text and then realized, meh, I'll stick to my topic sentence instead.

This is precisely my point. Had I addressed your comment based solely on your initial post I would have thought your comment to be more in the camp of "Lewis only wins because of his car" and my response would have been tailored as such. However your second post on the topic suggests you just think the team side of things don't get enough credit. And like I stated, I can agree with that to a point. The fact that Mercedes still dominated Ferrari two years ago when Vettel had the fastest car on the grid proved the value of the team when it came to netting a win. Ferrari consistently stepped on their own toes leaving the door open for Mercedes to steal the win.
 

Thumper

Autocross Champion
Location
Sedalia, MO
Car(s)
2012 Golf R Stg3 APR
This is precisely my point. Had I addressed your comment based solely on your initial post I would have thought your comment to be more in the camp of "Lewis only wins because of his car" and my response would have been tailored as such. However your second post on the topic suggests you just think the team side of things don't get enough credit. And like I stated, I can agree with that to a point.

Yeah, my feelings are that the team doesn't get enough credit, but that goes hand in hand with Hamilton gets too much credit. ;) If Hamilton gets 90% of the credit, then the team gets 10%, I feel like the team deserves closer to 50%, which means Hamilton is over credited 40%. 😁

I do think Hamilton wins because of his car, but not JUST because of his car. The car gives him the tools he needs to win, he still has to deploy them every race. But if the car was not perfect, he would not be winning because no amount of skill can make a car go faster than it's physically capable of.

Do I think Hamilton in Russell's car would be in 11th? No way, his consistency and occasional tire wizardry clearly shows talent. Although, putting Hamilton in Russel's car would give us a good view of how much the Mercedes team is helping him. LOL Is the car worth 1 second a lap? Or is it worth 5 seconds a lap. So yeah, we'll never know cause that won't happen.
 

torga

Autocross Champion
Location
Seattle
Car(s)
'11 GTI
Come here often?

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95gto

Go Kart Newbie
Location
STL
Yeah, my feelings are that the team doesn't get enough credit, but that goes hand in hand with Hamilton gets too much credit. ;) If Hamilton gets 90% of the credit, then the team gets 10%, I feel like the team deserves closer to 50%, which means Hamilton is over credited 40%. 😁

I do think Hamilton wins because of his car, but not JUST because of his car. The car gives him the tools he needs to win, he still has to deploy them every race. But if the car was not perfect, he would not be winning because no amount of skill can make a car go faster than it's physically capable of.

Do I think Hamilton in Russell's car would be in 11th? No way, his consistency and occasional tire wizardry clearly shows talent. Although, putting Hamilton in Russel's car would give us a good view of how much the Mercedes team is helping him. LOL Is the car worth 1 second a lap? Or is it worth 5 seconds a lap. So yeah, we'll never know cause that won't happen.

If you are comparing the performance of a Mercedes AMG car to that of a Williams, I would suggest the car contributes over 50% of the equation. You could put any driver on the grid in that car and they would be in the top ten. However when you compare a Mercedes to a Red Bull or Ferrari (barring this season) the car factor drops significantly to less than 20% imo.

If the 2022 car change does what it is intended to do, you should see the car become even less of a factor everywhere. However you don't want to eliminate the ability for teams to bake an advantage into their car, otherwise you are left with a spec series and we already have too many of those.
 

Thumper

Autocross Champion
Location
Sedalia, MO
Car(s)
2012 Golf R Stg3 APR
If the 2022 car change does what it is intended to do, you should see the car become even less of a factor everywhere. However you don't want to eliminate the ability for teams to bake an advantage into their car, otherwise you are left with a spec series and we already have too many of those.

I am 100% with you there, like I said I have a healthy respect for the guys and gals building these things and giving them room to play and experiment is a big part of what makes it so exciting to watch.
 
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