Formula One 2024 - The end draweth nearer!

Sport
21

Probably a pre-retirement bucket list thing.

Always nice to say you drove for Ferrari in the after dinner speech :slight_smile:

22

Never go full Mansell.

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23

Wow. Iā€™m really surprised, tbh. Thought he was gonna end his days at Merc.

Iā€™m sure the payā€™s not bad, but thereā€™s a likable romance to it too - I hope he does well. Him v Leclerc will be fascinating

25

Ferrari have shown that they have a competitive car for 30% of the time, so I am sure Hamilton will have a lot of fun, and frustration.
Doubt he has time in his carrer for Allison to get Merc technically competitive again

26

Itā€™ll be either glorious, or a total shamblesā€¦ā€¦:thinking:

27

Clearly there is a lot going on behind the scenes here. From what I have heard Allison did not act on what Lewis said and so he is a part of this.

Also the team will be turned round by the layer beneath Allison and the layer beneath them and not Allison.

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28

But surely the leadership and the strategic management have to come from him?
Or what does a Technical Director do?

29

That is a good question.

Their job is to deal with the FIA, FOM, the teamā€™s board and owners, the other teams at technical meetings, look at competitors, look at available resource and how to increase it for the team, look at ig supply arrangements like the engine etc.

They have very little input really into how the car is to be developed (unless their name is Adrian Newey), more a rubber stamping exercise and ensuring that the layer beneath them are communicating and has the resources that they want.

Merc have (and have for 10+ years now) the stuff required to turn the team round, they just need the technical leadership team (the 2 layers that I mentioned) to actually deliver.

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30

This article explains why Allison is not the person to turn Merc round.

https://thejudge13.com/2024/01/09/mercedes-chief-designer-unlikely-to-help-hamilton-win-8th-title/

And no, I did not write it, but do agree with what has been written.

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31

Thsnks for posting that Ian.

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32

I understand that Lewis might not appreciate the way the wind is blowing at Mercedes but Iā€™m really not convinced that going to Ferrari will take him back atop the podium. And I wonder how much Italy will take to him?

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33

Itā€™s Ferrari, itā€™ll be both :smiley:

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34

Setting-aside the usual minority of hopelessly racist cunts - if heā€™s in a red car and delivers results theyā€™ll adore him!

35

Seems every F1 drivers dream to be in the red car, even if their race strategy sucks.

I wonder how Charles feels about this?

36

This. If you win you are idolised. If notā€¦ā€¦arrivederci :-1:t3:

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37

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38

Time to cash in big time as his career comes to its end.

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39

At least one decent race is guaranteed for a few more years.

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40

I know the team owners wanted to keep the 3 highest paid employees and drivers out of the budget cap - which, of course, meant it wasnā€™t and isnā€™t a budget cap at all but they have screwed themselves IMO.
Once the good drivers suss that they can basically ask for as much as they like all that potential profit will go the way of the driver with the best negotiating position.
Already experienced engineers are being screwed on salary or replaced by know-nowts because they are inside the budget limit, so we have a situation now where th most important members of the team are screwed and the ones that matter less are cashing in.
The beginning of a long downward spiral for F1 probably.
If I were Gene Haas Iā€™d cash in at the top of the market for team value.

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41

On the subject of Andretti whilst their exclusion is due to the greed of the people currently fucking F1 it is true that they would probably struggle hugely, probably more than Haas.
When I was helping out Lola I went to the US often to support CART customers and the very best of them had about 10 to 20% of what is necessary to build a F1 car and, IMO, pretty weak understanding of the conceptual requirements of a racing car as opposed to data on setup stuff.
If they manage to get some good people and build a car and test it whilst not in F1 they will learn what they really need - I am pretty sure they donā€™t yet - and if they use the testing cleverly they can learn fast since the actual teams arenā€™t allowed to do much testing and the 2 most important parameters are missing or bodged in the simulators so running a car could be a really big advantage to them over existing teams and lift 2 fingers at them.
I bet they wonā€™t though.

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