Silly Season 2013/14

[Trocola]

McLaren just announced that Perez is out and Magnussen in. And they are delaying the announce of the new sponsor that was going to happen on dec 2nd

[Richard]

McLaren just announced that ....

Have they? For some reason that's been missed by Google, the McLaren website, and the McLaren twitter feed. It seems Kevin Magnussen doesn't have a twitter account.

It seems that its highly likely, but not been announced just yet, but McLaren do have a habit of holding press conferences on Tuesdays...

[Manoah2u]

anyway, what do we OFFICIALLY know now?

1 - Vettel [contracted] - REDBULL
2 - Ricciardo [contracted] - REDBULL
3 - Hamilton [contracted] - MERCEDES
4 - Rosberg [contracted] - MERCEDES
5 - Raikkonen [contracted] - FERRARI
6 - Alonso [contracted] - FERRARI
7 - Grosjean [ not yet confirmed ] - LOTUS
8 - ???? [ Hulkenberg / Maldonado / Valsecchi ] - LOTUS
9 - Button [ not yet confirmed ] - MCLAREN
10 -????[perez / vandoorne / magnussen / ] - MCLAREN
11 - Di Resta [contracted] - FORCE INDIA
12 - ???? [Sutil / Calado / Hulkenberg] - FORCE INDIA
14 - Sirotkin [ not yet confirmed ] - SAUBER
15 -???? [Guiterrez / Hulkenberg / Maldonado ] - SAUBER
16 - Vergne [contracted] - TORO ROSSO
17 - Kvyat [contracted] - TORO ROSSO
18 - Massa [contracted] - WILLIAMS
19 - Bottas [contracted] - WILLIAMS
20 - Bianchi [contracted] - MARUSSIA
21 - ???? [Chilton/Magnussen/Vandoorne/ - MARUSSIA
22 - Pic [contracted] - CATERHAM
23 - ???? [Kovalainen/VanderGarde/Rossi] - CATERHAM

So we have 9 total seats that are not yet fully confirmed.

[Trocola]

McLaren just announced that ....

Have they? For some reason that's been missed by Google, the McLaren website, and the McLaren twitter feed. It seems Kevin Magnussen doesn't have a twitter account.

It seems that its highly likely, but not been announced just yet, but McLaren do have a habit of holding press conferences on Tuesdays...

The information is on the autosport website.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/111249

I have just readed what i wrote and I understand what you said: It is not a McLaren announce, it is just the information from autosport. I did not read the information because I save my visits to autosport news for races (just 30 news a month is too little)

[Holm86]

And McLaren are holding back the announcement of their 2014 sponsor. They want to announce at the car unveiling. This means a new livery according to my logic. Though I have been wrong once. But the 80's are so long ago

[adrianjordan]

McLaren just announced that ....

Have they? For some reason that's been missed by Google, the McLaren website, and the McLaren twitter feed. It seems Kevin Magnussen doesn't have a twitter account.

It seems that its highly likely, but not been announced just yet, but McLaren do have a habit of holding press conferences on Tuesdays...

The information is on the autosport website.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/111249

I have just readed what i wrote and I understand what you said: It is not a McLaren announce, it is just the information from autosport. I did not read the information because I save my visits to autosport news for races (just 30 news a month is too little)

BBC also reporting this online...

[Aesto]

anyway, what do we OFFICIALLY know now?

....

Di Resta is hardly a sure thing at Force India.

[Manoah2u]

anyway, what do we OFFICIALLY know now?

...

Di Resta is hardly a sure thing at Force India.

I thought i saw on a website he had a contract? Guess contracts don't mean squad tho, neither do promises.
Silly season 2014 is absolutely true now, though.

I guess the next important thing to be announced is what happens at lotus in 2014. Maldo or Hulk.
Hulk/Perez @ Force India then ?
Gro/Maldo @ LotusF1 ?

[GitanesBlondes]

If Perez is gone from the sport, it's no big loss to be quite honest. He's a guy who excelled when Sauber got the tire strategy correct last season.

[tim|away]

As far as choosing Magnussen over Cheko is concerned, you have to put all emotions to the side for a moment.

• The fact that McLaren failed to provide an adequate car this year doesn't disable them from evaluating their drivers.
• Formula1 has never been about fairness. It has always been a ruthless competition and only the best will make it.
• As armchair critics (myself included), our judgement of Cheko's performance relative to Button is extremely limited - we certainly do not know better than McLaren themselves who have all the data.
• A driver's performance is almost certainly not determined by a single race, but as a global metric over the whole year.
• Apart from current performance, McLaren would also estimate what could be possible (i.e. hidden potential). At this point, they feel Magnussen has more potential going forward than Cheko.
• I do not know how the evaluation process works in detail (i.e. what sort of data is collected, how it's weighed, how representative it is, etc.). If anyone has any insight into this, I am sure I wouldn't be the only one reading that with great interest.

Given the above, I personally can't blame McLaren for their decision. In fact, it seems the only logical choice in a data-driven world like Formula1. I would love to question the accuracy of those datapoints to esimate a driver's hidden potential, but without knowing anything about the methodology I can't argue that either.

[fritticaldi]

The way Stoffel Vandoorne shattered the record in the recent GP2 test is a clear indication he could make the leap to F1 straight away. To me it seems the young Belgian driver from the McLaren Academy is just as good as the highly touted Kevin Magnussen.

[langwadt]

The way Stoffel Vandoorne shattered the record in the recent GP2 test is a clear indication he could make the leap to F1 straight away. To me it seems the young Belgian driver from the McLaren Academy is just as good as the highly touted Kevin Magnussen.

He came seconds in fr3.5 so of course he is good, but Kevin has been on top of the time sheets at the young drivers test
so he has proven he is also fast in an F1 car

[ringo]

I think mclaren are wasting time with the young drivers for 2014.
There is no such thing as an off year. You go into every year with the intent to win the championship.
People made the same mistake when they thought mercedes was going into 2013 not wanting to win. Then came the fast as hell W04.
What if they chose magnussen and he flops? What's next pick another newbie and then he flops like the first one?
In some ways the selection of Perez in the first place was the beginning of Mclarens downward spiral. The team is just not as stable as it used to be. They are going to get lost focusing on sifting through these young inexperienced guys, while other teams are busy focussing on improving their car with the feedback from their long term drivers.
I can't see why Mclaren haven't seriously consider hulkenberg.

[ringo]

As for Massa to Williams. That's a very fair move. I don't think he'll do too bad there. The synergies are well matched.
What this move does evoke, is which countertop will Maldonado slam down his cash wad.
Will it be Lotus?
What if Kimi's back doesn't get better for next year, will Hulk get the ferrari seat, or Bianchi?

[iotar__]

As far as choosing Magnussen over Cheko is concerned, you have to put all emotions to the side for a moment.

• The fact that McLaren failed to provide an adequate car this year doesn't disable them from evaluating their drivers.
• Formula1 has never been about fairness. It has always been a ruthless competition and only the best will make it.
• As armchair critics (myself included), our judgement of Cheko's performance relative to Button is extremely limited - we certainly do not know better than McLaren themselves who have all the data.
• A driver's performance is almost certainly not determined by a single race, but as a global metric over the whole year.
• Apart from current performance, McLaren would also estimate what could be possible (i.e. hidden potential). At this point, they feel Magnussen has more potential going forward than Cheko.
• I do not know how the evaluation process works in detail (i.e. what sort of data is collected, how it's weighed, how representative it is, etc.). If anyone has any insight into this, I am sure I wouldn't be the only one reading that with great interest.

Given the above, I personally can't blame McLaren for their decision. In fact, it seems the only logical choice in a data-driven world like Formula1. I would love to question the accuracy of those datapoints to esimate a driver's hidden potential, but without knowing anything about the methodology I can't argue that either.

This is basically saying that whatever F1 team does is right, IMO also a proof that their selling the situation through senior sources leaks and shaping public's opinion that way worked. Magnussen might be a great talent, potentially faster than Perez, fine, but he's as ready as Ricciardo/Vergne when they entered F1.

What happened to their evaluation methods you have so much faith in when they were hiring Kova, Perez or keeping J.B. because you can't criticise Perez in his first season without Button getting caught in it. They were on similar level. I'd add to that examples from the past when great drivers weren't performing when McL didn't want them too and say that if the car was half decent it might have looked differently.

Speaking of evaluation, this is the third top team that skipped Hulkenberg. They clearly know more than media and net over-hyping him , so Raikkonen, Magnussen, Ricciardo are better. Hulkenberg shouldn't worry since Lotus got another clueless owner liking hype, along with some money, to choose drivers instead of technical staff and management. Tempting spotlight but you have to pay for it later on sporting and financial level, not everyone is smart enough to leave it to Briatore.

Ecclestone promised Brazilian and "his" team hired one but where is Maldo moving, Force India? Sideways move. Replacing who, hopefully not Di Resta, he can keep Hamilton behind better than Hulk so he's clearly a superstar and deserves to be in F1.