2014/15 Silly Season

[noel]

i honestly don't know whether giedo is a bad way to go or not. we know ericsson is not exactly world champion material, to put it mildly, but when van der garde got the sauber for fp1's, he was always within 2-3 tenths to his team mate. that's not at all bad. and he brings money.

[WaikeCU]

There's a blog post at Adam Cooper's F1 blog that reported Rubens Barrichello having a deal made to drive for Caterham the last 3 races of the season. Shame Caterham didn't even made it in Austin. I'm quite astounded with Rubens coming back to have a proper farewell to F1 as a pay driver.

[Racer X]

Indeed. Sauber's immense decline in only 2 years has been almost tragic to watch. On the flip side, you have a team like Mercedes, who at the end of 2012 (believe it or not) had a significantly worse car than Sauber. Now look at where each team is at.

Yes Sauber in 2012 was as you say it's a combination of Financial stability the drivers and how good you prepare. Next year sauber with two pay drivers that can't be good but then again Sergio Perez was considered a Pay driver once so who knows maybe Sauber wins the lottery again and we see some podiums. I'm talking about Ericsson and The rumoured Van Der Gard is that how you spell that? But anyways I wish them all the luck in the world but it will be harder if you don't have the right drivers. For example I think Sutil is mediocre as was Di Resta and then you have Gutierrez who okay he had a good rookie year best of the rookies or at least second best. But he's been in this team let's use Checo as an example the same time as checo and done nothing compared to him. I just think Telmex needs to drop Gutierrez. Then Force India will have more funds (pending they retain him) For next year imagine Force India with more resources next year this will make for a better fight from them. Then also you give a chance to a driver that maybe we haven't seen enough off too show he should be in the sport. We don't know that these guys just need one more season. On the other hand Esteban that's just too many seasons now... I don't see Esteban back in 2016 if he sucks this next season but I hope he leaves the sport won't miss him..

[Phil]

Indeed. Sauber's immense decline in only 2 years has been almost tragic to watch. On the flip side, you have a team like Mercedes, who at the end of 2012 (believe it or not) had a significantly worse car than Sauber. Now look at where each team is at.

Yes Sauber in 2012 was as you say it's a combination of Financial stability the drivers and how good you prepare.

IMO, the good performance of Sauber in 2012 was a bit of a lottery and luck, due to the unpredictability of the Pirelli tires. I mean, we had 7 different race winners in the first 7 races. Sauber was fortunate to a degree that their car was very good on the tires and it also enabled them to gamble on strategies which usually saw one of their drivers benefit from, like Perez on numerous occasions when he landed a 2nd spot (and nearly win) or a podium - which to be fair, was a lot of good fortunae in the first place because lots of cars ahead ran into tire wear problems towards the end of the race. As the season progressed and teams got to gribs with the tires better, the Sauber (with lack of funding and development too) gradually moved further back into the midfield again.

I agree that their drivers aren't cutting it - Sutil is probably the better of the two, but he's had a big handicap because he is also heavier, but on the whole, Hulkenberg did a much better job the previous year. This year has been very unlucky for them, because the PU is one of the largest performance differentiator and with a car/chassis with limited budget and the Ferrari PU, they've ended up way behind in the standings.

[Racer X]

Yeah great points I just like Esteban but then again how could they show anything if the PU isn't good and you have a limited budget. Well either way let's say they keep Esteban then maybe Ericsson will be great and with their combined funding we can then see a Suaber who can better develop a car. Then there would be no excuses for the drivers. Tho Ferrari does need to up its PU game..

[Jonnycraig]

Esteban had 2 seasons to prove himself and he hasn't impressed at all. But if Sauber signs V/D Garde that would be one of the worst line-ups in F1 history.

You realise Van Der Garde is a FR3.5 champion right? More than either Sutil or Gutierrez has achieved outside F1 for example.

[Macklaren]

ANOTHER TWIST! Pitlanetalk abruptly deleted their twitter account saying they were wrong about Alo to Mclaren. No additional details. Pitlanetalk was among the earliest to break and most vocal with this story...

[Thunder]

Next twist:

Alonso Deal with Mclaren gets announced, Pitlanetalk comes back "Told Ya!!!!!!!!!!"

Seriously, don't believe anything other than official Anouncements anymore, that whole Pitlanetalk "show" is just weird.

[mikeerfol]

ANOTHER TWIST! Pitlanetalk abruptly deleted their twitter account saying they were wrong about Alo to Mclaren. No additional details. Pitlanetalk was among the earliest to break and most vocal with this story...

Ι'm still laughing =D> =D> =D>

So, did anyone see their last tweet? Was it just "We were wrong about Alonso to McLaren" ?

[Macklaren]

it was something like "we said we would delete our account if we were wrong about alo to mclaren. We were so its time to go"

[Redragon]

If this weekend with Honda boss at interlagos Alo is not announced as new Mclaren driver,
I doubt he is joining the team.

[mikeerfol]

"Honda boss at interlagos"

Is there a source about that?

[xDama]

Esteban had 2 seasons to prove himself and he hasn't impressed at all. But if Sauber signs V/D Garde that would be one of the worst line-ups in F1 history.

You realise Van Der Garde is a FR3.5 champion right? More than either Sutil or Gutierrez has achieved outside F1 for example.

Yeah, but you're forgetting Sutil made the jump from F3 to F1, while VDG did 2 seasons FR 3.5 (winning 1 title against a very medioccre line-up) and 4 seasons GP2 (with only 1 3rd place). To be fair, I'd choose Sutil over VDG anytime. IMO VDG is primarily around because of his McGregor money and because he's a nice guy He's not a bad driver, but imo he's miles of the top of the field.

[kooleracer]

Esteban had 2 seasons to prove himself and he hasn't impressed at all. But if Sauber signs V/D Garde that would be one of the worst line-ups in F1 history.

You realise Van Der Garde is a FR3.5 champion right? More than either Sutil or Gutierrez has achieved outside F1 for example.

And as a WSR 3.5 champion he didn't preform in the GP2 series, why you ask? Because back in the day the WSR 3.5 didn't have a strong field. He beat 2nd place Julien Jousse and 3rd palce Fabio Carbone have ever heard of those guys again in racing? He then did a incredible 98 races in GP2 and only won 6 races and don't forget he was in top team Barwa Addax for 50 of those 98 races.

Esteban finished top 3 in his second GP2 year and Sutil isn't stellar either, but he has showed he can be competitive in a F1 car on numerous occasions. Sutil is a competent F1 driver he has showed that in his career.

If you take out that win of the WSR 3.5 of V/D Garde which was then not a feeder series to F1 it was more like AutoGP is now. Then V/D Garde junior career has been really poor to say the least. Ericsson and V/D Garde junior results are really comparable. Ericsson won the BMW UK 2007 against no names also his Japanse F3 win was against no names. If you look at his other results like his GP2 record: 94 races and 3 wins, also a year with DAMS who then were the top team only managed 1 win that year. So even in a good car the guy isn't performing.

Sauber in 2015 will be the blind leading the blind, but is all about surviving at the moment for Sauber. Sauber has a big organisation so they don't wont to cut their staff or their facilities. But if they continue this way scoring points will be difficult because both driver won't extract the maximum of the car like Hulkenberg or Perez did. Also the teams they are battling against Force India and Torro Rosso have similar cars buth way better drivers driving for them and that will make it almost impossible to beat their rivals. Mercedes,Ferrari, McLaren, Red Bull, Williams, Lotus are out of reach. So their only rivals will be maybe Force India ( but i think they will also out of reach). So STR are their only rivals and if they retain Vergne he will score those 9th and 10th places rather then Ericsson or V/D Garde. Lotus will have a Mercedes powerunit also the 2015 car is on schedule unlike their 2014 project. So Lotus won't have a horror season again. So Sauber needs to build a bullet of a car to score points in 2015 because their competitors are improving and their aren't with V/D Garde en Ericsson. Hope they get Kamui in as their test driver so they can have a reference for the performance of their race drivers.

[Phil]

If this weekend with Honda boss at interlagos Alo is not announced as new Mclaren driver,
I doubt he is joining the team.

If he is not joining McLaren, then where is he off too? Not RedBull. And not Mercedes. Staying at Ferrari might be one option, though I can only imagine the fun if that happens, in regards to Vettel that was supposed to head out there. Maybe Kimi will be shafted for the second time out of a contract?

There's only one certainty that I see; Vettel is leaving RedBull Racing so he is either off to Ferrari or McLaren.