The F1 2015 thread…

Jeeze, this is getting tedious. How long to shift one bloody car??

Tyre management, how thrilling. Between this and Rugby Yawnion I could bore myself to death!

😯

That was unexpected!

jonnytheleyther – Member
Tyre management, how thrilling. Between this and Rugby Yawnion I could bore myself to death!

Didn’t see SA v Japan yesterday then??!

some overtaking due to different tyre strategy/management – and apart from a man on the course – nothing much else happened….

the more i hear from Mercedes the more i think Bernie has asked them to “lose a few” for the viewing figures and him selling the TV rights a bit higher to Italy 🙂

Lotus Retain Maldonado[/url]

Either that boy is walking round with a massive pile of cash or he knows where a lot of bodies are buried.

His continued involvement in the sport is a bit of an embarrassment given some of the talent sat on the sidelines

Well there’s no question about his (well, PDVSA’s) pile of cash – £30m they reckon.

Interesting though as people thought him being retained would mean Renault weren’t going to buy Lotus but that largely seems to be deal. The suggestion was that maybe Bernie wasn’t going to pay Renault their money up front so they wanted the PDVSA money to keep things going at Lotus.

As to Singapore, reckon it was just a bad race for Merc and a particularly good one for Ferrari (well, Vettel).

Telegraph reporting that Button will quit at the end of this season and go to WEC. The timing (Japan) would make sense but I’d have thought he’d want one decent season to finish but maybe there’s not much confidence that Honda will sort it out next season…

Autosport tells you everything you need to know

Autosport

Whole things nuts, PDVSA are in trouble with the current oil price so are borrowing billions from China, and then they give millions to an F1 team for what? While Bernie keeps taking more money.

As pointed out on the commentary yesterday (by Coulthard?) Maldonado also guarantees you a certain level of publicity and TV time.

Renault Boss blurted yesterday that Grosjean will be going to Haas; which is probably a good deal for him.

Maldo is a liability. But money really does talk.

Interesting comment yesterday that Merc’s woes may have something to do with Pirelli’s new minimum tyre pressure and their enforcement of it.

We’ll see next race…

Telegraph reporting that Button will quit at the end of this season and go to WEC

Will be very interesting to see which WEC team he heads for. Porsche don’t exactly need him, he doesn’t strike me as particularly Audi like, and I cant see Toyota having the cash to meet his salary although I also cant see him struggling around in the Nissan until its properly sorted.
More interesting times ahead for F1’s feeder series though!

BBC Sport are reporting the rumour that Button will retire at the end of the season. Seems like a good call for JB, he sounded like a broken man yesterday. I can’t see Alonso being too happy about having a fast, young team mate tho.

JB was giddy as a schoolboy on Saturday on Sky F1. His post Qualy interview was great fun; good humoured, upbeat and funny.

It’ll look good on his tv CV.

I can’t see Alonso being too happy about having a fast, young team mate tho.

No one will be going fast in that McLaren Honda.

Anyway knowing that McLaren are likely to have money problems as sponsors leave, then any new driver is less likely to be fast and more likely to be rich.

It’ll look good on his tv CV.

What, like “three times Le Mans winner Allan McNish” to give him his full name 😉

Perhaps Im a bit cynical but I do smell the long arm of Bernie wanting to make sure the championship goes to the last race to keep the TV and sponsor money happy.

Looks like someone in Michelin’s F1 department is a mountain biker. According to the BBC they want to switch from 26″ wheels to 28.3″ Yeah they’ll really bring the track to life…

FWIW I hope Bernie does keep the title going until the last race – I’m going 😉

@chrimac has it 🙂 i wonder if the super secret “concorde agreement” up to 2020 states that no one team can win more then 3 races in a row, and the championship cannot be decided before 3 races from the end – would not surprise me after bernies popped his cloggs a lot of skeletons come out of the cupboard

more bad news for bernie trying to sell tv rights….
figures collapse

the less popular the “stars” of the show the less you get people wanting to see them.

formula E final had 1.2m viewers in comparison. Bring it on !

more bad news for bernie trying to sell tv rights….

Not surprising when you sell it to Sky who then lock it behind closed doors. Needs to be back on BBC full time.

Not surprising when you sell it to Sky who then lock it behind closed doors. Needs to be back on BBC full time.

As long as the money keeps rolling in Bernie doesn’t give a monkeys about viewing figures. Boxing seems to be awash with money at the to end but hardly anyone watches that now.

And F1 could be good for Audi now – after their US diesel scandal they may need to develop some new alternative technology!

VW Audi using dodgy hidden technology to get an advantage, yep they’ll fit right in to F1 😉

Right now VW need as much money in the bank as they can, as the US might be about to take them to the cleaners. So I think that pretty much kills their investment in F1 if it was ever going to happen. But what will be the wider fall out as allegedly Renault may have similar issues so we’ll have to see if that impacts on their F1 involvement.

In a world where the BBC are being squeezed for money by the government then the F1 deal looks bad. I’m not sure I can see them re-bidding in future.

If Bernie doesn’t care about viewing figures then the teams should make him aware.

I’m fairly sure the sponsors are interested in viewing figures 😉

futon river crossing – Member
I’m fairly sure the sponsors are interested in viewing figures

Quite!

I’m fairly sure the sponsors are interested in viewing figures

I don’t think that’s always the case, F1 is a global brand, with the associated press coverage that this brings. If I was a multi-national company sponsoring F1 I’d be more interested in getting my brand on as many multi platform / country reports that hit as many eyes as possible (be it news reports / press coverage etc) rather than trying to appeal to a snapshot of a countries population who will watch the race live.
Its all a marketing tool, the actual race is just a very small part of it.

Latest driver gossip (and it is gossip so…)

Grosjean to Haas (not really new gossip)

Checo to Renault

Magnussen to FI

Kind of makes sense. KM would be better at a team that will hopefully allow him to prove himself but FI does seem to be a bit of a dead end for drivers

Magnussen to FI

…so Vandoorne to McLaren?

And Grosjean hoping to get Kimi’s place in 2017.

Checo to Renault

This would be a shame, I was hoping to see Jean-Éric Vergne at Renault

Grosjean has signed for Haas

Grosjean has signed for Haas

Is that official now then?

Wouldnt surprise me if Button doesnt see out the season with McLaren – knowing Ron he’ll let him escape, subject to a payment, to go off and do a WEC and he can put in a youngster to get up to speed with the car , due to limiting testing in season.

not sure why, but everyone in F1 is saying audi are in, and everyone in audi are saying no we are not….
is F1 trying to talk up their arrival to try and bluff others into looking into F1.

is that official now then

Think I jumped the gun slightly.
Reading the article back, it’s not officially been confirmed yet

Winterkorns resigned from VW. That’ll put F1 on the back burner I’d imagine. Wonder what Mr Horner’s thinking at the moment

Wonder what Mr Horner’s thinking at the moment

Time to polish up the CV!

Wow. This is big news! I guess VW were never meant to be in F1!

Wonder what Mr Horner’s thinking at the moment

Don’t trust a German or an Austrian?

It’s not looking great for the caffiene sellers.

I was away so had a delayed catchup with Singapore – watched most of the race on fast forward. I hate to say it, but I’m starting to agree with the moaners who say it’s got too boring and nothing much happens, I want to keep loving it, but that race was so dull.