Button and Perez have weak car development skills (?)

[PlatinumZealot]

The 2013 formula one season is nearly over, and what has Mclaren to show for it? Just a few mediocre finishing positions: No pole positions, no podiums, poor race operations and finally poor car development. I can't tell when was the last time Mclaren was so poor in in-season development! It's shameful. The technical capabilities back at Woking certainly have not degraded, I am sure they have all the engineering tools needed to bring the MP4-28 up into podium fighting form, the internal operations have not changed, even Sam Michaels and Whitmarsh couldn't screw up last year... so what really caused this slump? The only thing left are the two bandits... Jenson Button and Sergio Perez. Not even a whiff of the podium in the seventeen races past and these mediocre drivers seem so satisfied with "the car feels better to drive this race, we are making progress!" The bitch and whinge about "no grip" every race. The blame must drop squarely on Jenson Button and Sergio for the poor car development.

In 2009, that car was a real DOG.. a real shoe box of a car at the beginning of the season. The aero-concept was just wrong... the team were fighting for top ten finishes right up to the summer.. But the real difference was that the drivers at the time were giving the required inputs to make the car into a winner! You could see suspension development progress, then you saw the aero changes coming in. The drivers were telling us of the changes and little bits and bobs.. It is even documented by the media the inputs claimed by the two drivers at the time. Do we hear any thing from Button or Perez in their own words how they help to develop the car, about how they push the engineers to try new things? Nope! I mean I concede that telling the media is not evidence of how much a driver contributes, but at least it shows the driver is "in the loop."

I think for the sake of the future of this team, and Mclaren's reputation of being the best in development. Perez and Button need to be dropped for 2014. With all the complexities going into next year's cars too much is at stake to keep Button and Perez. I am convinced that these two drivers cannot contribute substantially to develop a car over the season. FIRE THEM!!

[Pup]

Button's setup difficulties and the problem of pairing him with an inexperienced teammate were well discussed before the start of the season. If anyone should be fired, it should be the person who paired them.

Then again, they didn't have much of a choice. Button is Button, and there's no evidence that their only other choice at the time, Hulkenburg, is any better at development than Perez.

Regardless, the car is a dog. As much as we fans hoped, there was just never any latent magic to unlock. It was the wrong philosophy and we have to admit that the panicking hysterics who called for McLaren to bring back last years car were probably right. No amount of setup work on this car could have closed a 200 point gap.

Not to mention that Perez is gone and all signs point to Button leaving after next year, so I'm not sure I get the point of the thread.

[Holm86]

I've been saying this for ages now. Button is very bad at giving feedback. How on earth can he help develop a car when he cant even find a setup that works best for him at the track?? Often he seem to have okay speed in FP1. Then it drops in FP2 or 3. Because all the other drivers figure out what sort of setup they will run.

It seems as Perez has the same sort of problem. But development on the 28 cant be blamed on him. He is still young and completely new in the team. Button has been in F1 in ages and has been with McLaren for 4 years now.

Honestly I don't know why McLaren wanted him in the first place. My guess is that they fell too much in love with the idea of having two British world champions in a British car.

As I've also said in some other tread I believe McLaren has run out of patience with Button. If they were any sort of pleased by his performances in the team they would have given him a new contract and made it official long ago.

Button will be in McLaren for 2014 only because of his experience with the team and because they don't have a replacement. I don't see him at McLaren in 2015.

[FoxHound]

Neither are going to register in the pantheon of greats, but not even Zeus would have made the 28 a winning car.
Blame the drivers all you like, the problem with the car started way before Button slapped his eyeballs on it, or Perez even setting foot on Mclaren property.

[Jersey Tom]

The technical capabilities back at Woking certainly have not degraded, I am sure they have all the engineering tools needed to bring the MP4-28 up into podium fighting form

That is mightily speculative, IMO.

But in any event, certainly there are some drivers who are fast racers and poor developers, and there are some who are slower racers and better for development. There are MANY who are crap racers and crap in development. And every once in a while you get someone who is exceptional at both.

Tough trade-offs. Would you want someone racing your car who gives better verbal feedback but is several tenths slower come race time?

[PlatinumZealot]

The technical capabilities back at Woking certainly have not degraded, I am sure they have all the engineering tools needed to bring the MP4-28 up into podium fighting form

That is mightily speculative, IMO.

But in any event, certainly there are some drivers who are fast racers and poor developers, and there are some who are slower racers and better for development. There are MANY who are crap racers and crap in development. And every once in a while you get someone who is exceptional at both.

Tough trade-offs. Would you want someone racing your car who gives better verbal feedback but is several tenths slower come race time?

If the guy who is two tenths slower can make my car 6 tenths faster for the race I'll keep him no doubt. His faster team mate will benefit and so it's a win-win situation.

[marcush.]

Well -from a distance it looks like it was Hamilton who took the speed from Mclaren to Mercedes...and Hamilton is the Messiah of car setup inspiration....
But then who gave Sauber the ideas to develop their car into a almost winner?

Even though I would like to believe a driver can give development direction it is more than obvious teams think they can do it without this input.
I very much doubt any driver would encourage their team to take a new approach when their current design is a match for the very best..It is the engineers vision that´s triggerring the actions...dropping the known designs and givin it a go.
Mclaren did not think they took a gamble ,and they even refused to drop the car as soon as they realised it was way slower than expected...all not in the hands of the drivers.

Look as far as Sauber ..similar issues .an ambitious new car design ,but flawed .One driver a rookie the other a quick but young hotshoe ...but still they have against all financial difficulty found the answers to the questions and now perform exactly on the expected level.


It´s not Button and Perez who failed to deliver -it is clearly Mclarens development team that failed to come up with fixes for a fundamenatlly flawed design or a total epic fail to understand their very own designs...your choice.

Button scored as many points as Hamilton in their three years together.I´m fed up with those claims he is a mediocre driver or car developper .
He does rely more on a car suiting his style maybe more than others -this might explain his varying gaps towards Hamilton but one should not forget he had weekends were he beat the "Boss2 fair and square ..notably in Spa -and who would say that was not a drivers circuit...

drivers are drivers and NOT designers or engineers-end of story.

and for the quicker driver or car developper - you are kidding JT ,are you?

Where is the worth of a quicker driver if he eats up all the rubber in 4 laps with his speed and the seemingly slower driver has found the right balance and can drive at his admitedly slower pace almost forever---I´m pretty sure at the checkered flag you will be very happy to have stuck with the "slower" driver.
I have to admit working in the team you lovethe out and out racer but rarely those are the ones who keep it all in check and score .

[JimClarkFan]

As has already been said, I don't think blame lies (certainly not completely) with the drivers.

Management is where the real problems at Mclaren lies, there were a plethora of mistakes in the run up to this season that has resulted in the lack luster performance. Specifically Mclaren changed too much on the car, they went into preseason testing with a brand new, well everything, meaning they couldn't pin point what was working on the car and what wasn't. They did the exact same, albeit it to a lesser degree in 2011 with the funky sidepod design. For much of the season it looked like the blind leading the blind and management failed to sort it out. Two errors of that kind within a few years, both under the stewardship of Whitmarsh should be punishable.

The second error was the hiring of Perez in the first place. There were several of us last year who thought it was a bad choice, and felt that the performance of Perez was mostly down to long runs on tyres rather than out right pace. It has proven as much this year, and to be fair, I don't think Perez ever got to show the best of himself.

The third problem is that Mclaren, by their own admission, have switched development to their 2014 car too late. The shift should have happened sooner, and as a result of bad management, their is every chance that the 2014 car will not be as good as it should be either.

Then we have the behavior of management this year in the drivers market. I don't know what else they can expect Perez, or Button for that matter, to do with that car. The way they have went about the sacking of Perez was completely wrong, they should have been upfront instead of stringing him along for the best part of the last few months. In doing so they have hurt his chances of getting a drive next year, and could have potentially set back his F1 career forever.

With respect to Button being unable to develop or setup a car, I believe that is false. I think the problem is Mclarens, Button did some great things with the BAR Honda, and the Brawn Mercedes.

[GrizzleBoy]

I would have much preferred Perez drive along Magnussen tbh.

He might have had some trouble earlier finding his place in the team and what he needs to do in terms of consistency/performance/aggressiveness (especially with Whitmarsh egging him on to drive outside of his comfort zone in terms of aggressiveness), but imo he's been right there with Button, if not doing better at times despite the point difference.

[JimClarkFan]

I would have much preferred Perez drive along Magnussen tbh.

He might have had some trouble earlier finding his place in the team and what he needs to do in terms of consistency/performance/aggressiveness (especially with Whitmarsh egging him on to drive outside of his comfort zone in terms of aggressiveness), but imo he's been right there with Button, if not doing better at times despite the point difference.

''He might have had some trouble earlier finding his place in the team and what he needs to do in terms of consistency/performance/aggressiveness (especially with Horner egging him on to drive outside of his comfort zone in terms of aggressiveness), but imo he's been right there with Vettel, if not doing better at times despite the point difference.''

or

''He might have had some trouble earlier finding his place in the team and what he needs to do in terms of consistency/performance/aggressiveness (especially with Montezemolo egging him on to drive outside of his comfort zone in terms of aggressiveness), but imo he's been right there with Alonso, if not doing better at times despite the point difference.''




See what I did there?
We can say that about several other drivers, but points are what matters.
The relative points difference between Vettel and Webber, and Alonso and Massa are roughly the same as Button and Perez.


Now I would agree that the points difference between Button and Hamilton last year did not represent the actual difference there was between the two drivers performance over the course of the season, however given that both Perez and Button have been dealt similar luck this year, I don't see how you can really suggest that.

[Richard]

Yes we do hear that some drivers give better feedback than others, but as others have said even Zeus or Senna (which one is higher in the heavenly hierarchy?) would struggle to make anything out of this year's car.

Even if we do humour the hypotheses for a moment, who are we to judge the input of an individual on car development? We're not party to the conversations. It's just conjecture and hyperbole.

So we come to the denouement of the thread when we revisit the universal truth that a thread with driver's name in the title is almost certain for closure.

ps - "How does driver feedback help develop a car" would be a good thread.