Michael Schumacher not as adaptable as previously thought?

[myurr]

Put Alonso, Hamilton, Kubica or any other driver on vacation for 3 year and than change motors, tires, and lots of other on cars and than judge Michael.

What he said.

It's still just an excuse - if he had no chance of getting back up to speed then he shouldn't be racing, full stop.

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

Put Alonso, Hamilton, Kubica or any other driver on vacation for 3 year and than change motors, tires, and lots of other on cars and than judge Michael.

What he said.

It's still just an excuse - if he had no chance of getting back up to speed then he shouldn't be racing, full stop.

A valid excuse.

[myurr]

I'd be surprised to see Schumacher on the grid next year, I think it's embarassing enough for him to see this season out.

That's going to depend entirely upon whether he thinks he's past it and not good enough any more (for whatever reason), or if it really is just the car not suiting him and that this is something they can change for next year.

As I said on another thread, it's easy to think with your heart, Haug must have painted a most romantic picture for the Mercedes board, why I question the xistance of the entire team if their performance doesn't shift dramatically within soon.

I too worry about the long term suitability of the team. Effectively they're Honda + Brawn + Mercedes. Is that combination strong enough? For me the original Honda team were weak mechanically and piss poor aerodynamically, with the odd moment where they lucked into a not so bad combination. No doubt that's a huge disservice to some of their guys, and performance is always relative, but compared to the top teams they were no where.

Someone is now going to jump up and down and scream 'Brawn won it last year', but that was by far the most expensive and highly developed car on the grid with Honda running two wind tunnels full time for 18 months on that car, at the same time McLaren and Ferrari behind the curve after an extremely draining campaign the year before, and Red Bull had more than their fair share of mechanical issues. Even then Brawn came close to throwing it all away as throughout the middle of the campaign the updates they brought to the car didn't seem to work and often ruined the balance of the car.

This year we again see the strong mercedes engine being hampered by an aerodynamically inefficient car that has basic weight distribution and mechanical issues that they can't seem to get on top of. Whilst they're not back of the grid they're not performing anywhere near the level they were aiming for, and are well out of the championship hunt.

Next year I can't see them pulling it all together any better than this year. The new tyres are a complete unknown and the changes in aero rules will mean a complete aerodynamic overhaul. They will also have the packaging problems of incorporating KERS, something that only Ferrari and McLaren ever really got to grips with, and Renault to a lesser extent at least have the experience of running it in some races. In short I think they're going to struggle again.

[myurr]

Put Alonso, Hamilton, Kubica or any other driver on vacation for 3 year and than change motors, tires, and lots of other on cars and than judge Michael.

It's still just an excuse - if he had no chance of getting back up to speed then he shouldn't be racing, full stop.

A valid excuse.

Not at all - we're past the half way point in the season and he's still nowhere near the form of his junior team mate. We're seeing him being out performed by rookies now, such as Hulkenberg and Petrov. They've never raced in F1 before and yet have managed to learn all they need to know and are now getting up to speed and turning in good performances.

Schumacher's still stuck in mid-field at least half a second off the pace of his much more junior team mate. When will the excuses stop and the results start coming in for Schumacher? Sooner or later the excuses must stop and he must either perform at the same level as his contemporaries or he should retire for good.

[xpensive]

@myurr.
Indeed, my sentiments presicely, I think the Mercedes engagement as a factory-team is a a deadringer for BMW's.

Not properly thought thru and thinking with your heart, Theissen eager to show Patrick Head a thing or two with his megabucks, while Haug was thinking "I can do this" after fifteen years with Ron Dennis. What Haug did not realize was that this was the same crap-team that Craig Pollock set up in order to berich himself and Jaques Villeneuve on BATs xpense, read Tyrrell.

[marcush.]

to stay a little off topic:
this implies that REDBULL is still that crap Stewart read Jaguar disaster and Didi Mateschitz will soon see the real face of his F1 outfit ..newey alone surely cannot be the saviour?
comeon ,guys how long ago was BAR formed?It does not make sense to stirr up mud that is old enough to be found in a museum...

back on topic...Schumacher is performing comparably(speedwise) to his teammate as Button to Hamilton,Webber with Vettel-here we have them swapping leadership ,alonso /Massa or Sutil/Liuzzi etc..
to draw up a picture that Schumacher did not ever match Rosberg on outright speed this year is simply not true or could one draw up the picture of rosberg having bad days for having Schumacher as quick.....???

[myurr]

to stay a little off topic:
this implies that REDBULL is still that crap Stewart read Jaguar disaster and Didi Mateschitz will soon see the real face of his F1 outfit ..newey alone surely cannot be the saviour?
comeon ,guys how long ago was BAR formed?It does not make sense to stirr up mud that is old enough to be found in a museum...

Redbull have proven that they've changed and improved, they've also had a large restructuring since those days and have brought in many new personnel other than just Newey.

Honda/Brawn/Mercedes had a great start to last year with by far the best car, at least in part due to the reasons I gave, but have been mediocre at best the rest of the time. They've brought in Brawn and Schumacher, and now the Mercedes engine guys, but other than that as far as I can tell they're still pretty much a slimmed down version of the Honda team. I hope they change it around as I've always liked Norbert and Rosberg and it'd be good to have them in the championship hunt with the other teams, but I can't see it happening. They're on a downward trend at the moment and next year is going to bring some challenges that they've been historically poor at solving.

[marcush.]

historically they have come up with the best interpretation of the 2009 rules..
but i see your point
back on topic.

[RH1300S]

I don't think adapatbility is the problem, anyone who has watched him drive other cars (ROC for one example) would know he can drive. I would pretty much agree with WB's theory about lack of testing - but that doesn't account for the raw talent he has (had?). His talent was very real before his F1 career and early in his career. He reinforced that with the work ethic WB refers to and effectively created the legend from that.

I wonder if he has lost that will to win, the ability to extract something that wasn't really in the car.

Also, you could say that this year there is more talent on the grid than he was probably ever seen (including Nico) so it's much harder to look good.

Interestingly his sorry episode (my opinion) with Rubens might be the trigger to unleash the driver he can be. Maybe a fire will be lit somewhere again. If it doesn't it's fair to say his comeback was a mistake.

[gridwalker]

I watched Schumacher drive the 2007 ROC live and he didn't come close to setting the world on fire : at one point, he stalled on the line and nearly got lapped by Kovalainen.

He fluffed his round in the final of the nations cup and Germany only won because Vettel performed flawlessly!

You really shouldn't use the ROC as a yardstick

[marcush.]

honestly speaking I would have loved to have him out of the car for Spa and Monza ,to give Nick a decent chance to show what the No3 car is worth really.
Nick cannot claim he´´s rusty ,he has to prove his worth ,and would be eager to prove his point.
would or could he beat Rosberg ,jumping into the car or not would give an instant answer to all questions.
Of course the ones against Schumacher would find all excuses in the world for that being not represenative ..but they would so if Schu was in front,stating he got preferential service by his pal brawn...so the bad mouthing will not stop anyways..
be it he was slower ,beit he was equal ,faster or lapping rosberg...so i don´´t think this discussion is really going anywhere.
We can be sure that Schumacher will stay as long as Norbert is able to keep him as I´m pretty sure Michael would instantly stop if he thought he was not up to it or not going to close the gap...In fact he is not really looking for excuses ,is he?
he just states the car is too slow and they fail to find a good setup in all conditions.to call him slow in a situation where he missed Q3 being .008s slower than his teammate is a ridiculousstatement... that is just luck or lack of it.

[Just_a_fan]

Didn't Kovalainen beat him in a previous ROC (driving a Ferrari 360) too?

He also beat Loeb during that ROC in a rally car. And that takes some doing!

[RH1300S]

Didn't Kovalainen beat him in a previous ROC (driving a Ferrari 360) too?

He also beat Loeb during that ROC in a rally car. And that takes some doing!

That's a whole different conversation - but maybe Heikki is wasted in F1. He's a real talent.

[marcush.]

Loeb was a complete rucksack full of seconds slow on his outings in a f1 car ,he had his difficulties in LMP racing as well .
ROC is show ...forget about this to compare F1 driving talent.

[RH1300S]

I'm getting a message here

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