Mercedes AMG F1 Team 2012

[ninogenio]

@foxhound you are the only one intend on destroying this thread. were all quite entitled to oppinions we know what has been said and done but something clearly doesnt add up whats so hard to understand about that?! .

and even though i am a schumacher fan i from the bottom of my soul am glad msc has seen sense and gave up on this team. good luck to hamilton because he is in for a very very hard time. i actually wouldnt be too displeased if schumy stoped right now and let bird finish the year off that is how bad mercedes are.

[FoxHound]

were all quite entitled to oppinions we know what has been said and done

No qualms about opinions. It's debate after all.

But you have the facts, from the driver, from the team manager, from the drivers manager etc etc....what is so hard to grasp that Schumacher had enough and wanted to go?
It's quite easy to grasp this.

[ninogenio]

two words......body language

might not be fact but i dont think anyone other than you is desputing that everything is not as black and white as mercedes would like us all too belive.

it doesnt matter anyway because i belive we will be waving goodbye too mercedes in a few years.

[FoxHound]

@ninogenio

You say body language is telling you more than the facts surrounding Schumachers departure?
That is most interesting. Can you be specific as to which picture/video you viewed that gave you this insight?

I too believe Mercedes will leave. But that's just a hunch. And dependant on results... Which are currently rubbish.

[marcush.]

The facts are:
Brawn lured Schumacher into this promising competitive machinery and a shot at the title in year two and three of the three years contract.
The team misjudged their own capoabilities by a huge margin compared to the opponents.The car was never ever a championship contender ,in fact it only looked competitive-capable of a win on merit- for a string of 3or 4 races in 2012 .

The weaknesses of the car in all these three years were titled as tyre issues ,and no matter how much they seemed to adress those problems the end result was never a gain in performance -not in lap time not in results.

They had appalling reoccurrance with things going wrong -something that escalated this year on Schumachers car.Even if the team was at pains to state it was coincidence the fact remains they have reliability issues.


i think the whole saga will take time and distance to sink in with Schumacher and I´m not sure if he will reflect very nicely on his friend Brawn and Haug with the happenings of the last three years

But -we have to thank both Brawn and Haug -for bringing Schumacher back into Formula 1 .According to the official timekeeping Schumacher still has the speed to take on everyone in Formula 1 -Ricciardo admitting to try his very best to keep Schumacher behind....to me a sign of respect ..recognising this is the guy to beat ,holding of Rosberg would be just
a normal duel ..but if you can beat the 7times champ that´s something to tell your son when your formula 1 career is long over......says it pretty much all.
If he´d considered him as an outdate ol man he would not have bothered (nor would Schumacher have cought him coming the back of the field with a car good enough to qualify 13th...)

I do not see them as a team that could lift themselves up to challenging RedBull,Mclaren or Ferrari over a whole season.The improvements they are able to draag from themselves are easily soaked up by the develomment speed of every other team
but some teams found ways to develop quicker -interestingly those have less money to spend then MGP.

[ninogenio]

@foxhound

right here goes lol.

first fry having a dinner meeting with simon fuller at christmas/newyear.
then all the little comments coming from schumacher ie ive achived nothing were on a five year plan blah blah.
then the team not telling schumacher they were about to anounce hamilton. then you only have to look post race interview with schumacher from today for body language. then lauda saying it was all brawn and brawn saying it was all lauda.. then the phone call from zetsche to schumacher. and the list goes on,

im not blindly saying these things because im a schumacher fan im just curious as too whats went on because no one in mercedes looks particularily comfortable right now.

[Raptor22]

its fairly clear that the "facts" are disconnected and distorted.

[marcush.]

the question is :
who of those persuaded him to call it a day?
Sure Brawn was miffed Schumacher did not sign early on .
I still believe there was a clear target in terms of success for 2012 put forward by Michael -this was not met.I think this pretty much was what was behind the whole story .

He simply had made it clear he won´t go for another season with a team unable to raise to the occasion .And they proved again they are not made of that kind of wood.
Their fail effectively pushed him not to sign.
The surprise was that somehow Hamilton was lured into the team -something Schumacher had not really thought would happen..
But again I think to quit MGP is absolutely right .Three years is enough ,considering the results they were able to achieve.
He should have signed with sauber for one more year though...romantic ,maybe -but i´ds swear Schumacher is exactly like that ---- so what made him quit?

[clipsy1H]

FoxHound is right, if Michael wanted to continue then he should sign the contract but the question is why he didn't sign at that moment? and why later he changed his mind a little but was too late because Hamilton already signed !
i'm sure if he hadn't announced retirement and Nico leave he would choose to stay for another year(because he want to be In F1 next season but there's no options)
but now we talk about Mercedes and how they treat Michael and Nico..... 3 years without any performance because car is so *!%$ but w04 will be a step forward and Lewis with Nico can fight for podiums/wins (and if Lewis scores points i'm sure media and Mercedes would blame Michael because he has a huge impact and no one would say about how bad was w03 and how many problems he had and also how team ruined his race in China where he could fight with Nico for win.
back in present I think Michael regrets a little that he announced his retirement Friday after today's race he could have an open door to Lotus

[FoxHound]

its fairly clear that the "facts" are disconnected and distorted.

Seriously man, I really hope you get over Schumachers departure and stop blaming the team for it. Blame them for making crappy cars by all means. But do NOT distort the facts as spoken by the team, the team members and Schumacher himself.
You lose credibility by laying this at the teams door.

[FoxHound]

@nenio

I see what you are saying. But XIX entertainment had Ferrari as guests in monaco.... It's part of their mandate... Schmoozing.
F1 is an incestuous business as we see almost every week, so I'm not reading anything into whom has met whom for a chinwag over champers... Because it happens all the time.

For the people feeling uncomfortable at Mercedes, it's only right staff be looking over their shoulder for underperformance.
But I'm not sure how quickly you can root it out and move forwards....

[marcush.]

If I were Brawn I´d be concerned about Laudas views concerning the swiss Sauber team.
Lauda pretty much has found them as the perfect example of how a team should operate.In his eyes they have all what it takes a godd infrastructure and motivated people....at a fraction of the cost of MGP..
So I expect budget cuts big time for next year -lauda questioning the efficiency of MGPs work -and that will of course lead to sacking a lot of tthe people they just hired -at least those expensive kings -sauber is doing well without any of those...
as Lauda starts his work this monday ,according to him ..we can look forward of the turns MGP will take in the reminder of the season....

about underperformance in the team ...FRy is there from day one ,Brawn since 2007 -so 6years 3 reorganisations or more....he should pretty well know who is performing ......? and who he should have better kept on the payroll..

[Raptor22]

its fairly clear that the "facts" are disconnected and distorted.

Seriously man, I really hope you get over Schumachers departure and stop blaming the team for it. Blame them for making crappy cars by all means. But do NOT distort the facts as spoken by the team, the team members and Schumacher himself.
You lose credibility by laying this at the teams door.

fellah you are contradicting yourself. You say blame them for making crappy cars but then you say Schumacher's departure shouldn't be blamed on the team? Are they disconnected events? You seem to be arguing they are not then you argue they are.

I am pretty glad and comfortable with Schumacher's departure from Mercedes. What I and others are intrigued about is why quit entirely when he has the pace, the ambition and the love of F1 to achieve what he wanted elsewhere.
What made him not take up his option at the time?
How does the negotiations with Hamilton feed into that event and his decisions and how far back do they stretch?

You can choose to believe everything you read as gospel truth, I won't deny you that comfort. However, F1 does not work that way and always the truth is under the surface.

[clipsy1H]

btw; looks what Michael posts on his website

[...] In the final laps, I had a nice and interesting battle with Ricciardo, but in the end I couldn't get past him, because the Toro Rosso was so quick on the straight

official Mercedes team with DDRS cant past a Toro Rosso i still can't believe

[Raptor22]

marc said"about underperformance in the team ...FRy is there from day one ,Brawn since 2007 -so 6years 3 reorganisations or more....he should pretty well know who is performing ......? and who he should have better kept on the payroll.."


Bingo. Brawn is there for 6 years and they have achieved one WDC and one WCC as Brawn GP. That was achieved with Honda money and expertise. The performance dropped off after Honda staff left so who in Honda was responsible for some of the innovations in the BGP001? Clearly those persons are no longer there and unavailable to Brawn.
Contrast that to the years at Ferrari and it becomes obvious that Brawn is underperforming in his role as Team Manager.
At Ferrari todt did the hiring, the structuring. Todt kept the Ferrari politics out of the F1 team. Brawn does not seem capable of similar feats.

It will be interesting to see what comes of Lauda's recommendations.