Ross Brawn, merc (qualifying spoiler)

[sammyg2]

Less see how fuzzy the ole memmory is:
Ross Brawn was technical director with benniton, and they won a couple of driver's championships and a constructor's championship with a young MS. But not without technical controversy.

They both went to the scuderia and after a couple of rocky years won 6 constructor's championships in a row.
There were protests every year about ferrari's new wings or boards or whatever but FIA always said it was OK.

Brawn left Ferrari and went to honda (who sucked), which he eventually bought and turned into Brawn GP and won the constructor's and drivers championship their first (and only) year. Remember the controversial rear diffuser protests?

Then it became mercedes and Brawn was less hands on. For a while. And they sucked.
But, now Mercedes has the controversial W-duct and mercedes is sitting 1st and 2nd after qualifying, and it appears that Rossberg forgot to sandbag and blew everyone away early which stood to the end by over 1/2 a second. (hambone actually qualified 2nd but has a grid penalty).

in qualifying where a dozen cars can be covered in a spread of 3/10ths of a second, he finished over 5/10ths faster than anyone else out there. Obviously they're onto something big. Will it be as big as the blown diffuser for red bull last year?

So what's the deal? Everywhere this guy goes they come up with some sort of miraculous and controversial new technology that totally dominates.
Is he really that smart or is there something fishy going on?
Maybe he's from the future?

[BRPORSCHE]

Neat fact:

Last time a merc was on pole was something like 1955. With Fangio!

Brawn really is damn smart, and he looks to have lost some weight.

[emcon5]

The duct is really clever, but only really useful in Qualifying, where they use DRS every-damn where.

I didn't see it, but Matchett mentioned the Mercs were even using DRS in some of the faster corners. In the race, they can only use it on one straight, so while it is still a little better than DRS alone as implemented by the other teams, it is much less over the course of a race lap.

Did you guys see Rossberg's in-car of his pole lap? It looked like he hardly braked at all before turn 1, and then trail-braked his ass off after he turned in.

You have to admit, Brawn is an outside-the-box kind of guy.

[MattKellett]

He also joined Jaguar TWR racing and won the FIA sportscast championship in 1991.

Either he's been at the right place at the right time, or is just a damn good engineer! I know what I believe, the quiet guy just gets it done.

[nota]

in the race their DRS trick only works to pass in one zone
the M-B still eats rear tyres on a warm track
they got lucky china was cold for Q

I expect them to finish behind Mc and redbull
maybe behind kimi and the flying wonder Sauber too

[intakexhaust]

The first thing everyone looks at is aero related. What really is going on is those stealthy engineers are perfecting electrons mating with everything - chassis/ tranny / eng. / brakes ... KERS and thats the real game. Ex. When and where a button is used at a brake point to trigger another boost under deceleration... regulate torque at the wheels... yeah its sneaky wild and weird science.

[GH85Carrera]

Originally Posted by BRPORSCHE

Neat fact:

Last time a merc was on pole was something like 1955. With Fangio!

Brawn really is damn smart, and he looks to have lost some weight.

How cool is it for Rossberg to have his name on the record books right next to Fangio!

[TheMentat]

Brawn is clearly a brilliant engineer. However, the FIA can seem fairly inconsistent in its rulings.

Remember the Renault "mass dampers"? Movable aerodynamic device? Please...

[Neilk]

Wow! What a race!!!!

[J P Stein]

Anyone think that Brawn was/is sitting on his hands with the rear tire wear problem? He may just be the best car set (or call it what you want) up guy that ever came down the pike.......ain't too shabby at strategy either.

[URY914]

I like the winner. He looks like a F1 driver.

[motion]

Very exciting race. Huge props to Merc and Rosberg on a dominant win. But, I sure am put off by the fact that the race pace was 8 seconds off of Schumacher's 2004 pole time... and usually 9-10 seconds off. The cars aren't getting that much quicker as the fuel burns off. For someone like Schumacher, who has toured that course 8-10 seconds quicker than today, he must feel like he's driving a Formula Ford. I love F-1, but I think this is BS.

[Neilk]

Big difference between today and 12 years ago is that with refueling, the cars were setup for a far narrower range, ie, un 1/3 of tank, new tires, drive 20 laps and repeat. Today a car has to start with a full tank and make it to the end with only fresh tires and minor front wing adjustments.

I would think today's cars could get within 3-4 seconds if they didn't have to compromise so much.. I didn't check, but was the difference in qualifying times?

[ted]

I liked the first 10 laps...
Mercs 1/2 with Shumi in 2nd and Kimi in 4th...
Like rolling back time 5 years.

[legion]

Great race. Nice to see the running order not determined in the first few laps with a hand full of changes due to pit stops/pit strategy.

1) Michael Schumacher as the #2 driver. He's apparently comfortable doing this, which I think speaks highly of his character. He's also damn good at holding up the field without running afoul of the rules.

2) McLaren is still the team to beat. If Button had a better final pit stop, or Hamilton didn't take the grid spot penalty, or Hamilton wasn't held up by Perez, either would have been challenging for the win.

3) Lewis Hamilton is a more mature driver. In season's past, he would place all value on winning, and often throw away the race trying to pull off risky moves. Now he's been on the podium every race this season without winning, and he has an early (albeit slight) lead in the driver's championship as a result. Also, the moves that worked when he was a rookie and people didn't expect them don't work anymore.

4) Red Bull is lost. Take away their magic gizmo that suits Vettel's driving style, and suddenly Weber is the better driver.

5) Ferrari is lost. But Alonso is a good development driver. They will improve, but will they improve enough in comparison to their rivals?

6) Lotus is improving. Raikonen is an excellent development driver, and as they sort out tire strategy and the limits of this season's Pirellis, I expect them to win a few races this season.

7) This is shaping up to be a repeat of the 2010 season. McLaren will probably pull away with the Constructor championship early, but I expect the Driver's championship to take much longer to sort out, possibly going to the last race of the season with multiple possible winners.

[sammyg2]

IMO The tires of today suck in comparison with those of ten years ago, even without the grooves.
I believe they are intentionally designed to barely last and provide marginal grip to help build drama.

[motion]

I watched the Eurosport version of the race. DC mentioned that the tires have 2.5mm of rubber when new. That's not much to chew through.

[Flieger]

Originally Posted by sammyg2

IMO The tires of today suck in comparison with those of ten years ago, even without the grooves.
I believe they are intentionally designed to barely last and provide marginal grip to help build drama.

Ya think? That was what took them so long to develop them. Had to give the FIA the show they wanted. The deal was Pirelli wanted more importance and attention paid to the tires. So by making the really soft tires and then hard tires it would add "spice". Then they found there was too much of a gap last season so they tweaked them for this year to be more equal.

F1 now seems to be nothing but artificial spice. I much prefer seeing innovation pursured in areas other than getting around aerodynamic restrictions.

[motion]

Originally Posted by Flieger

F1 now seems to be nothing but artificial spice. I much prefer seeing innovation pursured in areas other than getting around aerodynamic restrictions.

I agree 100%, but now is not the time for unlimited budgets. Hopefully, they can loosen things up in 5-7 years when the world economy is strong again. Or, when China buys the series and turns it into a regional championship. Whichever comes first.

[Flieger]

Looking at vintage F1 and all the innovation they had- 6 wheels, 8 wheels, sucker cars, upright mounted wings, active suspension, etc. And they did not have big budgets. Stewart's book talks about how small the Tyrell operation was but they still won the World Championship.

I think the problem is that they are stuck in this lavish living. They are like royalty now rather than racers.