Mercedes won’t win as many races in 2015 – Alonso

F1 Fanatic Round-up

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In the round-up: Fernando Alonso believes Mercedes will not repeat their feat of winning 16 races in 2015.

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Alonso sounds warning to Mercedes (Sporting Life)

"I don't think they will win so many races this year. Yes, they are favourites, but all the other teams will be more prepared than last year."

Dennis explains early woes (Sky)

"The engine is an integral part of our size zero policy. The car is phenomenally tightly packaged in the back end, which has given huge scope to Peter Prodromou and his team and they have taken full advantage of it."

Honda says McLaren engine problems fixed (Autosport)

"We have already fixed it. We have found out what has happened, and tonight we change something and tomorrow will be much better."

Vettel sees 'huge potential' at Ferrari (ESPN)

"The potential is obviously huge, but it's also a time of change with a lot of people leaving, a lot of people coming, people getting promoted and put in different places. But definitely motivation is high, not just with me, but all the team to get back to the front as soon as possible."

Formula One suffers global drop in TV figures (Daily Mail)

"The fall in F1 numbers, disclosed by F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone in the sport’s annual broadcast report, yet to be made public, showed that worldwide audiences fell by 5.6 per cent to 425 million different fans tuning in across the season from 450 million previously."

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Comment of the day

Some perspective on Mercedes’ impressive start to testing yesterday in which they racked up 157 laps at Jerez:

It is quite rare for one team to be so reliable straight out of the box. These are the most laps completed by a team on the opening day of testing:

2014: 31 laps
2013: 89 laps
2012: 105 laps
2011: 99 laps
2010: 102 laps
2009: 65 laps

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On this day in F1

F1’s current points system – twenty-five for a win down to one for last place – was officially confirmed by the FIA five years ago today.

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Keith Collantine
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54 comments on “Mercedes won’t win as many races in 2015 – Alonso”

  1. I’d guess at either a livery change before Australia, or at the start of the European leg, or at Silverstone, they are the only 3 times that make sense to me

    1. They’ll change the livery when the announce their new title sponsor.

      1. ColdFly F1 (@)
        2nd February 2015, 3:23

        like they did in 2014 ;-)

      2. Oh yeah :).

        Actually I think Denis is reacting to people’s reaction when they presented MP4-30. They social media sites were flooded with negative comments.

        1. Yes I think this is the same as his “Our title sponsor will be announced very soon” comment last year. Just something to appease all the fans who felt that disappointed that it wasn’t either Orange or Red/White. Personally, having now seen photos of it on track I don’t think it looks bad. Yes it is dull and very McLaren-esque, but it’s not horrible to look at. Somehow I can’t see them going for an Orange livery, because that would be very hard to get right, and the Red/White is out because that was only down to their Marlboro sponsorship. If the livery does change, I think it will still be mostly Chrome/Black.

          1. @tthwaite
            Why would orange be hard to get right?

    2. @sam3110 There’s a rule that states fundamental livery changes are forbidden during the season, any significant change needs to be approved first.

  2. F1’s current points system – twenty-five for a win down to one for last place

    Getting a bit ahead of yourself there Keith :)

  3. All the other teams except McLaren do look stronger than they did last year, but at this point in the game mileage & the resulting data are invaluable. That’s where Merc have the huge advantage at the moment, so I’m not gonna down play their chances of repeat dominance just yet even though I’ll admit it does seem less likely. I put more stock in their miles than I do laptimes at this point, however: last year Kimi topped the sheets for Ferrari on day one & look how their season turned out. The Silver Arrows racked up the miles, got on with development, & well, the rest is history.

    1. On day one last year Ferrari not only did the fastest time, they also did the greatest number of laps. In fact looking back over the last several years it is rarely the case that the team doing the most laps in testing is a title winner at the end of the season. So count me as a skeptic of the whole “It’s the number of testing laps which is key” school of thought.

  4. Alonso does make sense as it’s not totally new even for McLaren although they’ll have more catching up. It’ll be good for us fans.

    If McLaren uses the shinier silver or more chromed effect as in 2007/2008 and change the rims to silver it will surely be a huge improvement on the livery. Betting on the orange will be unrealistic. Never liked the black rims as it is more suitable for sportscar.

  5. Ferrari fastest on day one of pre-season testing! Whoopee!..thats exactly how they ended the first day last year…and look what happened!

    On the Mclaren front, well it was expected isnt it? Hopefully they get more running done today. Ron may have let the cat out of the bag about their new title sponsor…he mentioned “lime green livery”…..makes sense, the Spanish press tipped Movistar to be Mclaren’s title sponsor for this year…Movistar Mclaren Honda then…

    The Merc is way ahead…it would be hard pressed to see anybody other than Lewis winning this year..early days but the signs are ominous.

    1. Youre writing off Nico way too early…’

      1. ColdFly F1 (@)
        2nd February 2015, 3:29

        agree – it certainly wasn’t a walk-over last year.

        1. @coldfly I’m going to say that from a racing point of view, it was a walk-over. It couldn’t have been much more one-sided than it was. Not on Saturdays, Nico did a terrific job there, but on Sundays it was almost a Hamilton one-man show. Brazil and Austria were about the only two races where Nico had Hamilton’s measure on Sunday.

          1. @mattds In Spain and Bahrain it was close, and we never saw how Abu Dhabi could have gone (although it is most likely that nothing different would have happened)

          2. @Strontium Bahrain was close because the safety car left Hamilton exposed with primes and Rosberg with faster options, and Rosberg still could not pass. Especially with the SC, Rosberg should have won that race but didn’t.
            Abu Dhabi… Well, I certainly had the impression Hamilton was in control. Spain was close, sure.

            All in all that’s not nearly enough for me to say they were in the balance and it wasn’t one-sided.

          3. @mattds There’s no denying Hamilton was always in control of most of that, but Rosberg definitely didn’t make life easy for Hamilton.

          4. @strontium the W05 was so great that it guaranteed second place (if Hamilton won) or the win if Hamilton didn’t and no anomalies happened during the race. It wasn’t due to Rosberg’s stellar driving that Hamilton had to drag it out to the end.

            Therefore I’m still calling it pretty one-sided.

      2. Why not? It’s not like Nico has ever beaten Lewis in any category they raced in.

        1. So just like Mercedes had never beaten Red Bull before last year then?

          1. Bad comparison mate, your statement is to vague and flawed. Merc only became a full works team in 2010, Lewis has been dominating Nico from their karting days, that’s more than a decade.

          2. That is a stupid thing to say.

            Car’s change dramatically every year, a driver doesn’t. You don’t go home and change a section of your brain out to gain a few tenths of a second it’s just in you, you’ve either got the talent or you haven’t.

            Rosberg is not quick enough on pure pace to consistently beat Hamilton, that is a fact that I don’t think anyone can form a good argument against.

            If he is to win he will need to rely on outside influence, he needs the gap to be less to the other teams just so others can get involved but the problem that will likely cause is it could end up costing Rosberg more points because he also cannot pull off overtakes the way Hamilton can.

      3. @matiascasali

        Ive been following Nico since GP2 and would love nothing more than him to win the title. We have to be realistic, all things being equal, over the course of a season, Lewis is the faster driver. The only way I see Nico winning this year is Lewis has an implosion, which wouldnt entirely be a surprise.

        It might be closer this year, but my money is on Lewis and Merc…unless Mclaren or Red Bull can surprise us!

    2. Lewis is top candidate but I’m expecting others to be closer and even stronger than Merc at specific circuits.

      It will be so much better if people like Ricciardo, Vettel and Alonso can mix with Lewis and Nico more often.

      Bring on 2015!

  6. Honrtly I think there is more chance of Mercedes winning every race this year than them winning less than last year. Every loss last year was completely avoidable and I’m sure the lessons have been learned.

    Even if the pace advantage is not as high as last year it won’t matter, they had so much in the bag they were the only team capable of beating them selves.

    I predict Mercedes are targeting every win as a minimum this year and will measure their true success is 1-2 finishes.

    1. I doubt that their minimum target is achieving something that has never been done in the history of F1. You need a completely dominant car -in every track and in any condition-, good drivers and a lot of luck to win every race.

      1. So they’re missing luck?

        And why wouldn’t they’re target be history and unbeatable records?

        These people chase perfection and they only had them selves to blame not achieving it last year.

        1. @philipgb
          Yes, luck is not be underestimated in F1.
          Rain, others’ mistakes, FIA decisions, etc…. make it very difficult to get a 100% perfect result throughout the season.

          1. well, it was only down to bad luck in Monza that McLaren didn’t get a perfect season in ’88…

        2. They could have 100% wins as a dream, but not as a minimum -or even realistic- target. There have been immensely dominant cars and drivers over the decades. Remember some of the Schumacher-Ferrari years, they could start from the pit lane and still win by 30 seconds. Or the Senna-Prost era. Vettel at Red Bull, more recently. Yet no team ever had 100% wins. And there were fewer races per season in the past.

    2. @philipgb Upon reading the title of the roundup, I was thinking to myself “ya they won’t win as many… they’ll probably win more” in a sarcastic sense.

  7. A beautifully crafted piece of Ron-speak there! :P

    1. Indeed. Ronspeak enabled.

      This size zero rubbish reminds me not of red bull coke bottles, but more Williams’ skinny gearbox that turned out to be a bit of a damp squib.

  8. Concerning McLaren changing livery, I think that was pretty obvious from the launch and its photographs. Expensive launches are pretty common for big teams and normally feature most of the stuff McLaren did when they announced their drivers recently. So I thought no launch given the new partnership was very revealing. They obviously are waiting to announce their title sponsor, which presumably will be Santander, especially given the Spanish-English link of the drivers who have both been sponsored by them. This should cover the white rim of the drivers helmets, the overalls, the sidepods and the rear wing, which all look very bare atm. It would also introduce more red and white to the car, naturally leading to a new colour scheme. However, as a fan looking to buy merchandise from their website, I find all the products are boring black and white. Why buy that now if McLaren will be red and white from March? So bearing that in mind the car will probably be black, white and red. Which doesn’t sound too great a colour scheme and probably why Ron Dennis said on the livery, “yes we could change colour, yes we could do something more daring, we could all these things, but give me a reason why? And if it’s just to aesthetically more pleasing, that’s not enough reason to me.”

    1. @rbalonso That’s not strictly true. Ferrari had even less of a ‘launch’ than McLaren. Most teams have been doing it this way for a few years now, and it isn’t really telling.

      1. Indeed. Just look at Mercedes @mashiat2, @rbalonso. They showed us some footage, then pictures of their shake down on thurdsay and on sunday just left a while for people to take pictures.

        The time of proper launches is long gone, with McLaren giving their best and Red Bull presenting an interim last year and FI doing a sponsor event with the old car in Mexico this year.

    2. If its not quantitative, then Ron’s not interested. McLaren are easy to like but much harder to love.

  9. The issue with Mclaren’s livery isn’t the colours. It’s the design. A day before the launch I heard it was grey, black and red and instantly thought of the West Livery. Instead it was just lazily put on.

    1. I know everyone else hates it…but I actually like it. But I’m clearly in the minority here.

  10. ColdFly F1 (@)
    2nd February 2015, 3:45

    McLaren Honda will get there come Melbourne

    They more that doubled laps/day versus Abu Dhabi (2.4x).
    If they continue to do so over the next tests then 57 laps in Melbourne should not be an issue.

    1. With 2 cars, three practice sessions, qualifying and the race no doubt they’ll manage at least 57 laps between it all in Melbourne :-)

  11. “twenty-five for a win down to one for last place”

    There’s a point for last place? :o

    1. The financial situation is really worrysome if there are only 10 cars left :P

  12. Someone posted this on reddit… I just laughed

    http://i.imgur.com/aINi8tn.png

    1. Lol great.. i will use this link :-)

  13. Maybe measuring F1’s popularity with TV viewers alone is not enough. Despite FOM reluctance, many people watch F1 online (illegally). I pay to watch F1 on TV but I also go online to get Sky or Brazilian Globo feed and I’m sure millions more do it too.

    The crowd at Jerez yesterday make me question the whole “F1 is doomed” speech.

    1. Well, I guess its pretty accurate that when they charge incredible amounts to view it, viewership IS going down.

      The big mistake in thinking to mirror success of Football/Soccer or even a sport like Golf to an extent, with F1 on Pay TV is that those are all sports that can be relatively easily be experienced in person by many people to allow interest to grow and then “harvest” that interest on pay TV.

      With F1 (or to an extent Motorsports) its far from clear where any new viewers are going to come from when its not available to see on TV.

      1. @bascb core football fans are alot! Core F1 fans? I don’t think so. The truth is only core fans pay to watch.

        1. yeah, but they are a lot primarily because almost everybody can and does play footbal at home, on the street, at the local playground

  14. I don’t know how the define “fans” when they say there has been a reduction in fans, because normally they use a statistic like “viewers” or such like, so when they say “fans” my thinking is the number of TV viewers must be considerably less, which is hardly surprising.
    I’m grateful for the sponsors who willing hand over millions of dollars to support their favourite team.

  15. Regarding the COTD I partly agree. Yes it’s a mammoth mileage in question, but that also prove that last years car was a solid (not bulletproof as we saw) base to continue without making to many changes, no more than ironing and polishing what was already good. That was the advantage that was gained by massive speed they showed. That gave Mercedes a cushion to work on reliability and not so much on performance, which is even better by the way. It would be hard to knock them out from the top spot but we will see. The big unknown is McLaren Honda of course and also how much the other teams gained in the meantime.

  16. 2014: 31 laps
    2013: 89 laps
    2012: 105 laps
    2011: 99 laps
    2010: 102 laps
    2009: 65 laps

    Yeah, all right, but for completeness consider the teams who set those greatest number of laps, and then remember how they fared that year.

    2014: 31 laps – Ferrari
    2013: 89 laps – Force India
    2012: 105 laps – Force India
    2011: 99 laps – Ferrari
    2010: 102 laps – Ferrari
    2009: 65 laps – Toro Rosso

  17. this size zero name makes me sick! seriously comparing a beautifully designed machine to an ill and starving woman is an awful “marketing” idea, a wasp, a greyhound, a cheetah, so many better words to describe that rear end! i hope it doesnt catch up.

Comments are closed.