rockitman

Interview after practice, maybe no McLaren after all and he's out of Ferrari...silly season continues.

LuigiVampa

He may have outsmarted himself out of a ride next year.

rockitman

That's what I am thinking...all that talent on the sidelines next year ? Hard to believe it could happen to that calibre of driver.

mklaskin

Seems short sighted, right? Ferrari would keep him, so if he cannot secure the ride at McLaren or Mercedes, keep the Ferrari deal and at least take the income...

rockitman

But what about Vettel ? Sounds like he's signed with Ferrarri and Kimi is still under contract.

mklaskin

Understood, but he has not officially declared that he's heading Maranello and they have yet to confirm. To be clear, I agree that Vettel seems Ferrari bound. I also think that Alonso will wind up at McLaren and Hamilton will (should) stay at MB...

Silly indeed.

Ritter v4.0

Hate to say it but would Ferrari really pass on Alonso to keep Kimi?
I don't think so.

rockitman

If Kimi is under contract, Ferrari can't break it unless they paid off Kimi handsomely and he agreed to leave.

rockitman

I agree that is how it will play out. perhaps McLaren is still pissed off when Alonso left them the first time around ? I think there was a lot of money involved (fines) ? Lewis will win drivers championship I think and would be foolish to leave Mercedes. Who knows what new reg change wrenches FIA will throw in the mix next year to mess with MB dominance.

paradisenb

Alonso out of a drive? No way. Someone will give their left nut to make room for him. He will be on a top team next year.

Kimi may end up the odd man out. In that case, he will take the money and party off into the sunset. I would like to see him drive a car he can set up to his liking.

LuigiVampa

Perhaps McLaren screwed Alonso over as a little pay back.

Chaos

But, but he's the most talented driver& princess in f1

Ritter v4.0

Thats what I meant- buy him out. At the best of times he's only half there and these are not the best of times for either him or Ferrari.

multi21

I'm speculating that Alonso is waiting to see what Hamilton does at Mercedes. LH has only one more year left on the MB contract where Rosberg has multiple years left. Alonso has the clause to walk at the end of this year based on Ferrari being 4th or lower, so in essense, he is a free agent... if he wants to be. Vettel is going to want to be the #1, but so is Alonso.

It's really contingent on Hamilton signing an extension with Mercedes. My guess is that McLaren would rather have Hamilton back than Alonso. Too much back blood between Alonso and Don Dennis, Hamilton has many more years left in his career than Alonso and the emotional alure of reliving the glory days of McLaren/Honda may be what Ron Dennis is banking on with Hamilton in addition to bank in terms of the $$$$ Honda can deliver to sway Hamilton to come back to McLaren and leave a top team like Mercedes.

There is also the scenario of what Alonso did when he announced a year early that he was leaving Renault for McLaren. What if Hamilton wants to leave Mercedes, but they won't let him out of the contract and force him to stay at MB and in affect screwing McLaren/Honda in their first year back together to gain a competitive advantage? Alonso would then have to sit out to wait for that spot to open at MB. Would MB not want Alonso in their now and delay his arrival to gain advantage against McLaren/Honda? Don't know. We all know the Ferrari and Renault engines are dogs compared to the Mercedes. The wild card is going to be the Honda engine as no one knows how good or bad it's going to be, but my guess is that if McLaren REALLY wanted Alonso, he would have already been signed by now.

As I said just after the Japanese GP, why wouldn't Honda use their home GP to announce the signing of Alonso? Ferrari has always used their home GP for big announcements to great fanfare and success. I could be wrong, but everything points to Alonso not going to McLaren.

Larry Herman

Maybe the allure of even more money and the return to his roots could bring Hamilton back to McLaren, but Mercedes would be foolish to let him go, especially for Alonso. Hamilton has matured and is proving to be an incredible force to be reckoned with. He has proven that he is the best driver and barring mechanical difficulties, he will bring Mercedes that championship.

Alonso is probably driving as well as Hamilton, but is on the backside of his career, whilst Hamilton is just at his peak. And does anyone really think that Alonso would play nicer with Nico than Hamilton has? If Mercedes are looking towards the future, then if Hamilton does go, they should stay with Nico and promote a junior driver to develop. After all, if it weren't for Hamilton, we would all be talking about how Nico has it sewn up.