the_vetman

Some of you have previously commented on Lewis Hamilton. Here's what he thinks about being in a team:

http://autoweek.com/article/formula-...wracingweekend

Cloudspin

I watched the entire Periscope video interview and read the AW excerpt from it that you posted. I respectfully have to say that you have mischaracterized what he said. The excerpt is not about what he thinks about being on a team nor is it about team engineers sharing setup data. It is about a slower driver using a faster drivers line, braking, etc data and then just trying to replicate it out on track to go quicker. Do you think that back in the pre-data days Senna would voluntarily share information like that with Prost or vice versa?

ProCoach

On the former, now it is you who presupposes that the imperious interviewee will be "the faster driver." <grin>

What galls me is that the first wheel hasn't even been turned and yet LH is whinging about a team decision and policy.

What? So, Valtteri is quicker on the sim? LH doesn't want to help any more than sharing the design of his overalls and car livery? Still butthurt from last year?

Sheesh. A nearly half billion dollar enterprise and the prima donna wants to dictate policy... smh

Data is just an incredibly detailed recounting of what just happened, not why... the driver can look at all they want and they STILL have to DO it.

On the latter, they did have data at McLaren, and yes, Honda insisted that they share. Honda was writing the check, too...

mmuller

To me its simple. Mercedes isn't in it to make Lewis Hamilton a star. There number one goal is to win the Manufacturer's championship. If sharing both car data and driver data helps ensure that, then they should be able to do that. If Hamilton doesn't like that, tough, he is a paid employee like the rest of the team.

This is the same type of problem Hamilton had at Mclaren - He didn't understand that its not about him, he is there to do a job and that is to make sure his employer wins.

multi21

Just more proof that Lewis Hamilton's the biggest douche bag in F1 history. Talk about hypocritical... in his rookie year at McLaren, he was using all of Alonso's data which made him look better than he really was. When Alonso started to balk at the use of his data, Hamilton's results began to suffer.

Mercedes F1 strikes me as a no nonsense kind of German team... individual accolades are always secondary to the team goals and honestly, ANYONE could have won with that car in the past years. Personally, I'm hoping Red Bull or Ferrari can put new pressure on Mercedes so that this a$$wipe can implode even more. His act is so old, it's annoying...

Spinout

Louis should STFU and invest in his own team. THEN... he can play by his own rules.

Paul Solk

Hmm, I guess people forget Schumacher banning Herbert from looking at Telemetry data after Herbert set a few faster laps on the same setup. Massa had to learn from watching him on track.

It's interesting to see all the criticism for Lewis since his comments considering if you are a MotoGP fan then you undoubtedly know the man who many (not myself) refer to as the GOAT Rossi himself had a wall put up between him and his "teammate." Most riders will abandon practice laps if there is even another rider following them learning their lines and braking markers. In fact, the GOAT is more sensitive to it than most and routinely abandons laps with his hand in the air.

All Lewis said was :“Funny how the two sports differ and the rider who many consider the greatest ever absolutely refuses to share telemetry and data with his teammate, I don't remember Schumacher being called the biggest douche in F1 yet in F1 today the reaction is well, somewhat less supportive... GP is a Constructor's championship as well and Schumacher was not exactly a team player, so two of the arguably greatest ever's seem to feel the same way.

Just food for thought...

enduro911

I wouldn't agree with the first sentence but would agree with the rest of it. Alonso was uncomfortable in providing his setup data to Lewis in 07. That's his problem as, from what I've read, no #1 clause was written into his contract.

However, Hamilton did very, very well with a good car that Fernando obviously helped to set up. Let's not forget that Lewis' rookie mistakes (literally at that point) cost him points and we can prove this.

1 - Lewis admitted to getting the setup wrong in Britain where he had access to Alonso's data and then went a different route.

2- Following the Hungary incident, Alonso beat Hamilton in total points scored, after it was published that he was going to have some privacy when it came to his setup. I'm not sure if that meant telemetry AND setup, but certainly the results speak for themselves. Both drivers had a DNF in mixed conditions, and, excluding Hamilton's technical problem in Brazil, Alonso scored more points.

Lewis would not have been in that situation had it not been for the team's initial policy of having both drivers work together.

This leads me to my next point which CFGT3 mentioned. The last few seasons, Mercedes could have had two average to above average drivers and won the championship comfortably. With that in mind, I'm surprised no one has tried playing a "moneyball" strategy in F1 when it comes to paying engineers and designers vs. drivers. Newey makes $10M a year but he's an outlier when it comes to salary. Frankly, I think he adds more speed to the cars than most of the drivers making that or more. Take other solid personnel in the pit lane that add a tremendous amount of value (see speed and reliablity). Paddy Lowe was lured away from Mclaren by a mere $1M euros. How much does Andy Cowell at Mercedes Benz High Performance Engines make? Less than Lewis, but he seems to be the architect responsible for a good deal of Mercedes' success in this set of rules.

I get the impression that while Lewis' talent is spectacular, it probably isn't justified (from the constructor's championship standpoint) on a dollar-for-dollar return. For the record, this can be said of many of the better, higher paid drivers. While you probably need at least one experienced driver in the team, I don't think you need the best two guys on the grid to get the job done. If I were Lewis, I'd be careful as this practical effect of kicking him to the curb, gaining back dollars from his salary to re-spend on pit lane and wind tunnel talent, and going faster yet, is very possible.

I'll be brief about my final point. Lewis made a tremendous call by going to Mercedes and putting himself in a position to win more championships. Ask Fernando if he'd like to have some of that luck. But that's just it, isn't it? More championships are won and lost in contract negotiations than on track. Schumacher surrounded himself by the "dream team", and look how that turned out.

Our most recent Super Bowl and the commentary afterwards shows that F1 isn't the only sport with this theme. Tom Brady was heralded as the GOAT after this Super Bowl. Very possibly, he's certainly made the most of his situations. It also helps that he's been with one of, if not the best coaches of all time his entire career, had a defense around him earlier in his career when he wasn't as developed, etc. It may or may not be worth debating what others people could do compared to a successful person if they had been in a similarly favorable situation (Peyton with Belichik, Alonso with Mercedes, etc.), but you do have to give credit to those who put themselves in a situation to be successful. The thing is, Lewis put himself there, but now seems hellbent on trying to take himself out of it. That makes his initial foresight seem more like luck and that to me detracts from everything he's done.

24Chromium

It's the endless dilemma in F1... is it a team sport (i.e.: the constructor's championship), or is it an individual sport (i.e.: the driver's champion ship)? Every year we see the sport wrestle with this very question. From a money and rules perspective, it's very clearly a team sport and not an individual sport. However, the fans, attendance, and world-wide television audience are there for a favorite driver (OK, so Ferrari has fans rooting for the team - no matter who drives - but they are the exception, not the rule).

mhm993

I kind of figure it's Lewis psyching out Bottas. Lewis never misses an opportunity to screw with his mates' heads.

LuigiVampa

I know you can go to school on someone else's line but I think he is assigning way too much value to it. You still have to drive your own car.

Carrera51

I agree with mhm. Lewis spent his rookie season learning from a master of head games, and obviously took good notes.

multi21

Given the comments above, I've only just starting watching MotoGP over the past few years so I'm not as well versed on that as I am with F1, so I cannot comment on walls within the garage or anything like that (honestly don't know why MotoGP was brought up in an F1 thread), but okay. That being said, it appears that the riders matter more in MotoGP than they do in F1, as you can have a Pedrosa and Marquez on the same team, same bike, and they are miles apart. MotoGP seems to be less "button down" than F1 and by that I mean that the riders make WAY more mistakes than drivers do in F1. Team strategy in F1 is nearly spot on to the Nth degree and when someone screws up the strategy, as we've seen done over the years, the team pays for it in negative press and comments.

In MotoGP, I'm always shocked when the riders ignore the pit boards and don't come in when their teams tell them to for either dry or wet bikes... This would NEVER happen in F1 and the closest I can even recall is when Vettel ignored instructions from the team to not pass Webber or Hamilton to stop backing up Nico. In short, MotoGP seems more seat of the pants, no pun intended, than F1. Another thing MotoGP doesn't have to deal with is data on downforce which makes braking and braking points much more subjective to the riders than if they did have DF.

I'll also emphasis this, I don't think just average drivers in F1 could have won with the Mercedes of the past 3 years, but ANY driver on grid could have won, including Manor drivers, Maldonado or any paid driver could have won with the Mercedes. The only person you had to beat in that car was your teammate. The car has been the most dominant in the history of F1 the past 2 years running!

With regard to Schumacher, it's a completely different situation. Schumacher left a two time WDC WDD situation to go pull Ferrari up who hadn't won in XX amount of years and told his buddies to come with him, to trust in his judgment. Schumacher was also the one doing the testing and making the car better each and every time he was in it. In this era of no in season testing, Hamilton has no input on making the car faster or better like drivers had to do in years past. The point about Newey is very accurate as he has more to do with the out right speed of the car than the drivers. In Mercedes case, the car was so damn fast, they just had to not hit each other. In Red Bull's case, they actually needed drivers who could scratch and claw to get the most points possible. GUARANTEED, I would have loved to have seen Ricciardo or Verstapen in that Mercedes next to Hamilton and see what would have happened, to say nothing of Alonso or Vettel. Also, the Ferrari policy was and has always been to have a clear #1, which of course was Michael. They never said their driver's were equal as Mercedes has said (although not always in practice). Ferrari wanted the WDD, but they wanted their driver on the top step of the podium each race and if that meant the #2 helped the #1 get on that step, then that was their policy. I'm not saying it's right or wrong, but their policy is different than Mercedes or McLaren, etc.

Bottas is a hired gun on a one year contract. Hamilton is being paid $50m by Mercedes. We'll see how Bottas performs, but if the Finnish mentality has shown us anything over the years, is that they typically don't give a $hit about their teammates or head games. The $$ spent on Hamilton would could more certainly be used in other areas as it's a waste of money. The bottom line is that Hamilton is not making the car any faster than it already is.

wanna911

Actually, as with many racing series, talent is being diluted with technology. Automated everything. The rider has far more control on a bike. It's harder to differentiate between the gifted drivers and the other pro drivers where it was much more apparent back in the day. Lewis wanting the sport to be a measure of skill again being frowned upon is laughable at best as that's what's sorely missing in F1. Tire preservation competitions with gimmick forms of passing. Lewis is old school in his competitiveness. I respect that. No, actually I applaud it.