Mercedes GP W02

[Lorenzo_Bandini]

Mercedes-Benz motorsport director Norbert Haug conceded that rivals can now underestimate Mercedes after failing to meet expectations of the grid.

At the beginning of two consecutive seasons, Mercedes couldn’t manage to match the pace setting cars and rivals always hoped a better Mercedes would show up at some point.

“We knew we would be quick. I think all in all Ferrari and McLaren are not that far behind and you can never underestimate Mercedes,” had said World Champion Vettel after the first race of 2011 season. 2008 champion Lewis Hamilton also had stressed that although Red Bull, McLaren and Ferrari are fighting for wins, one should not underestimate Mercedes.

“They have a very good racing history and they did in 2009 under the management of Ross Brown. So you can never know what these guys can do.”

However Norbert Haug told the media today that rivals now should leave them alone.

“That has been a huge pressure here and there on the team. When we listen to our rivals, we felt we had to do something not to make them wrong, but that’s it. We cannot hold it. Please leave us alone and underestimate Mercedes from now on. We just can not do it any more.

“We are already working on our 2012 car and the project is well underway. We hope we could again build a car not strong enough to win races but weak enough to be underestimated. That way, we can solely focus on ourselves and try to do better this time. I want to reiterate one more time: Our rivals are free to underestimate us.”

[xpensive]

The above man is very clearly confused, what in the world is he babbling about, "underestimate us" and "leave us alone"?

He*l, I think only JET would miss them if they simply left...

[Byronrhys]

Mercedes-Benz motorsport director Norbert Haug conceded that rivals can now underestimate Mercedes after failing to meet expectations of the grid.

At the beginning of two consecutive seasons, Mercedes couldn’t manage to match the pace setting cars and rivals always hoped a better Mercedes would show up at some point.

“We knew we would be quick. I think all in all Ferrari and McLaren are not that far behind and you can never underestimate Mercedes,” had said World Champion Vettel after the first race of 2011 season. 2008 champion Lewis Hamilton also had stressed that although Red Bull, McLaren and Ferrari are fighting for wins, one should not underestimate Mercedes.

“They have a very good racing history and they did in 2009 under the management of Ross Brown. So you can never know what these guys can do.”

However Norbert Haug told the media today that rivals now should leave them alone.

“That has been a huge pressure here and there on the team. When we listen to our rivals, we felt we had to do something not to make them wrong, but that’s it. We cannot hold it. Please leave us alone and underestimate Mercedes from now on. We just can not do it any more.

“We are already working on our 2012 car and the project is well underway. We hope we could again build a car not strong enough to win races but weak enough to be underestimated. That way, we can solely focus on ourselves and try to do better this time. I want to reiterate one more time: Our rivals are free to underestimate us.”

I might be wrong but I think thats fake, posted by some guy on Autosport who has a spoof F1 website.
http://www.ali-unal.net/F1Fool/2011/07/ ... -mercedes/

[Rikhart]

http://www.itv.com/formula1/news/2011/7 ... edes-4637/

Mercedes, please let this team quietly fade away...

Quite frankly embarassing, for the second year running, they get the very basics completely wrong. Schumacher should just hightail it from there! This team has no right to carry the mercedes brand name!

[siskue2005]

Thats not real news!
it a fake

[xpensive]

The Norbert article is obviously fake, "Formula One Fool", but I think the Ross Brawn pice looks genuine?

[marcush.]

rereading the Brawn piece ,I get the impression they have not understood anything..
normalised lap times ...reducing the gap ,6 months out of phase in development and in the next sentence we would have done a different wheelbase as we see too much of a difference in the sweet spot for qualy and race setups...and we did not design the car originally for the sophisticated exhaust arrangements which are performance differntiators these days.
This is just laughable .How can I expect to get closer to the front when I´m not realising what will be the most important technology and how it is applied to the car? Even more :why is there nobody in the team with a ground breaking idea that actually is giving lap time ? They had someone coming up with the outwash front wing and dd difusser in 2008 for 2009 ..where are those people now?

[xpensive]

I have a theory marcush; Haug and Daimler had not grasped that Ross Brawn was Technical Director in name only, that it was Jörg Zander who did the Brawn 001. Then when Brawn was xpected to perform in a design-engineering capacity, he tried to act accordingly and things all went south from there?

I mean, who would dream up "novelties" like the short wheelbase, high fueltank or the double radiators?

[Leon]

hey should also buy ToyotaF1's remnants))). Their TF110 prototype could be a good basis

[marcush.]

I´m not sure if Zander is a genius but sure enough he is an engineer -he was the responsible guy at BMWsauber for f1 06 and 07 and left 1.jan.2008 for Honda..so maybe he had also input into 08 .

So we got basically three cars he has to be credited for .

BMW f1.06
BMW f1.07
BrawnBGP001

I think Zander went for a clash in personalities or very different ideas about W01 ? So maybe someone had to prove he was right and now we see in wo2 that he was not? just an idea.

W02 has some areas were it is different ,as W01 was a bit different...but we can savely conclude those areas of difference were indifferent in terms of car pace or even bad for performance...they clearly have lost confidence in their decisions when in the winter they were sure they had the right masterplan now they have completely changed and conclude the decisions have compromised performance...so basically all proceedures and decision takings were wrong (based on wrong assumptions).
As the people involved are good ,some maybe even the best in the field it´s just a second that is missing or two ...the old story .you can even transform a Lada into a decent race car....but it will be a lot more work ....

[xpensive]

My xperience is that in any business, it's typically rookies who goes for an overly radical solution to a technical problem, thinking "those old farts must all be idiots!". Come to think of it, one xample is The Mercedes flat-12 sportscar 20 years ago...

So think about it, the input to those strange things on the WO2 might have come from some young and ambitious Mercedez-Benz engineers in Stuttgart, which would make my previous theory about Ross Brawn himself dead wrong?

[marcush.]

I would put some money on this idea x....this would also explain why Mercedes is keeping quite quiet considering the results.
and it would explain some blunt manufacturing on the british side..german childs could easily become orphans when sent over the channel..

[xpensive]

Indeed, it could also xplain a few other things, they keep a rather small staff in Brackley, basically for detail design-engineering and manufacturing, while the conceptual work is done in Stuttgart? It would also xplain the stubborness on the xhaust...

If it is set up this way, what en engineering nightmare!

[mep]

He is there any sing that they really do something for the team in Stuttgart?
This would be new for me.

german childs could easily become orphans when sent over the channel.

What do you mean by this?

[jav]

I am disappointed in W02 and the team...I have been so - for so long that I no longer expect much. The only consolation I have is that they may have been trying to be true to the RRA- and perhaps all the new job postings is a sincere effort to improve. Right now- the car and team are barely staying ahead of the midfield and certainly X's explanation is as logical as any I've heard.

I don't know how or who got them to this point but I certainly haven't seen any progression that would lead me to believe W03 will be a contender. Perhaps Bell will be the hero, and perhaps the additional resources will allow the team to bring in season developments at a pace closer to Ferrari or McLaren.

I don't believe (and I hope I'm wrong) that this year or next will be significantly different. I would be rather surprised if the MGP brought any credable challenge to the top 3 teams any time soon.