Your thoughts on who will win the teammate rivalries 2013?

[SectorOne]

But the number 0.143 s isn't a good measure of the speed difference when we are considering different circuits with different lap times, as it doesn't unambigously describe a speed difference. In Malaysia the Q3 times were above 1 minute and 50 seconds, while in Monaco they were below one minute and 14 seconds. That's a substantial difference, meaning that if for example Hamilton had beaten Rosberg by 0.2 s in the Malaysia qualifying and Rosberg had beaten Hamilton by 0.2 s in the Monaco qualifying, you would find an average difference of 0 using your method. While in reality Rosberg would be the relatively quickest driver on average. Lap times and the differences in lap times are not directly comparable from one track to another. That is why you have to normalize the times in order to get meaningful results, and even then there may be issues. For example you could argue that when the cars are running close to terminal speed on the straights, the driver doesn't affect the speed at all and this part of the track should be excluded. But at least the times will be more comparable when normalizing.

But in the end both are human beings and both are running on the same piece of tarmac.
Regardless if one track is longer then the other they are still running equal cars on equally long tracks.
If you start thinking like that you can add a whole host of variables that define certain tracks which just won´t work.

The easiest and simplest way to comparing the speed of two drivers in the same car is by taking out an average of their Q3 times over all the races they have done together that season.

With regards to the wet qualifying in Malaysia, they were running on a drying track with intermediates. That should normally give the driver who runs last an advantage. But it should also mean he wears his tyres faster, as intermediates wear very quickly on the dry parts of the track. Considering that Mercedes didn't change to new tyres and were beaten by 2 seconds by Vettel, tyre wear was probably a large factor and you can't exclude the posibility that Rosberg simply had slightly more worn tyres than Hamilton and that this accounts for the speed difference.

And again now you incorporate theoretical stuff into the equation.

That´s like me saying well Hamilton uses his tires more so he would have more worn tires then what Rosberg had regardless of the situation.
It just doesn´t work because it´s just a theory, nothing more.

By the way, are you aware that if you do the same exercise with Hamilton and Button from the first 6 races of 2010, you will actually come to the conclusion that Button was quicker than Hamilton? On average Button beat Hamilton by 0.121 s in qualifying for the 6 first races of 2010. The same arguments about being new in the team and not fully adapted yet could be used about Button in 2010.

You would not come to any conclusion because you would have facts to look at.
Facts do not care about opinions or conclusions as it speaks for itself and indeed in the first 6 races Button was quicker, nobody can dispute that because the facts have proven that.

Would you agree that Button was quicker than Hamilton and a better qualifier? If not, how come you rely on analyses that would give such a conclusion?

For the first 6 races yes without a doubt. For the whole season? Facts say Hamilton was quicker.

Now if you ask me on my opinion on who´s the quicker man assuming we only had the 6 races to look at i´d still say Hamilton but that´s just an opinion not backed by any proof.

And if you ask me now what my opinion is on Hamilton/Rosberg even if we just assume for a moment that Rosberg on paper (facts) is qualifying higher on the grid and is on average quicker i´d still say that my opinion is that Hamilton is the quicker guy.

So there´s a difference on what the facts say and what my opinion is.
In the same way someone can think Rosberg is the quicker man despite Hamilton being quicker on paper so far.

[Richard]

I really don't think it makes sense to consider qualifying as long as we consider the points

So again, I feel the most sensible way to go is to look at the points.

I agree, it's called the WDC table. No good being "fast" if you don't convert that to points.

[biggs]

OMG, So many Hamilton fanboys here getting upset becos Rosberg is threatening to him.
Its clear that Rosberg is faster than Hamilton at the moment, he can blame it on the brakes or whatever he wants but Rosberg is outperforming him at the moment. THIS IS A FACT.

In F1, no excuse are accepted.
It'd be interesting to see how Hamilton deals with this threat from Rosberg and how Mercedes develop the W04 this year.

Rosberg has always been one of the quickest drivers in F1, its just he never had the opportunity like Hamilton to constantly have a race winning car to show it.
Mercedes had a glimpse of hope with the W03 where Rosberg described at the Monaco GP as the fastest car of the weekend, same as this year, but in the next race it fell back down the field and to a point where they struggled to make top 10 finishing positions.
If the W04 can overcome the tyre problems without reducing its speed, then we will see a constant battle between the 2 drivers.

I've never been a Rosberg fan, but my money is on Rosberg to continue outperforming Hamilton.

[turbof1]

It's something we are not used from Hamilton: he either beats his teammate, or he has a period of mental unstability and screws it up. But Rosberg is beating Hamilton while Hamilton is not making any mistake and driving towards his best capabilities. Hamilton for the moment is left clueless. Though he'll rebound; Rosberg is tough competition, and severly underestimated. Hamilton will find ways to raise his game.

[marcush.]

let´s see if Hamilton can raise his game .Clearly the 3,4 or 5 tenth some fans had thought he was worth are simply not there yet and he does not really look any better than Schumacher when pitched against Rosberg..at least in year two and three..

[SectorOne]

I think with all the top top drivers there´s not more then 2 tenths separating them in ultimate pace.

[biggs]

let´s see if Hamilton can raise his game .Clearly the 3,4 or 5 tenth some fans had thought he was worth are simply not there yet and he does not really look any better than Schumacher when pitched against Rosberg..at least in year two and three..

When Schumacher came back in 2010 alot of question marks were raised because of his age compared to the young guns of Vettel, Hamilton, Rosberg, Alonso..etc

The first year Schumacher came back, he didnt really perform well, but thats mainly due to being away from the sport for a few years and the cars being different to when he last drove in 2006.

The 2nd year he started to outperform Rosberg at time.

The 3rd year he would have matched Rosberg if he didn't have some much bad luck at the initial stages of the season when the car was still competitive, when his bad luck started to gradually fade after Canada, the W03 had fallen back to midfield or lower midfield. Except for Italain GP there was hardly any chance to compete in the championship.

Hamilton's struggles are less clear. The car's been quick all year so far and he is still young.
Going against Rosberg, Hamilton has everything to lose while Rosberg has nothing to lose.
Most believe Hamilton blow Rosberg away from the word go.
However, this has not been the case and the battle has not been as ideal as Hamilton or the believers might have thought.
Hamilton's problems are more mentally than anything else when it comes to his so called struggles this year.

[turbof1]

let´s see if Hamilton can raise his game .Clearly the 3,4 or 5 tenth some fans had thought he was worth are simply not there yet and he does not really look any better than Schumacher when pitched against Rosberg..at least in year two and three..

I disagree with your claim Hamilton isn't doing better then Schumacher. He clearly is. Hamilton is on the moment marginally beaten by Rosberg, and lets not forget Hamilton get the better on Rosberg in the beginning of this season. Schumacher, on the other hand, was massively beaten by Rosberg.

In any case, the case of Hamilton being beaten by Rosberg is being more about people underestimating Rosberg then overestimating Hamilton. Mercedes clearly and by far has the best driver line up.

[SectorOne]

Hamilton's problems are more mentally than anything else when it comes to his so called struggles this year.

You forgot the words "in my opinion".

[marcush.]

let´s see if Hamilton can raise his game .Clearly the 3,4 or 5 tenth some fans had thought he was worth are simply not there yet and he does not really look any better than Schumacher when pitched against Rosberg..at least in year two and three..

I disagree with your claim Hamilton isn't doing better then Schumacher. He clearly is. Hamilton is on the moment marginally beaten by Rosberg, and lets not forget Hamilton get the better on Rosberg in the beginning of this season. Schumacher, on the other hand, was massively beaten by Rosberg.

In any case, the case of Hamilton being beaten by Rosberg is being more about people underestimating Rosberg then overestimating Hamilton. Mercedes clearly and by far has the best driver line up.

so where and when did Roberg outperform Schumacher? Ican only remember some qualy issues when Schu did for one and another reason not make it into Q3 and Rosberg seemed to always be a Q3 entry..but that was only 2010 and a bit in 2011
ut come race day Rosberg never ever really was miles ahead of the ol man .he did out score him though which came as a surprise to me but thst was a function of dnfs more than being too slow- but maybe I´m completely wrong there..Sure Schumacher was not happy to lose out to Nico on scoring points.

[biggs]

let´s see if Hamilton can raise his game .Clearly the 3,4 or 5 tenth some fans had thought he was worth are simply not there yet and he does not really look any better than Schumacher when pitched against Rosberg..at least in year two and three..

I disagree with your claim Hamilton isn't doing better then Schumacher. He clearly is. Hamilton is on the moment marginally beaten by Rosberg, and lets not forget Hamilton get the better on Rosberg in the beginning of this season. Schumacher, on the other hand, was massively beaten by Rosberg.

In any case, the case of Hamilton being beaten by Rosberg is being more about people underestimating Rosberg then overestimating Hamilton. Mercedes clearly and by far has the best driver line up.

Schmacher massively beaten by Rosberg?
Are you sure about that?
Their qualifying in 2013 is evenly matched.
Points wise MSC suffered mainly due to technical problems or bad luck.
You also have to remember Rosberg scored most of his points during the initial stages of the season when the car was still competitive.
When the car slid down to Toro Rosso levels, they were struggling to finish in the top 10.

[Stradivarius]

Regarding Schumacher and Rosberg, Rosberg was clearly best in 2010. In 2011 it was quite even, and in 2012 I actually think Schumacher was better, even though the difference was probably too small to really distinguish them. In 2011 Rosberg did better in qualifying, but Schumacher generally made up for that in the race. It actually looked like Schumacher was improving year by year and in 2012 he even matched Rosberg in qualifying, so if his progress had continued, who knows what he could have done this year, other than winning in Monaco. (Schumacher qualified better than Rosberg in Monaco all three years with Mercedes.)

When it comes to Hamilton and Rosberg, I simply see no reason to say anything other than that they are even. This reminds me of Raikkonen and Massa back in 2007. Most people expected Raikkonen to be much better than Massa (and some even still claim that he was). And the same excuses of being new in the team were presented by people who were convinced Kimi would eventually show that he was supperior. But the results show that they were pretty equal, even after 2 years and a half. Actually, Kimi performed best, relative to Massa, when he was new in the team. I am not saying that this has any relevance here though, other than the fact that when a human being is convinced about something, it often takes a lot of evidence to change its opinion.

[rich1701]

From Mercedes point of view, Hamilton is costing twice as much as Schumacher and isn't any quicker. It can be argued he is actually slower. It is early days, Hamilton needs to adapt the car to his style, something which Schumacher and Rosberg were very good at and I feel this is not Hamilton's strength. Hamilton is probably the fastest driver out there in terms of raw speed but having an astute understanding of car setup and a high degree of technical understanding has been a weakness. Rosberg by far outclasses him in this category.

[Ral]

What I think is interesting about Hamilton's problems, is that they are pinned on one particular issue with the car. Which, if it is true (and I'm not saying it is or isn't - there is simply no way to know) sort of questions the previous assertions that Hamilton "can drive around issues" - or at least puts a ceiling on how much he can.

It has a bit of an air of the issues Räikkönen had with his steering setup last year. It will be interesting to see if Vettel ever moves to another team, if he too will encounter something along those lines. I can't remember any issues ever being reported for Alonso, despite all his team changes although perhaps access seems to be a bit more in depth these days or perhaps he just had to work through all the handling issues ever in his Minardi days

[SiLo]

I don't know about that, not having confidence in the car doesn't make it easy to drive around issues. You can have an issue with the car and still have confidence in it. Considering how Hamilton brakes he will lose a lot of time of he doesn't have confidence under braking.