[2018] Pecking order speculation thread

[Peter1919]

Having seen all the cars now my order and reasoning is as follows
1. Mercedes - Engine is just too powerful and reliable and chassis is good. 3 engine rule will hurt everyone else but Merc may well manage the season with 3 engines.
2. Ferrari - Raikkonen is past it and too weak to get the points required for Ferrari to beat Merc
3. RedBull - Will push Ferrari for 3rd but think the Renault engine will just mean they fall short despite the best driver line up on the grid.
4. McLaren - Same power unit as RedBull but chassis not as good and Vandoorne is unproven.
5. Renault - Chassis just not as good as McLaren's and driver line up is similar quality on average.
6. Force India - I just can't see them managing to overperform for a 3rd straight season will but will be in contention for 4th all season and may come down to if their Merc engines are reliable enough to avoid engine penalties.
7. Williams - Good looking car, much improved on last couple of years but their driver line up is far too weak.
8. Haas - Better drivers than Sauber & Torro Rosso but Merc engines and better chassis should keep Williams ahead of them.
9. Sauber Alfa Romeo - Better engine and aero but too much to catch up on the rest in one close season
10. Torro Roso - Diver line up just too weak and Honda engine will still be down on power and reliability to the others

[nokivasara]

Having seen all the cars now my order and reasoning is as follows
1. Mercedes - Engine is just too powerful and reliable and chassis is good. 3 engine rule will hurt everyone else but Merc may well manage the season with 3 engines.
2. Ferrari - Raikkonen is past it and too weak to get the points required for Ferrari to beat Merc
3. RedBull - Will push Ferrari for 3rd but think the Renault engine will just mean they fall short despite the best driver line up on the grid.
4. McLaren - Same power unit as RedBull but chassis not as good and Vandoorne is unproven.
5. Renault - Chassis just not as good as McLaren's and driver line up is similar quality on average.
6. Force India - I just can't see them managing to overperform for a 3rd straight season will but will be in contention for 4th all season and may come down to if their Merc engines are reliable enough to avoid engine penalties.
7. Williams - Good looking car, much improved on last couple of years but their driver line up is far too weak.
8. Haas - Better drivers than Sauber & Torro Rosso but Merc engines and better chassis should keep Williams ahead of them.
9. Sauber Alfa Romeo - Better engine and aero but too much to catch up on the rest in one close season
10. Torro Roso - Diver line up just too weak and Honda engine will still be down on power and reliability to the others

It'll be interesting how the lower end of the midfield pans out, Haas/Sauber/Williams will be really close I think.

[Jolle]

I know you shouldn't look at the times during winter testing, but for the last few years they gave a pretty good indication anyway

1. Mercedes. Looks like the ease they did fast times on the hardest tire of them all could mean they are (again) a second faster then anybody else.
2. Ferrari: Building on a good platform from last year, but playing bit catch up to Mercedes. Kimi far behind Vetel in the first half of the season.
3. RedBull: Just like the last few years, first half year no where to be seen and then catching up to Ferrari.
4. Renault: Good times during winter testing on the medium tire. Will have internal struggles with a relative new team still.
5/6/7. Williams/McLaren/Force India: nice midfield battle. Williams will feel that they have novice drivers.
8/9/10: HAAS/Sauber/STR: SRT might make the jump to 5/6/7 halfway trough the season with a lot of PU penalties with further and further developments of the Honda.

[NathanOlder]

Pretty much agree on all of that Jolle, maybe not expecting honda penalties as much as you say though. They seem pretty reliable this week.

[Jolle]

Pretty much agree on all of that Jolle, maybe not expecting honda penalties as much as you say though. They seem pretty reliable this week.

Not per see penalties because of failures but to introduce updates. In my view STR is a testbed for RBR next year. Where STR or how many points they gather is secondary.

[FelixAustria]

Here's my more or less educated guess after following the first test week in Barcelona:

CHASING FOR WINS
================
1) MER - seem to be most sandbagging in current tests and still they run incredibly smooth, fast and reliable without any issues that one would expect if you introduce a totally new engine concept as they claimed. Just impressive. Still i don't think they will be as dominant as in the previous years.
2) RBR - chassis is said to be the best one around and i believe it, engine of Renault looks better and more reliable than in last season that should allow VER and RIC to claim more wins and podiums.
3) FER - they will deeply miss a second motivated driver besides VET so they'll drop behind the bulls in constructors championship for sure. Also their past years trick of the side air inlets has been now copied by most of the teams and FIA will have a closer look on oil consumption that will hamper them as well. They even could face a tough season being far-off MER and RBR with RAI having difficulties to stay ahead of REN and MCL.

BATTLING FOR BEST OF THE REST
===========================
4) REN - Definitely made a huge leap during winter even though that Polish expert they hired from FIA hasn't even started working for them yet. Will benefit from their immense developing power of bringing constantly updates. Hulkenberg will be desperate for his very first podium this year for sure.
5) MCL - Looked very confident and ambitious so far in the testings despite some minor issues which the huge team force will solve quickly. Expect VAN capturing more points than ALO as the season unfolds as ALO will feel the struggle chasing from track to track in two different series at the same time to a certain extent. Race performance will also be much influenced by their pitting performance where they missed out completely in past season (this is why i put them behind REN and not before them).

MIDFIELD
========
6-8) FOI/STR/HF1 - hard to spot presently any major performance differences. FOI may suffer from limited testing for giving away valuable time to Mazespin and their progress from previous year seem to be way less than REN and MCL so they won't be able to retain their 4th position. STR with Honda can be anything from hero to zero depending whether the Japanese finally get their stuff together or not. Their aero looks pretty neat. HF1 seem to have built a pretty unsophisticated car that shouldn't be up to many surprises, both positively and negatively.
9) WIL - car probably on par with the others but they will pay for only hiring pay-drivers. As they changed their car philosophy a lot they may have higher improvement potential in later phases of the season though. Also could benefit from strong pitting performance if they can show it again this season.

TAIL
====
10) SAU - as for now in the tests they appear to lack quite a lot of performance. Probably too much to hand over the final position despite they declared that in the second test week the will bring along an abundance of updates. I wish it works out well.

[McL-H]

1. Mercedes
2. Red Bull
3. McLaren
4. Ferrari
5. Renault
6. STR
7. Force India
8. Haas
9. Williams
10. Sauber

[willmesquita]

Mercedes
Ferrari/Red Bull +0.8s
Renault +1.2s
Williams +1.8s
Haas/McLaren +2.0s
Force India +2.3s
Toro Rosso +2.5s
Sauber +2.9s

For now

[GoranF1]

Mercedes
Ferrari/Red Bull +0.8s
Renault +1.2s
Williams +1.8s
Haas/McLaren +2.0s
Force India +2.3s
Toro Rosso +2.5s
Sauber +2.9s

For now

Agree just that Wiliams will be behind Mcl and Haas due to drivers .

[makecry]

Mercedes
Ferrari/Red Bull +0.8s
Renault +1.2s
Williams +1.8s
Haas/McLaren +2.0s
Force India +2.3s
Toro Rosso +2.5s
Sauber +2.9s

For now

Agree just that Wiliams will be behind Mcl and Haas due to drivers .

I honestly dont think McLaren will be 0.8 seconds behind Renault. Nopes.

[techman]

1. mercedes
2. redbull
3 ferrari
4 renault
5 torro rosso or force india
6 mclaren
7 hass
8 williams
9 sauber

[GoranF1]

1. mercedes
2. redbull
3 ferrari
4 renault
5 torro rosso or force india
6 mclaren
7 hass
8 williams
9 sauber

Yeah i think STR will beat Mercedes...

[bauc]

I have it in 4 groups.

G1
Ferrari - (Car works on all tracks, its up to Seb & Kimi to raise their game on the level of Lewis)
Mercedes - (Same beast as last year, but Lewis always gets few tents extra, Bottas needs to raise his game)
Redbull - (Super downforce beast, 4-5 wins in the season, Daniel and Max at their best this season)

G2
Mclaren - Renault - Force India (All 3 teams to exchange fierce battle for the last 4 spots in the points, occasional podium finish or some lucky win)

G3
Haas, Williams (Fighting to enter Q3 and occasional points scoring, I lean more over to Haas due to the fact they have more experienced drivers )

G4
Sauber, STR (Sabuer - Test bed for Ferrar, STR - Test bead for Honda and RedBull for 2019 but with very weak driver line up especially STR, few points during the season if others hit trouble)

[Thunder]

Yeah i think STR will beat Mercedes...

Nowhere did he imply that....

[Phil]

I think he meant TR beating a Mercedes powered car...