It was written in the stars, or rather the rumourmill, and today, Renault F1 has confirmed that Fernando Alonso will return to the team with which he won his two F1 World Championships with.
From a sporting point of view this is not the best, but from a marketing perspective it is. Remember that F1 for Mercedes is mainly a marketing tool.siskue2005 wrote: ↑20 May 2020, 19:04Daimler reportedly ‘pushing hard’ for Vettel
https://www.planetf1.com/news/daimler-p ... an-vettel/
There are rumors that Bottas is going to Renault and Russel to Merc team, but Daimler wants vettel in that seat
As you, I think Russel will be a top driver, but what proof do we have of it? He did well against a driver we really have no good gauge for, just previous repetition before a big accident and long lay off. He may not have been as good on hos return. Testing? yes he showed good times v the other drivers, but as we know tests are run to a schedual and they were all given a delta for most if not all or the laps.SiLo wrote: ↑21 May 2020, 12:06If I was Mercedes I'd be telling Vettel thanks but no thanks. Russell is a better bet, they still have Hamilton and the HAM-BOT team works very well together. Better to keep everything harmonious and keep winning, than it is to risk a lot on Vettel coming in and not pissing off Hamilton.
Maybe Hamilton asks for a lot of money, but it's not like he's stupid enough to go somewhere else right now.
It's just not worth the risk of having intra team battles on and off the field, potential busts ups etc.
We as general public don’t know. Mercedes on the other hand have tons of data about him. Not only from his time on other classes but also sim and testing data. Those few weekends on track in an undrivable car is not what they base his future on.Big Tea wrote: ↑21 May 2020, 14:36As you, I think Russel will be a top driver, but what proof do we have of it? He did well against a driver we really have no good gauge for, just previous repetition before a big accident and long lay off. He may not have been as good on hos return. Testing? yes he showed good times v the other drivers, but as we know tests are run to a schedual and they were all given a delta for most if not all or the laps.SiLo wrote: ↑21 May 2020, 12:06If I was Mercedes I'd be telling Vettel thanks but no thanks. Russell is a better bet, they still have Hamilton and the HAM-BOT team works very well together. Better to keep everything harmonious and keep winning, than it is to risk a lot on Vettel coming in and not pissing off Hamilton.
Maybe Hamilton asks for a lot of money, but it's not like he's stupid enough to go somewhere else right now.
It's just not worth the risk of having intra team battles on and off the field, potential busts ups etc.
Is there any real poof that he is as good as we hope?
There's probably a good reason for that, both from a team's perspective of managing the relationship, and from the drivers' perspective of wanting to be the top dog in a team. Easier if you're the guy with the ribbons on his jacket, not so easy if both have them.
Prost Senna? Hamilton Alonso?
To be fair, Senna wasn't a champ when he joined Prost at McLaren. And when Prost left he was still only a one-time champion, he got second and third title when Prost was already gone.
Many of the multiple world champions were rookie teammates of multiple world champions (from the top of my head: Clark-Hill, Lauda-Piquet, Laura-Prost, Prost-Senna, Piquet-Schumacher, Senna-Häkkinen and Hamilton-Alonso), but never when they already won multiple titles.
