Big technical coup for Ferarri

[xpensive]

When Nick Tombazis left Ferrari to join McLaren in 2004, only to go back to Ferrari a couple of years later, was probably a bigger technology-transfer than anything else, when he was the chief aerodynamicist with both teams.

But this is how it works, you cannot stop people from working for who pays better.

[WhiteBlue]

I guess you will see more of this in the future. The RRA plugs some avenues to spend money to outdo your competitors so teams with more money than brains use their surplus cash to buy superior resources. The more it happens by one team the more that team highlight it's own deficiencies. Ferrari certainly do not have a lack of qualified people in a situation where they have to shed a big part of their work force. That they still poach people from McLaren in that situation is speaking volumes of their internal strength. Poor buggers.

[timbo]

I guess you will see more of this in the future. The RRA plugs some avenues to spend money to outdo your competitors so teams with more money than brains use their surplus cash to buy superior resources. The more it happens by one team the more that team highlight it's own deficiencies. Ferrari certainly do not have a lack of qualified people in a situation where they have to shed a big part of their work force. That they still poach people from McLaren in that situation is speaking volumes of their internal strength. Poor buggers.

Really?
So you could say same things about Macca in 1997 when they got Newey, and again in 2009 with Iley?
Actually moving people around is good. When people stay in the same environment for too long they tend to loose their edge.

[gibells]

Well one way to look at it is they've stopped the rot of an Italian only team. Maybe in an effort to recreate the Byrne Phenomenon.

[timbo]

Well one way to look at it is they've stopped the rot of an Italian only team. Maybe in an effort to recreate the Byrne Phenomenon.

Well, not everyone is Italian in Ferrari. And I'm not sure Byrne phenomenon can happen without Brawn.
I think they may want Fry because he showed he can successfully lead development project throughout the season.

[lebesset]

now all we need is an article in one of the red tops saying that McLaren irradiated his brain before he left so that he forgot everything he learned there

[WhiteBlue]

I guess you will see more of this in the future. The RRA plugs some avenues to spend money to outdo your competitors so teams with more money than brains use their surplus cash to buy superior resources. The more it happens by one team the more that team highlight it's own deficiencies. Ferrari certainly do not have a lack of qualified people in a situation where they have to shed a big part of their work force. That they still poach people from McLaren in that situation is speaking volumes of their internal strength. Poor buggers.

Really?
So you could say same things about Macca in 1997 when they got Newey, and again in 2009 with Iley?
Actually moving people around is good. When people stay in the same environment for too long they tend to loose their edge.

Hmm, I did not know they had another RRA in 1997 and McLaren was laying off half their staff.

[DaveKillens]

I guess you will see more of this in the future. The RRA plugs some avenues to spend money to outdo your competitors so teams with more money than brains use their surplus cash to buy superior resources. The more it happens by one team the more that team highlight it's own deficiencies. Ferrari certainly do not have a lack of qualified people in a situation where they have to shed a big part of their work force. That they still poach people from McLaren in that situation is speaking volumes of their internal strength. Poor buggers.

HUH?

Obviously someone has no concept of how major sporting organizations stay compatitive. Be it a soccer team, or baseball, or a race team, you always strive to improve. Even when you're on top, you strive to improve. For example, the Manchester United soccer team always brings in new faces to suppliment their core of steady regulars. That's how you get on top, and how you stay on top.

Sometimes I really wonder if some people comprehend what it takes to be on top. A racing team is a combination of many separate disciplines, of which a weakness in one could impact in a negative matter. One person makes a tiny mistake (for instance, a messed-up wheel change) and the whole pile of cards comes down. And when the cars are competitive, you basically have to put together a perfect weekend by each and every person on staff in order to capture a win.

Ferrari is weak on internal strength? Wow, that's news to me, their record for the last ten years led me to believe otherwise. And considering that they are sitting on a strong third position, my interpretation is that they are scoring about 99% and just need to cleanup that last one percent to be just that little bit better and climb past Mclaren and Red Bull. Maybe it won't happen, identifying and fixing that one last percent is darn tough.

I don't even know why I'm responding to this post, obviously the OP just wanted to do some trolling.

[Pup]

Yes, I love it when the poaching of a single engineer is interpreted as a sign of impending disaster for the sport. Talk about wearing your biases on your sleeve. It's always FOTA's fault, no?

My take is that Fry was actually let go long ago, after McLaren had to bring in Lowe to fix the donkey that was last year's car. McLaren doesn't like disasters of that scale. Newey could get away with it (sort of), but Fry didn't have a chance. Ferrari will want him for whatever info he can bring from McLaren - which will be considerable, I'm sure - but which is why it looks like he's going to be essentially the assistant to the assistant. The design will still be Italian, which should limit how well his info can be put to use, and McLaren won't mind, since both they and Ferrari well know that business is much better when the battle for the lead remains between themselves, without those pesky mid-packers getting all uppity.

That, or Fry doesn't know how to delete his texts.

[WhiteBlue]

Obviously someone has no concept of how major sporting organizations stay compatitive. Be it a soccer team, or baseball, or a race team, you always strive to improve. Even when you're on top, you strive to improve. For example, the Manchester United soccer team always brings in new faces to suppliment their core of steady regulars. That's how you get on top, and how you stay on top.

Your rant does not take the particulars of Ferrari's present situation into account. Naturally all teams will poach key personal in boom times which has applied pretty much to the last ten years prior to 2010. Only this year we have seen the impact of the RRA which brought a natural selection into play. Your example of ManU is simply a comparison of apples with bananas. Soccer teams need a fixed number of players and a bit of disposable reserves. I would accept your point if we were talking drivers here. But we are talking engineering work force. A much better analogy is the behavior of engineering companies in economic cycles.

In a recession when companies shed workforce they typically improve the relative quality of their internal strenght because they get rid of the weaker performers and keep the better personal. It is extremely rare in such times that companies recruit from the outside and do lay off at the same time. It usually is lack of strategic planning if it happens or occasionally it happens due to accidents or other fatalities of key players. Those reasons were not applicable in the Fry case.

Maranello, 22 June (AKI) - Ferrari has announced that Pat Fry will join its Formula One team in the new role of technical director after leaving rival McLaren where he worked as chief engineer. Ferrari on Tuesday announced he will report directly to technical director Aldo Costa and start work on 1 July.

Most people rate Aldo Costa as a reject promoted to figurehead which makes Pat Fry the real technical director.

[Pup]

Oh, please. You're just being deliberately obtuse at this point. A lead McLaren engineer became available, and Ferrari pounced on the chance, just like McLaren pounced when Iley was let go by Ferrari last year. The pillars of the sport are not crumbling.

[WhiteBlue]

The pillars of the sport are not crumbling.

Nobody has said that. It is just one of your rhetorical figures of speech. What is crumbling is the illusion that Ferrari's Aldo Costa is capable of filling the role of a technical director.

[ISLAMATRON]

I don't even know why I'm responding to this post, obviously the OP just wanted to do some trolling.

Why is it trolling? I just wanted to post a relevent news story about a technical manager moving from McL to Ferrari.... in my post it calls the move Brilliant, which it is... not exactly on the same level as poaching Newey or Brawn but maybe a tier or two below.

Not my fault the Ferrari Fanboy of F1T(FFF1T) cant take a joke... many of them claim that McLaren's whole operation is based on Ferrari techinical data(so then why poach a McL engineer if all he knows is 2007 Ferrari specs?)

And yes Ferrari are cheaters
http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/84658

[donskar]

WhiteBlue wrote:

That they still poach people from McLaren in that situation is speaking volumes of their internal strength. Poor buggers.

Candidate for most illogical post of the month. I'm at work, so I'll let it go at that, but others have done a good job of commenting on WB's post.

[Agenda_Is_Incorrect]

x2 donskar. I wonder if Mercedes/Brawn would be called weak in it's internal structures as well because of Ross Brawn hiring, which was also during the crisis.

And yes Ferrari are cheaters
http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/84658

All teams are allowed to have those small shakedowns and all of them do it. Not good jokes, also not a good attempt to make all this just jokes.