just ignore the trolls....please.

Split personalities from Frans?

Kar, I am not sure what you call smooth. But producing the same lap time over and over again with minimal deviations among them would be considered smooth in my book. He may appear wild and on the edge of control but to complete that feat he must be very smooth.
I was at Monaco in 1997 watching him go through the gears on the main straight and he was the only one that made it all the way up to 6th gear for about 1 second before downshifting. Irvine and none of the other drivers that we watched and listened too shifted higher than 5th. His exit point out of Rascasse was much smoother thus giving him extra traction and speed in the heavy rain going turning onto the main straight.

Oh by the way, does anyone have the stint times?

Prost was called "smooth", because his tires, from all drivers, usually were least worned down towards the end of the race.

I am amazed that anyone who has seen any of my postings in the last 2 weeks would think I would bash Schumacher. Unbelievable. Criticizing MGP is something that we all should be doing. The standard excuse (2009 aero parts) shouldn't still be acceptable since Jerez test is meaningful and important. I am sure that Schumacher will be consistently (atleast) 0.5 seconds faster than Rosberg but its not important if he is 1 second slower than alonso.

Someone tells his concerns over possible MGP pace, whilst saying several times he wants Schuey to win, and is seen as a Schumacher basher. Apparently I'm not the only one who's been working overtime every day.

Exactly. I am worried. And I think despite the good face that the PRs will put on MGP is worried to. Thankfully saturday is wet and we'll get to see some schumacher magic.

Anyone got any Michael Schumacher W01 wallpapers?

I'm currently using this one:
http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/wp-content/uplo...02/IMG_1602.jpg

Rosberg was quickest yesterday in what little dry time there was,so clearly the Mercedes isn't a pathetic dog of a car. Again,even the Ferrari was unable to beat his time from yesterday despite the lengthy amount of dry running everybody got today. Third,Schumacher finished the day ahead of Alonso,and his quickest lap was four-tenths quicker than that of the Ferrari. Both of them did short sprints as well as long distance runs,so there was absolutely no reason to suggest Alonso wasn't in a position to beat Rosberg's time. Fourth, Alonso's longest run was 47 laps long,while MS' long run was interrupted by a clash wit h Kobayashi's Sauber. Michael actually was running around in the 1:25's with damage on his car. Some feat,that.

Result: the Ferrari and it's 2010 aero-package is in no position to challenge the W01 minus it's final diffuser and damaged side pods.

See how silly drawing conclusions from testing can be?



Thing is,different people have different ways of looking at the same situation,some inevitably more pessimistic than others. This does not,however,mean you can expect NOT to get criticized for trashing a team/driver. This is an online forum,people don't know each other personally so nobody's going to take it for granted that a poster is an avowed fan,nor would anyone give a damn. There's a fine line between being objective and overdoing the criticism,especially more so if it isn't justified.

Nicely put BRK.

Good demonstration on how winter testing can be misleading.

assuming MB is still running the Brawn 09 diffuser, what is the point of hiding it where MS is in the pit?

It´s seems that Mercedes has quite a different approach when we compare that to most other teams.
We´ll see in 4 weeks if that was good or not but I´m sure they know what they´re doing.

I still believe they've made all those changes to the rear suspension and drive shafts to accommodate a much larger diffuser.

It could really stretch the interpretation of the rules and provide some considerable advantage (at least on CFD and wind tunnel). Thus maybe they want to hide it right till Bahrain or the last Barcelona test to delay possible copies from other teams as much as possible.

http://gallery.autosport.com/picture.php/d...su_mk1011fe45-3

Merc are using a new diffuser.

Can't access that.

Nope. t's the same they launched the car with and the same they raced towards the end of last year.

I wouldn't call it trashing by any means. I am not concerned by MGP performance, but I can see why others are. Maybe he will be unfortunately right and MGP will be midfield. Perhaps us non-concerned are going to be proven right. But it doesn't make any bit of sense calling someone who clearly is concerned that MS cannot win, but definitely wants him to, to be a Schuey basher/troll.

Let's just respect each other's opinions (including concerns and excitement). We're hear to discuss those opinions and what happens with MGP.

Jhope, maybe you were comparing with the Brawn diffuser from the first races. They've changed that quite a bit towards the end of the season into something like what has been present in the W01 so far.

Augurk,

Move on...

Don't loose time bashing me, let's talk about the W01.

Exactly my thoughts.


By the way,anything on the makeshift panel on the air inlet they were running today? I think Timstr11 posted images on the f1technical forums?



Absolutely,but my point was that he shouldn't really be baffled people labelled him a troll. On a forum nobody's going to research your posting history before jumping to a verdict: you get what you sow. GIGO.

This:

http://www.autosport.com/gallery/photo.php/id/13245288

http://www.autosport.com/gallery/photo.php/id/13245315

I believe they figured the electronics being cooled by those side inlets didn't require so much air. Thus they closed it further to reduce drag.

EDIT:

Having said that, the cross section of the openings seems to be quite the same both with and without the makeshift panel. Maybe it's aiding with the air flow to the rear...

I'm not massively sure of a new diffuser coming. The one being currently run looks crude but it is different to 09. The 09 version was like a mushroom shape. The new one looks different to that. Maybe after all the commotion of DD in 09, they went conservative when others were more aggressive, but then again, you would of had to go aggressive knowing Ferrari and McLaren would focus solely on diffuser designs for 10.

No, the mushroom shape was used in the beginning of the 2009 season. It's also the one so many thousands of words were written about and images displayed. Hence the confusion.

Towards the end of the 2009 season they've changed that mushroom shape into what can be called a flattened mushroom with additional holes.

It's this last version which was actually raced in Brazil and Abu Dhabi that is currently fitted in the 2010 car.

Like showed on the f1technical.net forum:

Start of the 2009 season:


End of the 2009 season diffuser:


Current 2010 diffuser:


So, the only difference I can spot from the last race of 2009 to today is the slight rounding of the upper corners above the side channels. It's pretty much the same.

http://www.formula1.com/news/features/2010/1/10343.html

Little history...

The wired parts on the cockpit surrounding and Schumi's helmet are interesting as well. My first thought when I saw the cockpit mounted one was that it's a plain old IR laptimer receiver but the similar bit on his helmet is kind of strange.

Is there a chance to get or find times from Michael's long run...

May have been answered earlier but... how many of you guys consider this new Mercedes works team to be a 100% fresh start?

Does Mercedes GP technically inhereit the 2 WDCs and wins from their 1950s stint?

Opinion is one thing. But making statements like "embarassing day for Schumacher", "bad day of testing for Mercedes" etc. - you can expect people call you out on such strong statments. If he had just said "I'm worried about our pace", that would have sounded differently than stating it was an "embarassing/bad day for Schumacher/Mercedes". We don't know if it was an embarassingd day, a bad day or a good day.

With the risk of being a troll ( definition = someone with a viewpoint to yours which is also negative ) it does seem that the obvious advantage that Brawn had in testing last year has evaporated currently.

Having said that, I think it will be very close at the first race.

Andy

The different opinion was not the problem and we have already made it clear, if you can read.

Here you can find stint times from yesterday: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=WDQ6XCTQ
These are taken from live timing when was working. There is a time, lap number and lap time. You can compare different stints in similar time of the day.

It's probably got something to do with the inlet as well-I was surprised by just how low the airbox is on that car,those additional intakes are almost directly behind the driver's head. I guess they can't quite get proper readings with the narrower opening they ran yesterday.




Last season's car had a lot of effort (and money) put into it,plus they had the trick diffuser up their sleeve: not so the case now as they had to fight until the very end of 2009. Also the team's tiny compared to the likes of McLaren and Ferrari,further undercut thanks to all the layoffs in December 2008. Compare that with this year's Ferrari which has been worked on for almost a year now-the F10 is clearly very quick,but definitely not head and shoulders above the rest like the BGP001 was.

No and Yes.

Thanks a lot!

Welcome to the forum!

Hi everyone...will there be a testing next week?

when is the last testing before the first race? Thanks!!

Tests: Jerez 17.02 to 20.02.2010 , Barcelona 25.02 to 28.02.2010 .Any idea why Mercedes made this morning only 4 laps when was dry(around 1hour 30 min.), while all others made 20-30 laps? They were having problem? Seem little strange? 20-30 laps could be useful.

Looking at the stint times (great work ivand911 btw) the picture is a little bit better. The two earlier runs were in the 22-low 23 range and pretty consistent. The 30 lap run looks better if it was 1:24 and the final run had 4 laps in 1:21.


On the other hand looking at the STR's times makes them look really good also. consistently in low 22s and a 7 lap run in the 20s. Not bad.

I am still hoping that the final car will be a bit faster. I think they need to make up about 0.5 seconds on the Ferraris. Mclaren seems to be about the same performance.

Bullshit. I am a Schumacher fan for a good 18 years now and when the car isn't good I have no qualms about stating it outright. Fans of the team may not appreciate it but spending the whole day being slower than the STRs and Button is embarrassing. It may be a strong statement (but no less so than sacrificing virgins which I also made during the Valencia test).


Lets face the facts here. The Merc is not a winner. Schumacher might pull it up to be a front runner but as of now the car is a lame duck. Looking better than the Ferrari 96 but definitely not even as good as the Ferrari 1999. Yes I know they haven't shown their hand and haven't brought out the '10 diffuser + fwing. The question you should be asking is why the hell haven't they?

Believe me, nothing will make me happier if brawn makes me eat my words and produces a winning car. If I have to eat crow when Schumi wins his 100th GP or his 8th WDC I'll do it. But that will no stop me from being critical of the team.

a bit early to tell, honestly.

For me bigger problem is reliability, more than a speed at this moment. They are not doing enough laps(today only 53). We "beat" today Hamilton ,but this doesn't mean anything. They are not going for the speed now. And weather is not helping also, next week is not good too. Also Mercedes is not giving any information. This make fans worry more. Their Twitter is useless. I hope the picture they see is better from what we see from outside. I hope tomorrow things will be better. From what I see Red Bull is also not very long car like McLaren and Ferrari. They are more in the middle. And maybe short solution of MGP is right decision.

Today Nico drove with the panels off again.

You are whining too much IMO.

I'm amazed you lived through '96 or even '05 with that kind of attitude. The least a 'fan' could do is have faith in the abilities of your chosen driver and team,yes?

For a Schumacher fan,you sure don't seem to know much about the way he (or Ross) goes about his businessdo you? They're not here to please the world at large,they're here to challenge for the title at some point .When Michael signed up for this he did make it pretty clear that he was in this for the long-term,that he wasn't expecting to get into the car and fight for wins right away,rather work toward achieving that same aim soon. I'm sure you remember this. The team aren't there to impress or please us fans with daring feats of quick lap fests during testing-they've got a schedule to stick to and targets to be met,I'm sure they're doing exactly that. Why you keep going on and on about the Merc being slower than the STRs of the grid while conveniently ignoring the fact that Ferrari-possibly the team to beat this year-were just as slow,languishing behind the Merc-beats me. They were doing their long runs,yes they lacked pace on these compared to the Ferrari,but that's the whole point to testing,yes? Find the areas where you're lacking in and work on weeding the problems out: it takes time.

As for the diffuser,again I don't understand why you're under the impression that they'd parade around with it this early just to please the fans-what's the point? On the other hand,a good number of reasons why they could've chosen to hide it a bit longer have been proposed already in this thread,do read posts before you start with the criticism. I mean I know it's a recent fad going on in the MP 4-25 thread,but give it a rest. It's already been pointed out that Ross Brawn mentioned in an interview the car is an interim solution only,and that the definitive aero package will NOT make it's appearance until Bahrain.

Agreed

What is important to the team is whether the test day is considered 'successful' or not. A test day is considered a 'success' when the planned test programmes(quite precise) are run successfully and targets are met, regardless of what the fastest lap time is, unless that in itself is part of a test programme. Something we cannot tell from where we're seated.

The tests next week should give a slightly better picture of pace, then again there is more to it than sheer pace when it comes to winning a race this year. So Bahrain is still a much better indicator.

On the evidence of what are you folks inclined to believe that there will be a new diffuser?!?

Some stint times from today: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=FWZLHZKA
Next week they will drive : Schumi, Nico, Schumi, Nico. Because 17 and 19 a better(dry) days, and also odd numbers.
This is my expectation.

Parade it for the fans? No I don't give a shit about parades. I want them to test it. TEST IT. Having it developed and sitting in a small locked room isn't going to solve any issues that it might or might not have.