He hasn't done his low fuel burn?

still to come on sunday

I think different personal standards. MS had one hek fast Ferrari in the past, so he knows. What Nico had thus far?

On the picture in AMUS there is the new front wing of MGP. The problem is that today they didn't make all planned work.

But Schumi miss three year's races after all, the car has changed a lot than three years ago. I prefer believe Nico in this point.

hell yeah were gonna see some fast laps on sunday as expected but will we see some fast laps from Nico tomorrow?

Maybe it is a sign that some of the old pace isn't there and he wants to believe it's down to the car? Yesterday I read some comments from Brawn saying that Schumacher has been out for a while and will need time to adapt to the changes in the cars etc. I hope it's just the natural pessimist in me reading too much into comments!

http://www.jamesallenonf1.com/2010/02/barc..._source=twitter
Michael Schumacher was also in action. He did a 1m 21.689 on the second lap of a four lap run around lunchtime. Asking around engineers from other teams, the feeling is that Mercedes is not sandbagging, but does have some issues, perhaps around the weight distribution. It seems that getting the tyres switched on for a single lap is proving tricky. If this is the case, it’s worth remembering that the Brawn had the same problem in the second half of last season.
Am I having dejavu?

I think he would know by now if it's down to the car or himself. I mean they could already compare data with Rosberg's.

The car should be there when it comes down to race pace but it seems they´re really struggling with the qualifying pace.
Warming up the tyres should be a minor issue for Bahrain at least but it can´t be the solution to rely on hope that the weather is hot for the whole season.
If we only take the cars of the 3 other "top teams" (their quali pace looks fine) it means the Mercedes cars might start in the 2nd half of the Top 10 most of the time.
It´s clear that you won´t win races from that positions too often.

If that is the case then expect a very short comeback...if MS thinks his abilities are no more enough to fight to win,he will not compete.

Personally I think he knows that the car is not there yet...Rosberg is just happy racing for the top spots,MS always raced for the top spot.

How is it known that merc are struggling with qualifying pace when schumi stated today that they have done no low fuel qualy type runs?

i have the same thinking

I'm thinking that neither have other teams seriously done qualifying runs...i think it sounds a bit pessimistic but mercedes at best would be the 3rd best car and realistically 4th best..I would love to be wrong, but I don't think mercedes is sandbagging much...

http://img4.auto-motor-und-sport.de/Michae...ba4b-310692.jpg

^ those huge rear wheels look amazing.

The cars look great this year.

I like. The old front wing looked really chunky, so it made the whole car look front-heavy.

Are we going to see some new sidepods on the Merc?

They went from having some of the smallest sidepod inlets last year to having some of the biggest this year.

i dont understand that either

Any pics from Rosberg today?

The upper air inlet has changed either. It is much more curved on the second picture and looks as if it is tightening. Looks a bit unnatural to me - I guess the tightening is supposed to create something like a Venturi effect. For what purpose? No idea.

Looks like the exhaust pipes have been cut back.

Looks like rosberg is doing low fuel quali runs. 1:20.6 is a good time. Since track got faster over the course of the test I think the Merc is showing pace just a little bit slower than the Ferrari for qualy also. On the other hand Rosberg put his time down early in the morning.

The quali pace looks better today than it has in the past. We could see that Schumi was fast on the long runs. Fast and consistent. If the car can do a good quali Schumi could be challenging for 3-4th place in the first race. With a little bit of luck even a 1 or 2. I think Ferraris will be 1-2 unless they suffer a failure. 3-4 is probably between Schumacher, Vet, Webo, and hamilton.

I think the difference in comments by Michael and Nico is just because Nico is always optimistic. In interviews at the beginning of a race weekend, he always has high hopes (if the car is not completely crap). He is usually not far off in his judgement, but it is a best case estimate, whereas Michael is more conservative or even slightly pessimistic.

So far, I believe the Merc is not the best car on the grid, but only a few tenths behind.

I agree. I think Merc is better than McLaren at the moment. Ferrari are out front, probably with Red Bull directly behind. I think Merc is about the third best car, although there are teams which may be up there and which are still a bit of dark horses to me (Sauber, Toro Rosso).

well well well, mercedes using buckets of flow vis, pic on wri2.net

Remember McLaren were doing long runs yesterday,with about 150+ kg fuel and times in the 1:26s-1:27s. As some teams were also using the softer compounds yesterday,I reckon Merc and Ferrari were on half tanks for their long runs,and thus lapping in the 1:24s. So I think McLaren are just as quick as they seemed to be earlier on,just that they're on a completely different programme to the others. Nico was quick today on his quali sprints,but then the track's gotten quicker as well.

Considering all this,I'd put Merc behind Ferrari, McLaren and Red Bull,at the moment-best case scenario-with the updated aero. Worst,I don't know. Only unknown at the moment is the new diffuser.

Why not also link to the Pic.

thanks,
because it never works when i link from that page

Just in case someone missed it on the live forum:



Bad Google translation from f1today.nl . We sort of get the drift,though.

"Schumacher will have to tell that the car is very very fast and the victories are possible."

What the...?

Someone suggested this PR crap had to do with the big German sponsor 'that has never been involved in F1' to be unveiled in time for the start of the season.


By the way,Michael's at the track today.

Michael's comments not liked by Mercedes and he has to correct himself now in another press conference and say how the car is a rocketship? Wow!

It will be interesting to see how all this turns out because you can say whatever you want (or whatever you are ordered to say), but facts will be facts after all.

I know that PR is very important for Merc, but comments won't change the facts and it's the facts - ie. how they will be doing in races - those will give them good or bad PR, not comments. In fact, if they indeed do it and make Michael change his comments, that is what is a PR disaster not what Michael said.

Ok, let´s see what he tells us.

btw, somebody knows if there was a rule change this year when it comes to straight line tests?
Is it possible for MGP to test their Bahrain package next week before going into the season?

What's new about it ?

It's the same concept, but with clearly different shapes.
The leading edge of the middle section is raised.
The flaps are shaped differently.
Compare with the 2009 wing.

lol, was the first thing i thought also, but as pointed out there is differences, but concept stays the same, so mercedes developed this car around a one year old frontwing concept, well as long as it works

Today MGP use old front wing, maybe they set the fastest time with it? Also Rosberg is testing the black Shubert helmet or it was Schumi? Have to be the first assumption.

Would you know if Nico is on low fuel burn yet? (Sorry, is Michael back today)? I forgot.

I just see 2-3 pictures from today and the car is with the old wing.

from yesterday, new frontwing
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4043/438947...fbe4cdf7c_o.jpg

About the flow vis, did they really used or was just driving behind McLaren? To use the same colour like them? I think they drive behind McLaren because they have paint on the front of the front wing? And nobody mentioned until now.

Please tell me you're joking.

Nico started a run in 1.27s, i hope it is a race simulation

OfficialMGP Back out after the lunch break now and Nico will be working on race procedures for the afternoon...

Michael Schumacher has backtracked from his earlier remarks.

"He also backtracked on earlier remarks that his Mercedes team could probably not win the first race."

Schumacher, who won five of his record seven world titles for Ferrari, replied: "Maybe not. I can't make judgements on other teams but we are not perfectly in the position we would like to be, which is competitive to win straight away."

But in a news conference on Saturday, he said: "I did not only say this on Friday - I said this right away from the beginning that we might not be in a position to win the first races.

"But that is not really important as you have to win by the end of the season and not the beginning.
"Probably this could be the case although I mentioned it on Friday after not studying the data.

"This was an initial feeling and it looks like that maybe we were running more fuel than others on Friday and that is why track times didn't look so good.
"Now I've looked at the data it looks not so bad, it looks very reasonable. So let's see where we are in reality.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/motorsport...one/8540564.stm

"Yesterday I was a little bit pessimistic but after studying the data last night actually it looks more reasonable than I thought."

Really

Nico on a race simulation it seems but stuck behind Buemi

Oh dear! So indeed Mercedes made Michael backtrack on his pessimistic comments.

No . I don't know much about flow vis. And I hear for the first time today that MGP used it. To start to worry? Because in McLaren thread in the beginning of the tests this was seeing as not good sign. But here I hope is a just test with good result.

The lines you are talking about are just part of the paint scheme of the car, they have been on their since they unveiled the car.

wtf???? Merc made Schumy back track his statement??
Unbelievable