When you look at the results, I don't think that McLaren did THAT bad in 1994 with Peugeot. Peugeot were riding high after two striaght Le Mans wins with the 905 and brought a modified version of their Sports Car engine with them. It was their first year in F1 and everyone was really expecting great things.
Then when you look at the Sauber/Ilmor/Mercedes, it doesn't make a great deal of logic from the outside. Obviously, something went wrong, for the deal to be cut one year in to a three year partnership, but what?
I just don't think Peugeot ever fully recovered from that.
What went wrong in the McLaren-Peugeot relationship?
Started by
Megatron
, Oct 30 2001 12:29
3 replies to this topic
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#2
Wellington
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Posted 30 October 2001 - 14:24
Hi
I humbly think that the future Mercedes promised to McLaren was by no means comparable to the one with Peugeot.
When they made their deal, they intended to share the team: Mercedes wanted to take a big part in McLaren's financial assets, which could not be done by Peugeot. With Mercedes, McLaren had a strong partnership in both technical and financial fields. It is a way of integration of the engine into the chassis-maker, a bit like Ferrari.
With Jordan, Peugeot had a not-that-good team which destroyed they dreams of success and, with it, their acknowledgement as a top motorist. They finally buried this concepts with Prost: Straight at the beginning, they would not commit too deep with the French team for they did not have external nor internal backing regarding the F1 activity. Thus their come-back to rally, less expensive and more rewarding, less frustrating.
Regards
I humbly think that the future Mercedes promised to McLaren was by no means comparable to the one with Peugeot.
When they made their deal, they intended to share the team: Mercedes wanted to take a big part in McLaren's financial assets, which could not be done by Peugeot. With Mercedes, McLaren had a strong partnership in both technical and financial fields. It is a way of integration of the engine into the chassis-maker, a bit like Ferrari.
With Jordan, Peugeot had a not-that-good team which destroyed they dreams of success and, with it, their acknowledgement as a top motorist. They finally buried this concepts with Prost: Straight at the beginning, they would not commit too deep with the French team for they did not have external nor internal backing regarding the F1 activity. Thus their come-back to rally, less expensive and more rewarding, less frustrating.
Regards
#3
Takahashi
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Posted 30 October 2001 - 14:45
This is going to be the most un-technical response you'll get on this thread, but here's what I've always thought about the McLaren/Peugeot split.
1994 was of course the first non-Senna year at McLaren for a very long time. McLaren having been 'Senna's team' as much as Ferrari is Schumacher's team now, I think they simply underestimated how difficult it would be without Senna (and a lesson they might want to consider for 2002, their first non-Hakkinen year???).
They went into 1994 having secured a French engine supplier in Peugeot, and there was talk of another Anglo-French super alliance rather like Williams and Renault. But what McLaren got was a company that was perhaps less committed than Peugeot, which produced an engine nowhere near as reliable as Renault's was right out of the box.
In hindsight, 1994 was never going to be a great year for McLaren. Realistically, it was to be a learning year for Peugeot especially. But after the Senna years I think McLaren were expecting quite a bit more. In the end, something had to give. McLaren decided that if they were going to have to go through a rebuilding phase, they might as well do so in a long-term commitment with a company of known long-term racing pedigree, in Mercedes.
As for Peugeot, I wouldn't say they never fully recovered after 1994. In 1997, with Jordan, their engine was amongst the most powerful, and most envied. I think it was their tumultuous relationship with Prost that really hurt them.
1994 was of course the first non-Senna year at McLaren for a very long time. McLaren having been 'Senna's team' as much as Ferrari is Schumacher's team now, I think they simply underestimated how difficult it would be without Senna (and a lesson they might want to consider for 2002, their first non-Hakkinen year???).
They went into 1994 having secured a French engine supplier in Peugeot, and there was talk of another Anglo-French super alliance rather like Williams and Renault. But what McLaren got was a company that was perhaps less committed than Peugeot, which produced an engine nowhere near as reliable as Renault's was right out of the box.
In hindsight, 1994 was never going to be a great year for McLaren. Realistically, it was to be a learning year for Peugeot especially. But after the Senna years I think McLaren were expecting quite a bit more. In the end, something had to give. McLaren decided that if they were going to have to go through a rebuilding phase, they might as well do so in a long-term commitment with a company of known long-term racing pedigree, in Mercedes.
As for Peugeot, I wouldn't say they never fully recovered after 1994. In 1997, with Jordan, their engine was amongst the most powerful, and most envied. I think it was their tumultuous relationship with Prost that really hurt them.
#4
Pascal
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Posted 30 October 2001 - 15:33
My opinion is that McLaren knew from the very start that their relationship with Peugeot would not last long. I have trouble believing that their partnership with Mercedes happened out of the blue, and I believe that Ron was busy negotiating the terms of the agreement with the German company right when he was publicly praising his new French motorist.
That said, I also believe that Peugeot got itself in that situation because of its own smugness towards Formula 1. When they slammed the door on the rallying scene at the end of 1986 after the FIA banned Group B cars, they had to find a replacement challenge. They first started to win races in raids such as the Paris-Dakar race, and also won twice the Pikes Peak hillclimb. But those victories gave them very little recognition. From the start, Jean Todt defended the idea that Formula 1 was the way to go, but the Peugeot board wouldn't have any of it. So the decision was taken to win Le Mans. Again, Peugeot was able to achieve victory twice before they realised they had to move on to other things. At the beginning of 1993, Todt tried again to convince his bosses that only F1 would give Peugeot the scene for a worthy challenge, but again the board got cold feet at the sums involved, and decided that going there as a full factory team was out of the question. Todt then joined Ferrari shortly after that decision.
But Peugeot took the middle road and finally decided that they would build a F1 engine and provide it to a top team. So they started studying their V10, optimistically thinking that it would give them the same level of competitiveness they had reached in other forms of motorsport. They were not prepared to be fully committed partners to a team, but rather expected McLaren to deliver once the engine was "out of the box". I think Ron Dennis, after years of close partnership with Honda, immediately guessed that Peugeot would never give his team more than an engine and a few engineers to run it. Mercedes was a lot more promising prospect for a long-term relationship, and he coldly did was seemed like the right thing for McLaren.
Peugeot at the same time was very naive to think that they would be the best thing since sliced bread. I suspect they were still deluded about their true level of competitiveness compared with outfits like Ford, Renault, Ferrari, or Mercedes for that matter. They simply failed to take into account the fact that raids or Le Mans are not as tough a challenge as Formula 1, and having lost a driving force such as Jean Todt hurt them much more than they cared to admit.
That said, I also believe that Peugeot got itself in that situation because of its own smugness towards Formula 1. When they slammed the door on the rallying scene at the end of 1986 after the FIA banned Group B cars, they had to find a replacement challenge. They first started to win races in raids such as the Paris-Dakar race, and also won twice the Pikes Peak hillclimb. But those victories gave them very little recognition. From the start, Jean Todt defended the idea that Formula 1 was the way to go, but the Peugeot board wouldn't have any of it. So the decision was taken to win Le Mans. Again, Peugeot was able to achieve victory twice before they realised they had to move on to other things. At the beginning of 1993, Todt tried again to convince his bosses that only F1 would give Peugeot the scene for a worthy challenge, but again the board got cold feet at the sums involved, and decided that going there as a full factory team was out of the question. Todt then joined Ferrari shortly after that decision.
But Peugeot took the middle road and finally decided that they would build a F1 engine and provide it to a top team. So they started studying their V10, optimistically thinking that it would give them the same level of competitiveness they had reached in other forms of motorsport. They were not prepared to be fully committed partners to a team, but rather expected McLaren to deliver once the engine was "out of the box". I think Ron Dennis, after years of close partnership with Honda, immediately guessed that Peugeot would never give his team more than an engine and a few engineers to run it. Mercedes was a lot more promising prospect for a long-term relationship, and he coldly did was seemed like the right thing for McLaren.
Peugeot at the same time was very naive to think that they would be the best thing since sliced bread. I suspect they were still deluded about their true level of competitiveness compared with outfits like Ford, Renault, Ferrari, or Mercedes for that matter. They simply failed to take into account the fact that raids or Le Mans are not as tough a challenge as Formula 1, and having lost a driving force such as Jean Todt hurt them much more than they cared to admit.
