What If?

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girry
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Re: What If?

Post by girry »

What if the US GP 2003 start had been scheduled 1 hour earlier, the rain would have been avoided and Kimi would have won the race & subsequently the title in Suzuka.

Now this probably doesn't seem like a heavy change, but remember how Matt Bishop said at the time that Kimi had admitted to him he would retire from F1 the very second he won the title because he hated Ron so much. Assuming Kimi had kept this promise and retired for good after just 3 seasons, that would naturally leave a lot of good future rides empty.

Who'd get the suddenly open 2004 McLaren ride? Heidfeld possibly but was he tied at Sauber? Justin Wilson was walking free at that time, maybe him or Wurz the test driver? Or were they all too unproven and Ron gives Mika a call for a couple of seasons?

How about the 2007 Ferrari - presumably Michael continues on til 2007 2008ish without Kimi taking his seat, but then what? Alonso, or is that a chance for a wild early Ferrari opening for Bobby K?

Then we have the competitive Lotus 2012-2013 to fill, etc...any takers to complete the alternative history?
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Aislabie
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Re: What If?

Post by Aislabie »

giraurd wrote: Assuming Kimi had kept this promise and retired for good after just 3 seasons, that would naturally leave a lot of good future rides empty.

The way I work it out, there's a chance that no Raikkonen might have meant no crash-gate. No crash-gate would have meant a longer tenure for Flavio Briatore. Briatore would likely not have let Robert Kubica go rallying in his spare time. No rallying means no injury. You see where I'm going here...


2004
McLaren-Mercedes - Nick Heidfeld takes Raikkonen's spot.
Jordan-Ford - Timo Glock and Giorgio Pantano both get full seasons.

2005
McLaren-Mercedes - Heidfeld would probably have thrashed Coulthard, and keeps his seat.
Williams-BMW - With no Heidfeld to sign, it seems possible that Pizzonia might have got a full season here.

2006
McLaren-Mercedes - Much the same, but with Heidfeld still in the place of Raikkonen.
Sauber-BMW - Kubica races a full season alongside Villeneuve, meaning that Villeneuve completes the season also as there's no competition for him.

2007
McLaren-Mercedes - They still make a double-change, bringing in Alonso and Hamilton.
Sauber-BMW - Heidfeld goes here next, partnering with another German engine manufacturer.
Ferrari - There's a post-Schumacher vacancy and no Raikkonen to fill it. Possibly Fisichella to take over the reigns here?
Renault - After leaving so acrimoniously, there's no way back for Villeneuve. Monteiro alongside Kovalainen perhaps?

2008
Ferrari - Alonso replaces the disappointing Fisichella at Ferrari.
Renault - Fisichella returns to Renault after having lived the Italian dream for a season to partner rookie Piquet. Crash-gate never occurs.
Force India - Vitantonio Liuzzi, no longer of Toro Rosso, partners Sutil.

2009
Ferrari - Alonso & Massa still. Mighty Marc Gene fills in for the injured Massa.
Renault - Fisichella and Piquet. Piquet is still awful and gets replaced by Grosjean.
Force India - Carries on with Liuzzi and Sutil.

2010
Ferrari - Alonso & Massa.
Renault - Still run by Briatore, they manage to sign Hulkenberg instead of Petrov. They are very competitive.
Williams - Without GP2 champion Hulkenberg, they take GP2 runner-up Petrov.

2011
Renault - Briatore does not let Kubica go rallying, and his injury never occurs. Still partnered with Hulkenberg.
Williams - Opt not to keep Petrov, preferring the fatter chequebook of Maldonado.

2012
Lotus-Renault - Goodbye Briatore. Kubica makes a genuine tilt for the World Championship, possibly taking as many as four wins. Grosjean looks even worse by comparison, and crumbles out of F1 for a second time, replaced by d'Ambrosio.

2013
Lotus-Renault - Kubica continues to take Raikkonen's place. Kamui Kobayashi takes the second seat.

2014
Ferrari - Kubica replaces Massa at Maranello. Drives well alongside Alonso to earn third place in the constructors.
Lotus-Renault - Maldonado and Kobayashi makes for an... exciting driver pairing.

2015
Ferrari - New world-class driver pairing: Kubica and Vettel. Contain your excitement, please.

2016
Ferrari - A hard season, saved only by Kubica's win in Catalunya.
Haas - Grosjean disgraced himself previously, so Haas decide to pair Alexander Rossi with Gutierrez. They score one point (Gutierrez at Austria), and finish 11th in the Constructors behind Sauber (2) and Manor (2).

2017
Ferrari - An exciting title battle in store between Bottas, Hamilton, Kubica and Vettel.
Haas - Rossi, having performed disappointingly, is replaced by Kevin Magnussen alongside Gutierrez.
Manor - After surviving 2016, Manor sign Jordan King and Felipe Nasr. They look promising, but short of cash.
Sauber - Finishing ninth as opposed to tenth means that they can actually afford 2017 Ferrari engines.

So yeah... I ran with that one.
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Re: What If?

Post by Bobby Doorknobs »

What if Life Racing got a title sponsorship deal with Death Cigarettes?
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mario
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Re: What If?

Post by mario »

giraurd wrote:Now this probably doesn't seem like a heavy change, but remember how Matt Bishop said at the time that Kimi had admitted to him he would retire from F1 the very second he won the title because he hated Ron so much. Assuming Kimi had kept this promise and retired for good after just 3 seasons, that would naturally leave a lot of good future rides empty.

Would he necessarily have retired from F1 altogether, or just from McLaren? I could see a scenario where he might have left McLaren and seen if he could move to another team instead, since he would have been attractive to a number of teams on the grid.
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Re: What If?

Post by Butterfox »

Simtek wrote:What if Life Racing got a title sponsorship deal with Death Cigarettes?

*head explodes*
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Re: What If?

Post by Rob Dylan »

-Want to buy some death cigs?
-You don't want to sell me death cigs.
-I...don't want to sell you death cigs.
-You want to go home and rethink your Life.
-I want to go home and rethink my Life.
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Re: What If?

Post by dr-baker »

There are two certainties in Life: Death... and taxes.

Where do taxes come into this story? Or should the phrase be...

There are two certainties in Life: Death and unreliability.
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Re: What If?

Post by dinizintheoven »

This wrote:
Simtek wrote:What if Life Racing got a title sponsorship deal with Death Cigarettes?

*head explodes*

As does the engine, on the out lap.
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Re: What If?

Post by girry »

mario wrote:
giraurd wrote:Now this probably doesn't seem like a heavy change, but remember how Matt Bishop said at the time that Kimi had admitted to him he would retire from F1 the very second he won the title because he hated Ron so much. Assuming Kimi had kept this promise and retired for good after just 3 seasons, that would naturally leave a lot of good future rides empty.

Would he necessarily have retired from F1 altogether, or just from McLaren? I could see a scenario where he might have left McLaren and seen if he could move to another team instead, since he would have been attractive to a number of teams on the grid.


Well realistically I could see him pulling a Rosberg, doing Nascar, lawnmower racing and dropping off yachts for a couple of years, and then realizing he likes F1 and money too much not to sign with Ferrari in 2006 or 2007 at latest.

But its a nice what if scenario to consider Kimi gone.
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Re: What If?

Post by Butterfox »

What if Ken Tyrrel did't sell to BAT? How long would they last you think?
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Re: What If?

Post by Bleu »

I think pretty soon after Ken got terminally ill. Might have stayed intact until his death.
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Re: What If?

Post by Bobby Doorknobs »

It was because the team was about to go into debt plus the inevitability of continually rising costs that Ken sold it on. He knew that, with the team in the sorry state it was, there was little chance of even beating Minardi anymore, let alone making a long climb back to the top. That and the fact that no one else in the Tyrrell family was interested in taking the reins, and Ken himself feeling he'd just about done enough for a lifetime, I doubt the team would have seen the millennium, illness or no.
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Re: What If?

Post by dr-baker »

Considering that Honda were testing a Harvey Postlethwaite-designed F1 car in 1999 with Jos Verstappen, I wonder if Honda might have been persuaded to have bought the team a few years earlier than in reality if BAT hadn't bought them? Of course that then begs the question of what happens to the careers of Villeneuve, Button and Sato, how long Honda stays in, whether it still morphs into Brawn and if so when, plus when Mercedes buy the team. Oh, and what happens to the history of Super Aguri. Do they also enter F1 sooner if Honda enter sooner?
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Re: What If?

Post by Rob Dylan »

Here's a good one I just thought of:

What if Nico Rosberg had won the title in 2014, and retired then?
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Re: What If?

Post by James1978 »

I'm racking my brains to think who gets the 2015 Merc seat and all I can think of is Alonso (as Hamilton doesn't have the clout he does now not having been World Champ with Merc yet). And Suck My Balls keeps the 2015 McLaren seat (not that it does him any good). :)
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Re: What If?

Post by Rob Dylan »

It's a tricky one, I think. Ricciardo is married to Red Bull, Räikkönen and Vettel are set into Ferrari. At this point, Kvyat would have no reason not to go to Red Bull himself as well. At this time as well, I have serious doubts that Alonso and Hamilton would want each other as teammates, especially with Alonso deep in the process of moving to McLaren-Honda when Rosberg announces his retirement.

I don't want to say an obvious answer and assume Mercedes would go for Bottas again, but it's a possibility. Valtteri would see himself as safe in a good seat for the near-future - 2014/5 Williams was a good car to be in. With their constant bickering and disagreements, Massa/Hamilton would be a flat-out no.

McLaren-Honda needed a big driver to lead them to "victory" for their grand comeback. I don't think they would have let Alonso go that easily. Williams likewise need a main driver, with Massa acting as the wise old consistent mentor character. They would have needed a solid number 1 as a replacement if they were to allow Bottas to go. Which is why, unless they were offered a huge amount of money, I don't think they would have dropped Valtteri.

At this point, the public and the teams would still remember Romain Grosjean's decent 2013 season, perhaps. I don't remember much of his 2014 season to know if he shone enough to get anyone's attentions. He at least had recent experience being at the front, which would count for something.


I think this is a big problem that F1 has faced as long as I've watched it: big teams thrive on continuity, and so many great drivers never get a chance in a front-running car, long destined to sit in the midfield graveyard teams. With Webber retiring in 2013 and Rosberg the following year, suddenly there's a massive panic because there are literally no tested drivers available. It's why, when Rosberg actually did retire after 2016, that I gave a smug grin when Mercedes had to pay a rather large sum to prise Valtteri off of Williams. It's what big teams get for having no backup plan.
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Re: What If?

Post by James1978 »

I suppose then given those possibilities listed, you're looking at someone like Hulkenberg or Perez then!
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Re: What If?

Post by This Could Be You »

I'm thinking that Mercedes might have tried to sign Button- he's a world champion, got on decently with Hamilton at McLaren and even has experience with the Brackley team, it having previously been BAR, Honda and Brawn. As a result, Magnussen would have partnered Alonso at McHonda, and we all know how well that would go...
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Re: What If?

Post by mario »

Rob Dylan wrote:Here's a good one I just thought of:

What if Nico Rosberg had won the title in 2014, and retired then?

As you say, you would have to assume that most of the major drivers, such as Vettel, Ricciardo, Räikkönen and Alonso are unlikely to have been available - all of those drivers were already under contract to another team, and it is very unlikely that, even if they wanted to (and I agree that most of those drivers would probably already be happy at the team they were at), their teams would probably have refused to open negotiations, much as what happened to Mercedes in 2016.

If events played out similarly, then you'd have to assume that Mercedes's best chance of securing a replacement driver would have been from the midfield pack. Hulkenberg and Perez are then potential targets, and I agree that Button might have been a potential target too given that, with Ron Dennis reportedly wanting Magnussen instead of Button, he might have chosen to walk away from the team if offered a chance to go to Mercedes. Bottas, too, would probably have been in the mix as well given his links to Mercedes via Wolff.

As others have suggested, Button is perhaps one of the more plausible options - they know he'd probably get on OK with Hamilton, would know the team from his prior stints there and would be a fairly safe pair of hands - with Bottas also being one of the more likely alternatives.

Rob Dylan wrote:I think this is a big problem that F1 has faced as long as I've watched it: big teams thrive on continuity, and so many great drivers never get a chance in a front-running car, long destined to sit in the midfield graveyard teams. With Webber retiring in 2013 and Rosberg the following year, suddenly there's a massive panic because there are literally no tested drivers available. It's why, when Rosberg actually did retire after 2016, that I gave a smug grin when Mercedes had to pay a rather large sum to prise Valtteri off of Williams. It's what big teams get for having no backup plan.

To be fair to Mercedes, I don't think anybody would have expected Nico to suddenly turn around barely a few months after signing a new contract and just walk out on them.

Nico himself has said that he only began to discuss the idea with his partner about six weeks before Abu Dhabi, and that he only committed to quitting about two or three weeks before that race - so it sounds like something of a snap decision on his part. Given that his decision to quit seems to have been almost spontaneous, it does make me wonder whether he would have actually chosen to quit at the end of 2014 even if he did win the title - he's hinted that he might have kept going even if he had won that year, rather than quitting as he did in 2016.
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Re: What If?

Post by dr-baker »

Can't remember if this question has been asked here before, and there are far too many pages to skim through, but here is a "What If" question that occurred to me while rewatching the 1997 European Grand Prix.

In 1997, Damon Hill famously went very well at the Hungarian Grand Prix, overtaking Schumacher in the early stages, and unsuccessfully battled with Villeneuve in the final stages, eventually finishing second in that race. In the 1997 European Grand Prix, Damon Hill was the fastest driver that did not set a 1:21.072 in qualifying. What might have happened if, at the race start, Damon had made a demon start, and the first lap had seen Damon Hill take the lead with Schumacher and Villeneuve in 2nd and 3rd (or 3rd and 2nd, either way round)? How might Damon have tried to influence the championship outcome, or would he have just gone all-out for victory, regardless of the championship battle behind him?
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Re: What If?

Post by Enforcer »

As I said in the thread on this, Hill & Schumacher needled at each other as late as 1998, so it's reasonable to assume Hill still wasn't a Schumacher fan as at the 1997 European GP. Although that said, idk what Hill's opinion of Villeneuve is. Maybe he didn't like him either? You can also speculate that Hill mightn't have been the biggest Williams fan in 1997 and would not have been particularly enamoured by the concept of doing their lead driver any favours.

But let's say Hill does personally prefer Villeneuve to Schumacher, does that translate into him interfering with the result in this hypothetical scenario? Boring answer is that if there had been any inkling in him to try and influence the Championship against Schumacher, the pain of being denied at Hungary would've probably overruled it, and resulted in him going all out for the win had he taken the lead. And if his pace wasn't enough to stay clear of Schumacher and Villeneuve then he would've bottled them up and it would've been incumbent on them to overtake them.

The question is do Villeneuve or Schumacher in 2nd try particularly hard to attack Hill? Since they only need to beat each other, and do they want to risk a collision, or simply a mistake trying to overtake Hill that lets the other ahead. Or does holding station open them to attack from the other? Maybe the collision between might happen at that stage. Possibly even in a manner that is genuinely accidental, or not obvious enough to issue a penalty, and Schumacher is the 1997 WDC?

I suppose all that depends on how much Hill would've held them up.

In the actual race, Hill seems to disappear after the first set of stops, having initially been in 6th and holding onto the back of Coulthard. I can't see anything on the race replay to explain it because they're understandably following the leaders the whole time. I know he ultimately retired from the race, but he seems to have suffered some loss of pace, poor strategy, gremlin etc. around the first pitstop a long time before he retired. One would assume this would happen to him had he been leading, so thereafter JV & MSC are free to duke it out, if they haven't smashed each other already.

Now, Schumacher built a few seconds of a lead early on which Villeneuve whittled down, partly because of a slower Ferrari second pitstop, and partly because Schumacher couldn't recapture his early race pace (do remember hearing that he was having an engine problem, hence why he attempted the demolition job, but I can't find any trace of that suggestion now). If he doesn't have that little cushion because they were bottled behind Hill for the early part of the race, he likely ends up behind Villeneuve in the last stage of the race and Villeneuve wins the 1997 WDC in completely uncontroversial circumstances.

So yeah... tl;dr loads of variables, but I think we get Villeneuve as 1997 WDC unless they crashed into each other behind Hill.
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Re: What If?

Post by dr-baker »

Enforcer wrote:So yeah... tl;dr loads of variables, but I think we get Villeneuve as 1997 WDC unless they crashed into each other behind Hill.

Generally I agree.

Enforcer wrote:You can also speculate that Hill mightn't have been the biggest Williams fan in 1997 and would not have been particularly enamoured by the concept of doing their lead driver any favours.

This is what intrigued me when the question popped into my head.

Enforcer wrote:I know he ultimately retired from the race, but he seems to have suffered some loss of pace, poor strategy, gremlin etc. around the first pitstop a long time before he retired. One would assume this would happen to him had he been leading, so thereafter JV & MSC are free to duke it out, if they haven't smashed each other already.

Funny thing is, Damon Hill and Michael Schumacher both retired after 47 laps (although I'm not sure if Damon Hill was lapped at this point - I know Ralf Schumacher was lapped earlier in the race and he retired on lap 44).
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Re: What If?

Post by Dom_Wings »

Well, during the '97 Japanese Grand Prix, Hill held up MSC for the best part of 2 laps while letting Frentzen through immediately. Make whatever you want of it
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Re: What If?

Post by dr-baker »

Reject_Dom wrote:Well, during the '97 Japanese Grand Prix, Hill held up MSC for the best part of 2 laps while letting Frentzen through immediately. Make whatever you want of it

Pretty much sums it up. Especially considering that Hill was pushed out to let HHF into his seat.
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Re: What If?

Post by Enforcer »

Reject_Dom wrote:Well, during the '97 Japanese Grand Prix, Hill held up MSC for the best part of 2 laps while letting Frentzen through immediately. Make whatever you want of it


I had that in my head, but when I went to look for it I found Hill 'holding up' Schumacher at the 1998 Japanese GP. Where they were battling for position as Schumacher came back through the field, so it wasn't exactly dirty from Hill.

I assumed I'd just gotten confused about it and 1997 hadn't happened, so I didn't mention it.
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Re: What If?

Post by James1978 »

Ha, I remember the 1998 one better - Ralf was Hill's teammate in the Jordan and couldn't get out of his brother's way quick enough!! (Ralf dissed Hill far more than Michael did too in the post-race interviews).
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Re: What If?

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James1978 wrote:Ha, I remember the 1998 one better - Ralf was Hill's teammate in the Jordan and couldn't get out of his brother's way quick enough!! (Ralf dissed Hill far more than Michael did too in the post-race interviews).


Allegedly after Belgium, Michael went into Eddie Jordan and bawled at him for not letting Ralf race Damon for the win and said that Ralf would leave (he was already fluttering his eyelashes at Williams at this point). Eddie gave back as good as he got, may have brought up 1991, and told Michael that if he felt that strongly to pay up, or if not, shut up. The outcome was that Schumacher's management bought out Ralf's Jordan contract for 1999 so he could join Williams.

So yeah, that was the relationship between the Schumachers and Jordan at the end of 1998.
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Re: What If?

Post by ibsey »

Enforcer wrote:
James1978 wrote:Ha, I remember the 1998 one better - Ralf was Hill's teammate in the Jordan and couldn't get out of his brother's way quick enough!! (Ralf dissed Hill far more than Michael did too in the post-race interviews).


Allegedly after Belgium, Michael went into Eddie Jordan and bawled at him for not letting Ralf race Damon for the win and said that Ralf would leave (he was already fluttering his eyelashes at Williams at this point). Eddie gave back as good as he got, may have brought up 1991, and told Michael that if he felt that strongly to pay up, or if not, shut up. The outcome was that Schumacher's management bought out Ralf's Jordan contract for 1999 so he could join Williams.

So yeah, that was the relationship between the Schumachers and Jordan at the end of 1998.


EJ confirmed the above story in an ITV interview at the time (either after that race or at the following race at Monza 1998). Of course that was the race where M Schumi also accused DC of trying to kill him as well. Not Michael's finest day. :facepalm:
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Re: What If?

Post by ibsey »

What if Warwick had been allowed to join Lotus alongside Senna for 1986?

Might that have helped or hindered Lotus thereafter?
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Re: What If?

Post by Butterfox »

ibsey wrote:What if Warwick had been allowed to join Lotus alongside Senna for 1986?

Might that have helped or hindered Lotus thereafter?


I think Honda still wanted Senna and Nakajima, so either Honda got its way, or Honda didn't happen, but i'd be betting on the first. So on Lotus side of things, not much would have changed, except that Warwick would score a few podiums in 1986. The best available seat in 1987 that i could think of would be Arrows or Brabham, maybe Benetton instead of Boutsen.
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Re: What If?

Post by Rob Dylan »

What if the virus had been just a teeny tiny bit slower, and the Australian race had gone ahead, with or without McLaren? What kind of weekend might that have been?

And what might that have meant for the following actions the FiA could have taken up until now? Do we think that if Australia had gone ahead, the FiA might have been more encouraged to try all the races behind closed doors?
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Re: What If?

Post by dr-baker »

By racing in Australia, it would have reduced the number of continents that the championship needs, from 3 to 2. And that could have then meant possibly a focus purely on Europe and the Middle East for the remainder of the year.
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Re: What If?

Post by Kinnikuniverse »

What if bernie ecclestone never existed? what would formula 1 and motorsports look like? what would happen to brabham?
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mario
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Re: What If?

Post by mario »

Rob Dylan wrote:What if the virus had been just a teeny tiny bit slower, and the Australian race had gone ahead, with or without McLaren? What kind of weekend might that have been?

And what might that have meant for the following actions the FiA could have taken up until now? Do we think that if Australia had gone ahead, the FiA might have been more encouraged to try all the races behind closed doors?

I don't think we would have seen any more races take place in the short term because Bahrain, Vietnam and China had already made the decision to postpone their races before the Australian Grand Prix was to take place.

After that, it is hard to see how many of them might have taken place - Jan Lammers has indicated they wouldn't have held the race in Zandvoort because it wasn't financially viable without crowds, Monaco would probably have cancelled the race anyway and the subsequent restrictions on mass gatherings in France means that race would probably have fallen by the wayside anyway. That possibly leaves Spain and Canada as venues where they might have tried a closed door race, but the only one that seems likely would be the Spanish GP.

It means we might have just had that one event, and then been left with a very long gap after that - I think that the later restrictions on air travel and mass gatherings means that, even if the sport tried to hold closed door events, it's probably unlikely most of those subsequent races would have taken place anyway.

Kinnikuniverse wrote:What if bernie ecclestone never existed? what would formula 1 and motorsports look like? what would happen to brabham?

I guess that another team boss would probably have risen to prominence in his place, as I suspect that the teams would eventually form something similar to FOCA (albeit perhaps along different lines).

As for Brabham, given that Ron Tauranac was uncomfortable with being a team manager instead of a designer, I suspect that he would have still tried to sell the team on in the early 1970s. I guess one possibility is that Tauranac might have tried to sell the team to Graham Hill instead.
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Re: What If?

Post by Yannick »

What if Jamie and Enoch had not discontinued f1rejects.com? Would this site even be still around?
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Re: What If?

Post by dr-baker »

Yannick wrote:What if Jamie and Enoch had not discontinued f1rejects.com? Would this site even be still around?

Before they left, Enoch had planned to rewrite his MasterCard Lola profile based on the thread I compiled, so there was still a passion and interest there. But they were also men with less free time for side projects, which this undoubtedly was. Wonder if it might have naturally evolved into what it has become anyway, with forum user created content taking the lead?
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Re: What If?

Post by MyHamsterRacedAnOnyx »

OK here's three for the price of one:
1.What if Jack Brabham hadn't thrown the lead away at the last corner in Monaco and Britain 1970? Those extra points would have given the championship to Jacky Ickx instead...
2.What if Nigel Mansell had managed to squeak past Senna on the line in Spain 1986? Those extra points would have given him the championship
3.And what if Eddie Jordan had won the contract battle in 1991 and Schumacher had stayed with him?
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Re: What If?

Post by FortiWinks »

MyHamsterRacedAnOnyx wrote:OK here's three for the price of one:
1.What if Jack Brabham hadn't thrown the lead away at the last corner in Monaco and Britain 1970? Those extra points would have given the championship to Jacky Ickx instead...


Ickx is the reluctant World Champion which prompts Ferrari to change tactics to focus entirely on the F1 side of their operation for the ‘71 season, the 312B2 is more reliable due to this change and leads to a slightly closer title fight but Stewart still wins relatively comfortably.

The next few years remain on the same timeline but as Ickx has more appeal as a World Champion it means he gets the McLaren drive for ‘76 over Hunt leading to a second WDC, he stays with the team until 1978 (as Hunt did) before returning one last time to Ferrari for his final two seasons supporting Villeneuve to his first title in F1 in ‘79. He signs full time for Porsche in WSC for the ‘81 season and continues in real timeline from here.

MyHamsterRacedAnOnyx wrote:2.What if Nigel Mansell had managed to squeak past Senna on the line in Spain 1986? Those extra points would have given him the championship


He goes on his promise and retires from F1 in ‘90 of course leaving a free seat at Williams, with no other star drivers available (Alesi probably still goes to Ferrari) Frank retains his existing driver lineup for one more season before signing Prost a year early for ‘92, dominating the field that season and promptly retiring after Senna offered to drive for the team for free (in effect moving everything forward a year).

Now this does prompt the question whether this means that Senna still has his accident in ‘94 now he has a year (and a championship) under his belt with Williams but because it’s too hard to predict otherwise I’ll leave this event as it is.

MyHamsterRacedAnOnyx wrote:3.And what if Eddie Jordan had won the contract battle in 1991 and Schumacher had stayed with him?


Schumacher would only stay for the remainder of the ‘91 season as most likely Benetton sack Moreno at the end of the season anyway so unless they managed to sign Prost alongside Brundle I don’t see Schumacher being at the team too long.

Let’s say that Benetton managed to grab Prost and Schumacher re-signs for ‘92 with Jordan I’m assuming that Mercedes would have a say about shifting Michael across to Sauber when they entered the sport and follow them to McLaren forming a formidable partnership of Dennis/Newey/Schumacher.
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Re: What If?

Post by mario »

FortiWinks wrote:
MyHamsterRacedAnOnyx wrote:OK here's three for the price of one:
1.What if Jack Brabham hadn't thrown the lead away at the last corner in Monaco and Britain 1970? Those extra points would have given the championship to Jacky Ickx instead...


Ickx is the reluctant World Champion which prompts Ferrari to change tactics to focus entirely on the F1 side of their operation for the ‘71 season, the 312B2 is more reliable due to this change and leads to a slightly closer title fight but Stewart still wins relatively comfortably.

The next few years remain on the same timeline but as Ickx has more appeal as a World Champion it means he gets the McLaren drive for ‘76 over Hunt leading to a second WDC, he stays with the team until 1978 (as Hunt did) before returning one last time to Ferrari for his final two seasons supporting Villeneuve to his first title in F1 in ‘79. He signs full time for Porsche in WSC for the ‘81 season and continues in real timeline from here.

I am not sure that it would necessarily have resulted in Ferrari concentrating their resources on F1 at the time, because the impression that Forghieri has given in his autobiography suggests that Enzo was much more keen on sportscar racing anyway and that he was especially smarting after Porsche's run of success in recent years. Furthermore, with development of the 312PB already fairly far underway before Ickx is likely to have overtaken Rindt's points total, I suspect that it might not have resulted in the F1 operations being given significantly more resources in reality.

Another factor is that Ickx's relationship with Ferrari does seem to have been a bit erratic and a little antagonistic at times, such that it's questionable whether he might have been able to get the support from the team to focus more on F1 over sportscar racing (particularly given how Ickx was active in sportscar racing as well).
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Re: What If?

Post by James1978 »

Here's one I remember reading about in "Fatal Weekend" - what if Senna survives his crash at Imola, then (as mentioned in the book) he gets out of his Williams contract to sign for Ferrari for 1995. Though it did mention that a possible condition of leaving Williams without a big name meant he had to lure Prost out of retirement to drive for Williams again (which I couldn't imagine Prost doing) - so if Senna was desperate to go to Ferrari, he may have had to wait until 1996 but if that happens, Scjhmacher doesn't go there.

Though if Prost had come back then it does give visions of a great 3-way fight in 1995 between the old protagonists plus a new rival to both of them in Schumacher - all driving for different teams too!
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